Office Hours: The Ethics of Amazon vs. Meta, Naming a Next-Generation Product, and What to Do if Your Child Believes in Conspiracy Theories

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1:08Welcome to the Prof. G. Pod's Office Hours. This is the part of the show where we answer questions about business, big tech, entrepreneurship, and whatever else is on your mind. If you'd like to submit a question, please email a voice recording to officehours at profgmedia.com. Again, that's officehours at profgmedia.com. First question. Hey, Scott. This is Sean from Seattle. Love the podcast. Thank you so much for taking my question. I recently fielded offers from Amazon and Meta and got into a debate with friends around which was less ethically problematic. Given the contentious business practices and societal implications associated with both companies, do you truly believe there is a distinction in choosing one over the other for ethical reasons?

1:46Can someone really sleep better at night choosing to work at one big tech company over another? We'd love to hear your insight. Sean, this is the mother of all good problems. And so let me be clear, both firms from an employee perspective are great firms. I would say probably a third of my kids, and when I say my kids, my students, would go to work for big tech. And at one point, 20 % were going to Amazon. And the people I know that went to Amazon described it as intense, unforgiving, and very rewarding. Meta has a fantastic reputation in terms of how they treat their employees. They pay them really well.

2:22A lot of investments in human capital. Well, around the ethics, I think your first priority is to develop economic security for you and your family. And I think big tech is good for the world. I think if we had a button we could press and make big tech vanish, we would not push that button. We are net gainers from big tech. The problem is with the word net, and that is we're net gainers from pesticides. We're net gainers from fossil fuels, I still believe. But we choose to have emission standards and an EPA. I would argue at this point, meta is probably a net negative, whether it's teen suicide, self-harm, self-cutting among girls, election misinformation.

3:03I mean, these guys really are mendacious fucks. And Amazon might be mendacious fucks, but the implications of that are monopoly abuse and small retailers go out of business and bigger retailers or greater employers might have gone out of business faster than they otherwise would have. But they're not spreading conspiracy theory. They're not spreading anti-vax information. And some of it might not be that the people are any less or more ethical. It's that they're just in different businesses. So if you really got to the point where it came down to who was less bad or more ethical, I would say you'd probably choose Amazon just by virtue of the fact that they're in the business of e-commerce and cloud versus media.

3:47Having said that, I think most likely you should probably make the decision based on what's best for you personally. Do you want to live in Seattle? Do you want to live in the Bay Area? Where do you think you'll have senior level sponsorship? Where do you have a better rapport or relationship? Do you believe currently or that you'll develop with who you'll be reporting into? What does the career path look like at each organization? I find with decisions like this, you don't want to listen to a podcast or that is yours truly. You want to build a kitchen cabinet of people and say, okay, these are the offers.

4:20This is the opportunity. This is the division. What do you think? And then at the end of the day, you'll probably ignore all those decisions and just go with your gut and make your original decision. So these are personal decisions. I would say the quote-unquote ethical stuff, if you will, is a tiebreaker unless it's something that really weighs on you. Corporate America, these are platforms for making profits. And folks in the media and people such as myself, I think, play a role in holding them accountable and trying to urge our elected officials to put in place the regulations such that there's guardrails around these companies.

4:57But at the end of the day, they are going to do whatever increases their profits, full stop. That's just what they do. But anyways, like I said, let me end where I began. This is a great problem. Congratulations to you. Offers from Amazon. and meta. Jesus, Jesus, man. Good luck to you. That's fantastic. Question number two. Hey, Scott, my co-founders and I started a company in a niche industry known as computational chemistry that accelerates pharmaceutical R &D. We've had some good success with our 1.0 and successive versions, both within this niche, as well as expanding this niche to more users who traditionally don't use these types of tools.

5:33We're now about to launch a new version of our product. And although the use cases will be the same, we were wondering, should we evolve our existing branding with a 2.0 tag showing progression or introduce a completely new brand name? In a sector that's both niche and on the cusp of broader reach, how should companies strike the balance between legacy and innovation in their product branding? What are the implications of these choices on market perception and accessibility? Love the show. Thanks so much. Okay, let me get this. You are the co-founder of a company in computational chemistry that accelerates pharmaceutical R &D.

