Under the Influence (with Jo Piazza) - A Quickie： Instagram Hates Politics, Taylor Swift Boosts Her Boyfriend and Minnesota Joins the Party

00:00:00.000 Hello, lovelies, and welcome to our Friday episode of Friday Quickies. I think that's

00:00:08.440 what we're calling it. Maybe I called it something different last week. I'm not. I'm

00:00:12.580 not totally sure. I don't know. The point is, on Fridays, we do quickies. We do hot

00:00:18.580 takes on whatever is happening in the world of social media. You know, so that you have

00:00:24.200 something to talk about at your kids' never-ending basketball practice over the weekend. This

00:00:29.640 weekend, I am actually leaving my children. I'm getting on a plane in about an hour to fly to

00:00:34.460 Seattle to go to the Madonna concert. The Madonna concert on Sunday. My child-free friends who have

00:00:43.920 a lot of money because they're not raising children booked a suite for the Madonna concert.

00:00:59.640 So I ordered myself a sparkly, gem-studded bra from the Amazons, and I'm gonna wear it.

00:01:12.460 I'm gonna wear it like a virgin, and I'm gonna party hard, or as hard as I party these days,

00:01:19.500 and I'm gonna vogue. I'm gonna do all the voguing. I'm very, very, very excited for this.

00:01:27.180 But you know what I'm most excited for? Being on a plane alone. I love flying by myself. I write the

00:01:35.360 best when I fly myself. And you know what I'm going to be writing? My trad wife murder mystery. Yep.

00:01:40.980 Yep. I've already put part of it up on the sub stack and I'm going to be releasing it in

00:01:45.100 installments, much like Charles Dickens. In fact, just, just think of me like the Charles Dickens

00:01:52.020 of trad wife thriller murder mysteries. That's what I am. Joe Piazza, Charles Dickens. The same.

00:02:01.400 Okay, what stories are we bringing you today? Well, Instagram and Threads decided that they

00:02:08.340 will no longer promote what they believe is political content. Here's the problem.

00:02:15.400 No one actually knows what they define as political.

00:02:19.620 That's not even a joke. 0.98

00:02:22.120 And no one thinks that this is going to get rid of the terrible, ridiculous, world-destroying 0.92

00:02:28.200 disinformation that is on Instagram. 0.95

00:02:31.680 No, no, no.

00:02:32.280 It's probably just going to get rid of the good stuff that we follow, like Emily in your

00:02:37.700 phone.

00:02:38.700 You all know Emily in your phone.

00:02:40.040 she brings us incredible progressive news on a regular basis. I called her up because I want

00:02:46.680 to know how this might impact her account and what we can do to support her content.

00:02:53.880 Hey, Joe, this is Emily Amick at Emily in your phone on Instagram. So I've been doing a lot of

00:02:59.680 empirical research. One thing I can definitely tell you is that Instagram posts about cooking

00:03:05.620 and trad wifey content that don't include politics are doing a lot better than anything that includes

00:03:12.220 politics for what our followers can do if they actually want to see our content so the only

00:03:16.900 thing that i have really seen actually work is for someone to engage with my content as if they

00:03:21.840 are literally my friend so like screenshotting my story and being like oh emily add emily in your

00:03:26.900 phone blah blah blah blah blah because then instagram will think you guys are really actual

00:03:31.540 friends and they will show you their content you have to engage with the content though

00:03:35.180 the other ideas that people have had we don't really know what is going to work so obviously

00:03:41.000 follow make someone a favorite uh you can if you search for someone on fyp you can mark yourself

00:03:48.720 interested in their content we don't know how that's going to impact also some people not that

00:03:54.380 many have the ability to go into their settings content preferences and toggle for political

00:04:00.240 content um there's some toggles in there for everyone it's a little different we don't really

00:04:04.940 know what the outcome is going to be on that. What's been really interesting is that the biggest

00:04:10.280 place where people are seeing dings is actually stories, not on feed, which isn't exactly what

00:04:16.820 Meta told us was going to happen. The biggest concern here is that there is no definition

00:04:23.040 of political, and there's no definition of what news is. And while there are a lot of things I do

00:04:31.120 not want to see on my Instagram feed, I also don't think that they are capable of determining

00:04:38.180 what is political or what is news. Next up, we have something that's very, very important.

00:04:46.200 Very important. Taylor Swift. I mean, really, just the Taylor Swift effect, generally.

