a magneticas source. there is another way of developing solar panels. there is a solar cell that is not silicon-based that is almost 90% effective in capturing the sun it to electricity. why not merge they government that the government started and stop criticizing and demonizing each other. to wipe us out. >> we have heard your point. >> we don't need to demonize each other. some systems are better than others. better than the chinese system. if we let it work. if we fix the economic fear, it will work better and faster than the chinese system. we have had a contest with

communism and we beat them. them when they took down the wall. we have beaten this thing. they think they can have some government folks direct the economy and that sort of thing. good luck with that. it did not work with the soviets. it did not last long term. we will win if we let the power of capitalism work. the power of capitalism is not working now. ofm getting away with a lot trash dumping without you making me accountable. accountable and all kinds of blessings will follow. >> martin, democrat. can get't think you most american people to be in favor of government action to combat climate change. trying to you are

force them and they don't see the evidence yet. if you look at it from an economic standpoint, i have called in on this comment before. built anvernment interstate railway system to transport freight from state to state and convert truxton diesel gas instead of fuel, we could cut back on the amount of oil that is used in the united states. tried driving a couple years ago and could not believe it cost a couple thousand dollars to transport a load of freight from coast-to-coast, and it takes a couple days. it can be done in a matter of hours on a railway system. the railroad could be used to pay back the cost of the government for using the railroad. sounds like everybody in america would be better off. guest: good stuff, martin. really doeshat rail

reduce emissions compared to trucks. trucks are valuable for short and quick deliveries, but you are onto something there. the way we would like to do it is not by having the government stepped in and tell the trekkers to do this or that until the railroads to do this or that, but just level the playing field, make it so all the costs are in on diesel and on natural gas. nat gas has a lot less powerons than coal for generation, and it has advantages when it comes to transportation fuel. the better thing to do rather than having some of the in government say that we have a great idea here, just like we said earlier about china and the soviets, they thought they could centrally plan that. well, that is not what gave us the cost crashes with cell phones feared cell phones were once very expensive. now a lot of us can afford them.

it is because private competition meant they were after customers. let's do that in energy, make it so that you level the playing field. ishink what you mentioned what would happen, a lot more rail and natural gas being used. it would be exciting. the air would be cleaned up, and we would be making a lot of money. you: mr. inglis, i thank for the conversation this morning and talking to our viewers about this issue. if they want to learn more, they can go to republicen.org. that is republicen.org. org, just to be announcer: a look at lack markets and cybercrime. here is a preview. she talks about how more devices

connected to the internet provide more avenues for cyber crime. with insulin pumps, pacemakers that have a network component, refrigerators, front door locks, and vehicles computer on a set of wheels. connectedhe number of devices will outnumber the number of connected people by a ratio of six to one. that statistic, i have been using it for a couple of years and it is the -- it is crazy we are in the middle of 2016. of the world with a digital component, there are more attack paths for cyber

criminals to go after. crime to have a digital component. >> three years after a supreme court ruling overturned part of the voting rights act, courts have struck down a number of state laws, saying they discriminate against groups of voters. saturday night, c-span looks at voting rights and the impact on the 2016 election. will feature part of the 2013 supreme court argument. there was a look at whether to rights act.voting plus, a discussion on whether the voting rights act is necessary. voter id, a lot of places are not going to have voter id. what does that mean? you keep walking in and voting? a what is happening is

sweeping effort to get empowered and disenfranchise people of color, poor people and young people. >> c-span, created by america's cable television companies and brought to you as a public service by your cable or satellite provider. >> the state department confirming $400 million cash payment to iran was contingent on the release of american prisoners. john kirby was responding to questions about a story, reporting the u.s. would not let iran take control of the money, which the country was owed as part of a settlement until a plane carrying the prisoners had

left iran. portion of that briefing from earlier today with john kirby. >> rather than getting up, as much as i am sure you would love me to pick apart the media story -- >> is anything true? like to respond this way. i have seen the article. let me address this issue of timing. we were able to conclude multiple strands of diplomacy within a 24-hour period. you can look at europe and work that was done back then. you will see we were aboveboard

about this. even the president talked about the timing. we were able to conclude multiple strands of diplomacy including implantation of the nuclear deal, prisoner talks, and the settlement of a tribunal claim, which saved intentionally billions of dollars. we deliberately leveraged that moment to finalize these outstanding issues. it is already publicly known iran itseturned to $400 million. with concerns iran may renege on as prisoner release, as well , mutual mistrust between iran and the united states, we sought to retain maximum leverage until american citizens were released. that was our top priority.

is there anything in the wall street journal you dispute on factual ground? ini don't have the article front of me. i am not going to go through line by line. that isere something left out that is untrue, you would be in a position to tell us. >> i have characterized the central finding of the story, that the payment of the 400 million was not done until after the prisoners were released. >> why weren't you able to tell us that 10 days ago when i asked if you could assure us those prisoners were in the process of being released before the money? >> we were not in the position then and had no intention -- and had no intention of getting into a -- that happened in that period. we answered your question at the time. it was never our intention to

have to do that. you are asking me about a press story that was already written about it. i am providing some context. >> first you said this was two separate tracks. that it was saying used as leverage, which would connect the two. >> they were independent. >> you said you are using one for leverage as part of the other. >> they came together near simultaneously. moment, if in this your top priority is to get americans out and you have some them, youut locating that releasesure gets done before. are connected in the sense

at theey came together same time and we were making our priority getting the americans out. if we had done it differently, james and i would be having a different conversation. payment was contingent on their release? >> what i am saying is that mayuse we had concerns iran renege on the prisoner release, given the unnecessary delays, as well as mutual mistrust, we to retain maximum leverage until after the american's release. of thedoes withholding cash give you the kind of leverage you were seeking? >> we felt it would be improved

not to consider that some leverage in trying to make sure our americans got out. connection between these two events. events came together simultaneously. concernsalready have about the endgame in terms of getting your americans out, it would have been foolish for us not to have tried to maintain maximum leverage. if you are asking me was there a connection in that regard, i will not deny that. getting away from the word basic english you are saying you would not give them the $400 million in cash until the prisoners were released, correct? mr. kirby: that is correct. >> a number of republican members of congress reacting to

today's state department briefing. walters.t from mimi two weeks ago the white house denied this was a ransom payment. now, it is clear the administration misled the american people. it is august and the congressional break continues for members of the house. returns september 6. they take this time of the year to visit with constituents, hold town halls, tour businesses and schools. frank lewiss from of oklahoma, sending this message. look forward to hosting a town hall in yukon later this afternoon. we will be at 10 the west main street from 5:00 to 6:00 p.m. maryland was holding a town hall meeting in ocean city, maryland, today.

he was there as part of the maryland association of counties and responded to a number of questions. on theessed questions zika virus, flooding, relations between police and the black community. let's look at part of that event now. >> what is being done? you are looking at ending racial profiling. where is that at and where does it stand? in maryland and around the nation, we have seen horrible episodes and loss of life. our prayers go out to the families impacted. to have the right type of policing and our community. we admire the men and women who are first responders, who are law enforcement. the majority who do their work every day in a professional manner to keep us safe. the tragedies that have the fall

and our law enforcement is outrageous. one in which we had to pay a great deal of collective community attention to make sure that does not happen in america. we have seen too many episodes where we have seen the consequences of unprofessional policing. it has turned community against the law enforcement. tragedy, freddie gray i met with one of the leaders i know. they foundelling me it difficult to work with the police because they do not think the system is fair to the people of their own community. someone brokey be the law, they did not know whether they wanted that person in our criminal justice system. there was mistrust between our police department and the community. that cannot continue.

blakenie rawlings requested the department of justice to do an investigation. that was recently completed. it brought out some of the significant problems we have had in policing in baltimore. the leadership understands that report. implementorking to what needs to be done. communities want to establish and they relationship are working with us. we will have a consent order that will implement the findings. it will require all of us from baltimore city to the state of maryland to the federal to provide the wherewithal and tools so baltimore and all communities can have adequate policing.

do is whate need to you brought up. racial profiling must and in america. -- must end in america. >> you can watch all of that later in the c-span prime time overnight schedule tonight. it is available on our website. johnson -- i want to back up a second. on tuesday, september 6 will be back. the house live on c-span and the senate live on c-span 2. they will work on the federal ,pending bills, zika prevention research, other issues. a possible impeachment of the irs commissioner. i want to talk about jeh johnson for a moment.

the homeland secretary was in the louisiana today. from kevin frey, secretary jeh johnson is on the ground in louisiana and meeting with state leaders. jeh johnson held a meeting and was accompanied by the governor of louisiana. runs about a half hour. we will show that to you now.