6:09So, okay, if you didn't leave your name, but if you call me and the terms aren't outrageous, I'll put 100 or 250 grand into this thing. I don't even know what you're doing in computational chemistry that accelerates pharmaceutical R &D. That just sounds like Benjamin's. That sounds like I'm hanging out with Benjamin after you work your ass off for five years and sell the Pfizer or Novartis or Moderna or something. Anyways, these are, again, we should brand today's office hours as the mother of all good problems. Okay. Generally speaking, I have a bias here, and that is the vast majority, the vast majority of incremental revenues at a consumer company are from brand extensions, not new brands.

6:49What is a rookie move? A rookie move to practice unsafe corporate sex. What do I mean by that? A rookie move is to say, we need a new brand. Everybody wants to have kids, right? Everyone wants to have unsafe sex. And I get that. I get that. But here's the bottom line. Diet Coke sold about 20 or 30x what Tab was going to sell or any new soft drink that Coca-Cola has come up with. Brand extensions are the way to go. Unless it's so different, right, that it really doesn't make sense and you need a new name, then, okay, Dayton Hudson is actually kind of a nice higher-end department store similar to a Macy's.

7:25And they launched this big box retailer that's more focused on kind of Walmart low prices with a little bit of flair and a bulldog with a bullseye on it. Okay, that's Target. And we shouldn't call it Dayton Hudson's Target. Old Navy is Gap at 80 % of the quality, 50 % of the price. So it's Gap's Old Navy, then Old Navy by Gap, and then Old Navy on its own. I find in almost every situation, until a brand gets to about a few hundred million, sometimes even a billion in sales, or a company gets to that level, there's no reason to start having unsafe sex because every new brand is a mouth to feed.

7:58It has a new marketing department, new logo, new design, new pricing, new channel strategy. So unless it's a distinct product with a different customer set or a different value proposition, I say go with 2.0 or maybe not even changing the name, just updating it. Anyways, thanks for the question. We have one quick break before our final question. Stay with us. Adobe Acrobat Studio. So brand new. Show me all the things PDFs can do. Do your work with ease and speed. PDF spaces is all you need. Do hours of research in an instant. With key insights from an AI assistant. Take a template with a click.

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9:17I've already put years into this place. And maybe the most common one, isn't everyone kind of miserable at work? But there's a difference between reasons for staying and excuses for not leaving. It's time to get unstuck. It's time for Strawberry.me. They match you with a certified career coach who helps you go from where you are to where you actually want to be. Your coach helps you get clear on your goals, create a plan, build your confidence, and keeps you accountable along the way. So don't leave your career to chance. Take action and own your future with a professional coach in your corner.

9:56Go to strawberry.me slash unstuck to claim a special offer. That's strawberry.me slash unstuck. Welcome back. Question number three. Hi, Scott. My name is Jeannie, and I am a middle-aged marketer and mother here in the Boston area. specifically my question is about my own child who is a 21 year old male who is impacted let's say quite negatively from the isolation resulting from the lockdowns for COVID-19 and has found his way back to college after doing some other work. He has also found his way to a lot of conspiracy theories and really is diving into those deeply. And I know part of that is because of his underdeveloped frontal lobe and still trying to seek answers and trying to figure things out.

10:56But my question to you is, how do I help him see things rationally and guide him as to what these conspiracy theories are and why they're attractive and maybe why they're wrong and how to assess things from an analytical and perspective of logic. Anyway, I'm rambling. Thank you so much. Keep up the good work. Gene from the Boston area. I just did something for the first time, and that is I paused the show here so I could go do a bit of research. I think when you're talking about your son and conspiracy theories and parenting around this, I think, one, I think this is so important and so sensitive.

11:41And two, I have so little domain expertise here that I wanted to do just a bit of research before spouting off here. And I went to the Anti-Defamation League's site and looked up some information on conspiracy theories. So what are conspiracy theories? They explain various events caused by powerful people, usually that they're being manipulated by powerful people behind the scenes, and they reject the established and accepted narratives. Why are they dangerous? They undermine trust in institutions. They can sow division, more polarization. They demonize marginalized groups, and they can also be used to justify violence and persecution of people.

