Pivot - Instagram's new privacy settings, Big Tech's record profits, and the Capitol insurrection hearing.

Episode Date: July 31, 2021

On this week’s Pivot, Kara and Scott wonder why Instagram took so long to add protections for teens, and what Big Tech will do with its record profits. A Pivot listener wants the details on Scott’s investment strategies, and this week's prediction is about vaccine mandates. Plus, Kara sends Scott off in style for his month-long vacation. She’ll miss him, but the slew of guest hosts she announces might help fill the void. Just a little. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Hi everyone, this is Pivot from the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher. And I'm going on vacation. I know that. I know that. What are you going to do? What's going to happen? Today, I go to Madison, Wisconsin to go to the CrossFit Games. And I'm actually very worried about it because I don't know which I'm going to... I started buying crypto and I'm now a vegan, so I don't know which to tell people first when I walk into a bar. And then I'm going to, where am I going? Then I'm going to Ibiza.

Ibiza. You probably are going to Ibiza. To see DJs and be the oldest person there. And you know what Americans think of Europe, Cara? What? They don't. We don't care. Then we can go back. Everyone's coming back and forth.

We don't care. Yeah, the new Amber thing. And then I got to Nantucket for the rest of this is oh my god you're such a cliche of a rich guy i am a cliche i'm a cliche of a cliche yeah i just solved that by not taking vacations just so you know that's how i do well you know what i told my boys i told them all right i pulled out a big nap i put it up on the refrigerator and i said take a dart and we can go anywhere. And so I said, wherever the dart goes, that's where we're going. So we're spending two weeks behind the refrigerator.

Okay, great. Oh, God, that's such a dad joke. That's good vacation humor. Oh, my God, that's such a dad joke. You want to know something I noticed? Very interesting. I was talking to this before. People loved when you put up that judo video of you smacking my ass around. It was a little weird how much people enjoyed that video. People loved it. It was crazy. You know, I did judo. You know that,

right? In college. I did not know that. So we're adding that to the more, guess who is the lesbian? I was going to be a spy and I did judo. And I did judo. Excuse me. Judo. Talk about cliche. No offense. Talk a little cliche here. Little cliche. You did judo. I think I got to a green belt.

I don't know. I have a brown belt. Who knows? Anyway, I liked it. It was cool. But I was always sat upon by other judo people. I always lost because people sat on me. I was very, very skinny.

I was 105 pounds it was crazy and a little thing i was a little thing now i'm same height substantially more weight um but they uh but they sat on me and that was the end of the judo situation that was it that was a tough one but that was it that was the whole nine years brought brought a quick end to your judo career judo career i may get back. I may get back to it. I've been doing Tai Chi lately to calm myself down. What do you think about that? I'd go straight to drugs. I'd go straight to Xanax.

I do Tai Chi as well. It's called Xanax. But, you know, I think that's great. Good for you. Yeah. Good for you. Well, there's a lot going on. Let's have a little banter.

Let's have a little banter. This is our final banter for a month. I'll miss you so much. So Instagram is introducing new child safety protections. The platform announced changes this week that include default privacy accounts for children 16 or younger, hiding teens' accounts from potentially suspicious adult accounts, preventing advertisers from targeting kids, and removing existing accounts of kids under 13 and creating a new age verification method.

This is like, you know what my question for this? Why hadn't they done this before? Yeah, I was like, wait, that isn't in place already? Yeah, I know. Isn't that crazy? I was sort of like, I'm not giving you any claps for this one. I was sort of shocked that this wasn't in place.

Yeah, when I read this, I thought it was like new safety standards for your pet African anaconda. And you're like, well, hold on. There are for your pet African anaconda. And you're like, well, hold on. There are pets who are African. I think Instagram and kids are oxymorons. I don't think that term should exist. Yeah, they're going to do Instagram for kids thing.

I just, the whole thing. I'm like, no, no, no, no, no. You don't, if they didn't do this first, they were letting like potentially suspicious adult accounts see teen accounts that's crazy you know and then they were you know yesterday i think the one of the reporters was doing some hashtag that was just awful you know like teen toes or something terrible and like pulled up all kinds of awful business and so i just don't you know i don't know how they prevent kids because you know my kids tried to get onto these accounts when they were under 13.

But we were we were hip to that. And it's really I just don't even understand. Good. They put in the child safety protections. It should have been there 17 years ago. So I don't feel very good about it. And Facebook to their Facebook really is the master of distraction and illusion. You know, look over here while we do this over here and hope that you don't see it.

Instead of a conversation, the conversation we should be having is what is the age where people should be allowed on platforms that results in greater levels of self-harm and depression? Like what there's evidence, my colleague Jonathan Haidt and other psychologists have found a link between teen depression and social media platforms. And so the question should be, all right, what should the age be? Instead, they say, no, let's skip that question and talk about all the things we're going to do to make it less bad. And we'll end up with an argument that immediately presupposes that we're down with kids being on Instagram, which we shouldn't be. Yeah, I agree. I think it's just, it's not a good form. It's like sugar.

Like you shouldn't give kids too much sugar. That's just the way it is. It's not as cool as judo. Did you know judo is the Japanese art of folding clothes perfectly while the people are still in them? Boom, that's good martial arts. Where do you come with these bad jokes?

