Trump's Meme Stock, Florida's Social Media Law, and the Baltimore Bridge Collapse 46:22

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Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher. And who are you who is late to the party? Yeah, I was squeezing orange juice and I'm drinking orange juice because... Why were you squeezing orange juice? Well, I like to stay regular. And here's the thing. I am very regular. I always, Kara, I always have a... Are you talking about pooping? Well, here's the thing. It works for me. I always have a bowel movement at 8 a.m. every morning. The problem is I don't wake up until 9 a.m.

That's good. No. That's good. Oh, yeah. Yeah, I can't believe this. Little croon regular old guy humor there. You know, interesting. I'm in Boston. Everyone was asking about you at my event last night with Governor Maura Healey, who's the governor of Massachusetts for a book event.

A number of lesbians came up to me and said they like your penis jokes, just so you know. This is the thing. I think media has a tendency to bagger-vance women. It immediately portrays women as these... What? Well, I think media has a tendency, and unfortunately it teaches young people, that women have less agency and that they're always victims...

and that they're not as strong as they are. And also, women are dirtier than people think. Women have the same profane, vulgar thoughts. And here's one of the things we're accomplishing here, and I figured this out on my ketamine trip. We are taking vulgarity and humor and profanity and ability to laugh at ourselves back to progressives. Oh, okay. Yes. Lesbians can laugh. Yeah. I'm not joking here. I think one of the things that...

You know, when I look back on this, that I'll feel really good about is that you and I respect each other's differences, but we also rib each other. And it's a form of affection. We're not trying to diminish each other. I make jokes about your sexuality. You make jokes about mine. Yes. And it's OK. It's OK. And the thing I think that really hurts the left is we're now perceived as fucking humorless.

And that's not true. No, we're not perceived. That's an old trope. It's not true. It's not true at all. Oh, we're so sensitive. No, come on. The right wing is now like ridiculously censorious now and like tsk, tsk, and you can't do this, you can't do that. I think the right is owning that space these days completely. By the way, I absolutely think we should have a sponsored prayer moment. Have you seen this on Fox?

No. God, it's the best. What? They're now doing prayer live, and it's brought to you by some prayer app. Well, did you buy the Trump Bible? Oh, there's a Trump Bible? No, I haven't bought that. Yeah, he's selling a Bible now. 60 bucks. Can I just say, my favorite part of the whole ad for the Trump Bible is the guy who's selling it with him goes, so what's your favorite passage? And he's like, oh,

I don't want to say. The guy kept pressing him. The guy was like giving him a tough interview on what his favorite biblical passage was. It was interesting. That happened to Trump.

John Halliman. Yeah, just did again. He's selling a Bible and he couldn't come up with a Bible verse. Yeah, they're like New Testament, Old Testament. He's like, oh, I don't know, Medium Testament. The guy has absolutely no regard or concern for- He hasn't cracked a Bible in his whole life. Anyway. By the way, the hotel room you're staying in looks like one of those hotels you go to to kill yourself. It's not very uplifting. No, no.

It is what it is. I've had a hard week, Scott. My mom broke her hip. My mom fell and broke her hip. I'm sorry to hear that. Is she in the hospital? She is now. And after extensively being told if she didn't have help, she would fall and break her hip, which is precisely what happened.

And so Chia, she goes to rehab. She's as lively as ever. Let's just, anyone worried about Lucky? She's as lively as ever and blaming everybody else. So there you have it. I was going to say, lively is Kara speak for a total pain in the ass. Yeah, I, you know, we told her this was going to happen. And then, you know, it's interesting. I only mention it because I think a lot of people have this issue.

getting parents as they move out of their independent stage of their lives into something that requires a lot more help. And I think a lot of people have difficulty and it's hard to get my mom to recognize her problems, her deficits that she needs help with or to take help. And it's a really interesting thing

Phenomena that I hear from a lot of people, at least my age, dealing with parents. You're dealing with it. I'm dealing with it. My dad's about to turn 94. But just going to a more tactical thing, once you hit your 50s and 60s, you really want to take advantage of the last chance to get your quads, your glutes, your hams, and your abs really strong and also start doing, and I'm doing this now, I'm doing these balancing exercises because core strength and balance is

Because unfortunately, the mortality rate goes way up when you slip and break a hip. Well, I will make sure Lucky does her core exercises if I could get her to do that. I can't get her to wear that thing around. I've fallen, I can't get up thing around her neck. I can't get her to do that. It's really, it's just a-

by years. Yeah, I think we're past that with Lucky. Did you see Jerry Seinfeld said I was funny? He was on his podcast and he's like, that Kara Swisher's hysterical. She was getting laughs. She was throwing lines. Just so beautifully done. If you want to watch a great comedic performance from someone who's not supposed to be funny, check out Kara Swisher on Bill Maher's last show.

