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Uncanny Valley | WIRED
LegalEagle, the Internet’s Favorite Lawyer, Makes Sense of ‘Multiple Watergates per Week’
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- [00:01]
Outshift by Cisco Representative
This show is supported by Outshift, Cisco's incubation engine. Today's AI agents operate in silos, limiting their true potential. We've been focused on building bigger, smarter models, but scaling up is just one approach. To reach superintelligence together, we need to do more, we need to scale out, and we actually have a blueprint from 70,000 years ago. Humans didn't just get smarter individually, they the cognitive revolution transformed society because we began sharing knowledge, goals and innovation, agents are now at that same inflection point. They can connect, but they can't think together. That's why Outshift by Cisco is building the Internet of Cognition, transforming AI from isolated systems into orchestrated superintelligence. By creating an open, interoperable infrastructure, Outshift by Cisco is enabling agents and humans to share intent and context and reasoning. The cognitive evolution for agents is here. Explore the Internet of cognition@outshift.com that's outshift.com
- [01:06]
Found Company Representative
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- [02:11]
Katie Drummond
From Wired. This is the big interview where we'll get to know the people behind the headlines in conversations that explore the intersection of technology, power, and culture. I'm Katie Drummond, Wired's global editorial Director, and my guest today is Devin stone. Or on YouTube. You may know him as Legal Eagle.
- [02:28]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
This channel is about breaking down the American legal system. From deconstructing your favorite courtroom dramas to explaining what's going on in the news, my mission is to give you an insider's view into our courtrooms and our legal process.
- [02:43]
Katie Drummond
And with 3.9 million subscribers, they seem to be onto something. Here with me now is the Legal Eagle himself, Devin Stone. Devin, welcome.
- [02:52]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
Thanks for having me. It's a really interesting time to be a content creator, a really interesting time to be a lawyer, and really interesting time to be both a content creator and a lawyer.
- [03:01]
Katie Drummond
I have no doubt. I can't wait to ask you all about it. And I wanted to start by saying and letting our audience know. If you have not checked out legal eagle on YouTube, you are a real practicing lawyer. You're also a law professor at Georgetown. You also have this enormously popular YouTube channel. So I am trying to triangulate a little bit how you get all of this done, but I. But I'm curious to sort of back up. What made you go from, okay, I'm going to get my law degree, I'm going to go down a conventional path to YouTube. How do you end up there?
- [03:33]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
You spend a lot of years grinding away at a very large national law firm where you get the best training in the world. And then when it comes to the time when you would be elevated to partner, realize that you are completely burned out and that it would be more fun to just make videos and post them to the Internet.
- [03:53]
Katie Drummond
Now you do a lot of very serious legal breakdowns on your channel. I want to spend time talking about those. But first I want to talk about the fun stuff like breaking down legal representations as they appear in film or in tv. How accurate the series Suits, starring, of course, Meghan Markle, really are. The episodes are a lot of fun. I'm curious who's getting it right? Like, have you seen some really high integrity examples of how the law profession and the law are portrayed in TV and film?
- [04:26]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
Oh, yeah, for sure. And I don't want to give the impression that I don't enjoy a ridiculous portrayal of lawyers and trials suits.
- [04:34]
Katie Drummond
For the record, I think Suits is probably one of my favorite TV shows. I think it's incredibly good.
- [04:39]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
Okay, all right, I'll tread lightly. Seuss is not gonna make it into my list of most accurate portrayals. I would say that the TV show that stands out the most is Better Call Saul. They really did their homework in terms of making sure that what they were doing was very legally accurate. And honestly, I don't think the show needed that. They could have taken a lot more liberties than they actually did. But honestly, as a lawyer watching Breaking Bad and watching the Adventures of Saul Goodman, I had another layer of Enjoyment that so much of, you know, the drudgery of litigation where it's, you know, pushing papers all day long and doing a lot of legal research. They actually did a lot of that stuff. And they might have sped up the timetable a bit, but the issues that they were dealing with really rang true as someone who, you know, has spent 12 and 13 hour days in front of a computer looking up code. And then I would say the movie that almost every lawyer, myself included would say really gets it right is My Cousin Vinny.
