Tech News Weekly Episode 235 Transcript
Please be advised this transcript is AI-generated and may not be word for word. Time codes refer to the approximate times in the ad-supported version of the show.
Jason Howell (00:00:00):
Coming up next on Tech News Weekly. It's me, Jason Howell, and my co-host Mikah Sargent. And we got a lot to talk about today. Starting with Texas HB 20. This is the law in Texas that is now in effect impacting social media networks and impacting their ability to moderate content on the platform. Plus how to solve the pipeline problem to better utilize black tech workers in the workforce. Grubhub's free lunch promotion gone seriously awry. And finally, how drugs like fentanyl, dangerous drugs are being sold pretty easily on social media, all that more coming up next on Tech News Weekly.
... (00:00:39):
Podcasts you love from people you trust. This is TWiT.
Jason Howell (00:00:59):
This is Tech News Weekly episode 235 recorded Thursday May 19th, 2022. This episode of Tech News Weekly is brought to you by Barracuda. Barracuda has identified 13 types of email threats and how cyber criminals use them every day. Fishing conversation hacking ransomware, plus 10 more tricks. Cyber criminals use to steal money from your company or personal information from your employees and customers. Get your free ebook at barracuda.com/tnw
Mikah Sargent (00:01:29):
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Mikah Sargent (00:02:04):
Hello, and welcome to Tech News Weekly. The show where every week we talk to and about the people making and breaking the tech news. I am one of your hosts, Mikah Sargent,
Jason Howell (00:02:14):
And I'm the other guy, Jason, how good to see you, Mikah, thank you so much for for covering for me last week. It was <laugh> COVID was not nice to me, so I really appreciate you stepping in last minute. I know it was very last minute.
Mikah Sargent (00:02:27):
That is a okay. We got through it and we're back together again, virtually
Jason Howell (00:02:32):
<Laugh>
Mikah Sargent (00:02:32):
This week. So we're good.
Jason Howell (00:02:34):
We're good. That's right, right on. Well, let's get things started. Certainly. You've heard all about, you know, everything going on in Texas with content, you know, around content moderation, HB 30 content moderation on its surface, at least to me. And I think to a lot of other people feels like a necessary tool in just keeping the internet safe and oftentimes from literal harm in many ways, but the there's a law in Texas right now that was recently allowed to pass through on an appeal after first being shot down late last year. And it's really taking aim at the foundation of content moderation and scales out from there. And <laugh> as with everything these days, it's very political as well. So joining us to talk about this is T attorney and just all around knowledgeable guy on this subject from electronic frontier, foundation's Stanton legal fellow as well. Welcome to the show.
Mukund Rathi (00:03:30):
Thanks for having me on I'm a long time TWI fan.
Jason Howell (00:03:33):
Oh, right on. I love it when we hear that. That's great. That's a good bonus. So thanks for hopping on. We're happy to get you on today and we love the work that that BFF is doing. So it's it's good all around. So let's first of all talk a little bit about the Genesis of this because it's really, you know, everybody's, you know, in the technology press right now, everybody's talking about this now, but this isn't the first that we've heard about this. It kind of happened late last year. I think around October timeframe where this first popped up talk a little bit about the beginnings of HB 20 what exactly it is, how it ultimately came to life and then eventually got shot down late last year.
Mukund Rathi (00:04:14):
Sure. So HB 20 finds its origins and a lot of the controversy over content moderation. As you said, a lot of people see content moderation as a necessary practice on the internet. In order for people to find the information they care about and to stay away from the information they don't want the speech they don't want to see and things that are legitimately harmful to many people. Of course, there is also a lot of controversy over this moderation and especially a lot of the big platforms like Facebook, Google, which owns YouTube Instagram, which is owned by Facebook and not just app, but also Reddit Pinterest, any number of platforms use content moderation in ways that are controversial. They take down speech that many people feel should stay up and many different groups of people have claimed in the past. Rightly in many cases, I think that this is discriminatory and that errors are being made.
Mukund Rathi (00:05:09):
And so HB 20 is a law that Texas passed. And when governor Abbott signed the law, he said very openly that this is intended to protect conservatives from discrimination. And he kind of harken into this idea that these are big Silicon valley monopolistic liberal companies that are stifling, the voice of the little guy, the conservative in Texas. And whatever one thinks about whether that's actually happening is besides the point, as far as the law is concerned, the law is very clear. The first amendment makes it very clear that companies whether they run online platforms, whether they publish a newspaper, whether they have a television show, whether they're doing a radio show, they have the right to say certain things or not say other things. They have the right to host certain speech or not host other speech. And the government cannot say one way or another whether you know, they, the government can't interfere as far as that practice goes again, whether it's, we're gonna publish this in the newspaper, or we're gonna host this on our online platform, what HB 20 does is precisely that it tells platforms that have more than 50 million users.
Mukund Rathi (00:06:22):
So it, it is focused on large online platforms. It tells them that they can't discriminate when they do content moderation on the basis of the viewpoint of any user. So it's hard to know exactly what that means it's written very broadly, but what we can imagine, especially based on what governor ABD said about protecting conservatives, we can imagine that say someone posts something that repeats what many considered to be misinformation about the last presidential election. If the platform takes that down, but allows up other information about the 2020 election that says that the election was legitimate, that president Biden is the correct president. Then they could, that platform could be sued for viewpoint discrimination so that law was passed. But before it went into effect the government was sued by an association of technology companies on the basis of their first amendment rights and a federal district court in Texas entered an injunction, finding that the law violated the first amendment and prevented it from going into effect.
Jason Howell (00:07:32):
All right. And then that kind of brings us to the now, which <laugh> suddenly very suddenly it seemed it was undone in appeals court essentially. And and here we are in a situation where HB 20 is, I mean, it's, it's in effect, but are we seeing the effects of it yet on social media networks? And I'm sure they're, they're scrambling to figure out, like, what do we do as a business you know, in the state of Texas, if this continues to go forward, but are we starting to see kind of like the chilling effect of that?