That's high praise. So women can be funny. Anyway, but we've got a lot to get today, including misinformation swirling online around the Baltimore Bridge collapse. What a thing. Oh, my God, that video was something else. And Florida's new law that will effectively ban kids from social media. You'll be surprised what we think, I suspect. But first, Ronna McDaniel is out at NBC following a backlash from Steve

staff. An apology memo from NBCU News Chairman Cesar Conde was sent to employees saying the hiring undermined the goal of a cohesive and aligned newsroom. Reminder, McDaniel's hiring caused on-air complaints from high-profile names such as Rachel Maddow, Chuck Todd, and Joe Scarborough. McDaniel is reportedly exploring legal options and expects to be paid out in full of her contract of $300,000 annually for two years. I think they should pay her. They made a mistake. I think they shouldn't have hired her in the first place. I don't know. This was...

They should pay her. I can't believe they hired her. That's my beginning gambit here. I don't know. What do you think about this? It seems like a real stupid move on their part. Your thoughts? I mean, you knew the moment it was over. When Rachel Maddow came out and came out against her, that's like, OK, she's done within 24 hours. Because that's like Michael Jordan saying, I don't like the new rookie on the team.

Phil Jackson's going to find a reason to trade the new rookie right away.

And you knew it was over for her. You're absolutely right. Of course they should pair up. The management team fucked up. They did poor math here. Good for them. A step back from the wrong direction is a step in the right direction. They course corrected quickly. But here's the thing. They fucked up. She convinced them to hire them despite them knowing, at least having some idea that she was an election denier. She has a contract. Unlike Elon Musk who decides

says sue me and doesn't hold himself accountable to legal contracts, employment contracts. Comcast and MSNBC should say we fucked up. We're sorry. You're out. Here's congratulations.

Look, CNN paid me out for the full year when they pulled CNN Plus, because guess what? I had a contract and they honored it. Right, exactly. You know, I think there's a really there's a great idea to bring in different voices. And I think a lot of the cable companies do that. Like there's a lot of you know, there's always a right winger on the little panel or whatever.

This woman, like just a short checking of the things she said were just so egregious. I'm just saying this woman was not someone who deserved any kind of platform, I think, in a news organization. Go ahead. What if someone, I won't even name names, but a lot of people attack you? You get more. I get some attacks. You get more.

What if they brought someone who had just lied about us and accused us of being propagandists? And they said, oh, the new podcast from Vox. We were like, what the fuck? She undermined the credibility and attacked incessantly many of the journalists at MSNBC. And then they want them to work with her? I mean...

It was just such a tone-deaf move. I wonder why they didn't consult Maddow or Todd or Scarborough or any of them. That I don't get at all. Why not? Why not ask them? Because it's a controversial person. Like, particularly controversial people. You know, it's one thing if it's, I don't know, Ken Buck, who has been, you know, truthful. And it's another when it's someone who was pushing election lies that they've been reporting on. You know, I thought Christian Welker did a pretty good job

with her on the interview. She had booked her before she knew that she was hired, which put her in a terrible position. But it was just kind of ridiculous. Like, she changed her tune. She was suddenly like, I believe the election was fine, even if there were some little problems. Like, she changed her tune completely to she's a liar in some fashion, like on either side of this trade. I just...

There are certain people who are liars and they shouldn't be allowed on. They shouldn't be hired, at least. They can be on the air if they want to create their, you know, they can go on Fox News. But there's separate issues here. You're right. The management team, you know, this was an IQ test. Like this election denier, it's one thing to be the spokesperson and always spin shit. It's another thing when you're, when you know, she knew she was lying. She knew she was lying.

And then she was attacking the people that she's going to then try and go to work with. They fucked up. And to their credit, we all screw up. They acknowledged it. They unfucked it. The issue around what you asked about, why didn't they check? You can't do that. Because the problem is once you start checking with your employees, Jim Bancroft didn't call me and ask about the new podcast they've launched. The problem may be called you. But- They did. There you go. I knew you were going to say that. When management starts checking-

with on-air employees about the other on-air employees they're bringing on. They give them the sense that they're going to check with them not only all the time on hires, but on fires. And it's a bad precedent. I guess.

I guess just for this person, this one's a particular. I mean, if someone has a personal history working with her, they might want to say, what do you think of this individual? But the moment you get people like this with enormous egos, which people in front of the camera have, otherwise they wouldn't put up with the bullshit to get to the point where they're on camera. The notion that they somehow have veto rights over hires and fires, that's a bad precedent to set. I think calling Maddo might have been a good idea in that case, since she's carrying the network. Anyway.

