Nick Clegg’s stint as Meta’s president of world affairs ended earlier this 12 months. Now, in his e book Easy methods to Save the Web, he outlines what he thinks wants to vary in tech. The reception hasn’t been form, with some calling the e book “baffling and unsatisfying.” However buried within the in any other case skinny prose are a number of stunning anecdotes and arguments.
Clegg as soon as sparred together with his deputy in MMA
Mark Zuckerberg’s reinvention as an MMA fanatic is nicely documented. Much less identified is how he inspired his senior executives to affix him. “Mark’s dedication to MMA is so sturdy that he insisted one morning, throughout a administration offsite, that a few of his most senior executives be a part of him for a coaching session,” Clegg writes. That’s how he ended up on the mat, straddled by his deputy Joel Kaplan (who would later exchange him), in “a manoeuvre apparently generally known as the ‘Domination Mount’,” which Clegg admits was “too shut for consolation.”
Politics accounts for simply 6% of the Fb feed
Clegg makes a spirited, if not at all times convincing, try to deal with the declare that Meta has harmed public interactions and polarized politics. “Most individuals don’t actually use social media to interact in politics,” he writes. Political content material, he claims, makes up lower than 6% of what individuals see on Fb. If you wish to assign blame for political discourse, he suggests, look as an alternative to X (previously Twitter).
Social media has modified democracy
In response to Clegg, social media has remodeled democracy, nevertheless it hasn’t destroyed it. “Undoubtedly it has [changed democracy],” he writes, describing it as a “disruptive and messy change.” He argues it’ll take time to grasp the complete implications however insists there are advantages alongside the well-documented issues.
Clegg suspended Donald Trump’s account in 2021
One underexplained part covers Meta’s response to Donald Trump’s function within the January 6 Capitol riots. Trump was banned from Fb apps, a choice later reversed after his suspension ended. “Trump’s assist for these protesting on the Capitol, and his refusal to sentence the violence of the insurrectionists, was tantamount to inciting additional violence,” Clegg writes, including that “Mark Zuckerberg made clear that the choice can be mine.” Clegg finally selected to droop Trump’s entry to Fb and Instagram.
How AI will change our world
Clegg thinks generative AI may help deal with the West’s stagnating productiveness. “The implicit promise of capitalism is that the following era will probably be higher off than the final, with exhausting work rewarded by financial safety and first rate public providers to supply a security internet when tragedy or misfortune strikes,” he wrote. That promise, he argues, has damaged down: youthful generations are overworked, underpaid, and overstressed.
Clegg believes AI may help. “I’m not suggesting AI is a silver bullet that can immediately reverse many years of gradual decline,” he wrote. “However the developed world badly wants a productiveness increase.”
Clegg wasn’t a fan of the AI Security Summit—or AI doomers
Clegg recounts his expertise on the AI Security Summit in Bletchley Park in November 2023, attended by Kamala Harris, Rishi Sunak, and Ursula von der Leyen. Clegg claims he advised a narrative a few hypothetical girl, referred to as “Mrs. Miggins,” who lived simply down the highway from the summit. He writes: “’I can assure,’ I stated, ‘that she’s extra scared of AI now than she was earlier than this summit began two days in the past.’”
Little shock, then, that he additionally dismisses doomsday eventualities of AI domination. “We’re merely within the foothills, debating the perils we’d discover on the mountaintop,” he writes.
