00:00A significant ruling. I'm pretty surprised by the investor reaction, which is meh,
00:04but perhaps there's some overhang that's gone.
00:08Well, it's significant, and perhaps the reaction isn't so bad right now,
00:14because this is only the compensatory damages.
00:17So there were $3 million for compensatory damages.
00:20That's for pain and suffering to reimburse a person for what they went through.
00:25But the jury decided that there could be punitive damages,
00:28so there's going to be another proceeding to determine punitive damages,
00:32and that's where the big money comes in in a lot of these cases,
00:36where they want to punish the company.
00:38So things might change if there's a big punitive damages award.
00:43When we talk punitive, like how much are we talking?
00:46And then my understanding, I was listening to you, I think, on with the team over at Balance of Power,
00:50that this is the first of many cases to come to trial against these companies.
00:54Right. There's another case, I believe, trial is scheduled for July in Los Angeles,
00:59but there are thousands, I think three thousands of these cases.
01:02There's also a case by state attorneys general against these companies.
01:07So what's really important is they call this a bellwether trial,
01:11so it's the first one to go to trial.
01:13So that does make this verdict very important, because down the road,
01:18that might mean that Meta might be more pliable as far as settlements.
01:23But also, you know, I think that it's hard to read into just the one verdict.
01:27Like people are comparing it to the tobacco cases.
01:29Well, the tobacco cases, it took a while before a pattern was established.
01:33So here, I think you have to go through more than one trial,
01:37a couple of trials before you see which way the juries are coming back.
01:41Also, you know, I was surprised by the verdict because there was a lot of evidence
01:46that this young woman had a lot of other mental health struggles,
01:52that she had problems at home, she had a learning disability,
01:55she had bullying problems, I believe, in school.
01:58So there was evidence that there were other sort of, you know, influences on her,
02:05not just Meta.
02:05And so another thing that strikes me as a parent is that, you know,
02:11she was on the social media platforms like 16 hours a day or whatever.
02:16And, you know, where are her parents at that point?
02:19You know, I don't think, you know, I don't know what would happen if my daughter
02:23would be on, you know, all those different hours, you know.
02:25You raise a lot of good points, June.
02:26And I'm wondering, from a compensation standpoint, is there a chance, you know,
02:31not just from the perspective of, okay, punitive versus compensatory.
02:36Compensatory.
02:36Compensatory.
02:38But does it create some sort of precedent, you know, that moving forward,
02:44this is how, and not necessarily a legal precedent,
02:47but this is how people are thinking about this technology?
02:50Well, I mean, yeah, this is how people are thinking about this technology.
02:53And perhaps when they choose the next jury,
02:55they'll try to eliminate people who are thinking this way about this technology.
03:00But it is sort of, it is a trend.
03:02I mean, there are states that are passing laws.
03:04Yeah.
03:05As I said, the social.
03:06Countries that are ahead of this compared to the United States.
03:09Right.
03:09So, but, you know, I don't know about pushing the blame on, you know, one company.
03:14But, you know, the problem was that in this trial,
03:16there were a lot of internal documents that were showed to the jury that,
03:21you know, revealed a sort of ignorance on Metta's part or on the executives at Metta
03:29about what this was doing or, you know, I don't, we don't care about it.
03:32So I think that that, you know, those internal documents probably played a big part
03:37in the way the jury came back.
03:39But remember, they were out for nine days.
03:42Yeah.
03:42Forty hours.
03:43So this, they didn't come to this conclusion right away.
03:46It wasn't like, oh, wait, you know, here, we saw, we saw what happened.
03:49And we heard it, and we're ready to, you know, rain down on Metta and Google.
03:54Just real cookie.
03:55Just real cookie.
03:57I'm a little hungry, perhaps.
03:58June, just real quickly, 30 seconds here.
04:01Can these two companies appeal or is there any pushback?
04:04They'll wait until they get the punitive damages verdict in.
04:08And then, yes, they're already saying they're going to appeal.
04:10There's no doubt that there'll be appeals in this case.
04:13Okay.
04:13Which is maybe why I explain to the stock reaction.
04:16The stock reaction.
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