[MUSIC]
Let me tell you about the time that I forgot my dad's birthday.
It was a few years ago, and I woken up with large bags under my eyes,
the true mark of a Grey's Anatomy binge.
I reached out to my phone, to shut my alarm.
And I'm greeted with a stream of notifications, texts, emails,
friends, family, social media news.
Even my meditation app was grasping for my attention, and so,
I did what I'd done thousand times before.
I sat in bed, and mindlessly scrolled.
And this happened throughout the day.
I felt present in my interactions, but at every buzz ping, and moment of free time,
I would reach out for my phone.
And so, when my dad called me later that day, I looked at the time, and
it finally hit me, that I was behind on work.
And so, I ignored his phone call, and decided that I would be productive.
I put my phone away, and open my computer, and that's when it began again.
Later when I found out that I missed his birthday, I felt so guilty,
I had reached a new low.
That was the day that I came to terms with my technology addiction.
And so, I did what most people say, is the solution to this addiction.
I deleted social media, and distance myself as far as possible from technology.
And for a while, I felt great.
In fact, I was successfully unplugged for two years.
But the longer that I was off the grid, the more I missed out on.
I missing photos of my friends,
I miss staying up to date with the latest pop culture.
And I miss learning about the World through others.
My tech addiction, and my digital detox taught me that we can
expect individuals to take isolated actions.
That will lead to collective societal change.
We need to shift the responsibility from responsible tech usage to
responsible tech creation.
Don't get me wrong, technology is a powerful force for good.
Over the last few years, I've worked on products that have touched hundreds, and
millions of users.
And I've seen firsthand the transformative power of technology.
Technology has revolutionized our World, and made our daily lives easier.
It has connected us, brought us joy, and entertainment, and
sparked our creativity in new ways.
It will lengthen our lives, and improve our quality of care, but
I also understand that there's a cost to all of that.
And personally, I worry that in trying to solve some problems,
I will create even more, because it's not just me.
A lot of us have difficulty stepping away from the products we love.
We spend five hours a day, consuming digital content, and
12 hours a day in front of a screen, that's half of our lives.
And it's not just tech addiction.
Over the last few years, we've seen the impact of technology all around us, for
misinformation, and polarization, AI bias, and privacy infringements.
The potential to fuel our anxiety, and depression, the potential to radicalize
individuals, and destroy our democracy all rooted in this perpetual dependence.
Left unchecked technology, and its downstream effects,
are poised to be the greatest public health crisis of our century.
So, how do we get the good without the bad?
Well, I've always believed that looking at where we've been,
can help us get to where we need to be.
So, let's take a look at a public health crisis of last century.
Cars.
In the early 1900s, cars replaced horse drawn carriages,
bringing a wave of possibilities.
But over time, more, and more cars were on the road, and
these cars were able to go faster, and faster.
Drivers didn't have licenses, age limits, or sobriety requirements.
Cars didn't have seatbelts, airbags, or mirrors.
And roads didn't have speed limits, traffic lights, or crosswalks.
The result, people were dying.
At its peak, there were 35 deaths for every 10,000 cars.
For context today, this number is one.
Once a beacon of promise, and possibility,
cars were surrounded by the unintended consequences it created.
That's exactly where we are with technology today, fullest potential, but
surrounded by the unintended consequences it's created.
For cars, the responsibility was shirked for decades,
auto manufacturers look the other way, government was slow to act.
And the onus was on consumers, the drivers, and
pedestrians to be more careful, look where they're going.
Ultimately, it was a work of mavericks, and standout individuals, and
organizations that led to the change we see today.
So what can we learn from this?
Well first, it went on for far too long, it took 50 years for
a simple safeguard, like seatbelts to be commonplace in cars.
With the reach, and scale of technology, we can't afford 50 years.
But I also, learned that safety sells, safety, and
responsibility is good business.
Would you buy a car today that didn't have seatbelts or airbags?
As consumers are becoming more aware of the downstream effects of technology.
Safe tech is a competitive advantage, and building, and
retaining their trust, will soon be non-negotiable.
But most importantly,
I learned that the responsibility is on us as builders to create responsible tech.
Because saying, that the solution to tech addiction is for
consumers to just manage their screen time.
Is the same thing as saying, the solution to car casualties,
is for drivers to forgo seatbelts, and just be a little bit more careful.
Technology needs to be responsible from the onset.
So over the last year, I've talked to hundreds of people in the space.
Gen Z teenagers, tech ethicist,
heads of product to understand what we can do to build responsible technology.
I'll share three things with you today.
The first is we need to reimagine the future,
the alternative to today's reality.
We need to take a step back, and ask ourselves questions,
like what are the meaningful habits, and
the intentional interactions that we want to help foster?
What are the products that we want our kids, and our grandkids to grow up with?
And what does technology that we trust actually look like?
Instead, we're too focused on the here, and now,
the quarterly earnings, the annual revenue.
And those short term views bring us short term solutions.
So, I challenge you to invite your team to a meeting,
and brainstorm that idyllic future.
Because with a clear vision of the future that we want to build,
we can shift from band-aid solutions to long-term transformations.
The second thing we need to do is measure what really matters.
We have a natural tendency as technologists to imagine
all the good that our products will do for the world.
But once they launch, and reach scale,
we don't see the negatives, we're surprised by them.
We're so focused on building the car, that we ignore the traffic.
So plan for that wild success, treat those edge cases as core cases,
those extreme users as core users.
Establish a risk mitigation process, that will help identify,
and surface those hard to imagine consequences.
Not all risks can be avoided, but they can be anticipated.
We also need to measure new things.
Most products have a North Star Metric,
a singular metric that all teams are striving to optimize.
Usually this comes in the form of short-term engagement,
something like time spent, or number of sessions per day.
And as a result, the teams are over optimizing on moving that needle.
But when you over optimize for that short-term squeeze,
you forget everything that comes at the cost of that.
And so instead of a single North Star, I propose a metric constellation,
a set of metrics that measures not just engagement.
But also digital well-being, value thresholds, and better usage habits,
because what gets measured, gets managed.
And finally, we need to be champions of caution.
Silicon Valley has a strong bias for action, a tendency to release
something half baked, and test, and iterate, and test, and iterate.
But while, this is great for progress, it's dangerous for society.
Instead, we need to prioritize veracity over velocity, purpose over speed.
We need a culture, where it's okay to ask the tough questions.
A culture where we don't hide behind all the good we're doing.
A culture of responsibility, because it's the right thing to do, and
it's good business.
So what does this actually look like?
Think back to your team's last product release.
Mine was a celebration, that included lots of cake,
we have shipped something on time, and under budget.
But imagine, if we set a norm where we reward teams for shipping something late,
because an ethical concern was surface, and fixed.
Or we decide not to ship it at all, because of the major
causes it could have on people, I say that deserves cake.
Now, it may sound a little bit trivial,
but this is exactly the culture that we'll need.
To push the bounds of possibility, to define new business models, and
discover novel ways to provide value to users.
As technologists, we can release a product, and
millions of people will be impacted, just like that.
Technology is not born bad, it reflects the interests, behaviors, and
desires of its creators.
As future entrepreneurs, and investors, and technologists, and changemakers
all of you play a role in building the future of responsible technology.
I to be part of the problem, to be passionate about the solution.
But whatever drives you, I hope you'll buckle up,
and join me on the ride, thank you.
>> [APPLAUSE]
[MUSIC]