Pivot - Kara's Ketamine Trip, Meta and Tesla Earnings, and the FTC Bans Non-Competes

Episode Date: April 26, 2024

Kara and Scott discuss the campus protests, Harvey Weinstein’s conviction being overturned, and… Kara doing ketamine. Meta and Tesla’s Q1 earnings are out, and Scott’s got predictions on earnings to come. Plus, the FTC bans non-competes. Then, a listener question on what the TikTok ban means for the presidential election. Follow us on Instagram and Threads at @pivotpodcastofficial. Follow us on TikTok at @pivotpodcast. Send us your questions by calling us at 855-51-PIVOT, or at nymag.com/pivot. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Just go to Indeed.com slash podcast right now and say you heard about Indeed on this podcast. Indeed.com slash podcast. Terms and conditions apply. Need to hire? You need Indeed. Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Cara Swisher.

And I'm Scott Galloway. Scott, we're Webby winners. We're Webby winners. You know, Cara, I just don't buy into this whole kind of modern day, ridiculous, sugar high, need for accolades. I don't. I'm sorry, what's that again? I haven't even been tracking this every other minute and hitting refresh and asking my doorman to register at Webby's so he can vote for me. We totally packed it, didn't we? Oh, my God. We literally, these awards things are such a scam. It's like the bestsellers list

on Amazon. You can be, with any book, number like two or three in- Which you are. Let's just get to that in a second, but go ahead. Anyone can be number two or three because they slice the cheese so many millions of ways. It'll be nonfiction books by bald, angry professors suffering with ED that have a great Dane. And it'll be like, you're number two. And you're like, I'm number two. Well, no, Scott, you hit number one on Amazon, all the books. So that's that is an accomplishment. Anyway, won the Webby. I'm getting a Webby Lifetime Achievement Award. Lifetime Achievement. Which means I'm old.

It means you're dying. You're getting all this Lifetime shit. I know, I'm getting all of them. I'm getting one today from Washingtonian. I'm getting all the old lady ones. So right now you're number four in all books, which is, that is a thing. That is an act,

meaning you're going to be at the top of the New York Times bestseller list, just so you know. You're number one in Introdu to investing. I thought that was kind of a weird one. Like that's a category. You're number one in success, self-help and wealth management. You want to help yourself? Come to the dog. Said no one ever. Said no one ever. No, but it's not self-help. It's success self-help. It's a very particular one. That's Latin for boasting. Boasting. Yeah. And wealth management, that's success self-help. It's a very particular one. That's Latin for boasting.

Boasting, yeah. And wealth management, that's a legit thing. But you're number one in books. That's a big deal, Scott. That's a big deal. Thank you. You're number four now. You've moved down to four. But in new releases, you're number three. And then let me just look at business and money. You're at the top of business and money. Why didn't they put that? You're number one and two. It's probably your audio. And five. You're number one, two, and five in Business and Money.

That's a big deal. I'm really enjoying this. I know. It's nice. You're doing great. You know what is really huge in terms of power? What? Is Morning Joe.

It is. Yeah. You got to get on The View, too. I had never been on Morning Joe Live. I was on with Willie Guy. By the way, he's very handsome and very nice. He's a handsome man. And that show is so tight.

I really appreciate what an incredible production is. They are so good. They really try and set you up for success. Yeah. They try and really go deep on stuff and they have thoughtful commentary.

Yeah, it's a great show. It's a great show. And also, you should go on The View. Actually, a very good show, too. I think that's one you need great show. And also, you should go on The View. Actually, a very good show, too. I think that's one you need to get on. I would love to be on The View. They haven't called me. I'm going to tell them to have you. I actually, I got a note from Jen Psaki. I'm going to read it. She goes, my mother saw Scott on Morning Joe, and now she's talking about him all the time. I said, have him on your show. Your mother will be happy.

So there you have it. I'm big with moms. I'm big with moms and media. Jen Psaki's mom loves Scott Galloway. Hello, Jen Psaki's mom. Anyway, you're going to get to the top of New York Times bestsellers. So very exciting. We're Webby winners. We are winners all over the place. People were, I was at a dinner last night at Puck Thru, starting for the White House Correspondents Dinner, and they are fascinated by our success. They don't understand it, all the other journalists. I love the part of the show where we talk about us. No, I'm just saying, they were like, how is it you two are so popular? How is it? Like, that's how the question starts.

It's your hair. If we combined your looks and your credibility with my rap, we'd be the junior senator from Pennsylvania. We would. We would. We would. Anyway, we do have a lot to get to today, including the latest earnings from Meta and Tesla. They had a blowout, but Wall Street gave them a little slap get to today, including the latest earnings from Meta and Tesla. They had a blowout, but Wall Street gave them a little slap that he do

because of the money spent on AI and Tesla had a shit the bed essentially. But then we're announcing some things that helped their stock. The FTC's big move to ban non-compete agreements, Scott. Finally, your biggest thing. We'll talk about that in a minute. But first, guess what I did this week?