We'll see. It's a bad mistake. We'll see where it zeroes out. But by the way, speaking of good calls, we called it. Reddit's IPO is a victory. Shares of the company are up 15% at the time of taping after jumping 48% on the first trading day. Reddit's market cap is currently over $9 billion. Another thing we called Trump Media is a meme stock. Shares of the company jumped over 50% in the first minutes of trading, causing a brief volatility pause.

Trump Media is trading at a market cap of almost $8 billion. The company made just $3.4 million in the first nine months of 2023.

which is, and they lost a ton of money. They're losing, they're down 39% in users. It's just a scam of some sort. It's just a Ponzi scam. I don't know what's the word you would use. So talk about Reddit first and then Trump Media Stock. We call this the Reddit most trafficked site in America that's not owned by Alphabet and terrible monetization of that traffic. But at the same time, that represents the opportunity.

And there's also a ton of money on the sidelines. It just, all the moons lined up. You could just feel this thing was going to get a big pop. And also there's this very strange dynamic in the IPO market where it now makes sense for the company to price below the actual value they could get such that...

Because here's the thing, we're talking about the fact that it was up 48%. It's the only time you have this branding event to be kind of the most successful or one of the more successful IPOs of the year. And people say, well, they left money on the table because they could have priced it higher. When you're talking about a float of 20%, maybe you lose 2% of the company. But to be one of the most successful IPOs of the year and set the tone for your company, it's worth the dilution. So this is the racket. And it is a racket.

The investment banks say price it below what it's worth, and it's good branding. It creates nice momentum, nice halo for you. You only give up a little bit of dilution. And we, the investment bank, get to essentially give free money to our institutional clients who generate fees for us. Now, the unfortunate thing is the average retail investor doesn't get to participate. They have to buy it at $47, even though it priced at $34, I think.

So it's a racket. It's another example of a transfer of wealth from lower middle-income homes to

to institutions and rich people or people with access. Some people would argue, well, Vanguard, Blackstone have a lot of money from firemen and teachers and they get to participate. But be clear, the IPO market is an insider game and it is a bit of a fixed racket. Yeah. Where's it going to go from here? I think they'll just have to, now they'll be on the basics of what their business is like going forward, I think. There's only one thing that matters from this point forward. Right now on its basic numbers and its growth, it's overvalued. If they show any momentum

that they are able to better monetize that Niagara Falls of traffic

This stock will go up from here. If they do not show momentum around monetization of their traffic, it's going to go way down. All I can tell you is in a year, this stock will not be here. Yeah, I would agree. I think they've got it. It's going to be in there, but it's still a very small, it's very Snapchatty. It feels very Snapchatty, very great, a good product. We'll see if they can look like better than what it is. I like the people who run it and it's still small. It's still a very small social media site. The contrast with Snap is Snap had much better user interface.

in my opinion, was probably more innovative, better monetization, but didn't have nearly the traffic of Reddit. And I think the market is deciding that the harder part is to get the traffic, that you can probably figure out the other stuff. Because this is trading, I mean, this is trading at a rich valuation. Now, as a segue to True Social,

Okay. Let's talk about NVIDIA. NVIDIA is arguably the eye of the storm for hype around AI, and it's trading at 37 times sales. Oh my God, that's insane, right? 37 times sales, Reddit's trading at 11 times. So 11 for Reddit, digital media, potential huge growth, we'll see. NVIDIA, arguably hottest company in the world, 11,000 people turn out, like a Justin Bieber concert or a Banzai concert at the San Jose Stadium to see Jensen Huang speak, the financialization, the

idolatry of innovators and billionaires. Anyways, that's trading at 37 times sales.

Truth Social is trading at 1,500 times sales. You want to talk about a company that is Jenga or a house of cards? And by the way, not financial advice. I would not get near this thing because you don't know what will happen because this has nothing to do with the fundamentals. Because you don't know if their followers are going to do it. It's all based on his followers. And if they're going to keep it up, they're going to keep getting him money. It's also a very deft way to give him money, right? If he's going to sell it is to keep...

It's a really complex way to give him money, but he, you know, they're trying, it's all Trump fans and it's going to be Trump donator, people who want to donate in a different way just to keep it going. And there's all these rumors that he's getting people to keep it going, you know, by buying. All you have to buy is just a little bit to keep this stock in a crazy zone. You don't have to buy that much.