>> i want to thank our federal partners for their quik response in the way they have worked with us at the state and local level to respond to this unprecedented , historic flooding event, but to help us plan and transition into a quick recovery. fema teams are starting today to make assessments. flood smallst business administration center opens today. departmenthank the beginelopment as they opening the centers. we are not out of the woods. as i have been saying. this is an ongoing events.

in somefloodwaters and cases, record floodwaters as they move south. housing will be a major issue. stress, if you have not done so, you need to register your dam urges -- your damages. even if you are not in one of the 20 parishes that are part of the major disaster declaration, you can and should register your disaster assistance claim by calling the number or going online. we have had 86,500 registrations with fema. still waiting on the

water to reseed. others are beginning the process carpet, drywall, removing damage from their homes. , document your damages by taking photographs. i encourage everyone to look for .ips it is important you clean out your homes as soon as possible. restoreas possible, electricity and air-conditioning so you don't suffer mold contamination. we are working very hard to make sure every available resource is getting into the hands of the

people across the parishes who need it. we are working to make sure no request goes unanswered. we are sheltering 472 people. this number changes rapidly. the us far, more than 30,000 people have been rescued and over 1400 pets. i am sorry to report the number of confirmed fatalities caused related to the storm is now at 13. over 40,000 homes impacted local first responders, aided by their state partners, state police, wildlife and fisheries, the fire and thes office national guard have done a tremendous job of safeguarding lives and preserving property.

with the 40,000 homes that have been impacted so far, state and federal assessment teams began going out into the affected parishes. in the louisiana, taking care of one another is a way of life and we are on our way from response to recovery. i asked for continued prayers for the people of louisiana. at this time, i'm going to be followed by secretary johnson, after which congressman richman is going to speak to you. following him we will hear from the ceo of the american red cross. at this time, secretary johnson. jeh johnson: thank you, governor edwards. i am here today with the governor and members of the cabinet, the governors homeland security and first responder law enforcement officials as well as congressman cedric richmond.

congressman graves was with us earlier and he had to leave. and the head of the red cross, the governor and deputy administrator of fema, regional administrator tony robinson and jerry stoler. i shelter in the ascension parish and some of the more affected areas. i just sat in with the governor on a briefing by his cabinet on the current situation on the ground. if i had to characterize the mood here in the community, it would be with one first responder said to me a few hours ago, whose home had been severely damaged by the flooding.

our hearts are broken, but our faith is strong. the federal government is here, we have been here and will be here as long as it takes to help this community recover. the president has declared a major disaster declaration affecting 20 parishes. that means fundamentally two things. individual assistance to those who have been personally affected, who had damage to their homes, and public assistance. as the governor said, to become eligible for individual assistance, you must apply by calling either 1-800-621-3362, or through www.disasterassistance.gov. we've had 86,000 individuals apply for federal assistance. this includes assistance in repair of your homes and replacement of certain personal items.

once eligible, money can be transferred to you in a matter of just a few days. we are here to provide public assistance as well in terms of repair of infrastructure, roads and schools. at present there are some 950 fema personnel on the ground. we expect another 750, possibly more, in the coming days. we have helped by contributing cots, meals, blankets, water, and other things. our coast guard, which is also part of the department of homeland security is here on the job, immediately in the hours after the flooding began they engaged in search and rescue. the coast guard continues to monitor the situation in the rivers, monitor the water levels. the small business administration, which is a federal agency, is also here to help with small businesses. the red cross is also present and i have to say, for those of

us who have toured the affected areas, this has been a reaffirmation in terms of our ability when a crisis happens to pull together at the federal, state, and local level, to help the public and to help individuals, to help the people that we are sworn to serve. i've been remarkably impressed not only by the spirit and faith, but also by the level of volunteerism that i see in this community and in this state. governor, i want to thank you and commend you for your leadership. in the last week or so it has been exemplary, and i want to thank you for that. i will be briefing the president on the situation that i see here at some point very soon. he is getting daily briefings on the situation here and he cares greatly about the people of louisiana, and on behalf of the

president and myself, i want everyone here to know that the federal government is here. we are devoting a lot of let me start by thanking ca governor john bel edwards for his leadership during this crisis, and i have been here during katrina as both a victim in a state rep, and he has provided very steady leadership, especially during the rescue portion of this disaster. i also want to thank secretary jeh johnson, who is here today because he cares, and because it sends a message that the federal

government has are back. when you are a state like louisiana where it seems that we are fighting one thing after another, it's always reassuring to know that you have a federal partner that will be here to help. i also want to say something about what we are dealing with. this flood affected so many of our parishes, but it also affected baton rouge, which is our state capital, where so many of our government workers and our first responders live. and the fact that they are shown up to work every day, they are still making sure that we transition from rescue to recovery, even though they themselves have been victims of this storm. so we have to keep in mind that many of the people use the out here -- many the people you see working out here to make sure that recovery starts are also victims.

and let me just conclude with this. i think it is important that people hear this. no matter what neighborhood you are in, if it is rural or urban, no matter if you are rich or poor, this recovery is going to make it to everyone. and so we may not be on the national news as a headline, we are a headline to the people in the state of louisiana that run government, and we are a headline to the president of the united states, who has had his secretary of homeland security, administrator few gay, and those who bear the responsibility of helping us recover -- administrator fugate, here on the ground. what i've seen firsthand, the residents are back. as the water recedes, they are

gutting and remediating their homes and doing the work it takes to start recovery. our commitment is that we will be partners on the street in every community to make sure we do what is necessary to help our residents get through this disaster and move forward and heal the community. so thank you very much, not only the governor and the secretary, but all of the leadership that stands behind me that have been sacrificing from day one and will keep sacrificing until the job is done. >> let me start by saying on behalf of the entire american behalf of the entire american red cross, our hearts go out to people of louisiana. this is the second major flood in just five months, and it is by far the largest operation the american red cross has engaged in since superstorm sandy. it is absolutely enormous. you can drive through the affected area and as far as the eye can see, you can see people's belongings on the curb,

you can see where the water level was. it's really devastating and it's extremely difficult for the residents here. i also want to thank governor edwards, your leadership has been incredible through all of this. your state emergency management crew and team and local emergency management has just been phenomenal, and it's a privilege to be able to work with you. secretary johnson, fema is doing such an outstanding job here and and the coordination is -- is tremendous. when i think of how fast you're moving assistance to the people of louisiana and responding, we appreciate that as well. the american red cross has been sheltering a lot of residents here. at the peak there were 10,000 people in shelters in the state. last night there were 8000 in total. as people start moving back into their homes, we are going to

