00:01:39.160So if you've been on TikTok at all, you've probably seen this new subsection of true
00:01:42.660crime content where very creepy AI-generated children who speak in this like weird robotic
00:01:49.740baby voice about how they were tortured or murdered is flooding the platform.
00:01:54.420They purport to show actual murder victims telling their stories.
00:01:58.860Now, there are adult victims being depicted, including politicians and celebrities, but
00:02:03.520the ones that feature children are by far more popular and plentiful.
00:02:08.920These TikTok accounts claim to be honoring, in heavy scare quotes, the victims and their
00:02:15.160stories of violence, but Rolling Stone reports that they often get pretty major details wrong,
00:02:19.960which may even be an intentional attempt to get around TikTok's rules against AI-generated
00:02:25.040deepfakes of famous people. Exoneree Amanda Knox, who we spoke to on There Are No Girls
00:02:29.900on the Internet last year, who also has a new podcast about the history of true crime called
00:02:34.040Blood Money, had a really interesting perspective that she shared on Blue Sky, that even though
00:02:39.520this addition of AI is definitely creepy, this is nothing new. Amanda Knox writes,
00:02:44.840This isn't a fresh hell. There's a precedent for this dating back over 400 years,
00:02:49.220One of the earliest forms of true crime was the printed broadside poster.
00:02:53.380These posters would tell stories of brutal murders, often murders of children.
00:02:57.300And these stories would often be told in the ballad form,
00:03:00.120a song written in the voice of either the condemned criminal or the murdered person.
00:03:04.400Whoever authored these ballads would just make them all up.
00:03:07.020They would invent the pleading words of the child in the moments before they were killed,
00:03:10.560or they would convey the thoughts of the criminal as they confessed or acknowledged regret.
00:03:14.200So these creepy AI-generated true crime deepfakes of children may not be a totally new phenomena, but the addition of AI to recreate these child victims definitely makes them much more creepy.
00:03:27.500Like, to be able to tell an AI program to generate the likeness of a murdered child for views on social media is pretty weird, and I think it represents this AI presenting the possibility for ever more expanded, tech-facilitated ghoulishness.
00:03:41.340yeah gross creepy uh you know amanda knox as usual makes a pretty good point that it's not
00:03:49.480new that people have been using true crime and broadsides for you know hundreds of years ever
00:03:56.780since the invention of the printing press but i guess one thing that is new here with ai is that
00:04:03.060historically i think those like ghoulish tales were often told uh for some sort of political
00:04:09.760purpose, either to, you know, vilify some savage enemy or heartless empire who committed
00:04:18.520atrocities on local people to get the local people like riled up for some sort of political
00:04:39.760Without there being some kind of, whether it's implicit or explicit, political agenda.
00:04:45.840We've seen time and time again where true crime and the stories of bad things happening to people and people's misfortune is used to strengthen and bolster specific legislation, police crackdowns, more policing, increased criminalization of people of color, increased surveillance of people of color and the poor.
00:05:05.940I think that true crime stories are often political, even if they don't seem political on their face.
00:05:14.060I think the fact that these videos, Rolling Stone reports that they get millions and millions and millions of views and are particularly more popular when they feature the stories of murdered children, that tells me right there that whether or not these videos are explicitly trying to make some sort of political or social argument, they absolutely do fuel political and social dynamics in our culture.
00:05:35.940Yeah, it makes me curious who the perpetrators are in these stories.
00:05:40.400You know, I think that would be a pretty interesting thing for somebody to look at to get at that question of what what is the political agenda behind this new phenomenon on TikTok?
00:05:52.480Well, I mean, I don't even necessarily think that it's like when I say political, I don't necessarily feel that people are posting these because they're like, oh, this is going to get everybody riled up and they're going to support X, Y, Z legislation around policing.
00:06:05.940I'm not saying that sometimes they absolutely can be.
00:06:08.300We see that a lot when it comes to true crime content about trafficking, that that is then used to support specific legislation.
00:06:15.420I'm not saying that that's what's going on here.
00:06:17.660But I am saying that when people are consuming more and more and more content about grisly murders and torture of children, it is just that's not happening in a vacuum.
00:06:27.640It's happening in a culture where we already have conversations about policing, about, you know, stranger danger, about, you know, public safety.
00:06:36.100And so when I say that they're political, I mean that they feed into a current cultural conversation around those issues that, you know, they're not happening.
00:06:46.440I think it's easy for people who are true crime fans to believe that they're consuming this content in a vacuum, standalone, like, oh, it's just entertainment.