- [05:41]
Katie Drummond
Oh, wow. That is a throwback.
- [05:42]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
Yeah. I mean, it obviously features a hapless show, Pesci getting his way through the legal system and sort of learning in real time as the audience does. But the things that they do in that show are, again, not only incredibly accurate, but unbelievably entertaining as well. And, you know, people in trial advocacy classes will look to the many cross examinations that Joe Pesci does in that show and point to it as a good example of something that you can and should do as a trial lawyer.
- [06:08]
Katie Drummond
Now, I have to ask. I mean, obviously I'm disappointed to hear that the profession of law is not just sexy people flirting and looking incredible. That's. That's too bad. But in the spirit of fun, I
- [06:19]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
mean, look, it's not.
- [06:20]
Katie Drummond
It's not that you can. You can be sexy and flirting and winning cases, but who are the egregious offenders out there? Like, are there shows just putting out kind of nonsense legalese into the universe?
- [06:33]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
Oh, yeah. More often than not, that's the case. Kim Kardashian's new show.
- [06:38]
Katie Drummond
Oh, yeah, not seen that one, unfortunately.
- [06:42]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
I mean, it is entertaining, I will give it that, for the costumes alone and the ridiculous dramas that they find themselves in. It's a very entertaining show, but it is not legally accurate. And it's funny because that show purports to take place in my old office, 16th century city in Los Angeles. And the sets are physically impossible to exist in the buildings that they claim they are in, which is just a weird coincidence that I happen to know that building really well. But apart from that, the legal stuff that they talk about in that show is pretty risable. And I actually, a lot of it deals with divorce law, and I reached out to some divorce law lawyer friends, and I mean, they were just falling out of their chair. The things were. Were so ridiculous.
- [07:23]
Katie Drummond
It's too bad, because isn't she a lawyer?
- [07:24]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
No, not yet. I mean, that is not a lawyer.
- [07:27]
Katie Drummond
Okay, still not a lawyer.
- [07:29]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
And that's a Great way to kind of look back and take stock of the Legal Eagle channel. Is that one of the first videos that I did in talking about the legal news was talking about how Kim Kard was taking the time and going through this really unusual route of becoming a lawyer.
- [07:45]
Katie Drummond
Yeah. Which is very admirable, just to be clear, you know. Yeah, I agree.
- [07:50]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
And, you know, she comes from a family of lawyers. She's very passionate about, you know, criminal justice reform, and I laud her for that. But, you know, as long as she's been trying to be a lawyer is about the same amount of time that legaleagle has been trying to explain the law as well. She'll get there eventually.
- [08:08]
Katie Drummond
Kim. Kim, it's time to focus. You gotta pass that bar. So I know that there is a lot of fun on the channel. Right. But you are also operating in a really unprecedented context right now when we talk about the United States of America, the political environment, and there's a lot of that that shows up on the channel, and I think that that's fascinating. So a lot of coverage, you know, has used the word unprecedented to describe the times that we are living through. And we have some really sophisticated, you know, complex legal cases and legal situations coming up with the Trump administration. How has all of that changed your channel? What has Trump 2.0 meant for you at Legal Eagle?
- [08:46]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
Yeah. Or as our president has said, unprecedented times that we live in.
- [08:52]
Katie Drummond
Among the many things that he said, he has said that. Yeah.
