Kathy O'Neill (1:31)

I was thinking of it more as a victory lap than a postmortem.

Felix Salmon (1:34)

A victory lap. There you go. We do have Jordan Weissman.

Jordan Weissman (1:37)

Hello, everyone.

Felix Salmon (1:38)

We do have Anna Shymansky.

Anna Shymansky (1:39)

Hey, there.

Felix Salmon (1:40)

And we are gonna be talking about TED Talks is a kind of. As a thing. We're gonna talk about talks as a thing because, you know, there's certain Obama types who are back in the news for forgiving talks. And so this is just gonna be the Talk Talk edition.

Kathy O'Neill (1:57)

Ooh, nice.

Felix Salmon (1:58)

Talk Talk. But yet. Kathy.

Kathy O'Neill (2:00)

Hi.

Felix Salmon (2:01)

Congratulations.

Kathy O'Neill (2:02)

Thank you. Thanks.

Felix Salmon (2:03)

So you gave your TED Talk happened. And everyone I know who's given a TED Talk, like, all they do for months before they give their TED Talk is kvetch about the TED Organization and the. What they put you through without any payment. Right?

Kathy O'Neill (2:23)

No direct payment.

Felix Salmon (2:24)

The idea is that eventually we'll get.

Kathy O'Neill (2:27)

To the indirect payment by the time.

Felix Salmon (2:28)

We'Ll get to the indirect payment by the time we stop talking about Barack Obama. Barack Obama. But the. But they really, like. For those of us who've given talks in the past, we like. We scribbled down some ideas, maybe put something on an index card, get up on stage. It's not like that.

Kathy O'Neill (2:42)

No, it's not. Although I have to say I resisted quite a bit of that pressure. But, I mean, the people around me were so stressed out that I made a pact with one of them that if, like, if something went wrong and one of us started pooping on the stage, then the other one would run up to the stage and poop in solidarity. Turned out we didn't need that.

Jordan Weissman (3:03)

It's like the weirdest worst case scenario. Well, we figured uncontrollable bow.

Kathy O'Neill (3:08)

But that's exactly how. This is like the fever pitch. They get you to where you're like, I'm not sure if I could not poop on the stage. It's really ridiculous. The other theory I have about is the reason they put you through so much stress is that, like, afterwards, when you're finally done and when everyone else is finally done, there's just a whole lot of sex. It's like the fucking Olympic Village, except TED Village.

Jordan Weissman (3:33)

That's. That's not unexpected.

Felix Salmon (3:36)

Yeah, that's amazing.

Jordan Weissman (3:37)

But like the Olympic Village. So for being like, extremely attractive, hard bodied, like, well, Olympic athlete, the TED.

Kathy O'Neill (3:44)

Talks are Guys, Guys, not listen.

Felix Salmon (3:46)

Some people find smart people attractive. And by the way, the official.

Anna Shymansky (3:53)

Not a corporeal sex.

Kathy O'Neill (3:54)

In fact, most of this. Yeah, probably I'm exaggerating for a fact because that's what I do. But like. And I should also mention that, like, the average TED speaker is pretty attractive.

Felix Salmon (4:04)

And I will add that the official slogan of TED is Ideas Worth spreading.

Jordan Weissman (4:09)

Oh, God.

Kathy O'Neill (4:10)

Okay.

Felix Salmon (4:11)

Yeah.

Anna Shymansky (4:11)

Which is like gonorrhea.

Felix Salmon (4:13)

Gonorrhea. Yeah. This is.

Jordan Weissman (4:15)

It's a viral idea. And I found another virus.

Kathy O'Neill (4:18)

Wow. Wow.

Jordan Weissman (4:19)

Sorry.

Kathy O'Neill (4:20)

Really? What I should have said.

Felix Salmon (4:21)

Do you have an idea which was worth spreading? Kathy?

Kathy O'Neill (4:24)

Well, yeah, I talked about my book. I talk about weapons of mass destruction. I talked about, you know, how we have. We have to hold algorithms accountable. And I ended with kind of a call, like a political rallying cry.

Felix Salmon (4:36)

Was there a call to action?

Kathy O'Neill (4:37)

Yeah.

Felix Salmon (4:38)

Is that a thing that the TED talks want? Is it?

Kathy O'Neill (4:41)

No, I don't think so. I changed it at the end without telling them.

Felix Salmon (4:43)

Oh.

Kathy O'Neill (4:44)

Which is something like they're not that you kind of not supposed to do, but like, they are control freaks. So what you have to do is like nod and smile and then give the talk you want to give.

Felix Salmon (4:54)

So what they want, like, walk us through this, they're like, you have a good book, but can you please, like, turn it into a story with narrative arc? Put yourself in there more and, like, ideally have, like, some, like, triumphant note. You can end on something like that.

Kathy O'Neill (5:10)

Yeah, there's a. There's an arc, which is sort of the. I mean, it's a joke at this point, like how formulaic TED talks are. But it's kind of. And they're really not all. They don't all follow this exact thing. But the idea is you start positive, you connect with your audience at some personal level, and then you get deep, you know, and kind of shocking, maybe, and in my case, a little scary, threatening. But then you end with saying, but we can. We can do this, you know, and, like, you end up on an upbeat. And then, you know, people get so excited, they rise to their feet. Like, not only is there a problem that we didn't even know about, but there's a solution that we're super excited about.

Anna Shymansky (5:44)

Yay.

Kathy O'Neill (5:44)

You know, and that's. That's the general idea.

Felix Salmon (5:46)

And how many of the ted. I mean, you saw pretty much all of the TED talks.

Kathy O'Neill (5:51)

I didn't, because it's. I really maxed out, especially with Elon Musk, which we're going to talk about. But, like, I. There were some talks, and I should mention that, like, I feel like I had a pretty positive experience overall. But one of the things that happened was that I was. My session was moved. I was originally supposed to be in something called the. Our algorithmic overlords? No, our robotic overlords. Which I was like, oh, this is perfect for me. You know, perfect. But I was moved to. To, like, Wednesday night instead, which was a totally different session. It doesn't matter to people on the outside what session you're in. But, like, when you're in the conference, it kind of seems like it matters. So I was a little bit like, what's going on here? What's going on? And so I went to the robotics overlord talks, and it was. It was basically a bunch of AI professors, mostly white guys, talking about how wonderful the future is going to be once they basically are in charge of everything. It was, like, really scary.

