Pivot - Google ad track changes, implosions for the entertainment industry and Square buys Tidal

Episode Date: March 5, 2021

Kara and Scott talk about Google changing its ad model – they won't be selling ads based on how your browse the web anymore. They also discuss Square purchasing Jay-Z's music streaming service company – and we're not quite sure why... Meanwhile, Alamo Drafthouse files Chapter 11, and ratings for the Golden Globes hits an all-time low. In listener mail, a 21-year-old on a visa asks for advice on how to build an international career as an entrepreneur. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Support for Pivot comes from Virgin Atlantic. Too many of us are so focused on getting to our destination that we forgot to embrace the journey. Well, when you fly Virgin Atlantic, that memorable trip begins right from the moment you check in. On board, you'll find everything you need to relax, recharge, or carry on working. Buy flat, private suites, fast Wi-Fi, hours of entertainment, delicious dining, and warm, welcoming service that's designed around you. delicious dining and warm, welcoming service that's designed around you. Check out virginatlantic.com for your next trip to London and beyond, and see for yourself how traveling for business can always be a pleasure.

I just don't get it. Just wish someone could do the research on it. Can we figure this out? Hey, y'all. I'm John Blenhill, and I'm hosting a new podcast at Vox called Explain It To Me. Here's how it works. You call our hotline with questions you can't quite answer on your own. We'll investigate and call you back to tell you what we found. We'll bring you the answers you need every Wednesday starting September 18th. So follow Explain It To Me, presented by Klaviyo.

Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher. And I'm Scott Galloway. And Kara, I am just so excited about the timing of this anti-mask movement in St. Patrick's Day. Because I don't know about you, but I find that people make really good decisions on St. Patrick's Day. Really good decisions. As a matter of fact, as a matter of fact, I do think that when the people who don't want to take the vaccine, I just call that natural selection. I think that makes sense. Why do this at the end? Like, it's just masks. Just

open some stuff, sure. But like, we're so close. Look, there are just some red flags for all the ladies out there. Word to the ladies. There's some red flags that say this individual should not find purchase in your womb, meaning you should not procreate with this purchase. Specifically, if anyone ever mentions cash back and a credit card, you don't want to mate with that person. If somebody talks about how they're into their magic, if someone is saying they're going to get the real estate license once they stop promoting that club, that just means you shouldn't. And also, if they're really into St. Patrick's Day, that means do not have children with that person. Do not have children with that person. Do not have children with that person.

And anyone also who in any way says, you know, I'm not going to take a vaccine, that means that branch of DNA should not grow leaves. It won't let go of this issue. Like, honestly, it's like I literally think of like our founding fathers. I'm like, they wore masks. They had a vaccine. They had issues. Jesus Christ, can you get over this?

They got to get over this. Can you get over this? They got to get over this. Can you get over this? I cannot. I just don't. My mom had to carry around, or my mom's father, I should say, had to carry around this weird mask, gas mask with ears on it in London as the Messerschmitts were raining hell down. They had to carry around this ridiculously clunky mask in case the gas alarm went off. But no, to wear a cloth mask into Walmart is tyranny. Tyranny.

It's tyranny. Tyranny. Anyways, Governor Abbott, get your head out of your ass. Yeah. The great state of Texas deserves better. I don't want to blame the people of Texas. Yeah, I feel bad for the people of Texas. Like, even the ones that are cheering this on, I feel bad.

You're stupid. Like, be stupid, but don't be stupid. Anyway, let me just contrast it with Do, be stupid, but don't be stupid. Anyway, let me just contrast it with Dolly Parton, who's our vaccine queen. She did an astonishing, she took the song Jolene and sang vaccine, vaccine. I'm not going to sing like Dolly. She's amazing. Rebecca will put it in. It goes, vaccine, vaccine, vaccine, vaccine. Vaccine, vaccine, vaccine, vaccine. I'm begging of you, please don't hesitate.

Vaccine, vaccine, vaccine, vaccine. Because once you're dead, then that's a bit too late. I think she should, like, tape the song Vaccine, Vaccine in the Jolene, since she wrote Jolene, and then release it and give the money to something. But she's already given money because she helped finance the Moderna COVID- Vanderbilt. To Vanderbilt, the COVID-19 vaccine research. She finally got that. She waited in line.

Like, I love Dolly Parton. I want Dolly Parton to run our entire frigging country. She writes songs. She's a great entrepreneur. She's kind. She's like, she listens to every side. It seems like everybody likes her. So I just, I love Dolly Parton. And speaking of vaccines, kind. She listens to every side. It seems like everybody likes her.

So I just love Dolly Parton. And speaking of vaccines, President Biden announced there'll be enough vaccines for every adult in the U.S. by the end of May. And by the way, district government announced that it's changing their system because it's so ill-served. It's citizens. So now it's a two-step

system where you register and then you don't have to do this sort of Hunger Games vaccination thing, which is going to be great. So now it's a two-step system where you register and then you don't have to do this sort of Hunger Games vaccination thing, which is going to be great. So it looks like things are, you know, I got to say, I gave the government a hard time, but they moved quickly and solved, fixed the problem, or trying to fix the problem. So more people get vaccines in their arms. So a fast moving government is always a good thing. And this looks like we will be getting, more people will be getting these vaccines by the end of May. So you should all go back and listen to Tuesday's Pivot episode,

interview with Andy Slavitt of the White House. He's a White House senior advisor to the COVID response team. So those are all, you know, masks, you're just going to make people sicker, but get a vaccine then. Just get vaccines in your arms. I don't know what to say. If you really need to do that with a mask, get yourself a vaccine that is coming to you much sooner. So, what else is going on? I broke

Twitter Spaces yesterday. Did you hear about that? Say more. Well, Twitter has the Spaces, which is a competitor to Clubhouse. It's actually very good. I have to say I enjoyed it. I enjoyed it. And I like it because it's, everyone's like, oh, Clubhouse is one. I'm like, but all my interest graph is on Twitter. And like, it attracted, I don't know, a thousand people. It was really something. And I got, what happened is I went on the first place. I was one of the, doing one of my time stops. Are you cheating on me with

Spaces? I am. You didn't even tell me about Spaces. You want Spaces maybe soon. I want, we need to, you and I need to, that will be good. And we can like cut people off. That's my favorite part. So describe, I describe spaces. I know it's, I'm hoping it's a clubhouse killer, but I don't know any more than that.

It's a clubhouse competitor, I would say. And what, I actually really like it. I really like it. It's, you go in and then everybody shows up. It tweets out so your followers can see it. And you can just let certain people speak, people you invite to speak, or you can let everyone speak or just everyone who follows you speak. That can be

really noisy. And only 10 people can speak at once, I think, the first 10 people that get there. What I did is I let nobody speak and then I clicked on and made them speakers, essentially, as they had questions when they made requests. And then every now and then, someone I saw in the room, I made them a speaker, and they spoke. And so... Did you have a topic? Well, interesting, because I broke Twitter. What happened is they had an update, and everybody could only hear my part of the conversation

and not the questions. Generally, I find anything you're involved in, most people can just hear Kara. Just hear Kara. Except in this show. I'm going to do, you know what? I'm going to do a data thing. That's good.

That's good humor. How many minutes you talk versus me? I bet it's, I bet, I would bet you would win on that. We're going to do that. Rebecca, get on it. So anyway, let me finish with Twitter spaces. So anyway, you go in there and you talk and people ask the best questions.