00:04:54.080 Apparently, Taylor's boyfriend, Travis Kelsey, he plays a sport. He's a sports person.

00:05:00.560 His podcast that he hosts with his brother, Jason Kelsey, Go Eagles, Go Birds,

00:05:06.320 their podcast is now apparently more popular than This American Life and Smartless.

00:05:12.360 Yep, yep. Why do we think that is? Why? It's definitely the Taylor Swift effect.

00:05:19.280 Between October and December, New Heights, the Kelsey podcast, was the sixth most popular podcast,

00:05:26.100 up from being number 67 the prior quarter.

00:05:31.620 What changed between those quarters, my friend?

00:05:34.740 One thing. 1.00

00:05:36.580 Taylor fucking Swift. 1.00

00:05:38.660 And last but certainly not least, 0.99

00:05:41.720 Minnesota has joined the seven other states

00:05:44.160 to protect children of influencers.

00:05:46.920 Here to talk about it is friend of the pod,

00:05:50.420 incredible journalist for Tessa Latifi.

00:05:52.820 this week minnesota joined the seven other states that have pending legislation that would protect

00:06:00.480 the monetary gains and in some cases the privacy of child influencers so there are eight states

00:06:09.100 total that have introduced legislation that would do this and there's only one state in

00:06:14.560 the entire country and that's illinois where there is actually a law in place which is so

00:06:20.400 bananas because this is a multi-billion dollar decades old industry this is not new but we only

00:06:27.160 have one state where the earnings of these kids are protected which basically means that in 49

00:06:32.440 other states they could these kids could you know work their entire lives and then reach the age of

00:06:38.820 18 and have nothing to show for it which is just totally bananas and these states are trying to

00:06:47.060 fix that. So the states that are working on legislation for that are Maryland, California,

00:06:54.500 Georgia, Missouri, Ohio, Washington State, Arizona, and Minnesota. And Washington State

00:07:02.620 introduced theirs in 2023, but all the rest of those states, those seven other states,

00:07:07.760 all introduced the legislation in the first month of 2024,

00:07:12.200 which I think really just shows the way that we're thinking about the child influencer industry

00:07:21.020 and how that's changing because we went from having one law passed in 2023 and only two

00:07:29.380 proposed to seven proposed just in these first few weeks of 2024 so if you're interested in

00:07:35.000 this at all follow me anywhere i'm at hi fortessa h-i-f-o-r-t-e-s-a i'll be tracking all of this and

00:07:44.480 i will keep you updated we have now one last fun thing my friend nora from terrible thanks for

00:07:51.740 asking yes yes all the podcasters you love are friends that is that is a true thing she's dropping

00:07:57.680 a new podcast that's totally awesome why is it totally awesome because nora helped make it and

00:08:02.700 also because it's about swingers. Yep, yep, it is called Time Capsule, the silver chain. In the

00:08:08.780 early 1990s, a cache of abandoned newsletters found its way from a safety deposit box in

00:08:14.480 Minneapolis, Minnesota, to the state's historical society. The newsletters detailed the inner

00:08:20.600 workings of a secret 1970s swinger society, the Silver Chain Social Club. Fifty years later, 0.99

00:08:27.720 TV writer and host Paul Diddy tracks down the club's surviving members to uncover the group's

00:08:32.680 mysterious history, and the ties that connected its members long after the Swingers Club closed

00:08:38.320 its doors for good. Yeah, I want to listen to all those episodes immediately. Nora just sent

00:08:45.520 me the trailer, and I wrote back to her, oh my god, give it to me, I'm going to put it in this episode.

00:08:55.720 When someone says they're a swinger, we all pretty much know what that entails.

00:09:00.320 In the early 1990s, an envelope arrived at the Minnesota Historical Society.

00:09:17.520 Inside that envelope were the contents of an abandoned safe deposit box from First Bloomington

00:09:22.760 Lake National Bank. And with the arrival of that one envelope, their collection now included

00:09:30.500 newsletters from the 1970s. Mimeographed and folded like church bulletins and credited to

00:09:38.960 an organization based in Bloomington, Minnesota, an organization called the Silver Chain Social

00:09:45.460 Club. Month by month, these newsletters chronicle family camping trips. We went tubing down at the

00:09:53.360 Apple River. And yeah, that was a lot of fun. Monthly dances. We always just referred to it

00:09:59.660 as a dance club. And discussion panels like Women's Changing Role in Society and Don't Fuck 1.00

00:10:08.000 like a truck. Because behind closed doors, the Silver Chain was a well-organized swingers group 1.00

00:10:16.920 comprising over 100 couples. For over a year, I've been scouring these old newsletters,

00:10:27.280 these relics of 1970s Minnesota. And like any time capsule, the objects are the first thing

00:10:34.140 that caught my interest.

