AMT Lab Chief Editor, Samantha Sonnet, and Executive Director, Brett Crawford, discuss the current Google antitrust lawsuit and potential social media alternatives for arts organizations looking to expand their outreach and platform participation.
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Samantha:
Samantha: [00:00:00] Welcome to another episode of tech in the arts, the podcast series on the arts management and technology laboratory. The goal of our podcast series is to exchange ideas, bring awareness and stay on top of the trends. My name is Samantha Sonnet and I'm the chief editor for AMT lab. Today I'm joined by our executive director and publisher Brett Crawford and we're going to be discussing the changing ecosystems of tech. As tech giants are changing hands and tech companies are under scrutiny, it is important to keep your eye on the news and weigh options specifically concerning what social media channels your company is involved with. Brett let's start by discussing the current lawsuit that is occurring with Google. So, I'm going to give a little bit of background for those who don't know what exactly is going on. The justice department is suing Google for monopolizing digital advertising technologies. They are making claims that through serial acquisitions and anti-competitive auction manipulation, Google subverted competition, and internet advertising technologies. And a quote that I found that was interesting and helped me to understand what was going on was filed in the [00:01:00] “US district court for the Eastern district of Virginia, the complaint alleges that Google monopolizes key digital advertising technologies collectively referred to as the ad tech stack that website publishers depend on to sell ads and the advertisers rely on to buy ads and reach potential customers”. Basically, what Google's anti-competitive conduct has included is acquiring competitors by engaging in a platform of acquisitions to obtain control over key digital advertising tools. Also forcing the adoption of Google's tools., I believe correct me if I'm wrong, Brett, but I believe this would be utilizing chrome.
Brett: It could be utilizing chrome more than also in the webspace if you're taking a Google ad, like we do with AMT Lab, then you're having to use their tool to analyze the ad. Right. You're not able to use the other tools to do that.
Samantha: Okay and then they were also distorting auction competition by limiting real time bidding on publisher inventory to its ad exchange and impeding rival ad exchanges' ability to compete on the same terms as Google's ad [00:02:00] exchange. And finally, as I mentioned before, auction manipulation. So Google obviously is not the only tech giant under scrutiny by the federal government and this is one of many issues facing tech giants in the legal and public policy front. As many of you may know, Tik Tok was just fined by the UK for its content delivery to those 13 and under; data privacy has and continues to be an issue for Amazon Meta and Google. Google is currently facing a lawsuit in its home state of California over privacy and it's not so private mode.
Brett: So, that's a great summary, Sam., I think what was interesting was when I first read the Google lawsuit, I thought it was really focusing on their search term or on the customer side.
Samantha: Okay.
Brett: And Google's answer to that was basically, but you can use any of the various search tools within our Chrome platform. When I looked more at the justice department's case and it's actually the justice department, I think 14 other states are part of this lawsuit. [00:03:00] It's more about the, literally just about the ad space and essentially you have web providers say like AMT lab, and, we're taking ads out and then you have the people who are doing the searches and that it's basically one ecosystem. They're never really leaving their own ecosystem and therefore they're sort of getting paid from both sides in an interesting way. The other thing I thought was interesting is that the US government is including in the suit their repayment of overpayment for ads due to this monopoly system. So I think that the lawsuit also has to do with reclaiming., costs on various budget lines. So it'll be interesting to see where it goes.
Samantha: Definitely.
Brett: So, I'm running Chrome, but I use Duck Duck Go. Okay. And yesterday I was just looking at my data and then at three o'clock in the afternoon, I'd already had 445 tracking pieces blocked by duck, duck, go and well over [00:04:00] 14 K , up to this point in the year.
Samantha: I tend to use Safari on my Mac and it has its issues as many may know, but that also tells me how many trackers have been blocked. And I've been having a lot of issues with Chrome lately, just in general. But it's interesting to see how many trackers it is able to block and see how your data is being protected.
