On with Kara Swisher - Barry Diller on Biden, AI and the Hollywood Shutdown

Episode Date: August 31, 2023

Billionaire mogul and power broker Barry Diller doesn’t hold back (at all) as he takes us inside Washington, Silicon Valley and Hollywood. The legendary executive breaks down why Biden isn’t his ���fave,” how we can save the news business and “the republic” from AI, and how the “evil genius” of Netflix factors into the ongoing WGA and SAG strikes. That, and more, in what Kara and Nayeema dub “the Mediterranean ‘ratf*ck’ episode.”  Questions or comments? Email us at [e-mail] or find us on social media. We’re on Instagram/Threads as @karaswisher and @nayeemaraza Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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you can get closer to everything you love about city life in the all-new Reimagined Nissan Kicks. Learn more at www.nissanusa.com slash 2025 dash kicks. Available feature. Bose is a registered trademark of the Bose Corporation. Hi, everyone. From New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network, this is Lifestyles of the Not-As-Rich and Not-As-Famous. Just kidding, this is On with Kara Swisher, and I'm Kara Swisher. And I'm Nae Marazza. We started our summer with a ride over to Martha Stewart's estate,

that ridiculously big estate where we are still. Just kidding, we're not there anymore. And on Friday, we continued our tour of the Yes, So Rich and Famous with a trip to Barry Diller's yacht in Croatia. Yes, except we weren't on it. Sadly virtual the Yes, So Rich and Famous with a trip to Barry Diller's yacht. Yes, we weren't on it. Sadly virtual. Yes, it was virtual. It was virtual. But why don't you set the scene, Cara?

Well, he dialed in from this, I don't know where he was, floating around, heading to Venice. He's very famous for yachting over the summer. And so he was headed for a really cool event, actually, that his wife, Dionne von Furstenberg, is doing in DVF in Venice. So he dialed in from the yacht, which was fine, whatever. It's sad we couldn't do it in person. Yeah. Couldn't do it in person. He's invited me on that yacht, but I have declined every time. We should give listeners a quick rundown of what Barry Diller has done to get that yacht, because it's astonishing in the breadth of his career, really, everything that he's built. Why don't you start off?

Yeah, he's a classic media mogul. He started off in the mailroom at William Morris, like I started off in the mailroom at Washington Post, but I still don't have a yacht. He became a VP of Development at ABC, where he created Movie of the Week, which I watched quite a bit when I was a kid. He ran Paramount Pictures. He launched the Fox Network. He took over the QVC Network. He bought Silver King Broadcasting and the Home Shopping Network and took over Universal's domestic and TV cable assets. He's really been very peripatetic in a really interesting way in terms of his career. And the reason I like him,

and I've told this story, I told my story in my book that's coming up. He was the only one interested in digital very early on from Hollywood. And he was sort of the quintessential old media mogul. But he was the only two that were super interested were Bob Iger and Barry Diller, which was kind of interesting. Yeah, in the 90s, when he became interested in the non-TV businesses, and especially the internet, Silver King Broadcasting became IAC. Its own companies like TripAdvisor, College Humor, Vimeo, Match Group, all the datings. Tinder. Tinder, yeah.

The Daily Beast, Meredith Corporation, many, many more. IAC stock is, I don't know what it's at right now, but it's lost two thirds of its value. It has issues because it's not one thing. It's like a lot. It's one of these conglomerate type of things. And he sold them off and spun them off over the years. And, you know, he never really fully leaped into the tech space. He probably would have been a lot richer had he. You know, and he likes control of everything.

So that's hindered him a little bit in terms of things. But in any case, he's really been an interesting owner. Had big fights with big other moguls like John Malone. You know, he doesn't back away from a fight. And he's always, he's still, the first person I talked to about AI in media was him. And he had the smartest take about what was happening. I ran into him backstage in an event. Immediately he got it. And everyone else was sort of grappling with it, but he understood it pretty quickly. You and Barry go way back. Explain what your first time meeting him called you into

the office and what happened. Well, he called me in the office. He terrified me when I met him, but I think he owned Ticketmaster. And what year was this? Oh, it must have been sometime in the 90s, I guess. And he had just bought it, I think, Ticketmaster or CitySearch. I forget. There's so many companies he's owned. But he called me in and he just wanted to talk about the Internet. He was very interested. And I was the person covering it for the Wall Street Journal at the time.

And he wanted to know everything. He wanted to know the people. He sought out all the moguls, whether it was Jerry Yang at the time or whoever it was, he wanted to know who they were and get to know them. And even today, he's very good friends with Sam Altman

who ran Y Combinator. He has all these relationships that most people from Los Angeles and Hollywood did not have in a really significant way. And he did. And so, but he's just really, he's just one of the most interesting, I just find him to be one of the most interesting people.

I just love his demeanor. And I know, you know, the contrary to him yelling and all kinds of stuff. He's got sort of this sort of louder than life personality. But I've always enjoyed interviewing him because he really does use his brain to think about changes. And he's not scared of change, which I really appreciate. But he's also skeptical of tech, too, in a really healthy way, I think. He one time, he was walking out of the Vanity Fair Oscar party with Dion and DVF. And he gets in early. The more important people get in really early, and then you're stack-ranked to get into this thing.

And I had a pretty good time, but not Barry Diller time. And I was walking in with whoever I was going out with at the time, and I go, Barry, why are you leaving? Because I had seen him in a previous year because he's really fun to talk to at a party. And I go, why are you leaving? And he goes, Kara, it's a rat fuck in there. You've told me that story. And I was like, that's just why I'm going in,, it's a rat fuck in there. You've told me that story. I was like, that's just why I'm going in, because it's a rat fuck. But I just love the way it's a rat fuck in

there. And that's such him. I just love that. It's my favorite story. There's always a good story with Barry Dillon. He says them publicly. That's the thing. He says them out loud, too. He used to come speak at a class ITA at Stanford. We had some folks in common as well. And he's always a hit. Yeah. He's always a hit. And you last saw him at Semaphore, the Semaphore conference back in April. Yeah, that's where we talked about AI.

