--- title: The Future of Mobility | TIME description: A TIME panel discussion held Wednesday, Sept. 19, at the Newseum in Washington, DC canonical: https://time.com/video/VJkleT8i/ og:title: The Future of Mobility og:description: A TIME panel discussion held Wednesday, Sept. 19, at the Newseum in Washington, DC og:url: https://time.com/video/VJkleT8i/ og:image: https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/VJkleT8i/poster.jpg?width=720 og:type: video.other twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: The Future of Mobility twitter:description: A TIME panel discussion held Wednesday, Sept. 19, at the Newseum in Washington, DC twitter:image: https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/VJkleT8i/poster.jpg?width=720 --- # The Future of Mobility > Sponsored content. Supplied in partnership with TIME. 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They are at time.com/newsletters and are separate from a paid subscription. ## Video: The Future of Mobility [Watch (HLS stream): The Future of Mobility](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/VJkleT8i.m3u8) (1:17:19)  _Published 2012-09-24. A TIME panel discussion held Wednesday, Sept. 19, at the Newseum in Washington, DC_ --- Jul 27, 2023 3:27 PM UTC --- ## More From This Series [All Videos](https://time.com/video/) [Women And Success: Panel Discussion](/video/bUJYz6y2/) ### Women And Success: Panel Discussion [The Future of Mobility: Expert Panel Discussion](/video/YfK7xBF0/) ### The Future of Mobility: Expert Panel Discussion [The Future of Mobility: Q & A with Uber CEO Travis Kalanick](/video/RkqMLEI5/) ### The Future of Mobility: Q & A with Uber CEO Travis Kalanick --- ## Transcript Great, thank you Christine. So I'm Tom Weber, assistant managing editor at Time magazine. And I was the editor of their recent wireless, issue which I got to see in large, large print form behind us on stage this morning. I'd like to welcome you to the future of mobility and especially on a day when the red line was apparently not cooperating. Glad to see everyone here. we -, we're very excited about the group that we have gathered here this morning. It's, it's not easy to try to cover the entire wireless revolution in little more than 90 minutes but think we have the right speakers and panelists to give it a shot. also, it seems like the Newseum is really an appropriate venue to do this as somebody's who's been in media and publishing for a long time, if you want to look at a industry and just communication form that's been transformed by mobile obviously the, the implications have been huge. So the, probably needs some exhibits in the museum on, on mobile. Now at this point, normally I would ask everyone to turn off their mobile devices. But for this event, I think that's probably not a good idea. So, instead of hiding your smartphones, I just want to tell everyone, if you're gonna tweet from the event, please use the hashtag, TimeWireless. I should also tell you that we are being live streamed on time. com today, so somewhere out there, there are people watching us on mobile devices. when, when we decided to publish this wireless issue that, that you see back there we knew one thing without question, is that mobile technology as Christine said is, is changing the world. And it has been for years. In the US, nine in ten adults carry a mobile phone. So it was important to get the obvious out of the way right up front. We're all connected. All of the time, in ways that couldn't be imagined a generation ago. But our managing editor, Rick Stengel, challenged us to go past that and look at the stories of how our lives are changing as a result of this and you know, medicine. Health care alone is entering a new stage of evolution and you see the benefits not just in the hospital down the road, but in villages halfway around the world that are suddenly connected to knowledge that can save lives. That's just one example. So to find out more about how this is changing our lives and maybe just as importantly, our attitudes. We partnered with Qualcom to produce the Time mobility poll. It's one of the most extensive global surveys ever done about the impact of mobile technology, and the findings told us a lot about our wireless lives. From perceptions about the impact on business and politics to the, the simple fact that three quarters of young people now sleep with their phones next to them. In fact, one in three of the people we surveyed said they feel anxiety if they're without their mobile phone for even a short period. I, I don't know if I'm feeling anxiety quite but I know it's hard to go too long without checking the device. So this morning you'll hear more about that, and our panelists will talk about what all this means. But first, we have our keynote q and a, that we'll look at a case study in the benefits, but also the disruption that mobile technology can bring. And how that's challenging existing markets, and regulation, and policy, and, all facets of an industry. So I'd like to introduce Travis Kalanick, the co- founder and CEO of Uber which is a mobile start up that you probably know is getting a lot of attention as the, the car service of the future really. If you've taken an Uber car, you know I mean. You pull out your phone, you tap your request. And, a car shows up and you're on your way. Which is something that can seem almost magical, depending on what taxicab system you're, you're used to in the US. And I'd also like to introduce Michael Duffy. He's Time's Washington bureau chief. And he oversees the magazine's coverage of politics and national affairs. Michael's a pretty wireless guy right? He has an iPad, an iPod, a Blackberry, an iPhone, three sons who help him use it, I think and a wife, and he reports that he's been highly mobile ever since he got his first bicycle at the age of seven. So Michael and Travis, thank you. [ SOUND ] Travis, I want to just start talking about Uber right at the top here, could Uber have happened ten years ago? No. How come? Let's see. You didn't have widely- available GPS on phones. You didn't have battery life that would support that kind of functionality. You didn't have a platform on mobile devices whereby you could build an application for it. If you wanted to do something like this ten years ago, you'd probably have this big clunky box sitting inside of a car, which, in a lot a cities around the country, that's in your taxis and you see something like that. Because it's technology about a decade ago or two decades ago. So, not even close. In fact, even when we started, got going, we started getting things going. We launched in 2010, but. Late 2009, the battery life on the iPhone was not very good. So the driver phone that we would give every driver was plugged in, but it was using more battery then the car could charge it. And so literally after a few hours, our driver's phones would run out of juice. And we're really happy when they upgraded the iOS because it obviously had a big impact on how these guys use it. Did you also think that, quite apart from the technology, sort of the approach of people who have the devices? Sure. It was not ready for something like Uber. I mean I, you know, it was a little bit speculative. But, yeah, I mean, how do I get people, how would I get people who can't use an app on a phone because there are no apps on phones, how would I get them to use it? There's, there's no way. I mean it's, it's, it just wouldn't have been possible. When you, tell us a little bit just how you thought, the idea of the company up. Yeah. I mean, it's, it's pretty straightforward. So, my co- founder and I, you know, both live in San Francisco. And anybody who's been to San Francisco anytime, you know, recently, or even not recently, knows that it's very difficult to get a ride. And so we just wanted to push a button and get a ride. And we wanted to you know, we wanted it to be a classy ride. So instead of pushing a button and a taxi rolls up, you push a button and a town car rolls up. And for, at the beginning, it wasn't like a business idea. At the beginning, it was for him and I, and our hundred friends. We were gonna be in San Francisco have this magical button to push and a town car S- Class Mercedes rolls up and takes you wherever you want to go. And people would be like oh my God. How do I get this? It was for swag. It was, there was a little swag in there. I, I'd say, I bring the, you know, me and my co- founder say, I, I bring the efficiency and and he brings the classy. So he, he, when he rolls into one of these cars, he brings serious swag. Kay, now why did you call it Uber? Were you all frustrated German majors? Not exactly. [ LAUGH ] I, you, look, I know lots of languages, but they all are coding languages. [ LAUGH ] So What. So it is German in a way. [ LAUGH ] so, so what it is, is like when you're starting a company on you know, on the internet. There's only so many things that are unavailable in terms of domain that are, that are available sorry. And you know this was like a cab but it was awesome. And then you like go to these websites and you can say awesome, and cab and then it'll jumble it together and you'll get like a 100 different possibilities and you find out which domains are, available an -, and, at the beginning we were called Ubercab. Right. And we had to take the cab off because we got a cease and desist from the City of San Francisco saying that we were marketing ourselves as a cab company. So, we said we were always Uber, but now it's official. Now talk to me a little bit about since this is the classic disruptive, you know idea. Yeah. who's, ox