00:06:55.140But in fact, it is not happening in a vacuum.
00:06:57.740It is happening against the backdrop of already existing conversations about things like policing and public safety, which are inherently political.
00:07:06.660You know, definitely one doesn't have to look very far to see ways in which creating a feeling of fear and unease and distrust among the population fits pretty squarely with a lot of political actors, social media efforts.
00:07:26.420It's a powerful thing that plays to our emotions and particularly kids, huh?
00:07:31.860It sounds like you're setting me up for our next story, Mike.
00:07:34.520So I'm going to go ahead and take that.
00:07:37.940You know, I'm just trying to do my part over here.
00:07:40.020Last week, U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Murthy issued an advisory warning about the impact
00:07:44.740that social media is having on the mental health of young people.
00:07:47.920It's a pretty long report, but the crux of it is summed up in this quote from Murthy.
00:07:52.020We are in the middle of a national youth mental health crisis, and I am concerned that social
00:07:55.640media is an important driver of that crisis, one that we must urgently address.
00:08:00.340So I just want to pause here to emphasize what a big deal this is.
00:08:03.000The Surgeon General's office doesn't issue these kind of reports all the time, and when
00:08:07.360they do, they often have a big impact that can last for decades, right?
00:08:11.320We probably all remember or know about the Surgeon General's report on smoking and health,
00:08:17.160which really turned the tide on smoking in the US and set us up decades later after a lot of fights
00:08:26.080to be in a place where we are now, where fewer Americans smoke now than they have for the past
00:08:31.180hundred years. So it really sets the agenda for a whole generation of medical and public health
00:08:36.980initiatives. And it didn't come out of a vacuum either. It was when it was announced from the
00:08:41.060Surgeon General's office, there were supportive comments from leaders of some of the country's
00:08:47.100largest medical and public health organizations, including the American Academy of Family
00:08:51.360Physicians, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Medical Association, the American
00:08:55.980Psychiatric Association, American Psychological Association, the American Public Health
00:09:00.580Association, and the National Parent Teacher Association, right?
00:09:03.460Like, those are all enormous institutions that have a huge footprint, a huge impact.
00:09:09.600And so I just mentioned that here to just really underscore the point from the Surgeon General's report here that there's widespread consensus acknowledgement in the public health field that social media is causing a lot of harm to our young people and we need to do something about it ASAP.
00:09:26.120So the report does say that social media can have benefits to young people and that more research is needed to really understand the impact.
00:09:32.500So it is a little bit nuanced, like it's not all bad. But the main takeaway is that we need to urgently take action to create safe and healthy digital environments that minimize harm and safeguard children and adolescents' mental health and well-being during critical stages of development.
00:09:44.940And that's kind of one of the main takeaways of the report is that basically young brains are still cooking and they don't handle social media very well, which like kind of sounds like an obvious point.
00:09:57.620I always say, like, I'm so glad that I didn't have the social media climate that we have today with so many platforms that I, you know, when I was 13, God, I truly God only knows what I would have done and what I would be like if I had access to that.
00:10:10.860But the report says that a highly sensitive period of brain development happens between the ages of 10 and 19, which coincides when 95 percent of 13 to 17 year olds and nearly 40 percent of 8 to 12 year olds are using social media.
00:10:24.860The advisory notes that frequent use of social media platforms can impact brain development, affecting areas associated with emotional learning, impulse control and social behavior.
00:10:34.220Murthy has previously said that he believes that even 13 year old is too early for children to be using social media.
00:10:39.840So there's two things here worth pulling out of that, right? Like social media is particularly harmful for children because they are still developing their brains. Like you said, they're still cooking. They're not fully formed. And so it's particularly dangerous to them during this critical period.
00:10:55.280And also, we have a long tradition in this country and society of protecting young people, right? Like there's general agreement that we should do more to protect young people than adults because adults, they're adults, they're grown, they can make choices for themselves. Children can by definition.
00:11:16.880And so I just wanted to identify those two different reasons driving this call for more action.
00:11:25.240So the report does say that social media can be particularly beneficial to marginalized youth.
00:11:30.540It says, studies have shown that social media may support the mental health and well-being of lesbian, gay, bisexual, asexual, transgender, queer, intersex, and other youth by enabling peer connection, identity development, and management and social support.
00:11:42.840This is also really important because I have seen a lot of reporting that suggests that so much of the research about the impacts of kids and social media tends to be done on white kids, right?
00:11:51.940Like when the researchers are doing that research, they're not necessarily also doing research on all kids.