00:10:35.780 But it's the people behind the objects

00:10:38.180 that became my obsession.

00:10:41.180 Okay.

00:10:42.620 I have a picture of me in this beautiful red dress.

00:10:47.880 Pretty sexy.

00:10:49.300 Yep.

00:10:53.060 Yeah, I mean, I read in the newsletters

00:10:55.740 there are multiple times where

00:10:57.100 they're describing your outfit.

00:10:59.100 Really?

00:10:59.700 Yeah, in detail.

00:11:00.760 Oh, my goodness.

00:11:01.940 The further I delved into these newsletters, the more questions I had.

00:11:10.300 But 50 years later, many of the Silver Chain's members are no longer alive.

00:11:17.500 And for those who are living, well, they're not exactly excited to hear from a stranger who discovered a secret society that they thought was long gone.

00:11:26.680 please delete me from your list

00:11:31.420 and whoever else

00:11:32.800 might be on your list

00:11:34.260 that you haven't already contacted

00:11:35.480 thank you very much

00:11:37.040 goodbye

00:11:37.580 but for every person

00:11:40.120 who does not want to discuss

00:11:41.420 the silver chain

00:11:42.240 there are plenty of others

00:11:44.580 who do

00:11:45.480 so many people

00:11:48.780 that you just

00:11:50.060 flutter around

00:11:51.440 and talk to everybody

00:11:53.080 and

00:11:53.940 yeah it's just

00:11:56.680 fun. I was kind of a social butterfly. And the more I dug, the more questions I had.

00:12:06.520 Somebody's daughter joined. I'm almost certain that it was Judy. Because the silver chain,

00:12:14.040 it's a different type of whodunit. When you would have the parties at your penthouse,

00:12:21.620 Uh, how many couples would you invite?

00:12:25.720 Well, 20, 30.

00:12:28.600 30 couples?

00:12:30.720 In a group based on secrecy, where members knew each other only by first name,

00:12:36.680 what possessed someone to store these newsletters away?

00:12:40.280 And how did a club like this function in a conservative Minnesota suburb?

00:12:45.640 Well, Hal and Terry decided they were going to make a lot of money

00:12:49.380 and they were going to manufacture ecstasy.

00:12:52.320 Hal had the money.

00:12:54.700 Terry had the brains.

00:12:59.060 What happened to the club?

00:13:00.940 And what can we learn about ourselves

00:13:03.000 and our own relationships

00:13:04.360 from the experiences of our grandparents' generation?

00:13:08.380 I didn't expect to tell my whole life story

00:13:10.660 about my ex and my normal husband

00:13:13.900 and all this sort of jazz.

00:13:15.960 Well, you know, that's probably some of it

00:13:18.380 And I wouldn't mind having my kids know about.

00:13:20.960 Yeah. 1.00

00:13:21.820 So mom went from dependent to a stump.

00:13:25.940 It's a big deal.

00:13:27.800 In Time Capsule Season 1, we're time traveling back to the 1970s,

00:13:33.000 exploring the long-term effects of a suburban subculture

00:13:36.340 and discovering how these couples found a way to both connect and reinvent themselves.

00:13:42.400 we'll find out the truth about the silver chain and what was left behind because in the case of

00:13:50.460 the silver chain sometime capsules are never meant to be discovered at all hello this call

00:13:58.000 is being recorded hi hero

00:14:00.460 you guys do not realize you're playing with fire and that's all we've got for today friends

00:14:10.180 I am getting on a plane, I'm putting on that sparkly bra, and I am gonna vogue until I pass

00:14:16.980 out in a bathroom. Go do something nice for yourself. You deserve it.

00:14:40.180 Thank you.

Under the Influence (with Jo Piazza) - February 16, 2024

A Quickie： Instagram Hates Politics, Taylor Swift Boosts Her Boyfriend and Minnesota Joins the Party

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