Latest / Mini Scroll / MINI TECH SCROLL: Anthropic influencer dinner, "masculinised" tech marketing, Starbucks x ChatGPT + Tim Cook exit

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MINI TECH SCROLL: Anthropic influencer dinner, "masculinised" tech marketing, Starbucks x ChatGPT + Tim Cook exit · Mini Scroll

• 0:00
  Coming up today on Mini Tech Scroll, Anthropic's attempt to
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  court influences the new and unnecessary Starbucks and
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  ChatGPT collaboration, and Apple ushers in a new era of
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  leadership. Hey everyone, and welcome to
• 0:12
  Mini Scroll. The daily Internet culture
• 0:14
  podcast bring you the biggest stories from social media, the
• 0:17
  creator economy and the digital space every Monday through
• 0:21
  Thursday and sometimes Fridays. My name is Annabelle and I'm
• 0:24
  your Wednesday Mini Tech Scroll host and also the deputy editor
• 0:27
  of Australian youth digital media brands Centennial World.
• 0:31
  Welcome back to Mini Tech Scroll.
• 0:33
  A bit of a jump scare in that we have a new intro, so hopefully
• 0:37
  that is a welcome addition by you guys.
• 0:39
  I know it might take a little bit to get used to, but I think
• 0:42
  it's a fun way to start the episode.
• 0:44
  Anyway, the stories this week, I do want to say a quite brand
• 0:47
  focused, which is a bit unusual for Mini Tech Scroll, but
• 0:50
  definitely let me know if you guys like these type of stories
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  so I know to cover them more often.
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  But other than that, Please remember to rate, review and
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  subscribe and feel free to check out our Patreon if you want more
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  exclusive behind the scenes parasocial type content.
• 1:06
  OK, let's get into the stories this week.
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  I need to start with this anthropic influencer dinner
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  that's making the rounds. I started seeing it towards the
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  end of last week with a couple New York City based creators
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  like Carly Weinstein, Deepa Sharma, who's known as Real
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  Deepa Online among others in attendance at this anthropic
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  dinner. So the event seemed to be a sit
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  down meal with conversation starters scattered across the
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  table that was seemingly generated by Claude.
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  There's been quite a bit of coverage of this story from tech
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  journalists. Taylor Lorenz dubbed this event
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  as quote Anthropic gallipop dinners for influencers to
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  promote Claude Georgia from the Please don't make me focus up
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  Stack who I feel like I'm siding quite frequently.
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  Recently, she predicted that this is something that will
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  likely become increasingly popular because quote Anthropic
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  has been aggressively hiring for its social team over the last
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  year. So in saying that maybe this is
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  something that we should get used to.
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  We have had a couple of episodes here and there discussing the
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  ways in which Anthropic is marketing itself to the masses,
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  which is most often as an ethical AI tool.
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  We've covered this in relation to the company's red line with
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  the US government and its media campaign to how the company had
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  hired A philosopher to teach AI morals.
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  And of course, there are many contradictions here because
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  Anthropic does have a partnership with Palantir
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  Technologies, which is entangled with the US military and ICE.
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  But I feel like the move towards influences is just another way
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  to market itself as an approachable tool and an
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  alternative to other AI platforms.
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  Speaking of the dinner, some of the influences that attended
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  this event are definitely considered as problematic, but
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  the discourse on Reddit has been less than favourable towards the
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  attendees because they went to the event not just because of
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  who they are, but of course that plays into it.
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  And with this, many Reddit users are also questioning what the
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  point of this dinner was and who Anthropic is trying to cater to
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  with it. Because not all of the creators
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  in attendance were tech creators.
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  And I will say, as I've already touched on, I'm kind of not
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  surprised by this because Anthropic really tries to market
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  itself to the masses. So this just feels like another
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  way to do so. But I do want to share a bit of
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  a summary of the sentiment in the subreddits towards this
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  influencer event. 1 user described the whole event as
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  quote UN quote dark sided, while another said that quote this
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  isn't the flex you think it is, referring to the attendees.