Speaking of another topic, we've talked about a lot, Clubhouse. You don't need an invite to get in. It's not exclusive. Unfortunately, nobody wants to get in anymore. The numbers have gone down rather significantly. They were, of course, they boomed. They boomed millions of downloads when it became available.

Then they went to Android, which is critically important. But interest among iOS users is falling. So it was interesting that now that they've opened up, they said they had 10 million people on the list or whatever, and only a couple, 400,000 or something like that when they opened it up, which is good, but still not. It's interesting because I did a social vocal thing, I guess, social vocal social or whatever you want to call it. And, and it was great on Twitter. I do Twitter spaces and the people who use it, love it. And we have great audience. We have a thousand people.

And there's lots of other competitors, Spotify, green room, Facebook live audio rooms, LinkedIn is going to have one. But I, I, I, and I like it. I like the product. I just feel, again, that we were correct that this is a feature, not a separate company. Yeah, and we also predicted, one of our predictions six weeks ago was that the valuation of the latest round of Clubhouse was $4.5 billion. And Apollo purchased Yahoo, the fourth most trafficked internet site in the world, for $4.5 billion. And that one was going to increase in value and the other was going to decrease in value. And granted, some of those numbers are a bit illusory because it's just the lead investor

trying to maintain momentum to fool the markets into believing that an audio product, as you put it, with almost no revenue is worth four and a half billion dollars. But this is going to be... Let's help them. Let's be useful instead of slagging them like we do, which we do because we are not slagging. We're just pointing out the obvious. But what, what would you, what would you do if you were them? Because it's a good product. Like they're good products. Yeah.

like competitor to also go into video and start hosting video and audio and newsletter shows for creators that want to try and go direct with some sort of subscription model so the talent yeah well i i think the substack model is the way to go and or quite frankly the only fans model is the way to go and that is try and figure out a way they've got a lot of people have downloaded the app so if they said to creators look if you can create your own show, your own newsletter, I do think there's something around that creator economy that disperses creators to the end user. I think, and I think they're all sort of circling it and it's kind of, and they should pull a Buzzfeed and try and merge with the survivors to get some scale. But I don't, I don't think I have a killer idea for an audio based, I don't even know what you call this. It I don't think I have a killer idea

for an audio-based, I don't even know what you call this. It's a feature. But I have to, I will say it's great. And everyone who I've had on, I had Kellen Browning talking about all kinds of things last night,

Activision and things like that. And he was like, I love that. Like people, the minute they use it, they like using it. And it actually was a very civil discussion and the audience was great.

And so I can't say enough about how, I mean has glitches in the spaces no question um but it's um i it's really interesting to have a great product that you know isn't going to stand on its own i think you're right to become like a focus in on the talent because i think that's what's driving people to these spaces is people like myself and others who have actual chops in creating content and not just everyone let's get together or something the real advice and they've probably already tried this the real advice is to sell the real advice i mean they do have a built-in customer base that the space has been identified as hot i would imagine there's a platform that would give them four billion peace with honor and pretend no way way. No way is anyone paying $4 billion for that.

No way. Oh, no, I don't think that would happen, but they would say that- It would be a fake $4 billion. Yeah, they would say with the potential for an earner, or better, they would just say terms are not disclosed. Yeah. You know, like when, my favorite is Tumblr,

purchased for 1.1 billion and then what, five or six years later sold for 3 million. Yeah. This is the Tumblr of the audio space. Okay, very good point. All right, last thing. purchased for 1.1 billion and then what five or six years later sold for three million yeah uh this is the tumblr the audio space okay very good point all right last thing gawker gawker's back the infamous news and gossip site it's brought back from the dead by the bustle digital group um if you don't remember we all remember uh it was folded in 2016 after they lost a lawsuit filed by hulk hogan and bankrolled by peter teal um leah finnegan who's quite a she's a sharp-edged writer uh she was a staffer at the original

no i don't know i don't know her i think she's very funny though um in an introductory post she asked readers to keep an open mind adding that quote the current laws of civility mean that no it can't exactly be what it once was but we strive to honor the past embrace the present what do you think about this? Can you bring back brands like this, Mr. Brand? Mr. Brand? Oh, Gawker's got what is, I mean, what's interesting is I think it was purchased for like $1.5 million, the brand out of bankruptcy. And that's a great buy because it's a global, I mean, a global brand, but it has global awareness.

not a global brand, but it has global awareness. And part of the most difficult thing about building a brand is just awareness, because there's a ton of studies showing that about 98 to 99% of the money and time we spend on products are with brands that we've already heard of. So you're likely to click on a link that says the story on Tim Cook from Gawker is just much greater. And also Gawker, whether we like this or not, people like to watch slow-moving train wrecks and Gawker was really good at depicting that. Yeah.

So I think for a million and a half bucks... Is there enough stuff? I got to worry for it because like now Twitter sort of takes, everything gets a hot take on Twitter. Everyone argues with each other. On Twitter, yeah.

You know, people putting out nasty comments about each other on it. They like reveal things. I don't know. I think it's a different environment. I think she wants to take it in a different direction, though. I think a dozen hardworking, savvy, I don't know, do you call them journalists, what they're doing there?

