- A titan from the world of cable with a warning about new titans of tech.

This week on "Firing Line."

- These guys are all largely brain chemists.

You know, they understand addiction.

They understand the motivation.

And the product that they're delivering is quite addictive.

- [Margaret] John Malone was an architect of the transformation from broadcast TV to cable.

- I dedicate the news channel for America, the Cable News Network.

- [Margaret] His new memoir, "Born to be Wired," traces the tumultuous rise of cable television, which gives him insight into a new wave of tech and media giants.

- They're geniuses.

They've built wonderful businesses.

They are playing in a sandbox that's at least 20 times larger than the sandbox that I was playing in.

- [Margaret] What does John Malone say now?

- [Announcer] "Firing Line with Margaret Hoover" is made possible in part by Robert Granieri, The Tepper Foundation, Vanessa and Henry Cornell, The Fairweather Foundation, Pritzker Military Foundation, Cliff and Laurel Asness, and by the following.

- John Malone, welcome to "Firing Line."

- Thank you.

- In the first chapter of your new memoir, "Born to be Wired," you write, quote, "Contrary to the cliched image "of a rapacious business titan, "I never sought to build a conglomerate."

Now, you've had people accuse you of being everything from a robber baron to Genghis Khan to Darth Vader.

What did they get wrong about your career?

- Well, most of those attacks have come essentially from competitors or politicians who frankly have never met me or don't know me, largely because I'm a pretty reclusive person.

And as a result, you know, I'm not very social and I do not attempt to know and meet a lot of people.

- I've heard you say you would pay a lot of money to avoid a cocktail party.

You've called yourself a high-functioning person with autism.

And it's Barry Diller of all people who said, "The thing about John Malone is his humanity."

- Yeah, I think that's right.

I really enjoy people one at a time.

But I'm quite uncomfortable with people in groups.

- You write in "Born to Be Wired," "One of the most sophisticated networks "in the history of humankind was first laid out "by a ragtag group of risk takers, idealists, and" quote, "cable cowboys."

So for those who have not yet picked up your book, who exactly were the cable cowboys, and what about their ethos drew you to them?

- Well, early in the history of television, television transmitters were mostly in big cities.

So all these rural communities were struggling to watch TV and participate in the general society.

And the cable cowboys, so to speak, were the guys who would get a franchise from a little town, raise the capital and actually build the physical system.

- You reflect on how the industry as it is now was nothing like you envisioned it would be.

How has the purpose of the industry shifted from what you envisioned when you were first laying that coaxial cable to bring television to communities around the country?

- Well, there's been quite an evolution in technology.

All through the 1980s and the early '90s, it was almost a monopoly business territorially.

Then when the internet came along, cable had a breakthrough technology of being able to do high-speed internet connectivity using its terrestrial network and grew quite rapidly as the primary broadband supplier around the world up until, really, currently, where it's currently being competed with by everything from Starlink, Elon Musk's satellite technology, to direct overbuilt competitors.

That itself has reshaped the media industry where broadcast television and quote-unquote cable channels are starting to give way to random access, commonly called streaming.

- A significant part of your story is how you had to navigate government's regulatory encroachment.

You write that, you know, you often found government's efforts to regulate the cable industry as overbearing and misguided, and you cite several examples in your book of times when the government prevented you from expanding, innovating, growing, and it resulted in less competition in the marketplace and fewer choices for consumers.

And so what's surprising even to you, you write in your book, is that you have become a vocal advocate for stricter regulations of big tech.

I wonder if you could recount a story that you tell in your book about a 2014 encounter with Mark Zuckerberg face-to-face when you first met and you all were discussing how government regulators had forced you to invest more broadly in the media business because they blocked your vertical growth.

And how Mark said to you, "Well, I don't know why I would do that "if I could own everything."

He wasn't facing any government pushback as he tried to buy WhatsApp or Instagram.