Brett: Yeah. And that's not even using private mode. I'm not even going into the private mode on that side of things. And I think, you know, as we said, Google is one of, many of the big tech that is under scrutiny right now. And while the social media giants are not necessarily hitting the news for some of their privacy issues they're definitely hitting the news as we're sort of entering this post Twitter world. And I say that not only because it's being named something different because we're now in the X world, but because of all the business practices that have changed, it really shifted the ecosystem. So other social media companies are popping up and trying to make a play [00:05:00] for those who are leaving X. And other social media companies are really trying to, I think, take advantage of whatever their particular market space is. So, I know that you, and I've had a lot of conversations about social media in the last few months as this has been going on,
Samantha: Right. Well, I've been playing with a bunch of different social media apps, just to see. I personally am not active on X for a multitude of reasons and I've been trying to, , not necessarily find a replacement for myself because I'm much more of a visual person and I reside in the Tik Tok, Pinterest layer of social. But just in terms of understanding the current situation in social, I wanted to understand the new apps and maybe not so new apps that could serve as competitors to X and how people are utilizing them currently. So I did, break down and I downloaded Threads because I wanted to see what the hype was about. A lot of my friends have downloaded it and are not necessarily active on it, but [00:06:00] are saying that they have profiles and are utilizing it that way. So I did some digging, and personally when I downloaded it, I found it was interesting that on my Instagram feed, it told me that I had, for example, 121 follow requests pending, which I found was interesting because I did not have a Threads account. Now we know that if you have a threads account, it is automatically connected through your existing Instagram account, but you almost have to activate it to be participatory in the app. I hadn't done so yet, so it was interesting to me and a little bit scary to see that I had some pending follow requests for an app that I wasn't even involved with. But I decided to download it and see what was going on. I did some research about it and saw that Threads actually gain 10 million users in the first seven hours of its launch, which I found was super interesting. So clearly people are utilizing it. It's also being marked as the Twitter killer by the New York times. [00:07:00] So I found that interesting as well. , Forbes released a quote saying “to date, Twitter has lost half of the value price that Musk paid for it and it has lost advertisers and millions of users who have left for other sites like, Threads and various others”. “Elon Musk's decisions around Twitter and especially his rebranding of the site have left many loyal Twitter, X users, confused and mystified about what Twitter is now and what it is to be in the future”. However, as I mentioned, threads is definitely not perfect either and users are criticizing the fact that a Threads profile is only able to delete if the attached Instagram profile is deleted. So if you download a Threads account, you basically have to download your Instagram account that you may have had for 10 plus years .
Brett: Did you mean delete their account? So if you're deleting Threads, you have to delete your Instagram profile and you would lose everything
Samantha: And you would lose everything. So for me personally, I've been active on Instagram since maybe [00:08:00] 2012, when I first downloaded it. So all of that content that I have posted would be completely wiped if I wanted to get rid of my threads.
Brett: An excellent point because for arts organizations and for practicing artists, you don't want to lose that marketplace. And one of the things you and I've talked about is the MNR, the strategic solutions, mostly in the digital fundraising space, but definitely a digital specialist has said in the light of what's happening in tech space, that we really need to have some sort of strategy and not even a backup plan, but know why we're choosing particular platforms. And then be very adaptable, to when those things change and be sure you're not basically all in one boat. And something, I know that I preach when I'm teaching marketing is Facebook and Instagram are the same boat, right? And so being aware that threads is just adding more into that same boat is something to consider as people are figuring out their strategies moving forward as all these new [00:09:00] players and old players start vying for their piece that are bigger piece of the pie.
Samantha: Absolutely. Just understanding where your competitors or people in your same market are joining. Why they're joining those platforms is super important. I also did some digging as to why, I had pending follower requests because, I really was interested in that. Despite not having a threads account, there's the possibility for users to quote pre follow other users due to the fact that the Threads account is ultimately linked to the user's Instagram profile. Regardless of if they decide to sign up for Threads or not. So if you're a listener and you are a Instagram user, a tentative Threads account exists for you and basically you just need to activate it. So that's an interesting thing to know. You just need to weigh your options to see if others in your respective industry are utilizing it to which extent and if it's worth it to you or not.
Brett: And part of me sort of, and I have not used Threads. So, you know, I appreciate that you've tried that rabbit hole. I think of Threads and I think, well, why didn't they [00:10:00] just add, instead of having just the DM model for Instagram have something that incorporated you know, you have Reels, you have stories, you have your posts. They could have just literally embedded Threads in Instagram because ultimately since it's tied together. It's just making it be a separate app for a linked product.
Samantha: That's a good point. I never really thought about it that way. I don't know why it's separate. You can enter Threads through the Instagram app, but there's also a separate app for Threads. So I don't know, it seems to be complicating it a little bit more than it needs to be.
Brett: And it's definitely leaning on text over visuals. From my experience using Twitter is, it was much more text-based and definitely it started in the text-based mode. So,
Samantha: And I will say my personal experience with Threads, it looks exactly like Twitter. So if you were somebody that did enjoy the more text-based media, then maybe this would be the place to reside for you. I did find it slightly annoying how it also pops up on my Instagram feed now. So I'm scrolling through maybe looking for visual content and boom, there's [00:11:00] a threads post, which to others, maybe that won't be an annoyance, but to me I didn't like the, how it was organized.