00:11:57.300And that is particularly important because according to a study from the Youth Media and Wellbeing Research Lab, Black and Latino 5th through 9th graders adopt social media at a younger age than their white peers and because youth of color have such specific online experiences, right?
00:12:11.700These experiences can include things like hate speech and racialized harassment and racialized language being used online.
00:12:19.040And so if you're not researching and looking into the experiences of marginalized kids who are having such specific online experiences, I don't necessarily feel like you're getting a clear picture of the impact.0.99
00:12:32.420You know, we in social science, we talk about intersectionality and the importance of focusing on not just different demographic groups, but intersections of them.
00:12:41.180And absolutely, there's a lot of reason to think that kids from marginalized backgrounds who identify with specific marginalized identities would have a whole host of specific harms and specific benefits that they get from access to social media.
00:13:03.340And we really do need more research to understand that. But also at the same time, we urgently need restrictions to protect them. Right. Like in this in the U.S. regulatory framework, we are reluctant to ever try to regulate anything until it is solidly, conclusively demonstrated beyond the shadow of a doubt through many lawsuits that like, yes, it is actually harmful.
00:13:33.340And so we are actually able to pass some sort of regulation about it.
00:13:36.640In other countries, and in Europe, it's not like that.
00:13:40.180They're much more willing to acknowledge that something is being harmful and take action.
00:13:46.280And I really hope that we can do that over here.
00:14:00.260There's also recommendations for lawmakers to develop stronger health and safety standards for social media products and introduce stricter data privacy controls, which plus, plus, plus, plus, plus, I am a huge proponent of, especially for young people, but also for adults.
00:14:12.000Technology companies themselves, meanwhile, are urged to assess the risk their products might pose and attempt to minimize them.
00:14:17.520The report also mentioned something that I find pretty important, and that is the role that parents can and should be playing.
00:14:23.340The report says the onus of mitigating the potential harms on social media should not be placed solely on the shoulders of parents and caregivers or on children themselves.
00:14:32.240So this is where I kind of have a lot to say.
00:14:35.840The people who run social media platforms are making billions of dollars from harming our kids.
00:14:42.340Parents and caregivers have been burdened so much, especially in the last few years, having to manage virtual learning, shifting workplace policies around remote work.
00:14:51.360You can work from home, now you've got to come back to the office, a tax on schools, just to name a few.
00:14:56.640Tech billionaires know that their technology harms kids.
00:15:12.020So these tech billionaires know that their products harm kids, and they make billions of dollars from it, from that harm,
00:15:19.160while doing nothing to meaningfully mitigate how kids are showing up to their platforms.
00:15:24.340And then to turn around and then further burden parents to keep their kids away from these platforms is unacceptable to me.
00:15:31.400And it also speaks to the really, like, extractive relationship that I talked about in the episode that we put out on Tuesday with Paris Marks,
00:15:38.980where there's just an expectation that it is fine for tech billionaires to do harm to the public, including harm to our kids, if it makes them more money.
00:15:47.660And it's clear that that extends to harm to some of our most vulnerable children.
00:15:53.180We need to make it clear that our kids' well-being is not for sale.
00:15:56.480We are not sacrificing the health, safety, and well-being of our children to help make Mark Zuckerberg more money.
00:16:02.900And that's really what it comes down to.
00:16:04.380These companies know what they're doing.
00:16:07.340You know, I respect this report, but I feel like in places this report makes it seem like tech companies don't already know that their products cause harm, that young people are using them and that it's causing them a lot of harm.
00:16:20.620They do know that. And so we need to start from that reality.
00:16:24.560They know they're making billions of dollars of it and they're doing nothing to stop it.
00:16:29.880And it's going to take some kind of either regulation or new framework for lawsuits or something to go after them.
00:16:36.140But, you know, they're making a product that demonstrably harms kids. Right. There's not that many categories of product where you can get away with that. I think in the case of social media companies, it's a little bit complicated by free speech.
00:16:52.120you know the first amendment and also section 230 which we've talked about on this podcast
00:16:55.880uh and i wouldn't pretend it's not complicated but you just can't we can't continue with this
00:17:02.880extremely powerful important product that increasingly people need to be on to interact
00:17:10.240in society uh that also is just like harming people and all of the responsibility is placed
00:17:17.740on the individuals for not just protecting themselves, but their family. It's nonsense
00:17:23.480and it doesn't work and it's not working. Well, that's my thing is that parents already have to
00:17:28.560do so much. You can't just create a harmful thing and then be like, oh, well, just another thing
00:17:34.100that parents, it's up to them to keep this out of their kids' hands, even though it's everywhere,
00:17:37.960even though that's basically impossible. That's not a reasonable standard for parents. That's
00:17:41.920too big of a burden, especially when people are making money off of it. And so, you know,
00:17:46.980So I'm not a parent myself, but I do have a lot of young people in my life.