- [08:55]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
The channel started as commentary on pop culture and explaining legal issues and sort of dipping our toe into legal news. I don't know if you remember, but it was sort of inane. Things like people were going to invade Area 51 and Naruto, run through the gates because they wanted to find the aliens inside, and whether someone had committed crime on the International Space Station and whether Kim Kardashian could eventually pass the bar. Eventually that morphed into wanting to really capture the interest that I had in law school, where, you know, every day we would learn something new, and it would be like, wow, that's a really fascinating piece of legal trivia or a really interesting legal rule. And, you know, I really was fascinated in everything that I learned in law school. And so we slowly started to expand our coverage of legal issues. And eventually the lodestar of the channel was, okay, we'll release maybe one news piece a week, and what we'll do is we'll just find the single most important legal issue of that week, and we will deconstruct it. And explain it to people. And that has largely continued. But over the course of the first and now second Trump administration, the number of legal issues that sort of reached that threshold of this is so unbelievably important that we have to break it down and we have to explain it has exploded. We are now putting out three to five videos per week, which we have never done before. And I am incredibly grateful for everyone that's part of Legal Eagle. There are a lot of lawyers behind the scenes who are researching and writing and now hosting videos alongside me.
- [10:45]
Katie Drummond
Yep.
- [10:46]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
So it's. It's absolutely a team effort. And of course, the video editors who, who put all the stuff together and make us look good. But, yeah, I mean, that. That general idea of we have to explain this stuff because with few exceptions, no one else is doing it. So, you know, we live in a world where I'm not exaggerating when I say we have probably had in the second Trump administration, 20 to 30 scandals and legal issues problems that rise to the level of the severity of Watergate.
- [11:21]
Katie Drummond
Wow.
- [11:21]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
And so there are now essentially multiple Watergates per week. And so we feel that it's our responsibility to cover those things. And we don't want to sugarcoat things and say, oh, you know, there is a legal solution to some of these things when there isn't. And we're pretty upfront when we say that, you know, here is what the law covers and, you know, here's what the law does not cover. And some of these things are sort of moral issues or norms that are being broken as opposed to a legal rule. We're upfront about that, but at the same time, it's just been an absolute deluge. And I feel like the lawyers are sort of the Cassandras here, where, because we know what the law is, and if you have any knowledge of presidential administrations going back several decades, you understand how unprecedented this stuff truly is. My main worry is that there has been such a deluge and there is this thought that, oh, if you're criticizing the President, then it must be partisan politics, and it's devolved into ideological differences where it's my team versus yours that week in and week out. If we are, let's say, critical of the unprecedented and often highly legal or often highly norm breaking things that the Trump administration is doing. People will assume that you are a partisan hack and that maybe worst of all, there are a lot of people who just turned 18 and are turning 18, and they will just assume that whatever this president is doing is just politics. As Normal.
- [12:58]
Katie Drummond
Right. A good point.
- [12:59]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
One of my main concerns is that, and this is a quasi legal, quasi political standpoint, but one of my main concerns is that when this is all over, if there is not truth and reconciliation and a whole bunch of people in this administration don't go to jail for the illegal conduct that they have committed, then we're going to really backslide. And because, you know, once you lose it, you really don't get it back, there's been so much flooding of the zone that it's. I don't blame people for tuning out or assuming that this is just the way politics always is.
- [13:34]
Katie Drummond
But you're right. I mean, we're talking in April. So Trump's been in office for a second time for less than a year and a half, which is a shocking thing to say out loud. And, you know, I am in news. I cover news. I read the news many, many times a day, and I cannot keep up. When you said 20 to 30 Watergate level scandals, I believe you. I believe that that is correct. I could not list those. You know what I mean? Because it is coming so fast and so furious, let alone list them, let alone actually be able to break down what happened, how it happened, and why it's significant. I mean, is there one that stands out to you when you think about all the explainers that you've had to do, that you felt the need to do in the last year and a half, that has been particularly complicated, particularly profound to you?