Felix Salmon (6:45)

So we are welcoming our robot overlords, basically.

Kathy O'Neill (6:48)

One of them was even asked, and this is a guy from, like, Boston Scientific. And I don't think the Q and A gets onto the final edits of the.

Jordan Weissman (6:53)

Never does.

Kathy O'Neill (6:54)

Well, he was asked afterwards, like, do you have any concerns about this, about the coming robotic, you know, proliferation? And he was like, no, no, I love it.

Felix Salmon (7:05)

So how many of the talks, in general would you say fall into the general bucket of simple solutions to complex problems?

Kathy O'Neill (7:14)

Well, quite a few. I mean, so my. My friend Kate gave a talk about climate change and she's. She's at the Columbia World. What is it called?

Felix Salmon (7:22)

The Earth Institute.

Kathy O'Neill (7:23)

Earth Institute. And so she was talking about, like, you know, the, the uncertainty around how clouds are. Clouds are going to actually move and how. Whether they're going to save us from global climate change. The answer is no. But then the guy after her was a guy, and I don't remember his name, but his, his idea was like, just throw a bunch of chalk into the air. Like literally just throw a bunch of chalk into the air. And he wasn't a scientist. He was like a former computer programmer.

Anna Shymansky (7:48)

That is so indicative of like the male female response of some guy who knows nothing.

Kathy O'Neill (7:52)

Right, right. Because she is like a, you know, she could. She has an actual degree in physics and she knows stuff about. So she. But to their credit, and like, again, it's not going to go into the final cut. I don't think she brought. Was brought onto the stage at the end and was like, you know, this isn't going to work. And by the way, like, there's something called consent and like, you are trying to do this without, you know, the informed consent of literally anyone in the world. It's a bad idea.

Felix Salmon (8:19)

But it's solutionism. Right. I think Evgeny Morozov came up with this idea of like, wherever there's a problem, there's a solution. And it's probably a technological solution of some type. And then all we need is more technological solutions and then we will have solved all of our problems.

Kathy O'Neill (8:38)

And big data is probably part of it.

Felix Salmon (8:39)

Yeah, almost certainly.

Kathy O'Neill (8:40)

Yeah. There was a lot of that. There was a lot of that. And there was a guy who, the guy from Apple who invented Siri also forgot his name because I only remember ideas. But his thing was, oh, we shouldn't think of technology as a threat. We should think of it as our companions. They're going to, like, you know, they're going to augment our experiences in life and make us smarter. And that was a huge theme because the theme of the TED conference in general was the future you. So it was like, how are you going to be augmented by. By artificial intelligence?

Jordan Weissman (9:11)

So they're all really excited to live through her, basically. They really want her. Yeah. Walking. They want to be walking.

Anna Shymansky (9:17)

They want to be like in Phoenix and have Scarlett Johansson.

Kathy O'Neill (9:19)

Yeah.

Jordan Weissman (9:20)

Be their personal assistant.

Anna Shymansky (9:21)

Speaking of ye. Non corporeal sex.

Kathy O'Neill (9:23)

Yeah. And then there was like, a lot of. A lot of talk about, like, just having Your brain interface directly with the Internet, that kind of crap.

Felix Salmon (9:31)

And then. And then you were kind of the counter programming, I guess.

Kathy O'Neill (9:35)

Yeah. So, I mean, as I said, I was removed from the AI section. The hard science stuff with the. With the boys. And I was put into like. Well, actually I was put into a Wednesday night session with David Miliband, who you might.

Felix Salmon (9:49)

David Miliband, like another overachieving white guy?

Kathy O'Neill (9:51)

Yeah, yeah. So he was talking about refugee advocacy. And then there was this amazing woman who also. Muslim woman who was also talking about refugee advocacy. And like, there was me, you know, like, it wasn't clear why I was there.

Felix Salmon (10:06)

So you were there because you're like. You're like the downer session.

Kathy O'Neill (10:10)

I decided to spin it positively. Like, I was there because in the evenings you're entertained. Like, there's music, there's much more clapping during this. This talks like. So the original session was in. Was in the morning. In the morning you're supposed to be like, educated, you know. Oh, that's interesting. Oh, you're supposed to like, nod and think hard about what you just heard. In the evenings, you're supposed to like, react. And it's like entertainment, by the way. Ted. I always thought it was like technology, education, entertainment, design. It's entertainment and design. And like that really, like that really hit home when I was actually there because it is entertaining. Like, the musicians they have, the artists, they're. They're amazing.

Jordan Weissman (10:47)

Yeah. So, like, this, this is a question I have is like the people who attend, and often they are shilling out like $6,000 or more ticket, 8,500 typical tickets.

Kathy O'Neill (10:57)

But if you want to get in early to get a good seat, 25,000.

Jordan Weissman (11:00)

Okay, so like, what are they, like, what are they getting out of this?

Felix Salmon (11:06)

And plus who are. Okay, so let's. Let's come to this in the next segment because the whole, like, who is the audience at head and who is on stage is perennially fascinating to me. Okay, so the first question is, these tickets famously sell out in like a millisecond. They're like, you know, I don't know, Bruce Springsteen tickets or something, only they're much more expensive. And is it just rich members of the public? Is it people spending their own money? Is it people spending their, like. But, you know, it's all going on a corporate card somehow. Who are these. But people. Who are these people?

Kathy O'Neill (11:40)

A lot of them are working in family offices. I just, like, introduce myself to a bunch of them. So there are people that just, I don't know if that means that they're getting paid to go.

Felix Salmon (11:50)

But no, if you meet someone and you ask them what they do and they say, I work in the family office, what that means is I have so much money, I don't need to work.

Anna Shymansky (12:00)

Well, I don't know. I worked at a family office, so.

Felix Salmon (12:03)

But no, no, like the people, the people who are going, who work in the family offices, like, generally, they're going to be a member of the family. And. And so what? And my job is to invest my own money.

