Good afternoon, my name is Lisa Grande and I'm the head of the United States Institute of Peace, which was established by the U.S. Congress in 1984 as a national, public, nonpartisan institution dedicated to helping prevent, mitigate, and resolve violent conflict abroad. It is an honor for the United States Institute of Peace to welcome two exceptional women Her Excellency, President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, and Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield for a very special discussion on women's leadership in Africa. Next week, Washington will host the U.S. Africa Summit. Today's conversation, which comes ahead of the summit, allows us to reflect on and talk about the next generation of women leaders and their role in politics, public service, and the private sector across Africa. It also gives us a chance to reflect on the U.S.'s commitment to the global women, peace, and security agenda set out in Resolution 1325, adopted by the UN Security Council, and enshrined into U.S. law five years ago. It is a distinct honor for the Institute to welcome President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf of Liberia, the first democratically elected woman head of state in Africa. President Johnson Sirleaf is one of the most revered women leaders of our generation, receiving the Nobel Peace Prize, the U.S. Presidential Medal of Freedom, the Grand Cross of the French Legion of Honor, and the Moe Ibrahim Prize for African leadership. In 2018, President Johnson Sirleaf founded the Presidential Center for Women in Development, with the aim of championing women's ascension to the highest levels of leadership and challenging systematic barriers to girls and women's advancement. In 2020, President Johnson Sirleaf launched MUJI, a wonderful program that inspires and prepares women to take up roles and excel at the highest levels of public leadership. We are delighted to have with us today several MUJI leaders who will be taking the floor very shortly. It is a privilege to welcome back to the Institute Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield, the United States Permanent Representative to the United Nations, and a Cabinet Secretary in the Biden Administration. Ambassador Thomas-Greenfield has a distinguished 35-year record of public service and foreign affairs, having been appointed as U.S. Ambassador to Liberia from 28 to 2012, and with postings in Switzerland, Pakistan, Kenya, the Gambia, Nigeria, and Jamaica. Ambassador Thomas-Greenfield has served as the Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, the Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary in the Bureau of African Affairs, and as Deputy Assistant Secretary in the Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration. The Ambassador is the recipient of the University of Minnesota-Herbert Humphrey Public Leadership Award, the Bishop John T. Walker Distinguished Humanitarian Service Award, and the Warren Christopher Award for Outstanding Achievement in Global Affairs. Please allow us also to expend our warmest welcome to her Royal Highness, the Countess of Wessex, who is a global champion for the Women, Peace, and Security Agenda, and the UK's Preventing Sexual Violence Initiative, and who yesterday received the Hillary Rodham Clinton Award for exceptional leadership in advancing women's rights and creating a more peaceful and secure world for all. We're very pleased to introduce Alouelle Atom and Angela Chen, who will be moderating this very special, intergenerational conversation. Alouelle is a program officer with USIP's Curriculum and Training Team, where she manages the Institute's flagship training program with the Kenya border police. Alouelle is an African feminist activist who has co-founded two women's rights initiatives, Crown the Women, and Maria Sackett Village in South Sudan. Angela is the Senior Program Assistant for USIP's Sudan and South Sudan programs. As a Charles B. Rangel fellow, Angela has interned at the US Embassy in Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea, and will join the US Foreign Service in 2023. Angela is a Black American feminist activist, a graduate of the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, and a proud member of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority. I am delighted to hand over to Alouelle and Angela. Thank you, Madam President, Ambassador Thomas Grenfell. You've both had such notable careers in your leadership positions. And for many, especially Black young women, that itself is history and lessons. Can you both share with our audience today just a bit about your personal leadership journey to this incredible possession of power and leadership? I'll start off by first saying a big thank you to Lise Granin too, John Sanny for this event. Thanks to all of them, it's coming at the right time before the Biden summit takes place when all of our African leaders will be here to participate in discussions regarding global issues. In Africa today, we have two women presidents, four former presidents, and the two women presidents not democratically elected yet. So our numbers are small, and I'm glad that I was favored by the Liberian people to contest the presidency and to serve two terms and to respect the Constitution by giving up at the end of my second term and turning it over. But it was no easy walk. I mean, it took many years of work, many years of activism, of working on those issues that promote good governance, taking positions, standing out. And I think in a way that comes from my own beginnings, my beginnings of the family and the strong mother that enabled me to have the courage to take on what was required to run for high political office. And I failed a couple of times. I ran more than once. What, you know, failing to me was the upside of success. And I used the experience of failure to rebuild, to start again, and had the opportunity to lead our country for those 12 years and to face what was rarely formidable because our country had had two decades of civil war with a lot of debt and destruction. This functional institution destroyed infrastructure to try to bring back the creditworthiness of our country and the reputation of our country that was lost during those many years of civil war and military rule. I was just glad that we happened to have somebody like Ambassador Limbatang from Greenfield who was on the scene as your ambassador who was there to provide the kind of guidance and support and to point out those places where I think we could have done better. And she did. But I'm thankful that with the advice and all that happened and the manner in which we were able to work in partnership for Liberia and that we maintained that friendship and that collaboration I've established the Edding Johnson Center for Women and Development committed to try and see more African women become presidents from the AMUJ initiative which have two cohorts of some 30 dynamic African women who have committed themselves to their leadership journey and are really working and just need the kind of support, the kind of profiling, the kind of encouragement through mentorship that they get from other women like former presidents or high level African executives like those who hold global institutions who provide them the kind of advice and support that they need and encouragement to enable them to forge ahead. And we're always thankful that Ambassador Thomas Greenfield served with the foundation of the Center for some time until she moved on. She moved on to the stage where we all respect you, Linda. Thank you for all the positions you take. So that's my story. Thank you. When I listen that someone read my resume I never ever stopped being amazed at myself and I am a very, very humble person. But when I think about where I started and see where I've come I have to occasionally say, wow, you know, it's this little girl who was running around Bath-Eat in a rural area, loving life not knowing that I was poor because a lot of kids don't know they're poor even though they are, because I had a happy family. And, you know, I described recently to someone that I didn't even have ambition because I didn't have the role models to look up to. And as I got older, they were our teachers. One lawyer who was the husband of one of my teachers so I decided I wanted to be a lawyer because that's all I knew. I didn't know about diplomats, I didn't know about presidents. I didn't know about, you know, people who work in NGOs. I didn't know any of that. I knew teachers and I knew one lawyer. So I was going to be a lawyer. And I failed at that. I never went to law school. So at some point I did decide I wanted to be an academic and I played at that for a few years. And in the process of playing at that, I went to Lype area in 1978. And that's the first thing. You didn't know me, Madam President. I was nobody, but you were somebody. Come on, come on. You were somebody even then, 1978. And I looked up to her. I was amazed by her, watching her from afar as I did research in Lype area. I would then go on and teach for a couple of years then into the Foreign Service. And my concept of what my goals were, it was just to work hard. Do a good job at whatever job you give it. And I did that without ambition. Again, you know, my ambition was not to be a Deputy Assistant Secretary or an Ambassador or Assistant Secretary or a member of President Biden's cabinet. Those were not my ambitions. My ambition every single day was to do a good job at whatever job I was given and make a difference in people's lives. And in the process of doing that for 20, 30, 35, now 40 years, people began to pay attention to you. And that's how I ended up where I am today. The highlight of my career was serving in Lype area as the Ambassador when the President was there. And she really was an Iron Lady. And I love being there next to the Iron Lady and occasionally Madam President. And she had an Ambassador. And none of my staff ever thought I delivered a tough message to her. They never, I go back and they're like, she's so friendly with her. So nice to her. They didn't know what happened in the back rooms. And that is what diplomacy is all about. It is not about hijacking people in public. It is not about