Europe’s New Brits, Where High Speed Internet Harm Hits Hardest, and If People Want Lies Should Media Companies Oblige? Plus More! #160
Grüezi! I’m Adrian Monck, and welcome to this free newsletter featuring seven things that caught my attention this week.
Also this edition – VC Paul Graham burns oblivious billionaire Elon Musk, real life Succession drama, and Chinese mega-ships!
1️⃣ Europe’s New Brits?
Poland’s pilots helped win the ‘Battle of Britain.’
Now the country’s taking Britain’s place on the European stage.
Brits fretted recently that their faltering economy would be overtaken by Poland, a country that – until Brexit – it had looked to for well-trained workers.
It’s not just Britain’s economic place in the world that Poland threatens. With a pathological scepticism of the Euro, and all things European, the Poles have become the European Union’s new Brits.
Their Prime Minister, Mateus Morawiecki, sounds positively Brexity:
“I warn all those who want to create a super-state government by a narrow elite: if we ignore cultural differences the outcome will be the weakening of Europe and a series of revolts... In Europe nothing can safeguard the nations ... better than nation states.”
And the United States has noticed.
While France’s President Macron has been in Beijing and questioning Europe’s relationship with the US, Mr Morawiecki has been in Washington DC this week.
In case you wondered about the Polish PM’s message there, the NYT labelled his trip “an evident riposte” to Mr Macron. Supporters hammered home the point:
Poland will only be meriting more attention in the future.
⏭ More on Poland’s politics here.
2️⃣ The Internet Superhighway’s Crash Victims?
How teenage girls pay the price for online speed.
There are many myths about the internet and mental health.
To get some cold, hard data Spanish researchers looked at what happened when old copper wires were replaced by super fast fibre in people’s homes.
Their results were striking:
High speed internet “is a contributing factor to a significant increase in deaths related to suicide or self-harm among adolescents. The effects are ... more prominent among girls.”
The study goes on:
“Fibre penetration increases the incidence of anxiety, mood disorders ... drug abuse, and self-harm and suicide attempts, with most effects again due to girls.
“We document an exceptionally large effect on cases of self-harm and suicide attempts among girls aged 15 to 19 years (+112%) but no significant effect for boys.”
This is the kind of research that – if we value the lives of young women – needs to be taken very, very seriously.
⏭ A hearing into the death of a young woman had few doubts about the risks.
3️⃣ The Problem Giving People What They Want
Booze, gambling, cigarettes. What about lies?
If your business model is making people angry, don’t be surprised if they get angrier when you stop.
Fox News is finding out the hard way that nursing grievances creates demand that needs constant feeding.
It now faces a billion dollar plus lawsuit from Dominion – a voting machine company that became the target of a conspiracy theory.
A long NYT piece details Fox’s troubles:
“The network seemed trapped by the viewer expectations it helped set; attempts to address the preposterousness of the whole conspiracy theory would draw blowback and new attacks from rivals.
“Tucker Carlson gave it a shot... Even then, he qualified it: ‘It doesn’t mean it didn’t happen,’ he said. ‘It might have happened.’ And he still took a hammering online.
“If they didn’t want it from Carlson — who was at the same time seeding other false notions about voter fraud — they certainly didn’t want it from the news correspondents, who were not.
“As one Fox executive said of conspiracy theory debunking: ‘the audience feels like we crapped on them.’”
⏭ Until the 1980s, broadcast media had to abide by a Fairness Doctrine.
4️⃣ Missing Succession’s Terminated Tycoon?
While we’re talking Fox, let real-life Logan infotain you.
If you’re missing Logan Roy, Vanity Fair’s Gabriel Sherman has – with impeccable timing – this on non-fictional media magnate Rupert Murdoch*.
‘Friends’ of KRM’s fourth wife Jerry Hall appear to have given the writer the scoop on the aging mogul.
Sherman prefigures Murdoch’s own obituary:
“Murdoch built a $17 billion fortune out of a small newspaper company he inherited from his father. The only thing that mattered was profit. But amassing that wealth required Murdoch to destroy virtually anything he touched: the environment, women’s rights, the Republican Party, truth, decency—even his own family.”
His final verdict?
Murdoch seemed trapped by the people he radicalised, like an aging despot hiding in his palace while the streets filled with insurrectionists.
Still, unlike Logan, Mr Murdoch has more episodes to run.
* I exchanged emails with him a long time ago, and once opened my hotel door to find him lurking in the corridor outside. But that’s another story!
⏭ Gabe Sherman also wrote a great bio of Fox News chief Roger Ailes.
5️⃣ Words That Work
Depeche Mode got it all wrong in 1990.
Wharton’s Jonah Berger shared some interesting tips on persuasion:
“Saying you ‘recommend’ rather than ‘like’ something makes people 32% more likely to take your suggestion.
“Want people to behave more ethically? Rather than saying ‘don’t cheat,’ a 2013 study found that saying ‘don’t be a cheater’ more than halved the amount of unethical behaviour.
“People prefer advisers who express greater certainty even though that confidence outstripped advisers’ actual results. When people speak with certainty, we’re more likely to think they’re right.”
⏭ If you want more, Jonah Berger’s book is available here.
6️⃣ How Big Can You Make a Container Ship?
Ask the Chinese. They just built the world’s biggest.
⏭ And Shanghai shipyards just picked up a $3.2bn deal from France for more.
7️⃣ Twitter Exchange of the Week
Paul Graham burns an oblivious Elon Musk.
It’s not a burn if you don’t notice it. Incidentally Musk had a busy week, sitting down with the BBC for a last-minute interview.
That encounter served as a reminder to journalists that if you’re going to level accusations about hateful content on twitter, it helps to bring evidence – like this.
⏭ Non-hateful reading on Bea’s book club podcast.
If you enjoy this newsletter – please recommend it!
Best,
Adrian
