The Art of Modern Persuasion & The Manosphere
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Someone actually brought up there, they think you guys are taking to manage me.

But that is a while taking.

i'm tell you. But we all have our base. We're going to talk about modern persuing today.

And like you know, you got ta have your base and you gotta build on your base, okay? And you you don't do that with facts. You do that with feelings. You do that with rives.

Sometimes I do feel like alex is taking advances of you and I.

that's great, but i'm here for whatever part I do.

I don't know. You hope to get mikes. You actually wrote the jingle, which I still like, so I without very much appreciated and I do. Alex will profess a great affection for you and and you takes even though you you sometimes get all of the about not being a media person and stuff, I think you takes our welcome because it's .

good perspective.

This feels like form, you know.

well, IT was a punch. Kiss is what that was.

Thank you. punch.

Well, the people for salgado to show about detecting patterns and media, technology, culture and brian Marcy, each week i'm joined by ti. Yang and our slipher. This week we are digging into the topic of modern persuading and what we can learn from the rise of the manual. here.

I just scraped up an event last night with fifty top publishing executives and one of the underlying themes of discussion that was so in the background of all the different talks who are having with, you know, the basic question about the relevance of legacy media brand, I know something we discuss on the show up. It's just critically important. The election, in many ways, confirmed to many suspected, and that is that the information space has supercede ded in in many ways subsume the traditional media world.

In traditional media, to me, is just now one node of the information space. And perhaps more alarmingly, its influence and its ability to persuade has drastic declines. And that, to me, is more important than mostly academic discussions about trust.

So we talk in the epsom about the implications of the shift, particularly with the spotlight now on what's being called the manufacture, a chaotic, this confederation of pakistan, and youtube birds who have seemingly broken through to be a keynote of persuasion. Young men, we have to talk about cna, I mean, how do you end up adapt in something like CNN for this very different media? Hope you enjoy the conversation.

As always. Please leave us a ring, a review and I mean up with feedback to b. mr. Cy at three. Good in doc.

thanks.

I got a long complaint email. I can share this with you guys again. Most I think is for my base because they're .

blaming you who's you both .

of you yeah about your political reasons. I the review is that I was the APP, our last episode, hey, heavy handed parity of talking points that were blatantly wrong, the coin code fascism call out, sure, you ve got the insinuation that media was accurate, deserting important things. The prediction joke coverage is a farcical example. And alex, a suggestion that the media was playing the middle ground position.

no. Well, my .

lesson is, anything in politics is, is, is terrible place to be.

yeah. And are we dealing with Normal politics now?

Like, seriously. Like, yeah, very gentle.

But we allowed is IT like political to to talk about him and his escapees.

But I don't know. Let's get into IT because I think that it's going to be an interesting manage approach. See how everyone takes like you what is to come next because it's gona be a disruptive period.

But I can observe this in these new media behaviors for my son last night, and he's had this kind of long media education from, you know, being a gamer and member that I, Philippe, to franco, who was sort of one of the original youtube talking heads, sort of next generation news skies. And my son has me. I like, he's like, what's up with elon? And, you know, like, he's doing all this because he wants to die on mars.

Like, what's wrong with this guy? And and then, and then he said, you gotta watch this video. And I was from this channel called, it's almost like I had seen his musical taste above these sort of like his his youtube preferences and he's like, it's a guy that's anonymous.

I think he's canadian. His youtube channels called the elephant graveyard. And he does this kind of these mascots of, you know, he see sometimes uses A I to use like famous people's voices, and you just use as AI to to create them.

But he does this, this kind of almost ambient mashups. They're like news. If IT was played in a at .

burning man.

yeah, I used to be, I used to, I used to believe totally that we never want to. The nineteen fox, a show called conspiracy theory, did we go to the moon? And they added on television prime time, they got me hook, line and sinker. And for years, I believe that we didn't go .

to the so it's kind of like ambient news, music, image and animation intensive mashups. That one told the story of iron from south africa to the present day. And IT was like, I was like, what i'm watching here is someone who had just a fundamental different media education.

And their ACE have evolved something that's kind of surreal. Because as we were doing this, we were setting up a television and CNN was on the television and my son said, who would watch this? He's like, this is ridiculous. These talking heads like, I don't know how people watch this. And so, you know, he's just someone that come from a very different place than people that were raised with that kind of media can't ever see themselves anywhere close to that you know, format mei, you're a lot like m Alice neily .

like fifty years old. I completely bench the election. Ve yard I just got okay.

So you know what i'm talking about?

I was watching IT. I was watching IT in new york at your place. He has rogan take.

Did did you see the elon one?

It's incredible, guys. I mean, I think like did did you .

put step on to this? Or did is IT just coincidence maybe .

the algorithms out that I was .

browsing IT, but you on my profile, on my TV, by the way, your face is on my profile.

that maybe why I mean, i'm sure he found IT himself, but definitely just like longer video essays and is but they're .

almost like their their music videos. Alex basic, yeah.

they are very creative and I think there's different formats for stuff. He does long and short that the rogan take downs. And this is whole this this whole like Austin in comedy scene that is kind of some I funded by a joe rogan.