So, what did that story tell you about the tech titans' oppose-- - It just tells me, it tells me if you're in a great position, you're growing rapidly, and the government is nowhere in sight, buy everything you possibly can.

- So what I'm interested in is why you feel so strongly that the government needs a new regime of regulations designed to rein in and monitor the gigantic big tech companies.

You write that big tech has, quote, "Ominous powers to influence entire elections "by skewing their algorithms."

You've written that, "Overseas, Facebook has been used to, quote, "evil ends, "utilized by mobs "to organize their attacks against their foes "by despotic governments to quell dissent."

What would help this the problem that you see with big tech?

- Well, first of all, I don't know how or if there are people smart enough to regulate big tech.

It's global, it's impact, it's continuing to evolve rapidly.

To me, the biggest issue that regulators have to keep an eye on is abusive use of the possession.

- What do you mean by that?

- These guys are all largely brain chemists.

You know, they understand addiction.

They understand motivation.

And the product that they're delivering is quite addictive.

There's nothing changed, except the technology makes it much larger scale, much more powerful.

The chairman of Coke told me one time that all great fortunes are made on addictive substances.

And he was talking about the power of caffeine and sugar.

So these are addictive services that people are providing, and this creates a whole new paradigm.

I don't know how you regulate something like this.

I don't know where you find people with sufficient knowledge, depth of knowledge, intelligence, to be good regulators of these challenges.

But I do know that at some point, if they're destroying innovation, if they're preventing competitors from rising up and exploiting competitive approaches, competitive services, then I think they will have gone too far.

You know, you've got to ask yourself, what is the purpose of regulation, and is it to protect competition or to protect the consumer?

- [Margaret] Consumers, right.

- Now, obviously with Amazon, they've got a better mousetrap.

They've done a wonderful job of building their business, and regulators have kind of left it alone, and I think rightly so, because it's just done a better job.

And if Walmart wants to compete, they have to compete.

And new guys trying to break in have to come up with even better models.

But, you know, that's an example of an industry, retail, that's just been dramatically changed.

And the regulators, in my opinion, have left it alone to do so because it's good for the consumer.

It may not be good for competition.

- You suggest one of the reasons that big tech has avoided regulatory scrutiny for so long is that, you know, figures like Google's Eric Schmidt had close ties to the Obama White House.

Last week, you know, Mark Zuckerberg, Sam Altman, Bill Gates, and other tech leaders were dining with President Trump.

Elon Musk, of course, helped Trump get elected and worked at the White House.

Does that kind of coziness disincentivize an administration from being tougher in their regulatory posture?

- Well, in my history of, in the communications business, I would say government intervention has been generally very political.

The biggest one that I think was enormously destructive and ill thought through was network neutrality.

Eric Schmidt, and to some degree Reed Hastings from Netflix, did a fabulous job of lobbying the Obama administration and Valerie Jarrett to get network neutrality as a policy.

And they had good arguments, no question.

The problem was that that regulatory intervention set off a massive shift in the media business.

All of a sudden, CNN sees their audience declining because people now can stream Netflix, for instance, rather than buy the bundle.

And since CNN is, let's call it trapped, in that expensive bundle, as people decide maybe they don't wanna pay $100 a month for linear video programming, they live without CNN.

So it was a restructuring, I don't think a well thought through restructuring, of the industry.

- You speak very warmly of your fellow cable titans, Ted Turner, Rupert Murdoch, Barry Diller.

Do you see the big tech giants today, Mark Zuckerberg, Elon Musk, Sam Altman, do you see them in the same way, as honorable men that are trying to do the right thing?

- Absolutely.

They're geniuses.

They've built wonderful businesses, taken advantage of technology, regulation, global presence.

They are playing in a sandbox that's at least 20 times larger than the sandbox that I was playing in.

And they've utilized technology and their understanding of consumers to build fabulous businesses.

I think these guys are terrific.

They should be the heroes of a capitalistic society.

No question.

That doesn't mean that there aren't things they can be criticized for.