I guess journalists. I think she's a talented editor and a brand that has a lot of awareness. I think they got a shot. I think they got a shot. You know where they could go? Remember Spy, which was great. And they used to have columns that were so funny. And I didn't even care about media.

Like I was like a college student. I laughed and laughed and laughed. Same thing with Sassy. Remember Sassy? I don't remember Sassy. It was a magazine. It was a great magazine for teen girls. And I read it when I was in my twenties, but it was wonderful.

The writers were wonderful. It was funny. It was interesting. It's just, there's a lot of competition out there, and a lot of people do what they did. They took, you know, it reminds me a little bit of Recode. Everyone was doing what Recode did eventually, right, that we started to do,

and I wouldn't know where to start again if I was starting all these days. Well, you have started again, Kara. It's called Pivot. That's true. That's what I'm saying. I'm iterating. I'm iterating. I just don't know if you can go back.

Anyway. All right. Let's, I mean, if I was taking that brand. Okay, let's go to our first big story. is kind of astonishing. Three companies have a combined market value of $6.4 trillion, more than double their collective value when the COVID-19 pandemic started 16 months ago. Meanwhile, Facebook's revenue grew by 56% over a year in the second quarter,

the fastest growth since 2016. The company attributes the rise in ad prices, but warned of slowing growth in the quarters ahead. Nonetheless, what an incredible, for all of them, Microsoft had its most profitable quarter, record-breaking profits, cloud computing strong, workplace software strong, Alphabet just killed it. You know, YouTube was, you know, ad revenue of $7 billion, up 84%.

And Apple profits doubled this past quarter. iPhone sales up. Worried about supply chain, but still, and Amazon, we're waiting for Amazon, but they're expected to also do rather well. So what thinks you, Scott Galloway? There's no way to describe this other than just awesome, staggering, incredible. I mean, if you think about the pandemic, it's as if these companies were invented for the pandemic. What are we doing?

We're at home. We're streaming. We're working remotely. We're absorbing a ton of data. And all of a sudden, we're staring at our phones and our smart speakers. And we're finding everything through our operating systems, our digital operating systems. We're no longer browsing in the mall. We're no longer going up and down the aisles in a grocery store. So our new arbiters of all commerce and even content, we don't see even billboards.

We're absorbing and consuming so much data and products and services through which they are the gatekeepers. And so the numbers are just staggering. The thing that stuck out to me is that I do believe this is further evidence of legitimacy or justification for the breakup. And that is there's just no getting around it. You can't grow this fast without taking a lot of share from other players. They're just literally taking the oxygen out of the room for everybody. You can't grow revenues this fast without it impacting just the entire ecosystem. The other thing that really

stuck out to me though was YouTube. And again, this goes back to why a breakup will be good for shareholders. And that is YouTube is on a run rate of around 30 billion, growing 80% a year, 80% a year. So next year, if they were to be spun, you'd probably have a company running at a run rate of about $40 billion, maybe growing 60% a year. And also, that company alone probably gets a multiple of 20x revenues. That company alone is probably potentially bumping up against a trillion-dollar market capitalization company. And so the company trades at a total of $1.7 trillion. And then let me ask you this, when all of a sudden the analysts go, not only is this an amazing company growing 80% a year at $40 billion run rate that's hugely profitable,

they are now going to be unshackled to start, wait for it, a text-based search engine. Because guess what? YouTube is very good at search. And what are the prospects for- Well, they're not. I mean, it's interesting because, go ahead, go ahead. I'll jump in in a second, but go ahead. But the prospects, I think the investment market looks at a standalone YouTube that could get into text-based search and say capture just 5% or 10% of that $150 billion market. And you've got a $50 billion company growing 60%, 80% a year, that thing's worth a trillion dollars on its own.

So my point being that the reason these stocks continue to go up is not only their incredible performance, but we have to stop this lie or believing this lie that big tech wants to foment that this will be really bad for shareholders, that this is an anti-capitalist idea, the breakup. The breakup will be wildly accretive for shareholders. For everybody, yeah. We should make it. That's how we're trying to sell it. It's the economically best thing to do.

What's interesting about YouTube is there's just a, Google has just made some changes around its search, including trying to deal with something called data voids. Have you heard about this? Essentially, it's if there's not a lot of good information, say, about vaccines, and if there's a lot of bad, it'll fill the data void. And Google started to say, we don't have enough data. We don't have enough good information on this rather than necessarily flag the bad stuff, but make people aware that there needs to be more good information. And so they're trying to deal with these data voids and bring more data in and good and and good sources

essentially and it's a difficult thing now google's not been sort of pilloried as much as youtube but i think youtube has a real problem with surfacing bad content and so they they definitely you know young man yeah it's really it's a really interesting question of whether you know they would do more separately they certainly have the opportunity to do more now, but it's a, you're right, that would be one thing. Obviously Microsoft, same thing, cloud computing and workplace software is killing it, but then they have their game thing. Should that be broken up or pulled apart?

Not broken up forcefully, but should they think about it? Will they think about it? Probably not. And, you know, each of these companies, you could do that with probably not Apple as much, right? It's harder to do that because it's such a linked, they're such linked, their software and services and hardware is so linked in sort of an ecosystem. But Amazon, you certainly have the opportunity. You're right.