And he does, he does a lot of kind of explorations of that. Really great. Every time I turn on the t something like CNN like, what are we watching? This is like baby news. Is what you mean.

baby? What you mean.

baby news. So you wash the stuff, this very little substance, there's obviously a ton of padding. Then they bring on these talking heads who just repeat the same things. I don't know it's it's very hard for me to take IT all seriously. I don't even understand how it's still in the air.

You reminds you when I go to like the U K. First i'm going next week case anyone around but i'll i'll turn on like BBC news night and it's totally different in american TV and almost looks like a parity and then I start to realize that actually know like american cable news does look like a parity of cable news this point like just in all yeah I mean, Anderson.

exactly and you have all these kind of like Anderson Cooper looking into the camera doing these dramatic pauses is like acting like he's surprised about things that coming on to tell the prompt all that stuff is just, I give me a break but I think .

what it's baby news.

Baby news yeah I mean that so I don't know I mean, maybe that's what we're doing to i'm sure how much how .

much we're adding. Definitely this is baby podcasting.

yeah. So let a modern persuasion because I think what you're talking about is to me, you want a lot of the the the naval gazing with that happening right now, particularly with the news media, it's really less about IT used to be about, oh, how do we get trust back.

But now it's really a crisis of relevance like there's not I think this election made very clear that large portions of the news media is irrelevant to most of the audience really this point. I mean, he look at all of this sort of issues that were being highlighted, that were being pushed. They just didn't persuade at all.

And I think that there is this idea that you know, media is supposedly to be about informing, but it's really moved into. And if that always been there, it's been about persuasion. And it's less persuasive than ever to me that the downstream of being less vant than the on the manuals here, I do find fascinated.

I know alex, I know you're going to be trigger by this because this is strung up. And I think IT is pretty clear. The data showing that it's it's pretty persuasive. But you want to start us off with like how you're thinking about what underpins modern .

pressures will try. I mean, I thought, by the way, to start that you had you laid out and sort of equivalence across all the mediums of the sort of before and after, like what newspapers become, what lifestyles gazing es have become. And what we're all wrestling with, I think, is like a mental model for for this kind of information space and how how we participated in this in IT as business people or politicians that, you know need to use IT to to advance in agenda. And and I think that the conversation about the manufacture, what did alex call IT last week?

Something else, the griffius?

I mean, I don't know know .

the me something I want to I guess I think that people well, it's it's a good starting point because IT has characteristics that I think tell the story of what what this kind, what the ingredient are in the modern landscape and and let me try to break break IT down a little bit. Is that a lot of these you like, they're not just political. It's not just political commentary.

It's much broader than that. Like the connection I was in A I was in a uber last week in the U. K.

And the driver was a guy from mister europe who had lived in dallas and been chased out of the country because he did name papers and happened to love trump, and was like a Young guy, Young man, and was, and I said, like, who do you follow? And he said, I mostly follow the comedians. And so IT was clear to me that like that his path in was A, I guess, fundamentally about entertainment.

And when you break down the manos here, what you see is IT may have started in the gaming world. IT may have been part of this kind of participatory entertainment where you chat and play, sort of engage in a gaming environment and talk shit at the same time. IT may have started with sort of almost self help about, like, dude, self help rooted, I guess, in kind of mine, alipay.

IT might be about health, like getting jack working out, being strong. And you see a lot of those themes. And then also it's about hostile culture, like how to make money, how to make bank. And all of those things have been connected to politics.

And so you've got this world of almost kind of a follow up to talk radio, which is greeted by comedy or a reference or just like lad talk, and also where people can really find themselves in IT because it's about I eat, finding kind of male identity and and then health is connected to that, which I think makes IT really compelling for people that are looking to just kind of realized their own potential in the world. So I think that one that becomes about your health journey becomes really personal. And then it's it's like how you're going to like make money, like how you going na get ahead, how you gonna take back what's yours.

And so IT gets read. It's all of those things put together. And if you can, if you can insert a movement inside of that, if you can insert politics inside of that, you got the man like, it's really powerful. And I think that like narrow, like old fashion identity politics that are going to be the kind of how we see what dict ates, how you someone's going to vote, or how they think about the world not are not nearly as powerful, is this type of kind of participatory, Young, male, high mind media. And so I I think if we understood why the why this type of media and the personalities that fronted are so powerful weaken, we can connect some dots in terms of what media looks like next that make sense.

Yeah, almost. Why do you think that the of, first of all, do you think these these voices are powerful and and secondly, why do you see what what do you on pack? Because I mean, IT is just one particular demography. And I think I caught a lot of people unaware because they don't think a lot about Young man.

because I want I don't know about connecting IT to the results in any meaningful way. I mean, he obviously had some impact, but there were lots of things that play right during the election. So less comfortable about connecting the tube. But IT is force, I want, has been growing for a while. I might have started definitely started on on, on the internet, on forms. But I was looking at and wondering, like, hasn't IT kind of the ability to influence Young men has kind of been weapon zed throughout history? So, and this seems to be just like a new version of of that you promise them, you know, you promise them like a Better body, more money that women are gonna like you power.

and the more distances offer. And this, I think I .

think I think it's always it's all as I mean, it's like rogan or Peterson or any one of these things is all about like boosting your body, like you know relationship with women, they also like and it's it's also like just like a gross club, right? Very few bases .

the women are doing for b.