We did. I saw him and asked him to come on the program. He is friends with Sam Altman, and yet he's also taking on the AI companies. He is. I think he was suing them. Yeah. He's building a on the AI companies. He is. I think he's suing them. Yeah. He's building a coalition to sue them. And he's saying that we need to enforce copyright laws and also to enact better, more stringent copyright laws, which is kind of amazing because I forgot this when we taped the interview.

But almost a decade ago, Aereo, that company that Barry Diller owned, remember that? Yeah, he was trying to steal stuff, right? They were making an argument that they could, despite copyright, they could get around copyright law to take these little tiny antennas and get people who had internet access to broadcast networks and have those people pay them a subscription fee. The case went all the way to the Supreme Court where Barry lost six to three. It was found that the company was violating copyright laws. So it's kind of ironic. So he knows a thing or two

about copyright. He knows a thing. And he does not like to lose. He doesn't. He sometimes wins. He sometimes loses. But he just moves on. That's what I,

he's not, one time when they were, they were in a lawsuit, I don't remember what it was, with the Malone people. And they had told me they were going to shame him. And I told this to Barry and he goes,

don't they know I'm shameless? And I said, I do, but they don't. And I think he won that one. I guess, I don't remember. But it was funny. He's funny. He's really funny. Very funny.

Anyways, we're going to ask him about his shift on copyright, this AI coalition, the future of Hollywood. And we're past day 100 of this WGA strike. And Barry's a good person because he's on all the sides. He's been a mogul. He's produced. He's produced, yeah. He knows everybody. So he doesn't really have an agenda. So that's why it's good to talk to. There's a couple of people like that in Hollywood, him, Peter Chernin. There's a bunch of people who have a much wider perspective than the one side they're on. And I think he's very canny in understanding the power dynamics.

He is very canny. We'll take a quick break and we'll be right back with Barry Diller, direct from the EOS yacht. Let's hope it's a rat fuck. Somewhere beautiful in the Mediterranean. A Mediterranean rat fuck. Fox Creative. This is advertiser content from Zelle. When you picture an online scammer, what do you see? For the longest time, we have these images of somebody sitting crouched over their computer with a hoodie on, just kind of typing away in the middle of the night. And honestly, that's not what it is anymore. That's Ian Mitchell, a banker turned fraud fighter.

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It's never too late to try new things, And it's never too late to reinvent yourself. The all-new reimagined Nissan Kicks is the city-sized crossover vehicle that's been completely revamped for urban adventure. From the design and styling to the performance, all the way to features like the Bose Personal Plus sound system, you can get closer to everything you love about city life in the all-new, reimagined Nissan Kicks. Learn more at www.nissanusa.com slash 2025 dash kicks. Available feature. Bose is a registered trademark of the Bose Corporation. I want to get into the media business and AI wars, but let's start with the recent New

York Post headline from earlier this month, Democratic mega-donor Barry Diller maxes out Biden and Christie. They seem surprised, but you're basically donating to Christie. Why? Explain what you're doing in this political cycle. What I am doing is I'm trying to prevent Trump in any way I can, which is very small, I suppose, but I'm trying to prevent Trump in any way I can, which is very small, I suppose, but I'm trying to prevent Trump from being the nominee. And so that's why I'm supporting Chris Christie. In addition to the fact that I think the governor is a good person, and I think he would make a good executive,

chief executive. I don't think he will ever be that, but I do think that at least he is capable. At the most, he's more than that. But at the least, I think he's capable of throwing, hopefully, darts as close to the heart as possible. And when you think about throwing darts to the heart, you're also supporting Biden. How do you feel about that? Whoa, how do I feel? Well, I certainly prefer Biden over most of the Republicans in the field. So I am a supporter of the administration. I'm not exactly fond. I don't know. I don't really think it's, there's no either particular purpose in being fond of,

it's not like a necessary ingredient. He's an old pole and he acts like it. I don't mean the thing that he's doddering and bumps into things or trips, because I don't think that's, I mean, I at least don't think that's indicative. But, you know, he can definitely string a sentence together, and he can perform his executive duties. He's not my fave, but okay, I'd live with it. Okay. And who do you like, Republicans and Democrats? Who would you like to see? Because you're expressing what a lot of people think. Well, isn't that terrible? I only like expressing what I think in contrarian terms as much as possible, so forgive me. I think there's some talent there, but there's nobody really, you know, I was saying

this to my friends the other day, which is, what a shame there's nobody to really root for. There's, you know, when Obama came up, we thought, wow, now that's talent. I felt the same way about Bill Clinton from the first moment I met him. Very aspirational. There's nobody actually on the scene, some competence and stuff, but I don't find anyone to be aspirational to anyone great of the moment, which is, to me, a terrible shame. Which is, to me, a terrible shame. And that's, yeah, it's of course awful that we really have Donald Trump and Joe Biden for this country, this country that thinks of itself as exceptional. American exceptionalism, not where I can find it. This is the last political question, but a lot of conservative billionaire donors think long-term. They build up organizations like the Federalist Society, which helped them overturn Roe versus Wade.

They build up state party infrastructures, helped them take over state legislators. How does America recruit more, I guess, progressive, I don't want to say democratic billionaire donors. How do you get the fewer and far between to get more strategic? Is there anybody doing that from your perspective? Reid Hoffman. Absolutely. I mean, I think Reid for the last certainly six years,

maybe going beyond that, but my familiarity goes about six years. I don't know anyone as thoughtful, as organizationally, administratively competent, as generous as Reid has been for the Democratic Party. So, how do you build that? Do you think it's necessary or is there – it used to be dozens of people. necessary or is there it used to be dozens of people well my you know i only got my own stuff but uh some time ago uh there was a group that got together to create the democratic leadership council which was designed to move the party to the center to the center right centrism and it was triangulated it's allulating. It was extremely effective. So that's one way.

But right now, we just have this polar, you know, you don't want to hear me bamble on about something that's got everybody both concerned and bored, which is the extremism on both sides. And our media, of course, it's no surprise or shock, our media goes to the drama. The drama is on the fringes, as it would always be. Center is somewhat boring, as realistically practical as it may be. So I really don't got no answers about that. Okay. All right. I want to move to the media business. Give me your higher view of the media landscape right now. And you know, you've been in it for so long. Where do you think we are right now?