And what happened is Kayvon, who runs product for Twitter for many years now, came on and explained what happened. And it was great. And then I asked him dozens of questions about spaces and about product innovation at Twitter. He talked a lot about subscriptions and explained it even more, which was really great. And then people asked him questions. And so I had a product on Twitter. It was answering questions with me poking at him, but with people asking great questions about the product and other products at Twitter.

So it was great. That sounds cool. It was fun. It's really well done. And I really like this audio thing. It's very intimate. It's great for people with fans. They give you enough tools that you can cut people off.

And if they go crazy, nobody did. Everyone acted great in an audio setting. There was not craziness. And he did acknowledge all the problems that could come, like a white supremacist group or someone who, the host being crazy and stuff like that. And so we talked about that. So it was great. So you and I are going to go on Twitter Spaces. I'm excited.

Well, that's not only, I mean, the really exciting news is that Twitter, and we've been abdicating this for a long time. By the way, I spoke to a very senior executive at Twitter. They all call me late at night as if if they call me late at night, no one will find out about it. And said that the product development team at Twitter feels more heat than they ever have. Well, it's about time.

Anyways, them going into subscription is obviously a gangster move. I think they've shown more product mojo in the last 90 days than they've shown in the last five years. I asked about that. And what's really exciting is that Twitter is going vertical in content and has purchased Tidal, which is a genius move. So explain that to people. Now, I just was reading Jack's long explanation of it. Well, first off, you fell for it. It wasn't Twitter that bought it.

It was Square. Square, excuse me. Which, by the way, makes no fucking sense. I'm sorry. And indicates that Jack Dorsey, guess which child he likes more? Oh, if Twitter had bought Tidal and gone vertical with music, my understanding is Tidal has something to do with music. Yeah, they do.

It would have created more momentum. The Twitter stock would have gone up. But no, he wants it to go to where 91% of his wealth is. And supposedly, they're going to integrate

cash app and payments. Oh, that's interesting. I never even thought Twitter should have bought it. You're right. A hundred percent. What the fuck is Square doing buying Tidal?

Would you like his explanation? I'm just going to read it. Yeah, what is it? All right. He asked, why would a music streaming company and a financial services company join forces? It's a very multi-part tweet. I'm not going to read the whole thing.

It comes down to the simple idea of finding new ways for artists to support their work. New ideas are found at intersections, and we believe there's a compelling one between music and the economy. Making the economy work for artists is similar to what Square has done for sellers. So that's the economy. Making the economy work for artists is similar to what Square has done for sellers. So that's the idea. And so he says, given what Square is able to do as sellers of all sizes, individuals through Cash App, we believe we can now work for artists to see the same success for them and us. We're going to start small and focus on the most critical needs of artists and growing their fan bases. Square created ecosystems and tools for sellers and individuals, and we'll do the same for artists. We'll work entirely new listening experience to bring fans closer together, simple integrators and merchandise sales, modern collaboration tools, and new complimentary revenue streams.

I still don't understand it. Yeah, well, pass the beard oil and the edibles, brother. I mean, literally, that is just fucking ridiculous. First off, let's look at parts of that. Parts of that make sense. Okay. We want to expand. It does make a little sense. We want to expand the fan base. I know, let's find a social network with 180 million people and promote that original content as a means of differentiating

our social network and also bringing attention to the artists. Oh, wait, but we're going to do that on a financial, on a payment app? I mean, this indicates a couple of things. One, it indicates that Jack has the mother of all favorite children and literally Twitter is his second family. I mean, it's like every other weekend he'll swing by with a skateboard and a shitty Christmas tree and pay the rent for mom, right? Fine. That sounds like a story that may have happened to someone named Scott, little Scotty. You know, I expose myself and you jab. I'm just saying.

I just wanted to say. And, by the way, Jack Dorsey is like the mother of all star fuckers. This was a $300 million bar tab to hang out with Jay-Z. This just doesn't make any sense. This doesn't, this does not. But it would make sense to go to Twitter. My testosterone therapy is like exploding. I'm so angry

all the time. I'm literally so aggressive and so angry. It would have been a good thing for Twitter is what you're saying. This would have been a good. It would have been genius for Twitter for God's sakes. Go vertical into content. Proprietary content. When did Spotify's stock take off? When they went, they did the Joe Rogan deal. When did's stock take off? When they did the Joe Rogan deal.

When did Netflix's stock take off? When they dropped a full season of House of Cards. If Twitter goes serious into content, anything like this, that day they get to go shopping on the market's credit card. The stock will appreciate by more than the acquisition price. That's a great way of putting it. You know, it's interesting. You're going to be furious when Square buys CNN. Oh, God.

Don't even say that. Don't even say that. We're going to link the news with a payment system, subscription, blah, blah, blah, blah. And also, I want to hang out with Anderson Cooper. So, go ahead. Literally, I think the thing, I trust the thing that makes you happiest in the world is your little girl. A close second is when you trigger me. Be honest.

I never hear you laugh like when you trigger me. If Anderson Cooper ends up working at Square, I'm going on strike. I'm literally going on strike. I'm finding a union. He's got to save Andy. He's got to run in there and grab him and run out of the burning building. Oh, my God. If Jack Dorsey ruins what Ando and I have, I will never forgive him. I will never forgive him.

You've got to get Ando on here. You know that? You know, I don't want to abuse our friendship like that. He and I are close. He doesn't know that yet, but he and I are close. Well, anyway, this was an interesting deal. I agree with you. I see their explanation. What? No, I don't think it's interesting. I think it should have gone to Twitter. I was like, that's why I said Twitter, because I thought, of course, Twitter. I said it and you believed it, because why does it make

sense? I know. I know it's Square. I forgot. Yeah, it is kind of something. Yeah. You know, they could have just used a Square system on Twitter. Like, you know what I mean? Like, they could just spend a vendor like i don't know literally what is going on google's i mean seriously coinbase is acquiring maroon 5 what's next what the fuck is next speaking of bands the kings of leon we got to get to our big stories in a second is releasing its first album is an nft we're going to talk about nfts on monday which is this non-fungible tokens. Explain what they are so that we can get our people ready for discussing them.

The honest answer is I don't know. The only thing I'll say, and I'm trying to understand crypto, I'm like the guy who's been dragged into liking crypto just as I've been dragged into admiring Elon Musk. Like the interesting, Bitcoin is non-fungible. The beauty of Bitcoin is it can't be, it's not malleable. It's a dollar. You know what a dollar is.

You get a dollar. You know what you can use it for. You can't counterfeit it. If you do, the CIA shows up, which, interestingly enough, the CIA is actually charged with crimes around counterfeiting, which I didn't know,

in addition to protecting the president. But these NFTs, or specifically, I've been learning a lot about Ethereum, this notion of smart contracts and things you put on top of the blockchain for artists or to, you know, as a condition of payment,

you say you have to put this money into escrow. And if I'm getting NFTs wrong, which I'm sure I am, and I will hear immediately on Twitter how wrong I got it. We're going to do a search over the weekend. But there's this kind of what I'll call this next version of crypto where everyone is starting to understand a little bit Bitcoin.