do you think you have lured more, by rolling out this thing that didn't exist. The drivers whose services you supplement? Yeah. Or the government who's supposed to be regulating the industry? Who, who seems more aggrieved? Well, actually I'd say neither. Hm. Let me explain. First is, we provide this great service for consumers. And I'll get to that, I'll get to the point. We provide this great service for customers, people, citizens of cities. We like to say we give riders high fives. Cuz date night is back. Because I get to my business meeting on time. Because I'm not stranded in a certain part of town. We give drivers high fives, but we give drivers hugs. And the reason why is because they're able to fill their day, they're able to fill those dead spots, and what they're able to do is make a much better living, a much better living wage. And sort of, more than just make ends meet, they can start to invest in their business. We have a number of drivers who have gone from one car, just scrapping and barely making things work. To 15. Because a lot of the drivers who do delivery were just sitting still for part of the day. That's right. They'd have huge swaths of time where they weren't working and so this is another way for a driver to make a living. This is an alternative way for them to make a living that, or supplement their existing living. So for them, they love it. Right? And most of the drivers that are on our system are former taxi drivers. So this is another great opportunity for them. Now, the regulators don't have an issue with that, per se. The regulators though, regulate an industry called the taxi industry. And what can happen over decades of time when a regulator regulates these guys, you know, they build a relationship of sorts and it's sorta like Stockholm Syndrome where the regulators feel like they need to protect the people that they regulate. And, and that's when it starts to get interesting. Talk to us a little, how many cities are you now in Travis? We're in 17. And is there a kind of pattern that's developed as you've gone into each one, in terms of the reaction, particularly first by consumers, and then by governments and perhaps, you'll tell me the next chapter. Well I think that the first thing we see, that the first pattern is that, this thing spreads word of mouth, right? What's very interesting is that, you know like we see with like a Twitter or a Facebook where there's huge explosive growth and it seems to defy rational thought of how quickly these things grow. LIke how much explosive growth? [ LAUGH ] Like, well for us, we're growing 26 % month over month. Which means that we're 16 times bigger today than we were 12 months ago, As an example, and it's not slowing down. And so, so what's interesting is when that kind of viral internet explosive growth goes into the real world, right? So, when it, you know you look at a city that might go, wow we want a new transportation system, we want an alternative way for folks to get around, that can take two decades to happen. And now, it's taking months. Mm- hm. That's a big deal. Yeah. Right. So that's one of the patterns we see. But if you want to talk about regulatory, we see, you know, they, we often see very, every city's different. They have different regulatory scheme, but there's classes. And, generally the cities who, who, the regulators that have issue with us. And it's not in, it's in a small portion of the cities that we're in. They'll find something, and it's usually not based on the law. Talk to us a little bit about the build out in a typical city. You go in, what do you need in advance? You gotta have a core of drivers, you have to have a certain, I mean I found out about Uber by word of mouth myself while I was at a basketball game. Yep. And a kids' basketball game and someone pulled it out and said have you seen this? Have you just checked this out? Yeah, but, but, you, something has to happen before that takes place. Sure. So tell us just a little bit about when you pick a target, say, what are you minimums, requirements gonna be? I mean, we used to have all kinds of minimums, but what we found is that every city we roll out in just works. So, we keep pushing the boundaries. We're, we're in Dallas now. We're, we're in Denver, right, places that you don't think of as like, dense cities with taxis or that kind of car service, and the numbers are exploding. Right so. So look, I mean, we, we, we have a launch team that goes into every city, that basically lines up the supply side of the equation. We soft launch, and then we do a dinner the night before a launch with a who's who of that city. Sort of ingratiating ourselves to the city, paying our respects, saying we're rolling out a transportation system. We're really excited about it. But it's part of our culture which is celebrate the city. Right, is that, it's not like we're all in HQ in San Francisco and then we have all these little satellite offices. Uber is global. The ci -, the offices that we have in every city we're in has some of our best, you know, human resources, our best human capital is in those states. Can, is there, I wanna talk about what's going on in D. C. in a minute, is there a, is there, have you seen among those 17 cities, any kind of regional or different reaction to, sort of embracing it. Has there been places where, you know, boy, we don't like your kind here [ LAUGH ]. And place it with an asterisk. Who doesn't want to bring date, date night back. Right? Like we don't really find. We don't find that consumers have much of a problem with having an option of pushing a button and impressing their lady. Right. As an example. We haven't seen that problem. Now you could go, and every city has it's unique culture. And when we communicate what we do, we have to integrate with that culture. So, as an example, you don't talk about class in Seattle, you talk about style. Right? In D. C ., you do it in political terms. So, if I'm having fun at a D. C. cocktail party, I'll talk about the populous limo movement. Right. [ LAUGH ] You have to understand the city and the culture of the city when you go into it, and before we go in every city I go and do this launch dinner. I usually make a speech, and, and it requires me to sort to do like a modern day anthropological sort of survey of folks to understand the city, and how we work with that city. This is transportation. Everybody has a commute, everybody goes from point A to point B. And understanding pain points, understanding how they think about getting around the city. I like to say I have intimate love affairs with cities. And it's just a non exclusive relationship. This is of course not your first [ LAUGH ] not your first, disruptive experience. You were. No. Heavily involved in making music much more available to people ten, twelve years ago. Sure. When music digital revolution took place. just, take two or three minutes and compare for us, if you can, Sure. What it's like to, be involved in the explosion of One In Shoe, which was, you know, essentially a music monopoly, and transport them. And, and then I want to just follow on another one. So, just [ CROSSTALK ] Well it's interesting. Any interesting contrasts? [ CROSSTALK ] You know, If you take an industry that often might even have some sort of limited monopoly on their assets, like copyright could be an example of that. the, you may get into a place where innovation, disrupted innovation, is something that's anathema to how they roll. And when that happens, they will, you know, they find instead of competing, you'll often see that they try to squish and they try to slow things down. They try to slow progress down. And, I can't remember what one of the major music companies just decided that they're finally gonna do some digital distribution of tracks online now, 15 years after it originally started. So, they look to regulators and laws to slow things down versus looking to compete and innovate themselves. And you know, I say the difference between music and say, like something, like a, a taxi industry or something like that is that the taxi industry is fragmented. It's fragmented into hundreds of jurisdictions around the country, if not thousands, where like, you know, the city of Cambridge which I refer to as the Soviet Union of Cambridge. If you look at their laws, it's out of control. Cambridge, Mass? Cambridge, Massachusetts. Home to Harvard and MIT. If you order a town car in 15 minutes you then, in nic -, I'm sorry, you order a town car that comes in 15 minutes, you have to stare at that town car for 7 hours and 45 minutes before you're legally allowed to get into it. And if that driver lets you get into that car before that time is up, he can get arrested. So my point is, is that, they don't care about the governor of Massachusetts. That's their own thing. And so that's very different than the music industry which is regulated from sort of a, the laws are national. It's a different beast, basically. Talk to us a little bit about what is going on in D. C. that you guys, and the taxi folks and the tax commissioner in particular have been engaged in a kind of guerrilla war for you know, nearly a year. Each side has its good days and its bad days. Where do things stand and where do you think it's going? Sure. And I could talk a lot about D. C. The bottom line is that, before we roll out into any city, we do the legal review and we make sure their cities were not in, we're not in Vegas, we're not in Miami, because it's not legal for Uber to exist. Gambling and prostitution is legal in Vegas. Uber is not, okay? So, we went to D. C. where