And that there's all kinds of games happening here. I think this is an SEC violation happening in real time right now. And I think it's a shareholder lawsuit situation. And it's a scam of some sort. It's not even a scam. What is it? It's a meme stock. It's a meme stock. But it's the memiest meme stock in memeville is one of the...

reporters called it. And just stay away. Even shorting it is a very dangerous situation, correct? Because you get squeezed. My advice to anyone here is not to get near this thing because it's not trading...

It's just unknown what it's trading on. As far as we know, he calls someone in the Gulf and says, I'll make sure that we buy oil from you. Just do me a favor, come in heavy. And you're right, there's a tail of a whip here. A small amount of purchases can send the stock skyrocketing. And you don't want to get near this thing right now. I mean, AMC and GameStop were considered kind of the ultimate meme stocks. They're shitty businesses, but they were businesses. They were doing...

Billions in revenue. You could make an argument for theaters coming back. You can make an argument for GameStop getting in. I don't know, download a video game. You can make an argument. Good, decent management. The guy from Chewy, whatever. You can make an argument there.

This does $3 million in revenue. There really isn't even a business here. Yeah, he just has to call some guy and say, buy a million bucks, buy a million bucks here. And it's like Costa doing business for people if he becomes president. That's really it. It's so corrupt. It's so crazy corrupt. It's just going to be very interesting what happens.

The board is his son, Devin, and then who is it? It's another- Devin Nunes, his son, another one. They're all his friends. Oh, Linda McMahon. Yeah, another one. This makes Tesla's board look like a model of corporate government. Yeah, it's true. And they can announce, we've decided to reduce his lockup period or eliminate it, and he can sell shares right away. They will have to disclose that, but it'll be really interesting is what happens next.

See the stock, if and when it's disclosed or we get close to any date where he can sell, because my guess is he's using that stock, and I don't know if he has to disclose this, to guarantee his ability to raise the $175 million he has now.

But this guy is going to sell most or all of it, or he knows there's nothing there. And then what happened with the meme stocks is everyone together, they say, let's take over the castle. We can do it. We can kill these short sellers. And they do it. And then they look at each other and they fall asleep and they go,

I need to get out of here before there's a rush out the door. That's right. The other. And they're all looking at each other. And there's only one person they're looking at here. And it's the following. When can Donald Trump sell? And when does he sell? I just feel it's going to be so this is going to be such a case since it's his next criminal case or his next civil case.

where he's going to be sued for doing whatever he's doing. And there'll be emails everywhere because they're so clottish at their corruption. Anyway, on a more serious basis, Russia has extended Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gersovich's pretrial detention until the end of June. This is just torture for this guy who did nothing. Today marks the one year since Gersovich was arrested. He attempted to appeal several times and has appeared in court 12 times. He was last seen in February in a Moscow court.

I mean, Donald Trump's favorite thug is just using this to torture this very fine reporter. I don't know what to say about it. It's just, it's repulsive. It's awful. I mean, it's, what can you say? I appreciate and I like that people, including Jay Capra's been great on this, are consistently reminding people, as is the Wall Street Journal, as they should, reminding them that an innocent man

is in prison held up on trumped up charges. I mean, there's just no getting around it. And we still have Paul Whelan, a former US Marine in prison. And I mean, these travel advisories, I would tell anyone, I don't care if you're a journalist, I won't go to Russia right now. I wouldn't go to China right now. Never go to Russia. Just don't go. I agree. I was saying that someone's like, are you going to go to China? I'm like, absolutely not. I wouldn't go to three places, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf.

Russia or China? - I've been to the kingdom, it's really nice. But anyways, we're two for three. We mostly agree. - Well, I call them murderous thugs, so I think I'm not gonna go. Anyway, our heart goes out to his family, obviously, and him. - Biggest reformer in the world right now is MBS. I hate that data gets in the way of your narrative, but no one is making more reforms right now than MBS. - And yet he's a murderous thug.

Agreed with that. Anyway, we're going to work a lot about this. I don't like people who dismember people. It's just my thing. Anyway, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, we'll talk about how the Baltimore Bridge collapse became a target for conspiracy theories and take a listener mail question about appearance and etiquette when it comes to job interviews.

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Scott, we're back. Misinformation surrounding the bridge collapse in Baltimore is spreading widely around social media. Conspiracy theorists, far right extremists, politicians and others are pushing unfounded claims that the incident was tied to a cyber attack, the border. And yes, DEI, the collapse currently under investigation. But President Biden officials have said there's no indication it was intentional or terrorism related.

I don't even know what to say. Anything that happens, these lunatics think it's a conspiracy theory or it's the fault of people of color. I don't even understand why this is the go-to. What's the connection to DEI? I don't know. I don't know. Nancy Mace, who's lost her ever-loving mind in so many ways, it was like it's because of the infrastructure bill. I don't even understand. I don't understand. Yeah.