- [14:24]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
I don't think any of these are particularly complicated. You know, if we use Watergate as an exemplar and just think about one of the big turning points of Watergate was the Saturday Night Massacre, where many people in the DOJ left or were fired because they refused to engage in political actions at President Nixon's behest? There have been at least five of those, you know, that I can think of off the top of my head. Emile Beauvais trying to prosecute or explicitly refusing to prosecute. Eric Adams. You have several different tranches of DOJ attorneys resigning. Whether it was because of political prosecutions of the President's enemies like James Comey or Letitia James or Lisa Cook. You have massive corruption from the President and his family when it comes to individual holdings or donations of, you know, a 747 from Qatar making billions of dollars from crypto assets while in office. I mean, I'm missing.
- [15:30]
Katie Drummond
That was hard to listen to. But I asked the question. It's my fault.
- [15:33]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
But, yeah, I mean, and, you know, we'll remember that one week and we'll forget it the next because.
- [15:39]
Katie Drummond
Absolutely.
- [15:40]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
You know, there's just another thing. And, you know, now a lot of that's been pushed aside of the current war in Iran. But the big story before that was essentially militarizing ICE and CBP against Americans in Minneapolis. Before that, it was deploying the National Guard to other largely Democratic cities and states like Washington, D.C. where I live, where we still see uniformed National Guards, people roaming the streets. One that is, I think, lost on people are just the sheer number of what I would call economic crimes that are being perpetrated. And what I mean by that is this administration has been singularly sort of focused on either refusing to pay funds that have been appropriated by Congress to largely blue states or to, you know, programs and agencies that are required by law by Congress refusing to pay those funds. That sounds very sort of administrative. It sounds sort of ticky, tacky. Oh, you know, okay, so he's paying out people and agencies that, you know, shouldn't be paid. But that really strikes at the heart of our democracy that it's Congress's job to pass laws related to funding. That is their primary job, in fact. And, you know, already we live in a world where presidential power has been, you know, agglomerating for so many years that we're at the zenith of presidential power. And I would say most people think that that's probably a bad thing, but this president has taken so much more power from Congress and the judiciary himself. And, you know, when you do things like, you know, refuse to pay funds that have been appropriated by Congress, especially, I'm using air quotes, you may not be able to see it, but refusing to pay funds to your political enemies, like, you know, quote unquote, blue states, and then just refusing to follow the law when it comes to, you know, not paying out funds that haven't been appropriated, that's real authoritarian stuff. That's real bad stuff, because we've seen that the judiciary is just not up to dealing with someone who just says, screw it, we'll do it. And they can stop me later. As many narcissists and presidents that we've had who really wanted to grab power, this one is a difference of kind rather than degree. And we're all dealing with the fallout from that.
- [18:08]
Katie Drummond
We're going to take a quick break and we'll be right back.
- [18:14]
Found Company Representative
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- [19:12]
David Remnick
This week on the New Yorker Radio Hour, Steve Kerr, one of the best coaches in the NBA and certainly one of the most outspoken, calling the president a buffoon.
- [19:21]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
I kind of regret that, even though I felt it in my heart, because I'm representing a large group of people, not only for our organization, but our fans, too.
- [19:30]
David Remnick
Steve Kerr joins us next time on the New Yorker Radio Hour from wnyc. Listen, wherever you get your podcasts,
- [19:47]
Katie Drummond
I'm curious for you. I mean, you have a, a significant audience on YouTube. You are, you are very much of the Internet. There are people, I mean, I looked you up. I saw what people say about you on Reddit, you know, all that stuff in doing the job that you feel like you need to be doing right now for good reason. You are often criticized as taking a political point of view. Right. You alluded to it earlier, being liberal, being a leftist, all of these things, for trying to cover this uniquely frightening and, I think, uniquely damaging political situation that we have found ourselves in in this country. And how do you think about that? And how do you try to maybe reach some of those people who might otherwise be unreachable, if that makes sense. I think so much of the Internet now and so many conversations online are happening in these little bubbles. Right? Everyone stays in their bubble. If you're in the Fox News bubble, it might really behoove you to watch some legal Eagle videos on YouTube. You know what I mean? Do you worry about not being able to reach those people?
