Some things that we are now, right? We are the children Now that yet now We are the ones who make a brighter day so trending right now on Gawker family of websites is a story about a woman called the cops It's a story a White lady who called the cops on a family of black people for Charcoaling in the wrong area of the park around Lake Merritt What? Oh? That's that's just go Immediately there are two things that I think of number one it Living in a white neighborhood in Oakland it's have I seen this woman It's where in the park is this where around Lake Merritt did this happen? No charcoal grilling in my lake It'll put your charcoal out. That's why I'd be on the side I think it might actually be like right across the street. No no kidding. Yeah Cross the street from the ice cream place Well, I don't want to get too into it. No, I know that's why you that's why I use that No, this is I would literally just save the address but Ashley has rightly beaten it to me that I shouldn't be so forth All right, you guys ready Do those Would you care to read the pre-roll Justin you already have online three. All right. There we go three two Daily Tech news show is powered by you to find out more head to Daily Tech news show comm slash support This is the Daily Tech news for Thursday May 10th 2018 in Los Angeles. I'm Tom Merritt and from the shores of Lake Merritt I'm Justin Robert Young and ladies and gentlemen. We are sad to say Sarah Lane has the day off But our producer Roger Chang Still kicking still right here. I never leave stop kicking people Please it's becoming an issue human resources has been alerted This serves as an official warning. Yeah, exactly Well, hey folks. We have a fun show full of technological advancements and Thorny philosophical issues. So let's start with a few tech things you should know Spotify said it will stop promoting the artist R. Kelly is part of its editorial and algorithmic playlist Spotify concert partnered with advocacy groups such as the Southern Poverty Law Center glad Muslim advocates and the international network Against cyber hate to help inform and a monitoring tool called Spotify audio watch to flag hate content Apple announced it's canceling its project to build a data center in Authentery, Ireland due to delays in the approval process a Second data center in Denmark that they kind of kicked off at the same time is almost completed Opposition in Ireland centered around a strain on the power grid although Apple kept arguing that it would use renewables It would know for build Apple did win a court case in the Irish High Court in October But uncertainty about appeals to the Supreme Court caused the company to just say, you know what we're just cancelled this I mean like, you know, you want to know what guys we're just gonna leave so we'll expand our office in cork to make up for it But we're not doing the data. Yeah Well, if you want to find us we'll be at our tax haven Korea Fair Trade Commission Chief Kim Sang-jo told reporters that Samsung's current ownership structure is not sustainable Samsung Group uses circular shareholding to interlock Samsung C&T Samsung life insurance and Samsung electronics Kim urged vice chairman J Y Lee to make a decision concerning the ownership structure. That's rumblings Going after the cables See very interested in how that's gonna turn out. All right, let's talk about net neutrality The United States FCC said its repeal of the open internet guidelines of 2015 will officially go into effect June 11 You may say Tom, I thought you said they were already published They were the order was published in the federal register on February 22nd Usually publishing in the federal register makes something go into effect But it did not go into effect because the office of management and budget needed to complete its paperwork reduction act review. I Know I already is not lost by any of us The United States Senate however is set to vote as early as next week on whether to reject the FCC repeal of the net neutrality Rules even if it passes the Senate, which is gonna be tight It's probably not gonna pass the house even if past the house probably get vetoed But those open internet guidelines of 2015 Deadline June 11th on June 11th says Ajit Pai We will have a framework in place that encourages innovation and investment in our nation's network So that all Americans no matter where they live can have access to better cheaper and faster internet access and the jobs Opportunities and platform for free expression that it provides so starting June 11th Justin Oh speeds is gonna start going up according to Ajit Pai well On average, they probably will still go up, right? Who knows exactly how much that will have to do with also starting June 11th The repeal of these net neutrality guidelines will cause cause large reasons of the country to get warmer and warmer for months Wow, are you just looking for emails today? I don't know Yeah, oh you're talking about summer. Okay, never yet. No, no, I wasn't yeah, you're right I shouldn't have gone with warmer because that tips off climate change I just mean like it's summer. The sun's gonna be out. There we go summer time in the livings easy Look, these are obviously controversial decisions We won't know exactly how they affect anything until we see what happens before what what happens going through here But this is something where I believe you should be holding these companies feed to the fire if if The guidelines that were there before we're preventing The unleashed power of our American telcos and internet providers then Congratulations wild stallions you can run free on June 11th We look forward to the vast bounty of innovation.  But yeah within a year or two. We should be able to see effects Okay, we'll be watching the US FAA approved 10 of 149 proposals for commercial drone projects Among the projects are one for medical deliveries by zipline which has operated in Rwanda for years a mosquito control plan in Florida a partnership with the Choctaw Nation in, Oklahoma and CNN the food delivery or sorry food delivery in North Carolina proposals for Sorry from Amazon and DJI were not accepted Data from those projects will form the basis of a regulatory framework for future commercial uses Yeah, it's very tempting to person to anthropomorphize the FAA here and say oh is the FAA thumb in their nose at Jeff Bezos Not giving Amazon and also I saw a lot of people connecting the dots in North Carolina I don't think it's the food delivery project I think there's a separate North Carolina project for mapping might be the same project that involves Apple Apple getting getting in on that It's not it wasn't Apple's proposal, but they're cooperating with it So you know the headlines are reading Apple gets approved and Amazon doesn't it's not exactly what's going on Except for the Amazon doesn't I mean their their proposal did not get approved. It doesn't mean they'll never get approved It means they're not one of the first 10 To test the waters so the FAA can collect data This is a great story for daily tech news show listeners because folks who have been listening to this program for long enough Understand the idiosyncratic and oftentimes Incomplete way that the FAA has handled the you know regulatory process of drones. So this is I very much Echo your opinion that let's not look.  Yeah, it's not what's going on it's not that and and and I Would not read much into this beyond the fact the positive step that at least there are licensing for some of these drone projects and and That's been a huge Impediment to I think the increased reasonable use of these devices. Yeah, the criticism of the FAA here is that they move too slow Not that they're being Unwise that they're being over cautious and I'll be honest when you're talking about aviation I think we all prefer them to err on the side of caution. It's just how far 10 out of 149 You could make it argument. Well, that's a really small amount, but again being over cautious. They're like, let's let's pick some very representative projects. We've got FedEx working on Airport security with the Memphis County Airport Authority for instance, that's gonna put drones near airplanes. Let's not do too many of those Let's do one of those see how that goes monitor that. I think that's a smart approach May you should they have done 20 or 30 of these? Yeah, maybe but there is a line and they said at a time And also the FAA an organization that obviously deals with very very very important high-stakes businesses There could be an argument to say that maybe another Branch of the FAA to deal specifically with this kind of more agile Burgeoning industry would be Something that could happen, but look we have what we have and at least 10 got approved Yeah, and and maybe a new branch comes out of the data they collect with these 10. Sure. Yeah a report from Disrupt Africa shows the agri-tech market in Africa grew 110% this past year more than 19 million dollars in investments were made in the sector 82 agri-tech startups were in operation across Africa by the start of 2018 52% of them launched within the past two years Kenya and Nigeria are tied as the top two Agricultural tech markets Ghana's in third. They're generally e-commerce like Selling buying and selling allowing farmers to to buy equipment stuff like that That makes up about a third of the startups then there's info-sharing and some FinTech one of the interesting financial tech Agricultural startups in Africa is livestock wealth which sells shares in cows in South Africa And they're calling it crowd farming That's amazing that's fantastic. So yes dairy farmers in the Midwest you can laugh but Livestock ownership is a big deal in some regions in some countries And and so this is this is akin to Bitcoin in a way like ooh, you mean I could I could actually own livestock That's kind of a status symbol. I Mean sure Not only is it something that you can hang on your you know Hang on your wall and and feel good about yourself But it's another way that farmers which you're you know, we're we are in uncertain times for for farming Not only abroad but also here in America and another way that if you can make extra money faster in in a fairly cyclical I Mean literally cyclical business Market like farmers are in then that's great I mean, I'm sure that there are plenty of farmers that might be behind on a bill or two that would like to you know Virtually, you know sell a share of their cow that they would then pay back, you know, they pay dividends on later That'd be great. Yeah, if I have it right and I may not Livestock wealth actually either operates or works with ranches to say, okay, these are the cows that we will we will sell shares of And then they're kind of the middleman on that and they fund the ranches And collect the money from the investors and then pay it back out when when when the cows are turned into beef like that's the That's the deal, right? They're their tagline on their website is shares are complicated cows are easy I Can't get over how brilliant this is this is I mean it sounds funny at first but People are eating a lot of meat They certainly are Certainly are Tom and now you can own a share of it They're saying they're saying they get about 12.4% return on investment I mean that's It's reliable investment. I don't know think like a financial scandal with the cows would be called Like insider milking or yeah, yeah, I think that's I think that's good. I'm trying to think of it, you know Ponzi scheme pun, but I just can't Old McDonald was a rain today on charges of Other corruption We got it. We got it finally Researcher Amanda D. Hanford at Pennsylvania State University has created a device that can route sound waves around an object making it invisible to techniques like sonar Hanford Entertainment created a Metamaterial whose unit cell is smaller than the acoustic wavelengths used to deflect it The metamaterial could deflect sound waves underwater, which is very difficult Yeah, they've been able to do a version of this through air, but never through water till now So of course everybody's calling it an invisibility cloak and then everybody reads the story is like boots sound.  