Thank you for so long. I have too, Barry. When you look at it overall, how do you look at it as a business and where it's headed in the next 20 years, say? Oh, my God. You can't do 20 years. I don't know that you can do- Okay, five years. Yeah, I was going to say, I don't know that you can do five. It's endangered.

It's going to become more endangered, for sure. Generative AI is net destructive of many things. Not necessarily, let's call it journalism, but it's going to redefine, reconstruct, or lay waste to advertising as we know it, and all the other things you read and see about it. So it's for sure endangered. And there's no, because you cannot predict except one thing you can predict, it's going faster than, as you know, any of the people who've been involved in it thought it would go.

Faster than they thought it would go, which is really something. And so, you really can't do much with it. The only thing that I've recently come to kind of firm conclusions on is that for manual labor, it's going to be okay. Where it's really going to be disruptive is for office work for the higher levels. I'd say medium to semi-high areas of work, which is, by the way, about 25% to 30% of the work of the world, I think is going to be replaced. I think is going to be replaced.

I think when you get above, let's call it high to very high, truly intelligent, the real, call it the probably more than 1%, but less than 5%, it'll be okay too. So it's good for the bottom, bad for the middle, and probably okay for the very top. I think that to me, I can't see that not happening. But how does it affect one, the media business, and two, society at large when that's happening? This has happened before in farming, manufacturing, et cetera, et cetera. You mean the various revolutions?

Yes, the various revolutions. There's no there's no revolution like this one i think because all the other revolutions you could say you could pretty much predict what their effects would be you could predict what happened when people moved from the farms to the cities you could you could it wasn't hard to to prophesize what those effects on society would be, much less on any other things. This is unpredictable. How will it affect media? More than likely, not great for the current practitioners of media just fine. But for the people currently engaged in the pursuit or in the dissemination of information and entertainment and everything else, it is endangering. To what degree, how fast, I can't tell you. If all that happens, as far as what will happen to society as that changes, presuming that it is endangered without relief,

meaning you got to come to terms with it, I would only say a giant wow. But I ain't got more than that. You've talked about the destruction to publishers. Talk about those implications with more specificity. At the base of this is the copyright law, the thing that was enacted to say, if you create something, you have rights to it,

and other people cannot infringe those rights. The copyright law as written must be changed. It's unlikely Congress will do it, although I think they may support it, but it will probably come from litigation. And there is a fairly fast path to that. It may be something that you can resolve within a year. At the base of all of this is something called fair use, which is inside the copyright law that says, well, you can't take anybody's stuff. You can use limitedly a certain portion of it.

Right. You have to get rid of fair use and you have to narrow the copyright law to say that no no generative AI system can infringe upon your ownership of what you create and publish. Full stop. Now, since AI has right now, chat GPT and BARD and Google's BARD have soaked up current knowledge, almost. They don't really need anything more for today. But as we know, the world moves fast and every day that goes on, they want to continue to suck up more. If you stop that cold, which I think is possible, I actually think is practical, I also think

it's the only solution. The result that will come out of that is enough economic activity for publishers to support them. To support publishers. To support publishers. If that happens, then the republic is saved. I do believe it's possible for that to happen. If that does not happen, I use the word in danger.

I think that if that does not happen, I'm not going to say it in the negative. I think it will happen. And I think if it doesn't happen, it's a disaster. So you've banded together, and you talked about it at that Semaphore event I saw you at, to sue Google and Microsoft, basically stop them from scraping copyrighted material and feeding it into their LLMs. You started spearheading this at IAC, your company.

How is it going, and who's on board? I can't tell you who's on board. I can tell you it's going. Okay. But for a whole host of reasons, it is going. It's either us alone or us with others. I'm very certain that there will be others. But it is important.

I've been told by my colleagues who work on this daily that I cannot talk about who is either with us or not with us. Because there's not a lot of publications on board or because they're nervous? No, it's because they're nervous. And you can understand that. And so in order to get through this period, to get to a point where we'd be able to form the coalition, I'm advised. And as you know, it's very hard to restrain me, but I have been ordered, if there is such a word in my lexicon. I guess there is, since I'm abiding by it. I don't really care whether anyone's... Listen, this is a legal matter.

Right. So you'll sue no matter what, no matter how many. But you think there's strength in coalition? Because a couple of weeks ago, Semaphore wrote that New York Times was not going to be joining the coalition. Is that a blow? Because they're an important news organization. No, I don't think it has anything to do with it. Again, this is litigation. Whether you have 100 people or one people does not actually matter. So it's nice to have. I think in spirit they're supportive.

But I think many of these companies are believing. I would say it's – I would say I think it's a bit of a delusion, but they believe they can make possibly economic, their own economic relationships and deals with both of the big entities. As one of my friends at one of those two companies said, we're very happy to give you a percentage. It's a percentage of zero. Thank you very much.

So AP made a deal, already made a deal. So that's what they think, these companies. And do you think that's what the Times is doing? No, I don't know what anybody is doing. I do know that many of these companies are in discussions. By the way, we are too in discussions with ChatGPT and Bard, the two brands. We're in discussion with both of them. By the way, as I say, they're all saying, great, yeah, sure, percentage of zeros are fine with us.

And I don't think they mean it as horrendously as it sounds, cynically as it sounds. But it is the truth right now. The revenue that is being generated here is relatively small. Now, GPT believes it's a subscription business. They do not believe it's an advertising business. They do not believe it's an advertising business. They do. But it's not, it is not yet there. Are you actively talking to them at the same time?

