Whilst receiving his Icon Award at the Newport Beach Film Festival in London, Sir Stephen Fry took the time to lay out his problems with what social media has become, and why he feels like a fool for believing in it.
He was joined at the Newport Beach Film Festival event at Raffles at the OWO by fellow honourees like Felicity Jones, Sharon Horgan, Joe Alwyn and many more. Report by Burtonj. Like us on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/itn and follow us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/itn
He was joined at the Newport Beach Film Festival event at Raffles at the OWO by fellow honourees like Felicity Jones, Sharon Horgan, Joe Alwyn and many more. Report by Burtonj. Like us on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/itn and follow us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/itn
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LifestyleTranscript
00:00I'm particularly passionate about this because I'm the fool who believed in social media when it arrived in around about
00:072006-2007 there was a slow movie every year a new one came out Facebook with them followed by Twitter and so on and and
00:14They became all-powerful
00:21Hello sir, such an honor to meet you. Thank you so much for your time
00:24I was doing my research, you know
00:27Tonight and I'd write down a couple of projects underneath each person's name under your name. I wrote everything
00:34There's so much. I would like to talk to you about
00:36The first thing I want to say is how wonderful your tie is. Oh, I'm glad you like it
00:40Yeah, was this a personal choice or a stylist choice? I looked at the
00:44Invitation because I suddenly thought oh my god, is it black tie, you know
00:49Dinner jacket and he said cocktail and I thought
00:53cocktail
00:54What does that involve something bright and fun statement?
00:58He so I thought that would be reasonable and quite the statement quite the statements to make for a man
01:03Who is an icon tonight? Well, thank you. I'm what's wonderful. I want to be bestowed upon you by the Newport Beach Film Festival
01:10I'm sure you've had that word thrown at you a few times. How does it feel tonight to be recognized as an icon?
01:15Well, it's very charming. I
01:18I'll give away a joke that I think I'll tell if it works
01:20I was trying to work. I'll be a test on you. Yeah, I
01:25I
01:27was always an icon I'm gonna say when and I remember when I was a little icon and
01:33It proved true
01:35That great oaths from little icons grow. I love something like that work. Well, that does it thank you
01:44How has your I guess we're at the stage where we're still reflecting 24 looking forward to 25
01:48I think in the last year. I've seen a lot more vocal support from you for social media changes. I think it's such a great
01:56Campaign to get behind how do we approach us? And it was a big question to us right now, but what's your what's the plan?
02:01Well, it's interesting. I think in a strange way
02:05It's very similar to our water crisis
02:10Nobody wants our children to swim in contaminated waters
02:15And I think when people stop and think they probably don't want our children to breathe the kind of contaminated air of the culture
02:22that social media has
02:24belched out
02:26toxins for too long and
02:29It is simply a question of the same kind of protections we give ourselves against any other forms of poison
02:36And I'm particularly passionate about this because I'm the fool who believed in social media when it arrived in around about
02:442006-2007 there was a slow movie every year a new one came out Facebook with them followed by Twitter and so on and
02:51They became all powerful and at first seemed so wonderful
02:55The so-called Arab Spring of when was that 2011-2012 something like that. It's spread all the way across North Africa
03:02from Tunisia to the Yemen and and now you look at
03:06actually those
03:08And and they didn't last what seemed to be the hope that citizens would band together and make things better
03:17seems to be
03:19deeply exploded as an idea and
03:22Unfortunately instead of the cream rising to the top
03:25Scum rises to the top as it does in polluted rivers. So, you know the metaphor holds a bit
03:31I
03:32know
03:33the billionaires and the vested interests
03:37Who
03:38Want to quash any idea of control? We'll talk about free speech
03:44hilarious
03:46you know, I mean but
03:51The fact is on newspapers
03:55Which I now believe in more than I ever used to to be honest because well, you know, there are serious journalists
04:01They're telling stories and they are subject to
04:05controls to regulations the regulations that are self-inflicted and indeed wider ones and that's true in broadcasting
04:13In America as well as in Britain, you the BBC and you and I TV you ITM
04:20You have to follow certain guidelines to make sure that you're being responsible
04:25You can't just sound off and make things up if you do it's a scandal for you
04:32Facebook is a far bigger newspaper than any of the ones in the world put together
04:38Because it's you know, something like 80% of people get their news from Facebook
04:42But if you say to them, well, you should have the same regulations that apply to newspapers
04:48Oh, no, because we're a platform
04:50That's a kind of meaningless form of words as if that somehow excuses them
04:54It's like saying it's like a criminal saying no, I don't count as a person. Yeah
05:00It's just nonsense
05:01When you say about the Arab Spring in 2011 of words that was brought out. That was a citizen journalism. Yes
05:09Yeah, but now it's kind of like being bloody like anything citizen journalism. Well, it's unfortunately it's what happens the wheel turns
05:18I'm old enough to remember the very early days of Silicon Valley and there's a lot of guys
05:22Most of the guys it must be said guys and girls as well
05:25They're in in jeans and t-shirts who wanted to make the world a better place and who were screaming with delight at what the technology
05:32was offering phrases like insanely great were used and and and it was all given away because
05:39It was for everybody like science. It was fabulous and
05:44If you know George Orwell's animal farm the the pigs
05:48Slowly
05:50Stand on two feet and start wearing trousers and this has happened in Silicon Valley that
05:56That the people who wanted to improve the world and wanted to make things exciting and free and open have been absolutely
06:03Deluged by every detail of capitalism the money that was behind them because obviously the problem was that the things like Facebook
06:11whatever got very big and
06:14Cost a lot of money to run so they had to have advertising so they had to have venture capitalists
06:19So they had to have money put into them and the people who did that
06:22We're not interested in making the world a better place
06:24They were interested in another jet and another island another, you know
06:29Another billion and another billion on top of that and the power that comes with it and the more they get that I mean
06:35trouble
06:36They don't these people don't really
06:39Care about anything other than the money they made
06:44and
06:45Politicians are in
06:46Never been weaker and who on earth would ever be a politician now?
06:51Nobody I wouldn't you wouldn't
06:55Everything you do is scrutinized to death so that you were apparently going to be I mean poor Rachel Reeves
07:01I don't know the story behind how many years she worked, you know
07:05And and whether or not she's you know, been a bit of a con artist or not
07:09But it's a perfect example of what she should just go to hell
07:13Why on earth would I bother to try to do anything and that's true on all sides nothing to do with the fact that she's
07:19Left or right. It's just no politician. I decide from anything else. They're insulted and threatened and as we saw
07:27Murder, you know, it's it's we're living in a time of absolute crisis
07:32No one's in charge and the people who are
07:35Not in charge that are running things
07:38Are greedy corrupt violence brutal and have no interest in
07:44institutions of that keep things balanced and
07:48work for ordinary people
07:50Stephen I could talk to you all night long, but I'm being so selfish because so many people want to talk to you
07:54But thank you so much. Maybe sound off now. I go. I love that. I'm gonna come across
07:58Someone will cheer you up. I'm sorry
08:00Thank you