bringing them down. Sometimes they do deserve to be brought down in public, actually. Not this lady. She was about developing a relationship of trust, a relationship of confidence, and a common goal. And both President Sirleaf and I had the same goal. And that was to help Lype area to succeed. And sometimes we had different ways of doing that. But I always knew when I was dealing with her that her main goal was my main goal. And that was to help Lype area come out of war and to succeed. And when you have the opportunity to work with a partner and have the same goal and work toward that goal, it is an extraordinary experience. So as I look back on this now 40 year career, I got to change my file. The four years that I was in Lype area as ambassador really was the highlight of that career. And it was a full circle for me having started there in 1978 and going back there in 2008, 30 years later. I must say and Linda will say even more about that. There are certain women that gave me strength. Linda is one of them. But I look back and I look at Angela Merkel. And I look how she managed on the global stage. How she was able to keep global cooperation, to keep multilateralism moving. And today we can see it slipping away because we don't have that strong leadership to keep that going. And let me say in this country, one of my few right now, aside from you Linda, is Nancy Polici. And how she so well managed your congress and made those hard decisions and made it look easy. We can always take lessons from these strong women. We have strong African women, strong women in Latin America, in Asia and everywhere. And I always try to take counsel from them to see how they handle very difficult issues, how they respond to global issues. And we need that now more than ever as we go into a situation where there's no global consensus on the international standards and democracies to which we have all committed our countries to ensure that there will be global goods and we will be able to respond to the needs of the people. So it's a challenge to all of us as leaders to recalibrate and to reassess ourselves and see what we can do. I hope we have the center and provide some support and some real activism in trying to respond to these global contextual stages that we face. But that's your stage, that's your area. The global stage is yours. And it's so beautiful to see this friendship and connection in real life because I was reading some of the comments you made a post about this event online. And Liberians seem to have such profound memories of the two of you together in Liberia. And I'm wondering how did your friendship grow? How did you form this friendship and how did it grow? And also what influence did it have in the many collaborations you've done together that has also influenced your work on advancing women's peace and security? I'll just be brief. Let Linda say it. When she first went to Liberia to do research, I did not know her. I'm not sure she and I met during that period. I was in public service at ministerial levels. She was doing research and she left. And it wasn't until later years when she was appointed that we were able to meet and just discovered that we had certain shared values and her commitment to Liberia because in a way she came to love the country. The time she spent there and the country so loved her that we kept hoping that we'll fix the country in such a way that she would feel endeared enough to do the journey of coming to live in Liberia but that hasn't happened. I haven't given up on the idea. So you see we have a place waiting for her. What we saw but what we have enjoyed is the position she's taken. Not only as ambassador but not only the support she's given to the center we established and the advice that she provides but also we're so proud of the work she does on the global stage because when she takes a position, when she talks there, it's a reflection of what we feel, what we know should be done and we feel that this is in a way it leaves us with an entierment that someone is saying what we'd like to hear said and maybe missing from so many others. So I was watching her from afar as a young kid. Now we're the same age. I don't know how that happens, you know. And she was really a role model and a mentor for me. I knew I wasn't going to become a great leader in Africa but I knew I could succeed as a woman because I was watching what she was doing. You came to Geneva and maybe it was maybe 2000 for some kind of meeting. I don't remember what it was and I sat in the audience as you were speaking and you were talking about what was happening in Liberia and I was so enamored with you. At that point I didn't know I was going to become an ambassador. I didn't even know that I was going to go back to the Africa Bureau. I was doing humanitarian work. I didn't know I was ever going to meet you directly in person but I was so impressed with what you were trying to do to bring Liberia forward and you weren't even in a political job. You were kind of in exile then. I'm trying to think it may have been like 2000 or something like that. You'd run for a Senate seat in one and turned it down and I'm like who does that? And so it was just really for me impressive and I will tell you this story. So I eventually became the principal deputy assistant secretary in the Africa Bureau and the Bureau started looking at ambassadorships and I was asked Linda where would you like to go? And I said to Gambia. Little country.  I can handle to Gambia. And the then assistant secretary said to you to PDAS in the Africa Bureau I can't send you to Gambia. I'm going to send you to Kenya. And I thought wow. Do you think I'm good enough for Kenya? Then I'm good enough for Liberia too. And so I said nobody was trying to go to Liberia to be honest. That wasn't a long line of people waiting to go to Liberia. People were shocked that I said I wanted Liberia and not Kenya. And no one knew my history with Liberia because I hadn't talked about the fact that I'd lived and worked in Liberia when I was in my 20s. But once I said I wanted to go to Liberia suddenly Liberia was the place that everybody wanted to go to. It's like the PDAS wants to go to Liberia then it must be pretty good. So I really feel if I accomplish anything I put Liberia on the map for people who were really interested in doing real work. I mean people were wanting to avoid Liberia because of what we were seeing on CNN every single day. The news reports were horrific. People were being killed every single day. It was the country at war. Nobody wanted to go there. But Linda wanted to go there. And I did. And that's when our friendship really did bud and develop. And I have a friend for life who I have tremendous respect for. And it's something I will always cherish. Thank you. You are two exemplary leaders. And many women and men look up to you. Madam President, you mentioned that we're living in a time where consensus on the world order is no longer there. On top of that there's a climate crisis and there's emerging global health challenges. What kind of leadership do you think the world needs right now? The standards represent most over the years. The leaders who have the courage to take positions, positions that may not lead them in any popularity. The positions that are the right thing to do in the interests of peace, in the interests of the promotion of women, and development in countries. We don't see enough of that today. As we look on the global scene, we see too much of individualism, national interest that prevent those that have leadership talent but do not feel committed to be because of, if you may, selfish national interest. And I think the world needs today strong leaders. There are some of them around, yes. We must also recognize that those who are making the great effort to bring us back to those standards all new in the days of global cooperation that seem to be now threatened. To see if we can encourage them to continue to provide the global leadership that's needed because it's having an effect in Africa. We thought we had more than 30 democracies 10 years ago. In the last four years, we've had four Kouritas returning us to those terrible old days when Kouritas led to military leadership and led to great disaffection of the people and not being able to move the country forward. So now we have to go back as African leaders to find the means to address what has happened and much of it comes from the global scene. It's a bit confusing. It's a bit concerning for all of us because we've slipped in standing by the international standards we all have known so well. I couldn't agree more with the President and I would just add having observed her leadership we do need leaders who care about their people. We need leaders who have compassion who have strong values when they come into office who are committed to the world order committed to, as she said, standards leaders who believe in the UN Charter and who are willing to stand up for human rights to stand up for women and to ensure that their commitments remain as strong as they were when they ran for office. So everybody says the right thing when they're running and then when they're suddenly in the chair they do exactly what they want to do and countries people don't feel the ability to hold them accountable. So we need leaders who are accountable as well and there are very few of them as we look around not just Africa but the world. I'm laughing, Linda, because I want to say you need leaders who can get on a global platform and said to a major world leader you are wrong, Mr. President. And on that topic of leadership, next week we're heading into the U.S. Africa leader summit and there are very high expectations from some but from others there's a degree of skepticism. What tangible outcomes do you hope to see from the summit next week? Biden, I want to thank him too, you know, for this. President Obama had his summit several years ago. That's when the Ebola broke in our country, Liberia and I could not come because I had to be at home to be able to fight, you know, this disease. And I'm so glad that President Biden and First President Harris, Kamal Harris, have now made that decision to have another summit and to bring our African leaders