Mukund Rathi (00:08:08):
Everyone definitely is scrambling. And what's happened just to give a little bit of background what's happened is that the Texas government appealed that district court decision up to the appellate court. They both sides submitted legal briefs. They went to court and they each argued their case. And that appellate court entered a very short one sentence order saying that the injunction entered by the lower court was stayed. So what that means is the law could go into effect. And as far as, you know, practically speaking, it is now in effect in Texas. And so what that means is technically when platforms, if they moderate content, and to be clear, we're not just talking about taking down content what the law defines as prohibited content moderation or censorship is basically any type of content moderation that can mean if you demonetize something, if you deprioritize it.
Mukund Rathi (00:09:05):
And it's unclear if it, it would even apply to things such as, you know, very commonplace things that platforms do, which is they try at least from their point of view from what they say, they try to show us content that appeals to what they believe our interests are. If someone indicates that they're not interested in your post on the election and the platform then chooses not to show you that post, that could fall into what the law defines as prohibited censorship. So, so that law is, is practically speaking in effect right now we have not seen any lawsuits filed, but the law allows is for the Texas attorney general or any tech, you know, internet user in Texas who believes they've been discriminated against to file a lawsuit. So we haven't seen that yet. It's entirely possible that that could drop any day now, before, you know, up until the Supreme court takes action.
Mukund Rathi (00:09:57):
Hopefully as far as whether we've seen chilling effects, it's hard to know you know, one of the, you know, there are many issues with content moderation, one of which is that it's not a transparent process. We don't always know what's going on behind the scenes of these companies when they shift their practices of content moderation. It's not always immediately apparent. We only learn if, you know, we begin to see aggregate effects, or if there's some leak document from a company saying that, oh, you know, we decided to make this shift and what content we allow or don't allow. But without a doubt, these companies are definitely scrambling. And to be honest, you know, so are we, and so is much of the legal community and the community around free speech, because this is such a frankly legally outrageous event.
Jason Howell (00:10:47):
That's interesting hearing you kind of go into a little bit deeper detail as far as the, the, the broader implications, because I hadn't really considered this before. What you are talking about really makes me think that on the broader scale, something like this might have impact on just any, any AR like AI, a AI is making a ton of the decisions behind the scenes to say, Hey, this person wants to see this, this person doesn't wanna see this, or even this, we want to protect this person from the harm that they face by seeing this. And if that is in any way, shaping what someone sees on the other end, what you're saying from what my understanding is of what you're saying, that could be construed as preventing someone from seeing something that that they should be able to see whether it's harmful or not. And that just makes me feel like the people behind the law, like, are they just not considering deeply enough, kind of the, the associated chaos that comes with an unmoderated platform, as far as that's concerned,
Mukund Rathi (00:11:50):
It's very hard to get into the, of yeah. These or any politicians and try to figure out what exactly were they thinking when they did this. Again, you know, the, the messaging around this law from governor Abbot and in the Texas legislature, was that we are trying to protect conservatives from discrimination by the big liberal tech companies. Of course they did not write the law in that specific of a way. They did not say you can't discriminate against conservative viewpoints. I think that would've been maybe even too obviously unconstitutional for them, what they said is you can't allow viewpoint discrimination. And so there is maybe an argument to be made that viewpoint discrimination does not include all content moderation. For example let's say platform has policies around you know, limiting content that promotes negative thoughts or even suicidal sharing of suicidal thoughts or suicidal encouragement.
Mukund Rathi (00:12:50):
We all know that that's a very big problem, especially for young people using social media that, that kind of negative thinking and, and suicidal thoughts can spread many platforms say, okay, we wanna protect young people from that. So we will stop content that encourages suicidal thoughts is that viewpoint discrimination is that discriminating against the viewpoint of people. And this is obviously terrible, but, you know, when it comes to free speech, we talk about a lot of terrible things. Mm-Hmm <affirmative> is that discriminating against the viewpoint of people who do encourage suicide, because unfortunately there are such people you know, in a sense that certainly could be true. And so in response to that platforms may say, okay, we are going to stop all content that discusses suicide, because we don't wanna be accused of viewpoint discrimination. So whether it's someone sharing suicidal, encouragement type of content or someone who's trying to educate people about suicide and about mental health awareness platforms may decide to avoid allegations of viewpoint discrimination, let's stop all of that content.
Mukund Rathi (00:13:54):
So that could be one effect of the law whether it was intended or not by the, by the politicians, that platforms will, will simply start taking down more content because they don't want to be accused of viewpoint discrimination. On the other hand, as you said, it's also possible that they platforms will choose to moderate less, they'll say, okay, we don't wanna be accused of viewpoint discrimination, so let's not take down anything. And and, and again, you know, this is, it's really hard to picture what exactly that would look like, because just to re reiterate, we're not just talking about taking down content, we're talking about basically any type of content moderation, including just basic curation, what order do things appear in your feed? That is something that, you know, platforms obviously spend a lot of time deciding and all of those decisions seem to also be covered by this law. So it, it definitely does open up all sorts of possibilities as to what could happen. And it's hard to imagine to be Frank, it's hard to imagine that the politicians that passed this law imagine that it would actually go into effect. I, I have to imagine that even they were surprised that the fifth circuit let it go into effect as it is now.
Jason Howell (00:15:08):
Yeah. Which is amazing when you really think about it, like let's violate the first amendment and just see what happens. So how is the FF fighting this explicitly? Like what, what are you, what are you doing behind the scenes to move towards that outcome, to, to where this law goes away? Cause I assume that's, I assume that's the stance that you're, you know, from, from everything that I've read from what you guys are putting out there, but like how what's working behind the scenes.