Brett: So it is, they are doing crossover.
Samantha: They definitely are. And that's how they're doing Instagram and Facebook. I was noticing that as well when I was in my various Meta places over the weekend. Yeah.
Brett: But you also said which I smiled at, cause I thought I was an early Pinterest adopter and you are a Pinterest adopter. So tell me what your thoughts are on Pinterest. Is it trying to make a play for some of these users?
Samantha: I think it definitely is. I'm a little bit biased, as I mentioned before, I'm a visual learner. I enjoy visual aspects in every part of life. So, even though Pinterest is definitely not a new player, it's been around for over 13 years. It's old, but has a valid reputation and loyalty because of this. I think that the fan base that joined Pinterest to begin with, maybe they're not active daily, but they've had a pretty, consistent loyalty fan base over the past 13 years. , I really think it's very underrated. I was digging a little bit more into just what goes on in Pinterest and I [00:12:00] found it interesting that they have a really calculated algorithm that presents users with a specialized feed of items that they may be or already interested in. I found this really interesting graphic about their algorithm and how it works. So it begins with the domain quality referring to the quality of your website by detecting the popularity of the pin that came from your website. Then it moves on to the pin quality, which is the quality of the pin based on engagement levels and popularity of the pin. The third aspect is pinner quality, which refers to the effectiveness of your own pins, determining how often you pin and interact. And lastly, we end with topic relevance, which determines whether Pinterest wants to show your content to the user or not in the search results. So I found this super interesting personally, as somebody who did extensive research on the Tik Tok algorithm as well, just to see how the different algorithms are working per user, per app. I also found that the intuitive interface is also full-proof for anyone who would like [00:13:00] to use the app and the visualization of the posts are so beneficial to visual learners. Overall I think it's probably more so for people that have visual aspects to offer if you're only really, like we said before, text-based then maybe a, Twitter threads situation is better for you. But, what do you think?
Brett: I think Pinterest I always think of as my own little collection of boards and literally, cause you know, if you're putting up some sort of bulletin board model and my brain is collecting all these things and I'm hanging them on my digital wall. I do think from when I used to work in the performing arts Pinterest was not an easy match for any sort of deeper engagement because it's more audio , video and a little more text. I think that what I see when I'm on, there's a lot of visual artists, a lot of people who are photo oriented.
Samantha: Yes.
Brett: And that it's also very nicely and easily commodified, which was always an issue with Instagram I know. I think it's gotten better. And part of it is that if you really want to run a business and you're doing [00:14:00] something that's visual, Pinterest makes a ton of sense.
Samantha: Definitely. That's a good point.
Brett: Have you tried anything new? Other than Threads?
Samantha: I did. So, it's funny that you asked because I was actually sitting in my apartment after our various conversations about realizing new and innovative apps and potential replacements and an ad for ROAR came on my television and I was immediately drawn into it. It was marketed as the social media platform for good. So as soon as I heard the term, you know, I had to tune in and listen to what they were saying. They claim to be at the crossroads of social and philanthropy. Being a tool hoping to nudge Gen Z and young Millennials aged roughly 16 to 36 to assert their values and channel viral content and engagement to a larger social purpose. Specifically the way it's set up as users, signing up, pick one of a dozen hero [00:15:00] causes from anything from climate change to mental health, to animal rights, whatever you want it to be. Each of their posts is tagged with the matching icon, meaning all of the videos on the site. Original content as well as repurposed work from Tik Tok, YouTube and Facebook reels welcome are attached to the cause. There's no like option. Instead it's been replaced with the option to give. So replacing the like with the give is a huge difference in this app. And, there's also a wallet technology attached to it. So the ROAR social foundation is a 501C3 and it serves as a mechanism to collect and distribute donations. And you have a minimum of a $5 wallet upload and each give is set as a default of one penny, which you can obviously raise if you want to do that. But it's basically the idea of going through and liking content, but every time you like a piece of content, it donates. It's gamified giving
Brett: it's gamified and it also reminds me, there is a valid and effective use of what's called [00:16:00] peer to peer giving. Right. And so I'm at, I'm mobilizing my peers to give to a cause that I like it's the concept of Facebook Cause et cetera. It reminded me and we're not talking about this, I'm just going to mention it is Twitch has a little bit of that.
Samantha: Okay.
Brett: So you can actually, for those who are, and I'm not somebody who spends a lot of time on Twitch, but I have friends who do, and that Twitch has actually enabled for gamers, musicians, et cetera. They can both be paid or they can mobilize payments. Like I said, if you're a nonprofit through that platform.
Samantha: Oh, okay.