I'm shocked that we're hearing about it to be right. Yeah, like I'm sure someone at the DOD has contacted Professor Hanford and said hey Maybe come work for us now or this is something that has been done, right? Yeah, no, but this is a more commercial application of it. Either one. This is an academic application. There's no commercial application My commercial I just meant non-government, but yeah, absolutely. I think it's it's Fascinating I would love to know more of exactly how this works plus if you want to hide from bats Dressing this metamaterial old McDonald on the lam from the other corruption charges has now hid amongst the bats He's got his sonar invisibility cloak. Yeah, this is this is pretty great stuff And it's and it's just a metal It's a metamaterial metal so so again they make the the unit Molecules so small that the sound waves just I mean for lack of a better explanation to slip by it That's fascinating me. All right the content of 3519 Facebook ads said to have been financed by Russia's internet research agency were released by Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee on Thursday the ads dated from between 2015 and 2017 and seem designed to attract people from all sides of emotional issues I think this is the most important part of this release It wasn't pointing a finger. It was showing like hey, were you for gun control or against gun control? Guess what? It doesn't matter you got targeted by these ads immigration gay rights The list goes on files published Thursday show the text of each ad the number of impressions and the number of clicks Representative Adam Schiff who was instrumental in getting them released said quote the only way we can begin to inoculate ourselves against a future attack Is to see first hand the types of messages themes and imagery the Russians used to divide us Okay, all right um So where do we start I Mean what I know where we want to end because we've got a great wired story about like self-policing your use of tech Yeah, so where we start I think is Just short, you know, we start with if you've already listened to p3x And you know the political angle on this and the finger pointing What can we bipartisan wise pull out of this as tech users to say well Hold on maybe it wasn't meant to achieve a result other than to make us angry Is that fair to say or not? I think This very clearly to me and and these are this is where all this information has been leading and and now we see the ads themselves This these ads were designed to do nothing more than try to rev as high and and engage ability That they could right they were using Facebook's algorithm to see how far they could spread these messages and I even think that there is Beyond the war the the mental war games of trying to divide a populace by playing on their political fears There's also an element of this that I think that we haven't really thought about which is Maybe they just found that the things that engage the most are Politics and this is about trying to spread messages However, they can and trying to gather data as You know as much as they can and the method by which they did this was just that Politics stuff gets spread further faster by way of playing with with Facebook's rules of Engaging liking commenting how long they're staying on and this is what generates all that churn Again, I think that this was for political games, you know to divide us but the idea of how they did it is Exactly how Media has done it. It's exactly how politicians themselves do it and for Adam Schiff To say, you know, the only way that we can begin to inoculate ourselves against the future attack is to see the first-hand types of messages themes and imagery that The Russians used to divide us then I'm gonna take that to mean That he himself or his party or the opposition party will now cease and assist with writing misleading fundraising emails Misleading Facebook posts that are there to generate the exact same engagement that the Russians used because Like when when fundraising go look at what fundraising emails if you don't subscribe to fundraising things They are what they this is what the Russians were doing This is this is where we are at in terms of politics So, you know, if we want to point at them and say the Russians didn't invent incendiary a Content to you derive political action. They learned it from watching us I really quickly want to go back to you the point you made that I think is very important Which is we don't know that they wanted to sway an election We don't know that they even wanted to make people angry and divided they may have been happy about that. I Always hear that phrase data is the new oil Why did Cambridge Analytica break the terms of service to steal data from professor Cogan because they wanted the data? What does every AI? Projects say they need more of to make machine learning work better data What is movie past banking on to eventually turn the tide of their negative cash flow data? Yeah, maybe all this is about is like do stuff that gets people to click as much as possible because we want that data You have the more things we can do 100% and and I I have not really seen that talked about In in in a lot of places, but it seems like it makes sense to me Folks if you want to get all the tech headlines each day in about five minutes subscribe to Daily Tech headlines on the Amazon echo Google Home and as a podcast all in anchor or at Daily Tech headlines dot com Now one positive aspect of shifts message was hey if you know this stuff is out there And you see examples of it when now when you see another version of it if it slips past the net You may be less likely to fall for it because you know what to look for And there's a really good article on Wired today that talks about that a lot of tech companies attention is now focused on helping you control yourself in What you consume online how long you spend on your devices? Facebook is doing things like branding political ads trying to restrict who can buy the political ads They're doing all kinds of things Google flat-out stopped running ads during Ireland's abortion referendum Political ads anyway, and at Google I owe this week We talked about the fact that Google has all these digital well-being initiatives things like the dashboard that helps you become aware of your usage Robin Gonzalez at Wired looked at what research we've actually done on so-called digital well-being and what it says I want to run through three examples that he cites Justin. Let's start with the first one How you act is important not just the amount of time and dashboards great Knowing how much time you spend is probably gonna help you reduce it because you may spend more time than you think In fact, some studies have showed just that but Facebook internal research suggests that people who spend time Passively consuming information feel worse afterward whereas people who engage with others Experience the opposite feeling they felt better. Yeah All right So I would go through all three of these what's your reaction to that one which is the study shows Hey, if you're it's not guaranteed, but if you're online talking to people and having interactions Yeah, you probably end up saying yeah, no that was fun I feel good after that if you're just reading things you probably end up saying my life sucks or I'm angry Yeah, it makes sense to me I mean social interactions a very important part although you would make the argument that Sometimes something like a Twitter can combine both of those things to the worst possible effect, right? There's their anecdotally at least it seems like people are but that's the key here That's I actually jumped up and down there for a second. Yeah is this is a study like we have a lot of anecdotes We have no end of anecdotes people saying well, you know what they need to do Yeah, you don't this is this is one point of data granted We need a lot more and that's kind of the end point of all this is we need a lot more research on the effects This stuff is having well, but it's not as simple as we'll just put the phone down, right? No, there's also this Google can turn your apps gray To help you wind down so they're less interesting like oh, it's a gray Apple I don't care anymore because it's gray. It looks like a 50s movie and I'm getting sleepy a Handful of studies do suggest that warm tones interfere less with your sleep than cool ones That's why iOS actually does the orange glow at night, but there's similar research lacking on grayscale We don't know if grayscale does anything Yeah, this is one of those things that I I can't even kind of guess it makes sense to me Seems legit All right, let's finish up with the last one notifications, right? Everybody's like oh notifications too many notifications notification overload You got a match my notifications. Give me more control over notifications. I Am guilty of being the guy who says we'll just turn them off Don't turn on notifications and they won't bug you but it turns out that is just as bad computer scientist Louise Rello of Carnegie Mellon's Human Computer Interaction Institute found that disabling notifications Left some test subjects feeling less stressed and more productive during work hours But more anxious in their off-time so during work the notifications bugged them and took them out of their zone But in their off-time they felt like they were missing out. They're like, I don't know what's going on in the world I got no notifications. Oh my gosh, the stuff happened and I didn't see it the American Psychology Association's Conference of Technology Mind and Society found that test subjects who received their notifications in batches three times a day Reported they felt significantly happier more focused and less stressed than those who received notifications as usual or not at all So in other words the magic Balance point here was to get your notifications in bundles at regular intervals. That is fascinating All right. Can we can we do larger points on? Yeah? Yeah? Yeah? Let's finish up with some larger points here. All right larger points number one I think that this is very much an outgrowth in terms of like Google's interest in it Here in Silicon Valley, there are plenty of you know digital detox and summer camps and Daybreaker dances wherein cutting yourself off from technology is looked at as something that is Positive that you are like returning to some, you know pre-internet world where you were happier All these things are to me Examples of how we are evolving past the idea that we have this ability and this is to me has always been typified by Instagram the way that we have always thought people who've grown up with the internet and Knew what it was before and knew what it was as it was being built have been Fascinated by the lengths to which the internet can work for us. Oh my god Photos used to be precious now photos can be infinite I want to save every photo I ever take there's an Instagram Look it I'm gonna be so excited to go back and see my first Instagram photo People who grow up with these tools say ah geez no no no no I want to keep the best 10 photos on my Instagram and Delete everything because the permanence is not fascinating to me And so that's where I see like these notifications Before it's like oh wait somebody wants somebody can talk to me right now as