Mukund Rathi (00:15:36):
Yeah. So the eff has always as I said, we we've always supported the right to moderate content as protected on the first amendment. We've always said that governments cannot interfere with this, right? Whether it's the large platforms or with the smaller platforms that we often don't talk about, but who are ultimately affected in the downstream effects of these kinds of laws and regulations. And, and we think that's a really important part of how the internet operates is that users should be able to go online, find a platform that fits their needs. Different platforms have different approaches. Some are more allowing various types of content. Others are more restrictive. You know, it's hard to find a truly unmoderated platform where anything is allowed. And the few examples that we have of those are, are, you know, often notoriously rife with hate speech and racism and so on.
Mukund Rathi (00:16:29):
But we think it's important that the internet be a place where users can find and even create their own platforms with different such policies. So what we do you know, as a legal organization, one is, is we provide assistance to internet users who want to stand up for their rights. More often than not the social media platforms who are facing these kinds of laws are well able to defend themselves on their own. But FF will will discuss, you know, the first amendment issues with the legal community to come up with strategies. We also file what's called Amicus briefs in the courts. These are briefs submitted by third parties with an interest in the outcome of the case. So in the case of, of this law, HB 20 you know, a, as I mentioned it first went before the federal district court in Texas, then up to the appellate court, it's now up at the Supreme court. And at every stage, FF has filed a brief saying here is why as an organization that stands up for internet users, we think it's important for platforms to have these first amendment rights and be able to exercise them because in the end we do think that users benefit from an environment where everyone has that, right. And where the government doesn't get to dictate what happens.
Jason Howell (00:17:45):
Yeah, indeed. And that's why I really appreciate the work that you all all of you at the eff continue to do. So I really enjoy having you and bringing you on the show, Mora T from the FF eff.org, if people wanna follow the work that you're doing individually where can they find you?
Mukund Rathi (00:18:04):
You know, ironically, I try to stay off social media. Most of the time I use the internet plenty. But you know, the best place to follow FF is to go to ff.org. You can do some internet sleeping it if you want. I think I have a Twitter account somewhere that I probably close to occasionally. But T org is a, is a right ef.org is a great resource. I, you know, well, before I worked at this organization, I followed their news. We have a, a blog deep links where we publish regular updates on our take on what's happening in the tech and, and legal worlds
Jason Howell (00:18:38):
Right on, well, thank you so much for carving out some time for us today. Really appreciate it.
Mukund Rathi (00:18:43):
Thank you. This was great. Great being on great talking to you.
Jason Howell (00:18:46):
Absolutely. And best of luck, all right. Up next black representation among technical workers. And, you know, you've probably heard of it. The pipeline problem Mike is gonna get into all of that with our next guest. But first this episode, Tech News Weekly is brought to you by Barracuda in a recent email trend survey. 43% of respondents said that they've been victims of a spearing attack, but only 23% said they have dedicated spearing protection. Maybe probably need maybe that needs to be a little bit more. How are you keeping your email secure? That's the question and Barracuda has identified 13 types of email threats and how cyber criminals use them every day. Fishing conversation hacking ransomware, plus 10 more tricks, cyber criminals use to steal your money. <Laugh> from your company. Of course, maybe your personal information from your employees, your customers, and you are you protected against all 13 types?
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Mikah Sargent (00:22:16):
So you may have heard that tech has a talent pipeline problem. You may have even heard that big tech is trying to hire more black workers to different fields. And you may have heard that that is slowly improving, but despite the work that's being done, there still does seem to be some disconnect, something that is happening, where what they are trying to do is not happening. Joining us today from Protocol is Amber Burton, who has looked into this and is joining us today to talk about it. Welcome to the show, Amber.
Amber Burton (00:22:57):
Hi, thanks for having me.
Mikah Sargent (00:22:59):
Yeah, it is a pleasure to get you on. So I wanna talk first about kind of laying the groundwork here because you know, we've heard different stats about underrepresentation, but I think that the, the research that you included in this piece from the pew research center really kind of spells it out for us. Can you talk about underrepresentation of black technical workers please?
Amber Burton (00:23:25):
Yeah, it, it doesn't really get any clearer than what pew is found in its research and really what it comes down to is the numbers show that it's really remained quite stagnant in terms of representation for black tech workers, but underrepresented workers in tech as a whole. And so, you know, pew looked at, you know, black workers make up 11% of all employed adults in the United States, but, you know, compared to that, when you get into stem 9% of that representation as black workers, and it gets even smaller when you kind of drill down into, you know, if you look at engineering it's about 5% representation of, of, of black tech workers. And so it gets kind of smaller and smaller, but really those numbers have stayed quite stagnant. Pew found that there's been no change in the share of black workers in stem jobs since 2016.
Amber Burton (00:24:13):
And that's really been quite consistent with what we're seeing at Protocol. You know, I report on DEI, but reskilling and upskilling and training as well. And so a lot of our work is digging into those, you know, big impact reports that these big tech companies release every year or twice a year, and looking at their numbers and we've been tracking them for as long as a lot of these big companies have been releasing them publicly. And when you drill down into, you know, Latinx, black workers, a lot of those numbers have stayed right around the same that they were several years ago.
Mikah Sargent (00:24:46):
Mm-Hmm <affirmative> so then let's, so basically what that shows us is that yes, the, these numbers have not changed. And one thing that comes up whenever a company is asked about what's going on here is this idea that there is a talent pipeline problem. Could you please describe, or, or tell us what that means? If someone says those words, what is it that they're suggesting when they say those words that there's a talent pipeline problem, blind problem.
Amber Burton (00:25:19):
Yeah. It, it really almost spills like a buzzword these days. We hear that all the time and, and you start to wonder, okay, well, what, what is the pipeline problem? So what they're really talking about when, when they say that is that, you know, the talent that they were hoping to be readily available in there to enter into these in this instance, highly skilled tech jobs. I is not there. And so whether that be the skilling that needs to be done, the training or you know, people coming through certain college programs they're saying that the amount of talent I is not there and that more training needs to happen. And so it's, it's really quite interesting because you have the idea that there's not enough diverse talent coming through the pipeline, but then there's also the idea of, you know, it being more of a leaky pipeline.