what I call white glove legals. It's not even close, it's not even a grey area. It says that a sedan can charge as an example, this will give you an example of how it works, right. There's clear law in D. C. when we rolled in. It says a sedan, six person vehicle a vehicle that can hold six passengers or fewer that can charge, that charges by time and distance. And about a month after we had launched, the taxi commissioner, a guy named Ron Litton, was out there in the press, saying it is illegal for a town car to charge by distance. Just making it up, right. And so, we sometimes just have to deal with that kind of thing. But when the law's on your side, when the citizens of a city are on your side and the drivers are on your side, it's very hard to fight. And so, if they try to, you know, send us a cease and assist or do something along these lines, we send an email to our customers. We say they're, you know, threatening the ability for you to use a service that you love. Here are the folks that you should reach out to and in D. C. when they realized that the law that we were, that we were sort of complying with the law, they tried to change the law and they tried to set a floor so that we couldn't charge cheaper than five times the taxi on the minimum. And, our users went crazy. Right. And they rolled that amendment out. They called it the Uber amendment. And they rolled it out at 4 PM on a Monday, so it could be voted on 11 AM on a Tuesday. I sent a letter to our users very quickly 37, 000 tweets were sent. 50, 000 original emails. These weren't, like, robo emails. 50, 000 original emails were sent to city council people. 105 million social media impressions, and guess what? The Uber amendment was rescinded. It was pulled, right? We saw the same thing in Boston as well. The, one of the great advantages of the, of the mobile era is that you do have this astonishing and fast access to data. So when you drilled, lets drill down into the data. When you go look at the data, what does your data tell you that you didn't expect it to tell you? In addition to giving you these options and these sort of levers to pull is there, I'm sure you're seeing things that you never expected you would see. Oh yeah, I mean, there's tons of data. We, we know how the city moves right. But to give you an example like when we launched into New York, when we launched New York, we thought, well look, it's all about Brooklyn because you can't get taxi's in Brooklyn right. And every time somebody opens an app every time somebody opens up our app we see exactly where it is and we have a heat map over New York. We have these maps all over the office. Right, and we hadn't launched in New York. We didn't have cars on the ground, but people were downloading our app cuz they wanted cars, and they were checking all the time. And then we saw, well, we looked at the heat. There was no heat in Brooklyn. At least not at that time. And so then we're like, wow, we gotta change our entire strategy. These are the types of things we see, but we see how people move from neighborhood to neighborhood. I mean, I could go ad nauseam about some of the cool stuff that, that we're looking at. I, do I have time for a quick, lightning round? I think I have time for a quick lightning round with, with Travis. Okay. These are gonna come really fast now. Alright. What cities would you like to go in next? Miami and Vegas Cuz? Because they need us. [ COUGH ] Is, are you in L. A .? Yes, no sorry, yes we are in L. A, I'm from Los Angeles. This is my hometown. I live in San Francisco. Overseas, is Uber possible Uber there? We are in London and Paris right now. We are about to be in a whole bunch more cities probably four more cities, three or four more cities before the end of the year in Europe. Can you, is it different, is it, is there anything significantly, you know. We look at the markets city by city, not country by country Paris is more like San Francisco than New York is like San -, than New York is like Paris. When was the last time you took a real taxi? The last time I took a real taxi was actually in D. C. It's crazy, but it just, sometimes, you gotta do it. And I had my bag. I was going to City Council because we were talking to them about this law that they were trying to pass. And I put my bag in the back of, in the trunk. And I forgot my bag in the trunk. I lost my bag in a taxi. This was only a couple months ago when my team called, sorry this is lightning round but this is too freaking good, when my, when team called to find out about like how do we get the bag back? [ LAUGH ] The number, the phone number that you need to call to get your bag or any lost, any lost item, goes to the taxi commissioner's office. [ LAUGH ] So his assistant answered the phone for the lost and found number. That just tells you, needless to say, I didn't get my stuff back. [ LAUGH ] We're gonna stop there. Travis Black thank you very much. Yeah. Thank you [ INAUDIBLE ]. [ SOUND ] This is mobile right, right here, mobile. [ INAUDIBLE ] Thank you Travis and, and Michael. Who knew that the taxi business is such a, such a rough business. Especially if you're trying to accomplish some change. A reminder, the hash tag for the event is TimeWireless. I've seen a lot of tweets already in the morning. So, I'll keep following those. And now, we're getting our panel settled in here, so I'd like to, introduce them. Ines Chopra is the first Chief Technology Officer of the United States, and the architect of the National Wireless Initiative, among other things. Isobel Coleman, senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. And an expert on how democracies and economies develop. And the role that mobile can play there. Matt Flannery is the co- founder and CEO of Kiva, the ground breaking platform for micro loans that connects entrepreneurs around the world with Capital that can change their lives and change their communities. Judith McHale, CEO of Cane Investments and former Under Secretary of State she knows well the ability of technology to disrupt the way we individuals and companies communicate, but nations as well. And Ray Ramsey, the CEO of TechNet, the network where leaders of top technology companies come together to develop policy solutions. And to crack the whip on this group, our moderator Time's own Jeff Kluger. Jeff is Time's senior editor for science, health, and technology, and can give you brilliance on topics from cell phones to sibling rivalry. Jeff is an expert on and even the Mars rover, so Jeff. Thank you very much. You are [ INAUDIBLE ] [ INAUDIBLE ] Illustrious member of this remarkable panel. I will start my first question with Anish. We will go out [ INAUDIBLE ]. Anish the, the US benefits from having the chief technology officer. Part, part of the reason for that is that we're a mature democracy, Capital Hill notwithstanding, and we are good at separating the role of, of administrators and regulators and facilitators from what should be a very freewheeling media. Would a role like the one you built serve as well in a less mature and less developed democracy elsewhere in the world. The answer to the question is yes. I had the pleasure of serving as the co- chair of the US India Open Government Dialog. And my co partner if you will, is the Chief Innovation Officer for the government of India, Sam Pitroda. Now of course India is a mature and thriving democracy. I don't want to suggest otherwise. But its infrastructure, in many ways is, you know, challenged in the sense that there are communities within India that lack indoor plumbing and traditional models of infrastructure. But what was fascinating about the power of technology was when the President visited, we in downtown Mumbai, we're able to connect the president to a rural village in a state called Rajasthan, where they lacked access to the traditional models of infrastructure, but they had 4G mobile broadband. It connected to the village. And the President conducted a high definition video conference. And he learned all about how, in 90 days, the villagers were completely empowered. And his response to them was that you're leapfrogging 21st 20th century infrastructure and moving into the 21st. So the question on the table is, governments around the world are wondering, how do they harness the power of technology, data, and innovation to both solve problems and grow their respective economies? And that doesn't necessarily require one to have the uniqueness of the American model to take full advantage. And we're starting to see that happen. 