The People v. Netflix

**Eriq Gardner** (0:01)
Netflix is famous for The Binge, and so what exactly is the addictiveness? Is it the fact that there's autoplay after each episode, that it just goes to the next one? To me, it's kind of, you know, kind of kooky.

**Peter Hamby** (0:17)
Welcome to The Powers That Be Daily, Puck's podcast focused on the intersection of Wall Street, Washington, Silicon Valley and Hollywood, and the players who run it all. I'm Peter Hamby. It's Friday, June 12th. Today, I'm joined by Eriq Gardner, with a look at a pair of intriguing lawsuits making big headlines. One in Texas, where Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton is suing Netflix, claiming that their algorithm addicts children and secretly collects their data. Does this lawsuit have merit, or is this just a political stunt by an ambitious politician? Eriq explains. We also dig in to the case of Brendan Sorsby, a prized college football quarterback, who is at the center of an NCAA gambling scandal and a novel lawsuit from the University of Cincinnati that could blow up how player contracts work in the NIL era.
We'll discuss all that and much, much more on today's episode of The Powers That Be.
Support comes from AMC and AMC Plus, presenting The Audacity, the all-new drama from Emmy Award winner Jonathan Glatzer. Set inside the bubble of Silicon Valley, the series features a powerhouse cast led by Billy Magnussen, Sarah Goldberg, and Zach Galifianakis. Praised as irresistible by The Wall Street Journal, the darkly comic drama looks at what happens when the architects shaping tomorrow can barely manage their lives today. For your Emmy consideration in all categories, episodes available to screen at amcfyc.com.
Critics hail Wonder Man as a triumph of storytelling and a comedic love letter to the art of acting. Set and filmed in the heart of Los Angeles, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II and Ben Kingsley star in Wonder Man. From Disney Plus and Marvel Television, the series follows aspiring actor Simon Williams as he struggles to get his career off the ground. During a chance meeting with a seasoned performer whose biggest roles may be well behind him, Simon learns of a renowned director remaking his childhood favorite superhero film. These two actors at opposite ends of their careers doggedly pursue life-changing roles that peel back the curtain of the industry in a way unlike anything we've experienced before. For consideration in all Emmy categories and now streaming on Disney Plus and Hulu, TV Academy members can stream on Disney Plus.
Happy Friday everybody and welcome to The Powers That Be. Let's go Team USA. Big game tonight against Paraguay. But not as big as this podcast we're about to do with Eriq Gardner. That's for sure. Eriq, good to see you man. We're going to talk today about Ken Paxton, the Attorney General of Texas running for Senate, suing Netflix claiming that they have addictive algorithms that hook children and extract data from families. Is that a political ploy? Is there a real merit to it? We're also going to talk about a fascinating lawsuit in the world of college sports that could, could blow up the world of NIL as we know it. We'll see. But Eriq, good to see you man. Are you a big soccer fan or no?

**Eriq Gardner** (3:36)
In the past, I've been a big soccer fan. This year, I'm, I don't know, I'm not sure what to expect. I don't think the US has a great team, but I just like watching the games.

**Peter Hamby** (3:46)
I'm a skeptic, but I love gathering friends to watch the World Cup. That's the corniest thing you'll ever hear me say in public.
Fellowship. Let's start with this Texas lawsuit. We know that Republicans and Democrats, whether they're in Congress, whether they are attorneys general, have targeted big tech companies, Meta, Google, TikTok, et cetera. Paxton has filed a lawsuit against Netflix in Texas, going after their platform architecture. He wrote about all of this and explained the lawsuit for Puck. What is different about some of the latest lawsuits against tech companies is that they're going after the addictive nature of them. Some of the big tech companies have settled and paid out big settlements to plaintiffs who said they got hooked by these algorithms. So the lawsuits are less about the content and Section 230 stuff, and more about the way these platforms and streamers are built to hook people.
Look, I get that the big tech companies have been a punching bag over the years. A lot of people don't trust big social media companies and their support, their public support has withered over the years, but Netflix is still pretty popular. So it seems like kind of a weird lawsuit from a political sense. But what is the meat of the lawsuit that Paxton filed?