- "We need to also understand that we can only celebrate automation when we have strong safety nets and strong security systems that allow us to reimagine our ways of living."
- "If you want to win an election in India or any of the developing countries, you need to win the WhatsApp war."
- "Some of the favelas, which are low-income settlements, were run by drug lords and gangs of all kinds who would force you to be on Facebook."
- "If you look at say, Twitter, where 50% of young people are very active in Saudi Arabia, the most popular Twitter accounts are often imams themselves, because there's a lot of competition amongst these religious leaders to get the young people's attention."
Season 02 Episode 11
The Next Billion Users
Featuring Payal Arora
How does the rest of the world use technology? Author of The Next Billion Users Payal Arora joins Dirk and Jon to explore the use of AI and digital tech in diverse places such as India, China, Africa, Brazil, and Saudi Arabia.
Payal Arora, author of The Next Billion Users and Associate Professor, Department of Media and Communication at Erasmus University Rotterdam, joins Dirk and Jon to share her research on the ways emerging technologies are used in developing nations. From teenagers in India to the Chinese state to gangsters in Brazil to Imams in Saudi Arabia, we get an inside look at the current and future impact of technology in important places around the world.