soon as I post something Somebody can say something back. I'm so excited for it But I wonder whether or not the idea of these like three times a day mail drops are Are going to be preferable to people as as we get more of these tools But that that's the difference to me is I love the idea of saying well That's an interesting finding in a study. It seems like three bundles is the best Let's do some more study to kind of figure out why that is or if there's some other cause of that Etc that sounds promising to me versus hey, we turn your app gray because we think that might help you relax Yeah, yeah, no I I agree with that. I think that there's a lot of Understanding and honesty to be to be frank that we have to be not only with people who take these studies but ourselves in terms of understanding how we interact with this stuff beyond the fact that like I think there's There's a fear that if I let it go it'll go away and And that is to me a symptom of a populace that knew a world before it and even if it's illogical Fears that it'll go away It'll just like you know Oh, well then I won't be into all these things that I'm into. I'm losing these tendrils into these communities I remember relatives when I was very young Kind of saying well, you guys depend too much on electricity, right? How crazy is that? Yeah Hey, thanks to everybody who participates in our subreddit you can submit stories and vote on them a daily tech news show dot Reddit comm and facebook comm slash group slash daily tech news show a couple of mail bags to get to Frons our patron in the Philippines says hey DTS crew yesterday. You wondered how Walmart buying flipkart might benefit from it Here's my perspective as a JavaScript developer ever since the release of progressive web apps Flipkart has been the poster child for it now Walmart on the other hand has been an avid user of JavaScript Migrating their old back-end application to a JavaScript one if you think about it Those two companies can really learn a lot from each other flipkart learning the back-end side and Walmart the front-end and Progressive web app side in my opinion. It's less of a business decision and more of an aqua hire But that's just me Salamat Frans for sending that in and then Dave from two damn sunny not enough rainy Los Angeles says hello DTS team wanted to bring up another potential target for valves steam link apps set top boxes for a lot of people myself included our Best screen is not necessarily connected to our desktop computer and hauling it into the living room Just play video games is more than a little impractical But if I could launch the steam link app on my fire TV and connect a couple of Bluetooth controllers I can play fortnight on my home theater setup without having to plant a dedicated desktop in my living room I can even attach a fire TV stick to a projector and have a game night in the backyard for me This is a much more exciting prospect than squeezing a desktop game onto a five to six inch screen with touch controls Nice. Yeah, I think a lot of people have been writing writing up that aspect of this today Like hey, you know Apple TV could become a game machine for real with with thanks to Val. That's interesting And thanks to just Robert young for joining us man. Hmm. Well, thank you Tom for having me on the show I always a pleasure But if you would like to hear more on the political front, you can always go to my free political newsletter Oh, no, you thinking man, and you're gonna give me some crazy URL. No, I'm not free political newsletter Dot-com that's where you got to go you sign up for it. It's free It's a political newsletter and it comes to your inbox at a new or sorry midnight eastern time Around thereabouts Five days a week. So go ahead and check it out a lot of stuff happening It's a quick way to stay on top of it mostly links a little hot takery and some gifts Mostly from the Chappelle show free political newsletter dot com You know Justin is the master of short URLs He made one for me because I'm trying to fund a sequel to my novel pilot X on ink shares And so you just got to go to Tom's new book dot com. Thanks to Justin just that easy, right? Yeah, new book, and I use the grass thick right now a Trigor is your new book eventually you're gonna have another new book. You're just gonna switch that URL It's always got to be Tom's new book Whatever Tom's new book is you will always be able to either buy it or Support it right there Tom's new book dot com. All right, folks. Thanks for supporting us on patreon patreon.com slash DTNS We've got brand new hats in the store as well as hoodies and shirts and all kinds of stuff a daily tech news show Dot com slash store stop what you're doing pull the side of the road and buy a hat right now or not I mean you might have somewhere to go and that's cool. I'm okay with that Our email address is feedback at daily tech news show calm We're live Monday through Friday 4 30 p.m. Eastern 20 30 UTC to find out more at daily tech news show comm slash live Back tomorrow with Sarah Lane Aaron Carson and Len Peralta. Talk to you then This show is part of the frog pants network get more at frog pants dot com I'm in club. Hope you have enjoyed this bro And yes sharp-eyed video viewers noticed I'm on a different camera right now some reason my main camera just stopped showing up So I'll probably be on this one tomorrow too because I don't really have a lot of time before I leave time to plug them You didn't plug the meetups. Oh, yeah, I did that the last two days. So I gave it a rest and I'll do it again tomorrow Yeah, if you're gonna be in Sydney Huh, why are you gonna give it a rest people need to know the one to plug the book? Like I'm ball. It's your show baby. Yeah, you got to put a limit on it somewhere or people just get there like I can't Hear I can't hear it anymore But yeah, Sydney May 15th at 6 p.m. And Hart's pub Melbourne Tuesday May 22nd 6 p.m. At Bart, Veronica It's also pinned at the top of my Twitter Sydney and Melbourne Melbourne Melbourne Melbourne Australia Melbourne speech Melbourne So that's not a meetup this is a meetup ah Oh good, you know it the R. Kelly thing is interesting Specifically in the idea that they have just removed it from algorithmic and curated Surge right they didn't pull his music, right?  I Wonder whether or not we will begin to see similar Stuff for let's say Netflix, right? You know, there are hmm. There are many directors and you're like house of cards Comes to mind particularly, right? Well, I mean that would be a specific Example but also, you know, well, what about you'll Cosby film, right? Polanski, I don't know if he has anything on that fancy. Yeah, sure exactly like I don't know of Chinatown's on Netflix, but Would he get?  And it's an interesting approach because it says look if you are the kind of person who has no problem with this You will probably go looking for it It'll be like what Roman Polanski movies are there and you'll search and it'll come up in search So we're not gonna remove it But if you're the kind of person who does have a problem and we shove it in your face with a with a suggestion Then you're gonna get angry So it's it's a little bit amoral, right to be like really we just don't want to upset people. I mean Silicon Valley gets a lot of crap because they are simultaneously Trying to write the new morality for a digital age whilst at the same time Trying to not upset their users because they very much depend on interaction and growth and This is I think one of many examples to come of of where Where is the moral compass of? blank platform how my backpack Yes, is this moral compass in tops backpack the answer will surprise you Will Bob May will What are we calling this Roger make money until the cows come home Like it There's also utter corruption, but yeah, that's good, too By the way take a wild guess as to How much it costs to get into one of these daybreaker events?  Yeah UDD ER a cow letter not yeah Oh How much is good to get into it? What is a daybreaker event again? Is that when you put your life on hold? Leave yourself on at the door kind of thing Yes, it is a party a booze free and I think I don't know if it's tech free. It might it's definitely booze free Okay But I think it is encouraged that you are connecting with people So I don't know if it's a long does it last is it like a week or a weekend It's a morning. That's the idea. They're charging at least 500 bucks Well, geez, I'd tell you what don't give many ideas Roger That it is it is yoga or a workout at nine and then a two-hour booze free Dance party in the morning morning. Okay, sounds like preschool and you start your day with Intention is what your daughter. No, that's totally what my daughter does. This is preschool All right, so how much Let's go yoga class right there. You're talking 90 bucks. So to make it seem like a value. I'd say 199 I'll tell you what man, and now we're just doing an ad for 40 bucks at the door 40 Yoga class cost you more than that Well, because there it's not a real yoga. It's just a session. It's a yoga session and there's no booze So that I think that's the other part. I was forgetting. Yeah, wait a minute. Do they do the Silicon Valley? So this thing happens every day then It's fairly often But they run in many Many cities up to and including according to their website coming up Daybreaker parties in Austin, Chicago, Los Angeles, Paris, Washington, DC and Boulder So I am out of the loop on daybreaker parties. I never get invited to the daybreaker parties This 40 dollars Yeah more than I would pay Sure It's less than I thought they'd be soaking Silicon Valley, but then when you tell me like oh, they're in Austin It's like, okay. So this is a kind of a special event morning Pricing it at brunch for two super hip Mindfulness intentionality New fitness. Yeah You're baked. You're baked cage-free eggs and avocado toast for two cost 40 dollars. Yes Look how much more you get Yeah, and it changes your life Tom. I mean, right You start your day with intention Intensity But it doesn't happen every day in city No, it does not so for example, there was one here last in San Francisco on the fourth May 4th The next one will be on the 19th So probably twice a month in your city like I'm saying much mindfulness Will that make happen?  Do they do they have like a Like a match not matchmaking but they make sure you're like with a crowd of people your Coif or is it just whatever I would have used that that the whole group is the group that you're cool with right that you are meeting Oh, I see I see. Yeah, I think that's that's the that's the idea The new the one on May 19th here in San Francisco is twerk de Soleil That means Right because it's a dance party I forgot keep forgetting that the dance party the morning dance party in Los Angeles guys I don't want to go on May 17th. When does it start? It's at 6 30 Too early all the no, no, no, I'm sorry yoga begins at 5 30. Oh gosh Dance party begins at 6 30. This is for someone yoga begins at 5 30. I'm gonna have to get up at 4 30 or maybe even 4 To go like shower to take the dogs out drive wherever that is Also this theme is called denim days They say we're going head to toe denim Hello, Texas tuxedo Happy I thought it was a Canadian tuxedo. It's a Texas tuxedo now be racist While the flowers are doing their bloom thing and the Sun is doing its sun thing we'll be doing our dance thing Dressed in every denim item of imaginable. Oh, yes, that's right You've just been invited to a denim part a On Thursday May 17th meet up with us at the west side of town location coming soon Our fave Parisian DJ fDVM will spin the tunes while we dance at sunrise to celebrate spring as a man fDVM As a great morning for everyone so I can't sound a little pagan to me celebrate I think it's supposed to I think that's that's what makes it makes it edgy. Oh, that's that that's that rough rusted edge Listen, man. I I shouldn't laugh at somebody else's fun. If this sounds awesome to you.  