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  Others wrote that it just feels very quote UN quote dystopian
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  and that quote we have really lost the plot, which I think is
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  probably fair. There also seems to be an
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  ongoing joke within this discourse that Claude slash
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  Anthropic will take a class of influences to Coachella next
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  year. But this year we have already
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  seen the promotion of AI through the festival, mostly through
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  Google. Ahead of the festival, Carol G
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  ended up doing a campaign with Google where she shared quote UN
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  quote hints for her headlining performance through using the
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  Google AI function and asking questions that way.
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  On top of this, Google AI also sponsored influences ahead of
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  the festival, including TikTok creator Monet McMichael as well
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  as nick from love island season 7.
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  And I have even seen tik Toks from the festival grounds that
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  there was a Google Gemini photo brief.
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  So we are already seeing these AI activations and activities at
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  a festival like Crotela, but I could definitely see more of
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  these AI companies leading into this moving forward.
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  With that being said, having an influencer, the work with a tech
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  product or AI tool through content isn't exactly new.
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  We have seen this time and time again.
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  But I wanted to cover this story specifically because I think
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  it's interesting alongside other conversations that have been
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  circulating online over the past few months.
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  One that was specifically about tech companies trying to hire,
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  quote UN quote, storytellers and people that can communicate and
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  distribute their message to the masses effectively.
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  I feel like this really took off towards the beginning of the
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  year, maybe around February, specifically after a TikTok by a
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  New York City based creator named Lauren went pretty viral.
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  She argued that marketing is going to become increasingly
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  important in tech with AI kind of democratizing coding and
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  software development. I'll insert the TikTok here so
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  you can hear her argument. So the.
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  CEO of Snapchat just said that because basically anyone can
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  build software now through vibe coding, companies are going to
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  start allocating their budgets less on engineering and more on
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  marketing. Even the Co founder of open I
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  said taste is the new core skill.
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  Tech companies are now in a minor arms race to prove that
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  they have taste. They're hiring storytellers,
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  creating high end swag, and basically trying to make their
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  brand have aura. Because if the building part is
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  now getting automated and so many people are building now the
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  bottleneck shifts to why people should care.
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  I think this is a good thing for the creatives and the marketing
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  girlies is that tech needs you. I will say some people believe
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  that this kind of discussion and mentality is a little bit of
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  hope call for those who work in creative fields or have a
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  certain level of affinity for the arts and humanities.
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  And I'm definitely sympathetic to that view.
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  But I also do believe in the value of effective communication
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  when you are marketing tech products because they can be
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  quite complicated for the general consumer.
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  In a similar vein, there's also a growing conversation right now
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  on TikTok about how marketing seems to be rebranding as an
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  industry. This really kicked off when a
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  brand and social consultant named Miranda Shanahan posted a
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  TikTok claiming that marketing is becoming quote UN quote
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  masculinized. And she pointed to job titles
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  being changed seemingly to appeal to men.
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  I'm convinced marketing is being rebranded so that boys can do it
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  too. We are suddenly seeing the same
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  old marketing roles being given new technical coded names.
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  Narrative engineer, go to market engineer, even saw a UGC
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  engineer. The most interesting part of all
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  of this is that this is actually actually history repeating
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  itself. Before software engineer was a
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  job title, programming was actually a secretarial task
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  mainly done by women. It all changed in the 80s when
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  the personal computer was invented and the industry
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  started to realize that actually software is where the money was.
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  Programming was then rebranded into software engineering.
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  The industry started promoting this idea of the lone male
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  genius and overtime this filtered women out.
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  The software was feminized when it was considered clerical,
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  masculinized when it became high status.
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  Marketing was feminized when it was making things pretty.
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  Now marketing is being masculinized because AI has made
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  it so anyone can code, and now the biggest problem is
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  distribution. This technical language is being
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  applied to earn respect with leadership without considering
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  what that means for who those roles might go to and who feels
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  qualified to apply. And I will say there has been a
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  little bit of pushback on her take, but I thought her point
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  was interesting because given that we unfortunately live in a
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  patriarchal society, when an industry is catered to, men
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  overcomes increasingly masculine quote UN quote.
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  This indicates an increased level of importance and
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  legitimacy associated with that space, even though this often
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  shouldn't be the case. So I think with this context,
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  the interest and investment in influencer marketing from a
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  company like Anthropic does make sense.
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  Of course, on top of this, influencer marketing has been a
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  very successful marketing tool for many different industries.