I assume you are. Yeah, of course we are. As I say, the conversations are collegial. You sit across from people who, look, we are both on the expedia side one of the top five customers of google and uh in terms of advertising spend and on the receiving side given uh dot dash meredith and other ventures of ours receive lots of revenue. And we've been at this for a long time and we've got good relationships. And you sit across from people who say to you, without using the expletive, hell if I know,

you know, in other words, we can't identify. Google will say, we simply can't identify where the content is coming from. You say, that's not possible. And they say, oh yes, we cannot do that. Can we eventually do that? Yes, but right now we can't. So why then, let me ask you, then do litigation? Because many people think in litigation it matters that it's a single case versus a class action and a show of force when you're all together, which is what you had hoped, right? No. You don't think that? No. Let me say it differently. We think for legislative support, it's great to have a lot in the circle. For litigation, it doesn't matter at all. The litigation is based upon what we

believe is the very firm belief that the copyright law did not envision this actions being taken, is violated, and will be changed via litigation or out of legislation that will come when there is support for it out of the rightness of that litigation, if I haven't garbled all those words together. No, I got that. So are you worried about undercutting side deals like AP or maybe the New York Times? I assume that's what they're doing. No, no, no, no. Let everybody make their deals. They're irrelevant. Those deals aren't going to solve the problem.

The problem only gets solved if, in fact, copyright law says you can't take my stuff. Out of that will come either the survival of publishing as we know it as it exists today, because the LLMs will not be effective, or will come an economic solution that is good for all the parties, or they won't make a deal. You said litigation will hopefully lead to sensible legislation. Legislation. Yeah, I do. I mean, but I'm not dependent. Anybody who would depend upon legislation is a fool. I will depend upon the litigation part. So talk about the lawmakers you've talked to.

How do you engage with them? Or do you just not if you don't think they're going to do anything until litigation has some teeth? The ones I talk to, a lot of the senior leadership is sympathetic. But they're not galvanized. They're not, they got other things in front of this. And as again, I think that the litigation will hump it along a bit, but right now I don't, again, there's no, it'd be delusion, truly delusional to think that we're going to get out of this by legislative action.

Are you, well, now Sam Altman, who you like and know as a friend of yours, he has spent a lot of time in Washington. Do you need to match that? Not really. Listen, it's the ice cream of the second on a very hot day. The whole topic of AI is catnip for anybody. Get them to Washington. Every door is open.

Every speaker's forum is open. It's all hot noise. But Sam has very much been out there trying to tell people everything that, I think some constraints, but everything he really knows to give people a sense of no danger here or it will not be dangerous. He's a proselytizer for that, and he's exactly right to do it. I don't necessarily share his optimism in the end, but that's his job. Is there any legislator you think is on top of it? Everyone's talking about it.

No. They get called and visited by everybody now. No. Nobody? Nobody's leading it? Amy Klobuchar, to some degree. Schumer is in the right rhetorical place on this, but no, the answer is no. The answer is no. Okay. In building out the news coalition, you've said you have to tread

carefully around the Sherman Act. You obviously don't want to be charged with collusion. What's the strategy around that for you all? Or do you think these companies are so big and powerful? No, we have no worries about that. So long as we're very aware of collusion, antitrust, Sherman, et cetera, we're never getting even within waterline of those issues. We know where they are and the boundaries are, and they're not an issue. All right, let's do a mini antitrust lightning round. You said Google is an absolute monopoly. those issues. We know where they are and the boundaries are, and they're not an issue. All right. Let's do a mini antitrust lightning round. You said Google is an absolute monopoly. You want it regulated, not broken up. Why? Why what? Why do I want it regulated? What do you want to know?

Well, why? Tell me why. Why do you call it an absolute monopoly? Well, honey, forgive me. The word monopoly ought to cover it. When there is a monopoly, you have to have regulation. Full stop. All right. You've been critical of the App Store, the Apple App Store. This is now their 15% to 30% cut. What do you want to see happen here? Well, what I want to see, of course, is, listen, Apple is brilliant genius.

It's an absolute walled garden, not an unwalled as everything else on the internet is basically. This is a hundred foot wall, thousand foot wall. You can't get through it without paying a tribute. Right. When you have the kind of market share that Apple has, you can't have, you should not have that, which means that- And what do you want to happen? What I want to happen is for- All right, you're King Diller.

What would you want to happen? What I want to happen is for- All right, you're King Diller. What would you have happen? What I would have is that you do not have to pay a distribution fee of, look, let me do it this way. I would charge the same distribution fee by mandate that is charged by credit card companies, which is under 2%. Okay, by mandate. Because that's what it is. It is a distribution charge. That's what credit companies do to the vendors that offer their cards. They say that that's their revenue, and it's somewhere under 2%. Apple says they review a lot.

They say they do other things. Oh, please. They keep security. Yeah, yeah. Yes, yes. That's very nice by the way so too do credit card companies it has to resemble a market that was that in the credit card business was open enough to allow it to be set by market conditions being apple could set it listen this is pure steve jobs who's like he decreed uh music

under a dollar for the purposes then he decreed 30 he made it up it didn't exist except in the mind of a person who built again enough commerce and a wall so high that nobody could get through it or over it or whatever. It's just plain wrong. And the idea that they justify this because they provide safety is insulting to the word safety. All right. You've never decreed anything, Barry. You've never decreed anything. Anyway, Ticketmaster, I see you used to own it, then you spun it off in the aughts.

There's been a lot of rumblings about an antitrust case against Ticketmaster. Your thoughts? It's not fair for me to comment on somebody else's company and whatever. I was a participant, more than a participant to say the least, in the merger of Ticketmaster and Live Nation, we agreed to real protections for the consumer, quite lengthy protections. And I believe that I shouldn't – I'm quoting from what I have read is that there's a question of whether they have been lived up to. I think when you've got – the reason we entered into it is because we believed it – because we had such a large market share, we absolutely had to have restrictions on our behavior. Right. Do you think that's in place?

You did just comment on Apple and Google. Do you think that's in place? Well, no, no. I, we pay from all of our companies, oh, 750 million or so to Apple for their commissions every year. I'm not Taylor Swift, nor am I a consumer of going to Taylor Swift. And I have no business interests there. So I do not know is the answer. So I cannot comment on it.

I can only tell you that when we made the original transaction, it took us almost a year to work out a consent decree, a series of prohibitions on the actions of Ticketmaster. I can't tell you. I thought they were protective. I cannot tell you what has happened since. That's 10 years ago. A bigger piece of news here is that you're not a Swifty, but we'll move on from that. I'm a silent Swifty.