Um, that is my fun I've known plenty of people that are into this kind of stuff. I think it's Super rad and and and to be totally honest if you are somebody that doesn't drink or Has made it a choice to not drink for whatever reason. That's me You are looking for a big fun connection With other people in a like-minded sense, then I think these are fantastic. I mean so often people You know find it find sobriety isolating and this is I think a great opportunity to flower Your garden I have to say Tom knows me very well I am I'm I'm pretty much a tea toller when it comes to every after-hour social event Yeah, and I I don't feel it at all Isolating the fact I find it kind of interesting because people talk to me in a way they normally wouldn't because The alcohol loosens their inhibitions to that stopped me from listening all the gossip in the office I was sober for about two years and in that two years hanging out with my friends. I found a couple things number one The first 30 minutes of hanging out with your friends when you're sober and they're drunk is like any other time that you're hanging out with them The next hour is oftentimes some of the funniest or most interesting the Every hour past that Becomes increasingly less tolerable and it and it led to me Leaving after that hour and a half A very very often well part of it is I never really hung out with a lot of people who just kind of drank As an activity like they would drink As a side to like oh i'm at someone's birthday party or something but it wasn't like You know, well, let's get shit-faced or let's let's drink until we can't stand kind of thing Sure So part of it is probably because my experience and might like the way I kind of developed alcohol wasn't a big deal like in in it, so Whenever I saw it activities to do It wasn't it wasn't like a list of it was a it wasn't a line item So if it's something like hey, you want to go to a concert? Yeah, totally down with it Not gonna drink because I want to listen to the rest of the music and You can listen to the music and drink trust me. I did that once I did it Iggy Iggy I've done it more than once Iggy is area. Don't Iggy pop pop. Yeah Um, I did it last night I I did not it's funny. I missed out in the middle of the part because I was doubled over because Yeah, exactly. So drinking for me has a personal situation. Yeah, I I have more of a physiological Uh aversion to I think that's the biggest reason why you don't drink is because it makes you sick I wouldn't drink either. Well, it's because I go through the entire stage of drunkenness. Yeah. Yeah, I've seen it 45 minutes including the hangover. He's not kidding. It's crazy. Like ah, I I've I've seen Roger. I don't mean to to out you here, but I think we've talked about this before I've seen Roger doubled over sick And within an hour he's fine Like Oh, yeah, I'm literally going through the because and I've seen you had a headache like near the end and then you were fine Like I have a headache. I have I have my hangover. Don't speak so loudly to my ear Yeah, he ate brunch right in front of me. It was weird. This guy a maniac I have the cheapest date you'll ever find Oh Man, all right. Did anything anything else? Well, sarah will be back tomorrow um, and tom this is his last, uh Tomorrow will be his last day with us before he goes on his journey to the other side of the planet So if you want to see tom for this week, you need to you need to swing by tomorrow Uh, we'll also have erin karson and len perlton Bye everybody. All right. Bye


And so these questions fall away, because they don't have answers anyway. You can bang your hair on the wall for years and you will not get that answer. Because there isn't an answer for that. That's the whole beauty and lila of this existence, that the answers are not there, that the questions fall away. Namaskar. Thank you for the chance to speak with you today. I was very fortunate to have found your teachings early in my Advaita Vedanta journey. I feel like you saved me from taking a very long path that wasn't leading me where I wanted to go. I've been trying to follow the practice of surrender that you teach by bending and focusing inside and asking myself what would my soul say and waiting for an answer. I haven't heard it, but I wait a time of silence and I imagine what my soul would say and I try to follow it. In that time, in my work as a doctor and in my life as a father, there are times when I feel like I'm more present, I'm more here with the people in the deeper and more meaningful way than before. So I feel like I've been deepening in that, but I don't have that physical impulse that I've heard you describe. The closest thing that I've experienced, I guess I'd call it like twinges from my conscience, just a feeling of wrongness or maybe rightness, more wrongness in response to the questions that I'm asking. And I was hoping you could help me understand the difference between listening to the soul and listening to my conscience. And I'd be grateful for any guidance you have for me. Firstly, what is important to understand is that this entire exercise just makes you much more aware, present and conscious of every action you're taking or at least the larger, more let's say valuable actions or what you consider to be the valuable actions, which in and of itself is very different from stepping back from everything and observing everything as the neo-Advaitans bring because they forget to bring the element of surrender, which is a very, very crucial part of Advaita. Advaitas' Fundaments are based on surrender and that part has been nicely forgotten because it's the uncomfortable part and the cherry picking has resulted in especially the western approach to Advaita, which is therefore called neo-Advaita, a movement and a body of knowledge which is focused on detachment without the surrender. So, yes, you are very fortunate that you don't have to take that route which would lead to you distancing yourself from and detaching from the material reality of your existence, that especially since you're a doctor, if you're a medical doctor, is not a very advisable thing for your patients at least. The sadhana that is spoken about here, when you start this process, your thinking will start to question where is this answer coming from? Is it the conscience speaking and if it is the conscience then of course it is a result of your socialization so it cannot be trusted. If it's not the conscience then is it the ego? That's the other question that will arise and if it's not either of the two then what is it? It's the third question that would arise. And so you can spend a lot of time in conceptual gymnastics. What is important to see here is that the very fact that you're asking that question to your source, to your divinity within or to the source of truth within is in and of itself an exercise in increasing awareness and consciousness. It's a widening of the consciousness where you're not just focused on conceptual results of rational processes but you are looking, you're waiting for that whiff for that scent of the divine or for that impulse of soul. It is better to wait for that impulse and not have it than not to wait for it at all. It is sadhanasi. In earlier times you had to walk through jungles for weeks on end to reach a Guru at all in the first place and then when you reach the Guru the Guru said okay now stand on one foot. Then you have to stand on one foot for 10 years before you even received any kind of anything. You have to do seva of the Guru, you have to cut wood and burn hundreds of logs before you even got a word from them. So when you have received this and if it resonates then hold on to it tight because it will take you to a state which may not even be what you think it will be but it will certainly be a better place to be than where you are before you start out and I think you're smart enough to understand that otherwise it won't even resonate. So the disappointments along the way generally come when the surrender is not sweet enough. It's about bending down, it's about literally in fact in the immersives we show these physical kriyas because they connect you with that sense of the divine within. I mean you are from a Judeo-Christian background probably raised as either Protestant or Catholic or raised in an atmosphere of that. I know that nobody really is that religious anymore especially if they're sitting in this satsang but still those are the influences of the culture in which you live. They're strong, powerful, ancient or old at least if not ancient influences and they have put somewhere in you the fear of actually connecting with source because that's what religion has done, it has removed the divine and placed it outside. You have to put it back in and keep on piercing, piercing and the approach has to be surrender. Surrender is enough even if you don't hear anything for 10 years. Most of the students who have taken up this sadhana very seriously and really do seva and are really also real deep seekers. They start at one point to feel that center, it comes and it's even felt as a sort of an impulse. It's a deep knowing of what is the action to take. It's all about the physical material action. This is not about conceptual ideas of detachment or even a conceptual idea of surrender. The surrender is actually material, it's physical. You bend down a lot. You offer up the materiality. You offer up the emotions when life is too tough and when the emotions well up and there is suffering you offer it into that fire within. Then it burns brighter and it warms you.  Somewhere there is a core to you, whether it's called soul or source or whether it's made up of proteins from your genes whatever it is it doesn't matter. You'll never find out in a conceptual way what it is. No one has ever found out what it is and no one will because that is a conceptual exercise. What happens is that your consciousness expands and it expands beyond the conceptual where these conceptual questions actually fall away because the consciousness is now in different states. It's not anymore just conceptual, it's transformative. It's in a bliss state, in a unity consciousness state. It moves up and down, it expands and so these questions fall away because they don't have answers anyway. You can bang your hair on the wall for years and you will not get that answer because there isn't an answer for that. That's the whole beauty and lila of this existence that the answers are not there, that the questions fall away. Actually surrender mode is what it's all about and just being grateful to be alive, being here and not grateful in a religious sort of sense but grateful in a sense of presence, in a sense of awareness of self. That's the difference. So that's how you proceed through this life and you do trias you'll hear of in the satsangs. You do them and you expand your consciousness like that. The suffering also reduces because the way you look at that suffering changes obviously but without detachment rather you're more just present and joyous and in touch with source and self and yes you remind yourself of this every day. It's not something that's just going to drop from the sky, no. That socialization has taken so many years, you know. How is it going to just go away in one day? And the life divine is not after you pass away, it is here and now. You know that already, you have that experience.  Now it is about being with that experience, being one with it and also allowing yourself to have that experience, allowing it. Thank you.