It's lunacy. Every time there's a thing like this, there's a conspiracy theory attached to it. And now instead of just sort of under the surface, they just surface again, once again. And it's really, there's nothing that can happen in this country now that doesn't get a conspiracy theory attached to it instantly, right? Instantly. Right.

And I don't know, maybe that's just the way we are now, or I don't know. There's nothing to be done about it. Like novelty is much more interesting than the truth. Novelty, you can just go so many different places. And so novelty and conspiracy theory, the algorithms on social media absolutely love it. So when you keep getting hit by your mom's Facebook feed with these conspiracy theories, the more you see them, the less outrageous and illegitimate they feel.

So no one loves conspiracy like the shareholders of Meta or conspiracy theories.

And it's like, and unfortunately, this happened to our politics now, that if I repeat a lie long enough, it sounds, it begins to sound less like a lie. - Yeah, they should be ashamed of themselves. This is just a terrible accident. And watching the thing happen, it's like, oh God, like on some level it was riveting to watch. At the same time, it was obviously a stupid accident. And the fact that they're trying to score points about this, they should be ashamed of themselves. Nancy Mace, you should be ashamed of yourself for doing this.

I know you. I mean, shame to yourself, all of you.

Anyway, you want to do something, fix the bridge. How about that? How about that? How about work on fixing the bridge instead of trying to score political points? It's repulsive what you're doing. Anyway, let's also talk briefly about the economic impact of the bridge collapse, which is more important. The incident halted operations there in Baltimore's port, which generates about $15 million in daily economic activity, according to experts. Baltimore is the ninth largest port in the U.S. by trade volumes, the biggest for car imports and exports. The port also handles a large amount of construction machinery and coal.

President Biden said the federal government should pay to rebuild the bridge and he will be asking Congress to approve funds. You know, we are very vulnerable on supply chain and infrastructure by things like this. I mean, it just reminds you that everything isn't digital, obviously. And this isn't the biggest port, but all our ports are, you know, just one accident away from just like all the canals that we're having, the Suez Canal and different things like that. It really has a huge effect.

So any thoughts on this? I think you summed it up. I worry, and one of the reasons I think the Biden administration will go down as a success is the Infrastructure Act, because our bridges and our airports and kind of our soft tissue, our infrastructure, just needs a fairly significant facelift. So...

And I don't know if you can blame us on infrastructure. I've read theories from it was dirty fuel. I don't think it was. I think the bridge—I've been over it hundreds of times. I don't—you know, it's a bridge. It's built in 1977. It's a bridge. It probably should be updated. No, I agree. And also, I don't know what happened here. I'm not suggesting that there aren't investments and investigations that happen. But sometimes there's just freak accidents that are terrible. And I don't want to say no one's at fault, but—

We're always looking for who's to blame here. In order to process this, in order for our brain to process something terrible happening, we need someone responsible.

And, you know, you just, you just, it'll be just very interesting to see what the report says in terms of what series of unfortunate events led to this. I don't know how you avoid a freak accident. You just don't. They happen, people. Guess what? They happen. Anyway, but we do have to be thinking a lot, I think a lot harder about all our infrastructure in terms of hardening it. There's been so much, there's a lot of stuff about how, that we've talked about previously with a bunch of reporters who cover the infrastructure of our country and it is vulnerable, you know,

in every aspect to freak accidents and also to specific attacks. We have to keep that in mind all the time, from water to electricity to anything. And this is one of them. And I feel bad for the poor people who died in this. Sad thing, I was glad it was at night, at least. There were fewer people on that bridge.

But still, anyway. Moving on, Florida is set to have one of the most restrictive laws in the country when it comes to social media and underage users. Governor Ron DeSantis signed a bill earlier this week to prohibit social platforms from giving accounts to children under 14. I think we're probably forward to Ron DeSantis here. Companies will also be required to give parents permission before giving accounts to 14 and 15-year-olds and terminate accounts they believe belong to minors. The bill is slated to become law in 2025. It's expected to face legal challenges in the meantime.