They're like with all the but that's not the idea, right?

Like I think if you feel I wasn't commending on whether there was women and or or not, I was saying, what can we learn about media from this? And there is a related point, and IT seems to me, Brown, that the right leaves far more room for the centers, for crackpots, for opinion outside of these sort of prescribed agenda. And as a result, you can come to create a big tent of luna s. That all want you and i'm not preparative here like all they can all kind of participate in this thing whether like, you know, the dnc kicks hasan piker out of the convention because they don't like his views on palestine yeah and they were they worried that that's gona hijack their agenda or the calm that, or the alignment that they were looking for at the event yeah.

And meanwhile, I mean, meanwhile, like that, this kind of manos here type media also exists in the left. And hasan piker, a great example. He is a mortal enemy and a guy called destiny who's also like deepa st, started as a game streamer.

And these guys get huge audiences. But IT looks like the one on the right is maybe Better organized and concentrate around the same topics. But if you look at IT, right, not all.

There's a spectrum on one side which I think is more benevolent as their huber man guys, right? And probably the lex freeman who have some agenda, you know, but broadly kind of building kind of media empires around that stuff and it's and good for them. And on the other side, you have one hundred eight.

And that stuff is is purely of how you relate to women like you, how you know, how you make money and and everything in the middle, like over lapse. And if you listen to these things, I, I, I listen to this podcast called decoding the girls. They also have a pretty active rather community.

Where is these two academics kind of just go through a lot of, you know what they call the girl is where is you know Jordan Peterson or or now a rustle brand? All these guys and and kind of you know traces their path, you know and there's so much overlap between these guys, there's overlap. And the where their media is structured overlaps in the way they make money.

They participate in wein hours together. I mean, you'll be happy to hear that. And like, I mean, if you look at some of these webinars, it's like the list of the people you think and some of them are, you would say, maybe more destructive than others, but they all kind of gathered together because they know there's so much over up in their audience. I don't just been really interesting to watch, but the aid happens on the left as well is just more distributed, I think. Yeah.

the headline the headline for me and this is that persuading is participatory IT means that you have to allow space for people to be part of IT. It's not like you're gonna read an article or watch CNN and be moved by IT. The internet is is a participatory medium and this is so so if you're gonna create a tent, but almost by definition have to create room for different points of view that fit in with a brother narrative.

So can media corp, this I cannot be reverse engineered, or does IT go on a totally, I mean that the mainstream media package media would have everyone to call a legacy dia. Or is this always going to be an unfair fight? I mean.

because you're going I don't I think it's game over. Like the best social the paris social relationship that people have with podcasts, ers and streamers is so much more powerful than with the media, than a talking head. There is no connection. There isn't no.

Yeah but I mean, like what i'm wondering is like if you're sitting in like a legacy media company, okay, do you look at what's going on? Same okay. Well, we need our own creator stretch. We've a lot of have a lot of a lot of levers to poll you. We've got we've got brand relationships. You look at the the quality of advertising that, that still goes into media companies versus you know, I I find a hilarious that talk crossing is a good job reading his ads because he he he does the same gusta when he's reading some VP ad SHE does her deconstruction the deep state I appreciate I because .

I doesn't really matter what he says. I think.

right you know they're listening to you, don't you?

Yeah I mean, you just make a face like you just smell the fed and ask a question. That's great.

I think I think that there's an interesting question about whether or not you legacy media can adapt and and adopt some of of these um approaches that are clearly effective. And there's a big day going about whether cording to the left, which is masticate ministry media, think this question needs its own. Joe roan know.

but they had joe rogan.

But then the tent is too small because you'll reconsider asking questions about things. And and then now that's account, right? That force, critical force stem, right?

Yeah I mean, I think the left needing is on georgina is is an interesting one because what is joe rogan is is kind of hard to, I think, like a lot, a lot of the appeal about georgis that IT IT uses this kind of conspiracy theory, mindless right, and then attaches IT to work just having a conversation type format. And I don't know if that applies to everyone and if you can build, you know something yeah that that doesn't this stuff .

is part of the manufacture, by the way. That is totally part of the manual here.

But I I was part I was part of the documents are like, just like weird things that you could find on the internet would like. Form m is run by a conspiracy series, and he would get into these long conversations on r about stuff. And sixteen year olds would like, eat that up.

And then we talk about IT. And then I was also linked with like downloading, downloading the software and you know, sharing hacking tools and all that type of stuff. IT all started. There was probably ten thousand people, and it's the same thing is just been turned into entertainment that's like much easier to consume. And it's fun. It's fun to listen to conspiracy theories, right? It's really it's that they've managed you know, I keep saying that like everything is entertainment, they've just managed to baLance that like entertainment and news worthiness .

stuff yeah IT also comes IT also comes at a good time because I think there is no denying that mainstream dia's liberal, and that is the structure of mainstream media, is about control and that the internet is undermining that. And that is the perfect time for the people that don't, you know, see themselves or find their power centers in mainstream media to tear IT down.