Kathy O'Neill (12:16)

That's my impression. And I should say, I think the biggest draw isn't the talks. The biggest draw is the entertainment at night. Like, there's so many parties and dinners. Like, I get invited to multiple things that I couldn't possibly go to all of them. But I think a lot of people try. Like, they're like, I have to make an appearance at this party and then at this Jeffersonian dinner with the following theme of how to save the world. And it has, like, those dinners, by the way, have a little bit of a Davos feel to them.

Jordan Weissman (12:41)

I was about to ask, is this.

Felix Salmon (12:42)

Basically social circuit sound very Davosian?

Kathy O'Neill (12:46)

Yeah, I went to karaoke, just to be clear. I was like, where are the karaoke places? And I had like a, like a sort of counter anti Jeffersonian dinner thing going on. But I'm just saying those people are there to see each other.

Jordan Weissman (12:59)

Okay.

Kathy O'Neill (13:00)

And many of them have gone for 12 years or more and they're like, oh, Linda, where are you? Oh, my God, Scott, so good to see you. Like, have you met so and so? And it's like the most networky thing I've ever been to.

Jordan Weissman (13:11)

Are there any, like, true TED Talk, like, connoisseurs? Like, is there some guy who watches these things the way, like, Hemingway watched bullfights or something?

Felix Salmon (13:21)

Yeah, well, and, well, there is. And his name is Chris Anderson. And he basically, now we have to. We can't talk about Ted without talking about Chris Anderson. So. Yeah, Kathy, you've had more time with him than any of us. So, like, tell us about Chris.

Kathy O'Neill (13:36)

Well, Chris is like somewhere in between like a super villain and like a true believer. And you can't, you know, he really does know how to pick things that are going to feel profound to the audience. And I think that's his. That's his skill. But he also, you know, like, he, you know, he can't possibly agree with a. And not a. But he manages to come on stage after both of those talks, like, which are one expounding a. And the other one not a. And say, oh, that was so profound. I mean, this isn't a British accent. Could you do that?

Felix Salmon (14:12)

Oh, that was so profound. But I have to, if I'm, if I'm going to read something, I have to read actually out this, this piece which Evgeny Morozov wrote five years ago. He says I take no pleasure. He took, he takes great pleasure, by the way.

Kathy O'Neill (14:25)

That guy is super villain right there.

Felix Salmon (14:28)

In declaring what has been obvious for that, Ted is no longer a responsible curator of ideas worth spreading. Instead, it has become something ludicrous and a little sinister. And he's kind of right about this. He calls it an insatiable kingpin of international meme laundering, which is a great phrase.

Kathy O'Neill (14:49)

It is a good one.

Felix Salmon (14:49)

And then he goes on to say that Chris Anderson should explain how ideas worth reading become ideas no footnotes can support.

Kathy O'Neill (14:59)

You know, look, I was very conflicted about doing a TED Talk because I, you know, I felt like I was like a little bit of window dressing on an otherwise pretty sort of nefarious gig. I do feel like, having been there, that there were quite a few pieces of window dressing. Like, at some point, if you have enough window dressing, it's not window dressing anymore. Right. If you have enough sort of token, like progressives or token people who think differently, then it's actually kind of a mix. And I feel like we almost reached that point and it was really great having the Pope talk. Like, honestly, like he brought a really needed secondary message because we had that day, which was Monday, we'd had just a series of people talking about how it's going to be great in the future because there's going to be even more inequality. This is not how they said it. And we're going to be in charge. Right. And that was my interpretation. And then the Pope just came on and was like, you can't think of only technology as, like a way to own more. You have to think of these, of this. You have to think of the numbers and the people behind the numbers. And we are in charge of taking care of people, not just ourselves. And I was like, thank God for the Pope.

Felix Salmon (16:05)

So the question I have is less about the Pope and more about, like, the smart people giving the bulk of the talks.

Kathy O'Neill (16:11)

Yeah.

Felix Salmon (16:13)

And I guess what I want to know is how much of a delta is there between their normally, you know, really quite smart and thoughtful professional lives on the one hand, and then the 20 minute TED distillation of what they do on the other when they're on stage saying, we are going to solve all the world's problems with technology. Is that because they believe it, or is that because that's what the TED people have pushed them into saying?

Kathy O'Neill (16:40)

You know, that's a good question. I think my impression was they believed most of it. That people, you know, they were given a lot of time to think about how to distill their thoughts into 12 minutes, as I was. And usually 12 minutes, by the way. I didn't say. And I wasn't told what to say, just to be clear. Like, I wasn't. I wasn't.

Felix Salmon (16:59)

But how many, like, rehearsals. How many times did you need to give your talk? Twice to the TED people. Only twice?

Kathy O'Neill (17:03)

Yeah. I had to do it once in New York with Chris Anderson there complaining and Ray Dalio complaining. Ray Dalio tried to correct me about what an algorithm was. And then. And then I had a rehearsal at ted.

Felix Salmon (17:15)

So what did Ray Dalio say?

Kathy O'Neill (17:18)

Oh, my God. And you're gonna see this when it comes out, which will be in a few months. But he just talked about how great algorithms are. And at some point, he actually tried and almost succeeded in getting people to sort of chant the word meritocracy.

Jordan Weissman (17:31)

Oh, my God, Wait, this is gonna go so viral. This is gonna.

Anna Shymansky (17:35)

And I was like, speaking of supervillainism.

Jordan Weissman (17:36)

Oh, my God.

Kathy O'Neill (17:37)

I thought we all agree that meritocracy is an empty concept.

Felix Salmon (17:41)

So meritocracy is a concept which is invented by Lord Young in England as this kind of dystopian future. He's like, we're going to wind up in this horrible meritocracy where the only people who suc. That the cognitive elite and all the rest of us get shafted.

Kathy O'Neill (17:58)

Yes.

Felix Salmon (17:59)

And it became this good thing somehow. And Young was like, what the hell just happened?

Kathy O'Neill (18:05)

Exactly. And if you're looking for an audience of people that will clap when you're like, who doesn't want meritocracy? Let's hear it for meritocracy. TED is a pretty good audience to start there. And there were claps, and it was shocking to me because I was like, oh, shit, it's worse than I thought. But that. So going back to the original question, I mean, I talked to someone in Japan who distilled it perfectly for me. Like, she said that, like, in Japan, if you have even gone to ted, then you're considered more like. More in. More like wise. So, like, you just like that, you're.