Now, what are they going to do with this extra cash, Scott? What are they going to do? They can't really buy anything. Nobody's letting them because they're too big, right? They can't walk around and start picking up Pinterest or whatever the heck they want to grab. That's a really interesting question. Stock buyback, probably? No, that's not, they don't like to do those. And Apple maybe increase their dividend? They don't do those. They're not like the old companies. When I see a stock buyback, I'm like, can't you think of anything else to do with your cash? Agreed, agreed. But

they're going to have so much cash on their balance sheets. You're talking about Google's going to have, I don't know, a hundred billion on its balance sheet. At some point, a Carl Icahn-like figure will show up to Google the way he showed up to Apple and said, you really should be distributing this back to shareholders. But you're right. They probably can't do a big acquisition. I mean, people just don't understand the scale of this. These companies are just literally, they're becoming, I mean, $6.5 trillion market cap for these companies i think that's the what is that i think that's the gdp of germany it's just it's just uh i'm overwhelmed i need to go to abisa and take mdma alphabet has which doesn't pay a dividend at all is sitting on cash investments 157 point uh 157.8 billion. Okay, so it's got $157.8 billion in cash.

Right, yeah. In cash. They can't buy anything. And I can't get good snacks at fucking Vox headquarters. Literally, I can't get good snacks. Do you know how much Apple has cash on hand? $195.57 billion, up $3.7 billion. Yeah, that's crazy.

They can't buy anything. They can't buy. And their stock is high. It's like they don't even need the money.'s they're like they got whatever they feel like buying they could but they can't it's really interesting so what do you imagine it's going to happen break these breakups you still do you think that's going to yeah it's it's going to be look there again everybody wins in a breakup except for except for the ceo who wants to sit on the ground to your personal life she was one one's's personal life. Yeah, breakup.

I'm just saying, does everyone benefit? Do you know something I don't? No, I'm not. I'm kidding. I'm saying in general. In general, Scott. No, we're staying together, you and I. We are.

Oh, good. I'm glad. Yeah. Although it did kind of, it might be manipulated into going on vacation so that you can try out a lot of new hosts. Is this basically a Game of Thrones? Is this like when they brought on Dwayne Johnson and a bunch of people hosts. Is this basically a Game of Thrones? Is this like when they brought on Dwayne Johnson and a bunch of people to see who could get along with Kelly Ripa? And the answer

is very few. Very few people. That's very few people. You're right. You know what? I like to have options. You and Kelly Ripa. I'd like to see the two of you go at it in Juneau. I met her once. She scared me. I'll be honest with you. Yeah. I met her with a bunch of, I was in this NBC thing and it was like an upfront kind of thing. And it was Savannah Guthrie, Megyn Kelly, Hoda, and then Kelly Ripa. Yeah. And it was, they were all real tall and skinny and they were talking about eating carbs, which I didn't believe a minute. Like, they were all like, oh, we had so much pasta. I'm like, doubt it.

And they were, and I was looked like a hobbit next to them, like a hobbit. Unless you're four foot 10, Kelly Ripa is not tall. I think you're the first person who's ever described yourself. Well, she's not tall, but she was wearing really high heels, so I literally was the hobbit among them. But she had a laser look. She scared me. Makota was, as you might imagine, Savannah Butler's lovely. Drunk?

No, she wasn't. She was lovely. Savannah was lovely. Megyn Kelly was even lovely, even though she'd said some appalling things of late and often, actually. But Kelly, she gave me a look. I was like, wow, she would cut me in a second. But no, I'm not going to be able to. But you know, here's what I say.

There's a little bit of vibe. Let me just say, here's what I say to you. Maybe the morning show wants a little mommy. No, maybe the view. Maybe I'll go on the view. I'm not conservative enough. They need a conservative. We got to get George Han on the view. You know, they're searching for someone. Yeah, George Han's a little mommy. No, maybe The View. Maybe I'll go on The View. I'm not conservative enough. They need a conservative. We got to get George Han on The View.

You know, they're searching for someone. Yeah, George Han's a good idea. Back to the idea if I'm testing people, guest hosts. I like to have optionality, Scott. I'm always, I'm into optionality. That's my theme in general in life. But that hurts my feet.

You're making me feel insecure. And that means I'm going to have to do even more drugs when I'm in Ibiza. Ibiza. And a 56-year-old man in a K-hole, that's not a good look. I know, that's true. It's not a good look. Listen, as people are contemplating that, let's go on a quick break. When we come back,

we'll talk about what we learned from the first Capitol insurrection hearing, which was really something, and take a listener mail question. 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.

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and trust. Support for this show is brought to you by Nissan Kicks. 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. What makes the struggle harder and more painful is to know so many of my fellow citizens,

including so many of the people I put my life at risk to defend, are downplaying or outright denying what happened. I feel like I went to hell and back to protect them and the people in this room. But too many are now telling me that hell doesn't exist or that hell actually wasn't that bad. The indifference shown to my colleagues is disgraceful. So welcome back. That's Washington, D.C. Metropolitan Police Officer Michael Fanone testifying earlier this week in front of the House Select Committee investigating the January 6th attack on the Capitol. Fanone was one of four police officers who spoke at the panel's hearings,

all of them one more devastating than the next. During the January 6th attack, he was beaten unconscious, suffered a heart attack, and was later diagnosed with a traumatic brain injury. His fellow officers described brutal hand-to-hand combat. One said the rioter tried to gouge out his eye. Other, there was racial epithets thrown at them. And these were not normal tourists. Some of these Congress people are acting like they were normal tourists. You know what? The worst you can say is it was a protest that got way out of hand.