move from sheltering to fanning out to the neighborhood and helping people there. we've already served 100,000 meals and snacks to people in the shelters. we are bringing a group of emergency response vehicles that can serve food in and out of the neighborhoods, give people hot meals and also start distributing some bulk relief items like bleach, gloves, mops, things people need to start cleaning out their homes. i would ask the residents of louisiana to be careful as they start moving back. it's been my experience that after flooding, followed by home fires. make sure your wiring is safe, make sure your house is free of mold. we will be here in the community until everybody is back on their feet, and we believe that at the end of this operation, we will

have spent $30 million. we are prepared to serve 1.5 million meals and snacks. our volunteers are incredible and there's been an amazing outpouring of volunteers right here. it's neighbors helping neighbors, which is great. anyone wanting to volunteer for the american red cross, please go to our website, red cross.org. people here could use help, and if anyone wants to make a financial donation, that would be greatly appreciated as well. think you. you.ank >> at this time we are going to take questions. i want to follow up on something gail just said. the only downside -- perhaps the national attention is not on it as it relates to donations to the

red cross. i don't complain about the assistance we have gotten from the federal government, because it has been superb, but i would ask those people watching in louisiana around the country to seriously consider making a generous donation to the american red cross today, so that we can speed assistance to those who are needing to recover. we will now take a few questions. yes, sir. >> governor, can you give the folks out there a timetable as to when assistance will be coming? a lot of people have been asking over the last few days, do you have a timetable? you mentioned a few already but if you could just give us that information. >> i want to say seven parishes -- i think we increased that. it's going to be seven parishes will be opening on monday. those offices will be open for the next six weeks. over the next three weeks we will be in all 20 of the parishes that are declared, each parish will be for a week.

there is an announcement that i think has been made officially to that effect. it will start in those parishes that are most affected. in terms of further efforts, i would remind you that we are still in a response mode as well in southern ascension parish and st. james and potentially st. john. also acadia parish, and down in jefferson davis parish. we are working again today to formulate a more complete plan for transitioning out of response to recovery, and what that means with respect to the housing options that we will pick from, there nothing easy about this because we have folks from all demographics, some of which had flood insurance and some did not. some had the ability to read our stay in a hotel, others do not. we have some places where there

is capacity with rental units in hotels and other places where there are not. every home that has been damaged is not damage to the same extent. it may be easy to get some people in but difficult for others. you have to find the right mix of options and that takes some time. we have been working extensively, not just here in this building, but going out and meeting the big find out what the mix is so that we bring the resources necessary. we will have another meeting this afternoon to try to make some final decisions and we will be communicating those decisions two people very soon. we are working as fast as we can work to make this happen. but if people will register their assistance claim with fema

the way we mentioned, many of those people are going to have some dollars available to them in as little as 48 hours. so they will just continue that process. as they are deemed eligible, the spigots will be turned on. [indiscernible] >> will you be recommending that he come to louisiana and visit? >> of course the president cannot be everywhere. i can tell you the president has been closely monitoring the situation here in louisiana. he made a matter of hours, it was expedited. we are up to 20 parishes now. i will be briefing him on what i see here and the status of our recovery and response efforts. administrator fugate did the same thing after his visit here two days ago. the president is closely monitoring the situation. he is very much on top of it.

as i say, the president cannot be everywhere. i know he has a very busy schedule in the coming days and he is closely monitoring the situation. the chief executive of the entire u.s. government cannot be everywhere, including places you would like to be, but through me and through craig, i know he's very much on top of the situation. >> how hard is it, it if your updates are going to the president on the golf course? jeh johnson: as i said, he's very much on top of the situation and he is aware of the beel of assistance that can provided. i will be briefing him myself right after this visit. >> yesterday a federal judge in arizona issued an order [indiscernible]

jeh johnson: i'm aware of the decision. i have not personally reviewed it and i have no comment at this. >> how many housing vouchers have been given out? for hotel stays? >> the question was the number of housing vouchers that have been given out. >> fema no longer issues vouchers. with regard to temporary housing, we are working very closely with the state to look at all possible options. as the governor mentioned, depending on the extent of damage to a survivors home, that will dictate what solution each survivor household will be made available to them. >> in terms of the house to house searches, can you say how that is going? how long it will take before

they can search all the houses and cars that need to be dearched, and has any fema ai started flowing to the state or individuals that you know of? >> a number of individuals who have registered have already been deemed eligible for assistance and the spigots have been turned on. whether we are able to deliver that assistance electronically or by mail determines how fast it gets to them. typically it's going to be about 48 hours or a little longer if ail. secondly, with respect to the urban search and rescue, we are very thankful to have a team in from texas to assist in this effort, but the effort overall is being led by the state fire marshal, who really developed urban search-and-rescue here in louisiana and they are doing a phenomenal job. they are just about finished with livingston parish, and it's obviously necessary to do the

secondary search. i want to make sure people know what we're talking about. the people we rescued from homes are those we knew about who were stranded or people who called and asked for help. now that we are past that point in the crisis in most of the area where we are still undergoing response, it's now time to go back and do a comprehensive search house by house, whether or not there was a call for assistance to make sure there isn't someone in that house who was unable to call for assistance and who may need help. but it's not just the houses, it's the automobiles, because we have automobiles that were washed off of roads and down creeks and rivers. so we have to make sure we are searching automobiles , too. we dispatch and urban search and rescue team to ascension parish today. this is a partial report of what happened yesterday but it will

give you an idea of how important this is. of the first 800 homes that we searched yesterday in livingston parish, the secondary search, more than 30 homes had people who had not yet been assisted. they didn't know how to ask for help, i guess. many of them were elderly and frail. we were able to go in there and help. unfortunately we discovered one deceased and that was the 12 confirmed fidelity. -- fatality. it is critically important that we go door to door. unlike some things you saw in katrina, we're not having to do forced entry, but in very many cases we were able to mark the residences having been searched with chalk

rather than paint. we've learned a lot of lessons over the years and were bringing them to bear in this search and rescue. i want to address something about the question that was just asked of secretary johnson. it's easy to focus, i guess, on things that have not happened. i want you to know that within hours of me requesting a federal declaration, the president granted the declaration and called me to discuss it. secondly, i been in contact with the white house just about every day. the head of fema spent several hours here with me on tuesday. today we have secretary jeh johnson here with us, as you can see. he was dispatched here by the president. today, the four-star general over the guard component and a member of the joint chiefs of staff spent hours with us here today. we've had the major general in charge of the corps of engineers here today. and so i am not complaining in any way

about our federal partnership. the president is welcome to visit whenever he wants to visit , and whenever he wants to visit we will receive him and do whatever is necessary to make sure that visit goes off without a hitch. however, if you remember a few weeks ago when the vice president came to the memorial of the police officers who were shot and killed, if you recall the impact that had on our community with respect to closing down interstates, the security that was required and also police officers locally you had to be taken from other duties in order to provide that security, quite frankly, that is not something that i want to go through right now. so while the president is welcome to visit, i would just as soon he give us another week or two to get back to a greater sense of normalcy here, and then he can visit. well, i will say that

differently, he can visit whenever he wants to. [laughter] >> i think were talking about mid term long-term solutions for housing. >> we mentioned that a while ago. we cannot get the right mix determined until we know more about the population who is affected. we are working feverishly to figure out exactly who they are, whether they had flood insurance of they did not, whether they have helped to get back in their homes, whether their homes can be fixed in a matter of hours, or whether it will take days or weeks, and where all these people are geographically. when we have a better feel, we will know whether and how many manufactured housing units to order, what the rental capacity is, which changes, because we have a lot of people in hotels today, for example, and that sort of thing. we will have more definitive announcements forthcoming very quickly, and i told the team this morning that we are going

to work this evening and tonight so that if possible, we will have more definitive announcements tomorrow, before the weekend, so people can know what to expect and when they can expect it. >> can we get an update on schools? >> we will get you the information on schools, but that really wouldn't be the best question to ask right now. >> there's been a lot said in the last couple of days about the -- like in new orleans there was billions of dollars spent for flood grade protection after katrina. >> will this send a clarion call to double down on those efforts?

