It's a Scott's Loan show on seven hundred Will every Thanks for checking us out on air, online and in your hand, in your mobile, we the iHeartRadio app. Take us wherever you go, switch over to headphones and we portable like that baby. I think we might be missing the big picture when it comes to AI data centers, uh semiconductor industry, you know with then Tell and all that, and I know that stalled a little bit.
But big picture, though, is, despite all.
The environmental and electricity worries, what about restoring American greatness relative to technology, relative to manufacturing and in a different way than our previous generations did it. I'm talking, of course about Ohio now the fifth largest host of AI data centers, and that looks to be growing. Are we missing because of our fears and not unwarranted fears? I think they're legitimate, But I missed the big picture when it comes to expanding the job space here in Ohio,
which is sorely needed. In the show this morning is Doug Kelly from Columbus. He is CEO of something called the American Edge Project that deals with us. Doug, welcome back, Howray, Thanks Scott, how are you I'm doing fine. The reason why most of the civilized world speaks English because it is the business of language and the business that we created. American entrepreneurship industry created that environment. Dollar is the standard currency, the reserve currency.
Right.
How important is it to continue to lean on tech in order to continue that and put it into context with the congressional plan now with TikTok where they're going to make an American health company and kind of use that as a front.
Well, just a back one second, and let's look at the importance of technology in our overall daily lives. Right. So tech isn't just another sector of the economy, right, it is a very backbone of our national security or economy and the advancement of values that we really care about, free expression and letting your voice be heard. So the challenge is when Congress talks about regulating technology, it can't
paint with a very broad brush. Right, there's things that it can do that can either help our ability to innovate and compete against China, or are the things they can do that can fundamentally damage our ability to remain the technological leader in the world. They've passed that chips and science build, which is going to help bring more manufacturing and semi conductor chips the United States. It'll create technology hubs. It will also increase funding for STEM education.
So that's an example of a really good thing that Congress are doing to help our ability to innovate.
Yeah, and you know, I think that's important too, because there is a lot of bad. There's a lot of negative with this, and that is that our enemies have learned to poison up ourselves. You know, a lot us poison ourselves basically, which has always been the goal. That's you know, the fallow role. I'm destroyed from within. A lot of people predict that for the United States of America. I think we always find a way to write the ship though, right, We don't go away. We figure out
how to adapt and we move on. We're really good at that.
That's right. I mean, that's the heart of the American genius is our ability to innovate and adjust as circumstances come. So one of our concerns is that some of the bills that Congress is talking about passing are things that would undermine our ability as a country to innovate, and particularly they would target America's most innovative technology companies. Now these companies, yeah, they run social media platforms, they make
hardware and software. But what a lot of people don't know is that the biggest technology companies in the US are also the biggest investors and the most important strategic technologies that we're battling with against kind of so artificial intelligence, robotics on them, computing, these are all the technologies that
are going to determine who leads in the future. And so as Congress wants to clamp down on those companies, it's going to hurt our ability to invest in those areas, to develop and master those technologies, and it's going to hand over to China an edge that we're not going to get back, just like what happened with manufacturing.
Well in another edge too, we get back to Afghanistan and the fall there and how middle will rich that country is now that China has control of that or Russia as control or whatever. Now, now, where are we going to get these Where are we going to get the precious natural resources in order to make the chips
that you're talking about. That that's you know, we talk about how important that is, but I think that fits into what you're discussing here because the topic of rare earth minerals is now front and center.
Yeah, you're exactly right. I mean, you know, at the end of the day, we are in this competition in China, and it's okay, who can build the most microchips, who can have the most innovation. China knows that innovation is its weak spot, right. They're good at copying and reverse engineering things, but their challenge is innovation, and they've invested
a lot of money to boost their innovation. So at the end of the day, the US has to do things that accelerates our ability to innovate, and that includes things like freeing up our biggest innovators, making smart investment in building core critical technologies here. Now, there's certain things that can be done to you know, where the pressure and pain points come where technology hits politics and society.
There's certainly regulations could be done there, right, Connors should pass a privacy policies so people understand what their data is being used for, what control they have over So there's certainly smart things that can be done there. But some of the things they're talking about in Washington right now just under minor ability to innovate, and they actually don't solve the problems that people are feeling.