together. I hope that they'll be very straightforward in telling our leaders what is expected of them, recognizing where so many have indeed moved their countries forward, have achieved a lot of their development goals. But for many who determine that they'll hold on to office thereby sabotage the future of our young citizens and they need to be told that we must all have our chance to be on the scene to what we can do and then pass it on and have somebody else do it. I know there's disappointments too. I face a disappointment when I pass it on, I've got to tell you that. And sometimes I have to stop and say, did I do the right thing? But it was the right thing to do. What has happened cannot be an excuse not to follow the rules and the regulations. What we must do is a better plan for successions so that we can make sure that there's continuity in effort and continuity in progress and that I think all of our leaders should be encouraged to think in that way that there's always a good succession, there's always continuity if it's planned properly and if it's exercised rightly. So I think that's where we stand. Thank you. Just to follow up on what the president was saying and I think it's not, it's in terms of transitions, it's about ensuring that the population is educated and that's in any country, in our country as well, that they understand what they need in a leader and they understand what their vote means. It's the most powerful too that we have is our vote and sometimes populations particularly in Africa don't realize the power of their vote and they sell their votes. They don't realize how valuable their votes are. They vote for someone who is popular for any number of reasons other than being a good leader on the political stage and so we I think all of us have a responsibility to start to educate populations about how important their vote is and again I put the United States in that category as well and how valuable their vote is for their future. In terms of the leaders summit, I think having participated very actively in the first leaders summit, I think this leaders summit will be a reaffirmation of our partnership with the continent of Africa. I think the various leaders on the continent have wanted this and I think even though expectations may be different, I think just the fact that the United States inviting them to the US to have these open discussions on any number of issues is a positive thing and some of the discussions will be tough discussions. They will be discussions about the fact that we're seeing democracy diminish on the continent. It will be about the coup d'etats, it will be about corruption and we hear a lot like we don't want thing appointing from you and this is not about thing appointing, it's about having a candid discussion about what is happening. I was on the continent and said, there's no reason African countries ought to be suffering food insecurity because of Russia. Africans can grow enough wheat to feed itself, any single country on the continent. Liberia could grow enough rice to feed itself. So Africa countries have to kind of step up to the challenges that they face and take ownership, take ownership of addressing the challenges. It's a rich continent, it's a continent that can take care of its own needs. But the issue again is how leaders manage the resources including the most valuable resource and that's their people. So we're going to have those discussions and I think people's expectations will be met as we talk about those various things. I'm doing an event on the diaspora which I'm really excited about because one of the things that I say, people tell us we're always competing with the Chinese. The Chinese are overrunning you in Africa, they're eating your lunch in Africa and I say, bull, we have something that the Chinese don't have. We have an African diaspora from every single country on the continent. People who know their countries, their countries of origin and are committed to those countries and can speak out in the United States about our policies and influence our policies and I think that's a power that we sometimes forget that we have so I'm excited to have that discussion with the diaspora. Thank you. You know I think the message of taking charge of your destiny has resonated well in Africa. I think Africa too, African leadership feel that it's time that we do more for our people, for our continent that we have common positions that we can take to the global stage and ensure that our national interests are protected. There are shortcomings and I recognize both domestically and internationally and there are certain places where we too feel serious concern about failures to address things that need to be done but we also feel that the international architecture also needs to be addressed that institutions that were formed way back after World War II have not been able to be reorganized and have not given proper representation to those from other countries that today they measure up in terms of capabilities and integrity and whatnot so I'd like to see the international architecture changed and have much more representation I don't want to call the names of institutions I'm working in so many ways on that but I think for many the audience said they know exactly what I'm talking about. I hope everyone joins me in expressing our deep gratitude and appreciation and celebrate four exceptional, remarkable women. Madam President, Ellen Johnson-Surly, Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield, Alla Walautam and Angela Chen. Thank you.


We need you to give a shout out. We are hanging out to this tall handsome guy. We will be back. Whashas wide. So now we have the relaunch of Anga Cinematos, previously known as... Is this your first time in the cinema? In the same week. So this is the like this week or the first time. This week too. So this week too. And when you got the invitation, it has big names on it. Is it normal to you? It's respectable. It's normal. It's respectable in a way. Have you ever thought of being in a movie? Ya. Maramingi sama. I think of kukwa kua movies. Sayu ni kukwa videos hangu. But hopefully in kukwa kua movie anytime soon. So where we come from? Baiti ama baiti? Baiti. So baiti, baiti. Naulizaje. Naulizaje. Naulizaje. When you're making scripts for your videos. Inafikangaile puen tanyuna pata kreativity block. Do you have a team or how do you go about that? Mostly. Ok ni yuk kreativity block you come through sometimes. But asa ni kona team ya waseki dogo. So ni kipata concept na ni meshinda kuwi ndeleza. Na washtua. Tuna kapa moja, tuna relax. And then we build something kutukakwa the same concept. But creativity block you come through. Akunam tu apotagi yo. Which is that one creative muenye kazi haki unakongo meiti? Kenya ama. Kenya, Kenya. Kenya. Neza taja kaza. Kuna flako. Nuku wa creative sana. Kuna kena. Kuna mca triki. Ya, nao engi nekaba. Is it recommended creative? Ya. Niumkali. Niumkali. Neza tanga kufanya clip na e. Mola Tchaika vet. Eriko ako staawa. Niumzi toa miinif. Nua kembaia kutuka kitambo. Niumkali creative sana. Nikuipata opportunity niku saawa nae. So Eriko, hofufili kama unawochi. Tafadali fanya clip na kijana. Sona tuka kukurili. You go watch the movie. Have fun tonight. Ata ni mae. Koma snuaks zikwapi. Kuna soda apo utasabi wo kingia. Karibu. Sawa sana. Na shkuru sana. I'm hanging out to the one and only Marianne. Una kapua lemisaba sing that. I'm a princess. How have you been? I've been well. Long time. What's new? Nothing new as for now. But we are living life. It's December. Are you a moving person? I am. I'm actually a moving person. What are you expecting tonight? Fun to begin with. And then I'm expecting to enjoy our tattoo. I'm so happy to see you.  Have an amazing time. Okay. I'm hanging out to the one and only Simon Kabu. Simon lemisaba sing Una Kapua wo kusmat. Sana tisana. It's my weakness. Mambu ya kuhaya. Na nikuli zewa ifa kuaapi. Where's your date? Okay, we were in different places. She had gone to a different meeting. Tuka atanaski akili pegiya. Sana kuaapi. Nikuwa interview. Ume fika. Sawa. Uwa mekata simu. Anakam. Okay. Muna bunfaya you are one of the sponsors. What are you expecting tonight? You see, these days when a new venture is open, we need to support it. That's the best thing to do. And these days when you have become a movie, any content, be it whether it is in writing, social media movies, that's what you want so that people can be able to get more information and to get entertained. So expect to own a villa kuko na villa kuma kua beta and we're able at least to watch a movie at, you know, something, most of the people hapa maybe will kua na kujakitambu. Those people who are burnt houses you know, to look over to our shaggs, the people who used to swim kua muto, ni ni atukua to whether kujakitukua maizi those particular days. But now we expect now when we are to kua kubua we are able to watch now at a good place. Are you a moving person? On your free time watching a movie? What do you do on your free time? Yes, we do a movie. Action. Which way is it? It's your current movie and you know what's that? Okay, series watching. Kuna movie nili na inaitua. I mean inaitua, by the way, inaitua what we did in Vegas. Yes, that's a movie like Juzi. Sayida kuna umpila na alternate. Umpila, yes. So thank you so much in the joy evening saiba. Hi guys, I'm hanging out with Joro Wauuba and his date. I must still be right. How are you guys feeling? Great, great. Yes. What are you guys expecting tonight? A lot of fun. Yeah, a lot of fun. Expect to enjoy ourselves. Yeah. I'm also like I wanted to say to know are you a fan of movies? Yes. Yes, quite, I'm such a fan. Yes, a big fan. Is Avatar something you're expecting to watch? Yes, I was planning to. Yeah, after it's premieres, yeah. I mean I spoke to him just the other day at Kala Shawat when he won. I really want to know what you felt when he came home or rather you were there with that award? I was screaming first of all. I was watching on TV. So I was with my friend and she keeps saying how I pinched her hand because I was nervous on his behalf. But I was so happy and I'm always proud of him. He worked so hard. Yeah. Amazing. Thank you so much guys. Please enjoy your evening.