But this notion of placing smart contracts and non-fungible tokens that— So this was a long-winded way of saying, I don't know, Kara. What it is is essentially you get value. You buy these tokens, you get certain value. In the case of the Kings of Leon, you get special seats or releases, which is interesting because I think we really need to talk about this because this was

the idea around super followers at Twitter, this idea that there's some payment, and we took Kayvon and I talked about that, that there's some payment that you, there's some content that you make that's special for only people. And so, it's this idea that you invest and then they give you things. There's value. So, it's putting value on these tokens. So, cat meme just went for 300 grand as an NFT, I think. Yeah, you get special cat memes, though. You get some value. And what value is to people

is different. You know what I mean? What's valuable to you and what's valuable to me are so different. Oh, you think? Yes. You think? Yes. You know, like, so anyway, so what is the value? And so we're going to be talking about this more because it's really interesting because there's all these different payment things going on, like creators getting paid, you know, figuring out monetization around things like these clubhouses or Twitter spaces, around Cameo, around Substack. There's all these different,

and it's all about what Scott was talking about, which was Rundle, the recurring revenue bundle. I think we should start Rundle coin. Well, you know what? There's definitely going to be, I mean, I'm just waiting. And by the way, the most underreported business story of the last 30 days, Amazon is experimenting with a cryptocurrency, a coin south of the border of Mexico. Amazon is experimenting with a cryptocurrency

or coin south of the border of Mexico. No one's talking about it. We've been waiting for that. And what is the value? I mean, in a weird way, Prime is kind of an NFT. You know what I mean? What you get out of it. I like the hush tone to connote some sort of insight there.

I was just thinking. I've got to think about it more. I'm not intelligent enough on it. So let's move to something I actually am intelligent on, which is Google. Here is the big story. Google is announcing that it will no longer sell ads based on specific web browsing data. Ah, interesting.

That is interesting because one of their executives has a company that they started called Neva that is getting funding that has been getting more and more funding. Starting next year, the company will stop using and investing in tracking technologies that identify web users as they move from site to site. This is seriously shaking up the digital ad economy. Google accounted for 52% of last year's global digital ad spending at $292 billion. Google announced last year it would remove third-party cookies in 2022.

Of course, this all comes among increased antitrust strategy. I think this is a prophylactic, as you often say, against a big tech giant. Late last year, the Department of Justice announced a lawsuit against the company, alleging the company has a monopoly on search. And obviously, targeting is an important part of that. Tracking technologies is. Facebook also announced it would be lifting a ban on political ads in the United States. Meanwhile, they're over here, we're back to trouble. So, what do you think? What do you think about this? This is a big deal. And they're

leaning into privacy as, you know, they're trying to take Apple's thunder. Well, I think the only thing that really rivals Google's concern over privacy is Facebook's support of journalism. I think those two things are, you know, it's like when I go on boards, I always walk in thinking I know what's going on and what I always find, and this is a good lesson and it's something I'm struggling, I've struggled with my whole life

and I'm finally trying to acknowledge when I go into new environments and I think there's a lesson here for young people that is generally speaking, when you go into a new environment, you find out that you're not as smart as you thought and they're not as dumb as you'd hoped. And when Facebook says, claims that their actions reflect a concern or support for journalism and Google attempts to fashion this or spin this as a concern for privacy, well, guess what? We're not that fucking stupid.

This is, or the way I perceive this, and I'd love to get your viewpoint. I feel like we are that stupid, but go ahead. Yeah, you might be right. St. Patrick's Day. Anyway, so Google, something like 50% of all actions or all time over a certain amount of time on the internet touches a Google property. And so they can start grabbing data from your actions and use behavioral data on Gmail, on their browser, on Search, obviously, on Android. A cookie is a chance to follow you around the internet.

And if the New York Times, and you show up, and they put a cookie on your browser, and you show back up to the New York Times, they know you're at the Audi site, and they can start running you Audi ads as you're reading, you know, or reading Kara Swisher's column, and they can get more money for those ads and they can monetize their traffic to a greater extent as a function of cookie technology. If effectively Google starts clearing cookies anytime someone comes to one of their properties, then what they're saying is, all right, we control, we have the scale

to touch almost everybody every time they're on the internet, and we're going to reduce your ability. So basically, this is just nothing but a transfer of power from everyone that doesn't have 50% of all activity on the internet to Google. So the notion that this reflects in any way anything other than just them leveraging their monopoly power, if you want evidence for antitrust, this is it. This isn't an attempt to avoid antitrust. This is exhibit C of why Google should be broken up, in my view.

Oh, interesting. Well, you know, Israel, the reactions from the ad industry are all over the place. You know, some say that now if they can't target or get a detailed, this is from the journal, after Google's change, advertisers won't be able to get a detailed picture of people's, the targeted users went on to buy and advertise products. Still other industry executives

said the change is good for consumers and expressed hope that Google's new targeting technologies will still help brands achieve their goals in online marketing. And so, it really is interesting because I think they have to act in some way so it looks that they care about privacy. There's a thing where they've been working on a thing called a privacy sandbox, which they target ads without collecting individual information.

They group people together as cohorts and stuff like that. Search works that way, doesn't it? They claim they don't know you. They scrub your identity and then group you. And so I think there's a real tension in the industry right now around these issues. And so I think this move is the right thing for them to at least be communicating. This is their story, their narrative. And there are other, Shridhar, who ran a lot of their ad products has

started a company called Neva, which is doing stuff like that. So there's all kinds of interesting- Spoke to him last night because of you. Yes, that's right. And so I think that, what do you think of that, that idea of what they're doing there? So I could not be more excited. I think that there is a big opportunity here, the purity play, the citizen play, whether it's Snap or Pinterest accelerating because people see them as a non-toxic social platform, whether it's Twitter stock accelerating when they kick off hate and misinformation in the form of 140 characters known as our president. I think that the immunities are kicking in and people are saying there is a capitalist movement towards a better, healthier ecosystem. And one of the defining features of a healthier ecosystem is subscription as opposed to ad-driven models where it's just about your attention. So if it's just about your attention, you try and convince people on Robinhood that everyone's making money and figure out a way for 85% of them to lose money by trading every goddamn day.

out a way for 85% of them to lose money by trading every goddamn day. If you're on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram, let's train you to be divided, be angry, enrage you so you keep showing up and commenting and getting angry or convince you that everyone's better looking than you and you should be shamed and get back to get some sort of weird sort of fake relevance. So the idea that a search engine could be launched that's's subscription-based, and will actually take you to the best information as opposed to the information they can further monetize or enrage you with, I think is the future of search. And this guy has the chops. I don't think he's thinking big enough. I think he should go to, and I think there's an opportunity here, go to the best content creators in the world, whether it's the New York Times or Conde Nast or News Corp or Pearson or Nikkei, and say, you've seen what happened to you. Google partners with media companies the way a virus

partners with a host. Go in with all of us. Go in all with us and take all that shit off of Google. Make Google the sewer it deserves to be in terms of content and go exclusive with us. So Neva, to me, is a super exciting company. It's also you've got to get people using it. You know, people are so used. Google is such a practice. It's such a thing. It's like oxygen in so many ways. What's interesting is, according to the journal, and this is correct, the company said its announcement on Wednesday only covers its ad tools and unique identifiers for websites, not mobile apps, which is of course where a lot of the action is happening. So a big slice of the digital ad ecosystem wouldn't be affected. Mobile ad spending accounted for 68% of all digital spending in the U.S.

So that's one issue. But meanwhile, Apple plans to limit tracking of app usage required by developers to get opt-in permission. So there's a squeeze going on there. It would be interesting if Google embraced it the same way. And then did you see the Facebook, Facebook almost never sends messages out. None of this is good for Facebook. And then Facebook sent out a message saying, we stand with small business. This is an assault on small business. Thank God for Facebook protecting small business. Yeah. Thank God they're here for us. This is something. Facebook's getting

us going to get a squeeze here. I'm feeling a squeeze. They're all going after each other now. Facebook's going to get a squeeze here. I'm feeling a squeeze. They're all going after each other now. Ideally, which is good. Competition is good. I think it's great. Google Shareholds will be interesting.