Felix Salmon (18:40)

Halfway to becoming a living national treasure. Yeah.

Kathy O'Neill (18:42)

You're like, the branding of TED just Leaks onto you and sticks and, like, you are just. You're more important because that's essentially why.

Anna Shymansky (18:49)

They then don't pay you. Is that their argument?

Kathy O'Neill (18:51)

Well, yeah. Well, yes. I mean, they don't have to pay you. And every step of the way, I should mention that they sort of make it completely clear that you should be grateful for all their comments and complaints and that if you're complaining about 12 minutes, they might bring it down to nine. You know, it's like, absolutely clear who's in charge.

Felix Salmon (19:08)

And the idea is that once your video goes viral on the Internet, you're going to become a thought leader celebrity, and everyone is going to be falling over each other to phone up your speaking agent to offer you hundreds of thousands of dollars to give speeches.

Kathy O'Neill (19:25)

So, Felix, I just want to say that one of the things that I found most off putting about my experience last week was that it was completely unironic. Like, there were no snarky comments. Everybody was super earnest, and they felt like they were in a sacred space. And when they say things like thought leader, they meant it. And I was like, can we kill ourselves now? Like, I want to die.

Anna Shymansky (19:47)

Well, it has that, like, church feel to it, this kind of tent revival. The audience is primed to believe everything that you say.

Kathy O'Neill (19:53)

No matter.

Felix Salmon (19:54)

Yeah. A few years ago, there was this, like, parody video of a mashup of all of the TED talks one year, which turned out not to be a parody video. It was just someone who was such a true believer that they. They put all of the. My favorite bit was this woman who got up on stage and said, we can change the world if we believe the impossible.

Kathy O'Neill (20:15)

That is. That's exactly the kind of thing that gets said at TED Talks. And I'm sitting there like, you know, but people are just, like, so true, so profound, you know, and they just. They left their cynic at the door.

Jordan Weissman (20:30)

So what percentage of the audience is actually American versus international, though? Because I wonder if some of the lack of cynicism and irony comes from the international flavor of the event itself.

Felix Salmon (20:40)

No, I think it comes from the West Coastness.

Jordan Weissman (20:43)

Oh, is that.

Kathy O'Neill (20:44)

Almost nobody is. And that's why it's so special. If you even get to go. It's really very American, very Silicon Valley.

Anna Shymansky (20:52)

Okay, and is there actually a Q and A after you give the talk?

Kathy O'Neill (20:56)

Sometimes. It depends on how much setup time there is for the next talk. Like, if you're right before a band, then definitely. But I. And I had, like, one question, so. Yeah, most people get about one question.

Anna Shymansky (21:05)

Because it does seem like that's part of the problem of TED in general is just that people are giving talks. There aren't debates. There are no questions. You can kind of sometimes potentially make lazy arguments because the audience is primed to believe everything you say, to not criticize.

Kathy O'Neill (21:17)

Having said that, like, that's true, and it is a problem. Although it would be hard to interact with 2,000 people, which is. It's a large place. But having said that, like, there are. There were some really interesting moments in conversations after the talks, you know, like in the bars and in the lobbies where people were like, listen, you brought this up. I disagree. Let's have this out. So in that sense, and by, you know, in that sense, it was an interesting place to be because there were lots and lots of interesting people, and there were some. Lots of famous people, too. And that's the other thing. Like, when people buy tickets to ted, they don't just want to see each other. They also want to just say, I met Al Gore, who was in the climate change.

Felix Salmon (21:53)

Who was. Who was your top, like. Like, intellectual celebrity crusher you met in ted?

Kathy O'Neill (21:58)

I met Adam Savage, who loved my talk and gave me a big hug. And, like, I'm. He is. He's. If people don't know, he. He was this. One of the stars of Mythbusters, and my kids and my husband all worship him. So I was just like, I'm getting so many brownie points from my kids right now, but he. He was great. You know, I was like. I was so, like, not starstruck for the most part, but when I met Adam Savage, I was like, oh, my God, I just touched Adam Savage. Pope.

Jordan Weissman (22:26)

Pope and Adam Savage. Holy shit. Let me touch your garment.

Kathy O'Neill (22:31)

Pope was in the Vatican, but, yeah.

Felix Salmon (22:32)

Yeah, the Pope didn't actually physically turn up.

Jordan Weissman (22:34)

Oh, okay.

Felix Salmon (22:35)

Was there an Elon Musk story you needed to share?

Kathy O'Neill (22:37)

Look, I mean, I just want to say this about Elon Musk, and after spending way too much of the time thinking about him in the last week, which is that if he lived in my, like, neighbor's basement, like, he lived with his parents in the basement nearby. And, like, I went over every now and then and, like, oh, Elon's here. Like, tell us about your newest idea, Elon. And he's like, oh, I want to build a tunnel on her. And I'd be like, oh, that's so cute, Elon. Go back downstairs. And I would actually really enjoy him. But, like, as it is, as a. Like, a cult leader where people believe the Stuff he says it is fascinating and awful.

Felix Salmon (23:10)

Have you talked to the hyperloop true believers?

Kathy O'Neill (23:13)

I've talked to way too many true believers. Elon Musk style. Yes. And I mean they're all nuts. And they have no, it's like not scientific. It's like almost to the point of like climate change denial. Because they're like, let's just say this is true.

Jordan Weissman (23:27)

Yeah, but like, okay, so aside from okay, the hyperloop and the tunneling and like, if you leave that, what are the Romans done?

Kathy O'Neill (23:37)

So I mean, like, I mean, Tesla's.

Jordan Weissman (23:38)

A pretty cool company. Like, if Tesla, like it's so far it is doing it is delivering on what it has said it would deliver on its time, failed to deliver on.

Felix Salmon (23:47)

Almost all of its promises.

Kathy O'Neill (23:48)

Elon Musk is a salesman and he hit upon something that's selling. Yeah, I'm not disregarding that. But he's a salesman and not a scientist.

Felix Salmon (23:55)

And let's be clear that he is selling his ideas much more successfully than he is selling his cars. He has like 1% of the karma.

Kathy O'Neill (24:06)

Yeah.