40 plus countries have signed on to an international open government partnership to sort of bring these philosophies home in their countries, and it's starting to have a real impact. [ INAUDIBLE ] the idea that these are developing countries and developing institutions gives them more flexibility than others [ INAUDIBLE ] [ NOISE ] so that, there, there could be a, a, a well- hidden page there. Isobel when we spoke earlier you talked rather, rather in passionate ways about the power of technology to improve community health. Particularly maternal and child health. And yet we come up against say that the problems of local groups local anti western groups blocking polio vaccinations in Pakistan, which is ground zero for this final push to eradicate polio. Is there a way that mobile is being turned against the interest of of the spread of global health? And is there a way that we can use mobile to push back against that? Well, the potential for mobile to increase global health is enormous because there, there are two different issues going on. One is just the lack of information. People don't know what are just some very basic health, best health practices. And so being able to provide them with concrete information and steps that they can take to improve health and nutrition is a very high leverage way to interact with people and be it maternal health, you know, there is an access point when women are having a baby. They can get information then. But then they may not see any type of community health worker or health professional, until the next baby is delivered. And in between you can use mobile tech, technology through texting and very simple mobile technology to provide information to, to mothers, to fathers, to community leaders as the way of providing the health information they need and on the other hand also combating stereotypes and misinformation. So you mentioned polio, of course there's been a lot of misinformation about polio that has been spread not only in Pakistan but also in other countries like Nigeria that somehow, polio vaccinations will make women sterile. This isn't a, a Western plot to reduce birth rates of, of Muslim populations of, to. to bring all sorts of bad things into the community. And being able to combat that, propaganda, which in many ways it is. With fact and with information, mobile is a platform to do that and through you know, today, one of the big revolutions is that I travel all over the world [ INAUDIBLE ] of Afghanistan people have mobile phones. Everywhere I go, in Pakistan, in Africa, in fact I joke with my family that my cell phone service is better in Rwanda than it is in the island where I live, and really, it's, it's, it's been a remarkable transformation. Everybody has access to a cell phone now, so being able to use that to test important information both addresses the lack of information and the misinformation that is out there. I sometimes say that some of the better, I'm convinced that my cell carrier, I won't say what it is because they're fantastic. I think they communicate with the Cassini Spacecraft orbiting Saturn. I don't know how they do it. Matt, you have a, a Masters in Philisophy from Stanford. The kinetic world of the mobile device seems like the least reflective place imaginable. So, first of all I'm wondering, how you square that circle? But second of all, and I, I don't know if we have a slide up. In our poll, 34 % of our respondents said that, a few hours, is the longest they could go, without using their mobile device. In fact, I got a press release from a psychologist on the West coast yesterday, who hoped for coverage for the fact, that she is now treating, what she calls, NOMO phobias, the fear of being out, without your mobile device. Are we raising an attention deprived generation? Well, maybe so, I'm feeling a little bit anxious right now. [ INAUDIBLE ] It's been five minutes since I've checked my phone but, I think those are, all real problems. I certainly feel those problems. But I think they're primarily problems of the very privileged. I'm really interested in global technology as, a tool to help those people that are truly left out, in the most remote parts of the globe. There's a saying in the US, in Africa, mobile payments are a solution to a problem. In the U. S. bubble payments are a solution looking for a problem. There are real problems that mobile payments are, are solving in East Africa and all over the world We just had a borrower borrow $ 60 on his phone in the slums of [ FOREIGN ] to buy a wheelbarrow so he could go back and forth, to a recycling center. That's the kind of credit that would be too expensive to deliver in a banking agent cash. But with mobile phones, you can make those transactions seamless with almost a 0 % variable cost. So, it's really promising. It is. Judith, if you were still with the State Department I know your freedom to answer this question is somewhat circumscribed. But what kinds of conversations do you think you'd be having this week about how to use mobile power to address what's been happening in Egypt and Libya and elsewhere in the, in the Middle East? Well obviously I'm not there, but I can well imagine some of the conversations that they're having about the entire event. But one of the things when I was there and what was the key part of the administration's outreach and engagement was to really understand and use platforms that people were using as a communication tool. How do you get information out in, accurate information out into a marketplace very rapidly? In doing that, one of our, sorta big focuses was to sort of, be able to, find out how are people communicating that, certainly, I think one of the things that you saw, in, in Libya was how rapidly that information was going. Literally, information about that video was going across, the Middle East, frankly around the world. How quickly that information was released. To mobilize I think Isobel talked about, we, we, we tend to focus a lot on the good uses of mobile. Right. But obviously there are a lot of, the, there's the dark side of the technology as well. And I think one of the things that we wanted to do was to be sure that our voices were being heard there. That we too were able to go out and communicate, and to use those as tools to engage. And if you look at this proliferation of mobile devices around the world, demographically, deep into societies. It's critically important for governments to be there, to use that as an important and powerful communication tool. If I have a concern, I think one has to fight the tendency to sort of pull back a little bit. And, and in reaction to something like that. But I'm pretty convinced that my colleagues are not doing that. Obviously Ambassador Stevens was a great example of how one should go out and communicate and engage. And I'm sure that'll continue. So it's almost as if there's something of an informational arms race, that's being mediatied by or driven through, the prolific, profilic [ CROSSTALK ]. Yes and Hillary Clinton's been very vocal on that point the importance of doing it. And you know as I've travel around the world this is an issue that governments everywhere are dealing with. How do they do that? And particularly as you can imagine when governments [ INAUDIBLE ] controlling the flow of information, you're in an environment where you can't [ COUGH ] control it. So the important thing to do is to be out there with, with the information that you want to provide in a very positive and powerful way. Ray, when we spoke earlier, one of the most interesting things you raised was the idea that the robust growth of the apps industry isn't simply providing New tools to end users. It's also becoming quite an engine of job growth for the people who are writing the apps, marketing the apps and, and selling the apps. And I'm interested in, in how this side of that story is playing out. Well, you know, it's, it's one of the, the few good news stories in terms of the economy. We did a study at Technet that looked at from, from about 2008, 2009 till today, and roughly 466, 000 jobs, nearly a half a million jobs have been created in the app's economy as we call it the app's economy, and so that's all the way from people writing code, marketing, sales, et cetera. In fact there are, you know help wanted signs where this, new part of the economy, is looking for people to come into it. Now, there are implications for this in terms of public policy. Mm- hm. In order to keep this going, we have to make sure that we deal and address issues of spectrum, you know, that I know Anish in his former life was, was focused on making sure broadband both its availability and its adoption is available across the country. But one of the other good things about the apps economy, there are two things that I would point out. One is the barrier to entry is not that difficult. And the second part is it's, it's distributive across the country. So, when we looked at it, you have regions like Philadelphia and Milwaukee and other places that wouldn't necessarily jump out at you and say oh, that's where technology is going. So, we find it distributed across the country. So it is an economic and jobs opportunity for the entire nation. Anish. And I think we have a slide for, for this one too. In our poll that we conducted with Qualcomm, China ranked first among countries whose respondents said that mobile tech has made it easier for them to maintain and improve their family's health, with 90 % agreeing with that statement. The US and The UK, the most highly developed nations on the list that we, that we interviewed ranked last at 50 % or even a little bit below. Why that disparity? It seems so counter- intuitive. Well, it's changing rapidly. I mean, one of the most exciting trends in healthcare is the liberation of data. And this notion of personal empowerment is something that the President called for in August of 2010. It was interesting. For many, many years, our soldiers, when they retire, when they moved on into the Veteran's, Affairs, Department for their care, their records didn't follow. So for many years, billions of dollars have been spent. In fact, it's still going on today, to try to connect these systems behind the, the, the firewall, if you will. And, one of the innovations we, we encourage the President to challenge us on, was, well, why can't we provide the data directly to the service member, or the veteran, and then allow them the responsibility for doing what you're saying the Chinese have said they wanna do, help them maintain at least their own health data. So, he intiated a call he said, in August 2010, in the speech where he ended the combat mission in Iraq, he