00:23:52.320Are there have there been any stories this past week about something positive happening in tech regulation?
00:24:01.380I don't know if I would say positive, but there have been some tech regulation news.
00:24:06.780Let's turn to New York City, where they have just passed a new law around AI and hiring.
00:24:12.600So in all this talk around AI and jobs and how AI is going to impact all of our jobs,
00:24:16.880it's clear there is need for some kind of legislation or regulation to regulate how AI impacts the workforce.
00:24:22.320The New York Times reports that New York City just passed a law that requires companies using AI software and hiring to notify candidates that an automated system is being used.
00:24:31.360It also requires companies to have independent auditors check the technology annually for bias.
00:24:36.400Candidates can request and be told what data is being collected and analyzed about them, and companies can be fined for violations.
00:24:43.160Labor experts actually say that this law in New York City could potentially be expanded nationwide.
00:24:48.600California, New Jersey, New York, and Vermont, and D.C., hey, hey, my hometown, are all working on laws to regulate AI and hiring.
00:24:55.860Now, this sounds like a really positive step in the right direction, but some critics argue that the law is too biased towards businesses and corporate interests and has been watered down to the point of not being effective.
00:25:07.300What could have been a landmark law was watered down to lose effectiveness.
00:25:11.120That's from Alexandra Givens, the president for the Center for Democracy and Technology, a policy and civil rights organization.
00:25:16.800That's what she told the New York Times.
00:25:18.440So you might be wondering, well, what's so wrong with this law?
00:25:27.220The law defines an automated employment decision tool as technology used to substantially assist or replace discretionary decision making.
00:25:35.040The rule adopted by the city appears to interpret that phrasing narrowly so that AI software will require an audit only if it is the loan or primary factor in a hiring decision or if it is used to override a human.
00:25:48.800All of this leaves out the main way that automated software is used with a human hiring manager invariably making the final choice.
00:25:55.020The potential for AI-driven discrimination typically comes in the screening of hundreds of thousands of candidates down to a handful or in targeted online recruiting to generate a pool of candidates.
00:26:05.040So basically what she is saying is that the definition of whether or not AI is being employed in an employment decision is so narrow that a company would very rarely ever need to notify a candidate or perform an audit under this law.
00:26:20.120Basically, they're saying that like they are defining AI being used as an employment decision if it is the only thing making a decision or if it overrides a human decision.
00:26:31.380In reality, that is not usually the case.
00:26:34.360AI can be used to narrow down candidates, but generally it is there as a human involved in
00:26:39.520the process. So in the more typical iteration of how things usually work with AI in hiring,
00:26:45.460very few companies would need to change their behavior under this law because of that narrow
00:26:49.660definition of AI in the screening process. She also objects to the fact that the law covers
00:26:54.920screening candidates using AI for gender, race, and ethnicity, but not for disability or age,
00:27:00.960which we know are big parts of employment discrimination as is.
00:27:04.620So if this law does become a national template, as it very well might,
00:27:08.340it might not be as robust as it should be to actually protect workers.
00:27:12.580I really want to interpret this as a good start, though.
00:27:17.440You know, she's definitely the expert and probably right about it being too narrow,
00:27:21.840but like maybe there'll be some court case that interprets it a little more broadly.
00:27:27.120you know, I appreciate that this law at least attempts to establish some boundaries on what
00:27:34.440is acceptable to use AI for, especially in something as important as employment.
00:27:40.840And so, I don't know, it feels nice that some legislators are at least trying.
00:27:45.700And it seems like it would be hard for companies to argue that being transparent about the software
00:27:49.760they use is somehow an unacceptable burden to their hiring. So hopefully this can be
00:27:55.720either amended or built on to maybe expand that definition, add some teeth to it so that it does
00:28:03.160become more accepted and expected even that throughout the hiring process, any sort of AI
00:28:10.920that even has the potential to discriminate needs to be disclosed. At the very least,
00:28:20.040it seems like asking to have it disclosed shouldn't be objected to.
00:28:24.140People deserve transparency when they're engaging with technology like this. And I think that's probably one of my biggest concerns about this technology is that it's simply going to repeat and also make worse the existing biases that are already in our society.
00:28:40.620And so I think we definitely need strong, clear, robust legislation to prevent that from happening.