- [20:54]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
Well, that's kind of you to say. I do worry about that. You know, you can only do so much. And I guess we all put our faith in the YouTube algorithm that it will show the videos to the people that need or want.
- [21:08]
Katie Drummond
A lot of faith in that algorithm.
- [21:09]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
Yeah. I, for one, welcome our artificial Intelligence overlords. But yeah, I mean, you know, I see those comments on occasion as well. And you know, the way I think about it and I, I felt compelled to do a video on this very topic. Largely we'll do what we call entertainment videos or news related videos and then occasionally we'll do a full on op ed and you can usually talk.
- [21:35]
Katie Drummond
Oh, and this was about, this was that you were biased? It was that video. Yes.
- [21:39]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
Yeah, exactly. Yes. And you know, stuff's about to get real. When you see my face on a black background in the thumbnail, that's when you know things are serious and I'm going to give you my unvarnished opinion. And yeah, the way that I think about it is we believe in the rule of law. We believe, you know, strongly that politicians of every stripe should support the rule of law such that the law is applied equally and fairly regardless of who you are, that politicians and administrations should follow the law. And if they have a problem with that, they can change the law or specifically they can ask Congress to change the law. And that if a president of any administration is not going to do that, then we are going to take a stand and criticize that person. And I would agree that that is a somewhat political stance. Law is the end result of politics, after all. So, you know, I think that that is a nonpartisan position or, you know, maybe not recently, but it used to be a nonpartisan position. The fact that it is perhaps a partisan position says more about the political parties than it does, I think about that position itself. We never take a partisan position. You know, we are not like the pod save boys who will opine on policy preferences because of the policy preferences. Our standpoint is based on preserving the rule of law and analyzing the law as written. And when we give our opinion as individuals, we will be very upfront about doing so. Yeah, our position is that we, in that sense, we are going to be political, but we will also be nonpartisan at the same time. We will never take a position because I or anyone else is a Democrat or an independent or a libertarian or a Republican and make that define the standpoints that we take. We're sort of agnostic about those political parties, often agnostic about politicians themselves. And it has been often the case that we will cover Democratic politicians and Democratic issues and explain that, hey, you know, Bob Menendez looks pretty guilty of corruption and that's a bad thing and it's a good thing that he was, you know, convicted of those crimes. It's a super bad thing that this president has pardoned a bunch of politicians who were convicted of corruption and his friends and donors who have been pardoned.
- [24:09]
Katie Drummond
You don't think you're a lefty hack for saying that? Yeah, and just to be clear, I do not think so. I mean, this. What you were saying as you were talking. Talking it very much is reminiscent of a lot of the criticism that Wired has gotten in the last couple years. So I hear exactly what you're saying. I mean, we're trying to cover the news.
- [24:25]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
Yes.
- [24:26]
Katie Drummond
This is an extreme version of covering the news. You know what I mean? And there will be people who are very upset about any accountability journalism that is done vis a vis the Trump administration in corruption or illegal behavior. Any of that stuff is just anathema to them.
- [24:41]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
Yeah. I mean, to paraphrase William Gibson, the crimes are not evenly distributed.
- [24:46]
Katie Drummond
Yes, exactly. Yeah.
- [24:48]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
So. Yeah. Or charitably, the controversies are not equally distributed. So, you know, when Joe Biden left office and pardoned his son and members of his family, I felt that that was a breach of norms, if not a breach of law. And we covered that in much the same way we have covered the Trump administration. But the thing is, you know, Joe Biden, who many people have called, you know, sleepy, Joe Biden didn't do all that much controversial stuff as president.
- [25:14]
Katie Drummond
Yep.
