How to Get Involved in Politics, How Scott Galloway Writes, and How He Follows the News

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1:53Welcome to Office Hours of Provji. This is the part of the show where we answer your questions about business, big tech, entrepreneurship, and whatever else is on your mind. If you'd like to submit a question for next time, you can send a voice recording to officehours at Prof2Media.com. Again, that's officehours at Prof2Media.com. Or post your question on the Scott Galloway subreddit, and we just might feature it in our next episode. You're welcome. Okay. Our first question is from T122-11 on Reddit. And they say, hey, Scott, I'm interested in your thoughts on how to get involved in politics for someone not currently involved.

2:29I'm a 30-year-old married male with a good job in fintech, and I'm a Democrat voter who's very worried about the future of the government. Currently, I do the bare minimum towards improving our country's politics. I vote and try to stay informed. I listen to podcasts and read the news. For someone who wants to put effort into contributing and improving our country's future but doesn't know where to start, what are some actually impactful ways to get involved? Thanks. Huh. Yeah. I think there's a lot you can do. I mean, obviously, the first is to vote. The next is to encourage your family members to vote.

2:58And I don't think you encourage them to vote by lecturing at them your views on politics. I don't know if you have kids or some young people in your life, but I don't think I voted until I was well into my 20s. And I wish someone had kind of, I don't know, kind of drilled into me the importance of your civic responsibility of voting. And unfortunately, because young people don't vote, old people keep voting themselves more money, right? $40 billion child tax credit gets stripped out of the infrastructure bill, but the$120 billion cost of living adjustment for Social Security flies right through.

3:31And right now we're spending about 40 % of our federal budget on support for our seniors, whereas we spend 4.5 % on the Department of Education and 1.4 % on SNAP, which says to me, quite frankly, that either we don't care about our children or old people have figured out a way to vote themselves more money. and the fact that people under the age of 18 don't vote, the budget reflects values. And our values are that we don't really love our children. 25 % of Americans are under the age of 18, yet 40 % of SNAP recipients are under the age of 18, meaning we've decided to let kids go hungry and the wealthiest nation in the world see above old people voting themselves more money.

4:06But that's not what you asked. So get people to vote, be informed. I think if you have a social media platform and everyone to a certain extent is sort of a small media company, But I think being really thoughtful and highlighting some candidates, policies that you enjoy, you can obviously give a little bit of money. But I think being just politically aware, talking to people about it, encouraging people to vote, you can obviously volunteer as an election or pollster someone who works at the polls. I find those people are always really impressive. You go into some gym and it's just so well organized and they take it very seriously.

4:43I wish I'd started voting earlier because I find it a really inspiring experience you know everyone seems to get along everyone feels good about themselves feels good about the country the easy stuff if you want give some money use your platform to talk about policies and issues encourage people around you to vote canvas try and volunteer maybe even to register people to vote I think you know those people that set up tables in a busy area and say, are you eligible to vote in New York? And I was like, no, no, Florida hasn't. No, no, don't talk to me. But I think that that's part of it. And then if you really want to get involved, get involved in a campaign, I'm going to get, I've decided one of my big focuses or foci is going to be flipping the house back to democratic control.

5:30Not supposed to talk about politics on this show, but I'm going to, and I'm going to commit my time, treasure and talent. So those are really the three things, right? Your time, your treasure, and your talent. And that is canvassing, getting involved in the campaign, talking to people about voting. Treasure, obviously, give money if you can. And then your talent, trying to use your platform or get involved in a campaign and see where you can add some value. But I've found working on a campaign to be actually quite rewarding. I think it's great for young people. I think if I were just out of college or just out of high school and trying to figure out what I was going to do, I would just see if I could go work on a campaign.

6:07I think it's just a ton of fun, ton of young people. But anyways, lots of ways to get involved, and congratulations on your civic interest. Thanks. Question number two. Hey, Scott. I like how authentic yet articulate your speaking and writing styles are. Do you pre-write or rehearse your talking points for topics you know will come up throughout the week, or do you just speak on instinct? Also, do you employ any writers to help you with that? I'd love to know your secret. Thanks. So I'll give you my approach, and then I'll tell you a bit about the resources. I've been thinking a lot about the robots controlling us, and that is people say that AI is going to become sentient.