00:28:45.720So I am happy to see some legislation that it's not just a Wild West, but I want to make sure it's legislation that actually provides some meaningful and robust protection for all of us.
00:28:55.760Have you got any stories for me about health tech, Bridget?
00:29:00.740So back in March, staffers at the National Eating Disorder Association were laid off just days after they voted to unionize.
00:29:08.060Subsequently, the National Eating Disorders Association, or NEDA, announced they were shutting down their 20-year-old call-in helpline for folks dealing with disordered eating and food issues.
00:29:19.440They replaced a handful of paid staffers and a large group of volunteers with a chatbot called Tessa.
00:29:26.020Well, it turns out that Tessa did not do so great because rather than giving counseling to people calling in for help with their disordered eating, Tessa was found to be giving these people weight loss and diet advice.
00:29:37.460A psychologist who specializes in eating disorders ran a test with Tessa where she fed it questions
00:29:42.080that someone seeking help for disordered eating might ask.
00:29:44.900She pretended to be somebody who had recently gained weight and subsequently hated their
00:32:40.600They'll be digesting us for fuel, obviously.
00:32:44.660Okay, so this is kind of an important context.
00:32:46.680The NEDA says that they were not and are not planning on replacing humans with chatbots.
00:32:54.880But it does sound like that in the midst of this staff shakeup after their unionization effort, it does sound like this chatbot was the only resource that they had to offer the public.
00:33:07.660So they might say that they weren't intending to replace humans with this bot.
00:33:11.840But subsequently, that's like kind of what happened, whether that was their intention or not.
00:33:16.680yeah it's again hard to know what to make of the fact the idea that like they didn't intend to do
00:33:23.260the thing that their organization did like where did that come from was was tessa calling the
00:33:28.640shots at the board meeting it seems a little i don't know uh it just feels a little uh sketchy
00:33:36.320to me honestly like yeah the unionization part though like they uh according to the npr article
00:33:41.960that we read it is linked in the show notes here it's like an internal email at neda that points
00:33:49.240to increased legal risk about crisis handling and mandatory reporting is one of the reasons for
00:33:54.440laying off the coaches uh but then it just doesn't make sense that they would start to me at least
00:34:00.420it doesn't make sense that they would start using a chatbot as a replacement as if that would
00:34:03.680somehow be less risky it just seems odd you know and laying off workers within days of a vote to
00:34:11.440unionize feels super gross. So I think it's important to sort of separate the two different
00:34:21.660stories here, like the chat bot that worked as a prevention tool to help prevent people,
00:34:28.860because that study that Fitzsimmons Craft authored demonstrates that it did really help people
00:34:35.160with preventing eating disorders. But then it got used in this other context where it was actually
00:34:41.120harming people that's interesting um and worth talking about and then also it seems like this
00:34:47.480organization uh did not want to deal with the union and so just like replaced all their humans
00:34:52.880as soon as they unionized which is pretty disappointing for a non-profit organization
00:34:58.140that ostensibly is trying to help people yeah and i have to say like when i first chose this story
00:35:05.000to include in the roundup for today's episode i was like this is a story about like what i can
00:35:11.700never i can never say the word right schadenfreude i always say it wrong it's funny there's a uh one
00:35:16.660of our patreon patrons has that as their their like patreon name and i dm'd them and i was like
00:35:23.460i can never i have to like look it up every time schadenfreude i think that's how you say it when
00:35:27.360i first heard this story i was like oh this is what they get for firing their unionizing humans
00:35:34.920and trying to replace the unionizing humans with a robot, like, ha-ha, dunk on them.
00:35:40.760But as I looked into it more, like, it's really easy to make fun of the NEDA here,
00:35:46.600but it really does highlight what I think is a pretty serious issue,
00:35:49.760that a lot of people need access to mental health services and support,
00:35:53.060and that access is still out of reach for so many,
00:35:55.980which is why an organization, you know, like NEDA would feel like they had to turn to chatbots
00:36:04.720So it's easy to dunk on them here. But ultimately, that is a real problem that we do need to solve for. Whether or not technology like chatbots and AI can solve for it, I don't know. That's not something I know about. But it is a real problem. And Mike, I know that when you're not producing the show, this is something that you actually work on, right?
00:36:25.740That's right. Yeah. When I'm not producing the show, I do research with a nonprofit that creates free digital tools to help support health behavior change and help people overcome addiction.
00:36:36.520And so I do know a fair bit about this. This is an area where I'm actively doing research and actively working in a nonprofit where we run public programs that provide support for health behavior change over the Internet.