Coming up on DTNS, happy 30th to Adobe Photoshop, the real scoop behind bendable glass, and it is glass, plus the mystery of why Twitter is buying and shutting down an app that does Instagram stories. This is the Daily Tech News for Wednesday, February 19th, 2020 in Los Angeles. I'm Tom Merritt. And from Studio Redwood, I'm Sarah Lane. In Salt Lake City, I'm Wednesday's Scott Johnson. And I'm the show's producer, Roger Chang. We were just talking about the fact that the Oakland A's have got rid of the radio station in favor of internet streaming. A lot of other good topics on good day. Internet become a member at patreon.com slash DTNS. Let's start with a few tech things you should know. The Android app for Mozilla's VPN service is now available in the Google Play Store. The Firefox private network is powered by Mulvad, which has a no logging policy and uses the WireGuard standard. It offers servers in more than 30 countries for a limited time beta price of $4.99 per month. Well, Google announced the release of Android 11 developer preview one. Developers will need Pixel 2 or Pixel 2 XL, Pixel 3 or Pixel 3 XL, a Pixel 3a or a 3a XL, or a Pixel 4 or 4 XL. Or they can just use the device emulators in Android Studio, which will need the new Android 11 preview SDK and tools. The preview includes new display types, 5G experiences, conversational experiences, and the neural networks API 1.3 and privacy improvements. The Internet Society's Chapters Advisory Council will vote this month whether to recommend that the society not proceed with the sale of the .org domain registry business unless a number of conditions are met. The conditions include a lot more details around the proposal to sell the .org domain registry to ethos capital. Now, the sale could go through without that council support, but there's a lot of complicated factors in how they keep non-profit status. One of that relies on public support and Chapters Advisory Council is usually used as a way to show they have public support to justify the non-profit status. So there is some influence there. The new Office App for iOS is now available after its Android release on Tuesday. We talked about that on yesterday's show. The app was announced last year and has been in beta testing for a couple of months now, combining Word, Excel, and PowerPoint into a single experience. All right, let's talk a little bit more about what's going on with parental controls on TikTok, Scott. Well, TikTok, the juggernaut of social video sharing announced a new set of parental controls, as you mentioned, called Family Safety Mode, so parents can set limits on their children's app use. The features include screen time management controls, limits on direct messages, and a restricted mode that limits the appearance of inappropriate content. These features were already available on the app for users to set for themselves, but this allows parents or a guardian to take over these controls and toggle those switches on or off for their teens. The new features are available in the UK right now, and we'll roll out to other markets over the next several weeks as a fairly avid TikTok user. Honestly, the most powerful mention here to me is screen time management controls because that app is designed quite well.   It doesn't happen unless you're looking at someone's individual profile. So, so I think those are actually going to be very useful. The other stuff I'm a little iffy on, but that stuff's going to work. Well, and this is particularly for parents to put these controls on children. Now, I already hear people in the audience saying, yeah, but children can get around that. Yes, of course, they can totally get around that. They can already get around the restriction that TikTok was forced to put into place by the FTC last February that says if you're under the age of 13, you have to agree to a more restricted TikTok app that restricts what content you see and doesn't let you post to the public, et cetera, et cetera. And of course, children are capable of lying about their age. This is not about building a 100% foolproof system. This is about giving parents a tool that they can use with their children and will work in a lot of cases.  I do. And I think giving parents more tools has two effects. One, it gives them more tools, OK, a mission accomplished. They want more tools, give the give that to them, especially on a planet platform this big. And secondly, it gives TikTok a little better PR about the content. Truthfully, they're already kind of locked down on what they will or won't show. Like when we talk about appropriate content, that's obviously, you know, a lot of people define appropriate content in different ways. But there's no nudity allowed on that app. There's nothing that stays there for very long that breaks any of those rules. And the only other thing I could think of is there is often a bit of harsh language that a parent may object to for their younger kid or whatever. And so giving those parents tools to do something is better than doing nothing. So as a parent of kids who are now sort of on their own, I would have totally supported this in the day. The European Commission has set out a number of proposals for a new digital strategy in the EU targeted at promoting European tech business and providing a regulatory framework for AI. Use of AI in high risk sectors like health or policing would need to be, quote, transparent, traceable and guarantee human oversight. AI would be required to used unbiased training data. Other proposals include AI certification and safety testing for consumer protection, a voluntary labeling scheme for low risk AI, a proposal to ban facial recognition and to ban facial recognition in public spaces for five years was not included. Instead, the proposal calls for a broad European debate about the use of facial recognition. The other proposal for a European data strategy called for a regulatory framework to encourage responsible data sharing between businesses and governments, opening up the public sector data sets to foster innovation and incentives for energy efficient European cloud infrastructure. The European Commission will start drafting legislation based on these proposals and comments at the end of this year. One of the things I know people say they like about our show is that we help them stay kind of in the clear about what's really going on. So weapon one is next time you hear somebody say, well, they're banning facial recognition in Europe, you can say, no, they were thinking about it and they didn't recommend it. And the other side of that is even this proposal is just a white paper and a draft proposal. It's not actually legislation yet. So what will actually happen once this gets debated and turned into legislation could change this. But the significant step here, in my opinion, is the fact that we're beginning to see the European Union debate ethics and guidelines around AI. And this will not be the last we'll hear about it worldwide. This is an ongoing conversation of how best to regulate AI, how best to encourage good ethical practices with AI. And that's that's going to go on for a couple of years, I think. Not super surprised. They pulled back a little bit on the facial recognition stuff or didn't exactly put that in the proposal just yet about the five year ban or any of that. So much of Europe and specifically places in England rely on that for a lot of law enforcement. They've got a lot of facial recognition and close circuit camera work and stuff that goes pretty far into their legal system or into their policing system. So I don't know. I guess I'm just not surprised that that's not necessarily on the table yet and is up for debate because that is something they're already invested in and they don't necessarily want to stop doing that. I would suppose. Yeah, a lot of people are looking at this as, oh, the industry got to them and said, hey, this this will squash us if you ban it. And that may be true. Banning it may have been too big of a move. So encouraging a debate sort of says, well, let's talk it out. Let's find out if banning it really would be a problem. It is kicking the can down the road a little bit, though. The Verges, Sean Hollister has an excellent article on the glass used in the Galaxy Z Flip. And yes, it is glass. There's been a lot. This is another one of those things you're like, I heard it's not even glass. That is just a combination and well, sort of. But the glass is there. It's made by a German manufacturer called shot C S C H O T T. It does have a plastic layer on top, which is leading to the fact that it fails on scratch tests because plastic is way more scratchable than glass. So the the plastic layer on top is meant to protect the glass from breaking because to make glass bendable, you have to make it thin, which puts less tensile strain on it glass. That's aluminum foil thickness can bend like a flip phone, like what you see in the Z Flip. In fact, the Z Flip glass is 30 microns thick. To be able to bend like that, it has to be less than a hundred microns. So it's it's it's a third of that. You also have to get rid of imperfections when you make this kind of glass, because if there's a bubble or even a little dust might that can lead to breakage. Any kind of imperfection when the bending happens will cause that tensile strength to suffer, and you will have better chance of breaking. Hence the need for the plastic coating because a scratch is an imperfection that could happen on the glass. And even if it doesn't happen often, doesn't have to happen that often for that to reduce the tensile strength. And then suddenly you've got breaking glass. So you have the plastic coating to absorb those scratches and keep the glass from breaking. Now Corning, a different company that's making bendable glass, they make gorilla glass, but they're not the one that Samsung is using. Corning says it has bendable glass that won't need the protective cover and expects that to be on devices in the market within 12 to 18 months. We'll see about that. Also, you may have heard of a company called Do-Woo Insis. Samsung says it injects the glass it gets from shot with a special material up to an undisclosed depth to achieve a consistent hardness. So this is their special sauce to reinforce that glass. And it works with the partner Do-Woo Insis on that system to make the final product available for not only the Z Flip, but they're now willing to sell that to other companies to purchase to make their own devices. Wow, I'd love to know what that is. Okay, it's your special sauce.  