especially fortunate today to have with us Andy Winer, a longtime, very, very deeply appreciated friend, lawyer dispute resolution professional former chief of staff for Senator Brian Schatz, who as luck would have it was my daughter's high school classmate, and now the consultant to the governor and the point person on the Hawaii Victims Compensation Fund for the Maui Fire Victims and Claims and the community. Hey, I'm Tracy Wilkin, the longtime director of the Mediation Center of the Pacific and both the head and the heart of the mediation community here in Hawaii in so many ways that have served so many people and continue to. Tracy, Andy, thanks so very much for joining us. Hey, Andy, let's start with a hard question. Is it possible for you to give us a sense of what the core values of the Victims Compensation Fund project and work are? Yes, I think that's definitely possible, Chuck, and thanks for having me here today and for letting us talk about this important subject. The beginning of the Victims Compensation Fund really started on the day or two after the fire. The governor and I began having conversations about some of the issues that he was concerned about, both short and long term. And what became clear to me at least was that what he wanted to focus on was putting people first, that there were gonna be many, many things that we were gonna have to deal with as a state and as a community in dealing with the tragedy of Maui. But he wanted to make sure that front and center in all of that were the people, the victims that had suffered and had lost loved ones. And he wanted to try to find a way to address their situation first in a meaningful way. That is to some degree in stark contrast to some of the other fires that we've seen on the West Coast in particular where victims were largely ignored for large periods of time. So that was sort of the beginning sort of data point. But I think over and above that is that not only from the governor, but from all of the individuals that we've dealt with over the last few weeks and months has been a desire to make sure that we design a process that reflects the best of Hawaii, that really focuses on the values that we have as a state and one that is seeking to come up with a way to recognize the responsibility of the state. And when I say that, it's not meant to be who was at fault or who was liable, but as a state and as a community that we're gonna step up and take care of people that are suffering. And so as we proceeded with attempting to design a process to compensate those victims, sort of those two points, I think have been a couple of the things that have resonated not only with me, but I think with all of the people that have been involved in trying to design a program that can actually help bring justice and to restore the way that the community has dealt with these victims and how it is that as a state, we're gonna move forward. So those are the main philosophical course that we have, that this is gonna be a program that may not look familiar to people that don't live in Hawaii, but I would hope at the end of it, people from Hawaii look at it and they say, yes, we're proud of that. And this is how, as a state, we're gonna step forward and actually work to address what's happened as a result of the fires in Maui. And you raised a really, really important insight that's unique here. How does the fact that this is unlike New York City and the California wildfires and the British Victoria oil spills, this is a single community with a unique cultural history, including as the former capital of the monarchy and a very, very strong Hawaiian component culturally, as well as probably the most diverse population of any of the disaster areas in the US history. How do those things impact how you look at and deal with this? You know, I think that we share a common mentor, Justice Bert Kobayashi, was one of the founders of Alternative Dispute Resolution in Hawaii and I was fortunate enough to be what I consider a student of his when I was first starting a career in Alternative Dispute Resolution. And Justice Kobayashi was always an individual that wanted to make sure that the processes that we're adopting in Hawaii were actually going to fit the culture of the state. He believed very much that Alternative Dispute Resolution fit in this state better than probably any place else in the country. And so when we looked at the set of issues that came out of the terrible fires in Maui, I kept hearing that voice in the back of my head that you need to come up with solutions that are going to be appropriate for the community where this happened. And that those need to be kept in mind as you're coming up with processes. And so I think every single time I think that I've sort of hit a wall where I didn't think we were going to be able to make progress. Hearing that voice in the back of my head, but also hearing Governor Green saying, we've got to put people first when you combine those two things. It's an awesome responsibility to try to make sure that we're representing what Hawaii wants to be and should be. And I've tried to do that. And I know that the team that's working with the governor and frankly, the other parties that have been talking about it, I think that we've approached this in the spirit of a lo-ha. I think that there has been a great deal of effort made to be sensitive to the needs of the community and to come up with a set of solutions that are, as I said earlier, maybe a little bit odd to people that are not from Hawaii, but I think when we go through and explain them, it has very much a core of Hawaii and a very much a sense of the place where these fires took place. And so, we're still working on some of the details, but I would say that overall, when we've had conversations with others about what we're trying to do and conversations with people from Maui in particular, I think that we're on the right track. That's fantastic. And I want to get to the questions of what people need to know, but real quick before doing that, just Tracy has the mind and heart of dispute resolution, collaborative problem solving, ho-oponopono in Hawaii. What do you see as the unique factors here that really deserve priority and to be part of the cultural values and principles that embed this work going forward? Well, as Andy mentioned already, we have Lahaina, which is a unique community and a very strong community in itself. We've seen how they have come together and everybody throughout the state has come together to support them, but as the community themselves, they want to be empowered to help each other, to rebuild, they want a voice. And so dispute resolution processes give people that opportunity. And they have specific needs and desires and they've been through a lot of trauma. So creating dispute resolution processes that enable them to address their priorities, to work through these issues at a pace comfortable for them and to make sure that their needs that are important to them, not us outsiders see them are addressed to these processes. So I'm happy to see that we're looking at how to design a variety of dispute resolution processes because there'll be different issues that will and can be addressed through a variety of processes, such as the one that's being rolled out right now by Andy and the governor. And that's really important to understand that these are not just people, these are human stories. I was in line at the way to shoot a story yesterday and gentlemen next to me was from Lahaina. He had eight minutes to make it out and he made it out only because he knew all the back rows through the sugar cane fields and everything. The stories need to be respected. They need to be understood. They need to be honored because the stories are the people that makes Hawaii unique. So Andy, what two people involved in affected by the fires and the fire claims, what do they really need to know and understand most? So I think that there's a few things, Chuck and I preface all of this by saying that on November 8th, the governor did announce that we were gonna move forward with a recovery fund and that we were working on fleshing out the details and that is actually still occurring. And so as I talked to you today, there was not some immediate process that any victim or victim's family needs to engage in now. But I think that what we've tried to do is to give families a sense as to where things are going and when they're going and sort of what we're looking at as we move forward. Our hope is that sometime in early to mid December the governor will have additional details on the recovery fund as we finalize some of those discussions with the various parties that are gonna be contributing to the fund. Let me go through maybe a couple of the main points that I think hopefully reflect what I talked about earlier that we're trying to devise a program that fits not only the situation as far as this fire goes but also fits the culture of Hawaii and tries to reflect that in a way that allows victims and their families to have a certain amount of control over what they may wanna do moving forward. So first and foremost, the fund once it is up and operational will be completely voluntary, meaning that if you look at what it is that the state is offering together with the other parties that are gonna be participating in that fund that there's no mandatory requirement for a victim or a victim's family to agree to that process. And there may be very good reasons why individuals look at what is being put forward and they may decide that's not best for us, that they believe that being able to go to court and having their day in court is the most appropriate thing for them. And as far as the state and the rest of the individuals that have been involved in designing this program are concerned, that's fine. We want to provide options and to allow families to decide what works best for them. So that's one of the core principles of what it is that we're looking at. That the second core principle was to make or to create a process and to make it work in a way that would be expeditious and would be easy. That we didn't wanna create something where all you were doing is essentially substituting an administrative process or a litigation process. So that what we want victims to be able to do and their families is to be able to easily access an application form, to be able to easily understand what it is that they need to do in order to access the fund, that they know the steps in order that they need to fulfill in order to receive compensation and that there's also some opportunity if they do not have counsel and want to get advice that there was a way to access counsel pro bono. So when you put those factors together, I think that what you'll see when the program is put together is an announcement where you'll see something like a website with some very straightforward forms and also the ability to talk to the funds administrator. We're working to designate somebody that would be not an individual that is a state employee but somebody that is outside the state. The fund itself is going to be independently run by an administrator and will receive administrative support probably from a financial institution from Hawaii. And the idea would basically be that funds would be deposited in that fund. There would be instructions given to the administrator that the administrator would have a fair amount of discretion as it relates to how do you go about reviewing the documents? How do you go about addressing and communicating with victims? Although we expect the process itself to be relatively straightforward. In other words, if you submit your forms, you get whatever approvals need to come from the court and then you receive your check and your compensation. And so hopefully if we do this the way we envision we see this process taking somewhere between six and nine months from the time that we open up the fund as opposed to the years and years of litigation that a victim or a victim's family may be looking at. And once again to go back to the beginning point, if that's what a victim's family wants to do then we are absolutely fine with that but we wanted to provide them with that option. The last thing that I'm gonna mention may seem a little bit odd but I think it's an important point to make regarding what we're also looking to do. Anybody that decides to apply to this fund will have the right to be able to, if they would like, present their story to the administrator. Chuck, you talked in terms of like everybody has a story and we know that people that especially those who lost loved ones have stories that they wanna tell about their family members and they should have that opportunity. In some cases that can occur in a trial but in this setting where we're giving them the option to do something that's more expeditious, what they will have an opportunity to do if they choose to do so is to present that story to the administrator who will be more than