Brett: As essentially what I would call sort of the tip. They click the like I think they call them badges. Again, I'm not a Twitch person, so I'm not sure if I'm using the right language. But it's the same idea. It's like, everything I do has a value add it's a nice element to what it sounds like roar will be.
Samantha: Yeah. It seemed like really, if the content that was being posted resonated with you, or you felt passionate about the cause that somebody was speaking about then you were able to give to them. But it also, mentioned in the article that I was reading that the founders of roar are [00:17:00] trying to format it so that you will know the specific charity that your money is going to, rather than technically donating it to the person who said the comment and then is linked to the charity. You would know exactly where your money is going.
Brett: It's more that I liked your stuff. And because I know you're passionate about climate. It goes to something involving. Climate change.
S: Exactly. So they're working on that. Unfortunately it's not on the market yet, but you can sign up for the waitlist for early access. So I'm excited to see what it can do.
Brett: That's interesting as a consumer, I think we need to do a little dig and figure out how an art organization could be on the receiving side. Absolutely. There's gotta be a way that the money links, right?
Samantha: Right.
Brett: You've got to have an account probably as a nonprofit. That's cool.
Samantha: Yeah. It's I also think that, personally, as a visual artist, this is super interesting to me. If I saw an art organization on there that I was really passionate about or some type of discipline that I was passionate about, then I would. I wouldn't hesitate to give a [00:18:00] penny. So, you know, it's, probably worth it people just look into
Brett: and we love metrics and I'm like, how fast will those pennies go down? I mean, I think about those places where, you know, a variety of different fundraisers and you take in five or $10 and you're maybe doing a little bit of bingo or whatever. And suddenly like I've been here 30 minutes and I have no money left. How did that happen?
Samantha: So crazy.
Brett: If it's triggered correctly, that could be really fun.
Samantha: Yes, I could be. So have you been playing with any new social apps that you think would be beneficial?
Brett: I played with one new one. I'm in Bluesky now. I think I've been in Bluesky for a whopping two weeks. Bluesky is, as some people know, a nascent and de-centralized, platform that is the launch of Jack Dorsey, who was the former CEO of Twitter. It was launched actually as a beta test when he was still at Twitter but, it is now fully separate. And it's also running on this cool thing called an AP protocol, which is backed in [00:19:00] sort of an open source software model. The cool thing is, there's this backdoor to this, but if I wanted to leave, I can take all my followers with me to whatever my new thing is. Right. And, it's very transparent in that sense, and it's not trying to own your data, right. That's the whole model. There was a recent article by Buffer that basically said not only is it worth exploring but, this is particularly a good platform, especially if you'd like to Twitter. Right. I've only used it two weeks, maybe a month. I'm trying to get used to sort of how things are grouped. It is in theory also really good for creators. Some of the issues because it is fully open source they're trying to use AI for some of the moderation and to let the community self moderate. So between AI and self moderation, right. Well, I think we've seen what happens when we let AI do some things. . It has created some backlash because the AI and some of the moderation has also been biased and misogynist and racist in some [00:20:00] of the process. Right? So it's getting a little bit of a push against that. The only other complaint that people have had is there's a lack of transparency from that process. Like they said, we're dealing with it, but then the question was, well, how are you dealing with it? The community really wants a lot more transparency. It'll be interesting to see how this thing continues to evolve. I'm still on it. I did not instantly have followers, so that was really exciting and I'm sort of figuring out who to follow. There are definitely a lot of artists. There are a lot of what I would call those YouTube thought leaders in there. So I think it's a nice place to investigate. There is not a mass following on it yet. It's still in a waitlist mode. So it's what I would call in the beta test mode. So you have to apply it to be on the waitlist. And there was a really nice tech radar article that we'll link in the post on AMT lab that will have the transcript of this that says, here's how you can do Bluesky. Here's how you joined the wait list. Here's how you do all those other pieces. So other than that, I've just been, I have personally been playing [00:21:00] back with Reddit.
Samantha: Okay.
Brett: And Tumblr and Tumblr's, sort of the visual answer, right. So Tumblr was something I joined a long time ago. It where all my weird quirky friends were and Tumblr had this weird pathway. I think that it had never jumped into the fray of where we see some of the big social media yet because it changed ownership. It was purchased by Verizon. And so it was under Verizon for a while, and then it shifted to Automatic, which is the company that owns WordPress. And they bought it in 2019. When it was under Verizon, they definitely went there's going to be a no nudity clause on it.
Samantha: Okay.