I think probably it doesn't affect their money a lot, and they can still do first-party data on people that use their stuff as long as they get the permission to do so. And of course, it's all opt-out, not opt-in. And they have a lot of services like YouTube and others that collect something called first, I think it's called first-party data. And that works rather well for them. A combination of these cohorts and then first-party data, they've still got it covered.

Google's going to be just fine, kids, just so you know. As long as Pinterest acquires the rights to Michael Bolton, I think that's the gangster technology move that we've all been waiting for. Maybe Jack will buy Pinterest for Square. Seriously? Seriously? That one makes more sense because they sell shit. Anything makes more sense. That one makes more sense, doesn't it?

It would make more sense if you and I acquired the rights to George Michael music. I mean, by the way, genius. That guy's a genius. I love George Michael. Oh, my gosh. That was part of my youth. Literally all my favorite artists are dying from opioid overdose. So George Michael, Tom Petty.

If I were REM, I would not leave the house right now. Every one of my favorite artists are dropping dead from opioid overdoses. Okay. I'm sorry about that. Anyways, I'm okay. All right. He's going to buy something like Pinterest. Actually, that makes more sense.

Pinterest by Square, that makes more sense. Pinterest by Square? No, Square by Pinterest. Do you realize Square is worth more than Goldman Sachs right now? Yes, you told me that. I know. And you are going to get that turned around. I'm telling you again.

You're going to get that turned around. Okay, we're going to go on a quick break. When we come back, we'll talk more about implosions of the entertainment industry, and we'll take a listener mail question. Fox Creative. This is advertiser content from Zelle. When you picture an online scammer, what do you see? 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.

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My favorite movie chain is going experiences ruin. the Alamo Drafthouse movie theater chain is filed chapter 11. This is a movie theater chain that's been struggling during the pandemic. And obviously, so because it's a real experiential thing where you go and eat in the theater and they have food and then you watch movies and beautiful seats, et cetera, et cetera. They'll continue to operate, but have been acquired by Altamont Capital Partners, which frightens me in some way. I don't even know. They're one of, I assume, a hedge fund.

Meanwhile, the Golden Globes viewership sunk to record lows. Globe ratings plummeted more than 60% from the 18.3 million viewers last year to an audience of 6.9 million. So people tend to like television experiences. So I think they'll probably jump back next year and then go drank. And that's what they do. They do these sort of drank fests that they entertain people at. But what do you think about the Alamo thing?

We were talking about how different the movie theater experience. And I still think movie theaters are screwed, as I've said before. What do you think about this? Well, first of all, Altamont Capital Partners. Doesn't that sound like you go to meet with Altamont and then all of a sudden the elevator turns dark and you plummet to some unknown floor and they grab you and harvest your organs? Sharks. Sharks. That sounds so sinister. Welcome to Altamont, where the future is yours. Let me just say, allegedly. Allegedly, they have elevators.

You know what? They're a very nice company. They do not have elevators on the floor. I'm sure they're lovely people. They do not harvest organs. All to my capital partners. Let me just say, that was a joke. Let me guess, a bunch of white dudes. That was satire.

I'm just trying to protect us legally. That was satire. There's me and my identity politics. They are. Know nothing about them. Making stereotypes they shouldn't make. They do not have sharks at the bottom of elevators. Go ahead. Okay.

Okay. Live and let die. Roger Moore. Fantastic film. And he put his feet at the edges because he knew that. And the guy from 7-Up. Mr. Bond. Mr. Bond.

With the alligators running over the, anyway, back to this. Okay. This is the biggest jump over the biggest shark I have ever seen in media. Meaning? Okay. Golden Globe viewership was off 62% this year. You know how much you loved it? That would make you one of seven people who love the Golden Globes.

No, no. I like the whole thing. The viewership was down 62%. I know that. Of course it was down. I just, I didn't. Percent. I know.

I like some of the moments. Everyone's panicked. I like Jodie Foster making out with her wife, stuff like that, but go ahead. Everyone's panicked that the Super Bowl was down 8% viewership. The Golden Globes were down. And everybody said, oh, broadcast TV, out-supported television, will always have live events in sports. Well, guess what? That wall has been breached.

The Golden Globes off 62%. Yeah, that's a lot. And then, and then. People like that show. People like it and they don't like the new show. And then, and then what do we have? The other point of distribution for the media industrial complex, the film industrial complex, the movie theaters. Remember we had Mark Cuban.

I was like, oh, no, movie theaters are great. They just need to evolve. And everyone uses the same thing. Alamo Drafthouse. Bankrupt. I pick, which I love, bankrupt. And here's the thing, Kara, here's the thing. And I'm going to tie this to today's news. Okay. All right. Paramount Plus announced, is launching today. Yes, I saw that. Okay. So, you got Jean-Luc Picard. Right. You got Trevor Noah. You got Lionel Messi. They have the Premier League games. And you have SpongeBob SquarePants for $6 a month.

So the cost to go to Alamo for one night, that's at least $70 or $75. Or you can have Lionel Messi and Starship Commander Jean-Luc Picard for a year. I don't think it's a big business, but it's a small business in a non-pandemic environment. I don't think it's going to kill it. My idea was that all movie theaters are going to contract to small businesses.

But go ahead. Move on. Well, look, there's still places where you can rent movies on videocassette. You will see that business will go through a Chapter 11. It's essentially a retail play. And retail was invented for Chapter 11 because you get to go through and cherry pick the Alamos that are actually working. Right.

And they get an excuse to cut costs, get out of bad leases. It will come back. But my guess is, and I hate to say this, I think Alamo and every other theater, that could be a chapter 22, and that is it could come out and go back in. I pick, there's an I pick here in Delray, by the way.

There's no such thing as chapter 22, but go ahead. That's a finance term for insiders when you go chapter 11 twice. Jay-Z knows what that means. I can add. Jay-Z knows what that means. I can multiply. I can divide. Go ahead.

Anyways, we have an I pick here in Delray. And I love. Explain what I pick is for those who don't know. Well, I pick is basically you go to a movie theater and they let you watch in a Lazy Boy and they bring you Zacapa and Cokes. It's heaven. I'll tell you what it is. It's heaven. I started taking the kids to see kids' movies there.

I hate kids' movies more than anything. And then I realized I probably shouldn't be drinking on outings with my children. Totally a new story. Different story. Different story. Well, we all knew that. So I stopped doing that. But now when I go to movies, I only go to iPic.

I think it's amazing. And I would pay. They bring you sliders. They bring you alcohol. And you hit this button, and you have a lazy boy. It's a great – I imagine it's probably the same as Alamo. I don't know what Alamo is. Is Alamo the same thing?

Kind of, yeah. Go ahead. Anyways, it's a differentiated premium experience. iPic went bankrupt before COVID. They couldn't figure it out before COVID, and everyone loves it. But here's the thing. It's just we have, again, it goes back to dispersion, and that is the content creators and consumers are pairing up to say, you know what? Dispersion.

We don't need CAA. You know what? We don't need movie theaters to stop that great content from getting to your amazing living room that, by the way, has innovated like crazy. Like crazy. Like crazy. I have this thing called a wallpaper TV. It's incredible. It's just – anyway, so the dispersion of value to the end consumer is skipping over friction distinct of who it hurts.