Because yeah, the whole idea of having the plastic out or cover in order to keep the glass safe makes sense. But if it looks crappy after a short amount of time, that's not going to impress anybody. What you want is to not have to have that protective layer or to figure out how to make that protective layer glass or something that's a lot harder. Yeah, and it's nice. I mean, the corning statement, I'm going to tell we see it. Who knows what that stuff looks like. But it seems like we're headed that way where we're not going to have to worry about stuff to make it look OK or to make it work exactly right. Like we're very early in this kind of technology. So I'm pretty confident in a few years you're going to have fully bendable glass on all kinds of devices and we're not going to worry about whether something's got a plastic coating on it or not. Well, we'll get there. Yeah, the upshot of this is this is early days. These are the first products to even use that. So, you know, if you're into this sort of thing, then great. This is this is something that you can try out now. And if you're an early adopter and you like adopting technology, then this should excite you. It shouldn't matter that that it's not perfect because that's what early adoption is. It's about imperfect stuff. But if you're like, I want this stuff to work right out of the gate. Well, you're going to have to wait a few years, I think. Yep, iteration. All right. Twitter acquired Chromalabs, which I guess means they're iterating, which makes iOS photo editors targeted at Instagram and Facebook stories, Snapchat, that kind of stuff. Twitter does not have a similar ephemeral post feature. By that, I mean a post you put up and it disappears after some time. Chromalabs is shutting down its products and will only update in the future if iOS ends up breaking it or making it not work. Twitter product lead, Kavon Becpore says Chromalabs employees will join the product design and engineering teams to quote, give people more creative ways to express themselves on Twitter. Unquote. So you may be soon doing storage style, something from Twitter or in my opinion, you probably won't be. But maybe they think that people will. Well, if they if they're not going to do that, why would they buy this? They said it wasn't just an aqua hire. They weren't trying to get these engineers and put them on different products. But they are shutting down the apps that work with Snapchat and Instastories. So what are they going to do with that?  We're going to incorporate all this stuff and and Vine is awesome. And this is great. Well, we don't like that. That was that was actually an entirely different staff, practically. Well, sort of. But same same central leadership. I mean, I don't I don't I think it wasn't it wasn't it under Costolo? That I thought it was still under. Well, yeah, I could be wrong. The point is, though, I'm not saying that they'll screw this up. I'm saying from a use case perspective, I don't know why they think I'd love to be convinced otherwise why they think Twitter is right for having an ephemeral story feature like stories. And is this just a me to move or do they really have something unique planned? Because yeah, yeah, that's what I'm wondering. Like, is it is it just something where it's like not obvious to us? It's because we're thinking Instastories. Why would you do Instastories on Twitter? I don't think I want that. Maybe I'm just being an old man. But maybe it's ephemeral messaging in a different way. And it's very Twitter way. And that could be that could be intriguing. So it's also something that it's I don't I don't know if I want this or not. But I also I remember when Instagram stories launched and I was like, oh, they're just copying Snapchat. How dumb and most of the people, not everybody, but most of the people that I used to interact with on Snapchat in that ephemeral way have moved to Instagram stories. It's a huge hit for the company. So Twitter saying, all right, at this point, maybe it's a little bit of a me too. We we we want a feature like this, that so much of the public is used to this type of thing that I think that that's actually where Twitter could win if there was a product that rolled out correctly. Because all the other companies have gotten us used to it. That's interesting. Social media. Everybody's got it. We may as well too, because now it's standard practice to have a social media. And there's a lot of Twitter that's a little, you know, he'd make a joke. It's kind of throw away type thing. I can see Twitter actually working out well for this type of thing. Like this doesn't have to be something that defines you. I'm not going to pin this tweet. It's just something I'm thinking of for the moment. And and and maybe it gets bundled into a DM experience. I'm not really sure. Speaking of platforms, TechCrunch reports that Facebook is testing a tabbed version of the news feed for mobile, including the current most relative feed, moves the most recent feed from the sidebar to its own tab and then adds a tab for already seen, which was previously only available at the URL, Facebook.com slash scene. I didn't even know that existed or even been there before. The prototype was found in the Facebook for Android code by engineer Jane Manchin-Wong. Facebook confirmed to TechCrunch that it is testing the tabbed interface internally. So, you know, it's Facebook for mobile versus Facebook for desktop have always been two very different experiences for me. The idea that I have more choice over what my news feed looks like, I like this idea. I mean, Facebook, Facebook went away, away from risk chronological stuff a long time ago. And I just kind of, you know, everyone mumbled and grumbled about it. And you were all used to it at this point, you know, to this day, there, there are very important posts that I would have liked to see from friends, but for whatever reason, the algorithm just buried it and I didn't see it till later or never at all. You know, you ruin friendships that way, Facebook. But to give me more options for how I want to look at stuff or go back to stuff I've already seen, that again would just be, you know, into the ether. Otherwise, I think that's cool.  I mean, I agree, I agree. As a, I mean, of the people on the show today, we're probably the two most frequent users of Facebook. I don't use it that much, but I use it enough to know that the non unified experience between web and phones already kind of sucks. Uh, I would like at least them to be a little closer together, or if you're going to give me a really great experience on mobile, that would be wonderful too. Um, but the way you share things across groups and other stuff is different between the two platforms, which I cannot get my head around. Also mobile just felt like they just kind of kept laying things out on top of each other. Every time a new feature would happen and it just stacks forever, uh, feature by feature. And you're like, where does this even start? Where's my timeline? Like, I don't know anything, uh, about what I'm looking at half the time. So I'm all for improving that. Um, I kind of have to use it for things. And so, you know, I'd love to be one of those people who says, well, I don't even use Facebook, but I do. And so please improve it. That'd be great. Yeah. And for those of us who, and I'm the same way, you know, Facebook, because sometimes I'm like, all right, I haven't been on Facebook today. Let me just check it. But if I have, if there, there's a, I don't know, story that's sort of breaking and important to me, having a most recent feed is actually the reason that I'm on Twitter rather than Facebook. That's like the number one reason, because everything else on Facebook, it's like two days old and you're getting like happy Valentine's Day from last Friday and the whole thing. So again, more options because there is so much being shared on, on the network makes sense to me. I agree. I, I don't have the app on my phone to get all the tech headlines each day at about five minutes. Be sure to subscribe to daily tech headlines.com. Well, folks, as we mentioned, it's the 30th anniversary of the launch of Adobe Photoshop. It existed before that, before it became Adobe, but it was Adobe Photoshop launched 30 years ago today. Adobe announced some updates to celebrate Adobe Photoshop for the iPad. It now gets the object selection tool. That's the one that first came to the desktop version of Photoshop three months ago. It uses some AI to detect objects in an image so you can just kind of loosely circle it and it'll be like, oh, you mean this and snap to it. The iPad version also gets additional type setting and formatting controls. The desktop has a lens blur feature now that runs on the GPU. It had it before, but it wasn't that great and it ran on the CPU. Now it runs on the GPU. That gives a little more juice so it can provide a more realistic bokeh type effect. And the content aware fill workspace now lets you make multiple selections and apply multiple fills at once. Scott, I know this is a tool that you use in your daily life. How do you feel about the fact that Adobe Photoshop is five years away from being old enough to run for president and these new features that they're throwing in? Well, it's one of the only pieces of software I can look at and say that I think at least multiple times a week and certainly in the last 20 of those 30 years, every day I use Photoshop every single day in some form, whether it's brief or a long period of time, Photoshop is a part of my everyday life and I have a love hate relationship, but I think it's bloated in some ways and has some issues. And from an artist perspective, perspective, it doesn't always sort of lean into some artsy directions that I wish it would. But I don't think we can overstate just how impactful Photoshop is as a piece of software. In fact, it's got to be in the top three most important pieces of software certainly in my life, but maybe to