- [25:15]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
And. And so it's one of those examples of sort of correlation not equaling causation. The reason we didn't cover very many things in the Biden administration is because there weren't that many legally controversial things in comparison to the absolute deluge that we are facing in this particular Trump administration. And frankly, you know, as we got towards the end of the first Trump administration, and especially the facts that gave rise to his two impeachments, the trend was. Was coming. But at the same time, given the information ecosystem that we have, I can understand people seeing the correlation and the sort of lack of time spent on Biden and his surrogates and the sheer abundance of time spent on this administration and their surrogates. People are going to draw the conclusions that they draw, and all we can do is put forth the facts as we understand them, much as we do in a legal briefing where we have a fact section, and then we get into the legal analysis. And, you know, it's sad that we are not living in a world where we tend to share the same factual universe, but, you know, there's only so much that we can do, and we try and stay in our lane of factual and legal analysis solutions to the Overall news and media ecosystem. You'll need a different guest for that.
- [26:35]
Katie Drummond
Well, you have built, you know, something of a YouTube empire. And I wanted to ask you a little bit about that. How has YouTube. You alluded earlier, you talked a little bit about the algorithm, the famous YouTube algorithm. We think a lot about that at wired. How has YouTube changed?
- [26:50]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
You know, it has become more professionalized, for sure. I happen to think that the YouTube algorithm, as much as we bemoan being, you know, under the thumb of algorithms on all of the different platforms, the YouTube algorithm is the best. And the idea that if you are putting out good content, and by good, I mean content that people want to see, I guess we can debate the merits of some of the content that's being pushed out there. If you're putting out content that people want to see, the algorithm will make sure that people see it. Their overall guide is user enjoyment. It is not necessarily keeping people on the platform, although that is a huge part of it. But really, I don't think the algorithm has changed all that much. So much as the people who remain on the algorithm have just had a decade or so of experience to know what works and what doesn't. And you're seeing a sort of professional middle class emerge where more people have video editors now, more people have hired writers. Certainly, you know, I'm sure AI has made the scripts that people use much better than they used to be, or at least, you know, more towards the mean, if not necessarily original. But, you know, you can look at, say, a huge creator, the biggest creator of, you know, Mr. Beast, for example, and, you know, he's operating at sort of the highest levels in terms of user engagement, where, you know, every microsecond of his videos is scrutinized to make sure you are glued to his videos. But that sort of mindset and strategy has redounded to the creator middle class as well, if not explicitly, then just by the fact that, you know, We've been watching YouTube for a decade, really almost two decades at this point, and people who are YouTube natives, and I really do think that YouTube is the premier social media platform. And I think if you're on other platforms, what I hear is everybody, you know, tries to, you know, make it first on TikTok and then pivot to making more money on. On YouTube, but they just have the experience and they. They just sort of have. In the same way that a director would go back and watch all the Oscar winners of previous movies. I think people have been watching successful YouTube videos for so long that they just get that sense of what a better video feels like. So I would say it's become more professionalized and at the same time it has become more fractured. That in the same way that as a society we are not really operating from the same universe of facts. The YouTube algorithm has balkanized everything so that if you are watching largely right wing content, you will not be fed left wing content. Because the YouTube algorithm knows that. And it has been refined over time to know that unless they're trying to rage bait you, you're going to enjoy the experience of seeing stuff that you already agreed with. You know, once you find yourself in the sort of path dependent structure of what the algorithm knows you like, it's really hard to get out of that. And so a lot of us are in our own echo chambers. It certainly existed six and seven years ago, but it has become a bigger issue now.
- [30:04]
Katie Drummond
And how do you actually support the channel itself? I mean, how do you think about YouTube as a business?