do you think it would've made a difference had that been up and running in this flood event? >> the flood project is very important. it is two decades in the making, and there's not much progress, as you know. it is impossible to know whether the areas would have flooded had that project been in place, but the fact of the matter is, we had record flooding everywhere. we are going to move forward with that project as quickly as possible. i've already had a meeting today with the major general of the corps of engineers and he is meeting with separate group right now discussing that project and we are trying to get it moving as quickly as possible, because we do believe that it would aid in terms of flood control, but obviously it

was not in place and it's hard to guess just what extent the flooding would have been lessened. i will be followed by congressman richman. >> if history is any indicator, which i think it is, we've made a lot of noise for a long time about flood control, levee protection in new orleans. katrina came and we got unprecedented money from the government to get it done. if you just look back to hurricane isaac, the project which protects the river parishes had been dangling for 43 years. we finally got engineers report and were now going to move forward with the project. other projects will go in similar fashion because it highlights the importance. similar to what the governor said, i don't think there has been mapping or anything yet that will say what effect not having it had, but what we do know is that in a state like

louisiana, every project, every levee we have makes us safer. i'm sure that the delegation will go back with renewed vigor to try to get expedited. what events like this do is magnify to the core what we have been fighting for the whole time. i would suspect that this will go along the same lines of the west shore project and metro new orleans flood recovery projects. >> thank you all very much. [indiscernible] >> tonight at 8:00 eastern on

c-span, black-market and cybercrime. about why more devices connected to the internet provide more avenues for cybercrime. with insulin pumps now enabled with bluetooth, and pacemakers with a digital component. and vehicles that are essentially computers on a set world has more of the a digital component. interestingly, by the year 2020, the number of connected vices will outnumber the number of connected people by a ratio of to 1. that statistic i have been using for a couple of years, and it is crazy that

we are in 2069. -- 2016. landscape has banded great week -- expanded greatly, allowing crime to have more of a digital component. >> three years after a supreme court ruling overturned parts of the voting rights act, parts the country have struck down at voting rights laws, saying they discriminate against groups of voters. we look at voting rights tonight, and the impact on the 2016 election. members of congress look at whether or not to restore the theng rights act, plus decision on whether or not the voting rights act is necessary. here is what the presidential

candidates have to say. trump: a lot of places are not going to have a voter id. what is that mean -- what does that mean? you just walk in and vote. clinton: it disenfranchises people of color, poor people, and young people from one end of the country to the other. >> in-line yourself on voting light 10 -- enl ighten yourself on voting rights , tonight at 8:00. online.r radio app

techrt of the annual crunch conference from a brooklyn. -- from brooklyn. this is a look at internet privacy, data security, and hacking. >> good morning, it is so early. everyone, for waking up 3:00 a.m. >> just to see you. for those of you who do not know, if you don't know maybe you are at the wrong conference. is search engine specifically for gifs.

chat wanted to start the is, gifs have been around for a long time. why are publishers and platforms excited about it, and why are consumers? the growth has been extraordinary. -- wondering, up, why now? are just silent clips of videos, and we have always referenced those. always beenogy has there to share it, it is just like when the printing press was invented. when photography was invented, we wanted to capture images in a way other than paint. outmass population can put

moving photographs in the world , and this is gifs s to be way to allow gif played natively inside a social network. these programs that were so esoteric to the film industry are now available to the rest of the world. always beenad there, but the technology had not caught up. only in recent years has technology been available to capture these moments of human culture and information and upload them to the internet. a billion gifs a day, because people want to reference these moments and share this information. >> we got on the phone to prep for this, and you said, we could

wek about competition, but do not have any so let's not do that. imgur, gifsy, and even google to some extent want to be part of this market. and i know you just acquired gifgrabber? >> it allows you to make a gif from anything on the internet using your screen capture. cool.super >> quite the headline. it -- thet think search engines do not seem to have the same tagging system you guys do. a reference, it

is still small. my mom does not know what a gif is. most of the world does not know what a gif is. gifle working in technology, we want to work with you. we have been merging with these technologies, we acquired gif gr are creating something new. it is a huge industry that is going to happen, because we are just making photographs move. when we think about photography, how many companies are part of that industry? we want to work with everyone. in terms of competition, everyone else in particular, other people are keyboard companies, headlines of the internet, social networks, but we are a gift -- gi

alex: ok. jordan: that is what i thought. giphy cam is a genius idea. i do not hear people talking about it. i expected it to really take off. cam was our first gif camera. it is an app for your iphone. apple named him one of the best won a lot16 and has of awards. you can take a gif and put it on snapchat and send out a gif to your friends on social. it is very popular with an audience. as soon as people know it exists, more people will start using it, but after that, boomerang, snapchat filters, they are pretty much coming into the stage and this is good

because it is popularizing the idea of these short moving images across social networks and imaging. was one ofk giphycam the first to start the trend now there is a ton of other apps. as soon as more people are exposed to these applications, you can take a gif on your phone and sunday, my phone is basically another version of giphycam. everyone calls it something else. essentially they are short, silent videos. jordan: that also goes into the , and have used this term, not always a gif file type, right? alex: it is kind of like the kleenex facial tissue in the xerox of paper. 1987it was invented in there was a specific format specifically used for putting signs on your website, constructing a site you were never going to build after.

i think i have a few that still have that thing on it. now, it is just kind of used as a catchall phrase for any short, 3, 5 second video. different renditions of everything that comes up on the site. really live photos, we support them. a gif really is about the time segment and the concept versus the actual format itself. can beke photographs digital, printed, can be anything. jordan: right. kind of swinging back to giphyc am. you never built a feed into that app. that is no giphy product has that social feed aspect to it. i guess my question is, when you are taking something inherently on, right, gifs or about

expressing yourself and having fun. it is not a utility like uber is. we do not need it, we wanted. when you do not build that into it, i want to understand that decision-making process, right? there's not a whole lot of stickiness to giphy. alex: the stickiness is a utility. you have two options on the internet. you have the option of creating a social network and then trying to figure out how to get people to stay there, so giving and utilities or you have the option of building a utility and then having people come use your utility every day. google for example is the most popular site on the internet that is not a social network. a have tried that that did not really work out. other social networks have tried to build a utility like myspace but that did not really work and got boring. giphy has never been about building a social network. social going to go to a network like facebook and

tumbler. that is a community of people sharing things are talking to each other. we want to be a utility that takes all of the content into other places in the world. just like pancho says they are not a social network utility, we see ourselves as fundamentally first a utility so people can start expressing themselves with gifs and sharing them on the internet if that makes sense. jordan: it does make sense. it works. no social network. alex: i had a social network before this. it is the hardest thing to do. shut up to anyone who has ever made a successful social network. facebook is the social network site. it is her a hard to compete with facebook. if you can build a utility, and people use it every day, that is the easiest way to build something meaningful on the internet. jordan: can we talk about live gifing for a while? when you go on giphy the night

of the oscars and you see like lady gaga walked by leonardo dicaprio, you have been up in a couple minutes. how does that work? alex: we have deals with the oscars and most of the major events going on, and we have an entire team of editors on the west and east coast that sit and make these moments officially for our partners as they are coming out. we are there ahead of everyone because we are actually accessing a feed at the time making those gifs. the oscars, for example, there was a page on giphy and be officially made all of the gifs for them. every day we have another batch. we are the creator, the curators of that event. we are helping all of the partners that have events that want gif versions of content. jordan: right. what would you say is the ing?est for live gif alex: right now it is just what

you think in popular culture, award shows. the vma's, the oscars, emmys, golden globes, anything in tv, movies, celebrities. arele still think that cats the number one search gif on the world. a lot of people watch cats that 80% of content seen on giphy is from tvs, movies and celebrities. it is mostly pop-culture. if you do any kind of search on the internet, everyone knows that. that is really the median in the format that people are searching for. jordan: i want to come back to what you said. you said you have deals with the oscars and the vma's, etc. deals implies that there is money changing hands. alex: no, we are doing this purely, again, gifs are a small population. we are doing a lot of work to making gifs more popular on the internet. most people do not even know what a gif is.