And whether CAA or the guy directing Batman all want to hold on to the media. Their high dudgeon gave me a headache after my Jason Kyler interview, I got to say. Gave me a headache. Gave you a headache? Gave me a headache. Go ahead. So, look, this is more evidence of dispersion. I think movie theaters are going to be, I mean, they might as well call them seers at this point.

It's just, I think you're going to see a real implosion. What might be interesting is, it'll be interesting to see if and how Alamo comes back. But, okay, 62% down, the Golden Globes live. The advertising industrial complex, the movie theater, the film industrial complex is literally collapsing on itself. Yes. So what happens? I have to say, interestingly, Kara Swisher is going to buy another big screen TV. I have real old TVs.

I want to make – My son has a nice one. But I was like, they don't cost that much. And I really like watching at home. It sounds crazy, but I make kind of a nice- They're less expensive than nice wallpaper. I like have my food and I can get things delivered. And I was like, you know,

but I was wondering what I will go back to after post-vaccine, post-pandemic. And I think I will go to movies, certain movies, like one that I want to see on a big screen. Less and Less, Kara. Oh, totally. It was already happening. It was already happening.

But which movies will I want to see on a big screen? Like probably Top Gun or something like that. Yeah, Vance. I don't think, you know what it is. I don't think you're going to go to movies for the movie. I think you're going to go to movies for the people and that is your kids will get excited about something. It's a chance to get your kids out of the house.

My kids do not like movie theaters. My son never goes. I'm talking about people with children. When your daughter gets a little bit older, you'll take her to see Q movies for the experience. Maybe. How we see movies, we go with groups of friends, and we go see Queen all together,

and we wear white t-shirts. It's white tank tops. Because we're that kind of crazy, fun people. And then we go back and have a key party because we're bored and live in the suburbs. But beyond that, beyond that. A key party. You don't have key parties. There's a 70 reference, 70s reference. I know. There's a great movie called, with Sigourney Weaver, what's it called? Alien? The Ice something. The Ice. Oh, it's really good. It's about a key party. Bad things happen after a key party. It's just... I've actually never been to a key party. Yeah, it's called The Ice something? The Ice? Oh, it's really good. It's about a key party. Bad things happen after a key party.

I've actually never been to a key party. Yeah, it's called The Ice. I'm looking it up right now. Which is very understandable. I have never been invited to a key party, which makes a lot of sense. Well, why would they invite you to a key party? Well, that's my joke. That's my humor.

Thank you very much. It's really good. It's one of those set. Ice Storm. The Ice Storm. It's by Ang Lee. It's very. It's a platinum loyalty card holder at Alamo Drafthouse.

Yeah. Yeah, I don't think- I don't think. We go to movies for people and for experience, no longer for the films. And the Golden Globes, anyways, bottom line is there's so much value leaking away from the traditional film enterprise, from agencies.

I think you're going to see a major agency to go through a restructuring, moving to the streaming platforms. Because think about, my God, I thought Paramount Plus when I heard it, I was immediately snarky. Oh, God, another streaming platform. We don't need it. There's all these articles saying we have subscription fatigue. No, we don't. For six bucks a month, it's an amazing deal. It's an amazing deal. Then you have a lot of them. That's the issue. Ultimately, it adds up monthly.

There needs to be an operating system on top of it. I think you'll still pay as much. Consolidation. Do you know that when asked, there's some really interesting research. When asked what people think they pay for subscriptions, they report on average 84 bucks a month. Do you know how much on average we pay in subscriptions each month? I don't know. $230, which means we think we're getting a great value. Yeah, we do.

It all started with Amazon Prime. I feel good about it still to this day, and I don't know what I pay. Fascinating. Fascinating. All right, this is fascinating. We'll see what happens. I think Alamo Draft House will come out. It'll be smaller.

It's still a small—like what I was saying about AMC. It's like, look, it's a small business. That's what it is. It's a small business, and it's a smaller. It's still a small, like what I was saying about AMC, it's like, look, it's a small business. That's what it is. It's a small business and it's a smaller business going forward unless they can come up with some innovation

that is so fantastic that maybe, I don't know what it would be, maybe 3D. Taking your kidney. 3D. Taking your kidney. I think that's the only thing

that saves Alamo. Would you like sliders? Please flip on your stomach. You'll feel a pinprick in your shoulder. No, but like 3D. I can see them in virtual reality. I don't know, games. That is morbid. I feel a pinprick in your shoulder. No, but like 3D. I can see them in virtual reality.

I don't know, games. That is morbid. I don't know. I'm not an innovative person, so I don't know. All right, but let's take a listener mail question. Next. You've got, you've got. I can't believe I'm going to be a mailman.

You've got mail. Hi, Karen Scott. My name is Thomas and I'm 21 years old. I currently work as a software developer for a healthcare startup in Providence, Rhode Island. Due to my circumstance as a foreigner from Taiwan working in the U.S. on my student visa, there's a high chance I will eventually have to seek opportunities elsewhere. Here's my question. What advice would you give a 21-year-old when navigating the tech sector

with the hopes to one day start their own business? Additionally, considering that I'm most interested in exploring market opportunities in Taiwan and Japan, what are some principles in your opinion that I should follow when adapting existing American solutions to those regions? Thank you for taking the time to answer my question. This is fascinating. This is interesting. I had this question from a student where I'm doing a seminar at University of Chicago yesterday. They were someone who is on a visa here and is interested in fintech. And I said, oh, go to all these different startups.

I mentioned public, I mentioned lots of things. And they said they had to go to a bigger company because of visa problems. And the bigger companies can, like, I'm not going to say where they were going, but it was a big bank that they had to join. And they wanted, I was like, start your own company, do this and that. And then the difficulties, this woman had to make an economic decision based on visa issues. So, it'll be interesting to see what happens around visas. But I was always advising people to start their own companies or go to small startups. And that's always my thing.

But I had never even thought of this, and this guy has the same visa issue probably, will probably face that. So what do you think? Well, first off, a 21-year-old that's working in software and healthcare, I'd like to be him. Yeah, it's gonna be great.

So I hope that he has the perspective I didn't have at the age of 21 and to recognize how impressive a young man he is and how well he's doing. Look, I'd like to think that with the Biden administration, we are waking up again or reawakening to our superpower. And that is our embrace of immigrants. And that recognizing that 60 percent of the NASDAQ by market capitalization is run by either recent immigrants or first generation immigrants. run by either recent immigrants or first-generation immigrants, and that to cut off or to not embrace impressive young men like this individual, we're doing nothing but shooting ourselves. Imagine if you're the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, and every season you get your pick of the best

college players. You didn't have to go through a draft or a lottery. That's where America is. And for some reason, we've decided, no, let's send them to the Las Vegas Raiders or let's send them to the New England Patriots. I'm hopeful that this young man will have the opportunity to stay in America. We'll see though. A lot of people are worried. If he doesn't, to his question, what American values to take to other nations. I sold my first company to Dentsu, a Japanese company. I'm not familiar with Taiwan. But I think one of the reasons

America has been so successful as an entrepreneurial culture, it's in our DNA. We're risk takers. The people who came here are risk takers. The people who kept heading west were risk takers.

We're not afraid. I don't want to say, everyone says America embraces failure. That's bullshit, but we're not afraid of it. And my advice to this young man is a lot of people make the mistake of thinking, I need to go get certified or credentialed in order to start a business. I've been starting businesses since I got out of business school.