- [30:10]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
I think more so than most creators thinking of it as a business. This is not a hobby. I think I was lucky in that this was a second career for me. I was a big firm lawyer for a decade before I really made this pivot. And so by virtue of being a lawyer, I can scrutinize contracts and I can interact on a level and I can look at a P and L and I can understand, you know, what is ROI positive and what isn't. But I really do think of this as a business and make sure that as we expand generally, I think we've expanded slowly compared to others. But you know, there aren't a lot of YouTube channels who have survived these seven and eight last years. And I think there's a reason for that. I think every YouTube channel has two to three main revenue sources. One is AdSense, which are the ads that are placed on a video from YouTube. These are ads that largely the creator doesn't have any control over except saying, for example, oh, I don't want to see alcohol and tobacco ads on my channel. And then the other big source for at least legal Eagle is sponsorships, where we work with brands directly. I or the other hosts will say, hey, this is a product that we know and like. And hey, you should use our own specific link to go purchase that particular brand. And then, you know, over time, other creators have branched out into merch. We never felt there was a good merch fit for us. So instead we branched out into our own services. And not too long ago, I started a new law firm that's largely personal injury. But so many people were reaching out to me through the channel and wanted help with legal representation. So I started up a new law firm to deal with those people and help them. It's called the Eagle Team. So that has now been going for several years now. And that's sort of our version of doing things in house, offering services to people that we think that we can do a better job. It's so hard to find a good lawyer if you aren't a lawyer yourself. And sometimes even if you are a lawyer, it's hard to talk to people through word of mouth or go online and do a Google search. You know those insane billboards that you have, you know, people wielding a sledgehammer or.
- [32:32]
Katie Drummond
Oh, sure, like 1, 800 got hurt.
- [32:34]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
Yeah, exactly. You know, there's fire, explosions in the background. And that's kind of the state of legal advertising in this country. And, you know, there's no guarantee that that person is an actual good lawyer or a good fit for you. So, yeah, I mean, that's generally how we support the channel, whether it's through programmatic ads on YouTube, whether it's brands that we work with, through sponsorships, and increasingly now it is through building our companies and systems that we can offer things directly to our audience and kind of skip the middlemen.
- [33:04]
Katie Drummond
So let me ask you, lawyer, law professor, creator, which one is more lucrative?
- [33:10]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
I mean, the stereotypical. The stereotypical answer from a lawyer is, it depends. I will say that very few people are law professors for the money. That is a passion project that I just enjoy. I enjoy teaching people through the medium of video, but I also really enjoy teaching one on one, whether it comes to, you know, content creation or being a lawyer. You know, there are lawyers in this country that make less than the median income, and there are certainly creators out there who make less than the medium median income. And then there are, you know, people like Jimmy Donaldson who make hundreds of millions of dollars per year as content creators. And there are people, you know, who make hundreds of millions of dollars a year as lawyers. So I feel very good about my lot in life. I certainly make less than I would as a big firm lawyer, but my quality of life is definitely better. It's really intellectually fulfilling to continue my work as a lawyer, but also have this outlet of what is now basically group therapy, talking about the legal issues in the news. It really is.
- [34:23]
Katie Drummond
It really is like group therapy. We're going to take a quick break. We'll be right back. Comprehensive, witty, speculative, critical, insightful, profound.
- [34:36]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
Wide ranging.
- [34:37]
Katie Drummond
Hopefully doesn't take itself too, too seriously.
- [34:39]
David Remnick
I'm David Remnick, and each week on the New Yorker Radio Hour, my colleagues and I try to make sense of what's happening in this chaotic world. I hope you'll join us for the the New Yorker Radio Hour wherever you listen to podcasts.
- [34:52]
Katie Drummond
Thoughtful, exquisite. Just, you know, real. Okay, Devin. We like to close each show with a little game we came up with that we think is very clever. It's called Control Alt Delete. So I want to know what piece of tech you would love to control, what piece you would alt so alter or change, and what you would delete. What would you vanquish from the Earth if given the opportunity?