12:22And why do we get drawn into conspiracy theories? A feeling of belonging. Communities develop online. They've run rampant because conspiracy. Nothing loves a conspiracy theory like the algorithm from Meta because they're compelling, they're novel. Lies and conspiracy are interesting stories. The truth is usually a little bit more boring, right? The fact that Bill Gates might be implanting something in you via the vaccine such that he can track your every movement, that's kind of an interesting sci-fi story. Should they be stamped out? No. The dissenter's voice is important. And the problem is, is that the dissenters voice or the conspiracy theorist gets more sunlight and attention than they would organically because Metta just loves a conspiracy theory and will start sending out this content and elevating it.

13:10And the more times you see something, the more likely you are to believe that there's more veracity there or that it's less crazy. So people get drawn into these things for the need of belonging and a need to feel good about themselves. They include kind of a sense of superiority that I'm in the know. And what to do as a parent. So according to the Anti-Defamation League, it's good to just understand the conspiracy theories and understand their origins. Do not be dismissive of your son's belief in these conspiracy theories. And what I have found, and I think this is true and you can relate to this, Gene, as a parent, is the moment you as the mom try and talk your son out of something, they get entrenched in that belief.

13:53You're supposed to encourage critical thinking by asking open-ended questions like, why do you think the government would want to, you know, inject something that alters people's DNA? Why do you think Democrats would want to have a pedophile ring in the basement of a pizza shop? You know, just kind of ask questions or what do you think is going on here? And try not to be judgmental. Obviously, prioritize the person's health, safety and well-being and provide help if needed. and do not cut the person out of your life. Like I cannot have a son in my life that believes in QAnon or whatever it might be.

14:29That doesn't help either. I think it's sort of accepting them. I find with stuff like this, when I'm interviewing someone that just says what I think is just absolute falsehoods, I try and give them the benefit of the doubt and just keep asking them questions and let them arrive, hopefully at their own conclusions. But I just want to say, Jane, I can't imagine how upsetting this is. something that really rattles me. And it's a huge disappointment, even though I know why it's happening. My boys don't come to me for advice. I'm not exaggerating. I get hundreds, sometimes thousands of people coming to me for advice, like you are about raising kids.

15:09I get a ton of young men from the ages of like literally eight to 48 emailing me and texting me and asking me for advice. But my 13-year-old still does kind of seek my advice mostly around business, but quite frankly, my 16-year-old just isn't interested in what I think. And I think some of this is ego speaking, but it's really hurtful to me. It upsets me that he doesn't come to me and want to know what I think about stuff or ask for my advice or help on anything. And what I've realized is that, and I trust you realize this, is that it's important for kids to strike out on their own and separate from the pack, if you will, and separate from the parents.

15:50And they literally have a hormone and an instinct that says, I need to reject some of the basic principles of my parents and rebel such that I develop the skills to go on my own. And, you know, a more thoughtful and evolved father would say it's important that I embrace or let my son lean into his separation. But I got to be honest, it's really upsetting to me. And I got to imagine also it's got to be really upsetting for you to have your son, you know, and my guess is like most kids, he's probably a good kid, sort of embrace this stuff. I find that big tech is responsible for a lot of it. And I don't think there's a quick fix here.

16:30And I think there's more of it. So, again, I just want to express empathy that I think this must be very upsetting. Two, I think you have to continue to embrace your son. ask questions, try and understand why he thinks this. Obviously, view, voice your viewpoint, but engage with him as opposed to shame him and kind of hope for the best here. And to also understand that some of this is just a healthy, natural pulling away. So I want to send you to adl.org slash conspiracy dash theories. But again, Gene, Let me just end where I started. I'm sorry. I think this has got to hurt. And to the fact that you're obviously a very loving mother and that you're engaged in your son's life just means that this and other problems have a better chance of working out.

17:24Because your son has something that I find is the key to success, and that is that he has someone irrationally passionate about his well-being. Thanks for the call. 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 proptimedia.com. Again, that's officehours at proptimedia.com.

17:53This episode was produced by Caroline Shager and Jennifer Sanchez is our associate producer and Drew Burrows is our technical director. Thank you for listening to the Prop G pod from the Vox Media Podcast Network. We will catch you on Saturday for No Mercy, No Malice, as read by George Hahn, and on Monday with our weekly market show.

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