happy to listen to them and to also I think give them a chance to explain the loss that they've suffered as a result of this terrible event that happened in Maui. So those are the main things I think that people should understand but again, I wanna make sure that everybody goes away understanding there's no deadlines right now, there's nothing that they need to do but we wanna make sure that they're paying attention and we will do everything in our power to make sure that when the time comes that we are communicating with those individuals that might be interested in accessing the fund. So we know that there are, for example, besides litigation there are and Tracy's are leading expert on it, mediation arbitration that can be done privately and confidentially. How does this program differ from such private confidential resolution processes? This program will be different in the following way. What you would normally see in a litigation matter, let's say is that you would have a plaintiff and a defendant. You might have more plaintiffs and more defendants but you would have a legal action that is brought in court and a mediator might get involved to help try to facilitate a settlement between those parties and they'll negotiate back and forth. Tracy and Chuck, you're both terrific mediators and so over a period of time, you know that that process sometimes can be long and sometimes it can be short and you need to spend the time that's necessary to get something done. This is different in that we're not really negotiating per se with the potential claimants into the fund. We're setting up a fund, we're gonna set parameters on the fund, we're gonna set an amount of compensation that a victim or an individual might decide that they want to access and then they can decide if they wanna do that or not but we're not engaged in a negotiation or a mediation per se as a result of this process. It's gonna be creating an opportunity for them to access funds. It'll be fully transparent in terms of what it is that an individual needs to do to access those funds and what rights they might be giving up as a result of accessing those funds but it is not a negotiation like you would ordinarily see when you're looking at a mediation. So that's the difference here. So what do you see as the stages and the people in different stages that you're anticipating serving? That's a great question. You know, I think that one of the questions that we have had a lot from the legal community but the community at large is, well, wait a second, there's lots of other claims that are out there. You know, we're talking about wrongful death cases and injury cases where somebody has been hospitalized or stopped medical attention but there are obviously thousands of other individuals that suffered as a result of the fires. You have individuals that lost their homes, they lost their contents in their homes, they lost their businesses, their businesses were disrupted and all of those claims that are out there at some point in time will likely need to be addressed. And I think the hope of the state and Governor Green is that in some sort of like organized manner moving forward that those claims will have an opportunity to be resolved. Going back though to what I said at the beginning in terms of the philosophy behind what the governor is doing, he wanted to put people first. He thought in his view was the people that are paying the ultimate price for what happened in Maui are those families that lost loved ones in the fire and those who suffered physical injury. And so this fund is going to focus on those elements and those claims. But we all recognize that there will probably need to be other dispute resolution mechanisms that are gonna get created in order to take care of the other claims that I mentioned that are still gonna be out there. So this fund is not going to address those but I think what the hope is, and I think I'm seeing this as we are working together with the various parties that are part of the fund or who'll be impacted by the fund is that you're already starting to see that it's creating working relationships between those individuals. And I think hopefully setting the table for us to move forward as a community to look at those larger and probably thornier set of issues that are gonna be coming down the line that we're gonna have to address. And so those of you who are watching this who are mediators and arbitrators and facilitators we're gonna need all of you. We're gonna need to spend time with the community in Lahaina, but also up in Kula. We're gonna need to spend time trying to figure out how do we come up with solutions that fit the culture of this state? How do we figure out like what is an appropriate amount of compensation? And how do we do it in a way hopefully by the time that we're wrapping this up that we can come out of it thinking, this was hard, this was very difficult, but as a family, we sort of survived this. And so when we decided to call the overall program the one Ohana fund, it was very deliberate because I think that we viewed that what we were doing that this isn't just defendants throwing money into a settlement pot. This is sort of a family that is coming together and time of tragedy to work together to deal with the problems that have come out of the fires on mouth. So that's where I believe we're going in. And the two of you I assume will be among hopefully many that will be stepping up to work on the remainder. I'm hoping that we're a little bit of a beacon that we're hoping that it inspires people to some degree and it then sets the table for us to go ahead and look at what other processes are necessary to take care of these complicated claims. And that's a really, really important insight because we certainly know that there are some people and there are some attorneys that are gonna wanna go full on litigation and could be years, lots of expenses, a very adversarial process. It's expensive, it's lengthy, it's hard on people. And the time factor here, there may be many, many people who don't have the time for recovery that those processes take. How does your process and how you see it evolving differ from that and offer something that is more expeditious, more cost effective, more objectively, maybe neutrally assisted and managed? So if I understand what you're asking, Sharpe, I think what we tried to do here to address what Tracy had to say, which is a really important point, is you have to understand that individuals are gonna view this situation differently. Not everybody grieves on the same schedule. Not everybody is gonna be ready at the same time to want to figure out how to engage with the legal system. And I think that when we started looking at this, the thing that we saw when we looked at some of the fires, for example, that took place in California, that element that really kind of made us really take a step back and say, we don't wanna do that, is that in California, it literally took years before they got to the point where they were even giving victims an opportunity to resolve claims that they wanted to do that. And for some individuals, I think that they're going to want to move on. I think that they're going to wanna have an opportunity to not be involved in a lengthy legal process and to give them that sort of control to us is in stark contrast to what we were seeing in California. We're already starting to hear from some number of attorneys who represent some of the families of those who lost loved ones in this fire. And they're not anxious to go and relive that necessarily in court. There may be individuals that are, that want to be able to go to court and to tell their story and to be able to explain why it is that certain parties should be held responsible. And again, we're not looking to take that away from them. But I think that what we wanted to do was to empower those individuals who did not want to go through that lengthy process, who don't wanna wait three, five, eight years before something ends to give them the choice and that they could decide among themselves what's best for us. And that element was not present in California. And when we were looking at like one of the things that we could do in the short term that we thought could at least help to help heal some of those individuals was to make sure that they are not forced into that sort of process in order to seek compensation if they think that that's what they wanna do. So I hope that's an answer to your question, but again, I think those were some of the elements of the program that we wanted to implement and implement quickly so that we can give people options. And that I think is the hallmark of what we're trying to do is to empower people to decide what's best for them. Well, and I think what you've just done that distinguishes Hawaii and this program and yourself as I know you and Tracy is that this is a people and community oriented cultural value oriented process that is responsive rather than adversarily directed as litigation is. And that distinction is an important one here, yeah. And I think that as we worked on designing this program those sort of factors were in our mind. We actually wanted to come up with a way that we were not forcing people to put on proof of how much money their loved one would have made if they had survived or what are the individual circumstances that differentiate them. I know people may want to do that. We wanna give them the chance to speak to the administrator about that, but we wanted to derive and to come up with a process that didn't require that amount of legal proof that you would see for example in a trial before a judge and a jury. We wanted to come up with a way to come up with fair compensation and to provide an easy way to access it in an expeditious way. That is what really drove a lot of what we were trying to do to give that option that would move along the process a lot quicker than I think any place else I think I've seen in the country at least so far especially for a tragedy of this magnitude. And what we're hearing is you're talking about something that is so classically core value connected to Hawaii uniquely. And that is a process based on people and that their connections, their communications are collaborative rather than adversarial. And so rather than the lengthy, expensive adversarial processes that can be divisive and really hard on people. I'm hearing that you're aiming for something that comes from and for the people that is more collaborative. That's more objective scientifically evidence based that's more neutrally expert evaluated that's assisted by Hawaii's wonderful resources like Tracy of trained neutral mediators and people who can administer these processes in ways that are people oriented. So how do you draw people to see and understand the value and benefits of that choice that you're offering as opposed to the litigation standard stuff? That's a really good question. And I think that one of the things that I think we've been talking about among ourselves is what is the best way to approach individuals that are potentially eligible to apply for this fund? I think that what we wanna try to do is in all likelihood do some sort of outreach individually to those families to find a way to talk to them either directly or through their counsel to make sure that they know what is there and to answer their questions in a private setting that gives them a chance to express their concerns about what it is that they're being asked to consider. And so as we work on the next steps in this process one of the things that we have talked about is what's the best way to reach the individuals that are likely gonna be impacted and are going to need to know about what is there. And so we're consulting at length with individuals from Maui or from Lahaina who know many of the families that have been impacted by this fire so that we can get their assistance to figure out the best way to communicate what it is that we're trying to do. So the governor may make an announcement and I think that's very important for the public to know but I think as far as the outreach to the individuals impacted by the fire who can apply, we actually wanna get to the point where we're talking to each and every one of them. Individually, we could do in theory I guess some large community meeting but I'm not sure that forcing somebody that's lost a family member to come before a large group of people is really the best way to allow somebody to heal. And so we're gonna look for opportunities to touch people one by one. The thing about this first fund that we're talking about is we have a general idea of how many people we're talking about. And although it is a tragic number, it is also hopefully a number where we can actually have individual conversations so that we can explain what we're doing, answer their questions and then let them make their decisions after they talk to their family members but also their lawyers if they wanna involve