Amber Burton (00:26:05):
Some of the experts that I talk to talk about it in, in those terms the K four center did a recent report looking into diversity and tech and they, they term it as the leaky pipeline. And, you know, it's really looking at, you know, where are in this case, where are black you know, tech workers kind of falling out of the pipeline or, or black students who might be on track to go into this field? Where, where are they kind of falling out? And where are the holes? That's maybe preventing them to get into the door. And then you know, maybe one answer to what is the pipeline problem that might be a little bit less satisfying. Is there are a lot of experts questioning, is it a pipeline issue? Is it more so a closed door is something that some people are starting to think about? That's preventing people before they even get into the interview seat or, or pass that screening interview. You know, what's really happening there. So I know it's kind of a squishy answer at times. It, it is a buzzword now, but yeah, that's, that's the pipeline problem.
Mikah Sargent (00:27:03):
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, and what you're, what you're pointing out is kind of where I was going with that in the sense that we hear about this, and it is starting to sound like an excuse as opposed to being, you know, this is the actual real deal complication that exists here. You spoke with the NAACP's director of education, innovation and research ivory Toson about H B C U recruitment efforts. So these are efforts to solve for this talent pipeline problem by recruiting at HBCUs. And Toson, I like this likened the problem to a glacier. Could you explain what what was meant by that? Why is it like a glacier?
Amber Burton (00:27:49):
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, using it, as in that way also helps me really understand it as well. And you can also maybe picture it as a pyramid. So that's really talking about how those easily identifiable schools at the top, you know, your Stanford, your MIT, your Ivy league schools, that's where a lot of these tech companies kind of go directly to, you know, where they already have a network. There's gonna be a smaller percentage of black and underrepresented students who are coming through, you know, a computer science program there. But that's where they're going. And so if you look beyond that level and you then look at HBCUs, you're going to get a larger level of black, you know, computer science graduates. And if you go beyond that, you're going to get to, you know, your state universities, your two-year institutions and community colleges, your technical training colleges, and you're gonna get an even larger number of underrepresented employees that you could possibly choose from.
Amber Burton (00:28:45):
And so if you think about it, as it's getting wider, you know, the further you get to the base that's where you're seeing most of the talent. But if you're only looking above that surface level, that top of the glacier, what you see, you're going to get a smaller number. And, you know, the, the challenge with that is you're really dependent on these schools and their diverse recruiting efforts. If you're really solely relying on those pools of talent. Whereas if you look beyond that, the further you go, the further out you go in terms of where people haven't traditionally proactively recruited, that you're going to get more underrepresented quality possible job candidates as well.
Mikah Sargent (00:29:25):
Mm-Hmm <affirmative>. So, just to clarify, or to, to confirm, basically in this situation, these these, these big tech companies are saying, we're doing recruitment, we're going, and we're looking for folks, but what they're doing is they are looking for black candidates at Ivy league schools, or well known technical colleges and what they are, they're looking for them there, and they're finding some, and they're hiring them. But what experts are saying is if, instead of only going to these places that you typically go to, if you would start looking in these even all the way out to state schools, or specifically technical colleges that you would be able to find more candidates. And so it's almost that they need to expand the pipeline. They're, they're working with some very thin pipe, and if they would just open it up a lot more than they would have a lot more candidates they could, they could pull from yes.
Amber Burton (00:30:21):
Yeah, yeah, that's correct. And I, I like that idea expanding the pipeline. And I, and it's not to say that they're not looking at these schools, you know, they are looking at state schools and HBCUs, but it's more so are they proactively looking, are they, you know, putting just as much investment in time recruiting there as, as the top schools that they usually go to as well?
Mikah Sargent (00:30:41):
Got it. So then this is where that question comes up. If there are loads of initiatives and programs out there that are aimed at better representation, then what is it that's keeping those initiatives and programs from having an actual impact on job numbers? This is, you know, sort of a larger question outside of just the, the glacier or the pyramid or the, the wider pipe. There's sort of specifics that you mention in your piece about what experts are saying needs to be changed in order for this to improve.
Amber Burton (00:31:15):
Yeah. Yeah. It's really about scale. I mean, so it's, it's not to say that these, these partnerships that, that do exist with HBCs aren't necessarily effective. You could question that in, in many different ways, cause they're all very different, but what it really comes down to scale. I mean, a company might have an initiative that partners with 100 students and, and that's really great and, and really impactful, but when it comes to those thousands of applications that are, you know, flooding into a company every day, it's not quite clear that black and underrepresented candidates are having that same level of success. And so it's, it's really about that scale. And if companies aren't really intentional, there can be that disconnect between the people who are spearheading and leading these internal H B C U partnerships, and the people who are doing the day to day hiring those hiring managers who are interviewing and selecting candidates. They're often two different people within a company. And so if you don't have more of that kind of connection you're definitely gonna see a disconnect.
Mikah Sargent (00:32:15):
Mm-Hmm <affirmative> that makes sense. You mentioned deep work as this solution to this pipeline problem. What is it exactly, you know, when, when they're talking about deep work, this, this is kind of this larger the scaling of course, but also a conceptual shift and a culture shift that comes into play what all is involved with that deep work that needs to be done. And because of the fact that it's deep work, do you think that that then has an impact on companies who are saying, we're trying to make these changes, but we're trying to do them while remaining on a budget and deep work is something maybe that they're afraid of having to do for the bottom line.
Amber Burton (00:32:59):
Yeah, absolutely. So work can look like a few different things. And so I spoke to Allison Scott who's the CEO of the Capor center and, and heads a lot of their research as well. And she really mentioned, you know, that work could look like a really engaging partnership in which you partner with an H B C U when you bring them on, you know, almost in an internship capacity in, in addition to training. And it leads to employment. That's more deep work when you know that it's going to lead to employment. And, and we spoke to Accenture who has a partnership with Prairie view a and M university, and they kind of function more like that. So their, their version of deep work for example, is, you know, they partner with a cohort of students. They bring them into what they call a co-op program in which, you know, they bring them on as full-time employees, but they do that training and that skilling they give the students access to all of their resources and employees for networking, but really at the end of it, it turns into full-time employment or an internship for the students involved.