the entire industry. Yeah, kind of ever. Yeah. And it kind of touches everything, right? Like, it doesn't matter what you're doing, where you're going to do it or how you're doing it. Photoshop can be used to get you there, whether someone's finishing a logo or we're touching up photos for the, you know, my realtor side or we're trying to figure out a way to take imperfections off somebody's face so we can get it to print. Whatever it is, it is part of it is not only part of that important software history, but it's now part of just the zeitgeist of life. It is a piece of culture. And when people say, oh, that's been shopped, that's been photoshopped, that's not just the name of a product. That is now a term we use for a verb or otherwise when we're talking about just life. So I think it deserves the position that it has. I'm proud of its roots. So the guys who made all this happen, a lot of them went to the University of Utah, sort of famous here for this sort of stuff, a lot of those Adobe guys. And they pretty much created and now still own the graphics world. There's lots of competition now, lots of really cool up and comers and little offshoots and other things, no question. But Photoshop blazed an incredible trail and had they not been there to do it, maybe somebody would have filled in, but I'm not sure how well it would have gone. So a huge legacy, man, 30 years, it's just, it's insane and it's great. Yeah, as somebody who, I use Photoshop regularly as well, not the way you do those, God. I mean, free transform is still like, I feel like a magician and there are a lot of things about Photoshop I don't understand, but I do use it for various projects on a regular basis. And I thought the video for anybody who's just listening to the version of the show, you should really watch it because it is remarkable how much Photoshop has come along and how different it is now. And not so much the core tools, they've always been there, but it's such a nostalgic look at, oh yeah, that was the first time I saw Photoshop and I was trying to get my head around what I could do with this. And a lot of creative people were trying to figure out, okay, how do I make this part of my livelihood? I remember using it before layers existed and that was nuts. Like layers as a concept is earth shatteringly huge. Like it's just an enormous change, a sea change to creators, to artists, to people who work with photos. And for people who made to just be sort of tangentially aware of Photoshop, layers means that you can edit the photo on different levels within, right, Scott? So that in the original version of Photoshop, you made an edit and you can undo it. That was pretty much all the control you had. With layers, you can go and edit a layer and then have a layer masking it or over it. It just exponentially expands what you can do because you're not destroying part of the other layer when you edit one part. It's like for audio people, it's discrete audio tracks. Yeah, same idea. If you don't have that, then you're like, I don't know, I'll do my best, but with layers you can have so much control. That's a great comparison actually. And it's true that non-destructive quality of what layers brought to that world cannot be understated or overstated rather. And it's so part of everything I do now. And if you talk to any concept artist, anybody doing any kind of artwork using Photoshop, which is again the tool standard for the industry, they're using layers in incredible ways now that you just can't do on canvas. And it's Photoshop's fault that sometimes I'll work on traditional paper or canvas or illustration board and I'll be working away and I'll want to, my finger wants to hit control Z to undo something where I want to pinch and zoom somewhere because my Waycoms and TQL support that or in the iPad case for that app, same thing. Like it changes the way artists think about their canvas. And a lot of people don't understand because they don't necessarily hang around a lot of artists or whatever, but it is just profound. It is the impetus for digital art in the modern era. And without it, I don't know how far along we'd be. It's a huge thing. And this isn't just me pimping for Adobe. I like my Adobe stuff, there are things about it I don't like, there are plenty to say about lots of competing products. This isn't really what I'm saying, but just from a historical point of view, it's really hard to overdo it. It's a big thing. Yeah, I think that's fair because I don't use Photoshop, I use Acorn and I've used GIMP in the past too. I mean, there's a lot of alternatives, but those alternatives all really build on that language that you see. I know, Sarah, you said how much it's changed but it's also kind of odd how much is the same and how much of that Photoshop version one, if you see those videos that are flying around of 30 years ago Photoshop, how much of that is still the visual language of almost every image editing app out there? Yeah, that's true. Not only that, like specifically Tom in that UI, you look at that toolbox over there, it's essentially the same toolbox we have today with some additions and with some features like press and hold and then you get three more tools sub under that tool. And lots of other stuff, AI additions and everything else but really the lasso tool and the selection tool and the airbrush tool and the painter tool and the pen tool, like those are all there in that old screenshot from that black and white Mac. And there's something fun about that consistency and also the fact that that thing is just well beyond that now obviously and its capability, but it's a fun look back at a thing that I just don't know where I'm personally at in the internet and content creation without it, it kind of changed everything for me. It's also one of those subscriptions, $9 a month, gotta do it. Yep. Way to go Adobe, way to go creative cloud. Thanks everybody who participates in our sub Reddit, you could submit stories and vote on them at dailytechnewshow.reddit.com, also join in the conversation in our Discord, it's a good crew in there, you can join by linking to a Patreon account at patreon.com slash dtns. Let's check out the mail bag. We continue to get really good feedback about the whole idea of Slack and Microsoft Teams and workplace, kind of the enterprise and making sure that people are staying on task. First email from Adam says, howdy folks, I'm at a small government organization and we've recently rolled out Teams. The following retention policy was set after lots of head bashing between HR, legal and Adam says, I'm gesturing vaguely at the deployment team. He says, personal chats automatically deleted after three days. Team chats automatically deleted after 90 days. Team files stored forever until a better policy is decided. This was the compromise they came up with so people could use Teams for short term projects and immediate collaboration, but not so much that it became a burden for data storage. Considering we're pretty smoothly using this as a full on internal email replacement, it doesn't seem like we're generating any more data than we would have otherwise. Adoption has been mostly embraced wholeheartedly after we pointed out the gift button. Ha, the old gift button. That'll get everybody all the time. And then David from Phoenix wanted to write in about the team's conversation, said, I work for a fairly large nonprofit in Phoenix, Arizona. We're in the middle of a Skype to Teams transition as Microsoft is killing off Skype for business, the old link. Previous person wrote in about their org not letting them create Teams. The challenge we had was people were creating team names that were not useful for finding Teams, like Test or Test Test, or Joe's House of Monkeys. Also, every time you create a team, it creates a SharePoint site, an email address, a OneNote library, et cetera, which makes it difficult for an IT person to keep things tidy and organized in an active directory environment when it is the Wild West of random names and groups being created. That is more likely the reason for the limitation I am guessing. There's gotta be a way to say you can create a team without creating all of that stuff, but yeah, that's kind of annoying. Thank you, David, and thank you, anonymous person who works for Small Government Organization. These are great insights. Hey, shout out to patrons at our master and grandmaster levels, including Frederick Hubner, James P. Callison, and Juan D. Hernandez. Also, thanks to Scott Johnson. Scott Johnson, I know you're a busy man when you're not doing Photoshop, or maybe when you are. Where can people keep up with your work? Well, they can find everything I do. A lot of it was created in Photoshop, and a lot more of it's created in Adobe Audition. Over there at frogfans.com, you'll find everything I do. In particular, I'm really proud of a current comic project I'm working on. I put up a new episode on Monday. It is called Fred and Can, and it's a nice stark reminder that it's getting close to tax time. Go check out that comic at fredcancomic.com and send me your feedback. Let me know what you think of it. You can find me on Twitter at Scott Johnson. Hey, folks, if you're listening to the free public feed of Daily Tech News Show, which most of you are, you know that occasionally there's advertisements at the beginning and end of the show, and that is a way for us to fund some of the stuff we do here, but it's a middleman. It's gonna take some of that money and keep it for itself, and it's gonna take some of your attention. And if you don't want either of those things to happen, you can, of course, cut out the middleman and fund us directly by supporting us at patreon.com slash dtns. You get an ad-free feed, and depending on how much you're willing to spend, there's lots of other perks involved as well. So think about it.  Go check it all out at patreon.com slash dtns. Our email address is feedback at dailytechnewshow.com. We're also live Monday through Friday at 4.30 p.m. Eastern. That's 2130 UTC, and you can find out more at dailytechnewshow.com slash live. Back tomorrow with Justin Robert Young as our guest. Talk to you then. This show is part of the Frog Pants Network. Get more at frogpants.com. I hope you have enjoyed this program.