And a tarot down means to push on the other side, and which means that you have to everybody that you is newly empowered by, you know, the physics of the internet now have a single agenda, which is, you know, that type of media is over. You know, we are part of the next thing. And the next thing is aligned with, for the most, paris, aligned with Better, along with a righting agenda.

Well, because it's popular, right? And we're in a popular era and it's a it's a right wing populism that's taken root, not a left wing populism. And yeah, I mean, that's why it's a inevitably political at the end of the day because it's just it's just an off shit of the overall populous shift.

I think I keep hearing that mainstream media is liberal, but like doesn't forget like gona dismiss like syn Clair owning most of the local T V station. Doesn't I dismiss like fox news only only seventy percent. I think I don't think the news media is not a liberal at all. Yes.

that's why that's why the term is like talk because it's like more like institutional media, right? It's like i'm sorry you're you're gonna walk through like the new york times, the news room and you can spit. You're not going to hit many like you .

know can set how much of that is that is that the right has gone. If you actually look, analyze an outsider, if I look at kind of institutional media here, sure, you have M S N B C and certain things like that, that are very liberal. But the majority of the of the like, if you turn on cbs, and that doesn't read as liberal to me if you like, and it's just he feels that the rights on so right that everything else looks very, very maybe.

but I think that the new york post and and fox news are characters that sit on on the right side side of this. But for the most part, when you think about media being liberal or legacy media being liberal, it's not just the new york times, the newsroom, it's all of hollywood. It's all it's the culture creators, right? It's it's more than just a news, alex.

but that's always been in the case. I mean, if you if you go back to the thirties, you know you go to paris or or or berlin yourself like that just you know like the artists were always the more liberal ones, right? Artists were always kind of the ones flooding with communism. Like, I think none of that suffers, particularly I think.

what about you? I am.

Yeah, that's true. This proves my, I mean, I just that prom probably proves my point at all. Artists is gently yeah, but do you know what I mean? I don't I think people are reading into that and it's maybe the data will prove itself out. But the effect the format, the format is really good at influencing people because it's about sitting with hours while you're to work, while you're driving, listening to this stuff, right? It's very compelling.

right? Hey, why would you mind taking people through your sort of before after .

framework going to think there a big f like newspapers become like what the A, I companies are at. At the at the event I did last night, we had a, we had a group discussion and it's charm house, so I will discussed the person. But this person was saying basically that SHE got a totally delusions, the approach of publisher news publishers to AI because the AI companies are already doing, in her view, a Better job.

Um then a lot SHE caught up actually the washington, the post, he said I would rather have perplexities formation of a topic then you know, the washington post with their AI chapa. I want to have different perspectives. And Frankly, in her view, like the A S getting to the point where it's actually doing the writing Better and in many cases, anyway. So I think it's pretty I don't think did you can see particle that I finally came out?

Um are you? I use, I use so yeah .

and I mean.

IT just shows the the sort of the massively expanded interface possibilities with no A I is the aggregation tool. It's it's a really fun tilt use.

And then if you think about lifestyle magazines, craters have replaced them, right? I mean, we had a brian, uh, gold berg who's best to my event last night. Body cancelled. He's assisting cancelled foreign brand. You know you d look at what you know he's doing with like influences at bustle.

I mean, that's just it's kind of a tell right like it's the that the heat has moved to these these influencers, sometimes creators, but they're really influencers, whether the you know the brands themselves, like in a lot of these magazine companies, they they they're not nearly as relevant. I think I think moxi a made like a very good case, you know, for complex is still difficult. Me to think that for that demographic that you know what was like a classic and was basically a magazine brand is as relevant now now as I was previously.

And then you look at the cable news that's clearly shifted to podcast in youtube. S like that snot going back. I mean, these audience says on these cable news programmes, we see the commercials.

It's often like super old people. And this also is bias towards, I think I just think that right now, the conservative are far Better at youtube and podcasting progresses. But I think the of each, when you look at network news, I think that's x and threads, right?

It's onna split down the middle. Just as you know, access is already it's amazing how much that has shifted to a very right wing. It's impossible to get away from some of these characters.

That guy, this is shown mya. He's like A V C at sqa. No idea. He's he's like K, P, H, D and physic. Anyone who puts academic credentials in their bio, you know, I can't get, I can't get away from this guy. I don't know why he keeps telling me about like this, because I cannot .

get away from him the whole .

thing out .

you can just like to well.

that's the only way but I mean, like it's kind of insect that leg ella must took this over about free speech and IT is like dirty IT has turned IT into its a propaganda before .

choice before choice says that that is elon arrangement sydney .

right now IT is not, he said, said he was about.

he said he wanted free speech and he's applying his, I just want .

media news. I do not want the stuff. I don't want IT I P. I keep muting elan muss himself. I don't want the islamophobia month.