You know, Trump for the well second time now there's a new sheriff in town. Wasn't long ago where he had dignitaries in the United States go to places like Taiwan and try and build relationships with US. Rank in that connection to the United States and Tiuan because they're responsible for all the stuff we're talking about right now. We make a very small percentage, like twelve percent of those semiconductor products right now, so they're an important ally. We can't give that up.
You are spot on what that's got. I mean in the nineties when semiconduct were invented, right, American manufactured most of them. Now we manufacture just twelve percent, with the bulk of the most sophisticated chips being made in Taiwan, which is just one hundred miles away from China. And if China made a move on Taiwan that was fundamentally Do you think the COVID supply chain attruction was big,
that would be enormous. Yeah, And so you know, we have to be able to make sure that we're making in our own backyard as well, and at the same time, we have to do actions that checked China's ambitions, both from a technology sign but also from a little bloy ambition.
In regards to Doug Kelly, CEO American Edge Project on the show on seven hundred WLW, you're right there in Columbus. You're going to see this huge Intel plant and essentially town that is built to make semiconductors right here in Ohio. What's that mean for the state in America as well? I mean, that seems to be a huge step forward.
We talk about the lack of manufacturing in America, but this is high tech manufacturing, good for jobs and how to be sure, but in TOEP putting having a big footprint right here in Ohio let alone, the United States also is kind of what you're talking about here, and that is sounds like the United States, we're trying to increase our share of that market.
Yeah, you're right, it's going to be great news for Ohio and all the Midwest. First of all, you know when I talk about unintended consequences of bills that Congress may pass, right, you know, twenty years ago Condress did some things on manufacturing that kind of slowly led manufacturing jobs over twenty years, many of them exported to China.
And so one thing we don't want to have happen with the bills that Congress is talking about is unintended consequences that hurt our ability to manufacture and innovate on the technology side. And so the passage of this chip bill is going to bring new jobs, three thousand new jobs into Ohio just that plant. But at the same time, when you have like they're building construction trades and the other people have to build these facilities, those are going
to be even more jobs there. So it's a huge multiplier effect in building our own technology here.
Doug Kelly and Columbus CEO of the American Edge Project, which is pushing more and more tech, and you know, we've got Intel at some point, I think third twenty thirty one, as I saw when they opened the plant near Columbus you're talking about. But you know, the AI data centers and everything else in Ohio is fifth in the country when it comes to those data centers, which I think is awesome, and there's some concerns there too.
You know, we talk about the environmental we talked about electricity, the power and the grid. I talk about that a lot too, and it's conld put a bigger drain on the system, but you build more infrastructures supposed to just prevent people from doing this. We've got to continue to innovate and lead the world for not only our economic future, but also for our survival too, because we we got to stay on top ors of the Chinese and the Russians.
That's had a lot of people listening are concerned about social media the impact it has on young kids. For example, are you suggesting in some way, shape or form, maybe an unregulated Internet or it's hard to censor the First Amendment because that is a guy given inalienable right in this country. But there's got to be a balance there. How do you do that.
Well, I would say that, you know, our coalition is you know, twenty four different groups of you know, people who represent small businesses, minority business, Asian American businesses, as well as technology companies. And our message is focused on the importance of innovation because sometimes, you know, people forget that innovation is America's secret sauce that puts us ahead of other countries, and it's kept as they head of
other countries. To address your specific question. You know, at the end of the day, there are certain regulations that can be done that will give people clarity and insight on Okay, what could we be done with our data? Right, so Congress could pass the privacy policy. But what we're against the things that fundamentally disrupt America's ability to innovate. And that's the thing that we feel Congress is Russian
full with this legislation. And it's not just on fa I mean, right when you think of the biggest company Google, Amazon, Microsoft, these are companies are making game cheese and investments in the technology of the future. And if you if you disrupt or break apart those companies, it's gonna have lasting consequences. So at the end of the day, we're for innovation at the American ADS Project, and that's what gives us
our edge. But we're for smart type of regulation that actually solve the problem or against reckless regulation.
Right and generally when you start to break up companies, you know, we say that here Cincinnati Bell, for example, as no longer Cincinnati Bell for it. But but you know when they broke up the baby bell and the baby bells, you know, back in the back in the Day forty something years ago, fifty years ago.
That was to.
Control a monopoly. I don't know if I see that as much with big tech in that argument. And certainly Facebook is massive, and there's a lot of big alphabet right, a lot of big companies out there that do this kind of stuff. But I just don't see the tech the advantage in breaking them up. It's gonna Does it make competition better or harder?