A silent Swifty. Okay. Swifty, but we'll move on from that. I'm a silent Swifty. A silent Swifty, okay. I've had Alina Khan, John Cantor, and Tim Wu on the show, and obviously they're pursuing antitrust cases with an intensity we haven't seen in decades. You've spoken out as long as I've known you

against tech monopolies repeatedly. So give the Biden antitrust team a grade. How are they doing? Or is it too little too late? Poorly. Basically because they've gone after the wrong fish uh going after activision uh on almost any level made no sense in other words they've just made bad they've made i think poor decisions and uh and and and i think they're you you know, it's fine. Everybody makes mistakes.

I'm very forgiving of mistakes. Less my own than others. But anyway, I think they've made more than a share. Meaning it's almost like they're disqualified now by their mistakes. Meaning going after things that they shouldn't have gone after or? And not going after things they should have gone after. Okay. Yes.

So you're saying that they're aiming at small potatoes versus the bigger things? No, no, no. They've aimed at, well. Microsoft, yeah. You know, 70 billion or so acquisition, something like that, is a big enough fish. Just a stupid fish. Now that you brought it up, you do have a stake here, just so I'd be remiss if I didn't ask you about that. Oh, my God.

Sorry, Barry. You have to answer it. It's all right. And your stepson and your friend David Geffen about potential insider trading. Yes. You purchased options to buy Activision stock in January of 2022, days before Microsoft announced they were buying the company. You've said it was a lucky bet. What's the latest on the investigation?

Well, the latest, I think, thankfully, is that we haven't heard from any of the parties, any of the government parties in some time. I was interviewed extensively by DOJ, SEC, in one session where I went to Washington for several hours. This was six months ago. answered all their questions, said, you know, whether or not you believe in coincidence, this is classic. None of us had any inside knowledge. There is no, you know, there's no gun, much less a smoking gun here.

No emails, no this and that. We totally understand that because of the coincidence, you're appropriate to investigate this. All of our phone records, all of our endless amount of records on this transaction have been reviewed by the Justice Department. I can't say, you know, we said to them, wouldn't it be fair for you, rather than leaking this, wouldn't it be fair that you were investigating us, wouldn't it be fair for you to come to a conclusion

and then make an announcement saying you've investigated and there's, quote, nothing there? We're told they just don't do that. No, they don't. So we haven't, this is a year now this is so it's 18 months later uh a year of their investigation later and again there's nothing active that we have heard that doesn't mean that they can't do x, Y, or Z, but I don't believe, since I know there was no insider trading, and that they will eventually come to that same conclusion and it'll be over.

We'll be back in a minute. Support for this show comes from Constant Contact. You know what's not easy? Marketing. And when you're starting your small business, while you're so focused on the day-to-day, the personnel, and the finances, marketing is the last thing on your mind. But if customers don't know about you, the rest of it doesn't really matter. Luckily, there's Constant Contact. Constant Contact's award-winning marketing platform can help your businesses stand out, stay top of mind, and see big results. Sell more, raise more, and build more genuine relationships with your audience through a suite of digital marketing tools made to fast track your growth. With Constant Contact, you can get email marketing that helps you create and send the

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industry, unsurprising since you were chairman of Paramount Pictures, founded the Fox Broadcasting Corporation. You've probably got a lot of experience. You said if the SAG rate doesn't get resolved by September 1st, it could potentially, this is a quote, produce an absolute collapse of the entire industry. Recording this on August 25th. Is that hyperbolic or do you think the industry will actually collapse? And it doesn't look like they're going to get resolved by September 1st. There was a very recent attempt to get it on track with the WGA, which I gather collapsed in the last couple of days. It is right now where it looked somewhat momentarily hopeful it looks somewhat bleak so given that it is august 25th as you say and uh labor day comes

soon i think it's very unlikely now maybe so maybe it gets settled in september i don't know once you go past that and every month you go past that and Once you go past that, and every month you go past that, and once you go past that, you know, it kind of picks up geometric speed towards the end of the year. The result of that is inescapable to me, which means that production, having been paused for that amount of time,

come spring, summer of 24, when there is not a lot of fresh stuff to see, will have an effect on subscription revenue, subscription cancellations. I think they could be so high for anybody but Netflix, because Netflix will survive. But for the old majors, what may happen, and the reason that I think that collapses probably, absolute collapses, probably unlikely. absolute collapse is probably unlikely. But just when they have to gear up to make new programming, to quote, get back subscribers,

they won't have the revenue base to be able to produce. Right. So that is kind of catastrophic. Now, there's an evil genius of Netflix that is almost incomprehensible to understand, which is Netflix obviously started all this. Netflix spent so much netflix induced i would say to some degree seduced all these companies to go into streaming to lose huge amounts of money to try and build a competitive streaming service which consumers like consumers like which while while at the same time, I'm not talking about consumers here. While at the same time, they, instead of being arms dealers to everyone, they only fed their own entities, their own streaming services stuff. So, they got out, basically, of all their businesses. They got out, basically, of all their businesses.

They degraded their investment in cable because the effect of Netflix on cable. They degraded their investment in their broadcasting arms. Each of the majors owns each. Three majors own three broadcast networks. own three broadcast networks uh and by that process again you'd think my god what a genius scenario from the very beginning that the result of all of this is a giant weakening, almost an unbelievable weakening of the historic forces of those that had the majority of production worldwide. Right. I mean, it's an unbelievable, almost it's an unbelievable scenario. And they actually. And then, no, no, no.

To cap it all off, they are the architects of a strike, and they're in the same room with the people they have killed who are trying to get out of this in some way. Yeah. The strike does one thing and one thing only. In the end, because the strike will get settled. What does it do? I keep telling them that. It strengthens Netflix and weakens the others. Now, what kind of genius do you have to be to pull that off in a fairly straight line over the last 10 years? That's quite remarkable. And, you know, Apple.