said this fall, we will provide you a simple blue button that would allow you to download your personal health records to use as you wish, to share with whomever you like, and it would be simple, lightweight, and easy to adopt with privacy and security. We thought, the estimates in the VA, were something like, 25, 000 veterans might avail themselves of this service. They hit that in the first few weeks when the system went live, within 90 days. We are now two years in on that launch. It was October of 2010 when it went live and we are now north of one million Americans. Have pushed the blue button. Active duty military, retiree. I mean the, the VA, and medicare beneficiaries. And to pile on this movement Aetna and United have said that all of our patients will have access. And just last Monday Secretary Sebelius had convened, a consumer health empowerment session and private sector entrepreneurs have voluntarily agreed they will provision this blue button service. So you test that survey again in a year as the blue button proliferates. Right. And you're gonna start to see Americans feel like, I can have my data. HIPAA empowers me as a law. I'm entitled to that data, and a whole new series of apps to raise comment will emerge to say if you share it with us we'll tell you how to keep your family healthy, to insure that your care is coordinated, and overall we believe this will lower cost and improve quality. So, it, the, the spot in time in which you took the survey might be a bit disheartening, but the trend is overwhelming and the policies are, are putting some, some steroids, if you will on this ende -, on these efforts. Just a quick follow- up, do you think that part of that might also be part of this disparity, because we saw this in some of the, the numbers about whether mobile tech is making governments more accountable. And the numbers for that were much higher, again seemingly paradoxically, in China than they were in the U. S. But mighten that, both in the case of health and democracy, be simply that they're starting from such a low threshold to begin with that any improvement seems like an explosive improvement? I, I would actually, I, I think this is a very important question. McKenzie did a very uh, uh, thoughtful study about a year and a half ago. The sectors of the American economy that have not seen productivity growth relative to those sectors that have, obviously, our tech industry has just dominated. Right. Health care. Education. The government itself. These are sectors of the American economy that have been flat to negative in productivity gains. And if you go back to Greenspan's comments in the 90s, it's the application of technology that had achieved the productivity growth. So what you're seeing is alm -, essentially an indictment that we've not had these sectors of the American economy thoughtfully embraced the application of these technologies. Right. So, it's not just buying a series of iPads and. Hm. Putting them in the classroom. But it's how we change the way, information is, is shared and students are, are t -, are taught or, or p -, patients are cared for. That's starting to change as some of these newer policies are coming into action. And I don't wanna carpen, harken back on the s, Recovery Act, but the truth is, the President in that investment plan Not only helped the ec, economic recovery, but put in place the foundation for this digital revolution to impact healthcare, energy, and education. We're gonna have millions access their personal health data. We're gonna have millions access their personal energy consumption through the green button. And we're seeing the same thing happen in open education data, through the most recent Race to the Top competition. So it's going to happen and have a bigger impact than people have seen heretofore. Great. Isobel, education is a basic right and in many ways it's also a profoundly powerful health issue. Since illiteracy and lack of schooling are so closely linked to poverty, which in itself is linked to health issues. So how can we use mobile tech to assist in getting kids who are off the grid in so many other ways, pulled back on it and educated properly. Well, my, my focus is really in, developing countries and. Right. And I, look and examine some of the, poorest countries in the world. And they have a couple of different issues. I mean, all countries in the world are struggling with education. Some have access to education issues. Others have enormous quality of education issues. And what you see for the poorest of the poor in the world, those who are off the grid, in effect, is that i -, you know, the mobile, they all have access now to mobile phones but these are not, these are not smart phones. Hm. It's not the iPhone, you know, the iPhone 5 that we're talking about. These are very simple early Nokia versions of telephones where they can text basically, and, there's a lot of experimentation going on about how, to, use that to bring learning. Mm- hm. And, you know, we're not talking about, a whole, course for kids. It's not the equivalent of second grade, but some of them are picking up basic literacy from texting, And others, you know you, where you really see the impact is on teachers. I mean one of the biggest impediments to education is just lack of, teacher training and, and human capital to be able to teach kids. In a, in a quality way, and so now, there are a number of initiatives that are trying to use the mobile technology to improve teacher training and to update lesson plans for teachers. It doesn't replace the teacher, of course. It's not going directly to the kids. That is still too cumbersome unweildy with these not smart phones that they're using. But yes, through through texting and through some of the mobile applications they are getting lesson plans done on a national basis that are geared for the, the groups that their ty -, trying to teach and, and you are seeing some gains there. And of course it's, it's just information, I mean, there's a huge world out there, And for kids who are not on the grid, being able to access information is, opens up a, a world in an enormous way. I mean, before it's the proverbial well, you know. That's where they got their information. Their mothers went to collect water at the well, uh, there's a lot of, we were talking about misinformation before. There's a lot of rumor mongering, and misinformation, and, and superstition that's passed on at the well. And that's really the source and it's how it's spread and there's not a lot beyond that. Today, there, there is almost no community that's, that's centered around the well anymore. They have access through television, or through satellite, or you know, radio and, and increasingly through mobile technology to be able to ask questions. Search for answers so all of this is building basic literacy and, and just expanding people's minds. And just a very quick follow up to that, something you mentioned back in the green room. I wonder if you could just, explain briefly some of what you were raising regarding the, the gender disparity as well and the fact the, the male control of mobile device of certain parts of the world. And how women who aren't educated far too often are being able to or how, how you are getting mobile devices into women's hands. Well there have been a number of studies that the Cherie Blair Foundation has done a great study. Looking at, the gender gap and, and access to mobile technology around the world. And in developing countries, you see some pretty big gaps, still. Upwards of, 20, 30 points in some cases, where women have lower access to mobile technology, than men. typically, conservative societies, where men wanna control women's access to the outside, outside the family. And you've actually seen some violence surrounding that in countries like Afghanistan where women have accessed mobile technologies and have paid for it with their life. But now you're seeing a much more sophisticated approach by the cell phone companies who recognize women as great customers. They may spend less on a monthly basis but they're more loyal and so over the lifetime of the customer they're very valuable and they're pitching products to the husband or to the, the male decision maker on the basis of look. It improves health, safety, security, and by the way income generation. You know women now, a lot of them have home based businesses where they can access market information to know what price to sell their vegetables or their poultry or whatever it may be. And that's providing all sorts of tangible benefits; and helping to breakdown and overcome some of those stereo, stereotypes that are preventing women from accessing the, the technology. Great. Matt, and I think we have a slide on this one too. Yes, we do. In our polls, we found that most people, here we see 63 % in India, say that having a mobile phone or a mobile device allows them to get more work, to do more work get more work done. We've seen this in all countries. And this is particularly in a place like India. A force multiplier in a growing economy. On the other hand we also all have a fixed number of minutes in our days to, to spend as we will. And every minute that we spend working is a minute we are not spending with our family. Or doing other things that don't involve, income generation. How can we address this fact that, that, that mobiles, while they make us more productive, are also very much a time suck? Hm. [ LAUGH ] yeah, well I think there's all sorts of infrastructure in our society that saves us time and if you're growing up, or living in a rural place in a developing country, that infrastructure's not there. And there's a lot of things you do that waste a lot of time that aren't necessarily work. I was just in Lima, Peru. And I visited a group of people that had to walk two hours just to go to a bank. When they got to the bank they'd have to wait in a line that was often up to an hour. If you ever seen these banks in a developing world you wonder Are they going on strike? What's going on at the bank? No, it's just the line outside the bank. People have to go there and if, if you run a small business, a small kiosk or if you're a farmer, you make money on a daily basis, maybe like $ 2 or $ 3, you have to deposit that money somewhere. Or you have to save it or you have to spend it. And saving it at your home is often very, very dangerous. It's a lot of insecurity, instability in homes. So the point is, you waste a lot of money just depositing $ 2 or $ 3 in the bank every day .