Amber Burton (00:34:04):
And so you see a real actual reaction to that program. A, another form of deep work that she really talked up was, you know, we often talk about, you know, just throwing money at a problem might not be the best solution, but in this case, a lot of experts are saying, no, invest your resources into these schools because they have that proven track record that they can produce really great graduates that could come in and work for these big tech companies, you know, but they're often the most under-resourced schools. And so, you know, donating money, if you can, if it is in the budget, donating money actually goes a really long way in terms of sustaining these programs and making sure they not only stick around, but can grow and feed more, you know, highly skilled workers into your company. And then another thing that was, you know, really talked about in terms of deep work was, you know, connecting with the presidents at these universities, having the very real conversations of, you know, what does it take to get more, you know, of our students into the doors of, of these companies?
Amber Burton (00:35:11):
Mm-Hmm, <affirmative>, I think something that's a little bit, maybe indirect, deep work is making sure that your company does have that inclusive culture and that's free. <Laugh> making sure your company has that inclusive culture that once these underrepresented employees come in the door, they not only feel welcome, but they wanna stay. And so we've seen a lot of, I mean, we've seen a lot of tech companies, who've had issues where, you know, they're doing that work, they have these partnerships, but internally, you know, they're, they're dealing with a, a lot of issues in which employees aren't staying or, or they're, you know, there are allegations of harassment or things of that nature. And so, you know, resolving those internal issues is also part of the deep work too.
Mikah Sargent (00:35:52):
Absolutely. and by the way, for listeners out there, our audience is largely white. H BBC U stands for historically black colleges and universities. So as we've been talking about HBCUs, I just wanted you to be aware of what that meant, if you weren't aware. Now the, the last thing that I was curious about you mentioned specifically level up as one of these programs for, I believe ACC Accenture. Were there any other programs that did have the positive outcome that you shared as an anecdote at the beginning of this piece that you found in your research or was level up kind of a, a, a real standout here?
Amber Burton (00:36:32):
Yeah. Yeah. So level ups are real standout, but you're right. Like other companies do have this it's, it's really interesting. Like a lot of these companies have kind of been in the game for, you know, experimenting with different types of programs for about the past decade. So Apple has several partnerships and programs that function in different ways, anything from like, you know, their scholarships and internship programs. But they, they also have partnerships with HBCUs. And then I think the most, one of the most recent ones that there were a lot of headlines about, of course, was, you know, AWS partnered with Howard university. And they're more so focused on, you know, they have a master's program for data science in cloud concepts. And so that one's a little bit younger. So, you know, we haven't quite totally seen all of the outcomes yet, but that one has been, you know, very highly touted as well in terms of not only, you know, bringing the resources and the curriculum, but doing the, the, on the ground training as well.
Mikah Sargent (00:37:27):
Understood. well, Amber, I wanna thank you so much for taking some time out of your day to join us here on Tech News Weekly, of course, folks can head to Protocol.com to check out the work that you're doing, but if they wanna follow you online and see your great work, where should they go to do so?
Amber Burton (00:37:44):
Yeah, they can find me on Twitter. Of course that's, that's the main place, I think, where all of us are <laugh>, but yeah, follow me on Twitter. That's where I, I post as many of my stories as I can.
Mikah Sargent (00:37:54):
And what's your handle there?
Amber Burton (00:37:57):
That would be Amber Bree. <Laugh>.
Mikah Sargent (00:38:00):
All right. Thank you so much. We appreciate it.
Amber Burton (00:38:03):
Thank you. Bye.
Mikah Sargent (00:38:05):
All right, up next. We've got Jason Howell's story of the week, but before we get to that, I wanna tell you about podium, who are bringing you this episode of Tech News Weekly. If you own a small business, you know, the past couple of years have been hard. Heck you don't even have to own a small business to know. The past couple of years have been hard from supply chain issues to increased demand on top of everything else that business owners have to manage the businesses who are thriving right now are the ones who are forward thinking podium helps your small business stay ahead of the curve with modern messaging tools that make it easy for your customers to connect with your business. A lot of people hate calling a business. It's me. I'm that person. I'm one of those. A lot of people, maybe it's the plumber or the landscaper look having to play phone tag.
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Mikah Sargent (00:39:45):
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Jason Howell (00:40:57):
All right. I hope you're hungry because this is all about food right now, or actually it's, it's more all about the lack of food. <Laugh> really at the end of the day GrubHub. I don't know if you heard about this, but they had the best intentions or so it seems anyways, I'm sure. I'm sure this was all like, Hey, let's, let's throw some extra business at the restaurants that worked with us. Let's feed people in New York city. They just didn't have a whole lot of foresight apparently because it didn't go according to planned, they had conducted grub hub had conducted a survey prior to this last Tuesday where they discovered that many new Yorkers were skipping lunch. In fact of those, you know, that returned, the survey participated 69% said they're skipping lunch. So not a small number. That's a, it's quite a large percentage.
Jason Howell (00:41:48):
And you know, in GrubHub's mind, that's a possible opportunity to <laugh> to, to cash in on, I suppose GrubHub of course, is food delivery. They decided to do all of those lunch, non eaters, a favor and lunch was gonna be provided just this last Tuesday for, you know, very specific time between 11:00 AM and 2:00 PM for free essentially $15 credit people who redeemed the $15 credit to get the free food, they would still have to pay for tax. And I think, you know, like tip if they, if they're tipping on top of that, but $15 would cover the majority of, of that meal. So on Tuesday they put the promotion into effect and in the end, you know, ultimately they were averaging around 6,000 orders a minute. It brought the system down at one point temporarily once they recovered and they tallied everything up 450,000 lunch orders were tied to the promotion, which on its surface sounds like a pretty big success.