i talked to people that say, "i think i know what that is." we are trying to get to a point where our deals with the oscars, we will create all of these gifs and put them out in the world for publishers to come, write articles about, get information back to you, give these gifs on to you as your content and they allow us to do this. it is a trait of work for the rights to come to us to distribute their content. jordan: you have raised a ton of money. you were passed $100 million at this point. alex: i think total we have $75 million raise. jordan: close. good enough. potato for 2-2 at this point -- potato, potato at this point. you are not bringing in any money. what is the revenue plan? alex: we are still on the exponential content growth.

it is not really slowing down. we are trying to see when, what how big is the gif market? all of our funds are into accelerating our growth. we are in the growth phase, right? we're still growing. it is hard to keep up. multiples.e we have grown to fold in the last two months. if that keeps up, we will need another round of funding. jordan: for make money, right? alex: right. jordan: there are a number of ways to do that. i think we should zero and on that right now. alex: ultimately, we are going to make money. since day one we have had a revenue plan in place. we have been thinking about this since day one, and one of the reasons getting licenses, now that we are distributing, there are a bunch of different revenue models, but you can see the

major ones are mobile messaging. an ad into mobile messaging? people are sending hundreds of billions of messages a day. how do you get need of advertising into mobile? gifs are the perfect market for that. we send our from tvs come celebrities we have contract deals with. in a world where mobile messaging and and ad format, it is a perfect medium. if we are serving a billion plus a day, some advertising can be there and we can charge for getting the content into the system. we do a lot editorial work to bring it all in and have those exposed to all of the distribution networks. you can see that, basically, what google is doing in terms of hyperlinks, imagine if every

hyperlink or a moving image. they are making billions of dollars. we are going to do the same thing with highly more engaging images than most. jordan: right. i want to get back to the mobile messaging bit. and bringing ag native ad is very interesting to me because the idea that i could for example flag one of my friends friday night and it shows jim bean whiskey, it is almost incognito and flies under the radar. alex: we do not do any of that right now. alex: we would work with the distribution partners to do that in the future. yes, you can see a world when people are texting gifs through any medium, that they are mostly looking up expressions, hungry, grabbing a mcdonald's gif. send it to a friend. that is an entire kind of ad

ecosystem right there. everyone in mobile is trying to figure out how did we start making revenue out of our mobile messaging on the entire messaging platform? gifs are the perfect medium. to be exploredve and we will be exploring those very soon. jordan: i agree without, but my question is, how do you target? how much information do you actually have? you know what gifs they search for but it is not like google with your entire search history. when you think about launching an ad network of any sort or as within messaging which would be themselves and your ad platform, how do you target it at that point? what information do you use? alex: we have a lot of information inbound on where the people are finding gifs. haveof our partners, we do pretty get tracking on where images are going and where

they're going to. we know demographics of which networks for example tendert --tinder looking for flirting gifs. we know what they are looking for. we do not use any of this information with others getting a search better so we can get better content. in the future, you can see how that could be used to serve better advertising with the distribution partners. we have our own tools that can directly send gifs as well. we also have her website that has a lot of traffic we can monitor as well. we do have a lot of information on users coming in in their searching pattern. we have terabytes of that data. jordan: the keyboard is also a good point. you have people's messaging habits that you can learn a lot from. wex: we have a lot of apps are putting out and a lot of information on our website. jordan: i do want to talk

quickly. we have a little bit of time left about giphy keys. my main question is, what the hell took so long? i have been waiting for this for so long. why did it take you 2.5 years to do this? alex: we have thought of a cape verde -- keyboard since day one. apple's keyboard was not quite right yet. there were some great keyboards. i love the first keyboard. that was really good. we invested in some good keyboard companies. flash has an amazing keyboard. lastput on a lot of apps year. there have been some good keyboards, and once we found a point of view we were like, ok, we do need to put out what we think is our best. we had an entirely different point of view from all of the other keyboards and we wanted to be very minimal. it is not like you have to switch after texting. you can stay there and tax. once we discover that, it was

time to put up our own keyboard. again, the keyboard market is pretty small. anywhere that you can distribute a gif, we want to build an app or work with other partners. we actually power a lot of other keyboards out there. we just want to support that system. again, we want to work with everyone because we do not believe that one keyboard is going to win the entire space. we think that probably everyone will have a particular keyboard they like and we want to power all of them. we want to bring all of the content to those keyboards. jordan: the keyboard is almost a sales tool for your api. tox: they are using api distribute content as a good user experience. one thing we talked about, partnering with flash keyboard in the fall, actually in two weeks to launch an entire branded keyboard platform where they have an entire really cool

platform where you can just click a couple buttons and create a branded keyboard. we are offering all of our content partners with free, branded keyboards for the next couple of weeks. in a coupleo put buttons and launching a keyboard. that is good for everyone putting content out in the world. you can may customize experiences for people. jordan: cool. we are pretty much out of time. my last question is an age-old battle, essentially. is it gif or jif? we will put it to rest right now. i know you did not created but it is almost the same thing. alex: we officially support both. jordan: but -- crapis the most diplomatic i have ever heard. alex: i do not want to call people up for saying gif. jordan: to call them out for old. old thing that

people back in the 1980's talk about them as this nostalgic thing. the future, we are trying to means athat term as gif totally different thing than the 1980's, blinking, under construction sign. new contenttire producer sending out messaging. if you are sending stuff in messaging, you are probably sending gifs not jifs. jordan: gif say gif. you heard it here first. or again. you are free to go, dude. vicki. big round of applause for alex. [applause] jordan: all right. we are going to shift years in a violent way. we are going to go from gifs to privacy and security because that makes sense.

to be that theed government was protecting us from big corporations and now it seems like they corporations are trying to protect us from the government. we have to panelists that are going to help us figure out this murky situation. welcome to the stage made cargoes and marten mickos in our moderator. big round of applause. [applause] >> all right. welcome. thank you. ceo of hacker one, company that has a platform for hackers and researchers for discovering vulnerabilities in the code in compliance. we also have the senior staff attorney for the electronic frontier foundation that focuses on cryptography and free speech

issues. it is a good panel. i invite you are here. i want to start off a little bit brought in the we can get more specific. the big question i have, why do you think we see what seems to be an acceleration of the battle over security in the digital world? builthink that when we the internet around 20 years ago, we had just found stuff there. today, we have everything of value governed by software and connected to the world. suddenly, all of the organized terminology of the world is getting software systems and web systems that we must protect them. that is a huge shift. >> yes, i think that is right. we put our entire lives online. everything we read, our relationships and photos are documented. until recently, we are still really bad computer security. we barely understand how to secure devices like all of you