As Anna said, I want to give the perspective of the American Chamber of Commerce in Ireland, which, as Anna has said, is the voice of the 700 companies, Irish operations of US companies, that employ directly 130,000 people, indirectly 100,000 people and account for 26% of our GDP in Ireland. And of course, as you know, they're across all the key sectors, data born on the internet, ICT, pharma, medtech, financial services, and general services, including financial and professional services. And these jobs are jobs of substance and jobs of innovation. And you are well aware, I'm sure, in the audience of the amazing breakthrough innovations happening in Ireland, on the island of Ireland, thanks to you as foreign direct investment across all the sectors I have mentioned, and these innovations are enhancing and saving people's lives around the world. Some things about Ireland's corporation tax policy bear repeating, and I do apologise to those of you who have heard these things before, but they do bear repeating because they get forgotten, and they get forgotten in our country as much as internationally. And most recently, I heard a debate on our national radio station last weekend, where these points seem to have been forgotten by some of the participants in the debate. Our corporation tax policy was not a recent invention and was not imposed upon us by evil corporates. It was our own idea. And it was our own idea hatched by visionaries in the late 1950s. And thank goodness they did it because they were facing a country that had little industry to speak of that was on the edge of Europe. And apart from our innate creativity and brains as a people, our only natural resource was grass. So if we're going to live to the expectations of the rest of the world, and if we're going to have a future for next generations, we had to attract inward investment here. And indeed, it was visionaries like T.K. Whitaker, who was recently honoured at a tremendous event in Dublin in his 97th year, and Sean Lamass, that set the framework for that corporate tax policy that has led to 60 years of foreign direct investment. And the T.Shook recently in launching a book about T.K. said it very well. He said, the policy steered Ireland from a stunting and suffocating protectionism to embrace instead the idea of free international trade. Now imagine if T.K. and Sean Lamass and others sat around the table and had their crystal ball and said, let's hope that this policy attracts the top 10, if they knew about it, data born on the internet companies to create jobs here. The top 10 ICT companies, nine of the top 10 of the world's leading pharmaceutical companies, and seven of the world's top 10 medtech companies creating jobs here. They'd probably say, well, that's an outlandish expectation, but let's go for it. Well, that's what has been achieved. That's what we have achieved. And you'd imagine, for that reason, we would want to make sure we protect it within reason the ingredients that achieve that success. So in light of our history and that 60 decades, this, as far as Ireland is concerned, is not a recent idea, and we are not involved far from it in a race to the bottom. And Ireland has always focused on not just the rate, but our regime and our reputation. And I think it's interesting for Pascal to speak this morning and emphasize regulation. And I really, and the chamber really welcomes the contribution by the Department of Finance to research materials in relation to this global discussion. And I particularly highlight the excellent research worked on by Seamus Coffey of UCC with Kate Levy from the Department on Ireland's effective corporate tax rate, which I think has dispelled a lot of the misconception and noise. And as you know, our effective corporate tax rate is extremely close to our headline rate of 12.5%. Members of the chamber deeply appreciate the fact that we have a rules-based and transparent legislative system, that we have a robust revenue authority that meets best international practice, that we have such an extensive tax treaty and information exchange agreement, and that we are ensuring that all our tax code, and including measures like the knowledge development box, will be aligned with OECD and EU best practice. And of course, that we do not have any hidden tax deals in the Irish system. It's also worth remembering that Ireland's corporate tax take as a percentage of GDP is on a par with the rest of the major member states of the European Union, and that 70% of our corporate tax take comes from the foreign direct investment sector. Now, the chamber deeply appreciates the consultative approach taken to the BEPS process, not just by the OECD, but by our own Department of Finance. And I want to take this opportunity on behalf of the chamber to pay tribute to the excellent work done by officials from Revenue and the department, fully embedded and involved in the BEPS process and discussions. So you'll see our detailed position paper on BEPS on our website, it represents the direct involvement of 100 US companies operating here, as well as the input of the Silicon Valley tax leadership group. So it's very representative. And you'll see our focus is not just in Ireland, but on Europe, because Ireland, of course, is a gateway to Europe. And the chamber welcomed the budget 2015 move in relation to cooperation tax policy. We liked the mixture of certainty and ambition. We certainly cheered loudly the minister's statement that our 12.5% rate is settled policy, not up for discussion, not on the table. Because quite frankly, our member companies would welcome less of an obsession with our 12.5% corporate tax rate, because we do think it is settled policy and it ain't the only show in town. But we also welcome the ambition that the minister set out on behalf of the government that Ireland will continue to attract the best companies in the world. And like our friends in the United Kingdom, we have set out a very ambitious corporate tax roadmap, which includes elements such as the knowledge development box. Now, why this consultative process is so very welcomed by the chamber is because we believe, and it's worth stating again, corporates sector is essential if the BEPS process and vision is actually to be implemented and realized. And I think that's important in the context of some of the noise in the media debate and reference has been made to committee hearings, indeed on both sides of the Atlantic. And I think it isn't helpful to demonise corporates if we want to get the right answer to this problem. And in fact, in fairness to Pascal Santaman and indeed to Angle Guria, the OECD Secretary General, he's always been very clear that the issue we're dealing with is not behaviour by corporate taxpayers. The problem we're dealing with, quite frankly, is a failure of policy makers to keep pace with the developments of how businesses do business globally. And that's what the mismatch is all about. And you will all have seen that sort of face off between parliamentarians and the corporate sector, where essentially corporate sector is saying, you set the rules, we want to comply by them, but your rules are now out of date and need to be updated. So because, as you know, we are in an extremely competitive global battle for jobs and the European Union are competing with other super regions around the world. And we must remember that it's European Union collective battle for these jobs, certainty is absolutely essential. And reference has been made to the state aid investigation process going on. We believe it is absolutely essential that we have a robust and effective state aid investigative process, both that it does rise above political tensions. And also we believe it's important that the manner of that investigate those investigations should not seek to undermine the important and necessary interactions between corporates and and revenue authorities. Reference has been made to the C C C TB back on the table again. It's been on the table as long as I've been on the table. It should forgive that segue. But also it's very interesting and I won't do it any better than the Financial Times does today in its analysis of why it is back on the table. So certainty really important. Now in terms of the chambers view on the digital economy and the data sector, you know, we have a tremendous opportunity and price to be seized in Ireland because we have real substance from all the major global players in the digital economy here. And we have some really exciting startups in that sector also making their mark here as well. So we think there's a huge opportunity for Ireland to be a global center of excellence in data collection, protection, analysis, storage and commercialization. But I really mean it when I say a good corporate tax policy is not the only ingredient that we need to make that happen. We need we need a really strong talent policy. We need a really strong data regulatory framework. We welcome the appointment of Helen Dixon as data protection commissioner that office needs the resources and positioning appropriate to that authority. We need a progressive and competitive person tax regime. We need connectivity. And we need to make sure we continue and we really welcome the announcement about the Boland's Mills development. We really need to ensure we have continued to have a good supply of good office and residential accommodation in our city. So to conclude Anna and to include on the theme of certainty in that context, and the phrase raised to the bottom is really important that all these processes we're talking about isn't a raise to the bottom because we have a lot of great strengths in Ireland that shouldn't be diminished by these processes, including the fact we have certainty, we have a robust revenue authority and we have a very appropriate tax administration compliance burden, very appropriate, very competitive. That can't be diminished. And finally, we've talked today a bit about the process and the fact that this process originated, if you will, with people power. During the recession, people seeing consumption taxes and personal taxes rising and seeing the various stories about our corporates paying their fair share. There's expectation now from citizenry around the world about the outcome of this process, but also the expectation from the corporate sector that whatever solution is arrived at is in fact deliverable. Now this is really important because it goes to the faith that we have in the institutions leading this process. And that's not just important for BEPS, it's also important because many of those same institutions are also seeking to deliver what should be a landmark EU-US trade deal or the transatlantic trade investment partnership, TTIP. So faith in those institutions really important for those reasons as well. Thank you all very