There are no special skills to being an entrepreneur other than a willingness to absorb a lot of risk, a willingness to sell like crazy. Being an entrepreneur is Latin for selling, selling employees, selling investors. Yeah, ideas. You're right. And also bring what I call an American work ethic. America is about opportunity. It's about generosity. I'd like to think it's about empathy. And it's also about we work. And I've never had a successful company that didn't involve me working around the fucking clock. But listen, hustle porn. Let me just tell you something, though.

Hustle porn, that hurts. That's an expression. Do you know that? I know. I know the whole hustle porn industry. But listen, hustle porn. Let me just tell you something, though. Hustle porn, that hurts. That's an expression. Do you know that? I know. I know the whole hustle porn industry. I don't like it. I know that. Taiwan is no slacker in this area.

Look what they've done around COVID. Very innovative. You can start a company. They have DRAM or whatever. You can start a company anywhere with that kind of, what Scott was talking about. I'm putting words in my mouth. Okay, I'm just saying.

Are you going to accuse me of using the Nazi word again? You're very American. Like, I think there's innovation all over the world. But can I just get to the actual specifics? Oh, we own entrepreneurship. No, we do not. We do not. We are the entrepreneurship gangsters.

Absolutely not. Okay, name a company that's added more than $10 billion in a 12-month period outside. Where's the European Google thing? I get it. You got the European Google thing. You're going to do that. Outside of China, who's added more than $10 billion in one year? There's a lot of innovation across the world.

Anyhow. That's a bold statement. You American exceptionalist hustle porner. Biden's immigration plan, just so you know, this is from his news story, calls for dramatically boosting the number of green cards and expanding other avenues for highly skilled workers. It calls for dramatically boosting the number of green cards and expanding other avenues for highly skilled workers. You know, overhauling Trump's ban on HB1 visa bans that were pushing it back. But this is something they've noted. Biden's immigration plan does this, but House Democrats are weighing piecemeal approach to immigration that would put more popular measures like helping refugees, agricultural workers, and people brought to the United States illegally first, leaving no leverage to push through less popular measures like increasing immigration for skilled workers. And so how they do this is open question and whether it'll be problematic.

And a lot of people think this. And so there's all kinds of legislation going on. There's another, figuring out how to overhaul the HB1 visa program is going to be a political struggle, too. I want to be 21 and go to Tokyo and start a business. Yeah. That sounds pretty good. I do, too. I think that would be fun.

That sounds like a good idea. There's also Matt Goetz has some HB1 visa plan. I don't even want to know about it. What? I know. He does. Let me read this. I don't even want to know about it.

What? I know, he does. Let me read this. It's three American lawmakers have introduced legislation in the House of Representatives that stops employers from hiring foreign HB1Bs if they recently plan to furlough their U.S. workers. That's going to be the fight. Like, if you don't hire U.S. workers and requires employers to pay for HB1 workers more than their American workers. Guess who's involved? Mo Brooks, Matt Goetz, and Lance Gooden.

The American Jobs First Act. There's going to be a struggle here. This is not... This is a struggling thing, and so we'll see. I think a lot of... There'll be pressures from tech companies and this and that. But the fact of the matter is, give me your one thing, your biggest

advice you would give a young person who wants to start a company, besides working all the time and love and failure. Give me something fresh. Find great partners. Greatness is in the agency of others. Find someone who has different skills than you. And it's just so much more fun to build great things with other people. Yes.

That's how I feel about you, Scott. Go on. You mean that. There's a kernel of truth in there. I'm being very serious. The success we have recognized here together is more fun because we recognize it together. No, I would just say you asked me for one piece of advice. My first partner.

That is a good one. My first partner in profit was this incredibly introverted technology guy named Ian Chaplin, who's everything I'm not. He's smart. He's disciplined. He understands technology. He's very practical. When we sold our first e-commerce company, Aardvark, a pet company,

I wanted to take all stock from this amazing company called Patopia that was clearly going to the moon. And he's like, no, let's take half in cash, Scott. Just trust me on this one. Let's take half in cash. And the thing was bankrupt within seven months. Find someone who looks, smells, and feels differently than you. Different background. That's a nice idea. You know, I recently interviewed Blair Baverman, who does dog mushing and different things like that. She does a lot of wilderness things. She's an adventurer. And I said, what would you take out if you could only take one thing into the wilderness? And I assumed she would say a giant knife

or something like that. And she said a person. Yeah, someone else. I said a giant knife, but yes. Yeah. So anyway, it's interesting. I think you're right. I think on that note, that lovely note,

we will end that one. And so we're going to take one more quick break and we'll be back for predictions. quick break and we'll be back for predictions. Do you feel like your leads never lead anywhere and you're making content that no one sees and it takes forever to build a campaign? Well, that's why we built HubSpot. It's an AI powered customer platform that builds campaigns for you, tells you which leads are worth knowing, and makes writing blogs, creating videos, and posting on social a breeze. So now, it's easier than ever to be a marketer. Get started at HubSpot.com slash marketers.

Support for this show comes from Constant Contact. You know what's not easy? Marketing. 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,

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Get all the automation, integration and reporting tools that get your marketing running seamlessly. All backed by Constant Contact's expert live customer support. Ready, set, grow. Go to ConstantContact.ca and start your free trial today. Go to constantcontact.ca for your free trial. Constantcontact.ca. Okay, Scott, prediction time. Once again, I'm going to give you credit. You predicted that Roku will make acquisitions this year. This week, Roku acquired Nielsen's video advertising business.

I don't even understand this, another one. But they did not acquire Tidal, that's all I know. The acquisition means that Roku will acquire Nielsen's automatic content recognition and dynamic ad insertion technology, which basically just means better targeted ads. There's a lot of companies I've noticed lately that are going to try to compete with Nielsen. There's all kinds of things happening in that regard. So what does it mean for Roku's future? Explain this to me, person who would understand it, which I do not. Well, I don't know the specifics around the synergy or lack thereof.

My prediction was simple, and that is Shopify and Roku have such incredible valuations on their companies right now that they should, and they're smart, they should go shopping and start going vertical, either upstream or downstream into content or upstream into ad tools. But Roku and Shopify are arguably two of the most innovative companies in the last 10 years. And the weird thing, the amazing thing about the stock market and the reason why market volatility and Robinhood is such a threat to our economy, Goldman Sachs, why the fuck are you taking them public?

Anyways, different story, is that with a really healthy NASDAQ, the ability to help people envision the future and then pull the capital forward such that they can make the future happen is just an incredible advantage that America has. In America, an individual and a team can say, we see this future, and it is so bold, and it's so audacious, and we have something called the NASDAQ that says, you know what?

If that vision is that exciting, we'll give you the capital to pull the future forward. And Shopify and Shopify now— So these are the two companies. So what else should they buy then? I mean, is that enough? Like, no. I think Shopify, I think, well, Shopify, I think... So they make a prediction on that. So I've made the prediction. I think Shopify should buy FedEx or a fulfillment company. I think they should go toe-to-toe with Amazon. Because Amazon can't buy that company, right? Amazon is going to get into it. Well, Amazon doesn't need to. Amazon has built

their own FedEx. Right. Okay. All right. So I think the prediction was you're just going to see some gangster, fairly significant acquisitions. If I were an investment bank, I would just be presenting Shopify and Roku with ideas all day long. All right. So FedEx for Shopify. What else? Give me something else for Shopify. I don't know. I think that they could get into the business of brick-and-mortar retail by going in and buying.

get into the business of brick and mortar retail by going in and buying. If I were Shopify, I would take a hard look at Kohl's and use Kohl's more as well-staffed, well-lit warehouses. And Kohl's trades at a fraction of its value. And Kohl's has fantastic people. They have great human capital. They have great e-commerce. They're just in a shitty business right now, and that is selling big box, not big box, but selling other people's brands. So that would be accretive from both for real estate, accretive for both human capital. So look,

I think there's a bunch of opportunities. I know it's on Byte. Target, I think that would be too big a bite. Target's stock has accelerated and I don't think they could afford Target. Used to be such an innovative store. I was just in it the other day

and I thought, something's wrong here. Target? Target? I love the Super Target and Boca. I haven't been to the other day and I thought, something's wrong here. Target? Target? I love the Super Target and Boca. I haven't been to the Super. I say I'm in city Targets, I guess. They're not quite.