have in front of you and all of us have in our pockets. we are barely getting started with this. the fact that companies like apple are starting to figure it challenge.ing a >> speaking of that, we have the apple, fbi, the situation in brazil, the facebook situation. the job of regulatory agencies was to act as a consumer advocate, protecting them from corporations that would misuse it. it seems like many companies like apple or marketing themselves as champions of data privacy. privatization?ng >> that is a good question. we essentially do not have a legal framework. the europeans got out in front with a strong data protection guideline. we saw this fall apart a

year ago. in the absence of a regulatory framework, we need something to protect our data. yes, i think that is the pressure apple is reacting to. >>-one has deals with department of defense on one hand to tourism on the other. what you think of the most common, vulnerable systems? what did they need to pay attention to when they are building their security plans? >> we have the department of defense, we have over, general --uber, general motors and all of them the protection and all of them know there is no organization strong enough so that it does not need to help from hackers. you open up your programs at the beginning, they will tell , injections,ook at cross coding and everyone has told her abilities. every system connected to the

world is formidable one way or the other. >> you do you have been hacked or you do not know it yet. >> true. companies arek more willing to be open about security now, because previously security was very closely aligned with obscurity in secrecy. you did not talk about it, or your plans from the public and now we see a reversal of that with open-source encryption and stuff like that. i know there is an open chart of encryption and stuff like that. do you think companies are more willing to be open about security? >> i think we have a major shift from secrecy to open systems. we are witnessing the open source revolution 15 to 20 years ago and now we see the same thing and security where companies realize that the only way to be properly secured is to be open about your invitebilities and to people you do not know to help

you. >> i agree 98%. >> ok. oracle, right question mark every one here, if you have not read marion davidson's blog post, please go read it. you cannot find it on oracle because they deleted it after the morning she posted it. marion davidson is a security officer and she essentially says, do not mess with our stuff for we will come soon you. tonight and think about the vulnerability report. there are companies out there like oracle that would rather buried her head in sam's. -- in sand. the other 800 pound gorilla that no one wants to talk about or embedded systems, medical devices, voting machines, automotive. these companies have never had to worry about security because they never had anything with networking, the radio. now all of a sudden in the

internet of things or some other -- it is theords, internet of shit. there was an article the other how this might be the apocalypse and that is not wrong, right? why are we putting networking in everything? those companies that have engineering staff but no security staff, they do not know what to do a full or ability report, and in my practice, when i am counseling a hacker or a researcher who is doing vulnerability reporting, that the guys, the software companies, those are nearly always seamless. apple knows what to do with the vulnerability reports, even oracle who is not great still knows what to do. medical device companies, they do not have a clue. >> i agree with that. i think in the old security paradigm, people felt that human

beings were the problem and tech is the solution. i think we are now learning that tech is the problem in humans are the solution. inviting everyone to help you and have a neighbor watch or they can find your vulnerabilities, it is actually the fastest way to security system. >> we have millions of lines of code. there is no way your staff of 1500 engineers can vet all of that. >> if the department of defense decides they are not powerful enough to keep their own system secure without external help, then who can do this? >> right. there are some corporations that to this opent dialog. you mentioned oracle what apple is another one. bugs butcknowledge they have persisted an open bounty plan. why do you think they are

resistant philosophically? i was told that they see both positives and negatives but decided not to let this time. i am sure you are talking to these companies. what is the most common refrain? >> we do. many of those how are already taking steps to vulnerabilities because they will be good. those who have no clue, they have no idea that the system is honorable like when target was breached. it came through the air conditioning system because it was remotely constructed and nobody had an idea. you need to target those that are completely ignorant of this. >> yes. apple today does not have a bug bounty program but they say they do have a robust security team and they know it to do with the vulnerability report. that is tim cook's apple. steve jobs' apple is along the oracle line. that version of apple did not

produce security papers, did not their update say what was fixed or who reported. it was much more of a locked box. apple is big and it is taking a long time to change. there are three quarters of the way there, i would say. let's switch from encryption for a second. we have a lot of discussion about encryption obviously down from single messaging to big corporations and correcting traffic. before the feinstein bill, that was a big wake-up call. people thought is dangerous. what are the chances that something so aggressive, and obviously that has already been camped out but something so aggressive gets passed by congress? how clueless as congress about hacking in encryption? >> in this election cycle with this congress, the chances of anything past are slim to none.

the feinstein bill will not move out of committee in this current form. i do not know if people in the audience read the bill or read stories about it, but taken literally, the back will -- will would ban general-purpose computers which cannot purposely been their intent. that shows how 90 they are. it is the next draft we have to worry about. who knows. we heard it was going to be introduced two weeks ago and now we are hearing it will be introduced the week after next. who knows. >> one of the common things people talk about with encryption is sort of like the right that we all have to private communication, back and forth to one another and that is obviously one of the challenges in communicating with the government. pursuerstand you need to

communication that we have the right as well. one thing that is not to talk about as much is the clash we have for the poorest people not having access to systems that are as secure as people who have means to afford them. a person i can only by the $30 android phone which is encrypted by default. do you think there is a solution for that problem or a way to move forward and getting everybody the same rights when it comes to encrypted communication? >> we should do it if it is possible. >> yes. i completely agree. you are right. we have a new digital device -- divide. what strikes me as most were a fine about the apple-fbi debate is not just generally the fbi's take that they should have access to all of our communications, any sophistication will be able to use for encryption or signals or

whatever even if what happens and i message goes back to non-encrypted. the fbi is really only worried about the masses. deepen going to further this digital privacy divide. that makes me uncomfortable. refrainsre they common by the default government agencies or people that are oppositional who say encryption on the whole, i do not care about government hacking because i have nothing to hide. what do you say about people that still take that line in supporting these kinds of things? so, my response to you, i have nothing to hide is, it is not about you. that is a deeply narcissistic position to take. i do not have anything to say, but i still benefit from free speech because everyone else around me has diverse opinions

and they are right to speak their opinions and enriches all of our lives. privacy is the same way. even if i do not have anything to hide, it is not about me, just like i do not have anything to say. social movements and democracy and all types of social change from the civil rights movement to the gay-rights movement have depended upon the ability to organize -- depended upon the ability to organize freely. you cannot have a gay-rights in aent anywhere theocratic state without privacy and security. it is not about us, right? it is about everybody else. i do not care if you think you have nothing to hide, it is not about you. you are not that special. questions a kind of for you, martin.

when you are invited to companies and you go to them, this is why you need to open up a coat, when you need more people to look at those, do you see more and more of these companies think of the government as part is the threat model, something to protect their users from? >> i think when you build security into a system, you need to protect yourself against any criminal or malicious activity and all of the different groups that can be criminal sts,nizations, hacktivi terrorists, nationstates. it does not matter from the perspective of an owner or operator of the web system or other connected system. you just need to find the vulnerabilities and remove them before they are maliciously used. for us, it is important to know where the attack comes from. for you as building a defense, it does not really matter. you need to take every step to protect yourself in respect of of where the threat is coming from. >> you talk to companies

obviously quite a bit when you are negotiating with them and helping them out with legal situations. more willingness to view the government as an oppositional force? sometimes yes, especially with messaging companies. the government is definitely seen as an oppositional force. it is a field of dreams problem, because if you collect the data, they will come in for values that would include attackers, organized crime, law enforcement. if the data is there, you are going to have to protect it. one way of protecting is to not selected in the first place, which some companies are two great use. sapp does not have access to content. >> cap model seems to becoming more prevalent. we could give it to you if we wanted to give it to you, model