What's the word, y'all? A lot of NBA teams are falling into this trap and we gotta talk about it. Other day I was listening to Old Man in a Three with JJ and Tommy Alter and JJ dropped the gym that I need y'all to listen to. I actually wrote down parody distorts reality. So if you're the Raptors and I don't know their mindset, I don't know my size mindset, they're not a good basketball team right now, but they're close. And I think there's a number of teams that are close. As a full 12 minute clip, I highly recommend it. Before we get into talking, look at their banner on their YouTube channel.  Ain't that crazy? Everybody here has achieved greatness one way or another whether it be NBA championships, crazy points, championships, awards, awards, and then there's me. Shout out to the team over there, man. I appreciate that. JJ, this has been ringing in my mind all day. Parody distorts reality. First of all, this is exactly what Adam Silver envisioned when they decided to shrink in the odds to get the first overall pick. This is exactly what they envisioned when they incorporated the play in game because they wanted everybody to feel like they have something to play for. And honestly, the idea of parody for an NBA fan is amazing. I don't know what's gonna happen this season. Even the best team at basketball, the Boston Celtics are only the best in basketball but like a game and a half, y'all. And they're like, they're rolling over people like we've seen teams do. And let's say a previous to last season, every single year, we saw a Warriors. We saw Miami Heat. We saw Cleveland Cavaliers who we knew for eight years in a row was gonna make it to the finals. It was just a whether or not they was gonna win. You know what I'm saying? This year, anything can happen. You can tell me seven different teams are gonna win the championship this season.  That's real life parody. And that's a big thumbs up from me as a Die Hard NBA fan, but also a thumbs up for the casual. The Die Hard NBA fan, it's not a single day that goes by where I'm like, ah, today's Slater Games kind of me and I'm good. You know what I'm saying? And I feel like that happened a decent amount a couple of years ago. Maybe I wasn't in tune as much a few years ago, but still every single night, I know at least there's one game, two games, three games that's worth watching every single night. And for the casual NBA fan who probably won't watch any regular season, the playing game is lit. You know what I'm saying? A seven game series is crazy if you don't know if the one seed is gonna make it all the way. So the parody is exactly what they wanted and that's exactly what they're getting. But as I'm recording this video, there are 30 teams in the league. You notice, I don't know why I even explain it, there's 30 teams in the league. 17 of 30 teams in basketball right now at the halfway point are 500 or worse. 17 teams over 50% of the league are 500 or worse. And then you go back to thinking. Parody distorts reality. Some of these teams that are sub 500 think they have a chance. And I can't say that they're wrong necessarily but they think they have a chance. And I don't want every team, all 17 of these teams to fall into this trap. Of course I watch every single Chicago Bulls game and I watch all my home commentators. I know everybody don't love Stacey King and Adam Amin. Personally, I love both of those dudes. And one thing that I've been hearing a lot over the last couple of weeks because the Bulls had won like eight of their last 11 or whatever, they're starting to put it together if you wanna put it that way. Stacey King and every single one of these games whether it's Brooklyn or Boston the other night, the games before that he keeps saying, remember the Boston Celts were about 500 around this time last season and they went on to go to the NBA finals. And I love Stacey. I love Stacey. I wanna have a conversation with him as soon as possible. But if he has that mindset, I know that the front office has a similar mindset and I know there's other teams in basketball that are looking at what the Boston Celts did last season and look at their mediocre season and be like, we can turn it up. It don't take much. We just need to go on a little bit of run, a little bit of run. So no, we're not selling. No, we're not trading these fees. No, we're not changing the direction of our organization because we believe we can turn our season around because guess what? We might be selling 500. We go on a three game win streak. We're the 16. That's all it takes right now. So because of that, because parity is at an all time high, the reality of what your team is and what your team can be is highly, highly distorted. Absolute gem by Mr. JJ Reddick. And y'all know me as the internet general manager. Partially me saying this is because I wanna see trades. You know what I'm saying? I wanna see trades, but if everybody believes that they can turn this switch or everybody believes that they're actually in this hunt, you're not gonna see a lot of trades. But again, that's just me kind of being selfish. But I'm more so thinking about the long term for these organizations. One thing we've seen over the last couple of seasons is GMs be a lot smarter in when they trade their star players or when they trade their pieces. Because we found out, hey, if I trade this man on a one year deal, we're getting a little bit less value. So let's be proactive instead of reactive. The Spurs got three first round picks for Dejante. Maria, two years left on this deal. They got three first round picks. If they would have held Dejante for another season, that three picks is probably one in a super protected one. You know what I'm saying? So because every team out here thinks that they have a chance and every team out here thinks, well, not thinks, but they know that this period is an all time hunt, they might hold on to that piece one year longer. And it might set their franchise back just one season. Minimal, but again, it's almost impossible to know. And because of that, I don't envy anybody that is in the front office job because it is impossible to know.  If you told me the Atlanta Hawks went on the same streak, I couldn't call you crazy. If you said the Bulls went on another five, six game streak, I couldn't call you crazy. And I think that that's the mindset that we're seeing with these organizations. But a lot of us are so accustomed to it not being this much parody. We're like, the Miami Heat are just two games over 500 right now. And the fact that they were one shot away from being in the NBA finals, you look at that to say they are extremely underachieving, right? Only two games over 500 halfway through the season. But then I think about all the factors. And I think about, again, there's eight teams beneath them. I'm like, yeah, of course you wanna be one of those top four sees right now because that's who you were last season. But like, it's slightly disappointed but you can't even be too, too mad. But I say that, I mean, I know every fan base right now is upset with their team. Like I know we did that video like, oh, is every fan base happy? Is this fan base happy? If this fan base happy, I would assume that majority of fan bases right now individually are upset with the direction or the production outcome of their team so far this season. That's just the way fandom works. I would probably see a lot of Milwaukee Bucks fans not extremely happy right now because they are struggling in their sense but they're still the three seed and above the pack. You know what I'm saying? So fandom is a weird thing like that. A team that is extremely interested to me right now is the Portland Trailblazers. The Portland Trailblazers started off the season. Guns blazing hot the first week and a half of basketball. Damian Lillard was that dude and he was the MVP of the league for the first 13 days at a season but they lost again tonight to Orlando Magic at home to Orlando Magic who I absolutely love, Wendell Carter. I'm so sad that the two pieces that we traded away from the Bulls are both blossoming and looking great. Obviously, Laurie is in all star conversations. Wendell's not there just yet but Wendell is the perfect center for I think the future of basketball. This man can switch on to anybody and offensively he's still coming around but he's still a quality offensive center. I think that these players needed a new place to spirit the wings to get to the point they are now but I wish it was happening here in Chicago. Either way, the Portland Trailblazers lost their two and eight in their last 10 and they're 19 and 21 and no, I'm not about to rehash let's try to get Damian Lillard to a new team. I'm past that you'll never hear me say that again. The next time I'll mention Damian Lillard trade talks is when Dame requests if he ever does which I don't think is gonna happen or we'll make a video once he actually gets traded which I don't think will ever happen but at this moment in time, they are struggling mightily and I wonder what they decide to do.  I just realized my shirt was going crazy, my fault. No games back, they're literally no games back. They just lost a tiebreaker between them and the jazz. So do they have incentives to maybe move Jeremy Grant? No, do they have incentives to do this, to do that? No, if anything they might be buyers because they have Damian Lillard. The difference between being the 12 seed in the Western Conference right now and being the six seed, think about that. That's one, two, three, four, five spots jumped. The difference is a game and a half, a game and a half. So the team, that's the 12th which happens to be the Lakers in this case. They probably like, hey, we're here. Go on a little streak, we're here. But because of that, if I was a team that is at this point and we see the right and is on the wall and we're trying to be proactive, you can probably finesse some of these teams. Oh, they think they one piece away from being that team. Oh, we got that one piece. Oh, we got that one piece, that's crazy. We want a lot for it and you're gonna pay. So we'll see exactly what happens. But again, it keeps ringing in my head, parody distorts reality. Let me know what you think is your reality as an NBA fan of your organization has it been distorted because you have a chance or are you more realistic? Let me know.