6:51Jeffrey Hinton, kind of considered the father of AI, says that no species has ever been smarter than another species and not controlled it. And his view is that if AI at some point becomes more intelligent than humans, that it's going to control us. I'm not sure I buy that. I'm not a philosopher and, you know, defer to Jeffrey Hinton over Scott Galloway, but I think there's always a kill switch in technology. But you have right now, I would argue, that AI is already controlling us. What do I mean by that? I think our narrative and our orthodoxy and our beliefs and our values are being shaped by algorithms.

7:27And it's true of me, or at least until recently. And that is, I spend so much time on social media and on my screen, and there's a constant feedback loop saying, oh, what you said here is right and popular. And what happens is the algorithms identify kind of your political leanings and then take you further and further left. and the people who are drawn to you or the bots are increasingly like of one narrative and will give you 2 ,000 upvotes if you say something really mean and biting about the president. But if you say President Biden is too old to run for president, you get hateful comments or, you know, you just the algorithms and also a lot of people absolutely weaponize bots to try and shape your view or shut you down.

8:12I've tried to be much better about posting content regardless of what there's content I put out. I know that it's just going to go hair on fire and my comments are going to fill up with rage and how disappointed in me people are. And I'm like, that's not why we're here. So my approach to writing is the following. I want to be fearless. I want to write as if the only people who are going to read it are my kids in 20 years, and I want them to better understand the world and me. And so when I write something, I feel as if I have to do all these land acknowledgments. If I say something about, you know, boys needing men, and I have to say, well, and obviously mothers play a crucial role.

8:49I just, you get worried about the comments and the narrative and being shamed. And my view is how I try and write is if I think of something funny or off color or dirty or sexual reference, I like profanity. I write pro, you know, I'll include profanity. If I think that men should pay for dates always, which I know is going to trigger some people, women have a shorter fertility window, men need relationships more than women, a way you recognize the asymmetry, or at least not do it, is at a minimum show some valor. And every mammal has a courtship process. And I think part of that is when you're a man that you pay for stuff.

9:26When I write that, I know it's going to trigger people and it's going to fill up with a lot of comments. But I also think a lot of people would look at the reasoning and think, yeah, that's probably right. So in sum, I can write well, I know that, but I try to find insight. And more importantly, I try to be fearless such that the algorithms, at some point, I want to control the machines, not vice versa. And there's so much pressure now to sign up to a certain narrative and the same orthodoxy that as Jonathan Haidt says, we end up, when we're all barking up the same tree, we get really stupid. Now, back to resources.

10:02I have a ton of people drafting, editing, putting together charts, researching. I have a research team headed by a woman named Mia Silverio that comes up with ideas. We do a call with about 10 people on a Monday morning. We go over ideas and we say, okay, can we add anything to this idea? And then we figure out the medium for it. Is it going to be in a video? Is it going to be in our newsletter? Is it something that might end up in one of our books. It's something that makes for interesting data in one of my presentations. I had someone help me with my last book, one of the most talented people I've ever worked with, Peter Smith.

10:36You know, by the time the newsletter is done, five or six people have touched it. Anytime I write a book, it's like probably half the team, eight to 12 people have touched it. So I'm a big believer in if you have a good little business, but it's not scaling and you're having a tough time, you think, wow, we're really good at what we do, but we're having a tough time getting to enterprise value. What is enterprise value? Enterprise value means that the company has value without any single individual or small group of people. So here at Prof G, we're trying to establish enterprise value by launching podcasts that do not feature yours truly.

11:07Most companies never go from a practice to an enterprise. Why is that? They're not good at scaling. And what I mean by that is they're not great at figuring out a way to scale with other people against the above greatness is in the agency of others. Why? Why? Because a lot of times small businesses are like, oh, I'm super talented and all these people are fortunate to be here and they're young and they're learning. But I'm taking 80 percent of the economic value out because I'm, quote unquote, the founder and the secret sauce. This is why most firms never scale or they're just bad managers and can't attract and retain people.

11:37What you need to do is, A, compensate people well, both economic and non-economic compensation, and figure out career paths for them, and also show that you have a vested interest in getting them to economic security as well. And I don't want to virtually signal too much. When my companies get sold, I make more money than anyone else. But I usually give away a large portion of the company because I want people to feel like they have a vested interest in, or we have mutual vested interest in each other's success. and what I find with a lot of these practices that have never become enterprises is they don't share in the fruits.