. >> i would not be surprised if we saw icloud go to a zero solution. >> that raises a whole host of collective issues. are they preparing for these situations where you are advising companies on systems more and more? >> we do. our role is directed to advice. we do it with key customers that we are a marketplace, the world's largest community of hackers all over the world and all of the leading companies that need the service of that. we are like the uber of security because we connect the hackers with the companies. we advise a little bit but it is not the core part of her mission. >> we have a white paper for online service providers best practices that is woefully out of date but it still has good advice in it. >> you also have a kind of cici

for message system -- cheat sheet for message systems, right? >> yes. a secure messaging scorecard which we took down last week because we are updating it. i can give you is soon. i am not trying to hide the ball. i just do not know. we have a call at 2:00 this afternoon to discuss exactly when that will go up. >> one last thing i want to touch on really quickly is that, the issue has sort of arisen of a pin code versus fingerprinting. we had a case in los angeles where the court ordered systems could unlock the phones with the fingerprints and they were forced to do that. what do you think about biometrics versus pin? >> i actually use touch id on

this device. it is much more robust as an authenticator than a four digit pin number or even a 10 digit pin. i turn it off when i go through customs because on first boot, touch id does not work. the los angeles court was probably correct. my former colleague wrote an article for wired in 2012 or 2013, whenever touch id was first released, disgusting the many implications of touch id, and this was exactly the results she predicted. is the rightndment to be free from compelled self-incrimination. i cannot be compelled to turn over my password except under certain circumstances. i can be compelled to give a breathalyzer test or a blood test for alcohol or provide my fingerprints for a fingerprint

in that same line of cases we think the argument is good that you can be compelled to put your finger on the device. so, think about whether you want your thumb or a different finger. i do not know. something to keep in mind. >> thank you very much. appreciate it. think you for being a good audience. [applause] >> thank you very much. thank you. ♪ jordan: ok. i hope everyone feels more private and secure than they ever have. our next panel is called building an effective audience. i think that is perfect for me and you. you know? seriously. i am alone in this room? [applause] jordan: that is fine. we will get into it. it takes time to welcome up to

each other. please welcome our next guests from skimm and our moderator katy ruth. [applause] >> thank you for joining us in new york where you are headquartered. >> think you for having us. we are excited. we are really excited to be here. >> awesome. thank you. the skimm is in a known newsletter geared toward young women and is basically a cliff notes of the news of the day. you used to the tv news producers at msnbc. what inspired you to quit your job and start this? >> skimm is a multiplatform audience company focusing on female millennials in our

mission is a company is to make it easy to be smarter. that is what we are all about. the lady got there was a really personal first-hand experience. we work for msnbc news and wanted to work there are entire lives. we started interning as soon as we could. we studied abroad in college and work for the same people. we had moved up the ladder. they give us every news division that we had and we love it but we would go home at the end of the day to our friends that are all smart, educated, went to great schools, have great jobs and would ask us, what happened in the world? we were being paid to know what was going on. they were paid to know what was going on in their own industry and then they were looking at things that interested them, but there was still this gap of what is going on in the world you should know to be a normal person and have an intelligent conversation and be curious, and that is what we set out to create. the way we did it was, in order to kind of get a niche and be

successful, we knew that the missing link was to create a do the routine. we started a company with e-mails, not to create any not his company but that is what we get first thing in the morning. your alarm goes off and you check your e-mails first. you are growing really fast. >> i understand you have 3.5 million subscribers. actually, more than the digital subscribers of the new york times. that is pretty impressive. how are you able to spread the word? i know you have a viral marketing program. how do you get people? >> we are very into our skimm jargon. for us, the way we started was very organic. we were solving a problem that we saw that her friends had in the day. we ended up quitting our jobs, roommates at the time living in a very tiny apartment downtown across the water. for the first day we literally used all of our facebook

contacts, gmail contacts and e-mailed about 5500 people and we said, we just quit our jobs, will you sign up for this? day one, we got about 700 people to sign up which was a really good return, we thought. people just started paying it forward and the kindness of our friends and family, it was talked about on social media. as we were very lucky, the press picked it up right away. say, iwould write in and am never into anything but i love what you are doing. we were telling her mentor of ours, we are getting all of this enough and she said, why do not ask those people to share skimm with their friends? so every time someone wrote and we would say, thank you so much, please scare -- air skimm with your friends. everyone of the like, sure. no problem. it was amazing to see. we started with some relationships with these people and they joked, my friends are

calling me a brand ambassador. we call them a skimm ambassador. when we raise money, we hired someone as a reader out of europe. we have all of these people calling themselves skimm ambassadors. we do not even know who these people are. flash, we have well over 13,000 skimm ambassadors that are emblematic of our fema millennials. that group of 13,000 ambassadors has influenced or brought in rather 19% of our overall user growth. we say we have grown by word-of-mouth and those of the biggest mouth we know. >> i think for us, we are even amazed that, if you look at the growth the company has taken, starting at from our couch 3.5 years ago and now we are not only the fastest growing in the market but we are definitely, the third-ranked morning tv show when you look at morning news.

never just about getting the audience but making sure we grew in engaged audience. we grew 40% each day. that is really unheard of when you think about scale. there is always going to be a drop-off but from the beginning it was like, you can grow but how can you make people still love it and open it each day? for us, that was in it for two things. one, voice, making sure we had a voice that the audience felt resonated with them and secondly, what we hear again and again is that when people read skimm they feel like they are part of a community. they feel like they are proud to tell their friends that they are invested in our growth because that is how we have gotten off of the couch. >> q recently launched something new called the skimm ahead. it is a calendar of the day's events from a beyonce album release to the jobs report.

it cost $2.99 a month. how do people sign up? >> we are not releasing that yet. we have such an engaged audience we were blown away. even heard from apple. we have never seen this positive engagement around a product launch. they won we had over 1205 star reviews. it went really well, but i think for us, when we think about the comeroduct that skimm has as a company we make it easier to be smarter. there were so many different directions we could go in. we have had a lot of opportunities. i think we have become really good at saying no to things. we were really excited to say yes to an idea and say, well, what does this audience do? we know they check their e-mails first thing in the morning so we are doing that, owning that and then, they are working professionals but what else do they rely on? but i'm know about you, sure a lot of you would agree, we live on our calendars. that is a sad but true fact.

for us, we had to get into that routine. we created skimm ahead in the concept around it was inspired by our friends that live the same license us. telling us that it is great that you tell me union is on tonight, and i want to stay home for that. it is great that you reference "house of cards" on monday but i do not know it came back here. we really were looking for a void to fill. the webby think about it, the daily skimm e-mail the 3.5 people are reading, that makes it easy to be smart about what happened yesterday and everything to talk about today. skimm ahead is, let's be smarter about the future. we are enabling that and we are enabling you to integrate into your calendar if you have an iphone, you can experience it directly in the half itself. here are all of the events you are trusting us to tell you

about from the weather, orange is the new black coming back, or that the primaries are today and you should vote if you are in each state. or that it is national sibling day in your instagram fee is going to be really annoying. beingreally just about smarter. >> for us, really represented a pivotal moment in our company. when we launched, the primary revenue stream with the newsletter was sponsorship based. we have a 100% advertising model working with really premium brands in we do so in a way that feels very organic to our audience. now with the launch of skimm ahead we are in the subscription business. we have created an engaged audience with two different revenue streams we can build out with in the future. there is the e-mail and it all works from the newsletter is the

main anchor of the brain. that is really what we set out today. it was never a newsletter company, it was, let's create an amazing engaged audience and that is where we gather every morning and from there, we can create different products. the need of advertising, that is a little different than what a lot of media brands do. do you always let your readers know that it is sponsored? >> yes. we do. if you look and you can see from the logo to the pieces of inventory it is clearly sponsored, and it also never touches the actual news you're talking about. winds butout books, not the actual news of the day tying in with the brands. they are just lifestyle elements. that is something we learned early on. we used to tell our audience in the beginning that, you are

going to see an ad tomorrow and give them a heads up. from that, we made a decision to be very transparent. it is a free product, young company and we need to make money somehow and i feel it if you're are open and honest about it, people understand that there needs to be advertising but it needs to be done well. we would get thank you notes from our audience. we made sure that we do not work with brands must we are proud of them and we are proud of the advertising be created. >> you have raised venture funding. any plans to raise more funding anytime soon? >> we are in a lucky place were we do not need to worry about that right now. we have been focused on launching skimm i have. it is fun to see the growth >>. it has been phenomenal to see the revenue we have been able to bring in with our two different streams and that is something that has enabled us to not have to raise, which is always a nice feeling for a growing company.