But I do believe that they have created great businesses.

I wish that I had invested in more of them.

You know, they've taken their expertise and put it together with opportunity and built great capitalistic enterprises that are big enough to challenge national governments, which I think is incredible.

I think it's wonderful.

It's just gonna be interesting to watch how this works out, watch this play.

- Where the balance of power falls.

- Right, yeah.

- I'd like to ask you about the quality of television news and the news media.

You celebrate in your book the legendary CBS anchor, Walter Cronkite.

- Right.

- Who, as you quote, he, "Believed fervently that an educated public "was key to democracy's survival."

- Right.

- And, you know, there was a panel that you participated on with him back in 1998 where Cronkite questioned whether market forces and cable news, you know, would be able to perform their role in a democracy.

- There is an expectation that the news department should deliver the same percentage of profit that entertainment does.

And there is the feeling that the news department should be a special case.

They are charged with a very heavy responsibility in our democracy.

And yet if they're expected to produce the same kind of a margin of profit, they are going to have to pander to the lowest common denominator.

- I think the consumer is king.

And the consumer will ultimately demand convenience, accuracy in what he relies on, quality.

- I wonder, 25 years forward, do you believe that the consumer has demanded accuracy and quality when it comes to television news?

- Wow.

Well, first of all, there was something very charming about a country that 90% of the public was hearing the same news at the same hour every night.

It was very unifying.

- Yeah.

- And I've always been concerned about the fractionalization of our society because I think you're entitled, you know, to your opinion, but not your own facts.

I mean, that's always been an interesting question.

And I don't know if you know, but we owned "MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour."

- I learned that Liberty Media became a partner in the "NewsHour" in 1994, and then funded it for 20 years.

Before Robert McNeil hosted "MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour", he appeared on the original "Firing Line" with William F. Buckley Jr. in 1968, and they had a discussion about the influence of television on politics.

Take a look at this clip.

- What about the notion that an in-depth understanding of the political phenomenon is something that cannot be communicated by visual means, i.e., that there is an implicit conflict of interest between that which is highly viewable and that which is highly illuminating?

- I think there's a good deal in that.

And...

But I do think that there can be greater attempts than are made by American commercial television to provide in-depth understanding of things.

I mean, we are, well, we are discussing a subject in some depth for an hour or so on this program.

And I don't know how much in-depth understanding we're providing of it, but we are discussing it for an hour.

- Liberty Media became a partner in the "NewsHour," and you say it's 'cause it was the right thing to do.

- Yeah.

- Is it a public interest to ensure that there is straight news available, even if it's somehow not financially sustainable?

- Yeah, but how do you do that?

Now, it used to be, when broadcasting was king and there were only two or three broadcasters, the FCC had enormous power, right, over those broadcasters.

And those broadcasters could lose their license to do business if they breached, you know, any one of a number of rules.

Everybody was getting roughly the same news.

They all could talk about the same facts.

And those facts were represented as trustworthy, and supposedly enforced in their trustworthiness by an FCC that was open to hear complaints and contest, okay?

That was a pretty good system, I thought, a private but government-monitored and controlled system.

It worked well for the country and the unity of the country.

Unfortunately, the combination of technological change, loss of trust in government, and it kind of blew that up.

And now we have a system where you can listen to whatever version of the news makes you happy.

This is not good for a democracy.

So, you know, I think it's unfortunate that it's taken this route.

And, you know, when it comes to, you know, factual news, not only can you listen to different facts on the same event, right, depending on what news source you're using, you either hear all about it, or you hear nothing about it.

- Right.

- So they don't even agree on what's newsworthy anymore.

- Your criticism of CNN has been well covered as one where they've ventured into advocacy journalism from a sort of center left or left leaning perspective.

And yet, when they do their best to be honest about the facts, and there's a president who says every time they hold him accountable for the facts, they're fake news-- - Yeah.

- You know, how does one balance in that kind of environment?