The most you can say is an insurrection. So I'm willing to, like, talk about it in a way, but it needs to be investigated. So this particular session mostly served to reset the scene of what happened that day and try to disabuse people that it was anything but violent. And some people weren't violent. That's absolutely true. And of course, the committee is convening without the support of many Republicans, including Kevin McCarthy and Mitch McConnell, who both said they didn't even watch it. Obviously, Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger are on the committee as Republicans. So what do you think? What do you think? I was saying, why have I not been more tuned into this?

And it kind of reminds me, or it feels to me a little bit like the concept that the virus might have escaped from a lab accidentally, that this virus might be man-made and the lack of security protocols might have resulted in what is the greatest health crisis in 100 years. And that is, what happened here at the insurrection is so horrible and embarrassing for this nation. I have trouble tuning into it because, and I absolutely want to investigate, I want to get to the bottom of it. We owe it to ourselves, we owe it to those officers,

but I find the whole thing so disturbing. And I think the nation does too. I think the nation looks at it and goes, how? I mean, remember when we had John Meacham on? He said, even during the Civil War, they didn't get to the Congress. And here they did. And it's just, and then the notion that there was a president kind of rooting them on. And it looks like, I think we're going to find out that it wasn't an inside job, but there was people aiding and abetting that is going to be shocking because they probably didn't realize how far it was going to get. Yeah. Liz Cheney wants the panel to issue subpoenas to investigate any potential ties between rioters in the Trump administration. The committee chair, Benny Thompson, doesn't rule out subpoenas for Trump and other senior

officials. You know, I think calling attention to it is right. There's been a real pushback by some on the right that it was besides normal tourist thing it was not stop it and like and that it wasn't and you know let's kill the vice president yeah megan kelly acting like you know it wasn't as by the media made it out to be give me a fucking break megan sorry like what's wrong with you there's so many like i know her and i'm just sort of shocked of the turn she's taking i understand why she's doing it for ratings or whatever she's doing um So, you know,

just this idea that it wasn't that or that it was Black Lives Matter protesters and FBI. They're trying to throw everything and seeing what hits. This was a protest. And by the way, you can protest if you don't think the election

happened the way you wanted it. You were absolutely, you can scream and yell. You can, you can be mean. You can say nasty things. Great. Good on you if you want to be an asshole. But the fact of the matter is they, they attacked the Capitol. They were, there was very malevolent forces in there.

It was very dangerous. And, and again, the worst, the best you can say, it was a protest that got violently out of control. And then, and had some elements of real malevolence going on. And it was spurred on by the president of the United States. In any case, it needs to be investigated. This was devastating testimony. There's going to be more hearings. And I think we should keep reminding people.

What's the vibe in D.C.? You're more in touch with that stuff than I am. What do people think? What do people in the know think is going to happen? I think they're sort of appalled by the right-wing efforts, the Republican efforts to pretend it didn't happen. And I see why they're doing it, like to diminish it. And I think these officers sort of were good in that regard. I think they don't, Kevin McCarthy doesn't want to testify to what Trump said to him, and he needs to testify. He needs to, he actually talked about

it before he turned, he changed his mind on what happened, as did many people. So, you know, they said one thing when it was happening, and then now they have a whole new story, which means they're liars at one point in the situation, probably right now. Right now, in fact. And so, we'll see. I think people are sort of like trying to make sure it's clear that this was a violent action at the Capitol. Nothing has happened like this in history. There was malintent. Not everybody there was doing that.

There were people just outside just screaming. But having a hanging noose in front of the Capitol is not a good look for Republicans. I'm sorry. It just isn't. There's no way around that. So we'll see. We'll see. We'll see.

We'll see. So anyway, let's take a listener question. Roll tape. You've got, you've got. I can't believe I'm going to be a mailman. You've got mail. Hey, Karen, Scott. My name is Bart.

I'm from Poland. I have a question for the dog. I mean, Scott. You keep on mentioning that your strategy is to only invest in regulated monopolies. Given it seems that FTC and the government at large will soon be tougher on the tech giants, many of those companies you invest in may soon be regulated. How would that change your investment policy? Would you disinvest your stock in those companies? I find it interesting because you also mentioned that, for example, AWS and Amazon would be collectively worth more after breaking them up.

Give up the good work. Bye. I love that, guys. Have you been to Poland, Kara? Yes, I have. Yes. Where in Poland have you been? Warsaw.

Judo tournament? No. I was living in Berlin. Anyway. I love Poland. Most beautiful square in Europe, Krakow. Yes, Krakow. Wrocław, severely underrated.