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  But I think it's safe to say, given the way that this dinner
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  has landed among the masses, these companies need chronically
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  online storytellers and marketers to spread the
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  messaging effectively. This is something that Lawrence
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  talks about all the time. A lot of marketing these days is
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  understanding how the Internet will react to a certain campaign
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  or launch. But I will say at this stage,
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  with marketing AI companies and tools, I do think it's quite an
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  uphill battle that I don't think will be solved by someone's
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  favorite influenza promoting it, especially as anti AI sentiment
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  is really hitting its peak as we kind of discussed last week.
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  But yes, I would definitely be curious to hear what you guys
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  think about the way we're talking about marketing in tech
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  and how these companies are using influencer marketing.
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  Speaking of AI partnerships that did not read the room, I need to
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  mention this Starbucks and Chachi PT collaboration because
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  literally what is that headline? What is going on?
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  What timeline are we living in? I think it's safe to say that
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  Open AI and Starbucks are arguably two of the most hated
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  companies online at this current moment in time.
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  When it comes to to Open AI, we have discussed the public
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  sentiment towards the company pretty extensively over the past
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  few weeks, so I'm not going to rehash it all here.
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  But as a quick reminder, social media users have really been up
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  in arms about Open AI since the tech company reached an
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  agreement with the Department of War last month in the US.
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  And this really heightened A boycott ChatGPT campaign, which
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  became known as the Quit GPT Movement.
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  And that isn't even to mention the expose on Sam Altman that
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  dropped earlier this month by The New Yorker.
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  I also covered that in last week's episode if you want more
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  detail. Meanwhile, Starbucks has
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  actually come up a couple times in many scroll recently as well.
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  As Lauren previously explained, there are a few different
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  reasons why people are boycotting a Starbucks, but the
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  overarching reason is to stand in solidarity with the workers
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  in their union. And for a little bit of context,
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  part of it comes down to the Starbucks Workers Union's pro
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  Palestinian stands being struck down by Starbucks corporate
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  side, whereas the other part of it is the result of unfair
• 10:37
  treatment of workers. Where Starbucks Union has been
• 10:39
  fighting for a fair union contract and they're fighting
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  for a variety of different changes such as pay rises, just
• 10:47
  cause protections as well as more hours before new hires.
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  There are a few more things and I'll link the Starbucks Union
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  website so you can see it from the source.
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  But anyway, back to the story at hand because last week it was
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  announced that Starbucks and ChatGPT are collaborating on a
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  new beta Starbucks app available through the chat bot.
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  As Starbucks announcements reads quote in ChatGPT, customers can
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  explore a new Starbucks app that helps them find a Starbucks
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  drink based on their mood or vibe of the day.
• 11:17
  Just tell ChatGPT what you're in the mood for or even upload a
• 11:20
  photo that captures your vibe tag at Starbucks and it will
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  offer Starbucks drinks that match your request in the
• 11:26
  announcement. They kind of position it as a
• 11:28
  way for customers to be encouraged to try new things,
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  which kind of feels insane. As you probably would have
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  guessed, social media users are not impressed by this
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  collaboration, which honestly is not a surprise given the current
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  attitude to both these companies.
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  But honestly, that could have also been the reason why they
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  collaborated. They kind of have nothing to
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  lose. But As for why social media
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  users are not happy with the collaboration, I have seen takes
• 11:51
  on TikTok that say that a collaboration like this
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  encourages dependence on AI and therefore erases independence of
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  thoughts. So in one TikTok I even saw it
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  described as apocalyptic. I need you to hear me when I say
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  this. We have lost the plot.
• 12:08
  Starbucks is rolling out this new collaboration with Chachi BT
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  and I almost can't put into words how concerning this type
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  of marketing and trend with AI is.
• 12:22
  This is what I found in my inbox this morning.
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  A suggestion to ask Starbucks GPT.
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  I'd like something high in protein, low in sugar for it to
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  suggest the sugar free vanilla protein latte.
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  I can't even stomach it. It is completely just erasing
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  any independence of thought. Like you could have come up with
• 12:39
  that yourself. If you rely on AI to make
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  decisions like this, you have completely lost the plot and you
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  are becoming completely standardized to be a shell of a
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  human being without any free thinking or capability to have a
• 12:57
  personality. I have quite a few thoughts on
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  this collaboration. First and foremost, this is just
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  another example of a company using AI when it just doesn't
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  need to. Like we're seeing Starbucks
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  trying to find a way to jump on the AI bandwagon when it doesn't
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  have to in this way. But I do think there are other
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  interesting layers at play here, because I think it raises the
• 13:16
  question around Starbucks's environmental impacts.