Jason Howell (00:42:49):
Like they got a lot of pick up from, you know, GrubHub users who wanted to get that free meal and use GrubHub in the process. Only, they obviously didn't consider the logistical challenges of this. And apparently they didn't adequately notify partnered restaurants because, well, GrubHub's saying that, that we did let them know restaurants, many restaurant owners had no clue. So if GrubHub did send that advanced notice, they clearly didn't do it effectively. They probably could've done it in a different way that more restaurants would've noticed, but as a result, the restaurants weren't just, you know, busy with business. It wasn't just like super bowl, Sunday busy. They were crippled like many were just struggling to keep up with the demand. They couldn't fulfill all of the orders coming through hundreds of orders coming through, like in a matter of minutes as a result, you know, in the end, it ended up doing the exact opposite of what GrubHub was hoping for.
Jason Howell (00:43:49):
Ultimately many users did not get their food or they got it hours late. It delayed. And the real crummy thing about this is, you know, the <laugh> those customers who don't receive the food, they're less likely to really blame GrubHub for that. They're gonna blame the restaurant for not providing what they paid for or what GrubHub paid for. And so in the end, like I think I would imagine that the, in all the intentions were good as far as this is concerned. I don't think GrubHub set out to, you know, give the restaurants a bad name. They, they wanted to do, you know, and the restaurants to my understanding, they're getting paid, they're getting paid from GrubHub for this. So I it's my, and actually now that I say this, I don't know that I saw explicitly that they weren't paying for it out of pocket, but I'd be really surprised if GrubHub held a promotion like this and said, yeah, and you've gotta pay for it restaurant.
Jason Howell (00:44:39):
So I'm assuming that GrubHub is paying for yeah. So it's not like they're out, you know what? That would be weird if it wasn't that, but but it's all of the cascading effects outside of that, right. It ties up the restaurant you know, angry GrubHub users, not, you know, wanting the food, not receiving it. So they're, they're, you know, angry at the restaurant itself creates food waste. There was tons of food that as, as a result, like it was made and then they would get the cancellations because it's been like an hour and a half and they can't keep up with the, with all the orders coming in. So that food goes to waste. You know, violated the trust of the restaurant owners, working with GrubHub mm-hmm <affirmative> who may or may not have chosen to actually participate if they were given the option or if they, if they were given constructive information around it. Cuz it sounds like maybe there was some information, but it obviously didn't, you know, get through a lot of
Mikah Sargent (00:45:34):
Our, yeah, this should have come with, like they should have all gotten a box in the mail that when they lifted it up up, there was like a spring loaded thing of confetti really? And then there were like, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, alerts and sirens saying, Hey tomorrow, you're going to be swamped. There should have been, they should have sent a singing telegram person to every single house. Yeah. Look at this photo of these.
Jason Howell (00:45:57):
Yeah.
Mikah Sargent (00:45:58):
That's awful. I feel bad for everyone involved.
Jason Howell (00:46:02):
Yeah. Photo shared on Twitter, which was just one of many, I mean, social media was just going nuts. And I mean, this photo in particular shows, you know, a ticket machine and you can't even see the ticket machine. It is just a pile of printed receipts. A lot of the restaurant owners were saying, you know, they were getting hundreds of orders in a span of like five minutes. And you know, these are not, you know, these are not, these are small restaurants, a lot of them participating. This is another avenue for them to gain business. And so they work with GrubHub, but it's not like they have a kitchen of 30 to 50 employees standing by to make a hundred meals a minute or whatever that comes out to. And so as a result, you know, some of the interviews that I read, you know, the people had no idea.
Jason Howell (00:46:44):
It was like three people and they're training one person and then suddenly this day happens and they literally say like, this is busier than any super bowl Sunday I've ever worked. They're just caught completely flat footed. And I used to work in the restaurant industry. So I can only imagine what, you know, I could put myself in that, in that position and, oh my goodness. Like, I'm so happy that I didn't have to experience it, but I feel awful for anyone who just thought they were going into a regular Workday and they were faced with that.
Mikah Sargent (00:47:12):
<Laugh> yeah. Especially because like day to day different places will have their rushes that are already kind of, you know are they, are you sort of have to plan prepare yourself for them? Yes. And so I can just imagine a person's like, okay, you know, it's, it's a Tuesday and oh, Tuesdays at nine, those sure are. Ugh. And you sort of get yourself ready with your water or the, I don't know, the five hour energy you take right before it starts. And then to find out that, that whole day you're going to be just that's man. So on top of, yeah, on top of paying for all of these meals as GrubHub, I'm sure did they should be paying like, I don't know, ridiculous tips to all of the restaurants at the very least.
Jason Howell (00:48:03):
And you know, and I, you know, a lot of complaints from the actual GrubHub delivery people because Johns who are impacted, right. It's like they are for right or wrong. The GrubHub delivery person coming through the door is the, is the face of GrubHub in that moment when the restaurant is going, your company just like overwhelmed us, like to a point that we can't keep up on, you know? So then they have to face that or, or they go there for the delivery and realize it's canceled. Like it, it just ensnarled everyone. And I know that GrubHub was giving out like 40% coupons to people who didn't receive their food, which okay. All right. I guess it's something, but I don't know. It's just, I, I think ultimately, and you know, they've even mentioned this, like they did, they did not consider the impacts of a promotion like this, and they're gonna do better on promotions like this in the future. And I think there's a lot of ways that they could have done better, even though at the core of it, like good, you know, like I appreciate the, the sentiment, Hey, y'all, aren't eating, let's feed you. We're gonna pay for it. But just executed really poorly. Like <laugh>, I dunno, you got a lot of changes to make, to do that successfully next time.
Mikah Sargent (00:49:18):
Yeah. That I'm disappointed to be Frank.
Jason Howell (00:49:23):
Yeah. <laugh> yeah. That's a interesting story, nonetheless. So there's a lot of stuff you can find on social media. If you wanna see kind of the impacts, you know, people sharing photos and videos of exactly the chaos that was going on in kitchens when all that was happening. But hopefully that doesn't happen again. So that's my story of the week up next, Mikah, we're gonna hear your story of the week, but first let's take a moment and thank the sponsor of this episode, Tech News Weekly, and that is entry security, remote work. I mean, I'm remote working right now. I'm at home. It's here to stay. When the pandemic started is emptied, all of a sudden, everyone knew, you know what, something like a VPN was. The problem is that VPNs were designed many years ago for a much friendlier landscape.