Well, there's fierce competition and right now, So for the opponents of the big tech companies, I just challenged their assumption and their assertion that there's not competition there. I mean, Facebook is battling them out all the time when the other social media companies TikTok, and so there's really fierce competition among these and that forces innovations faster. And so right now, with the current regulatory scheme we have of how do we deal with monopolistic activity, it's done to
the court. That's the right way to go. That system works. There's no need to fundamentally disrupt that because technology moves really really fast. And I'm old enough to remember my Space and AOL when they were the big behemoth, right, And you know what the market took care of that, So we believe the market takes care of a lot of problems in competition. Is the real accelerance on that.
Yeah, But the argument that would be, well, if you just made a case Kelly and said, hey, yeah, you know, it's pretty fierce competitively now, but if we broke everything up in the smaller companies are thinking, well, that creates
even more competition, doesn't it. Or the other way to look at it as well, it's it's much tougher now to fund those companies because almost like a startup at the beginning, right, there's only so much you can do with the wealth at Facebook and other companies of a mask, it's probably easier at this point, right. So what I'm saying is, if you're using your argument, if you broke everything in the smaller pieces of the pie, you create more competition?
Is that not necessarily true?
Well, but there's some things that can only be done at large scale, right, So we're in the we're in the kind of the platform economy phase right of global development, right China as it's a big platform. We have our big platforms, and those platforms generate new ideas across a lot of different business lines, and they also generate profits
which are then investing into this cutting edd research. And I'll just give an example, right in those strategic technologies of the future that I talked about, our five big as technology companies in America invest more each year in those than the Pentagon does. Right, And these are dual use technologies, right, So they're both for military purpose but also for commercial purpose. And so we can either hand that at China militarily. But worse of all worse is
that that would give them a competitive advantage. Do we want them to sell all the different AI solutions? Do we want them to sell the quantum computer solutions to the world and reap that economic benefit? Well, that's not of what we want. Yeah, because it really matters which country and which set of values builds the future. Is it going to be US China? It's a simple question.
You know, you mentioned that data privacy and things. It's certainly big tech, and you know people who use big tech can join hand in hand.
Go, okay, that's something we should fight.
The most contentious thing, of course, is section two thirty, which is wonky. But you know, if you don't know what that means, it's simple. It means that platform like Facebook, for example, are not legally responsible for what people post on them. So prior to this, if a website you know, modified content or whatever, they're legally responsible for anyone who posted on that website. I look at this, it's almost like me trying to control what a caller would say
to a talk show. I can't control what you're thinking or saying. Now, there are certain dirty words I can bleep out and the like, but generally your message is as long as you don't swear, you can say pretty much whatever the hell you want. I kind of look at it that way. When it comes to section two thirty. It's bad and you have people can lie and spread mistruths, and you pretend to be a I don't know, a sixteen year old girl when they're actually a seventy five
year old man. I get that, but by and large, I don't, you know. I kind of look at it the same way.
Yeah, you know, a whole point behind section two thirty was to help innovation go and grow, and it has served its purpose specifically on the content moderation piece. Look, we believe in having more voices in the marketplace. Right or at the end, of the day. The best ideas are going to win. And yeah, acte what you said right. There's certain techniques and activities in as far as actors are going to do, but more voices in the marketplace being able to speak their truth and be able to
say what their opinion is. That's better. That helps our country, that builds a stronger, more robust electric.
Doug Kelly, CEO of American Edge Project up in Columbus, and it's all about American led innovation and keeping the Internet open, which I agree pretty well with most of this stuff. Anyway, Doug gotta go. Thanks to the TOME. I appreciate it. Hey, thanks Scott, great day you too as well. We're about to five minutes away for news on seven hundred WW traffic weather all that. Don't have to tell you. The Deep Freeze continues into our second week. We love
the first one so much. It is back for command performance. The frozen tundra of Cincinnati, Northern Kentucky, and Indiana.
UH.
Probably going to stay in this weekend a little lull because there's no NFL football this weekend and big stuff is pretty much out. Real college basketball ass you had X and a UC playing this weekend at home and some other stuff as well, but now largely maybe it's time to catch up on some streaming stuff. I got some stuff for you to do, some streaming related things. Will Gans is here from MAYBC, New York. Three things for your relative to the small screen if you're going
to stay in, which is a good idea. He'll get to that next Scott Sloan show back after news I'm the Home of the Red seven hundred ww