- [35:30]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
Wow. Okay. So are you sure your audience actually remembers what Control Alt Delete actually does? I mean, I remember dealing with DOS prompts and, you know, using AOL in a monochrome screen. So I hope people still remember that Control Alt Delete, you know, opens the task manager and lets you shut down your computer. Boy. Well, so I'll start, I think, with the easiest question, which is delete. I would probably delete the metaverse before it deletes itself.
- [36:03]
Katie Drummond
Before it. Before Meta deletes it and then renames the company again.
- [36:06]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
Yeah, I mean, I think it's done a really good job of destroying itself, so that's. That's, I think, the easiest one. I would.
- [36:13]
Katie Drummond
So there won't be, like, a Legal Eagle office in the metaverse anytime soon?
- [36:17]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
No, I mean, I think the Legal Eagle office is already in the metaverse online, but we have legs. The one that I would alter is definitely AI. I think that there's no doubt that AI is making its mark. It will save a whole bunch of time for different people. Certainly the legal profession has. Despite the fact that the news talks about lawyers using AI and that AI hallucinating cases, the problem, I don't feel, is really the AI itself, but so much as lawyers not checking the AI's work. And even before AI existed, we all had paralegals, we all had junior associates who were doing research. And if no one is checking the legal sites, that is malpractice. Whether it's a human that put the wrong sites in or a computer did it. So, you know, certainly there is opportunity for it to save a whole bunch of time and democratize the practice of law, such that more people who need legal representation should be able to. Because AI, I think, should be able to save a lot of the drudgery of the legal world. But at the same time, I am sort of worried that people will use it as a crutch and will forget how to learn to read and write and think critically. And in terms of control, oh boy. I would control probably solar panels.
- [37:50]
Katie Drummond
That is so specific. You have to tell me why that is so specific.
- [37:55]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
You know, solar panels and batteries. We've been doom scrolling for so long and obviously the world is getting hotter, but I am such a, in some ways a techno optimist that we are so close to turning the corner. Not because of necessarily regulation, but just because the cheapest power source is solar. And if we can solve the issue of the fact that the sun only operates part of the day and then bank all of the extra solar and I don't know, maybe require all new construction and all new parking lots to have solar panels, we could solve power issues for the rest of time and it would be so clean and that it would reduce CO2 emissions. And I think the world would just be such a better place. Living in a world where power is not only clean, but abundant, I've always felt that many of the problems of this world are simply power problems. Whether it's abundance of water or abundance of food or inequalities. So much of it is just if power was free, I think a lot of that stuff could be solved basically overnight. So that is my techno optimist view on solar panels, batteries and I guess, EVs.
- [39:09]
Katie Drummond
I love that. That is such a thoughtful answer. And I'm surprised that you didn't say control the YouTube algorithm because you could be bigger than Mr. Beast tomorrow.
- [39:19]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
I have absolutely no desire to do that whatsoever.
- [39:23]
Katie Drummond
Oh, this is a much better answer. Devin Stone, Legal Eagle. Thank you so much for being here. This was fascinating.
- [39:28]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
It was my pleasure. Thanks for having me.
- [39:34]
Katie Drummond
The Big Interview is a production of Wired and Kaleidoscope content. This episode was produced by our showrunner, Anne Marie Fertoli. Kate Osborne is our executive producer. Music and mixing by Pran Bandy this episode was fact checked by Megan Herbst and I am of course your host, Katie Drummond, Wired's global editorial director. Check back here on Thursday for the latest episode of Uncanny Valley, where Wired's writers and editors add you to their Slack channel.
- [40:09]
Kai Rysdal
Everybody has a hot take on the economy. And whether you're curious about inflation, trade wars or the markets, what you need is reporting you can trust. Hi, I'm Kai Rysdal, the host of Marketplace. Roll award winning reporters talk to everybody from CEOs to farmers to help you understand how the economy takes shape in the real world, you'll be smarter every time you listen. And these days, that's priceless. Listen to Marketplace on your favorite podcast app.
- [40:40]
Devin Stone (Legal Eagle)
From prx.