The only, yeah the only. The only thing that is surprising is just how obviously was at the time that that this was gonna happen. It's funny.

Threads right now is interesting. It's a lot of people saying I left twitter and i'm joining blue sky is a fucking in, miss. Okay, blue sky is definitely blue guys definitely having its moment, but isn't so to me like I am sorry.

And the final one is cable TV moves in the streaming and youtube.

okay. So you said this to reach up there, because is a nice framework that newspapers or the daily access information gets gets kind of trumped by the new aggregators and A I perplexity open or chat, bt or whatever, lifestyle magazines.

You know, the power, their shifts to your kind of daily blend of creators that are uninsured red by media brands that have all you know, they are not going to be d platform, that there is an infinite number of places for them to communicate with you. And it's about their their personal brands. Cable news has become podcasting. I think you said, is that right?

And youtube, I mean, I think those things are now like almost the same thing.

Yeah the network the thing that you go to for up to the minute news becomes these politicized platforms like exxon and threads, right? And they're not neutral anymore just like, you know CNN and fox are not neutral and cable is just you know whatever streamers is that yes, how you see that's .

pretty much IT. That's that's my framework.

Oh, I could I .

think it's is especially interesting as all of all of these things are also then algorithmic, right? And access to all content is moving to algorithms and A I specifically and things like perplexity is kind of like IT feels like the final form of an algorithm where you're just asking for something and IT pulls from all of these. So I think it's is somewhat different to the other types of media that exists that there is going to be interesting to see how people can make IT, you know, digest and record videos and things like this, which I think you are is going to happen.

But does does A I eat up a lot of this stuff too at some point because if you go about kind of like the reduction of friction laws that happen in tech is like IT is just about removing clicks, removing removing steps to the thing you want, right? And so maybe even browsing through instagram feels like friction of a time or looking at the youtube feed and and some of these tools are becoming really, really good, right? Like at some point you'll be hoping onto perplexity and you won't have to type anything. It'll just say, hi, brian, here's what's going on. You know, it's it's a massive shift that .

I think subset is actually in, in an interesting position here because it's one of it's become a platform the end of the day, and it's one of the few places that, that is bringing both sides of the political divide. You know they are both on IT and they really they muscle their way through, you know the the people who wanted them to move in a progressive direction. And I think that's gonna proved to be a really smart decision because it's differentiates IT.

Yeah, I mean, where they pushing for to move into progressive direction or they asking for new ones to be taken off the you know mean.

there was .

definitely a bit of there was definitely a bit of both. But I think that sometimes I all of that I know that some folks left because very specific publications .

were on the platforms. Well, we're in a year time where the political like having open, I never believe this, but this would be the case. But that coon code free speech has, you know, the the idea that the way to combat speech don't like as more speech.

And I know all of the the arguments cy aside with algorithms and all that stuff, but that that has become a political issue. I didn't really think of IT. IT used to be more of a left wing issue, but now it's it's an issue that divides the more progressive sides of media from the from the more conservative sites.

Yeah, I mean, I think and I think we're seeing IT IT exists on both sides right now. The new twitter is definitely kind of tweet alora m and and and the issue is always like, you know, I think one sub stack was just like, here's a thing, publisher thing, have your newsletter, that's one thing.

When they start becoming a content platform that promotes content to each other, it's more you can become more of business decisions where, like, I don't want to see the other side shit on my feed, right? Like I just don't or I don't want my advertising to be connected to these these types of views, right? And that's where a lot of these businesses, I think, in this new administration are going to bump into that at some point, right? So I don't know it's going to be interesting, but at at the end of the day, I mean, sub stack being a plan from nobody y's gna go to sub stack to read stuff. I don't think that's going to be I don't think that's gonna en. Why would you why like the idea, the idea brand, the idea like that people are already getting past the idea that you go to a specific brand to get content.

No, no, it's a specific person. I think that's different .

so that people want to .

have direct connection to to other human beings. And if it's mediated by a platform, that's one thing. But OK, the idea that we're just going to get a bunch of I A I aggregated stuff is I just don't believe that.

but it's not undifferentiated IT y plex. Tell me what, I give me a brand down of what was going on in prize prize world. There's there's creators I follow.

There is a very dynamic, active social media life. They're posting youtube videos. They are doing little clips here.

They have a patron. I can't keep up with that stuff. I wish I could say, like, k, you know, give me the latest from elephant's graveyard. And sure, IT might kind of pick the platform from there. But that's obviously to me, to me, to me. Obviously, the instate, if you believe that like technology is only about removing layers of attraction between you and the thing you want to do, I don't think anybody will be going to sub stack for that. I think sub stack people will be using sub stack for for staff.

It's hind A I don't like I know like a lot the legal issues, but like I mean, there has to be a limit to like the whole sale theft and breaking of the law that but I for IT a hallmark but brian.

but brian, I paid. I pay for your podcast and I pay for your newsletter.

And no.

I don't actually. But the thing is like the paywall is is just like one function away from being disrupted IT. Because like if I pay, I have a paywall, I have distinct LED the browser, I have an agent, right, you know that that runs by browser that can easily go to your site with my log in credentials.

