Megan McArdle on Internet Shaming and Online Mobs

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4.7 • 4.3K Ratings

🗓️ 16 October 2017

⏱️ 75 minutes

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Summary

Author and journalist Megan McArdle of Bloomberg View talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about how the internet has allowed a new kind of shaming via social media and how episodes of bad behavior live on because Google's memory is very, very good. McArdle discusses the implications this new reality has on how we behave at work and how people protect and maintain their reputations in a world where nothing is forgotten and seemingly little is forgiven.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to Econ Talk, part of the Library of Economics and Liberty.
0:07.0	I'm your host, Russ Roberts of Stanford University's Hoover Institution.
0:11.0	Our website is econtalk.org, where you can subscribe, comment on this podcast,
0:16.0	and find links and other information related to today's conversation.
0:20.0	We'll also find our archives where you can listen to every episode we've ever done going
0:24.0	back to 2006.
0:26.0	Our email address is mailadycontalk.org. We'd love to hear from you.
0:30.0	Today is September 11th, 2017, and my guest is author and journalist Megan McArdle.
0:38.0	She writes regularly for Bloomberg View. She's the author of the Upside of Down,
0:43.0	which we talked about on eCon Talk in April of 2014.
0:47.0	Today we're going to be discussing internet shaming,
0:51.0	the power of groups and related topics based on
0:55.0	a piece that Megan wrote for Bloomberg View that we'll put a link up to.
0:59.0	Megan, welcome back to eCon Talk. Thanks for having me.
1:03.0	As you point out at the beginning of your piece, people have always said and done
1:06.0	embarrassing things that live on and hurt their reputation.
1:11.0	The internet seems to make it different, though, how?
1:15.0	Well, it's the scale. Right? I mean, you see this in business all the time.
1:19.0	The scaling problem is that things that work very well at a small level
1:24.0	don't work so well when you try to make them bigger.
1:26.0	And the example I always give is trying to agree on where to have lunch.
1:30.0	Let's say you want to have lunch with three friends.
	...

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