- How do you deal with a phenomenon like Donald Trump, right?

This is very tough.

And so, you know, you take CNN, as hard as they try, right, it's difficult for them to separate their point of view.

And so the question really is, do you balance this by having an opposite channel?

But then that becomes, you know, you listen to the choir.

- Then everybody has their own version of the facts, and that's the problem.

- And everybody has their own version of the facts, and more and more people get their facts in headline style from social media, where there's no in-depth, no context.

And we're ending up with a shallower, less well-informed public.

You know, and then you have a dysfunctional Congress that's completely dysfunctional.

- You've talked about how we have cut the Chinese off from control of TikTok.

Congress, of course, passed a law to do exactly that, but President Trump has delayed implementing it three times, with another extension likely to come next week.

You know, I know, again, you have said in your book, you think of yourself as an engineer who likes to solve problems.

So, how do you solve the problem of a Congress that needs to reassert itself as a separate and equal branch of government to the executive branch as the founders envisioned?

- Well, that's really a systems engineering problem, I think.

I think you have to step back.

As our society becomes so complex, it's way over the head of a politically elected group in Congress to be able to fulfill its constitutional duties with knowledge.

And I think the answer is increasingly over the last decades, more and more it's been Congress punting their duties to the executive branch and the bureaucracy.

And you're really heading toward executive branch totalitarianism.

Because to make the country work, you're putting the president in a position where he has to grab the reins, whether it's constitutional or not.

Things have to be done.

Things have to be looked after.

Decisions have to be made.

And you have a dysfunctional Congress which seems to be getting more dysfunctional by the year.

Is there a big fix here that we can look forward to?

Reagan made it all work because of his personality.

So, you know, how do we get back there?

Is it possible we get lucky and find another Reagan?

Trump had all the charisma, right, of a Reagan.

He just didn't have the style of a Reagan.

And he's like a D-12 Caterpillar, you know?

And I like his policies, but his style is so disruptive and divisive that I'm not sure at the end of the day the country can survive it.

You know, it's one of those.

- When you say you don't think the country can survive it, do you really think it's an existential question for the country?

I mean, because there have been-- - Well, what we have to know is there's no middle.

There's no middle.

I support the hell out of Susan Collins, for instance, up here in Maine, because she's a centrist Republican surviving in the Republican Party by the skin of her teeth.

Lisa Murkowski out in Alaska, similar, right?

There is no middle any more in our political system.

And that bothers me because it means, just as a businessman, we're likely to see this thing swing back and forth violently and disruptively.

And that's not good.

I mean, the fact that we've been unable to solve the immigration issue for all this time.

You know, I look at this and I say, well, you know, what fixes it?

I mean, look, I love John Hickenlooper and Senator Bennett from Colorado because they supported charter schools in Denver, which I think is huge.

So I'm all over the map when it comes to my political perspective.

And what the solution is, I don't have a solution.

I think our society is way too complicated for Congress.

And somehow or other, there has to be some way that Congress can function but not fall prey to an overpowering bureaucracy.

- Or an executive that is too strong and that they can't stand up to.

- Well, yeah, no, I mean, right now, they're forcing the executive to play a much bigger role with his agencies than the Constitution intended, in my opinion.

Congress has abdicated a very important part of their role.

And the party system is like two mafia organizations fighting for power, where power is more important than the country, unfortunately.

Party loyalty trumping compromise.

The regulators should really be taking a hard look at the monopolies of the political parties.

- There you go, there you go.

The Department of Justice, unfortunately, is not looking at that.

John Malone, thank you very much for your time.

Thank you for joining me here on "Firing Line."

- Well, thank you, Margaret.

- [Announcer] "Firing Line with Margaret Hoover" is made possible in part by Robert Granieri, The Tepper Foundation, Vanessa and Henry Cornell, The Fairweather Foundation, Pritzker Military Foundation, Cliff and Laurel Asness, and by the following.

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