Let me just say, you've been a fan of Netflix for a long time. Remember when they were all insulting them? You wouldn't do it. I remember. I have said for five years, seven years, Netflix won. Get over it. You did. You said it to me.

Doesn't mean you shouldn't compete, but don't try and compete with the same kind of production investments that they have. You just bleed yourself dry. So I've been very consistent. They won. Figure out other alternatives to compete. Are there? Look, I absolutely believe. I don't know how far I'm going to go with this, but I absolutely believe that the major studios having joined streaming in extreme, not just like, oh, let's

start a streaming service, right? Yep. Interestingly, two of those studios had perfectly good streaming services to become, to come, meaning the streaming service called HBO, and Showtime. That existed. That was, by the way, not, there was no destruction by Netflix

in either of those services, right? Right. So you could have said, leave them the fuck alone. Why did they not leave them the fuck alone? Well, again, they each had their strategy. But again, I think that, let me say what I, again, I'm truly from the gallery somewhere because I- You're not running anything.

I'm not running one of those studios. You forgot that I did have also Universal for two years. You did. I'm sorry. You had everything. You had Tuesday, Movie of the Week, for which I love you forever. Excuse me. Tuesday, Wednesday, and had Tuesday movie of the week, for which I love you forever. Excuse me. Tuesday, Wednesday, and Saturday movie of the week for our sins.

Whatever. All the movies of the week. Okay. All right. So from the gallery, I believe that they ought to reverse strategies too strong. They ought to reorient themselves and say, we each own a great television network, fully distributed in every household in the United States.

Let's go into competition. Let's not treat it as some yesterday's sliver. Let's go into competition. Let's not treat it as some yesterday's sliver. Let's go compete. Let's take some of our shows. Look, it is in the end a business of hits. Let's take some of our shows and our creativity and build our networks back up. It's there for the take. Wow, that's interesting. Let's go take everything else we do and invigorate it again with capital allocation that fits the suit.

Build linear cable backup. I like this. Let's sell our stuff to every... Warner Brothers was the biggest arms producer in the entire entertainment world, meaning it sold, produced by itself with its capital, it produced television shows for every media, for every network. network they had shows on all three networks and their own network they sold in various uh uh strands of syndication etc all over the world it used to be again the netflixing of the world which is you own it forever uh and you never distribute it in other media, the entertainment business, the residual revenues from friends, from name any one of your endless hit shows that went through all forms of syndication, right? All that, go back to that. It's a good sound business. And you'll get back out of that your sovereignty.

But this geometric speed, you can say, you think if they don't do something quick, they're fucked, essentially, because of programming, SCED, and pipeline, et cetera. Well, I think one fundamental thing, they should certainly get out of the room fundamental thing, they should certainly get out of the room with their deepest, fiercest, and almost conclusive enemy, Netflix, and probably with Apple and Amazon.

I agree. Because they're in, you know, Netflix is in one business, and they are the rulers of the business they're in. The other two, Apple and Amazon Prime, are completely different businesses that have no business model relative to production of movies and television. It's just something they do to support their Prime or something they do to support their walled system in Apple. So, you know, I just don't think they belong in the same room as producers, and I think producers ought to go and say, we're on our own. We're going to

negotiate with you directly. We are your savior. Historically, we've been in business together for literally a hundred years. We are your natural allies, not your enemies. Have you been in conversation with studio heads?

Well, they're my friends. Yeah, so are you saying this to them? I'm not. I can only tell you what I think. That's the only, I mean, I can't do more than that. Are they open to this idea? Do they feel like they're trapped? It feels like they're trapped.

It's not something that I feel like. I mean, I can't talk about conversations I've had with them. Okay, all right. You've also suggested to your friends, these top paid Hollywood executives, that they and top paid actors take a 25% pay cut. Did you say this? What happened?

Here's what happened. Okay, explain, explain. Okay, okay. This is so no big deal. So I'm reading the statements of SAD. Fran Drescher. The over rhetoric, but that's what happens in strikes. And the thing about criticizing these huge paychecks of the CEOs and sounds whatever.

And the point I was making is that the top 20 actors make more by a lot than the top 20 CEOs. I had pointed that out. So get over it. CEOs. I had pointed that out. So get over it. And if you really want to have a sign of good mutual senior, huge payout people, both actors and executives, to show a little stuff to the majority of their fellow people.

I just thought, you know, it's a nice little olive branch. It took off in ways that I didn't really contemplate. Not that my words have any meaning whatsoever. Well, you look like a communist, Barry Date. You look like a communist, Barry Diller. You look like a communist. No, but you're saying preemptively redistribute. Preemptively. Yes. I agree with you. A couple more things. One big win

gets your idea of residuals. A WGA strike has gotten studios proposed to give writers confidential quarterly reports that include total SVOD view hours per title. That was a bit of a holy cow kind of proprietary information they'd never share, especially Netflix, by the way. Will that be enough to build back residuals?

Here's the genius again. If you just keep notching up the genius of Netflix, so Netflix from the first hour of the first day says, we're not telling anyone anything. There is no transparency. One person could be watching our stuff, a billion people. We're never telling you.

Why did they do that? Because what they wanted, again, this is a historical business in the vernacular of putting asses in seats. And when someone came in the movie business to see your movie, that individual admission price was notched up. And you knew that this movie, as against that movie, absolutely sold that many seats. You knew the same thing in the absolute transparency, whether you believed it or not, of Nielsen ratings, et cetera. They're all transparent.

Netflix comes along and says, no transparency of any kind. Why did they say that? Because they thought to themselves, first of all, we're a subscription service. We don't want anyone to know whether this is a more successful thing than that, because then we'll have to pay for it. It was a form of genius. Now, subsequent to that, of course, they have let little windows in, but they said the second part of that first statement was, by the way, we're buying out all the rights. You don't have a participation.

So, you know, no participation and no transparency subverts the very base of what the entertainment business is about. You make something, you put it out there, and to the degree that people show up to your individual little thing, not your subscription, but your individual little project, is how you get paid. Right. They took that away. Is it coming back? Can it come back? description, but your individual little project is how you get paid. Right. They took that away. Is it coming back? Can it come back? Of course it can.