Brett: And the no nudity clause was taken off in 2022 by Automatic. So I think they're trying to take it out of the PG-13 status and bring it into sort of that greater audience again and they also just did a complete redesign of the platform, which I admit, because I am an older user. I'm like, okay, got to re-orient myself to [00:22:00] this and it feels a little bit more like what I would call standard social media. Right. Meaning, the Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, how do I do a post it's sort of all lined up in the same places?
Samantha: Okay.
Brett: It used to be Tumblr was the whole other world. Right. So I'll be interested to see how that works. I do think it works well for creatives and it's definitely quirky. So I think that it may not be the place for some organizations, but others may really like it.
Samantha: Yeah, it's a bit niche. In my mind have always categorized it as the Pinterest for those who don't want to sell things and who are maybe niche creatives. That's how I've always thought about it.
Brett: But interestingly that , we covered this in AMT Lab several years ago, The National Theater in London has done several big projects of sort of the crowdsourced social media engagement projects through their education around productions using Tumblr. They'll have actors as characters set up like complete social media profiles. They'll put all of the contents or the back [00:23:00] content on Tumblr, because it does skew as a younger profile as well.
Samantha: Definitely.
Brett: Yeah. So that's, I think that they've done some really interesting things and I'm hoping that arts organizations will maybe start playing with these platforms a little bit more instead of taking them so seriously, I was thinking. Which they've actually, monetize themselves to be a megaphone. And I think those are the things I'm hearing and reading is many of these platforms aren't trying to be megaphones. They're trying to be communities. Which is why I recommitted to Reddit for a little while. I stopped Reddit when they went through sort of a misogynist, racist period because of the moderation issues. And then I was using it in this class. I mean, I was like, let's try this out. It's a great place to sort of like a little chat room. It's very old school, but it's clean. There's not like a lot of distraction. But what's cool about it is it really does have these hyper passionate users. And Rachel Broughton and her research last fall even pointed out like, if you're a modern art museum, why wouldn't you want to engage with people in the subreddit on Reddit, that's [00:24:00] passionate. They're all passionate about modern art. I mean, they're the ones who want to talk about it. And so regardless of where they live, it's still building the ultimate ecosystem for people who are passionate about your art form. So I think there's some oldies, but goodies that may have new life as they learn to evolve and adapt in this changing space. And I do think the ecosystem has changed because one of the you know, my frog metaphors, you know, one of the frogs has changed. And so now all the other animals are like, what. So I think we will definitely see some evolution happening.
Samantha: Absolutely. Have you done any experimentation with maybe more niche apps like Pebble which was formally, known as T2.
Brett: Well, pebble is actually sort of like what you were talking about. Roar. It's still getting its feet. It was actually in the news because , it's letting AI generate posts. And the article that I read was it was funny because it basically was like, if you're feeling uninspired to put a post [00:25:00] it will generate ideas for you. . I was like, how, how lazy can you be? It's almost like do you know enough about me that you could generate a post? That sounds like me because I can sure tell you that. Other AI have you, I have used is not hitting the cord yet.
Samantha: I could see that as a benefit for arts organizations that are maybe hitting writer's block and not knowing how to write captions for their posts or events that they're having. But as an individual, I see that as being problematic.
Brett: And I also worry about people who, I mean, there's so many things that are out there in terms of the psychology of social media. There was just a whole section of it in the New York Times on Sunday. But I don't think I want my tech saying things for me yet, but that's me. I'm a control freak, so I want to have the control. It's why, when I used to have windows machines, I would go in and change the code because I wanted it to do the things I wanted it to do. So
Samantha: I think it's a slippery slope and I'm still scarred from watching Black Mirror: [00:26:00]Joan is Awful. The idea of AI doing anything for me or having control over my personal narrative is a terrifying thought. And that's where I'm going to leave that.
Brett: That's an excellent place to leave it. That is definitely a perfect Black Mirror ending to an interesting conversation. And I will say, cause you know, I have the AI is ever dominating our lives and I was like, we almost made it through. We didn't talk about AI a lot. I'm sure we will talk about it in future podcasts, but you know, Bluesky and Pebble can't get away. Thank you everyone for listening to this tech in the arts, we had a wonderful let's talk with Sam and myself and be on the lookout for new episodes coming to you very soon. If you found this episode, informative, educational ,inspirational, or at least comic, be sure to send this to other arts or technology aficionados in your life. And you can let us know what you think about this podcast by visiting our website, AMT- lab.org, that's AMT dash L a [00:27:00] b.org. Or you can email us at amtlabcmu@gmail.com. Of course, you can follow us on social media because that's what we talked about. We are on Instagram. We are on Facebook. We're on LinkedIn and we're contemplating if there's somewhere else we want to be. So, thank you very much.