There's a problem with that. I just will never set foot in sub stack again. I don't want to do that, you know.

And I think if you if you're looking and and I know I am getting i'm getting into futurism here, I use something called the art broster. They were building a Better brother er devane that not be doing a second one. And the next version of there is going to be something that is much more AI driven.

They're not giving a ton of details OpenAI perplex. The all of these guys are saying that they're building agents that can do for you, you know, like the rabbit are one that the troy bought a little device was that there was the promise that they would do task for you once these things can do tasks for you. IT doesn't matter what platform deals they make.

Well, that's interesting. So I guess what my question is, what does agented media and look like, right? Like because IT seems like it's pretty clear that like everyone wanted to control the interface, they want they want to be doing the retrieval and they just want everyone else to be served. So whatever. And just like travelling content out there to be like manipulated or so, I just don't understand how agented media works as a concept.

People will have different things that they enjoy that includes friction, right? Like I like I still like reading a paper book Better than I like me know using my kindle or listening to audio book, and I choose to do that. But that's probably like a fraction of my media diet.

The majority of your media diet is is kind of like, I think the the quick kest kind of most enjoyable a version of that, right? So if I have right now, I subscribed to things on on podcast, apple podcast that I pay for. I pay for some stuff on on patron. I pay maybe for some news letter in use, letters as I have subscriptions to certain things and certain kind of like a media sites. And if if something could just go and do the work for me and pull IT out and give me clips of videos and read IT out and and pull out the stuff that I like, i'd pretty sure I would spend much less time on these sites.

Yeah, I mean, okay, starman, I get that there .

is I know. no. I when I was talking about this two years ago, and IT was a right.

when you when you forecast out far enough, you'll always be right.

right far enough, never.

never put on a prediction. Just talking about pod casters.

I mean, I think what brian scraping with is mean for a long, long time. In the future, there will be a layer below the aggregation layer, manifest in different ways. That layer could be in the form of you reading an email from Brown morrows y or connecting via sub stack, or the mechanisms that they create both monetization, right? They they manage a monetization later for creators or end, they fire out emails.

And I think that that layer below the aggregator will exist for a long time, just as the layer will exist in a fillip media where if you need to make sense of the best payroll system to get, you might not get all the information directly from the aggregator, you may go to someone who's done, who has a differentiated data set, who's done the work, who's made IT redial and legible and understandable, and whose brand you trust. I think that those those layers that really are about media will exist for a long time. The question the brian asked, which is I think the question is asking, is when everything gets absorbed in the aggregation layer and you are just shoveling your content into the coal into the fire that like there's no you know there's no mechanism for you to be rewarded for doing that. I don't think we disagree.

but maybe my point of views more optimistic. I was having conversations over the last two weeks with a few people in the video game industry like really large companies, and they're all saying everything is moving to algorithmic to the point where, like you know, we used to be able to spend money to advertise for four game, and they used our structures of big company, used to allow us to put a game in front of people because, you know, we had these, you know, we had events and we had magazines that we could put stuff in.

We can, we had, like these game news outlet, that because all of that stuff is going away and everything is becoming so much more algorithm, and the algorithm is fed by a bunch of creators that make your game successful or not. And so all the investments right now is moving away from creating these structures of like, okay, we're going to publish your game and here's how much we're going to push to. Hey, is this team that we're investing in creative enough to stand out to create something that's compelling? Because if IT is compelling, the algorithm find IT and it's much more about building quality content.

And that's right now being placed are just like let's that's fund creative teams. Let's let's give them autonomy, let's allow them to kind of build an audience because the algorithms are so good that if if there's something compelling for an audience, that audience will find IT. Now that that's kind of the new.

And I think that if you look at A I is kind of this final stage of some things is like, hey, find me something to do. Find me something to play. I don't only want to read brian, but I want to read about this topic. And turns out brian is a subscription I have and I will pull IT out.

And so as as you know, as you trying to figure out what media companies are doing next, like maybe you step back and maybe you funded these little different microgrid of people that are doing interesting things because at the end of the day, the other government is going to scare you. Care about your corporate structure, your brand and the amount of kind of infrastructure that you have is not gonna care of your on uh hive or behavior or sub stack or patrona whatever, it's just going to find the information. And I think I I feel like optimistic that good stuff is going to connect to the people that wanted.

I think they're just gonna get much, much Better at that, the same way they did with advertising, you know, like experience advertising on instagram. It's nearly fucking magical, right? And so the the future is becoming much more alyth mics based. And I think when you look at something like AI chatbot, that's kind of a final stage of that. And I do do without what you will, but I think bryan is actually on the right path.

Oh, thank good.

Thank god. I mean that, well.

I mean.

want to stop CNN where where CNN in this thing. Nobody is going to type CNN to talk to their I and D I might just like, will probably value the continent CNN making at a million dollars a minute, the same as what like elephant and graphic art like, know, thirty dollars. So try take the counter.