Gdansk sounds awful. It's actually very lovely. Oh, good. Polish people, friendly. We've been all over Poland. I've only been to Warsaw. That's nice. So, tell me, this is a good question. We just discussed this, collectively we're breaking up. So, what would be your new policy? I think Bart, I'm going to answer this very quickly. He said people are saying that that's the way to make money. He didn't think it was necessarily a good thing. Go ahead, Scott. Look, when people ask me for investment advice all the time, and the first thing I tell them is I get it wrong all the time. And the key is diversification,

such that you're Kevlar from the mistakes and you will make mistakes. The wonderful thing about the markets is no one has been able to figure it out. Maybe the exception of Elon Musk, who now manipulates the markets, but that's another show. But the wonderful thing about it is no individual knows what's going to happen. And you make mistakes, so you diversify. But the place where I have concentrated the majority of my public markets exposure over the last 13 years has been in Apple, Amazon, and I was in Facebook, and I got out because people correctly noted that I was so disgusted publicly that I was also financing this firm. So I sold money. I sold, excuse me, I sold my stock on Facebook. But Apple and Amazon, unregulated monopolies are just fantastic.

I bought Twitter at 30, sold it at 50, bought it again at 32, sold it at 58. I've been in and out of Twitter, and I'm addicted to it. I have such a love-hate, as you know, relationship with Twitter. Anyways, but I've done well there in terms of investing, and I'm talking about trading, which you shouldn't do. Don't trade. Do as I say, not as I do. Anyways. So you wouldn't change your investment policy. You would just invest as they broke up, right, as there's closer breakups.

I think on a risk-adjusted basis, there's just very few investment strategies that have worked as well and will continue to work as well as large firms that execute really well, that have monopoly power, and the government is asleep on the switch and not regulating them. Once they get regulated, what will you do? You hold on to them and then you'll do better. The stocks will go up. Yeah. The stocks will go up. Instagram is an amazing independent company. AWS will be the most

valuable independent company in the world by 2025. This is what happens. CEOs want to diversify. CEOs don't want... It is very stressful to have a company go up and down and earnings go up and down. So what CEOs like to do is they like to diversify and turn their company into a conglomerate which smooths out their earnings. And it also makes them feel important to be running a bigger company. But here's the thing, investors don't need CEOs to diversify for them. I would like to own AWS. I don't want to crawl over an e-commerce company or a search engine to get to cloud players. I want to have pure play cloud companies. So if in fact, so what happens is the market responds by finding the shittiest business and assigning the entire value to that business. When I was an investor and went on the board of the New York Times, my whole thesis was there's some amazing businesses in here.

About.com, the tallest, seventh tallest building in America that was probably worth a billion dollars on its own. Even 17% of the Boston Red Sox was worth a lot of money. And I'm like, but everybody goes, this is a newspaper business. It's a shitty business. So we're going to sign a multiple on EBITDA, a four to everything. So the disposition of assets in a conglomerate is accretive to shareholders. And we're not even talking about the dynamics of how they become more focused, more competitive, stop coordinating. Breakups are a wonderful thing for shareholders. So yeah, if you wanted to find stocks right now, my 13-year-old niece called me and said, what stocks should I buy? And I said, well, what companies do you like? What do you do?

I can't imagine anything. The whole market's expensive right now, so you have to be in the market for a long time to endure dips. But I have a long-term perspective, great way to build wealth, unregulated monopolies, way to go. Even in a breakup. You helped your niece, but when I asked you, you did not when I was doing an experiment. I don't like to give investment advice to my friends.

Well, I'm not doing it as an experiment, but okay, fine. Oh, that's right. You were buying stuff on public, right? Yeah, just trying to use it, just a small amount. So unregulated monopolies and wait for them to get regulated and then you'll do well again.

That's really what Bart from Poland. Heads they win, tails they win. So is there anything else? Is there anything else you've changed? Give Bart another little piece of advice. Anything else I've changed? In your investments policy. Oh, well, I'm doing what I call an immunity strategy.

doing what I call an immunity strategy. And that is, I was really inspired by Shopify that said, if Amazon can be as big as it is, there's always an opportunity for a company to zag and do something entirely different. So, Neva is the immunity to Google. Public is the immunity to Robinhood. I think that Better Mortgage is the immunity to kind of systemic racism and inefficiency in the mortgage market. I think that there are, look at what's happened with, do you know who's the best performing social media network stocks have been Pinterest and Snap. I think that's an immunity. I think people love social media. They just want to get rid of the noxious fumes. Open web is an immunity to the toxicity of comments. They're cleaning up the comment section on these media platforms. So immunity, I like it.

Or if I want a virtue signal, you could call it a citizen strategy. But there is money to be made in investing in companies that say to these companies with terrible externalities, there's opportunity for someone else to come in and carve out a market. And then the categories, I think, where you want to allocate your human capital as a young person are around fintech, education, edtech, and then health tech. I think those three categories are going to just go and incur so much disruption

and new creation of stakeholder value that it's a great place to invest your own human capital and your capital if you have access to good private companies, which most people don't. Fantastic. What do you think, Karen? That was very good. I don't know. I don't pay attention to these things. I hand it over to investment lady at Bernstein and she takes care of it for me. That's how I do it. That's smart. That's also a smart thing to do. All-woman staff in my investment lawyer account and everything. All women.

All women. And they all practice judo, everything. All women. All women. And they all practice judo. Yes. That's the prerequisite. Ever love an ass. Anyway. All right, Scott, one more quick break. We'll be back for predictions.