$ 3. It's very, very time consuming. And it leads to a culture where people can't save. Cool thing is, one, one thing I'm excited about with mobile technology is, it's possible for the first time for these people to have a bank account. Right there, on their phone. Get the money into their phone in their own hometown, and keep it there or send it to someone that they, that needs it, or even send it to a bank to save that money. So it's a, it's a real benefit that can enable people to actually save time, and spend more time hopefully with their family. And just a, a quick follow up here also, and I want us to be mindful of time, but this, this gets into a little bit more of what your real on the ground work is. We also were talking about the idea of fraud prevention. In countries in which these things aren't terribly well policed, if you only have $ 2 or $ 3 to deposit and, and you try to do it electronically and it's lost or filched, that's a real problem. With micro loans the same thing comes up. so, what do you, how do you deal with that? We're learning, you know, it's a, its a real day to day issue. I face it all the time. When I started Kiva about six years ago, at the beginning we're on Oprah Winfrey show and we raised million of dollars, really really fast, and I started spend -, sending money all over the world without visiting or knowing the people we were working with. And I lost a lot of money. Yeah. Needless to say. Encountered a lot of criminals. Fought some court cases in places where I would never win those cases. Since that time gotten a lot stronger. At the, the practice of evaluating organizations. And their ability to you know reference check people in their their community to take loans. So the way we're working with our mobile program is we, we work with NGOs in Kenya who refer borrowers to our site. They post the profiles and will actually send money to the borrowers themselves on their en pace mobile money account, directly from San Francisco to their account at 0 %. So far during this we'd have about a 90, 95 % repayment rate. In the last year we've only been doing, doing it for a year. And we're trying to use the best of like the micro finance industries you know wealth of learning's around [ COUGH ] trust, and group lending methodology, and reputational collateral. And we're trying to transfer that to the internet, for the first time to create this global digital community of trust. Giving people badges, having people endorse each other. My reputation's at stake, if you don't repay. Age old tactics about, around reputation. So far it's working. sometimes. We just, we just introduced repayment badges. And we gave this borrower in Kenya a gold badge on his profile. He was very proud. But he asked for the medal. [ LAUGH ] He thought he was gonna get a physical medal, and he wanted us to deliver it to him. So not all the tactics of social gaming transfer immediately to an African context, developing world context, but that's sort of the hypothesis of my, my life's work is whether I can figure that out. Yeah, you said earlier that you have had $ 1 million stolen at some point, which isn't something that a lot of us can say. So, you clearly have [ CROSSTALK ] On the record now. Yeah. Out of $ 350 million. Yes. So it's a deminimus numerator in a big denominator. Yeah. Yeah. Judith, you've been you spoke a lot about making mobiles power to make life safer in, in secure communities and you spoke specifically about Afghanistan and Pakistan. I think we have another slide about this. Our poll found general agreement over 50 % everywhere in the world that mobile tech makes their country safer. I'm wondering if you can mention a few ways in particular that Mobile Tech can be used to make life safer in the U. S. and perhaps in other places in the world. But let's start domestically first. Well, actually let me sort of flip it and start. Okay. From lessons learned from looking at some of those countries. When you're in an insecure environment, obviously having access to information which is directly relevant to you, is critically, critically important. And I think the same thing would, would hold true here. So, in Pakistan, two examples of that early on, in the administration in working with Ambassador Holbrooke as we looked at, Pakistan and Afghanistan we saw, very early on, the power of mobile in an insecure environment. In the case of Pakistan, we helped them establish tip lines where people could very quietly, in the privacy of their own homes provide information about potential terrorist attacks. That sense of being able to do that is hugely empowering to a, to an individual. Again, in Pakistan, the same thing we found in Haiti at the time of the earthquake. In Pakistan, during the, the, the floods and Haiti during the earthquake, one of the things that we found, that people in those situations were struggling with was the lack, lack of information generally. But most specifically, lack of information to me. I'm here in this particular village. I understand what's going on in a broader context because I'm hearing that on television. I'm hearing that on radio. But what is happening to me? Where do I go if I'm in a refugee camp in Pakistan? Where is my, where are my people from my community? Where do I actually go? The same thing in Haiti and frankly we saw the same thing in Mexico as the result of the drug war that was going on. People wanting very local, personal information, and I think that's one of the most powerful aspects of mobile, which would be applicable here or elsewhere. At a time of crisis, what is the most relevant information to me? How can I do that? And then the other side of it is, it is empowering so that you can communicate, with your community, with others, to say here's where I am. Here's my situation. Here's what's going on here, and I think it's that two way flow of very, very personally relevant information, which make it, makes it such a powerful, powerful tool. In the US do we think let's say, certainly disaster prevention or disaster alerts. Right. I think, I think there, there, there is, there also obviously clearly in the, in the case of a disaster, any kind of an emergency, this becomes very powerful. But all the things that we've been talking about earlier are just as relevant in the United States in terms of health information, education information. It is this concept of it being very personal and relevant and directly relevant to me. In my community, on my street, that will be what, you know, this flow of information back and forth I think in this country, we're not, you know, in most cases hopefully not dealing with terrorists the way they are in Pakistan but crime is an issue. And so the ability to communicate very relevant information rapidly to a community and for that community to become part of that process of dealing with those situations, mobile, clearly I think is, is an inc -, enormously powerful development. Alright. Ray, you were talking a little bit earlier, again, back in the green room about something that I hadn't even considered which is the ethnic and racial disparity in rate of adoption of mobile technology and that, of course, has a direct impact on the degree of penetrance in a community. Can you describe that phenomenon? Both the good and the bad, because there are two sides of it. Well, and, and that was a really good discussion that, that we had. Yeah. And, and I'll try to touch on some of the parts. Pew Foundation put out the, the Pew Internet group put out a study about a year or so ago. About adoption rates. In the African American community as well as the Latino community. And found a couple really interesting things. One was that in the African American community, there was a higher and faster degree of adoption of the utilization of mobile technology. And that, that became a primary source for accessing the internet. More so than other sources. Now there are, people are always trying to speculate as to why. One reason is, is that the home computer penetration rate in some of those communities were, was always going slower than other communities. So there was this quick movement toward using mobile technology. And there had always been a comfort level in many of these communities and I think a lot of that is based on and I think this is a universal principle, people seek access. And people have aspirations. And so, if they have an opportunity to use to leapfrog, to use a device to get there, that's what they're gonna do. I mean, and I found when I started One Economy Corporation, one of the things that we had, and I, it was a fight that we had with some of the foundation world, which said, well, quote, these