Jordan Weissman (24:06)

But no one expected him to have a ton of the car market.

Kathy O'Neill (24:08)

At the end of the day. He's also talking about ridiculous things that will not work and people aren't pushing back on him. And that's what I have the problem with.

Jordan Weissman (24:15)

I feel like maybe that's part of the genius of like, that's part of selling the cars in some way.

Kathy O'Neill (24:20)

It's stupid.

Jordan Weissman (24:21)

And selling the solar, like, I feel like maybe that aura of Tony Starkness is like what the possibility that he's going to create the actual like weird AI inception, whatever the hell singularity moment is what sells more of his cars.

Felix Salmon (24:35)

Wait, and on the subject of TED Talk, I need to ask about Elon's TED Talk. Did he give a TED Talk or did he just. Because when you are super, super important, you get to not prepare and just sit down and give a Q and A. Right.

Kathy O'Neill (24:49)

Serena Williams and Elon Musk. Q and A.

Felix Salmon (24:52)

And even the Pope had a speech.

Kathy O'Neill (24:53)

The Pope gave a talk.

Felix Salmon (24:54)

The Pope gave a talk.

Kathy O'Neill (24:55)

The Pope put out.

Anna Shymansky (24:56)

Elon Musk trumps the Pope.

Kathy O'Neill (24:57)

This is what I was saying. The Pope put out. But he was in the Vatican. Wait, then Joe, he didn't travel.

Jordan Weissman (25:02)

So here's my favorite Elon Musk. You saw he's dating Amber Heard. Right.

Kathy O'Neill (25:06)

Don't know who that is.

Jordan Weissman (25:07)

A model. Yeah, model. She's very, very good looking woman. And everyone's so they're perfect for each other. Well, so the thing that Slate we realized at Slate is that, you know, there's that famous Matthew McConaughey line. I keep getting older and the girls keep getting the same age. Stay the same age or I'm sorry. Yeah. I keep getting older and the girls stay the same age. He's the reverse of that. Like, if you look at early Elon Musk photos, he's a really, like, nerdy kind of. He was balding. Like, he's had serious hair plugs. And thanks to whatever combination of like, you know, like macro foods and cosmetic surgery he subjected himself to, it's. The girls keep staying the same age and he keeps getting younger. It's kind of amazing.

Anna Shymansky (25:45)

It's like Benjamin Button.

Jordan Weissman (25:47)

Yeah.

Felix Salmon (25:48)

So he has actually succeeded in what Peter Thiel, you know, wants to do. And becoming a more living in the.

Kathy O'Neill (25:56)

Basement is good for him somehow. Yeah, exactly.

Anna Shymansky (25:59)

Being exposed to UV radiation.

Kathy O'Neill (26:01)

Like, he's living. You know what it is? He's living as a teenage sci fi fan. And I. My husband is a teenage sci fi fan who, by the way, had this idea of tunnels at some point, like 10 years ago. And I was like, that's really nice. Go do some math. You know what I mean? He just said, elon Musk is a hero worshiped by everyone who wants to feel good about themselves for buying a really expensive car. And that is a power that he should not have.

Anna Shymansky (26:24)

But isn't that like so much of Ted though? In general, it's just like, yes. Yeah. Like he.

Kathy O'Neill (26:27)

A perfect metaphor.

Felix Salmon (26:30)

Chris Anderson and Elon Musk are marriage made in thought leader heaven.

Kathy O'Neill (26:36)

Kill me now.

Felix Salmon (26:38)

Okay, so we're going to move on, I think, to this whole concept of monetizing speeches. So, Kathy. Yeah, I feel like TED has done a number of things to sort of discourse, but one of the things it has done is it's created the concept of the speech as something entertaining and valuable and something which increasing numbers of conferences and groups are willing to pay astonishing amounts of money for. And this is the, I guess, how spoken, how unspoken is it idea behind ted, that if you give a TED Talk, you will then have this, like, long line of people queuing up to throw money at you.

Kathy O'Neill (27:19)

I mean, I said it a lot. People looked at me like, why are you talking about that? But, you know, so I have a speaker agent, a speaking agent agent, which I got like, basically when I. My book was about to come out. And my speaking agent is this wonderful person. Because basically, if you've written a book that is. That's popular, like you're Going to get invited three times a day to do something at least once a day to like, oh, will you come to, you know, Utah in August to talk to my reu? Like my undergrad program in the summer? And we don't have any money, but like, we'll pay for a coach ticket. And you're like, like, no. If, literally if I do all those things, I will never be at home and I will not can make any money, right? So you get a speaking agent and the speaking agent says, well, we're not going to let you do anything unless it's at least $5,000. And then, and then when I first got this speaking agent, I was like, awesome. I'm never going to have to give another talk. But like, every now and then, like, they'll pay, they'll pay you that much money. And it's kind of amazing, right? But until you realize that it's actually a lot of work and they make you come in a day early and stay in a day late and like you. So it's a lot of work, actually. And if you think about doing that once a week, it's, it's got a kind of daunting. And I don't do it once a week. But then, then, then you start understanding what this really is. And what it really is is an industry of conferences. Now you, you mentioned the TED Talk part of it, which is a very important part. But the real, the real industry is the conferences themselves. And they're industry conferences. So they're in Las Vegas conference centers. I've been to like the Caesars palace conference center. I wanted to die the entire time. And they charge a shit money for the attendants who could get paid by their companies to go. So they charge $800 ahead or much more or more. And then, well, they have to show them something, so they hire people to speak. So it's, it's a middleman industry, but it, it works very, very well. And I'll just add that they can charge more if they have TED speakers. And that's why if you're a TED speaker, you can charge more to come because you're like, I'm endowing your conference with this, with this extra special brand, which is the TED brand. So it'. That is the way you should think about things.

Felix Salmon (29:35)

And the speaking fee market is crazy. And virtually anyone who's written the book will tell you, I would say the majority of nonfiction books, you actually wind up making more money off the speaking fees than you do off the books.

Jordan Weissman (29:51)

Of course. Yeah, that's when someone says it's like a business card, the book has become a business card. That's almost certainly what they're talking about now.