Okay. So back, I'm going to ask you, are you buying Netflix stock right now? Are you thinking they're evil geniuses? I don't, I don't, I, listen, let me be really clear. They are not evil geniuses. And I absolutely, I say that it's that it's just such an inappropriate term for really smart people going about their business with single-handed conviction, courage, consistency, smarts on every level.

It is- And why should, but everyone else followed them too, and that's the problem. Well, no, no, no. What happened is they, because they were so effective and because of a series of unintended consequences, you would think, which is why, you know, I say this word evil genius,

believe me not to criticize Netflix because I'm hardly a critic. I'm an enormous admirer of Netflix. But if you see what happened from the very beginning to a strike that can't be settled because of them, right? To this very day, you line up all those things and you say, my God, that must be the work. Not the work of, but that is so astounding that I just make that reference. But I truly, I reiterate, I truly do not mean that they are because they're not.

All right. This is the last thing we're going to do. It's called promote your quote. Barry, you have amazing takes on everything under the sun. We're going to do a lightning round about a Barry Diller soundbite. And I want you to say if you stand by it. Yeah, I want you to get in trouble. Barry, it doesn't matter anymore for you.

You can do whatever you want. Yeah, right, right, right. I want to say if you stand by it or want to expand on it. Very quickly. Okay, work from home is, quote, kind of stupid, a crock, and my favorite, its own kind of pandemic. Stick by it? Expand on it? Absolutely, conclusively, and full stop.

Okay. Most ESG programs are, quote, truly empty calories. You basically say all they do is produce glossy reports. So I will note IIC has a big ESG section on its website with your quote at the top. Well, yeah, all the companies I'm involved in, we do what we have to do. But I think much of ESG is misunderstood, misnamed, mislabeled, and much a waste of time. How do you promote diversity then? No, no, sorry. Let me be very clear. We do everything we can.

By the way, everything we can is not enough. I would admit that. But we care very much about diversity. But we care very much about diversity. That has nothing to do with the, quote, industry of ESG, which is mostly a self-promotion industry. PR. Having relatively little effect. I believe very firmly in good governance.

I just don't believe in the movement. Okay. Crypto is, quote, a huge speculation on very spindly legs. Looks like you were right about that. Thank you so much. All right, I think we'll just leave it at that. And my favorite is a comment you made during the WGA strike in 2008.

You said it to me, actually. Quote, Hollywood is a community so inbred it's a wonder their children have teeth. Do their children have teeth now? Is Hollywood Hollywood is a community so inbred it's the one where their children have teeth. Do their children have teeth now? Is Hollywood changed? Is it still inbred? Yeah, ever more so, I think. I mean, I don't think there's been – look, because I have been around it because I've been in it a long time.

I've been around it because I've been in it a long time. And when it was a simpler business, or when it was a much more direct business where there was no consolidation, let's call it. When I, Paramount was owned by Gulf and Western, a much bigger company. was owned by Gulf and Western, a much bigger company. But Paramount was in the movie and television production and distribution business and nothing else until it got into actually starting the video cassette business, which it did. All the other companies were just in their own businesses. So the chief executive of those companies,

their hands and feet touched the product. They understood it to their fingertips or they perished. Now, out of consolidation, these businesses are so down the ladder from where they were that I think they have in various ways atrophied. There are and have been and are right now some good leaders of these businesses. But my God, the problems they have. Bob Iger is one of hands down, without any question, without any rhetoric, is a superb executive. Throw him a problem in this

area and hard to find anyone better to solve it. He has, however, the kinds of problems right now that may be insoluble, that are proving very, very tough to solve

on every front in every area. So, I don't know, I've bammed on about that. But to the very short form of the question is, has this business evolved? I think this business has not evolved for the better. Do you have any hope for innovation? Well, I always do. I mean, it's always, listen, it will come somehow from somewhere, from someplace, either

creative destruction when it does its mix master, out of that will come innovation for sure. Look, the movie and television business, the Hollywood business, really influenced the world in many, many wonderful ways. I mean, of course, it did some, of course, like anything. I mean, it did some, you know, bad product, stuff like that, of course, would come along. But on the whole, for almost 100 years, what a golden thing it was at its best. And circumstances, external mostly, but circumstances have changed that for the worse. And I don't think it comes back.

All right. Barry Diller, thank you so much. Thank you. Honey, forgive me. I don't care. This is my favorite moment. I know. You know what? I guess I would feel offended, but I'm not even slightly offended. I'm not offended at all. My favorite, my actual favorite moment was when he called himself a member of the gallery, the peanut gallery, which is like amazing term for someone that Christian, who produced this episode, called his favorite member of the Illuminati. Yes, yeah, he really is. He's a lot of, you know, he would be a character on Game of Thrones. He's like,

I'm just the peanut gallery. And then you're like, come on, you made Tuesday movie of the week. And he's like, excuse me, Tuesday, Wednesday, Saturday movie of the week. That was a huge innovation in television at the time. It doesn't seem like it now, but it was. We need more. As a country, we need more things of the week so we can get around something. But let's do a quick unpacking of the conversation. First most important question on Hollywood.

Would Barry, back in the days of doing all his movies of the week have taken a 25% pay cut? No. As an olive branch. I don't know. I don't know. Maybe. Maybe. He's very, you know, if it got him something better later, sure.

Yeah. I mean, I think he's always strategizing the next step. He's very chess-like in that regard. It takes away power from the writers and the actors if they do that. That's my impression. Yeah. If you take that off the table, what do they got? Well, I think it also shows a lot of what he was talking about, which was really interesting to hear, is partnership.

Yeah. Producers, writers, talent should be in partnership. And he gave a very good overview of why, of that kind of exponential shit show that will happen after Labor Day. Yeah, I think it's a little. Like, they don't feel like they're in partnership with the owners of these studios. They don't. They'll throw them out just like yesterday's trash if they need to. So I think that's, you know, I just

think he was, the dead-on thing he was right about is Netflix is really the enemy. And so is tech. Certain networks like HBO under Richard Plepler make you feel like you're in partnership. Certain networks, they're just going to give you their bad notes. I don't think it's ever been a partnership. I mean, there have been strikes every, you know, kind of couple decades in history.