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Mikah Sargent (00:52:06):
It is time for my story of the week. Yes. So I wanted to, I, I was, you know, looking through the stories and my, the different headlines and this one stuck out. And it's not a fun story, but it is one that I think needs to be talked about. And it is a story about fentanyl and social media. And, you know, when I have looked at, when I've heard about these stories in the past I'll be honest that I sort of had this reaction of the reaction that we have around Halloween when you hear different law bodies saying, Hey, make sure you check your kids candy because, and then they'll show you a photo where the edibles candy looks almost exactly like the candy that you can get from, you know, the grocery store.
Mikah Sargent (00:53:06):
So the cannabis infused peanut butter cup next to the regular infused peanut butter or the regular peanut butter cup and in a better cup. And what is the case? And what is this case in that situation is that most of the time, no one is going to take their very expensive edibles and put them into Halloween baskets because they would rather keep those for themselves. And, you know, the argument there is that, like, that is a situation that is so rare to actually happen because if somebody has their cannabis, they spent the money on that cannabis and they want to use it themselves, not give it away. Yeah. And we're showing a photo now of Stony patch, kids, double double ston Cheetos puffs with cannabis fruity pebbles with cannabis and nerds rope with, with cannabis in it. And so those, yes, they do look a lot like normal candy, but the odds of someone actually putting them into a candy bucket instead of keeping themselves to eat is low.
Mikah Sargent (00:54:12):
So when I think about dealers dealing drugs, I also, you know, if, if somebody's buying cocaine, I wondered why would a dealer lace the cocaine with an expensive drug when they can just make money off the cocaine itself? Why would they want to spend more money and not get as much money in their dealing of said drug? And so I looked into the research surrounding fentanyl and its use in lacing drugs. And the truth is that people are lacing drugs with fentanyl. A lot there are different, there are different reasons why they think people are lacing drugs with fentanyl different suggestions. Some of the research that's been done is actually boots on the ground research where these scientific researchers who are not you know, law officers. And so they can go out and talk to dealers, actual dealers.
Mikah Sargent (00:55:17):
And in some cases, distributors can talk to them without those people fearing repercussion they can figure out kind of what their thinking is and the thinking there is that fentanyl, well, there, there kind of two schools of thought one is that fentanyl is more easily available than some other opioids. And so in that case being able to sell fentanyl is a lot easier to do. And the other school, which in the research that I've done suggests that it comes more from not scientific research and more from just kind of people's general beliefs is that these drugs are being laced with fentanyl, for the purpose of getting someone hooked on those drugs so that the person comes back. But again, that one doesn't have as much backing in real science, more so than it's just the average person sort of trying to figure out their own logic for the situation.
Mikah Sargent (00:56:13):
So I just wanna make all of that clear before I talk about this actual piece, because there's a lot of, of a lot of information that is not backed by science or research or any of that when it comes to this, because we are talking about such a taboo topic and it is hard to figure out how people are operating in this space because they are doing something that's against the law. And so it is difficult to figure out, you know, true motivations and situations from that. So with all of that in mind, with that huge caveat that I provided before we get into this now we can talk about it. What we're finding is that there's been an increase in the number of drug overdoses for people 18 to 45. In fact, overdoses are now the leading cause of what we call preventable death among people ages 18 to 45.
Mikah Sargent (00:57:16):
That is, that brings it ahead of suicide ahead of traffic accidents. And ahead of gun violence overdoses are the leading cause. We've also seen a huge increase in experimental drug use by teenagers in the us. Overall it's been dropping since 2010. But despite that deaths from fentanyl have skyrocketed, so experimental drug use has dropped over time, but the deaths have gone up in 2019, there were 253 deaths from teenagers due to fentanyl overdose just last year, it was 884. So I wanna say those numbers again, 253 in 2019 last year, 884. So this has absolutely increased. And what they are finding is that people are looking to social media, particularly Snapchat and other sort of ephemeral messaging platforms to be able to find what they're actually looking for, which is Percocet Xanax and other similar pills, but what ends up hap oh, and typical ADHD medications like Adderall.
Mikah Sargent (00:58:40):
And there's a, if you scroll down a little bit on this page, this is a New York times article. There's a little, there's an image showing what oxycodone, which is an opioid actually looks like. And then below it is a counterfeit oxycodone that has fentanyl in it in the middle on the top is a Adderall tablet and below is Adderall laced with fentanyl and then on the right, which is a very popular drug at the moment that folks are after is on the Le on the, on the far right, the tablet on the left, that's white is authentic Xanax and next to it, which is in yellow is a counterfeit Xanax tablet that contains fentanyl. And as as the article points out and as I mentioned earlier, again, one of the motivations behind using fentanyl is that because it's because of its synthetic nature, it is easier to procure typically from Mexico and China is where folks are getting the fentanyl and you don't have to use as much.
Mikah Sargent (00:59:48):
It is incredibly potent in comparison. And unfortunately there are now other synthetic versions synthetic opioids. And I, there there's a place where they named kind of what the different ones were, but one of them was I think a hundred times more potent than average than, than actual fentanyl. And the other one was 10 times more potent than fentanyl. But that is part of the problem is that these folks are getting these drugs and they, so so fentanyl on its own is 50 times more potent. And so you can use a lot less of it and tell someone you're giving them heroin and it turns out you're giving them fentanyl. And if you don't know your measurements and things like that, you could end up very easily killing someone. And then in the case where they're using other synthetic options, those ones may be even more potent than fentanyl, which is already more potent than than heroin.