Felix Salmon (29:56)

And this is a relatively new phenomenon. Phenomenon. Like 20 years ago this was not the case. And there's been this bizarre confluence of. As the Internet has digitized everything, the demand for in person conferences where you physically sit in a room and physically listen to someone physically talk has just gone up and up and up and it doesn't seem to be abating at all. There's like a bottomless amount of demand, which is one of the reasons that the fees are so high for people who can give physical talks in physical places.

Anna Shymansky (30:29)

And is that a bad thing? I mean, I think there's often this idea that like there's something inherently kind of bad or sleazy about getting paid to give a talk. And I don't really quite understand why that is.

Jordan Weissman (30:38)

I think it depends on who you are and who you're talking to. I will say, I think that the live entertainment part of it just sort of mirrors we're seeing in other industries like music. I mean, that's the same thing as recorded music has become less valuable, actually live entertainment has. It seems like maybe that's. This is a version of that. People, people crave. Just like being near the Mythbuster or being there when the Pope spoke or whatnot, or Elon Musk, I guess who is the Pope for some. But so, I mean, I think to your question though, about why some people find it sketchy. And Felix, you mentioned Barack Obama. Again, it depends on if there's a sense that you're getting paid. There's a sense to a lot of people these speeches aren't necessarily a ton of work unless it's something like a TED Talk. And so if you're getting paid a gruesome amount of money and it seems like you're just kind of, it's transactional and you're going to add this is actually about buying your favor in some way, then I think that is it.

Anna Shymansky (31:28)

About buying your favor?

Felix Salmon (31:29)

Okay, so this is, I think we have to distinguish two different things. One is like the person who's written a nonfiction book and then gives a talk, which is, I think most of us find relatively unobjectionable versus, on the other hand, the politicians and, and if, you know, and we all sat through the most painful and longest and most gruesome election campaign of all time where you couldn't go five minutes without hearing about the amount of money that Goldman Sachs had paid Hillary Clinton to give speeches and it clearly touched a nerve. Right. And whether or not she wound up providing value for the speeches that she gave, ultimately she was collecting a bunch of money from Goldman Sachs. And it looked weird and the optics were weird. And every time a politician winds up making an enormous amount of money from a financial services company for basically no work. George Osborne, it looks weird.

Anna Shymansky (32:32)

I get it. And I get that the optics are bad. Although I think the George Osborne example versus Hillary Clinton, I do think there's also a difference with Barack Obama. He is no longer running for anything.

Kathy O'Neill (32:42)

Yeah, I'm going to jump in here. I want to throw in a little, I'm going to give it a little bit more heft because when you give a talk somewhere and I, you know, I've given quite a few talks like you, you're told what the context is and you don't just give the same exact talk unless you're an asshole like.

Felix Salmon (32:57)

Or unless you're a top ranked politician, in which case you probably don't give a talk at all. And it's just a very friendly softball Q A.

Kathy O'Neill (33:04)

You could have a Q and A. Right. Um, but you almost always, I would say always have lunch or dinner or both with your hosts. And I think that access is what we're talking about when we hear about $250,000.

Felix Salmon (33:18)

Definitely.

Kathy O'Neill (33:19)

And, and the other access is, the other issue is like you are going to give a. You're going to change your talk and you're going to change the talking points of your talk for your audience. And that process of doing it, which you're doing because you're getting all this money actually makes you think about things differently. And that is also kind of influence on the speaker.

Felix Salmon (33:37)

Certainly this is a really good point that if you get a politician in to talk in depth on a certain subject, then you're having dinner with them and talking more in depth about the same subject. This is a level of access to politicians and a level of influence on politicians because that's how people are influenced by, is not just by money but also just about talking about on certain subjects with certain people who have certain opinions. From a lobbyist perspective, that's an incredibly efficient way of putting ideas in front of these people.

Kathy O'Neill (34:10)

Yeah. And I would also say that I want to distinguish between the kind of talks I do with the conference centers versus like the book talks versus the Goldman Sachs things which are really different. Like Goldman Sachs has its own boutique kind of speaker session stuff that has. And I went to the CIA So I had one of those kinds of experiences, but it, it's, it's nothing like the conferences. Right?

Anna Shymansky (34:33)

I don't know, I've been to a lot of these types of conferences. I mean, you have different, you have, you have your client conferences. We are essentially bringing in a big name speaker to entertain your clients and to make you look cool. Like you have your Nate Silvers and your Malcolm Gladwell's who do these all the time. And, and then you have your industry specific conferences where you're bringing in companies where people, you know, you're meeting with investors and then you have your keynote speaker. Again, it's a little different because usually you're talking about a more specific industry focus thing at that point. But so again, I think a lot of it is much more about entertainment than currying favor in terms of what the industry is trying to get out of it. Having said that, I don't disagree that I think one of the bigger issues is just the influence of being in that environment only around a certain type of people and how that can influence your ideas. And Obama has actually spoken specifically about this previously. Having said that, I mean, I, I think all the criticism Obama is getting is a little overwrought.

Jordan Weissman (35:32)

Well, I think, I mean it's a lot of people who are disappointed because they're hoping he could still survive as some sort of political symbol in the Trump era. And it kind of given the feeling of the Democratic Party towards banks, it's, he has a taint in a way that he's taking their money.

Kathy O'Neill (35:44)

Let's just be clear. He's, he's giving a talk where, for how much?

Felix Salmon (35:48)

Cantor Fitzgerald to a health care conference for $400,000.

Jordan Weissman (35:52)

Yeah.

Kathy O'Neill (35:52)

I mean personally I would say that if he also gives talks at like the aclu, you know, and he, if he, if like that's how much they needed to pay him for him to like stop windsurfing, you know, that makes sense. But he should also be talking to other people.

Felix Salmon (36:07)

Which he is doing.

Anna Shymansky (36:08)

Which he is.

Felix Salmon (36:08)

And I don't think anyone's talking about like the opportunity cost of the talk here. They're not saying, you know, you're making $400,000 giving a talk to Cantor Fitzgerald when you could be doing something else instead. I think the problem is why are you taking $400,000 from Cantor Fitzgerald when you just signed a $65 million bill book deal? You don't clearly don't need the money, dude.

Kathy O'Neill (36:33)

65 million? Really?

Anna Shymansky (36:34)

60?