I just was always excited by a Target and now I've been in several that I'm like, eh. It just feels like it needs a refresh. That's my feeling. And then Roku besides Nielsen, what should they buy? I don't know. I don't really have, I don't have what I'd call a strong, you know, strong view on Roku. Yeah, but you're just like, go buy something.

What? Well, you're going to force me here. If I were Roku, I would think about starting to pick off the best parts of WPP, IPG, publicity, and Omnicom that are now a shadow of their former selves. Omnicom that are now a shadow of their former selves. I'd find the most data-driven interesting agencies that have amazing relationships and amazing human capital and go in and say, hey, WPP, I will buy Saxis, or whatever it's called, shitty name, XAXIS. These agencies all have buried within them

some fantastic companies with fantastic people that are trading at a fraction of their worth because they're trapped in the corpus of a shitty business called the advertising industrial complex where everyone says, okay, we're running ads on something. Viewership is declining 62%, the Golden Globes.

So I would get out my pencils and I would go to the big agency conglomerates and start picking up. I love that. So there's no more parties next year, are there? Oh, yeah. They'll just be thrown by Facebook, though.

Oh, you're right. I've been to that party. Or, you know, Mark Benioff does great parties. I love Salesforce parties. Yeah, he does. They're nice. They're good parties. They're not dirty anymore, though.

They used to be dirty. We'll have Mark Benioff on. I was just texting with him the other night about headquarters. I bet you were. I bet you were. I was. He texted me about something. Let me just tell you, we should have him on to talk about headquarters.

I love that Mark on. You know, remember you said Mark Benioff leaves San Francisco? So I asked him that. So my favorite image, my favorite image ever was that B-roll of you walking around Salesforce headquarters next to him. You guys look like a different species. I mean, seriously. He's a funny guy. That is a big guy.

He is. I think that's the most successful big person I know. Yeah. And he went to USC. Don't hold out against him. I like Mark a lot most successful big person I know. Yeah. And he went to USC. Don't hold out against him. I like Mark a lot. I like Mark a lot. Yeah, yeah.

I asked him if he was going to leave, and he wrote, I go, are you going to leave San Francisco? And I said, and he was teasing me, and he goes, I wonder what would happen if Salesforce left California. He goes, we already left, found an amazing new headquarter. We call it the cloud. Touche. Touche, Mark. He's not going to leave San Francisco. We have huge towers in San Francisco, Tokyo, Indianapolis, Chicago, New York, Atlanta, Dublin

and thing. But my heart will always be in San Francisco. Thank you. St. Patrick's Day. There you go. So my prediction, I think there's something to, I'm fascinated by this wealth tax that- Elizabeth Warren's back with them. Senator Warren, I don't, and here's the thing, I don't think it happens,

because if you look at the history of wealth taxes, if they're annual, they'd end up not working because very smart, talented billionaires are the most mobile people in the world. And Bernard Arnault just moves to Belgium. And it's very hard. These are individuals who are like, you know, I have a really nice life and I travel a lot anyway, so I'll just kind of headquarter or establish residence in London. Capital, especially human capital, when people are exceptionally wealthy, are the most mobile people in the world. And then Elizabeth Warren says, well, when asked about that, says, well, I'll impose a 40% exit tax.

And there's something uncomfortable that strikes at what is one of our advantages, and that is America and Britain have very strong private property laws. And at some point, and quite frankly, I think Senator Warren and Senator Sanders are like, you know, you've been in Senate long enough. You're the ones that created some of this income inequality. You controlled all three houses, branches of government, and you couldn't figure out a tax policy that didn't create incredible income inequality. And now you want to go kind of Robin Hood people's private capital. So I have, I think a one-time wealth tax because of the pandemic might make sense.

An annual one is not only, I'm not even sure it's the right thing. I said a temporary one. A one-time wealth tax because of the pandemic might make sense. An annual one is not only, I'm not even sure it's the right thing. I said a temporary one. Yeah, a one-time thing. We did a super tax on oil companies. Anyways, but a wealth tax, and this goes to my prediction, I think we're going to hear more discussion about, if you think about you need taxes to defend our borders,

you need it to create a society with connective tissue, redistribute income, protect our parks, et cetera, protect people, protect the country, protect our borders, encourage investment, infrastructure, you know, X, Y, Z. Most of that, most of that happens at a state level. And I think the real crisis here, and what will be interesting and get more attention, is that if you were to take the 10,000 people with the largest unrecognized capital gains, they are all moving to Texas and California,

A, because Texas and California, excuse me, they're all moving to Texas and Florida, A, because Texas and Florida are wonderful, but B, it's like they're engaged in massive tax avoidance. And that is if my SPAC just went public and I'm sitting on a $400 million gain, I can save $50 million by moving to Miami, and Miami's pretty awesome. You're going to see, and this would be, I think, the way to go, some sort of tax, and I think this would be more equitable, that says, a way to go, some sort of tax, and I think this would be more equitable, that says, if you spend 20 years in New York taking advantage of our roads, recruiting from the finest university system in the world, the University of California, leveraging our infrastructure, and you create a company worth $3 billion, and your share of that is $800 million, and you have benefited from the extraordinary infrastructure and

the taxpayers of California, you can't just peace out for 11 months and then avoid all those taxes and not reinvest back in the infrastructure that you have leveraged and benefited from. So I think the more interesting conversation we're going to start to have is some sort of what I'll call value accretion tax. And that is you can't do an Elon Musk and add the GDP of Hungary to your net worth and leverage the town of Alameda, leverage the incredible innovation that the Bay Area brings, leverage, again, Cal State, University of California, and then all of a sudden decide you've got to hankering for Texas. So I don't think a wealth tax, the kind of wealth tax- Let me just read something. Let me just, billionaire Len Cooperman, this is told CNBC, that he thought the idea has no merit. It's foolish. It's probably not legal if a wealth tax passes. Go out and buy yourself some gold because people are going to rush to find ways

to cheat, to hiding their wealth, essentially. He wants to do a progressive income tax. I believe rich people should pay more. The question is, we have to coalesce around this nation. What should the maximum tax rate be on wealthy people? Because that will define the revenue yield for the government. There's a lot. Get rid of capital gains.

But there's something around the new gangster tax avoidance, intrastate tax avoidance. Yeah. Yeah, Because other states like don't have to wear masks here, move here. You don't have to pay taxes here, move here. It's, you know, it's a real dog-eat-dog kind of thing. But it just, but what you want is you want taxation that foots to externalities and where people make their money. And if people are making their money in a state and leveraging the investment those taxpayers and that government are making, you should pay taxes there. Yeah. And so, I think we're going to start to talk about what I'll call a value accretion tax, a VAT, if you will, that says, all right, you made all your money. You made all your money.