Mikah Sargent (01:00:55):
And so it just goes deeper and deeper and deeper. And the fact that these teens are able to use social media to find these the, the whole piece kind of goes through and talks about different families who've lost their children to fentanyl overdoses. And in many cases, the children were not looking for opioids in the first place at all. In one case they were looking for benzodiazepines. In another case, they were looking for methamphetamine style drugs, speed, or ADHD medication, and ended up dying when they took these pills because they were laced with fentanyl. So ultimately this piece talks about the different social media networks Snapchat, it talks about Facebook. It talks about Instagram and kind of a little bit more inside knowledge of how folks are using these methods to get to both distribute and find drugs.
Mikah Sargent (01:02:06):
And I mean, in this one case there was a 20 year old man who was charged with the death of the kid that they, that they mentioned in the first part of the story with the, an anecdote that kicks off the story, like 20 years old distributing drugs, and ends up killing someone and is then charged with, you know, murder. Yeah. Is just, it's, it's horrible all around. And so I do encourage everyone to read this piece from the New York times, not only for the sake of just knowing what's out there, but also if you're, especially if you're a parent or something like that just a little bit more awareness, this what I will say, like this piece did not have that oh, here's the lingo the kids are using these days. And if, if it says AFK, you know, that means away from keyboard, no, this is, this is a piece that is more mindful than some goofy kind of hello fellow kids thing. This actually has I think trusted trust, trustable information that is actionable and would be helpful in in any situation as a parent. So, yeah, I just wanted to point out that it's out there as well worth reading. And it's very sad all around it. Like for the kids, obviously who have been killed from fentanyl overdoses also for the kids whose lives are ruined from dealing these pills, when they may not know that there's fentanyl involved in it, it's just sad all, all the way around.
Jason Howell (01:03:46):
Yeah. Yeah. What you mentioned about like the lingo and everything like that, they do in this article link to something that I mean, I, as a parent find useful, it's the, by the, the drug enforcement administration, it's the emoji drug code decoded. And it's, it's essentially like, as we've noticed on social media networks, that drugs are being sold, this is the emoji language that we've, that we noticed associated with it. Because again, it does go back to like me as a parent. If I, if I happen to see something along these lines, you know, the, these, this pairing yes. Understanding that these symbols could be used in that way is, is helpful. Not that they always are like, there's a million different reasons why you would use a mushroom emoji for something mm-hmm <affirmative> and then there's a drug reason, you know what I mean?
Jason Howell (01:04:40):
<Laugh> so, I mean, yeah, just to be aware, but they linked to that. I thought that was kind of kind of interesting to, to read through I mean, you know, this, this sort of stuff per mutates and, and has for generations, you know, as far as how, how someone markets illicit drugs to, to people who are looking to buy them and what that language looks like and how it's, you know, is it, is it done with, with burner phones and beepers, or is it done on social media? And right now, I mean, this is just, this is just where everybody is, is social media. So it makes perfect sense that this is being distributed and, and you know, it, it's interesting. One, one thing that's interesting to me is how, how do we tie this into the first interview that we had today, where there is this idea of, of content moderation and, you know, from a platform perspective, the platform can take this emoji drug code kind of sheet, as one example, and potentially there, there are clues there that would allow them to, you know, in on one hand protect users from from buying fentanyl, because they see the signs and, and, you know, a certain level of confidence that as a result, you know, block that message or whatever the case may be.
Jason Howell (01:05:59):
And how does that play with HB 20? And is this, you know, just something that's becomes a lot harder when you can't moderate your content on your platform. I don't know, but yeah. That's what comes to
Mikah Sargent (01:06:13):
Yeah. That, yeah, that guide, I think the, the one failing of that guide is that they don't have the they should have it for each platform. So you, cuz emoji can look very different for, for each platform. And I understand why they had to do it that way. It's because each individual emoji set is owned by the company. The artwork is owned by the company. So they may have not been able to do that. But in any case I kind of feel like translating those for, for iOS well worth checking out that piece, seeing some of the links that the New York times links to and just being aware overall.
Jason Howell (01:06:51):
Yeah. Yeah, indeed. Alright. Well, we have reached the end of this episode of Tech News Weekly. Thank you so much for watching and listening each and every week we do this every Thursday. And if you go to twit.tv/tnw, you can find all the links to subscribe and audio, video formats jump out to YouTube, watch it there, whatever you need, twit.tv/tnw.
Mikah Sargent (01:07:13):
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Mikah Sargent (01:08:02):
Now, if it's not, it'll be out very soon TWiT that TV slash club tweet seven bucks a month, well worth it. And you also get that warm, fuzzy feeling, knowing you're supporting us here at twit. I should also mention that for folks who use Apple podcasts, you can subscribe to the show directly and you, all you have to do is an Apple podcast. Look up Tech News Weekly, find the audio version of the show, and you'll see a button. You can press subscribe for 2 99. And when you do so you will get an ad free version of the audio feed right there in your Apple podcasts application. If you'd like to tweet at me, you can find me at mic Sargent on pretty much every social media network. I try to keep my username the same, or you can add to chihuahua.coffee, C I Hua hoa.coffee, where I've got links to the places I'm most active online. Check me out on Saturdays with Leo Laport, where we host the tech guy radio show, taking your tech questions from all over the us and elsewhere and on Tuesdays with rose Mary orchard, where we record iOS today. This morning, I got to see the upcoming artwork for iOS today. And I'm really looking forward to the new show artwork. So gotta keep my, my lips closed on what it looks like and all of that, but it's pretty exciting stuff. Jason, what about you?
Jason Howell (01:09:26):
Yeah, well, you can find me on Twitter at Jason Howell. You can also find me talking about Android things on all about Android, every Tuesday, Twitter TV slash AAA, and then working behind the scenes on a lot of Leo shows and everything as, as is Mikah. Big, thanks to John Ashley and Burke at the studio for doing so many things behind the scenes to make this show happen. We really appreciate your work. And we really appreciate you on the other side of this camera for watching and listening each and every week. We'll see you next time on Tech News Weekly by everybody.
Mikah Sargent (01:09:59):
Bye,
Ant Pruitt (01:10:01):
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