I would like to hear the counter there that CNN and its ilk are not just ultimately just managing decline. And look, there is there's a lot of value and managing decline, no problem. But I is there any conception in this world this says broadly like what Alexis is, is talking about where CNN is actually a bigger, more profitable entity in five years that IT is now. Like it's it's hard for me to see that path. But like maybe mark tomson has some tricks up ously.

I think there's an argument to be made IT might be hugely speculative. The reason that I like CNN as an example in this more than say a you know historic or you lang standing kind of media brand and say the lifestyle space, is because CNN is like their model, a created a level of funding, and what is so suited to the media that is attached to the escaping that is really difficult.

And so CNN is in a place like news weak west, right, where the idea of weakly, you know, news and lifestyle fed to you in a print publication like escaping that was really, really difficult. And those types of publications like, you know, business week or or or or news week have become a shadow what they were, right? Like it's really hard to find to reinterpret that idea for a new, a new environment.

Now CNN, if you were just to have fun with this, the question you asked and you thought, well, CNN is a global news gathering mechanism. Reporting is still important, being there, listening to people, making sense out of what's going on in the world. I E like a global news gather and capability is still important in doing that against a brand that people, you know can trust IT, you know, has value.

Then you could see how CNN could could continue to be, you know, relevant now. Then you would say, well, what form does that taken? How do they find their way in a paralysis? Comment through the algorithm? Well, your cost has to go way down of doing that news gathering.

Your personalization has to go way up. The intimacy with which you in now engage another human being has to be material ally different, either because it's dramatically sort of more personalized in its format or more human. And therefore, you want to engage in IT like as as a consumer of that.

So you could imagine that CNN had a radically different cost space that IT was, you know, a huge global repository of reporting and data fed through a layer of personalization delivered to you in your phone, you know, in the format that you want read by whoever you wanted. And they became an interface layer, a trusted interface layer, for news delivered how and when you wanted IT in a new world? Could that exist? yes.

Now the steps from here to there, and could I be add funded or subscription funded? I am assuming I could. Are, you know, the steps technologically and and in terms of the cultural transformation, are super intimidating, like basically get rid of everything that you have today, with the exception of your sort of reporting layer, and find a materially different type of personality that people want to engage with and completely reactor your cost structure. So if you can do that, great in the, you know on the way there, if you're more tomson, someone may restore your life like you may not make IT through because it's just I mean, I just I think that it's it's ten years of pain and suffering.

I can't see them becoming the interface. I think you know.

you understand what I said. Could you build on IT? You make a Better?

We could game A I, A dude. We could make IT. We could make IT fun, right? Like I would be, you know, snoop.

we'll be reading your news, right.

right? But everything is about talking heads and they're not even the right in. And so I mean.

and when we talk about news, when we talk about news, we're saying like they offering such as a service that is so indefensible in the news gathering, you have things like the ap, you know reuters, afp, you know that the chinese free present and all of these kind of large news organization which provide a ton of news, right? So that's covered that eo. You might say, well, you know their biased, whatever, but that's covered that we don't need CNN for that. Then you think about the interface.

Now I disagree, I disagree. I mean, I get we are saying because I think a lot of that night, I was pointed out, like last night, that like the only the only news deal that matter has done is like with reid's, like they want like the news wires because they need breath and and all that. But having unique breaking news still has value.

And and if you look at like all of the trump appointments, it's all been broken by the the the legacy media. If you're bringing new information in the table, if he is waiting for like people to publish press releases, yes, absolutely. A I can do that pressure, but I don't think but .

that I press organizations like the A P theron .

and reporting is not come on, alex.

It's not just .

something that someone else can do.

I'm not dancing on the grave of this thing. I'm not happy about that. What i'm what i'm saying is when you when you are playing things like, okay, here here, here's where you can come from.

You have you can strike deals with the ap and royal ers at the blue books of the world. You have direct fees coming from every single party and celebrity coming in from social media. You have a giant ecosystem of pound data that happens over podcast and youtube. And then you have a single interface that is kind of like a plexi OpenAI interface that gathers that stuff like I I think you saying well, but CNN has fine, right? CNN has really nice stables and maybe we'll park our cars in this table, but it's like, I don't understand what they IT is managed.

You are absolutely on fire today.

You're doing a .

great I don't know. I was I will not your counterpoint to my point of of the value yer that CNN could occupy. They would have to be they might have to add more value than I articulated.

I mean, I think you broke the fourth wall, so you kind of took the air of but I think I really believe that. I think it's that's why i'm getting a little, I think I guess, frustrated that we keep talking about these things because sure is a chance. But it's mtv right like it's mtv. And right now, what we're saying, mtv, you know, you should stop playing music videos and just think, yeah, I know, but i'm repeating IT because that's also good podcasting but if you know it's the same thing.

well, should we go a good product or what do we need .

finish? They listen to a seven hour next freeman podcast.

Yeah, he does. Why everyone with someone, right? Yeah, the anthropic.

you know, when people used to say, well, the podcasts an be more than twenty minutes long. That was like old media thinking podger should like I was that I I can do that. No, I used to do .

IT for the length of the commute. I figured a half hour was good because that's that's the average length of the community.