00:36:53.620And we've been talking a lot about chatbots lately and what role they can or should have for providing digital health services.
00:37:01.140Because as you mentioned, there is this huge unmet need for mental health services, as well as other kinds of behavioral health services like smoking cessation, diabetes management.
00:37:12.620management. There's just physical exercise, healthy eating, so many health behaviors that
00:37:22.020cause a lot of medical harm, medical costs, reduce good healthy years that people live on their
00:37:31.240lives. There's this huge unmet need for it. And if we can use digital technology to meet that need
00:37:38.740and connect people with resources that help them meet their health goals and adopt healthier
00:37:44.320behaviors that they want to adopt. But for various reasons, often including industries that
00:37:51.720aggressively market them to prevent them from achieving those healthier behaviors that they
00:37:55.460want to achieve. And so if you can use digital technology to meet that need and help support
00:38:01.960people to adopt these healthier behaviors that they're trying to adopt, that would be a huge win
00:38:07.960for everyone, but there's this question of, of how to do it. Right. And with, uh, generative AI
00:38:15.040chatbots in particular, we have no idea what kind of advice they might give to a person looking for
00:38:21.020help. Uh, and so there's a risk, uh, as the national, what is it? The national eating
00:38:27.560disorders association found out there's a risk that, uh, somebody who is in crisis, uh, or who
00:38:35.240is like really experiencing a problem might ask for help and receive advice that actually
00:38:41.240And that's, you know, as somebody who designs health interventions, that is terrifying.
00:38:46.900You know, the risk is especially high for people in crisis, you know, for example, people
00:38:51.800who are suicidal or intend to harm others because they're more vulnerable.
00:38:56.940And so we have a greater obligation to protect those people who are the most vulnerable.
00:39:03.540Um, you know, and I guess another related thing is that generally in public health, we have more priority to not causing harm compared to, uh, helping people, right? Like everyone is probably familiar with the trolley problem. Um, and again, it's, it's especially the case when people are at risk of being harmed, uh, who are already vulnerable.
00:39:27.020We really want to protect them and make sure that whatever treatment we're giving to try to help is not causing more or more harm.
00:39:35.600So that unknown factor about generative AI and chatbots, I think should give a lot of people in positions to provide them to the public pause about using those chatbots to deliver mental health support in particular.
00:39:50.640You know, there is a lot of potential there. As the researcher we mentioned demonstrated, you know, her program, TESA, really did help some people. So there's a lot of potential. But we creators need to be to carefully protect against adverse outcomes and risks to users, especially among the most vulnerable.
00:40:11.340And so it sounds like the version of Tesla that was implemented on their website didn't do that.
00:40:17.480And so I think it's good that the service has been taken down until it can be changed or in whatever way is needed, that it can then be demonstrated to be safe, to be made available to the public again.
00:40:30.520You know who else I think might need to be taken down until it can be demonstrated that they are safe for the public?
00:40:37.100Elon Musk. I'll tell you why after this quick break.
00:43:01.140Whew. Over the weekend, a verified parody account on Twitter that looks an awful lot like the real Twitter account for Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez claimed to have a crush on Elon Musk.
00:43:14.220Elon Musk replied with a fire emoji. Of course, it was not the real AOC. It was a parody, heavy scare quotes, account.
00:43:23.080The account has been around since 2018, but it was permanently suspended in 2019 under Jack Dorsey, the former Twitter CEO's leadership, for misleading parody content.
00:43:33.240I should say here that, like, this is a real problem online where there are accounts that just say off-the-wall stuff and they say, oh, I'm parody.
00:44:01.120So this Twitter account had been permanently suspended by Twitter back in 2019.
00:44:07.140But Musk reinstated it when he brought back a bunch of banned accounts.
00:44:10.600And because of the way that Musk's verification system works, which is basically pay to play, if you pay the $8 to get verified, it boosts your content in search and on the feed.
00:44:20.860It actually boosts the fake account because it is verified.
00:44:24.620So currently, and I tried this right before we started recording, when you search AOC on Twitter, the fake AOC is ranked first in search results above the actual authentic AOC's official account because it's verified.
00:44:39.400So Musk is boosting this fake account both because of the way that Twitter Blue works, but he is also personally boosting this account because he is engaging with it from his own individual Twitter account.
00:44:51.620It's so disgusting. He's such a pathetic creep. He knows it's a fake account. He unbanned it0.99
00:44:57.360anyway. And now he's engaging with it and boosting with it. Just ugh.
