#1558 - Tristan Harris

While we're obsessed with protecting our physical borders... we left the digital border wide open. If Russia or China tried to fly a plane into the United States, our Pentagon and billions of dollars of defense infrastructure... will shoot that thing down ... If they try to come into the country, they'll get stopped by the passport control system ... If Russia or China try to fly an information bomb into the country, instead of being met by the Department of Defense, they're met by a Facebook algorithm with a white glove that says 'Exactly which zip code do you want to target?'

One of the easiest ways you know that there's a problem here is that many of the executives at the social media tech companies don't let their own kids use social media.

These things are competing for your attention ... If you're not paying for the product, you are the product ... The thing that is the product is your predictable behavior—you're using the product in predictable ways.

Technology isn't really just this thing that's in our hands; it's more like this manipulative environment that is tapping into our weaknesses—everything from the slot machine rewards to the way you get tagged in a photo.

Speaking from a Silicon Valley perspective, venture capitalists fund these new social platforms based on how fast they can get to 100 million users ... I think Facebook took like 10 years to get to 100 million users; Instagram took four years [or] three years or something like that; TikTok can get there even faster ... So, it's shortening, shortening, shortening—and that's what people are competing for. Who can win the fame lottery faster?

These technology systems have taken control of human choice. They're taking control of humanity because they're controlling the information that all of us are getting.

70% of YouTube's watch time comes from the recommendations on the right hand side.

I applaud Apple because I think they are the only company that takes steps to protect privacy, to block advertisements... At least when you use their maps application, they're not saving your data and sending it to everybody. And it's one of the reasons why Apple Maps is really not as good as Google Maps, but I use it, and that's one of the reasons why I use it.

Over time, humans will prefer connection to robots and bots and the computer-generated thing more than the real thing.