12:12They pay kind of their people the minimum and then what do you know, those good people leave because those people want to be owners and want to make money too. I just see it all the time. People talk a big game about scaling and I'm like, well, have you given any equity away? What do you pay your people? Well, why the fuck would they stay with you? They keep getting, they churn through these young people who are willing to, you know, not make a lot of money and then the really talented ones move on to something else because they want to also develop economic security and kind of be ballers. There's a lot of non-economic compensation, too, trying to get people time on stage, trying to get them opportunities where other people clap for them.

12:46It's just not all about you. There's just a lot of ways to create compensation that's both economic and non-economic. But, oh, yeah, people think I work 80 hours a week and it's amazing I can do this and doodle this and put all this content out. And the answer is like, no, I do none of that. I work probably 40 to 50 hours a week now. I used to work 60 to 70. Greatness and scale is in the agency of others. We'll be right back after a quick break.

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16:14welcome back our final question is from mcdevitshawn on reddit they say scott you've mentioned recently that you get your news mostly from tiktok reels and other video type sources who do you follow who is the most trustworthy lastly what does it mean for the future when we can't take time to read the full article anymore yeah it's a good point um according to a 2025 report by the reuters Institute, social media and video networks have become the main source of news in the U.S., overtaking traditional TV channels and news websites. More than half, 54 percent of people, get news from networks, including Facebook, X, and YouTube, overtaking TV, 50 percent, and news sites and apps, 48 percent.

16:55TikTok is the world's fastest growing social and video network used for news by 17 percent of people around the world, up four percentage points since last year. More than half of respondents across the market say they worry about their ability to distinguish what's true and what is false in online news. Again, see above the algorithms or AI has already taken over because if you see something enough, you start to think that it's maybe if it's not true that it's less false. And that's the problem with social media right now is that stuff is incendiary. If somebody says mRNA vaccines alter your DNA, which is verifiably false, it gets more reach than it would organically because it triggers people.

17:33And so the algorithms go, okay, if it's going to upset people, they're going to make comments, and every additional comment is another Nissan added more money for us meta. So it elevates controversial novel content, which is Latin for bullshit and misinformation, above its own organic reach. And this is why Section 230 protection needs to be removed for algorithmically elevated content. I don't believe in censorship. The dissenters' voice is important. People should be able to say pretty much anything about pretty much anybody. But should it get unnatural or should it get reach that's greater than it would get on its own organically?

18:10Okay, even if it does, then the social media platform has decided they are a media company editing and creating content, meaning they should be subject to the same standards that every other media company is subject to. In terms of what I watch, I find that TikTok and Reels do just an amazing job using AI to figure out that I like listening to boring economists and geopolitical. I've been listening to this guy, the Geo Hussar, who I think is just fascinating on geopolitics. And to TikTok and Reel's credit, they find just these amazing, I love that these kind of, these basement economists and geopoliticians, I find some of them are just fascinating and very good at what they do.

18:50I've been watching these little clips from the FT about interesting data from this like very handsome British kid in a flannel shirt, which makes you feel like it's, I don't know, more Gen Z or something. You know, everything from the Wall Street Journal to these interesting economists, clips from traditional media. I was talking to Van Jones on the way back from an event in Toronto, and he said that broadcaster Cable News never makes news anymore. News doesn't happen when they're doing it. He says it's all about just trying to find a clip that can then get spun around the internet because it's sort of interesting.

19:28Like the social media platforms still love the traditional media guys. There's something about having an MSNBC logo behind you or whatever that gives credibility to something. But they're basically there to serve as fodder at the top of the funnel. And ultimately, the real impact that cable news has is not on cable news. It's on social media platforms. A long-winded answer where there really wasn't an answer. Thanks for the question. that's all for this episode if you'd like to submit a question please email a voice recording to officehours at propgmedia.com that's officehours at propgmedia.com or if you prefer to ask on reddit just post your question on the scott galloway subreddit and we just might feature it in an upcoming episode this episode was produced by jennifer sanchez our assistant producer is laura janier drew burrows is our technical director thank you for listening to the propg pod from propg media

20:22Thank you.