• 13:20
  There have been allegations of Starbucks greenwashing
• 13:22
  repeatedly over the years. Back in 2024, for example,
• 13:26
  Starbucks purs sued in the US by the National Consumers League
• 13:30
  alleging that the company was misleading consumers by saying
• 13:33
  that it was quote UN quote committed to 100% ethical coffee
• 13:37
  sourcing. On top of this, Starbucks does
• 13:39
  really continue to rely on single use plastics despite
• 13:43
  efforts to encourage keep cops and other reusable cops, as well
• 13:46
  as introducing more sustainable alternatives.
• 13:49
  Obviously, there is an ongoing and important conversation
• 13:52
  around the environmental impact of chat, GPC and AI.
• 13:56
  And this is something that we have covered before.
• 13:58
  And while there is a lot of debate around the exact impact,
• 14:02
  we know AI has a rather significant environmental impact
• 14:05
  due to the high energy consumption and water uses for
• 14:09
  cooling data centers. So with Starbucks collaborating
• 14:12
  with AI in this way, that feels super unnecessary.
• 14:16
  You could say that this is another example of the company's
• 14:19
  negative environmental impact, which ultimately contributes to
• 14:23
  its greenwashing efforts. On top of the environmental
• 14:26
  question, I do think it's also interesting to to consider the
• 14:29
  history of coffee shops here. I know that sounds kind of out
• 14:32
  of pocket and insane, but these spaces have long been considered
• 14:35
  as a primary social space for communities.
• 14:38
  Like if we go back to what many consider as the origin of coffee
• 14:42
  houses in the Middle East, they were widely considered as
• 14:45
  social, business, and political hubs.
• 14:48
  This is definitely continued on in its own way to the modern
• 14:51
  era. These days, coffee shops and
• 14:53
  even chains like Starbucks are probably 1 of the last kind of
• 14:57
  third spaces I guess for many young people to go and interact
• 15:00
  with their friends and peers that doesn't cost an arm and a
• 15:03
  leg. With that being said, it
• 15:05
  definitely feels ominous for a company like Starbucks to
• 15:08
  support AI in this way considering many see this path
• 15:13
  as a way to lessen interpersonal connection down the line.
• 15:17
  OK, that brings us to my last story for today.
• 15:20
  I'm sure you've probably all heard about it already, but
• 15:22
  obviously I couldn't ignore it. And that is that Tim Cook is
• 15:26
  down from his position as Apple CEO.
• 15:28
  We don't really often cover personnel changes on mini tech,
• 15:31
  but this story is just too big to ignore.
• 15:33
  So news broke yesterday that Tim Cook will become Apple's
• 15:36
  executive chairman with John Tarnis to become the Apple CEO.
• 15:41
  So obviously, Tim Cook is not leaving Apple.
• 15:43
  His new role will primarily involve engaging with
• 15:46
  policymakers, including Congress, of course.
• 15:49
  And I will say his departure has been long rumored, but I don't
• 15:53
  think people were expecting it right at this moment.
• 15:55
  Since the news broke, there's been a lot of conversation
• 15:58
  around Tim Cook's tenure at Apple and what he has meant to
• 16:01
  the company, and I thought I'd give a little bit of context
• 16:04
  here. So he took over from Steve Jobs
• 16:06
  in 2011, having originally joined the company in 1998.
• 16:10
  And over the course of his 15 year tenure as CEO, Apple has
• 16:14
  dramatically and rapidly scaled as The Newsroom announcement
• 16:19
  from Apple reads. Quote under Cook's leadership,
• 16:22
  Apple has grown from a market capitalization of approximately
• 16:26
  350 billion U.S. dollars to four trillion U.S. dollars,
• 16:31
  representing a more than 1000% increase.
• 16:34
  And yearly revenue has nearly quadrupled from 108 billion U.S.
• 16:38
  dollars in fiscal year 2011 to more than 416 billion U.S.