Scott, I think you and I are for this one, correct? Is that correct? Kind of, this is the correct direction. - If this was wins and fails today, I would give the win to Governor DeSantis. I love this. - Yeah. - Yeah, they're not waiting on the feds. They're like, "You guys are totally dysfunctional "and can't get anything done, and I'm gonna do this." I think it's- - Yeah. - There is no reason for anyone to be, anyone under the age of 16 to be on a social media platform. And the only reason they're on it, and the only reason that parents give in

is that if they're not on it, they're ostracized because all of their friends are on it. So the only way to solve the problem is to get everyone off of it. Yeah, it's interesting. I was at my high school this week. I also appeared at Princeton University for an event, but I went over to my, where I went to school from sixth grade to 12th grade. And some of the, there was a question from students about that. And I said, I'm sorry to tell you, I think you should be educated. And a lot of parents asked me at these events,

And I said, "I don't know what to tell you. Say no to your kids and take away their phone if you think it's really hurting them." Some kids are more advanced than others and more mature, just like in life. But this stuff has a deleterious effect on people, you know, 18 to 50, it does. And so same thing with liquor, same thing with cigarettes. You have to put it in the same bucket as that, as you just do. It's addictive.

And kids are really hurting from it. And so you just limit their use of it. It doesn't mean you can't use it at all in some fashion, but it should be monitored by parents.

And the government has to help parents do that in this case, given how addictive it is, both for the kids and their parents. Parents are addicted. Well, when you're going through puberty, you're just especially vulnerable to the affirmation of others. And we've decided that when boys and girls are just really developing a sense of self and individuality and are especially insecure...

that we're gonna addict them psychologically to a platform where they're constantly evaluated and they're basically in the high school cafeteria 24 by seven. And it's especially difficult on young girls 'cause they get sexualized earlier. Girls tend to bully relationally, whereas boys bully physically and verbally, and it just wreaks havoc on their sleep.

their social capital. It is absolutely a disaster. And whereas we are addicted, at least we can modulate. We have coping mechanisms. Our prefrontal cortex is somewhat developed. It is a different level of mendacious with young people. And I don't think there's a middle... Scott and Kara are very conservative on this issue. I don't think there's a middle ground here. I don't think...

I don't think parents, I mean, of course, parents have a lot of responsibility for their kids at the end of the day. But anyone who has a third, I mean, I'll just speak from experience. My kid, you know, wants to be on SNAP before he goes to bed. I'm like, no, it's time to wind down. And he says, Dad, all my friends in Florida, this is, I catch up with them every night. This is how I communicate with my friends back home. And here's the thing. The only way this gets solved, quite frankly, is if they're all off of SNAP.

And there's just no reason. This has to be age-gated. There is no tangible, there is no argument, it might be a legitimate argument, for why anyone under the age of 16 should be on any social media app. The downside here has proven to be so much greater.

Then the upside. Yep, I agree. Were you bullied in school? I don't know this. Oh, I was a little bit bullied several occasions. I was pulled into a bathroom and kids would start hitting me until I gave my lunch money. But here's the thing.

Some of that, you don't want to be traumatized, but some of that is good. I learned how to negotiate. I learned how to find the right friends. I learned that I don't walk down the hallway after homeroom. I get it, but you still shouldn't be dragged into a bathroom, period. But yes, but I get it. But anyway, we are for this. We are for this bill. Thank you for telling me that story. I didn't know that. I was never bullied. I thought I could recall. You ran the prison yard.

I did. I had one girl in fourth grade that used to hold my coat while I played. She wanted to. It was a good rabbit coat, but I'm just telling you, yeah, I did run the prison yard. You're right. Rabbit coat. That's hilarious. My mom had one of those. I had a rabbit coat and she held it. She liked the coat. She wanted to hold it. I let her hold it.

I did run the prison yard. Anyway, I didn't bully people, though. Finally, the Supreme Court seems like it won't be limiting access to mefiprestone, a drug used in two-thirds of all abortions in the U.S. Following arguments this week, it was the Supreme Court's first abortion case since overturning Roe v. Wade two years ago. The majority of justices seemed skeptical during arguments, questioning whether the group challenging the FDA's dispensing rules

on the drug actually had legal standing. The court's decision is expected by the end of June. But even if the Supreme Court preserves full access to the drug, it still will remain illegal in more than a dozen states that have near total abortion bans. That's right. You can mail it and all kinds of stuff. But anyway, I wasn't surprised by these arguments. I think they've decided they did enough with Roe v. Wade. And I think they're a little nervous to push it further in general. I don't know. What do you think?

There's a dangerous trend here. At some point, is having a glass of wine illegal because that leads to sex and unwanted pregnancy? I mean, where do they stop here? And it's bad for the economy. People, access to bodily autonomy is important for the economy. I mean, it's just people are going to stop having sex. People are going to stop falling in love. People are, I mean, everybody assumes there's this weird mythology that the pattern is

you meet, you bump into each other in a bookstore and you gaze at each other and you accidentally meet again and you fall in love and then you have sex and you get married. Guess what? A lot of people go out, get fucked up, have sex and decide they like each other after that. I mean, and you're going to start, the last thing we need to do

is stop young people being physical and having sex. I mean, my advice to young people is drink more and go out and make a series of bad decisions that might end up being wonderful. It's like when I was a kid, I don't know about you, my parents were worried I was going to get into too much trouble. I'm worried my kids aren't going to get into enough trouble.