It's different. But there's something now that is different, which he outlined well, which is Netflix took away the transparency. So no participation in the back end, no transparency. You know, I think he said it subverts the very idea of like people show up for your little individual project and you can track it. And the interesting thing is that Netflix, people still like working for Netflix because they can do things creatively. But the studios took advantage of that when they built their streaming business. They were like, oh, we're going to screw you on this side. When someone walks in the door screwing you and you kind of enter into the arrangement knowing that, it's a different thing than when you've been getting a deal that's agreed and then the change, the deals of the term are screwed. Yeah, I guess. But the most salient point for

him was Netflix really drove a wedge, right? Drove the wedge. They seduced, as he said, all these companies. He called them the architects of the strike. They're basically the LBJ, the media companies in his esteem. Although he clarified that it might not have all been anticipated. This is something I've been saying a lot is Netflix is not your friend, right? The issue problem with these discussions on the producer side is that everybody has a different interest and Netflix has no interest in settling. The tech companies don't really have interest in settling. And then you have the old studios, which have been sort of bled dry by getting into streaming, which they kind of have to do. I disagree with them.

They have to go there. They can't go back to the old way. The consumers don't like it because the young person, they aren't going to watch linear television. It's just not happening. I'm not going to watch linear television. He was not very friendly to Apple moving on to antitrust. Did you like his credit card argument there? Yes, I did, actually. It's actually a smart one. It's a good articulation of how they should argue it. Because, you know, Apple's not going to get away with this for much longer on this. They're going to have to give, and that's not a bad way to do it. And I think he makes a

good point. Credit cards protect against fraud and all kinds of stuff. I think Apple has a little more of a responsibility because it's on your phone and everything else. Credit cards have an intermediary. The banks that issue the cards. Great, but it's all part of the system. They could create a system. But who would it be? Because I think the challenge here is that Apple is literally putting stuff on your phone. Like, you are the merchant, so you accept the bad app, right? And there's no intermediary or protection, and so they can't screw the consumer. And I agree, like, I don't think 15% to 30% seems very high, but 2% seems so low.

Steve Jobs just made it up, and that's the point. Is it just if they can charge it, they charge it. If they can't, they can't. He decreed it, and the government will stop it. It's just there it up, and that's the point. Is it just if they can charge it, they charge it. If they can't, they can't. He decreed it. And the government will stop it. It's just there's no way it's going to continue. Well, things that the government will not stop. AI, it seemed like he was not very hopeful.

And again, it's amazing to see how he's kind of doing this very genius, like, multi-pronged strategy, right? He's, like, chatting to his friends who own the company, saying, trying to broker a deal, but also saying, I will sue you, and also going to Congress and saying, change the laws. His life as a mogul. I think he's quite up to speed on it. We'll see where it goes. He has some good arguments, and I think litigation is a smart way to go. We can't wait around for Congress to do something, and he will have leverage, and it will attract the notice. Even if he loses, he gets notice. I think it's just, it's the right way to go. It's the right move on his part. He does protest that the Times leaving has hurt them notice. I think it's just the right way to go. It's the right move on his part.

He does protest that the Times leaving has hurt them, but I think it's kind of hurt them. I don't think they can all row together. They all want to do deals with these companies because they think this time they're going to get the good deal from these tech companies. Never. Never get the good deal. Whatever. But the stakes, as he put them, he said the republic is at stake, basically, which seems dramatic, but also not because the fourth estate, like it's really the future of news here. I think he's right. I think he's right. You know, I do think these publishing companies are naive again. Like I remember when Meredith Levian

went out once to Google, this is many years ago, she was not the CEO that I'm just like, I'm going to meet him. I said, they'll fuck you. And they fucked her, not her, but like they fucked all of publishing for many, many years by stealing things. And I think it's really important to keep that in mind. I think he's aware of that. He's very aware of their leverage. And I think they don't, we keep hoping that they're going to act correctly. And I just, I think the best way to do it is litigate and legislate.

Well, and I think that it's a compelling argument. The one point where he lost me was around fair use, where I think he's saying we have to limit the ability of LLMs to access fair use, not get rid of fair use. He said, get rid of fair use. I would hope that's not a broad statement because obviously news organizations rely on it. Doc makers rely on it. Parody comedians rely on it. I think he means the ability to crawl and suck up every bit of information. Very quickly, politics. He was so sad about backing Biden. I mean, not exactly fond. Fond isn't a necessary agreement. Old poll, I guess you can string together a sentence.

Not my fave. I think he's honest. That's very true. He's being honest. I think a lot of people think what he's saying. So I think he was just articulating a very common feeling is that this is who we got and the other guy is so heinous we have to go with the guy we got. So, you know.

I love talking to Hollywood moguls about politics because they understand star power. So they can look at a person and say, oh, this, you know, how he described Obama, right? Obama had that. He's been very active politically. But they just know, like the Hollywood execs know what talent is. They see it and they feel it and they tell you if you have it and they tell you if you don't. You might argue that Biden's been a much more effective politician than any of those. They were all sort of jazz hands and not so much stuff.

So I would say Biden's a much more successful politician in terms of what he's passed. Well, I mean, the most honest thing maybe Ferry Tiller said in a sea of honest things was when he articulated what everybody felt about Biden, as you put it. And then he said, well, that makes me very sad. I like to be contrarian. Yeah, yeah, I know. He doesn't like everyone agreeing. He doesn't like everyone agreeing. He should go all in on Biden being lively and fantastic.

Anyways, read us out, Cara. Okay. Today's show was produced by Naeem Araza, Christian Castro Rossell, Megan Cunane, and Megan Burney. Special thanks to Andrea Lopez-Cruzado, Rick Kwan engineered this episode, and our theme music is by Trackademics. If you're already following the show, forgive me, honey. If not, you get to join the peanut gallery. Go wherever you listen to podcasts, search for On with Cara Swisher, and hit follow. We'll be back on Monday with more.

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