00:45:04.160Ugh, it's right. So the real AOC tweeted, FYI, there's a fake account on here impersonating me
00:45:09.420and going viral. The Twitter CEO has engaged it, boosting visibility. It is releasing false
00:45:14.360policy statements and gaining spread. I am assessing with my team how to move forward.
00:45:18.600In the meantime, be careful what you see.
00:45:20.840Soon after the real AOC tweeted that, the fake account tweeted the exact same thing
00:48:22.260Also, fun fact, she, I am so, like, I swear that I did not plan this.1.00
00:48:27.180I wanted to find a way to work in this tidbit that Elizabeth Holmes is going to be in the same jail as Jen Shaw from Real Housewives of Salt Lake City.0.84
00:48:36.980Yes. Yes. Okay. So just, that's information for y'all. If you, this is a real overlap of shit that I care about. Housewives, like Bravo Housewives, and tech scams.
00:48:50.700Yeah. Wow. I wonder if they're going to be buds.
00:48:54.400You know, they, there is no way that Jen Shaw is not already scheming how to get this woman on her team. I'll always say that. I know, I know my, I know my Jen Shaw. She's already scheming to get this woman on her team. Trust.0.99
00:50:31.640It was first started by Michael Morrison, whose Twitter profile indicates him as a member of the New York Young Republicans Club.
00:50:37.060Morrison posted about the suspensions on his account on the conservative social media platform Gabbed, where he also posted from a parody of AOC's official account between April 2019 and July of 2019.
00:50:48.160The posts shared on Gabbed were more sexually explicit, and the account re-shared posts from other users that contained racist slurs.0.99
00:50:55.740Surprise, surprise, this guy sucks.1.00
00:50:58.320Yeah, these people are such troglodytes. Like, of course, it's sexually explicit. Like, let's remember that the original tweet that Musk replied to with a fire emoji was the parody account pretending that AOC liked him and had a crush on him.1.00
00:51:17.160I want to come back to that. I should mention that NBC says that they reached out to Morrison and he said that he no longer runs this AOC parody Twitter account and that he thinks it might be run by a team of people. Take that for what it's worth. That's what he told them. I don't know if that's true or not. Who knows?
00:51:34.720So I have talked a bunch about verification and impersonation on Twitter.
00:51:38.840We did a whole episode of Internet Hate Machine about it.
00:51:41.340You know, having a blue checkmark is not just a vanity thing.
00:51:44.780It really did start as a way to help users identify people are who they say they are.
00:51:50.920And it's been a way to provide security for folks who are at the risk of being impersonated online.0.64
00:51:55.380We already know that impersonating Black women and women of color on Twitter can cause chaos.
00:52:01.140us. And it's a thing that bad actors do intentionally to do that. So it's not surprising0.82
00:52:06.300to me that AOC is being targeted. Also, I should say that the obvious thing, Mike, that you brought
00:52:12.620up that we kind of can't not mention is that this parody account is targeting a woman of color,
00:52:18.680elected official. And they're not just using this account to like poke fun at her political or
00:52:23.580policy decisions. It is making her say things like she has a crush on Elon Musk. And the real
00:52:29.840Elon Musk pathetically replies. Let's be super clear. This is so obviously about using a woman
00:52:36.840of color's gender, race, age, and sexuality to belittle her because she is a public figure.0.99
00:52:42.620It is about weaponizing her identity. And I think part of it is that AOC is an attractive young1.00
00:52:48.720woman. And so there is this thing when you are an attractive young woman who is also in public
00:52:56.000that elicits this really gross behavior, and it's all kind of linked, right?
00:52:59.860Like hating her, being obsessed with her, being titillated by her, putting her down.1.00
00:53:05.080It's all sides of the same fucked up coin.0.99
00:53:08.000And I have said this at 1 million times, but it's also not just about AOC.0.98
00:53:13.240It is meant to send a message to other young women who would be potential civic leaders
00:53:18.480or might run for office or be activists or be public in their communities
00:53:22.040That this is what you will have to deal with if you are a young woman, a woman of color, or a black woman who speaks up and wants to represent your community publicly.
00:53:32.900The harassment will be in plain sight, and it will be endorsed and cheered on and enabled by the powers that be, in this case, Elon Musk.
00:53:39.960So if you run for office or become an activist or become somebody who uses a public profile to advocate for things that you care about and help your community, this is what you have to deal with.
00:53:50.780It stifles free speech because think of all the women who will not speak up, who will not run for office, who will not serve their communities because they don't want to have to deal with this kind of crap.0.99
00:54:01.380Cheap, crass, quote, jokes like this should not be the cost of serving as an elected official.