No, no, you really need to, you know, there. I once saw national geographic video about this gold harder, like, hi, and nepalese mountain somewhere, I think. And he would, they would use kind of these large eagles, I guess, as a way to deter walls, right? They would train these eagles to attack the walls and save their flock, and the way they would do IT, as they would capture one of these giant birds, put them in a little hut and for twenty four hours, just like, play a little like guitar thing to them.

So whenever the bird would want to fall asleep and would just like, and then at the end of IT, they would break the bird and they would have a train eagle that would attack walls. And I think that's what podcasts are. You just break, you just keep going.

Keep legs, keep just talking, keep talking legs. Yes, it's all about love and friendship and understanding each other and everybody having a point of view. And you keep going, keep going until you you know you take over the brains wiring and that said you and then then you can sell them supplements, which is great. So I I like .

he goes through like eleven eleven straight of like supplement.

I break you. Yeah, exactly.

You just broke me. I don't think I can do a good product anymore.

I A good one.

Maybe because I .

don't know .

what .

IT is .

in mean magic mind.

Yeah, I got advertised this on instagram by fucking the comedian pete homes. And I bought IT and IT works. And it's probably why i'm so fired .

up right now that's .

on good choice feeling. And bolden.

Well, I think this cup product ties into what I like are saying about good things being surfaced by the algorithm. And this one broke through about six months ago and broke through kind of quickly. There's this this kid from me, jersey.

I think he's twenty three years old, seems to my gorden he was on snl this week, so he's kind of completely broken through. But I think his his his name, his third stage name or musical name is Mickey mk dot G E E. And I think he's a kind of generational guitar phenomenon and he's got this new album called two star in the dream police.

And what's amazing about IT is it's kind of new in terms of the way that he manages the instrument so that it's kind of got these like eighties, kinda soft, so fl vibes when he plays IT, but he hooks up his set up. A lot of people geek out to is set up on youtube because he he runs stuff through this four track where if the signal is to intensive the stores. And so it's this kind of combination of a kind of gentle Melody guitar playing with like, like little, punctuated with like really kind of metals sounding disruptive interludes.

And so IT works as like, who is this kid who's on youtube? Or he did this really amazing video with this other artist. Didion.

oh my god, he's incredible.

incredible. But he did this youtube thing called big mikes. You should check that out.

It's one of my favorite tracks.

and I love that track, and I love how they did that video, and I love how they miked IT. And IT was alive, and IT was so great.

And the guitar player on that was miki.

And that that was kind of how I started. And it's like france ocean vives meets kind of fill Collins but like reminisce of early prince and feels a little like bonev the police. The whole thing is great and he's sings to the guitar and she's got a great voice. And seven, nine, my son were completely nursing out on its set, just sam live in brooklyn.

And and he came out, he came out of on youtube. R.

yeah, he can came out of the algorithm lix. And he just kind of pop, and he's like everywhere.

So but this is this is IT like, you know, this is a podcast about finding patterns and it's and a lot of this stuff is about pattern breaking. It's about doing something different that the algorithm kind of spots and and pushes up and it's all becoming like that.

And when you hear him, you're like this is different, but it's familiar and IT broke.

So you're saying ly trying to trying to like pattern match to the algorithm. I mean, I guess the hopeful thing is that IT becomes like so hard to patter match the algorithm that your incense are to do things that are different yeah I mean.

I think good, good and different.

I think it's about finding an audience, right? Like I think that I think pattern matching starts working when you you know so so so the algorithm is like a stream going by, right? And you're just, do you have your you know you fishing roads in there and then when I when something you hooks, then that's when you patter match, then that's when you kind of lash on to what's working and double down on that, right?

Do you have a goal?

No, no, but I like analogies with my mind works. But yeah, I think I think it's really about working out and doing things differently when they tell you twenty minutes, maybe it's seven hours, oh, you know what? Electric tars are out and maybe there back in. And it's and it's cultures about repetition. Culture is about unus .

on the eagle, in the hot alex. The eagle gets so irritated by the guitar or guitar, I music, that when uncaged attack the wolff's.

okay, the thing that happens after that is they cut to, they cut to the guy at top of the hill, and the wolf is approaching its goat, and the fucking bird flies off the guys shoulder, grabs the wolf and flings them off a Cliff. IT is the most working at all piece of media have ever seen, have been trying to find a clip ever since but yeah, I think that was just like one .

of the most and that was all because they they tortured the bird with.

yeah, just because he likes freeman him and too .

full submission .

that's so IT works create .

tragic that's IT .

for this episode of people versus algorithms, where each week we uncover pattern shaping, media culture and technology. Big thanks is always to our producer. Vania arson SHE always makes us a little clear and more understandable.

And we appreciate her very, very, very much. If you're enjoying these conversations, we love for you to leave us a review. IT helps us get the word out and keeps our community growing. Remember, you can find people versus algorithms on apple podcast and spotify and now on youtube. Thanks for listening, and we will see you again next week.

awesome.

You guys.

yeah, really good bye. I need .

this right, I guess. but.