people aren't gonna wanna have the technology in their homes. And I used to say, you don't need a, a shrink or an anthropologist or a sociologist to tell you that if you give people access, they are going to run toward it. Because people want to join the economic mainstream. They want to do financial transactions. They want to do business. So, this opens up enormous opportunities for for both the commercial side but also social innovation. Mm- hm. Now you've got populations that have these devices. What will we do with them? Because it opens up, you know, good possibilities. Right. Right. A follow- up that's only tangentially related. Technet, Technet is, is promoted as a bipartisan group. A group of, of bipartisan industry leaders. Bipartisanship in Washington is, is a somewhat oxymoronic phenomenon these days. And joining, helping to draw lower income folks who are maybe at the fringes of the tech community into the mainstream sounds like exactly the kind of idea that could start a partisan cat fight on Capitol Hill. How do you, have you encountered much ideological opposition to this kind of broad scale enfranchisement of, of groups that aren't fully franchised yet? No, I mean the, the technology quote issues rip large don't fall into easy partisan categories. you, you're really talking about some very basic things, that are around physical infrastructure, human infrastructure, and, and things like that, that transcend party. And so it's really a matter of, you know, this industry faces the same, quote, gridlock issues than anybody else faces. And there's nothing inherently Democrat or Republican about these issues and I find that we're able to work with people if, to the extent we're able to work with people, it doesn't, it doesn't fall along, along partisan lines at all. Right. It just, it just doesn't. Excellent. Well, maybe I could take a piece of that, cuz. Sure. When the President issued his Jobs Act speech in September of last year, there was a lot of media wrangling about is this a partisan speech? Is this gonna go anywhere? You know, he's talking about new investments for America. Give me a break. It's not gonna happen. That night, my colleague at the time and I, Tom Kalil, we wrote a blog post. What were the five provisions of the President's plan to spur innovation and entrepreneurship. Four out of the five are signed into law and fully implemented, and they did so because of wide bipartisan majorities. One, we put forward the National Wireless Initiative, which creates the conditions for American leadership in mobile broadband. Not just in the current LTE deployments, but beyond. Number two. We talked about modernizing the unemployment assistance initiative programs to launch, I called it start- up UI, which is today, if you wanted to start a business as an app developer in Ray's description, you can't do that while seeking unemployment compensation, because the rules of the road were, if you're looking for unemployment compensation, you gotta be seeking a job, not making a job. So, Senator Ron Wyden had this concept called self- employment assistance, and the president called for it, signed into law. We talked about the importance of simplifying our, our regulatory structure for access to capital for start- ups. And in fact Kiva was one of the participants in an Access to Capital Summit that I helped, work on with Secretary Geithner, that led to this program called again, a bipartisan initiative called the Jobs Act, unrelated to the President's Job Act. But it looked at off, opening up crowd funding, simplifying our rules as companies go public. And these policies overwhelmingly passed both sides of the aisle, and you know, it's funny. You don't hear about them, a -, but, but they, they're very much part of what you can do in Washington. Good ideas tend to get, I think, peculated to the top, and the tech industry has really been of late, coming forward on these issues. I just want to add one little thing Sure. Because we were always tag teaming together Anish and I over the years but I just want to add one thing and I want it, don't want it to get lost. It was from one of his earlier remarks, which was really the, the liberation of data, and, and that shouldn't be underestimated, to the extent that, that this government, this administration is working very hard to liberate data. That's really important because that's going to get you productivity gains but most importantly, it's gonna lead to economic development. It's going to lead toward the creation of, of new businesses and new opportunities. We don't have time to go into all that but I find that to be one of the hidden drivers. It opens up a lot of economic activity. Great. And we have a question in the audience, I wanna, right before we get to that I wanna ask one final question of Isobel and, again this the one we spoke about earlier. The overwhelming majority of countries we polled. The parents in those countries said that they've felt that mobile tech was not a distraction to their children in paying attention to their studies. The only exception into that was South Korea, where parents said overwhelmingly, 62 %, that it was a distraction and they control access accordingly. South Korea perhaps, no coincidence, happens to be eating our lunch when it comes to academic performance by kids. Do they know something we don't? Well, as a parent myself, I think they probably know something we don't. [ LAUGH ] You know I see my kids and how they use their mobile devices and they, play a lot of games, you know, they waste a lot of time. But you do have to remember that we're, we're talking about countries that, it's hard to generalize. Because the parts of the world that I focus on that are developing countries. You know, it, they're starting from a different point. The, the access to information, what Ray was just talking about, this access to data, you know, in many cases, they don't have access to data, and so, being able to access now, a, a lot of them are not access the Internet. Remember that. They're getting information from someone via texting, but we're on the cusp of a massive transformation in developing countries because of the investments that have been made in recent years. In through underwater sea cables and others Africa in particular down the West Coast of Africa. The East Coast of Africa, there's been a massive investment in underwater sea cables that are gonna bring much faster internet access at a much lower cost. And so, these old non- smart phones are soon going to be replaced for a broader segment of the population with smarter and smarter phones and you're seeing it around the world. It's gonna enable kids to access much more information, much more data really expand their horizons. It's also gonna allow them to waste a lot more time, playing games and other things, but, you know, I also look at what my own kids play. I mean, one of my sons is addicted to Words with Friends. You know, that's actually really a way to expand his vocabulary. It's Scrabble, he's playing Scrabble. And, you know, it's not, it's not all bad. I mean, there are definitely time- sinks but there are also ways that kids are learning and you know, it is, it is a different world and I know as a parent, I'm always trying to catch up. Right. I think here, what the polls picked up was precisely that. It's sort of an unleashing to access to information. Right. In countries where people simply never had it before and so parents are seeing that and seeing their children having access to this information in ways that they never did and it's unleashing enormous potential. If you've traveled throughout Africa and you see the impact, where I saw it the most was really in those countries where you're seeing it being truly transformative, and I think that's what you're getting back in the polls too. I even see it in my, you know, at home. My kids ask me questions and, there's some I don't know [ CROSSTALK ] believe it or not, and I, I'm right there I'm able to look it up and then, and, and, and, be able to have a much more informed conversation about what they're learning. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. Definitely. Alright let's go to our, we do have a question, and also, we do have a little time for additional questions, so if anyone else has any thoughts they'd like to, thoughts or questions they'd like to share, please do. Thank you. So we learned about how the tax industry's been disrupted, the power of the blue button, then we learned about microlending and how that's done amazing things in the developing world. What are the next industries that the panel thinks will be disrupted by this liberation of data that's, that's coming forward with the, the mobility in the wireless revolution? Well, I don't wanna jump on Ray. So here we go. [ LAUGH ] But I just wanna, I gotta tell you, there has never ever, ever been a better time to be an innovator in health care than right now. Because technological innovations is just one part of the puzzle. You need business model innovation. And the single biggest barrier to the introduction of newer technologies into the care delivery environment has been our reimbursement system. So if you remember the president in the State of the Union 2011, said the ability to FaceTime video chat your doctor. What was not said in that sentence. Was that oh and by the way today that is not a reimbursable expense. So not a lot of doctors are looking to have a three minute video chat in lieu of a six minute in person visit, even though this might be more effective in answering your health care needs. So, what's happening