them as well. We're not gonna exclude lawyers from the process and if people want legal counsel, that's fine as well. And what we're hearing, which is unique to and culturally and emotionally and spiritually grounded in and appropriate to Hawaii is what you're putting together, the core values of it are not the go tell people this is what's gonna happen and see which side can impose their selective viewpoint or results on the other but the ask and offer process that Andy Weiner and Tracy Wilkin, two of the best I've ever seen in my 45 years at doing this is building something to approach people to ask what are your interests and priorities? Help us understand that. How can we put something together, design and offer it? That's going to be of the most help and service and with each of the groups not only the victims and those affected but the people who are being targeted as responsible. We have a utility that whatever your view has contributed huge value and played an incredibly crucial role in the development of this state and going forward has even a more core value responsibility as we shift to renewable energy to community-based energy programs and projects Kamehameha Schools whose role is hugely important to children, to families, to learning, to communities. All of those people, you're ask and offer approach. What are your interests and priorities? How can we work with you to put something together to best serve them in as expedited as cost-effective and as fair a way as possible? That I think as you knew, unique. That's not what 9-Eleven or the BP oil spills or roundup work. Those were litigation developed or litigation avoidance processes. So if you build it and they come how will you help them get there? So I think that what we talked about earlier was that we're trying to come up with a process that simplifies what an application looks like. We hope to have a website that is relatively straightforward has relatively few documents that will need to be completed. We will have the administrator available to be able to talk to individuals who apply or their counsel to answer questions. I think I mentioned earlier that we expect a financial institution to not only be holding the funds but to be providing administrative support. And I think what our hope is that we'll have a number of staff members that are trained who can answer the kinds of questions that people will have. On the website, we will have frequently asked questions so that they can take a look and see. For the most part, hopefully we've anticipated the questions and if we haven't, there'll be a way to communicate with the administrator and the people that are running the program. And then we'll also, I think, do some outreach with the plaintiffs lawyers. Obviously some of the individuals that be maybe attempting to access the funds are gonna be represented by counsel. As I said earlier, we're not seeking to exclude them. We're seeking to include them. And to the extent that they are going to be assisting with the preparation of documents to access the claims or the claims fund, we're gonna make sure that similar to individuals that they need to talk to the administrator or somebody that's administering the funds that there'll be an opportunity for them to do that. So, I assume that the governor, knowing just how he is personally will actually, I think, do some of the individual outreach. Having a physician as a governor in a situation like this I think is incredibly helpful. He has for lack of a better way to describe it a great bedside manner. And I think, and I can see that in certain circumstances that he will be a great communicator for us to be able to talk to people about what it is that we're trying to accomplish. But, we're also open to other suggestions. If anybody has thoughts on the best way to publicize or to make the program available generally to the people that are impacted, we're all ears. We wanna make sure that people are aware of it. They have a chance to ask the questions and then they can make a decision on what's best for them. And Tracy, I wanted to ask you, tell us a little bit about what dispute resolution resources which Andy has indicated are gonna be integral to helping to convene and manage these communications and processes. But what kind of resources and people do we have here and how might that be of value and service to this resolution process system? Well, Chuck, as you know, you and Andy are being some of the top dispute resolution experts in the state. We're very fortunate here to have a strong dispute resolution community. We have five community mediation centers throughout the state that have a large cadre of skilled mediators who do a lot of amazing work. We also have dispute prevention and resolution which is the largest for profit dispute resolution program in the state who has an amazing panel of mediators, arbitrators, facilitators. And then there's a lot of other independent people out there and there are individuals who have the skills who I know would be willing to step up to the plate to assist that are already working in the community in a variety of ways who have learned the skills even though they may not have the label of formal mediator facilitator, but they've gone through the training and they have the skills and they're able to use them. So I feel hopeful and excited that as we look at each of the areas and the issues from insurance claims, residential, commercial to landlord tenant issues and the variety of issues that need to be addressed that we can develop processes and that we will have the appropriate dispute resolution resolvers be able to step up and assist. And I know that people are already willing and able it's about looking at each of the issues and making sure the appropriate information is gathered to adequately and correctly address those issues in the process that's designed. And the key elements, you know, each process may look a little bit different as the program Andy has been describing but the key elements is people will have choices. They're empowered in the process, they have a voice and that is so critical right now. I mean, I can't imagine going through the trauma and as Andy pointed out, you know, everybody deals with the trauma and what they've gone through each in their own way.  And I know as we look at each of the issues and the timing is appropriate and designing that we will have many members of our community and the dispute resolution field who will be willing to step up and assist. And that's a fantastic vision. How do you and what is your confidence level that that can be done in ways that are really cost effective, affordable, low bono I think is the word you've used. For many of these claims are not gonna have a bunch of money for them. You've got death and injury claims that it may be million dollar claims and lawyers are gonna look at making money off those things but there are a lot of other stuff. What if there's no insurance or not enough insurance for the home or the business or the vehicle? What about if it's a problem like, oh, I lost all my documents, my immigration status my family status is jeopardized my employment status is jeopardized. What if I'm because I was economically devastated I'm at risk of foreclosure, eviction land or tenant problems and issues. How do we help design the people and the processes to be able to comprehensively welcome and respect and deal with all of those in a not only expedited but cost effective manner affordable manner, ideas? Those are really important points and are gonna take a lot of people coming together a lot of key stakeholders to talk about the issues and what it takes to design the right process. In some instances, as you say it'll be having adequate funding. And I know the state, the governor is looking at these issues now where do the funds come from to support people in these different situations? As far as the people assisting with the processes the neutrals, the dispute resolution professionals I think a lot of them would be willing to do the work pro bono. I don't think in every situation and it depends on the issues as you mentioned Chuck if it's a landlord tenant issue you need individuals who are versed not only skilled facilitators and mediators but are reversed in landlord tenant matters similar to eviction and the information that's needed to help people make informed decisions and negotiate needs to be pulled together. So it is gonna take a village to look at all these issues and make sure that the information that's needed is there and available and that the right dispute resolvers are there. And I wanna say, it will take a lot of work but I know it can be done. When we went through COVID and there was a moratorium on evictions there was, I know a lot of this came together whether it was attorneys, it was legislators it was judges, members of the community talking about what's gonna happen when that moratorium ends and the concern that there's thousands of evictions. And so similar, although this is much bigger we looked at what kind of process can we design to help landlords and tenants because landlords needed help as well as tenants to come together, be able to have a process that empowered both of them to negotiate to have outcomes that they needed. And through those discussions Act 57 was created and for one year, mediation was required when tenants and tenants had the choice they didn't have to mediate but landlords were required to participate prior to the eviction process. And as a result of that it was really the five community mediation centers throughout the state to put the program together once Act 57 was in place. And as a result, there were more than 1500 landlords and tenants that were able to reach agreements where payment plans were worked out. Tenants were be able to remain in the residence landlords were paid and it was developed quickly, respectfully and we reached out to a broad number of dispute resolution professionals who did it low bono and did it successfully. So based on that track record of success and how many members of the community stepped up to make it work. I know in my heart that we can design processes to help the people of Maui to be able to make choices and be empowered in a time that they must feel very out of control and having no power. So creating these processes just give them a little more control in their lives to help them be able to make a choice to address issues sooner so that they and their families can decide what their next steps are. And that's so critical right now. And you've raised a point that really is an especially thorny one, particularly for the entities that have been targeted and sued here is you've got an incredibly difficult causation situation with very, very high winds. 50, 70, sometimes 90 miles per hour together with very flammable grasses and utility poles that were aging that may have been energized that may have contributed to initiating fires. And you've got a whole bunch of other factors going on and you've got a lot of evidence that's gone destroyed in the fires. And how do you connect the funding and those really difficult causation allocation issues among those parties? So that's a very sort of difficult part of the work that we've had to do over the last few weeks. The challenge has been that we're seeking, one of the things we're trying to do is to move quickly. We're trying to actually stand up a program before the end of the year. That's four or five months after this fire took place. And one of the difficulties is that we don't have the benefit of discovery from a court case. And so we're not able to look at depositions or look at documents. And so we recognize that early on that was going to be a problem. We're not able to maybe provide some of the analysis that would make parties comfortable. But I think there were a couple of things that were driving the conversations that I think have been very productive. And I think some of that related to a shared desire by some of the parties you've mentioned, together with Maui County, that we understood that maybe this wasn't gonna be like the perfect process, but let's not make the perfect the enemy of the good. And so, among ourselves, we were pretty candid in terms of how we looked at liability at this point. I can tell you that that was a factor, but it was by no means the only one. And I think that the parties that have been at the table, not only we're looking at who's right and who's wrong, but all of them, I think early on, wanted to do the right thing. They wanted to come up with a process that allowed these victims and these individuals to have an option to make a decision. And so I hope that when we make the announcements as to where the funding is gonna come from, I think we'll make it clear that in no way, shape, or form is anybody saying, okay, this is how this is gonna be for every other process that gets designed moving forward. I think that there were circumstances relating to wanting to move