You benefited from the infrastructure and the high taxes of- The innovation of the government. Yeah, of New York. I just interviewed a very famous economist, Mariana Matsukatu, who talks about this. She's not that famous. She's not that famous. Who? Yeah, she is, though.

What's her name? She's working with a lot of people. She's working with a lot of, her name's, she wrote lots of books. The Entrepreneurial State. One of his arguments is that Apple benefited from all kinds of government, you know, government,

and she, it's a really interesting idea that the government has to sign better deals with businesses in the innovation it makes. You mean not let Apple create a P.O. box

in the Isle of Man and issue their IP? Not just that, it's that Apple benefited from GPS, benefited from this, all these government investments. And put it together, DARPA.

And then government has to sign better contracts with these people. Agreed. Or be part of the innovation moonshots. Like we should put them behind and have a piece of it. Anyway, this is a very fascinating, I think this dog won't hunt, as they say, with the wealth tax. But there are innovative ways to do taxing. There is. And it's not bad.

And it's not socialist. It's not this or that. It's just this one's not going anywhere. Not going anywhere. I think you're right. I don't- And it's, you know, I like that Elizabeth Warren is saying they have to pay their fair share. That's the thing she always says. I don't know if you listen to her. That's her little refrain over and over. It's not a little refrain, it's a big refrain. And that's her sort of rallying cry. But how they pay their fair share should be,

this is not the way it's going to happen. She embodies the best and the worst things about progressives. And I include that. I'd like to think of myself as a, she's right and she's ineffective. Or wrong in execution. She's just, she's absolutely right. Billionaires should pay more and she's ineffective.

Yeah. And you know what? Her and Charles Schumer and Senator Sanders, inspiring, I agree with them, and they're ineffective. Yeah. The $15 an hour, we want it in, fine, and we end up with $7.25. Yeah. Because you couldn't figure out a way to get Joe Manchin to agree to $11 or $12. Yeah.

Great. Great. You're right. You're right. It's a travesty, and here we are at $7.25. How judging is that going to work these days? You've got to really just get shit done. That's what I say.

GSD. GSD. Get shit done. That's what we do. Thank God for the joy and emotional reward you recognize from our partnership. Thank God. Thank God. I'm sorry, but I got to tell you, though, I'm going to work for Tidal now in Square.

I don't even know what they're doing. Oh, my God. Does that make? know what they're doing. Oh my God. Does that make... No. Let's just get back to that. What? Just say what? Seriously. We'll be back on Tuesday. We have Kevin Roos on Monday

talking to us about his new book, Future Shock. I want to say it just like that with lots of exclamation points. He's going to talk about that and we will talk about these issues and stuff like that. We will. We'll also talk. Maybe he can explain title to us. We'll also talk about the SPAC that you and I are forming.

We're forming a SPAC? The proceeds of which we will use to buy the lifetime rights of Tom Petty, the greatest American rock and roll artist ever. You know, why don't we do like a total scam like The Sting and start a SPAC and then just run away with all the money and see if they can catch us? What do you think? Yeah. I think it's a great idea. Yeah, that sounds, I like the idea. Let's do like a fire festival for SPACs. I like the idea of being A, on the run, and B, being on the run with Kara Swisher. We'd stay at very nice hotels. Yeah, that would last. We're smuggled out of Tokyo in a music box of trombones. Because we're not unusual looking. What a pair we would make up. You both hold up with Carlos Ghosn in Lebanon.

And I'll be like, Jesus Christ, this partnership didn't work out well. I think we should start a SPAC. I think we should start a coin. I think we should start a SPAC. I know you're involved in SPACs. I know. I am. I am involved in SPACs.

You and Joanna Coles are SPACing it up behind my back. Joanna's a gangster. She is. Smart. You're a SPACer. She texted me the other day. She's like, oh, I'm my second SPAC. I'm and Joanna Coles are SPACing it up behind my back. Joanna's a gangster. She is. Smart. You're a SPACer. She texted me the other day. She's like, oh, I'm my second SPAC. I'm like, what do you mean your second?

When did you get a second SPAC? Oh, everyone has a SPAC. Joanna's smart. My friend Joanna has a SPAC. Everyone has a SPAC. She's on my personal advisory board. If I have a big decision to make, I call Joanna. Really?

Yeah. I don't know about us. I call her for bigger decisions than this, but one of the decisions I've called her about is I need a fashion makeover. I'm in one of the, I'm in this stage where I just have absolutely no sense of like fashion identity. That's the bad news. The good news is I think I'm going to grow out of it in about 30 or 40 years. Yeah. I would describe my fashion sense. You're going to be decked out in leather when this pandemic ends and that's not going to be a good situation for any of us. I would describe my fashion sense. You're going to be decked out in leather when this pandemic ends

and that's not going to be a good situation for any of us. Well, my current fashion sense could be described as aging skateboarder and I need to move to something else and she's helping me. She's helping me. Her and George Hahn are going to dress me.

Oh, George Hahn. That's good. Yeah. They're going to dress me. They're handsome people. But they, I don't know, Scott. I think you should stick with what you know. I have the same shoes from high school.

That's the problem. I stick with the same exact thing. I don't know, Scott. I think you should stick with what you know. I have the same shoes from high school. That's the problem. I stick with the same exact thing. I don't know. I never change. It's a good look and I like it. I'm not sure your fashion sense works for me. No, it doesn't. I'm not sure it works for you and I'm sure it doesn't work for me.

Modified teenage boy. That's how I dress too. Anyway. 11-year-old boy. 11-year-old boy. I'm actually wearing my kid's 11-year-old boy t-shirts right now. That's sweet. Okay, we'll be, no, it's just I like them kid's 11-year-old boy t-shirts right now. That's sweet. That's sweet.

No, it's just I like them. They're nice. They're from Target, speaking of which. Anyway, we'll be back on Tuesday. Go to nymag.com slash pivot to submit your questions for the podcast. The link is also in our show notes. Scott, read us out. Today's show was produced by Rebecca Sinanis.

Ernie Indretut engineered this episode. Thanks also to Hannah Rosen and Drew Burrows. Make sure you subscribe to the show on Apple Podcasts. If you're an Android user, check us out on Spotify or wherever you listen to podcasts. If you like the show, please recommend it to a friend. Thanks for listening to Pivot from New York Magazine and Vox Media. We'll be back next week for a breakdown of all things tech and business. Title acquired by Square.

Yeah, that just makes a hell of a lot of sense. Just a lot of sense, Jack. Way to go. Hey, Twitter board. Hey, that makes just, that just makes a hell of a lot of sense. Just a lot of sense, Jack. Way to go. Hey, Twitter board. Hey, Twitter board, wake the fuck up and show up with a big question mark at the next board meeting. They won't. Support for this podcast comes from Anthropic. It's not always easy to harness the power and Thank you. iAnthropic is AI for everyone. The latest model, Claude 3.5 Sonnet, offers groundbreaking intelligence at an everyday price. Claude Sonnet can generate code, help with writing, and reason through hard problems better than any model before. You can discover how Claude can transform your business at anthropic.com slash Claude. Support for the show comes from Alex Partners.

Did you know that almost 90% of executives see potential for growth from digital disruption? With 37% seeing significant or extremely high positive impact on revenue growth. In Alex Partners' 2024 Digital Disruption Report, you can learn the best path to turning that disruption into growth for your business. Thank you. Available at www.alexpartners.com slash Vox. That's www.alexpartners.com slash V-O-X. In the face of disruption, businesses trust Alex Partners to get straight to the point and deliver results when it really matters.