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Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. Published by Capital Client Group, Inc. Okay, Scott, you need to give us a week's prediction, but it's got to last a month. So you need to do something really good. This better be a good prediction. I don't want you to half-ass it here, as per usual. Half-ass it? Half-ass it. Well, you know, we didn't talk about Robinhood's going public today.

Oh, right. Yeah. 40% of their revenue from selling order flow on options, 20% from crypto, 30% of their crypto revenue comes from Dogecoin. It really isn't a trading app. It's a gambling app. I mean, this is hardcore gambling what's going on here. But anyways, that's not my prediction. Okay. her kids off in camp and had to pull both of them out of camp because one of them had a breakthrough infection. And it just struck me that I think all of the nation is dealing with the pain and unnecessary sacrifice being levied on this nation because people have conflated an absence of oppression being an absence of responsibility. And in the 60s, we asked young men to go to Southeast Asia and fight a war to protect against this theory called

the domino theory of communism. And a lot of them rightfully said, I don't want to go. And we either force them to flee to Canada or we put them in jail. If you live in San Francisco or New York and you work your ass off and your partner works their ass off and you make really good money, the government shows up and takes more than half of it in the form of taxes. And if you say, no, I want to opt out of this responsibility, we fine you. And if you still opt out, we put your ass in jail. And the notion that we are asking people if and when they go into public places, if they go to the movies, if they go to schools, if they get on a plane, if they work for the government, I mean, for fuck's sake, Kara, have you heard that 40% of hospital employees are not vaccinated?

40% of hospital employees are not vaccinated. The nation has had enough. It is time for our leaders. That's astonishing. That's astonishing, I think, don't you? Like 40%. I swallowed my tongue. I'm like, you're dealing with sick people and you're

not vaccinated how i mean and kudos to nyu i got an email today saying scott you need to show proof of vaccination if you want to come on campus i'm like my sister's if you want employment not if you want to come in the building if you want employment yeah they're starting they're starting the department of veteran affairs is starting to say if you want to're starting the Department of Veteran Affairs is starting to say, if you want to work for the Department of Veteran Affairs, you have to be vaccinated. So this notion that we are, this is my prediction. I think that our elected leaders, I think their backbone is stiffening. And I think the data is so overwhelming that there has never been in the history of our modern economy, a product that offers so much benefit at so little risk and so little cost.

This is a blessing. And for the government to decide on this one, similar to the decisions they've made elsewhere, that this is good for the nation and you have to do this, it's time. And it's going to happen. I think we're- So, you think this will solidify? I was fascinated with the Washington Post. I know that some news organizations that we may be affiliated with are worried about the unions and things like that and figuring if they are allowed to force it. But I was fascinated, the Post said, is a condition of employment. If you want to work here. Well, this is yet another way the unions are going to continue to shoot themselves in the foot.

If you look at union membership across 45 countries, in every country, they've lost somewhere between 10 and 60 percent of their membership over the last 30 years. And unions should be organizing to get this done and protect their workers and protect their communities. So the notion that they're sitting there with their arms crossed saying, well, I don't know. Let me just say, I mean, that's one of the things they're worried about. Well, teachers unions are. They should be organizing. They should be helping this fight.

Anyway, I think we are about to see- Firmness is what you're, you're about to see firmness. I think we're about to see overdue leadership from our elected leaders who go, look, government is the connective tissue of our society. Occasionally we ask for a sacrifice.

You don't get to decide if that decision was right or wrong. You get to once every four years when you elect people or two years. But it is time. Vaccine passports, mandatory proof of vaccination, public transportation to work for the government. I hope that a lot of companies and a lot are starting to mandate vaccination. It is time to put, we have the White Walker here. We have a threat to our entire society here. We have a monster and we have been blessed because we

have discovered dragonglass and that dragonglass is a vaccine. And it is time to put this dragonglass in the fucking heart of this monster. And to sit around and go, well, you know, I'm worried I might get a blister from the dragonglass. I'm going to wait and see. Fuck that. It is time that Americans started acting more American. Well, now, of course, there's a big argument just in the

House of Representatives about reimposing the mask mandates places. Everyone's arguing about everything. About that, too. But look, the mask mandate stuff, you can argue back and forth, although please stop. The vaccine one, you're absolutely right. We're going to see, this fight is never going to stop. And for some reason, one side has decided it's about liberty. The other side is, it's a very difficult situation, but when it comes to vaccine, it should be a zero tolerance policy, I think. Unless you can prove like there's some health issues,

like just like with other things we do when we require. And this is the thing, it's just so weird. The Republican Party, it's going to be these pockets, these vaccine deserts that are going to get decimated. And they're almost all red districts. Yeah, it's interesting. I think the arguments will continue and it and it's getting conflated with the mask stuff which people throw back but here's the thing about math people have

had it i i also empathize with like i think i don't think we're going back into lockdown i mean they will call for lockdowns i think you're going to see really poor compliance i think people are just like look i agree i'm done you can argue the problem with the people who are continuing to be assholes about the mask thing. Look, you know, there was one back and forth among some people I know, some VC who's been obsessive with the mask thing and to the point of being an asshole. And I think the issue is I almost tweeted at him because I know him really well. It was like and then someone else whose uncle died. So this is really rude that you keep doing this. And I almost was almost tweeted. Listen, you can have any opinion you want about this mass thing but the problem is

you're a persistent and obsessive asshole and that's really the problem which you can't be curative by any vaccine like that's what it is it's like you went judo on his ass i know it was i didn't i didn't do it because i thought i'm just not going to contribute to this someone i actually liked and I don't anymore. That's called social media. Yeah. That happens when you follow anybody on social media. You can have whatever opinion you want, but boy, are you an asshole and you can't be cured of that. And so that's really what is the disappointment here.