Jordan Weissman (36:34)

Yeah.

Anna Shymansky (36:35)

For him and Michelle.

Jordan Weissman (36:36)

Yeah.

Kathy O'Neill (36:36)

But, no, but Also, he doesn't need the money.

Anna Shymansky (36:38)

Right, Right. But he is also talking at a health care conference, which I think is somewhat important. I think nobody points out that he is probably going to be talking about his views on health care.

Jordan Weissman (36:47)

Probably. But I think that, I mean, in the end the political debate here comes down to the fact that a lot of people on the left and in the Democratic Party just want to sever the connection between the party and banks. Like which that's what, that's a little absurd, maybe.

Anna Shymansky (36:59)

And also I would argue that Obama neither ran nor governed as an extreme. I mean, he specifically governed saying that like the party actually needs to work with finance and business. So I don't think he's being a hypocrite.

Jordan Weissman (37:15)

No. In some ways. And some of the responses to this have been from people who said, hey, this has been him all along. He's always been, you know, some people have been saying he's always been in the bankers pockets.

Kathy O'Neill (37:24)

And I'll just jump in and say like a black guy and a white woman get a lot more criticism about their speaker fees than a lot of white guys.

Anna Shymansky (37:31)

Completely agree.

Felix Salmon (37:32)

Well, except for Tony Blair, because there's a whole industry in the UK of criticizing Tony Blair.

Anna Shymansky (37:39)

Different thing.

Kathy O'Neill (37:40)

Exception proves the role.

Felix Salmon (37:42)

All right, so I think, I think we should have a numbers round.

Kathy O'Neill (37:45)

Okay.

Felix Salmon (37:45)

Because you know we're going to. Because when it's been a while since we've had a Cathy o' Neill number.

Kathy O'Neill (37:52)

I got a doozy.

Felix Salmon (37:53)

You got a doozy. What's your doozy?

Kathy O'Neill (37:55)

35%. 0.35. So there's a female engineer at Facebook who came out with an analysis that said that women at Facebook who are coders get 35% more complaints than men coders on average. And it was, it just sounded pretty bad.

Jordan Weissman (38:11)

Right?

Felix Salmon (38:11)

That's pretty bad.

Kathy O'Neill (38:12)

Yeah.

Felix Salmon (38:12)

Right.

Kathy O'Neill (38:12)

But Facebook came out with a counter analysis.

Felix Salmon (38:15)

I hate this counter analysis so much.

Kathy O'Neill (38:16)

No, I love it. I love it. So interesting. Which they said. Well, but if you, if you subgroup people by rank of like how, how fancy of an engineer are you? A junior engineer, a senior engineer, then it's. The discrepancy goes away.

Felix Salmon (38:27)

Yes. But here's the thing. The original analysis stood up to when you controlled for tenure at Facebook.

Kathy O'Neill (38:37)

Really?

Felix Salmon (38:37)

Yes. So basically the rank thing, if you wind up not getting promoted, when you get more complaints, regardless of how long you've been at Facebook, then basically you're controlling for the sexism which you're trying to discover.

Kathy O'Neill (38:52)

I see. Well, listen, I mean I, I was talking thinking about it a different way, which is that it's a Simpsons paradox. But. But it's not any Simpsons paradox. And Simpsons paradox is like where a statistic looks like has one trend if you look at it in aggregate, but a different trend if you subdivide and look in each subcategory. But it did beg the question, of course, why are there more women who are junior, you know, relative to, instead of senior? And, and my one of the questions is like, well, do they leave before they get promoted or do they just never get promoted? And what you're saying is like they don't get promoted as often often or as quickly.

Felix Salmon (39:26)

And I've been going back and forth on Twitter about this for like the past three days and there's some interesting debates. But the most interesting debate is basically it comes down to is there endemic sexism in Facebook or is there some other reason why women should be underrepresented among the senior ranks of engineers? And my answer to that question is yes, I have certain priors here about their sexism, but I have good reasons for those priors and my priors have been supported by this analysis. And if you find some other reason why women might be underrepresented among senior engineers at Facebook, you kind of scratch the surface of that other reason and it will probably turn out to be sexism instead, some way or another.

Kathy O'Neill (40:17)

Yeah, it's, it's rampant. It's rampant. And I'll just throw in one thing which I haven't seen on Twitter this week, but I'm going to be having a blog on my on Math Babe on Monday about it, which is how difficult it is to find a mentor if you're a junior woman. Like, the senior women already have too many mentor mentees and the senior men are either skeevy or want to stay away from you because it doesn't look right. So it's a real problem and we haven't addressed it. And Sheryl Sandberg with her lean in thing, that's not, it's not working so far.

Anna Shymansky (40:43)

I mean, that's a problem in any kind of male dominated industry when you're a junior woman is that you almost have to align yourself with the man. But then that's complicated. So it's.

Felix Salmon (40:52)

That's right, Anna.

Anna Shymansky (40:53)

So My number is 12%, which is the official unemployment rate in Iran, although the real rate is probably closer to 20%. And the reason I bring this up is just so to have one place to actually talk about the Iranian election, because no one is talking about It.

Felix Salmon (41:09)

There's an election in Iran. Yeah.

Anna Shymansky (41:10)

It's actually incredibly significant in terms of the reason region, in terms of Syria, in terms of Yemen. And we're all talking about France and we're not talking about the fact that.

Jordan Weissman (41:18)

Who's up for election in Iran? I don't even know.

Anna Shymansky (41:20)

Rouhani.

Felix Salmon (41:21)

Oh.

Anna Shymansky (41:21)

And yeah, the person who's leading the country, who, you know, is. We have the deal and probably. But right now the primary opponent is a hardline cleric who essentially has no governing experience, but lots of experience writing death warrants.

Kathy O'Neill (41:37)

Oh, God.

Jordan Weissman (41:37)

Interesting.

Anna Shymansky (41:37)

And so it is really important. I mean, like, this is. I would argue that this. This election is actually far more important than the French election. And nobody's talking about it.