• 16:44
  dollars in fiscal year 2025. And the way Tim Cook really
• 16:48
  managed to do this was by introducing new products and
• 16:51
  services, of course. And that has included the Apple
• 16:53
  Watch, Airpods. Honestly, those are two things
• 16:56
  that people probably couldn't live without today.
• 16:58
  And he even brought chip design in house.
• 17:01
  On top of introducing new products and services, the range
• 17:04
  of products has also expanded drastically.
• 17:07
  There are now about a million versions of each Apple product,
• 17:10
  which has also added to the revenue.
• 17:12
  While Tim Cook has been praised for his leadership, he's also
• 17:16
  faced criticism from tech circles.
• 17:19
  I was listening to The Verge cast this morning and the hosts
• 17:21
  were talking about how Tim Cook is not the quote UN quote most
• 17:25
  innovative leader where there was seemingly a focus on
• 17:28
  creating the perfect product as opposed to taking risks.
• 17:32
  Here's my big criticism of the Tim Cook era.
• 17:35
  They don't make enough stuff. They, like, simply do not have
• 17:38
  enough products. They're not taking enough shots.
• 17:40
  And when they do take the shots, they put too much pressure on
• 17:43
  them in like weird ways. The example I always go back to
• 17:47
  just, I think it's funny is the introduction of the Apple Watch
• 17:51
  where they just like overloaded the Apple Watch with
• 17:54
  expectations and hype. It's like, guys, you don't have
• 17:56
  to. You can just, you can just have
• 17:58
  more products. You can just try more things and
• 18:01
  see what works. The the vision Pro is the same
• 18:03
  way. They just like overloaded this
• 18:05
  VR headset with all of these expectations because they
• 18:08
  weren't trying enough things, right?
• 18:11
  Because the Tim Cook era is so much about optimizing the things
• 18:13
  that already exist. And certainly there are are
• 18:16
  products during his tenure that are very important.
• 18:19
  Like Airpods are very important. You make, you can go down the
• 18:21
  list, there's a lot of important products that came up, but all
• 18:24
  even Airpods are like now there's 50 variations of
• 18:26
  Airpods. But that that's my criticism of
• 18:30
  the Cook era, is that it was so deliberate because everything
• 18:33
  had to scale to a huge number, that sometimes their failures
• 18:38
  were even bigger failures than they needed.
• 18:39
  To be there's a chance that the new CEO, John Thomas, who is
• 18:43
  currently a senior vice president at Apple and has a
• 18:46
  history in hardware engineering, might be more open to these
• 18:50
  products risks and ultimately innovation.
• 18:52
  But there's also a chance that he will stick to the path that
• 18:55
  Tim Cook has set, given he has been at the companies for
• 18:58
  decades as well, starting back in 2001.
• 19:01
  On top of the frustration, I guess, around the quote, UN
• 19:04
  quote, lack of innovation, there's also been frustration
• 19:08
  towards the way Tim Cook has kind of handled the Trump
• 19:11
  presidency and kind of cozied up to him.
• 19:14
  I've seen discourse that people think that's why he's not
• 19:17
  leaving the company entirely. That's why he's kind of going
• 19:20
  into this role where he's engaging more with policymakers
• 19:23
  because if they have someone at the helm that Trump likes and
• 19:26
  knows, they might have a better chance of getting what they
• 19:29
  want. Having said that, though, there
• 19:31
  are definitely problems that John Thomas will inherit as the
• 19:36
  CEO. And the major question at this
• 19:37
  stage does seem to be about AI since Apple hasn't really been
• 19:42
  pouring as much money into AI as their counterpart.
• 19:45
  Instead, they seem to be positioning themselves as a
• 19:47
  distributor of these products since so many people have Apple
• 19:51
  products. But I guess we will just have to
• 19:53
  wait and see what happens there. Well, that is everything from
• 19:56
  Mini Tech School today. I really hope you guys enjoyed
• 19:59
  and I guess if you didn't, Lauren will be back for a
• 20:01
  regular episode of Mini School tomorrow.
• 20:03
  But thank you so much for listening.
• 20:05
  Bye. Centennial World Podcast Network
• 20:07
  operates on Gadigal land. We would like to acknowledge the
• 20:10
  Gadigal of the Eora Nation, the traditional custodians of this
• 20:13
  land, and pay our respects to elders both past and present.