Image: Alessio Jacona / Protocol
Mark Zuckerberg’s unwinnable fight

Good morning! This Thursday, Zoom wants you to Zoom on a Zoom device, Mark Zuckerberg faces a Catch-22 over bad content, and I'm a little bit in love with Netflix's new shuffle button.
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"I need to buy a gadget just for video chat" sounded, six months ago, like the crazy rantings of someone who watched too many episodes of "The Jetsons." Hey, add a flying car to the list, too! But now? Video chat hardware is one of the most interesting device categories out there.
Do people need a dedicated video chat gizmo? In a world where it seems like everything — your phone, your laptop, your freaking doorbell — has a camera, why add an extra device? That's the question I posed to Jeff Smith, Zoom's head of Zoom Rooms and the company's overseer of hardware.
Zoom launched Zoom for Home in July, along with a device called the DTEN ME that puts a 27-inch video chat device right on your desk. But Smith said he, like Facebook, is interested in lots of other form factors and screen sizes.
I think of these smart-display devices as the evolution of the landline phone, and I'm betting they're going to be on every remote employee's hardware request forms in the next few months. Time to add that to the IT budget, I think.
On Wednesday, Facebook announced that it deleted thousands of pages, groups and ads from its platforms that had to do with QAnon. (What is QAnon? It's … too much for one newsletter, but this Atlantic piece is terrific.)
Also on Wednesday, an activist group called Facebook a "major threat" to public health, and said it allowed health misinformation to be viewed 3.8 billion times in the last year on the platform.
Also on Wednesday, Pew released a poll saying nearly three-quarters of Americans think social media sites censor political viewpoints. (We can argue about what "censor" and "political" mean until we're blue in the face, but let's not.) The findings are fascinating:
Where does this leave Facebook and other social companies? The more actively they moderate, the less many people trust them to be fair and open. But if they do nothing, the whole social sphere seems about a weekend away from collapsing into what many others would view as an apocalyptic horror show.
When I hit the "Shuffle Play" button that's starting to appear on some people's Netflix apps, the first thing that played was "(Un)Well." Shuffle again: "Umbrella Academy." Again, again, again: "World's Most Wanted," "Arrested Development," "The Last Dance." Five shows Netflix thought I might like, in some cases because I'd already put it on my list, in others because I like similar things. And it was right on all counts.
Nearly every streaming company tells me the same thing: That the ideal interface is no interface at all, that you'd just open the app and it would magically begin playing exactly the right thing. In fact, any company that operates on algorithmic recommendations — from Netflix and Hulu to Instagram and Twitter — shares the same goal. Recommendations beat browsing every single time.
That level of personalization remains a pipe dream, so for now we're stuck with rows (and rows and rows) of tiles of stuff to watch. Any small way that services can shortcut the browsing process — and maybe turn you on to something new in the process — is a huge win.
And honestly, thank goodness for this new Netflix feature. I could spend 45 minutes deciding what to watch before just deciding on "The Office" again, or I could let Netflix choose. And at this point, Netflix knows what I like better than I do. I guess all of this is to say, I'm now extremely hooked on "(Un)Well."
Yesterday, Protocol hosted the first of two events in our 2020 national political conventions series. We convened engaging conversations on how leaders today will enable a diverse workforce of the future. Join us next Wednesday, when we'll host the second event in the series, featuring special assistant to the president, Matt Lira, and more. This event series is hosted in partnership with ITI.
On Protocol: Black founders and CEOs say they've faced bias, racism and harassment while pitching to investors, like this story from Net Watch Solutions' Peter Beasley:
Mad at Uber's treatment of drivers? Blame capitalism, Dara Khosrowshahi said:
Speaking of capital, in the same interview, gig-worker organizer Vanessa Bain said the campaign to pass Prop 22 is going to be huge and expensive:
On Protocol: One way to find diverse founders and employees is to broaden your own horizons, said Salesforce's Suzanne DiBianca:
TikTok's only crime is being in the middle of a political fight, TikTok's Vanessa Pappas said:
Prachi Gore is Checkr's new VP of marketing. She joins from SmartRecruiters, and said that "Checkr's fair chance program and mission were what initially drew me to the company."
Tom Bossert is the new president of Trinity Cyber. He's a former Homeland Security advisor and chief risk officer, and is a good choice for a company with lots of government and political clients.
Tristan Thomas is leaving Monzo. He's been the company's VP of marketing for about five years, and TechCrunch reported he doesn't know where he's headed next.
Nairi Tashjian Hourdajian is leaving Canaan for Figma. She was Canaan's CMO, and is heading back to the startup world for the first time since the early days at Uber.
Instagram, July 2018: "Today, you'll start noticing a "You're All Caught Up" message when you've seen every post from the last two days." Look at Instagram, trying to help people not use Instagram too much!
Instagram, yesterday: "So we just want to make it really easy for people to see that [relevant content] when they get to the end of their feed." No stopping allowed until you've seen all of Instagram!
Yesterday, Protocol hosted the first of two events in our 2020 national political conventions series. We convened engaging conversations on how leaders today will enable a diverse workforce of the future. Join us next Wednesday, when we'll host the second event in the series, featuring special assistant to the president, Matt Lira, and more. This event series is hosted in partnership with ITI.
Today's Source Code was written by David Pierce, with help from Shakeel Hashim. Thoughts, questions, tips? Send them to david@protocol.com, or our tips line, tips@protocol.com. Enjoy your day, see you tomorrow.
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