Felix Salmon (41:44)

So you see is his name, by the way, the opponent I have, my number is $73 billion, which I'm throwing in here, if for no one else's sake other than just for Anna, because, you know, we're the debt nerds. It finally happened this week. The inevitable. But it took much longer than people expected. Puerto Rico officially defaulted on its $73 billion in debt. So it's a really gnarly situation, which is. I mean, it wasn't even allowed to declare bankruptcy up until about a year ago. And they've passed this law which finally allowed them to declare bankruptcy, and then it's taken them about a year to get around to doing it. The bondholders are still being incredibly unrealistic. And this is going to take a long time to work out.

Anna Shymansky (42:35)

But that's also what you do as bondholders.

Felix Salmon (42:37)

But this is. But this is the. You know, know, it hasn't been getting nearly as many headlines as Greece or Argentina, but it's in that order of magnitude.

Jordan Weissman (42:49)

Yeah. And meanwhile, I saw a thing that said that Puerto Rico's population decline apparently rivals the Irish potato famine. Right. Like, it's not good.

Felix Salmon (42:56)

It's been going down steadily for what, 25 years?

Jordan Weissman (42:59)

Something. Yeah.

Felix Salmon (43:00)

And what happens, of course, is that the people who leave are the smart people who get the good jobs, and they get the good jobs in New York or Miami or somewhere like that. And the people who are left are the people who are reliant on the welfare state. So there's literally no way that it can even break even in terms of budget, let alone have money left over to pay its interest expenses.

Kathy O'Neill (43:21)

Yeah.

Jordan Weissman (43:22)

My number is also Facebook related. It's 3,000. It's a number of moderators the site is. Or the company is hiring to police murder and mayhem on its videos. You Know, there are some issues with people actually live streaming murders and shootings and such, not just in the US and so they're finally trying to crack down on it.

Kathy O'Neill (43:45)

And rapes.

Jordan Weissman (43:45)

And rapes. I mean, it's just, you know, it's good that they're doing this. It's the kind of thing that perhaps they should have thought of a little bit ahead of time. I have a friend who's kind of reported on this and just that Facebook kind of went into its video offerings with no sense of what could go wrong. How, like, there was no forethought about how someone might misuse the ability to, you know, livestream shooting someone on the world's greatest.

Kathy O'Neill (44:08)

What could possibly go wrong?

Jordan Weissman (44:09)

Yeah, exactly. So they're catching up. That's good. It also just like, you know, there is this realization, I think, on their part that they are a media company. That is what they are at this point. They are interesting.

Kathy O'Neill (44:20)

Do you know if those 3,000 people are going to just watch random things or are they watching things that have been, like, reported?

Jordan Weissman (44:25)

I think they're looking for flagged. I believe they're looking for flagged videos.

Kathy O'Neill (44:29)

So it's still in some sense, crowdsourcing, right?

Jordan Weissman (44:32)

To some extent. But I mean, on such a big.

Anna Shymansky (44:34)

Platform at this point, how else do you.

Jordan Weissman (44:37)

I mean, I think it's a step in the right direction.

Anna Shymansky (44:40)

So at least they're acknowledging what they are.

Kathy O'Neill (44:43)

Yeah.

Felix Salmon (44:43)

So I think that's it. I think.

Kathy O'Neill (44:46)

Sad. I missed you guys.

Felix Salmon (44:48)

I don't know how I can, you know, really. It's been bittersweet.

Kathy O'Neill (44:53)

So true.

Felix Salmon (44:54)

Kathy, it's so awesome to have you back here. You're always welcome back. And many congratulations on now being officially covered in a thin film of ted. For the rest of your life, you're gonna be covered that you're gonna be the TED Talk Cathy o', Neill, who will, you know, your minimum fee has now gone up to $20,000, and they are gonna be rich.

Kathy O'Neill (45:18)

You know what? I'll make do. I'll make do.

Jordan Weissman (45:21)

Given our conversation about what goes on in the Village, the thin film TED is just mean anything. Just, like, awful.

Felix Salmon (45:29)

So what is your. Was your talk going to appear online? Was it up to them? Was it me or me?

Kathy O'Neill (45:35)

Not totally up to them. Totally up to them. But maybe, and I expect it will. And I'm hoping for it to come around. Out around the time my soft cover comes out in September.

Felix Salmon (45:45)

Synergy.

Kathy O'Neill (45:45)

You like how I slid that in there?

Felix Salmon (45:48)

If you wanted to read Kathy's book but you felt Weird buying a hardback.

Kathy O'Neill (45:55)

I also added an afterword. It's like a new chapter.

Felix Salmon (45:59)

You can get the entire book plus an afterword at the end. Bargain cost of something less. Something less.

Jordan Weissman (46:06)

Like $14.

Felix Salmon (46:07)

Maybe 12 in September.

Kathy O'Neill (46:09)

September.

Felix Salmon (46:09)

Trade paperbacks. We love them.

Kathy O'Neill (46:11)

Yes, we do.

Felix Salmon (46:12)

So buy Cathy o' Neill's book in hardcover now or in paperback in September. Thank you, Kathy, for coming. Thank you, Anna Shymansky, for being happy to be here. Here as ever, thank you, Jordan o'. Neill. Thank you to Dan Schrader, who is the new producer.

Kathy O'Neill (46:28)

I just got renamed Jordan o'. Neill.

Jordan Weissman (46:30)

I just got combined with cast.

Felix Salmon (46:31)

Wait, Jordan o'?

Kathy O'Neill (46:32)

Neil?

Felix Salmon (46:32)

Did I say Jordan o'? Neill?

Jordan Weissman (46:33)

Yeah. I just got sunned, dude.

Kathy O'Neill (46:35)

Under twin powers.

Felix Salmon (46:36)

Activate.

Kathy O'Neill (46:38)

I love an ice cube.

Jordan Weissman (46:39)

Am I part of the family now?

Felix Salmon (46:41)

100% Jordan O'. Neill. Like Weisman is like. It's too many letters. We'll just call you Jordan o' Neill from now on, okay?

Jordan Weissman (46:50)

All right. Sure, Felix. Thanks.

Felix Salmon (46:53)

Apologies to Jordan Weissman, to Dan Schrader, to Steve Lichti, to Andy Bowers, to June Thomas, to the entire Panoply Network. Network@Panoply FM. Keep those emails coming. We are here, as ever, on slatemoneyleep.com and we will talk to you next week on Slate Money.