And the idea that we're going to take away a woman's right to take a very healthy, very safe, very inexpensive means of bodily autonomy, I mean, none of this makes any fucking sense. Yeah. I think these Supremes are like, we've done enough and we're not going to do anymore. I think they are...

nervous about what they did and they are not going to push it further. Maybe like Alito or Thomas might, but the rest of them are like, what have we done essentially? That's, I know that sounds crazy, but I have a feeling they've been doing a lot of appearances together. Like,

Amy Coney Barrett and Sotomayor. You've seen them. They're working on their brand. No brand has fallen further faster. They have. So they're like, we do get along and we are in a lot more in alignment than you think. And so I think those arguments, it's the same thing with the internet arguments that they are going to push back on around those ridiculous rules in Texas and Florida and also Missouri. We'll see where it goes. I would agree with you. I agree. This is kind of ridiculous. And they will

ruled in favor of being able, the FDA in this case. Anyway, Scott, let's pivot to a listener question.

This question comes from Susan. Let's listen. Hi, Karen Scott. This is Susan from Syracuse. I love your show. It's always informative and entertaining. Okay, here's my question. My son works in tech and lost his job recently. He has some interviews, but how much does appearance matter? I suggested he lose the scruffy facial hair. He says it doesn't matter.

Plus, we have a long-running argument about thank you notes. I told him to always send a thank you note after an interview. He says no. So do they matter? Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated. Thank you. Okay, that's a good question. Susan from Syracuse. Thank you. I'm going to start. He works in tax law. It's a job.

Louis Swisher, who I'm about to go see in Buenos Aires this week, has a mustache I like now, but I worry about working. It's definitely a look. He looks like Pedro Pascal during one of his roles and stuff. He looks like Che. Yeah. And so I do worry if he's looking for a job if he can have this facial hair. And I don't say I don't like it because I kind of do now. I'm used to it. It looks like a worm under his nose. Yeah.

And it's a really pronounced one. He's going for something and he's growing his hair really long. And

You know, I don't want to say anything. He's going to, maybe you'll hear this. I don't know. But I think it looks great. And at the same time, I do worry if he's, unless he's going to be an actor or a chef, that maybe he's going to be both of those things. He would have a harder time getting a job. I was thinking about that the other day. As to thank you notes, I don't know. I don't send them. So I don't know what to say. I think you probably should send some kind of note after an interview to say thank you for the interview. Probably that's, that's,

a good thing to do to remind people of three or four things you said, use it as an advantage. Scott? A couple of things. The reason Louis Swisher has a caterpillar under his nose is because he has rich parents. The reality of the workplace is the following. Appearance matters a great deal. It does. A great deal. And you know what? It sucks to be a grownup. And if you want to get a job at a major platform, you don't want to give them any excuse not to hire you.

And I'm going to go to very basics here because some of the same things apply in the workforce as they do in mating. Women are drawn to men for three reasons in terms of potential mating partners. Number three, kindness. Number two is intellect. And number one is their ability to signal resources. But physically, women are drawn to men with some facial hair because it expresses masculinity as long as it's well kept, big biceps and big chest because that intimates strength that you'll be able to protect their young.

And what I think in a modern age where physical strength is important, the reason why women are still attracted to men who are in great shape is it reflects a few things. It reflects a commitment. It reflects responsibility. It reflects discipline. It reflects self-worth and self-love. And when you walk in, and I coach a bunch of young men, the first fucking thing you need to do when you start looking for a job is you need to go get a navy blue suit from Suit Supply.

and watch a bunch of videos from George Hahn, and you need to look outstanding. You need to look outstanding. You need to look like you take pride and you make an effort. And whatever report they ask you to do, whatever piece of work they ask you to work on, you're going to bring that same diligence and that same perfection

to that work that you bring to your appearance. You can't be Brad Pitt if you're not good looking, but you can be the best version of yourself and you can control certain aspects of your appearance in your dress. You need help. Every man should have a woman, a gay man, or a mother with decent taste

and say, I need to look outstanding in these interviews and let them take over. Let me push back a tiny bit. Let me push back. I dress really sloppily, I would say. I wear a lot of soft pants. You're already rich. Yes, I know, but I always did. I'm just saying, I always did. So if you do great work, you tend to be able to, like in tech, a lot of the people look like unmade beds. They do. They do. They dress like they look like unmade beds. And so in tech, it doesn't necessarily matter

transmit that unless you're in the sales department or HR or something else, because that's the whole meme about tech. Scruffy is the look. So I don't know if it applies in every industry. I would not agree with you because scruffy is something. A couple of things. One, my advice to anyone young listening to this is assume you are not Kara Swisher.