quickly. I think that the parties, I think we're listening very closely to Governor Green's leadership on the idea of putting people first. And so there have been some hard conversations. I think everybody has their own views, I think, in terms of how they might advocate if they were in court. But I think for the good of the community, the good of the state, people have put that aside in order to try to come up with a solution that provides options for those individuals that we think are the ones that really should have an opportunity to have their claims addressed first. And so, although liability was certainly part of the discussion point, it was by no means, I think, what you would normally see if it was a case that was in litigation and you'd had a bunch of discovery. I think that there was a desire to see these people get treated fairly. And so, the various contributions that are being made, I will tell people are not necessarily reflective of how any of us necessarily view how a case might ultimately play out if it goes to trial. Well, and you've raised a really important point. We don't want to get off into the weeds of legalism, but the joint is several liability factor in American law, very different. In Britain, right? If you could figure out party A, your X percent, party B, your Y percent, party C, your C percent, that's how it's gonna split up. We don't have that. If A has 75% liability, but only enough money to pay for 10%, the other 90% is gonna have to come from B and C even if they're only a smaller portion percentage libel. So that factor, as you wisely infer, drops out. And the idea of working collaboratively to preserve the long-term viability of all the entities, how do we keep and motivate the utility to play the role and have the viability to be what Hawaii really needs it to be in energy? How do we do that with Kamehameha schools in education and community outreach? How do we do that with other parties with the state, with the county of Maui? Any thoughts on that? Yeah, I think that that is exactly what we tried to do over the course of the last several weeks, is to recognize that there was certainly, like I said, there's a legal overlay here, but the four parties that you've identified obviously are poor entities in this state. I mean, the state of Hawaii, Maui County, our largest electric utility, our largest private landowner and also our largest charitable and philanthropic institution. Those are major entities in the state. And I think that in the conversations that we were having, that there was a recognition that there was a responsibility that transcended things like liability or insurance coverage. I think what we tried to do is figure out, like it was almost like, what can you do at this point in time? You know, let's figure out what is doable at this point in time and make it clear that it may not set precedent for things going forward. I mean, Maui County right now is obviously dealing with a terrible tragedy. Its government is overwhelmed and it's doing I think the best it can under unbelievably trying circumstances. And so to burden them in a way that they would not be able to take care of the direct needs of their people with something that the state in particular wanted to make sure was being looked at and addressed. And I think when you see how it is that compensation was derived for this pool, I think that the state looked at it as, we feel a responsibility to everybody but we want to make sure that the county and the county government is able to function in a way that it is able to do the rest of what needs to happen in the coming years. And so, that's one example I think of how it was that we were sort of viewing all of this, that there certainly was some awareness of what happened relating to the fire but that we all knew that there was a larger and greater important goal that was in mind here which is we're putting people first, we're putting this community first, we're coming up with a way to address their needs in a hopefully an expeditious way. And we all understand by the way that there's gonna be criticism of what it is that we're doing. There's gonna be people that are gonna say the state is paying too much or he goes not paying enough or whoever else is involved, we're gonna hear all of that. And I will say that maybe it's not perfect, I will not be so egotistical as to think that that is the case but I do think that what we did come up with was a fairly, we're coming up with what I think is a fairly elegant solution to a very, very difficult set of problems. And I think that in a year from now, my hope is is that the people that have been involved in this will look back and view it as some of the best work that they ever did in their career and that we did something that set a standard for how it is that we're going to like go forward as a state and as one family to be able to address what happened. So those things have been very much going through my mind but I think it's also been clear all of the other individuals and entities that are there I think have come with that sort of spirit. And I commend our partners that are gonna be willing to do this. This is hard. I mean, the people that are making these decisions are going to be criticized and yet they are willing to go forward. And I think that that is courageous but I also think it's leadership in a time when the state desperately needs leadership. And so hopefully, as I said earlier this becomes a beacon for how it is that we wanna come out of this and that we come out of this crisis feeling like the people of Hawaii came up with a solution that fit the times and fit the place and fit the culture of the state. That's what we're trying to do. And my hope is that, you know, we'll show the way. You know, it's not gonna be perfect but I think it's gonna be a reflection of something that the people of this state can be very proud of. And I think what you've just encapsulated maybe better than anyone I've ever heard is that what really makes this unique and distinct from all the others and from the litigation stuff and all that is this is a coalescing, a collaboration of people realizing that the only way to get through this as intact as possible each is to get through it as intact as possible all. And to understand, respect and honor each other's ability, value and importance to each other to be able to do that. You folks are doing that in a way that way different than 9-11 petroleum oil bills out of any of those. This is in many ways more complicated because of the fact that in some of those circumstances you had one party that was being looked upon to provide compensation here, we have many that in principle and in legal theory may actually need to be involved. And so almost by definition, we ended up having entities that work together and know each other but they are working together in sort of different ways and we're trying to get them and I think that we've succeeded in speaking with one voice. That's where we want to get to. We all understand that we have different interests. We all understand that we have different pressures but I think that what we tried to do was put those down at the door and walk in, let's sit down at the table, let's figure out what we can do that's gonna be meaningful and important for this state and actually address the needs of the people that are most in need. So that's what we attempted to do and I would commend the others that were a part of this. This wasn't just the governor, this was the mayor, this was Kamehameha schools, this has been Maui County and the mayor and so as I said, I expect that not everybody will look at this and stand up and cheer but in the end, I think that we've come up with an approach that in a few months when we give individuals the choice, I think they're gonna choose to participate, a lot of them will and I think that they will be some of the first people that will say at the end of all of this that we did our jobs, that we gave them what they needed to be able to get on with their lives in a way that they could control. That's what we wanted to get to and I think I am hopeful that we'll hit that mark. And what I love about the One Ohana name, I don't think it could be any better than that is it recognizes and honors. Yeah, perfect to Hawaiian culture. We come into this as One Ohana, the only way and the best way to get through this and out of this as resilient as intact as able to go forward with our best lives and choices as possible is as One Ohana together. You folks are doing that. Andy Weiner, Tracy Wilkin, two of the best of the best at not only enabling that for people in conflict and in disasters but modeling themselves professionally and personally, two of the finest people I've known role models for me in my 45 years of doing this stuff and Tracy, last thoughts and words? I really appreciate the opportunity to be here with you and Andy and I'm looking forward to watching as the process moves forward. Andy, last thoughts? Thank you for having us, Chuck. I'm looking forward to working with you and Tracy moving forward. I think there'll be a lot of opportunities to do that. Thank you for the opportunity to describe what we're up to and for your interest in this. And as I said, stay tuned. A few weeks from now, I'm hoping, you know, we'll be able to show a lot more and I'm looking forward to hearing what you have to say when we do it. And I wanna with and for all of us take that message and pay it forward because I think we all wanna thank not only the governor who has exemplified this is what an emergency physician does in an emergency. The patient comes first, the patient's family and support group are the critical element of recovery and all the other resources have to be one Ohana to get through it. That's exactly what you folks are doing and exemplifying. And however one may view responsibility, liability, factors, things like that, that the Hawaiian electric companies and entity has for a long time contributed huge value and needs to be able to continue to contribute huge value to this community in order for us to come through it as one Ohana. That is certainly equally true of Kamehameha schools. It's equally true of the state, of the county and all of those who are impacted and affected. And I think we'll finish by saying there are none of us in Hawaii who are not impacted and affected some more indirectly than others. But if you're impacted in a way that when you're really thinking about this and hearing what Andy and Tracy are working on trying to ask an offer here, tears will roll down your cheeks as they are mine. Thank you Aloha for joining us. Thank you. Thank you Chair. One Ohana.


Hello, my name is Gloria Saeed. I am the Director for the City of Columbia's Community Development Department and I'm here today to talk about all-access Columbia. These are quarterly workshops that are presented through the City of Columbia and we're excited that our next workshop is going to be held on Thursday November the 7th from 6 to 8 o'clock in the evening and this workshop is going to be on social media and internet safety tips. In addition to the social media and internet safety, we're going to have a session on healthy cooking for the holidays. So we want to have a nice mixture. We're going to have Chef Judy and she'll be presenting some tips on how to eat healthy and cook healthy because we know during that time of the year we all sort of over-indulge and she'll have some things for us to sample as well in reference to the internet safety. We're going to have Emma Rush. She's the Education Coordinator with the South Carolina Attorney General's Office. We're going to have Terrell McCombs, who's with the Columbia Police Department and he'll be speaking on social media and bullying. And so these are all things that impact either our children's lives or our parents and sometimes even in the workplace we deal with things like that when it comes to social media. So we wanted to make sure we were able to provide some tools to the public where they could benefit from participating in this all-access for this quarter. I would encourage you whether you are a senior, a parent, children, even if grandparents want to bring their grandkids because there's something that we can all learn. We planned it this way because of some of the feedback we're getting from the community to do something a little bit different, but also we do want to make sure that as we do our all-access events that we have different topics and different things that will interest people to get get you out if you have an attendant one before. Maybe this is the one that's going to pique your interest and you'll be in attendance, so. Hey there, Mayor Steve Benjamin here. Thanks for watching this video. Make sure you give it a like right below the video and don't forget to subscribe. Also, while you're here, be sure to check out one of our other videos or follow on our social media platforms. Thanks again and remember, we are Columbia.