we used to laugh and we used to say, we will be a pre-revenue company but now we are not. ceos, who is calling the shots? >> we never thought about it as anything other than a partnership. we are both cofounders, in it together. it is never lie, who is the one making the decision? it is, these are two points of views and if we are ever at a place where we have a different opinion, we come up with a plan and we think about trying something else out and give it a run >>. our partnership is definitely unique. there is not a lot of companies like this. we looked at a lot of different models. one thing that we had since we strong partnership from day one. people always ask is, what

was it like to launch a company with your roommate? it was not like, let's move in together and launch a company. i do not advise that. >> it is unique test we get asked that question a lot. when we took in money, it was very easy to figure out who to take money from, because we work with people that understood we have a unique relationship and a great partnership. recently we went to go meet with an early investor and given update on the business and they interrupted the meeting in front of all of the partners and said, i just have to say, you guys can be proud of the business but the two of you have such a unique partnership and you should be proud you are doing so well, so we are very proud of it. >> definitely good you are getting along. i understand you have a very small team. three people help put together the newsletter and managing editors, so maybe five. >> our team is 20 people. it is not that long ago we

brought the whole company for the first year and a half. to go from two people on a couch to 20 people under two years. we look around and we go, you guys are doing so great. >> sometimes we feel like moms with our kids. >> 20 people work at the skimm. >> in total. it is a pretty large reach. >> you only have how many people sitting together? >> the majority of the people are looking at products and analytics. that is how we think about the future of the company. we are definitely a lean and mean started. >> usually there is a little witty or snarky comment before the news. what to say if you run into your ex or what to say at the networking group tonight. >> we created a character and that character the skimm girl

has a specific voice. we created a whole brand book when we have out lumberi a new employee. that is something that helps our writers when they are writing a newsletter but it also helps our engineers take about what products they would want to the future and how to think about who she would work with and what sponsors she would interact with. mywhen we started skimm friends would say, i had no idea daniel was so funny. her friend said, i had no idea carly was so funny. neither of us are funny. i think the thing that we get asked about all the time, where does the snarky part come from? i think for us, it is not humor, everybody has that no bs. girl represents that.

talking, catch me up on the kardashian's or news, it does not matter what it is. you just say it like it is. we love to go to those scenarios as a way of kind of reference the fact that we all have these shared experiences, a line at starbucks, in an accident and looking awful and had to integrate into a normal conversation. >> i found on your website you have these helpful skimm guides. i like the one for snapchat. need to know, check out this guy. do you plan on doing more expanding beyond newsletters? >> yes. i think with the apps i have it was the first service. there are a lot of products that we want to create. something with our guides, that came from our audience. insane, weriting in

know that you guys are writing about the background of syria everything with a, but i still have questions. a lot of this is really complicated and it is hard to sum it up and every day. obviously, there are a lot of issues in the world and for those particular topics we want to to dedicate more time. becomeere, it has really a great thing that people look forward to and they know they can get through reading the newsletter and clicking a link. it has been amazing to see the growth in the past year. sometimes half of the links we go to our shared. --are shared. >> with only a few people on your team you have a wide range of topics. pop culture, hard news, tack, , finance.tech you cannot be experts on all of these things. >> you cannot be experts on everything and we never said we were.

it goes back to our training. we work at msnbc news from 18 years old on word. --onward. but have political experts it is not likely came in as political experts or foreign policy experts. we are translators. how do we translate what is going on in the world and make it to where other people can understand it? we have e-mails and great anreach who say, we are expert, let me come work for you. we do not want experts. we want translators with us. how we do that is through our boys that makes things easy to understand. >> it also goes back to, when we were fund-raising people would say, are you a media company, a tech company? if we are going to have to pick, we are going to be an audience company. we are going to coin our own

word. that is our buzz word. i think it goes back to, what does this audience want to be and how to be make them feel confident? they do not necessarily want to be an expert on for policy but everyone wants to feel like they have an opinion and something to contribute to a conversation. >> breaking it down into layman's terms. tv producers, so as are going to be a video component of skimm. ? >> i think it would be a mistake if we do not use our video background. many of you looking down at her phone right now. do not take it personally. you are reading the skimm. thank you so much. we want every time you look at your phone, that is the new definition of meantime. whether you do it here or your commute or graphic, and we will not judge you, it does not matter. that is the new definition of me time. we want to own this new

definition. we want the skimm to make you smarter. we are the new morning television show in your e-mail. -eyeall this the one opener routine. >> it is great to see two young women, oxford hours getting funding and doing really well -- it is great to see two young women, entrepreneurs getting funding and doing well. this,hink, everyone says but it is true. do not quit. you have to really believe what you are doing because no one else is going to believe in it as much as you did. if you do not go up there and sell that vision, how can you have other people buy into it? , andally and figuratively i think we heard again and again, no, no, no i will not sign up for, no, why would you launch e-mail, that is dead? no, i will not find you. there is kind of two different

paths you can take. one, maybe this is not a good idea. the other, we quit our jobs, we believe that come our friends like this and we know there is a huge market for fema millennials not getting as much information. we just did it. i think it is really the easiest thing you can do is to give up. >> yes. i would add, know your audience. no matter what your company. there are very few companies for a huge mass audience. there are very few googles. i think the key is to know who your product is for. who you have in mind? i think for us, that has really been our work. >> thank you. we are out of time that it was so great to hear about the skimm . >> thank you for having us. [applause] announcer: monday march the 20th anniversary of the 1996 welfare law passed by a republican congress and signed by president bill clinton.

our special program looks back at the debate over the 1996 law. >> the current welfare system has failed the very families it was intended to serve. >> i do not know many people that want to humiliate themselves standing in a line waiting for their welfare check. yes, there are some freaks out there. they are out there, but there is no question about that. a lot of those people are simply people who have not yet discovered a way out of their misery and their poverty. that thee decided legislators out there in america are concerned about the poor and concerned about their well-being and is concerned or more so as we are about the status of welfare in their states. announcer: this includes discussions on how the changes impact to be poor. willom now on our answer

not be a never-ending cycle of welfare. it will be the dignity, power and the ethic work. today, we are taking a historic chance to make welfare what it was meant to become a second chance, not a way of life. announcer: monday night at 9:00 eastern on c-span. announcer: a number of news outlets are reporting today on the state department briefing. this story is from "usa today." the state department confirmed thursday that a 400 million dollar cash it in in january 2 iran was time with the release of four american citizens that have been detained from the country. negotiations over the united states return over iranian money from over a decade old frozen account was conducted separately from talks released a person has , but he says the u.s. withheld delivery of cash as leverage

until the u.s. citizens had left iran. most of that happened on january 17. again, that story in "usa today can now we will show you a portion of the state department briefing with john kirby. >> is there anything you dispute on factual grounds? mr. kirby: i am sure you would like to pick apart the media's story. >> is there anything untrue? mr. kirby: i would like to respond in this way because i have seen the article. let me address this whole issue of timing this way. we were able to conclude multiple strands within a 24-hour