And I agree with you. There are definitely tensions and things like that. But when it comes to vaccines, I'm sorry, people. You're going to have to take your medicine. Take your medicine to have a better tomorrow i guess you know but anyway we'll see what happens we'll see it'll be a real struggle it'll continue to be struggling republicans are making it an issue they shouldn't um anyway uh this is our last moments together for a month scott you're going to be gone for august explain people why you're doing this and

abrogating our responsibility and our work well you Well, you know why I take August off. No. Because I can, Cara. Okay. Because I can. Okay. All right. And?

And? I've decided I'm going to take August off for the rest of my life. Oh, okay. All right. Fine. Well, I'm going to get guest hosts, as many as I can. And, of course, I'm bringing back Andrew Ross Sorkin. The Canadian.

Yes, the Canadian. I'm bringing in Ben Smith from the New York Times. He's the media writer. I have Baratunde Thurston. Baratunde. I've got Stephanie Ruhl. I'm on his podcast this week. I've got Stephanie Ruhl.

The ruler. World ruler. I've got. I'm going to call her and just get all over her for anything she says on the podcast. Yeah. And then I have Katie Couric coming. Katie. Yes, I do.

Yes, indeed. Katie Couric. Yes. Don't make fun of Katie Couric. She'll rip your face off. No, I like Katie.ic coming. Katie! Yes, I do. Katie Couric! Yes. Don't make fun of Katie Couric. She'll rip your face off. She looks nice. I like Katie. She's very nice. Alright. I got a lot of people coming in. By the way, she's made the same deal with the devil that Tom Cruise. She looked 30 when she was 20. Now she looks 30 and she's older than that now.

Something's going on there. That's a deal with the devil. That woman does not age. You know what? For her... Can you find out what face cream she uses? No, I will not. That's all I age. You know what? For her, for her Sarah Palin thing. Can you find out what face cream she uses? No, I will not. That's all I ask You can't afford it. You can't afford it. Anyway,

and then, lastly, I'm going to have to give you the news. I have Preet coming on. Preet coming on. That's a joke, right? No.

Preet's going to do it. That's a joke. No, I got to do a legal thing. He's a legal guy. I got to do a legal show. There's a lot of legal things happening.

Why would you abuse our friendship like that? I just would too. Is this you lot of legal things happening. Why would you abuse our friendship like that? Is this you lashing out? Is this you acting out? No, it's not me acting out. He's part of the Fox Media Podcast Network. We have to be pushing our shows here. You know what I mean? What does Preet think? Preet, what do you think? I just can't wait to see what a brown-nosed girl on Preet. Oh, that was so smart. Oh, you're right. I hadn't thought of it that way. I promise I will straighten out up preach in the same way. We're going to talk about legal things.

There's all kinds of cases happening. There's all these, like, there's lots of legal stuff that needs to be discussed. Well, Cara, I'm just going to say things in a breathy, Ivy League voice, and I won't really say anything, but you'll be impressed. Yes, and there's some others that are coming up that are going to be fun. Are they? Yes, it's going to be good. We haven't gotten all the confirmations yet, but it looks pretty good.

I think Kathy Griffin is coming on, which should keep up with you. Kathy Griffin? Yeah, she's a friend of mine. Really? I've got a lot of famous friends, in case you're interested. I like Kathy Griffin. In any case, would none of them together take the place of you, Scott Galloway? I'm just saying that.

Go on. You're going to miss me. I feel pretty good right now i am i do you know when you came back last year you were like i really missed you you said remember you were like raring to go you were raring to go so here's the deal whatever you're doing to yourself in abyssa or wherever the hell you're going behind the refrigerator do as much as you want when you come back you need to be smart you need to be sharp you need to be on the news. School is in session in September, and I need you back stronger than ever. So come back rested and curious. That's what I tell my students.

That's what I say. Rested and curious and off drugs. That would be particularly good. And I wish you a great time. I will miss you. Thank you, Carol. And when you get back, again, be ready because I will be in shape, in judo shape with all these great guest hosts. The dog stands at the door.

Yeah. He's a German shepherd roaming the property looking for work like a Belgian Malinois. All right, then. Okay. Don't forget if there's a story in the news and you're curious about and want to hear our opinion on, go to nymag.com slash pivot and submit a question for the show. Scott, read us out. Today's show was produced by Lara Naiman, Camila Salazar, and Evan Engel.

Ernie Entretat engineered this episode. Thanks also to Drew Burrows. Make sure you're subscribed to the show on Apple Podcasts or if you're an Android user, check us out on Spotify or frankly, wherever you listen to podcasts. Thank you for listening to Pivot from Vox Media. We'll be back next week for another breakdown

of all things tech and business. Katie Couric is filling in for Scott Galloway. Never hear that. You never hear that. Support for this show is brought to you by Nissan Kicks. 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,

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