00:54:07.660But if you're a young woman, especially a woman of color or a young queer person, a young trans person, it absolutely is.0.98
00:54:14.160And Elon Musk obviously does not give a shit about his responsibility to make Twitter a place where this is not commonplace.0.97
00:54:21.700In fact, he's so pathetic that it's probably like feeding his ego the chance to be able to pretend like even for a second that there is a reality where somebody like AOC would even ever potentially think about him, potentially have a chance with him.0.98
00:54:36.420And that is the real joke here. The real joke is on Elon Musk, because he's clearly enjoying having his ego stroked by even the idea that a pretend AOC would ever give him the time of day, which would never happen.0.93
00:54:49.660So it's not all bad. I do have a little positive news.
00:54:54.820A little positive news for you. And that is Apple has just unveiled their new iPhone accessibility features, which I'm very excited about.
00:55:03.080Okay, so May 18th was Global Accessibility Awareness Day, and to celebrate, Apple unveiled a suite of new features to improve cognitive, vision, and speech accessibility.
00:55:13.100We should see these features rolled out on iPhone, iPad, and Mac later this year.
00:55:18.240Apple created these tools based on feedback from a broad subsection of users with disabilities.
00:55:24.180So for users who are blind or have low vision, they have detection mode and magnifier, which now offers point and speak, which identifies text that users point toward and reads it out loud to help them interact with physical objects, such as household appliances, which I think is great.
00:55:39.580And they also have a much more simplified grid home screen.
00:55:43.120So if you're somebody who doesn't necessarily need a half a dozen apps on your home screen, you just want to be able to, like, push one button and make a phone call.
00:55:51.420So I love this because, you know, I'm sure I've talked about this on the show before, but accessibility tools don't just benefit people with disabilities.
00:55:59.320They benefit everybody because we're all better served when more folks can show up online and in technology.
00:56:04.740My parents are both huge iPhone people.
00:56:20.580And one of the most complicated things or difficult thing for him to relearn was technology. I don't know why it was so difficult, but it was a real challenge. There's so much technology right now, and it can be so complicated.
00:56:34.960And I think things like the simplified phone grid home screen will be a real hit with him because he's not somebody who is like, you know, doing a million things on his phone.
00:56:47.560He wants to text and he wants to make phone calls.
00:56:50.180And so having it be a lot more simplified, I think, will be really good.
00:56:53.800Technology has really helped both of my parents just be able to show up more.
00:56:59.100You know, my dad's Apple Watch, it monitors his vital signs.
00:57:02.100My mom FaceTimes her niece every single day, sometimes multiple times a day.
00:57:07.200I'll say it is not without friction in our household because my mom loves FaceTime and no longer uses just regular good old-fashioned phone calls.
00:57:17.960And so every time that we speak, she expects it to be FaceTime.
00:57:25.780It's not how I want to have every conversation.
00:57:28.600So it's not without friction, but it's been great for them.
00:57:33.020And I also think it's like, it's just a good, I like tech being designed with accessibility at its core because it is very easy to think of technology as like just cutting edge stuff for young people.
00:57:45.300But that can be so limiting, you know, when tech should be designed with slash for people who need it.
00:57:52.640And I think it's really cool to see technology being made that centers older folks and folks with accessibility needs.
00:57:58.380I think that's really, really cool. And I think it really reminds us like who tech is supposed to serve and who should be centered in the technology that we use every day. So I love this. I think it's great.
00:58:09.000This is really nice. Thank you for bringing this to us. Yeah, this is such a nice story. Thank you for sharing it. It's so nice to see technology doing what it does when it's at its best, which is helping people who either have a disability or some sort of need meet that need and be able to use it as a tool to help them do the things that they want to do.
00:58:36.020And that's about as good as it gets with tech.
00:58:40.100And added bonus, with a simplified iPhone screen, maybe my parents will be calling me every five seconds asking me to do things on their phone.
00:58:47.880So way to foster a sense of independence for my parents specifically.
00:59:03.620Listen, I don't know if you have a similar situation, but when you visit your parents, it's like you'll have the dinner or you'll have the drink, whatever, and then there's like a lull in the conversation and tech support time starts where it's just like, oh, I've got this problem with my computer or like, oh, the internet is being weird.
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01:01:43.500Pro Society is a weekly podcast that's part book club, part group chat for anyone who thinks Pride and Prejudice and Love Island deserve the same level of discipline.
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01:02:42.700This is your girl T.S. Madison coming to you loud, live, and always in favor in color from the Outlaws podcast with me, T.S. Madison.