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that you are more talented than your average bear, which gives you more latitude around this type of thing. And if you're in the tech industry, there might be a different decorum. I think Sam Altman looks great. He wears t-shirts, but I think he looks great. He does. So what I'm saying is you need... Gay man. Gay man. There you go. Everyone needs a gay friend. I realize this is bigoted or whatever. They have better taste in this shit than you. Many do. Not all of them, but yes, you're right.

Go ahead. Well, okay. Chances are, or get your mom or get your girlfriend, right? There's something about the heterosexual male that part of their brain typically does not function very well. And they think it's okay to go in without showering or like even shit, little shit, like personal grooming. Don't have dirty nails.

Don't have chapped lips. Bill Gates used to show up unshowered to meetings. He came on to the Washington Post. I'll never forget it. He looked like an unmade bad who didn't shower. Well, he can do that. He can do that. And Steve Jobs didn't wear shoes and would not shower. He looked good. Steve Jobs always looked good. But go ahead. Why on earth would you not stack everything that you can control in your favor?

And looking good and being in shape says to the world, you have discipline and you're going to bring the same discipline and attention to detail to this job as you're bringing to your parents. What about a thank you note? Very briefly, thank you notes. I think a written thank you note is really powerful because it stands out.

And it also gives, it creates another impression, just a reminder of you with that person. It's general best practice at business school. You always follow up. Thank you for your time. And then go on and reiterate your strengths and how much you were born to do this job and you'd be the best in the world. I especially love written notes because they're really, whenever I get a written note with a handwritten written note, I read it and it kind of, it has a different meaning for me.

Well, there you have it. Susan, thank you for your questions. I think it just depends in a lot of ways, but we both believe in the thank you note in any case. If you've got a question of your own or you'd like an answer, send it our way. Go to nymag.com slash pivot to submit a question for the show or call 855-51-PIVOT. All right, Scott, one more quick break. We'll be back for predictions. Support for this podcast comes from Huntress.

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Okay, Scott, let's hear a prediction. So we're recording before Sam Bank been freed a sentence. I think he's going to get hit hard. I think he handled himself. He was so poorly advised around how to handle this. You know, the whole, oh, I made him, you know, I didn't know. I didn't. And then everyone flipped on him and gave states evidence.

And now, granted, the company is recovered or it's recovered. It's going to end up all of its debtors are going to get paid 100 cents on the dollar because the market is recovered so aggressively in crypto. But I think they're going to make an example of this kid. I think he handled himself terribly through this process. And I think they want to send...

a message to the crypto community, boys don't fuck with us. And if you just look at the data, he purposely decided to be in the Bahamas. He purposely decided to be sleeping with and doing drugs with his coworkers. What do you think? I don't know. This judge has been pretty tough on him and is angry about some of his behavior. They don't have to give him that much time, but I think they will give him a significant amount of time. You know, I don't think he's going to, even if they pulled back some of the money, you

But he doesn't, I don't think this judge much likes how he behaved. And he kept like violating things like using a VPN and stuff like, he did a bunch of stuff that I think was showed a lack of interest. And he can't keep, speaking of unmade beds, he can't keep pretending you're like a feckless unmade bed at this point. And that's why you deserve more, just more, more mercy. I just don't think you can. I think that's what he's been doing. Yeah.

And Kaplan is not like the argument that there was no loss. He calls it misleading, logically flawed, and speculative. I just think this judge is going to not throw the book, but he's going to give him a pretty hefty book at his head. I think that's what's happening. I think you're right. Yeah.

We'll see. We'll see very soon. We'll know by the time we talk next time. Okay, that's the show. We'll be back on Tuesday with more Pivot. Scott, can you please read us out? Today's show was produced by Lara Naiman, Zoe Marcus, and Taylor Griffin. Ernie Andertot engineered this episode. Thanks also to Drew Brose and Neil Saverio.

Nishat Karouaz, Vox Media's executive producer of audio. Make sure you subscribe to the show wherever you listen to podcasts. Thanks for listening to Pivot from New York Magazine and Vox Media. You can subscribe to the magazine at nymag.com slash pod. We'll be back next week for another breakdown of all things tech and business. Have a question or need how-to advice? Just ask Meta AI.

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