is, in the Affordable Care Act we've given HHS the authority to change the payment model towards what we refer to as value based payer. If you are de -, delivering better outcomes at lower costs, you should be compensated. What that means is, the, the group of doctors and hospitals who've said, sign me up. I want to get paid better if I treat my patients, if I learn more about their concerns, and I, I can a -, address their needs faster. With that business model change, the technological innovation that's been just frothing and ready to go but hadn't found a customer yet Is just poised to take off like a rocket. So no bigger industry in America has seen the kind of business model change potential than health care, and I'm really bullish on it. We didn't get much into the detail on education, but Arne Duncan is similarly pushing changes in how we deliver personalized learning. So, you look at American health care and American education. These are two massive industries ready to grow. And I think the business model side is gonna un -, unleash the power of the technological change. [ LAUGH ] Well, I was gonna [ CROSSTALK ] Sorry, Ray. [ LAUGH ] I was, I was gonna do education. Ray was gonna do health. [ CROSSTALK ] Aw, man. But, but I, but I think when you, you're beginning to see. If you look at education, I think you're beginning to see here and around the world. The beginning of the impact of this information. We talked about being able to sort of Google and answer to your child's question, and I think what we're gonna see, too, at every level of education elementary school, secondary school, the way kids learn, how they learn, how rapidly they learn, all the way up to through higher education, I think There was an article today in the Times about Coursera and the way all the universities are now putting their courses online. Imagine the impact that that is going to have on education around the world. I think will be really pretty, pretty amazing. Can I add something? Sure. [ LAUGH ] [ INAUDIBLE ] But you know, I would just like to add, I think financial services will also be one of those areas. Mm- hm. Yeah. And particularly in a US context because we tend to just think of it outside of the US. But the other thing would be, and I gave this testimony about a week ago about the apps economy and I said at some point, that will cease to be, you know, you won't be saying that's an apps company and that's an apps company, because every major business line item is being just intermediated and I think in a good way, by mobility. And so, you're gonna have all kinds of new opportunities based on consumer expectations. And some have said that print journalism has been slightly disrupted, but [ LAUGH ] I see no, no signs of that so far. It's good. All right. And we have, we, time for one more question, and then we'll bring Mr. Weber back. Thank you. So I work at the Grameen Foundation, and I work with our micro savings initiative. And I know it's been really great to hear about how many people in the world have access to phones, but there are so many people who do not have access to phones, particularly women. I know you mentioned the gender gap and I was recently in India working, gathering data with our micro savings one of our partners in India and they work exclusively with women. And I found that even women who own phones, don't know how to use them. There are numeracy issues and literacy issues and just general technology aversion. And they turn to their children, their daughters and their sons to help them. But there's still a huge knowledge gap even among women who own a phone. So there seems to be this, this top, this great revolution that's happening but there's so many people who are getting left behind. So I'm just wondering what, what are solutions to getting more people access or even educated on how to use the thing that they already own. to get them the maternity health issues, and the education, you know, information that they, that they do need. The financial services obviously too that they, that they do need to survive. There are going to be people who are reluctant technology adapters, because, adopters, just because they're intimidated by it and scared by it, But, you, you would be surprised by how quickly a lot those women, in particular, who are illiterate, overcome those challenges. And so, you may have been interacting with people who are really new to the technology and go back in a couple months or years and you see how it trickles down. You know, they are being taught by their kids in some respects. Their sons and their daughters. There's a whole generation of women coming up who have grown up with using phones. Again, these are not smart phones for the most part. They're your old Nokia that they're texting, but I've seen illiterate women, who have had no formal schooling at all and they're able to it, it starts out when there's a real need. You know, necessity is the mother of invention and it's, it's true and when they're reliant on this new technology to receive a cash payment. A mobile cash payment from their husband or father whomever who's working in a distant village, they figure it out really, really quickly. They've, they're not literate but they figure what are the keystrokes I need to be able to receive the money. To respond to it and it's, it's fascinating how quickly that transformation happens. Matt, I'm sure you've seen this in, in your business. Oh, yeah. You know and I think that's a great point you made, which is oftentimes when we talk about financial access, we forget that that's just one of many things that people need and it's probably not the most important thing in the whole suite of services that, you know women need to help build businesses or save so that's, that's really important to call out. And it, with regards to mobile, What I've seen is that, once it starts to serve a very, very basic need, people figure out how to use it. Illiterate people figure out how to use it. It's just amazing what people can figure out how to use, particularly when it involves transacting with family members. In Kenya right now, I think there are more transactions, dollar wise domestically, than Western Union processes internationally. So just within that country, family members transacting with family members primarily, from villages to cities Is outpacing the growth of reminces worldwide. It's an incredible development and I think when it, when it serves people's basic needs, especially with family, people will figure it out. One other thing, that, it doesn't have to with sort of your technical, sort of you know, proficiency with technology but there were in some cases we found in countries like Afghanistan and elsewhere there were cultural issues where in fact men were restricting women's access to it. And along the same lines as sort of necessity drives this. One of the approaches that we tried which was quite successful, was to demonstrate to the community to a leader in a particular case, the benefit to the community of women having access to these devices in terms of maternal healthcare, child healthcare and what have you. And so we found that that was one way of overcoming the cultural barriers, the very real cultural barriers that might be there by if you will appealing to the enlightened self interest of, of the leaders, and that's one way of doing it. So I think there are a number of organizations focused on this to try to sort of move it. But I agree that it's stunning how quickly people adopt the technology when they can see the real benefit to themselves. And it's not, not to downplay that those gaps don't exist. Yeah. They do. And I mentioned that you know, in, in a country like Afghanistan and Pakistan, and I think also in Bangladesh. There has been instances of violence around women trying to access cell phones. It's seen as somehow that they're now loose, they're on the loose. And they're, they've got freedom that is resented by controlling family members. And this is a cultural tug of war and it's not gonna be resolved overnight. but, you know, I have seen very dramatic change in the countries that, that I visited. In sub- Saharan Africa, South Asia Southwest Asia, in just a matter of four, five years. Places that didn't have any access, it's now ubiquitos. Well I want to thank our terrific panel and our terrific audience. I think it's been a wonderful discussion. I've learned much more than I even imagined I would. And, I will pitch back to Mr. Weber. Yeah, thank you Jeff and a, a big thanks to to our speakers today for a terrific. [ SOUND ] Okay, well thanks everyone for joining us today. I would say if you're suffering from no, what, nomophobia, is it? Nomophobia. You can get back to your phones except from the number of tweets, I could tell no one was actually suffering from nomophobia. So thanks again for joining us today. And this will be also available on time. com / wireless if if you want to pass it on to someone else. ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"The Future of Mobility","description":"A TIME panel discussion held Wednesday, Sept. 19, at the Newseum in Washington, DC","thumbnailUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/VJkleT8i/poster.jpg?width=720","uploadDate":"2012-09-24T17:20:20.000Z","contentUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/VJkleT8i.m3u8","embedUrl":"https://time.com/video/VJkleT8i/","duration":"PT1H17M19S","potentialAction":{"@type":"SeekToAction","target":"https://time.com/video/VJkleT8i/?jw_start={seek_to_second_number}","startOffset-input":"required name=seek_to_second_number"}} ```