What'd you do? I took ketamine. Oh my God, I forgot. No, and you, okay, okay. Start from why are you traumatized and need ketamine? What were you trying to do here? I'm not, I'm, my next book has to do with a lot of healthcare and tech and things like that.

And obviously a lot of tech people, as we've read, take ketamine or use it, or there's a lot of investment by tech people in psychedelics. And I have never taken any drug in my life. This was the first psychedelic I've ever taken. I believe it's in that group. And I needed to understand it. And so it's part of, I'm working on a documentary at the same time that I'm writing my next book. And I felt like I needed to do it. And we needed some video and stuff. And so I did both a cryotherapy. I did one of

those freezing things, which I've done before, which I like quite a bit. But before that, I did ketamine. And I did it with this company called Stella, which bought Fieldtrip. Remember we had Fieldtrip at Code a couple of years ago? Yeah. Yeah, I like that guy. But that guy's not running anymore. It's owned by another company. It's a tough business. But this other group, Stella, which did a great job, they had a beautiful facility here in D.C., great, all medical. I did the whole thing, you know, doctors. Pre-screening to make sure you're not. Pre-screening, the whole thing. And so I think that's, let me give you a few impressions because you did yours and I think you didn't like it very much. No, I actually, on the whole, it was positive. Yeah. I was shocked

at how intense it was. Yes. Anyways, enough about me. What were your thoughts? Well, I think I had the same experience. Let me tell you, at the start, I wouldn't do it again. And I know there's a lot of people who have therapeutic issues that do it four or five times, which I think is great. I can see doing it.

Huge benefits, too. It's registering huge benefits. Yeah, and also, if you do it in a medical setting. Number one, this should not be done recreationally. I just don't see it. I know they do it, but this in a medical setting, number one, this should not be done recreationally. I just don't see it. I know they do it, but this is a medical, this is a serious drug. And it was, I think I would have been terrified if I did it by myself. And I'm not, not just because I'm not a drug user. If you do it in much smaller doses recreationally. Yeah, I know. I know. But I just

am like, this is something you need to have some sort of guidance and medical help with. The first thing is, I love the spa feeling. You know, you get in the chair and you sit back, the weighted blanket, the whole thing and the eye patch and stuff like that. And the music, really well done, puts you in the right state of place you should be. I had a medium dose, I guess, of it. And at first I was like, nothing's happening here. And then you're like, oh, no. Elevator up. Up, up. The disassociation is crazy. Did you have visualizations?

No, sort of. No, not really. It was all black and a little bit of purple. Then you didn't have a big hit, in my view. Well, no, I think I feel like I did. Okay, go on. Yeah. So I felt like first it was,

elevator up is a really good thing, but more like a roller coaster that you got on and it clicked and you're like, oh shit. And here we go. The first it was a roller coaster. Then it was like a luge. I've never been on a luge, but a chute. If you've ever gone down a tunnel, then it felt like that, like a wormhole.

Then it felt like floating in space itself. Like, but none of it felt like you had control of anything, like that you were being floated. And then it felt like womb-like for a minute there. All of it was about being moved along without your moving it along. And one of the things that I thought was interesting is, like you, I didn't think about work at all. I tried to. I actually tried to will myself into thinking about work. It won't let you, your mind won't let you or something. You're not, you don't feel in control in any way. And then I thought only about my kids, only about my kids. And it was very pleasant. It was, it wasn't deep and revelatory. It just was,

oh, look, there's Clara. There's joyous and positive. Yeah. Yeah. I agree. I didn't, I honestly, I thought a tiny bit about Amanda, but it was all the kids, for all kids. That was it. That was the entire experience. And, you know, I kept trying to have bigger revelations to try to almost force myself into it. And it wasn't like, oh, nature. Oh, my beautiful life, that kind of stuff. None of that. I did not like the nausea afterwards. Oh, I took an anti-emetic. So did I, but I still had it. You still had nausea? And dizziness. And dizziness I don't like in general. I don't like being on roller coasters. I don't like being spun around. I have a real problem with dizziness. When I get on boats, I get dizzy and seasick. And that, I didn't like that feeling. And that was profound. That was, I don't like it.

And so that coming out of it was weird where you can't move your hands. Yeah, you're drugged. Yeah, you're really drugged. And so I'll tell you the biggest insight I got is, I literally thought Elon Musk shouldn't be taking this all the time. This is not, this is really. It's a real drug. It's a real fucking drug. And, you know, I'm sure people will push back. Oh, you know, you don't understand it, but I wouldn't do it again. That's the other thing is I wouldn't do it again. What about you? So a couple of things that I had that you haven't mentioned, I want to see if you had them. One, I had a few points of anxiety in my life at that moment that weren't that relevant that did pop up a few times. The sorting mechanism was pretty good big picture in that my kids came

in, which is obviously the most important thing, but also a few things were on my mind just at that moment kept popping up. You didn't have that. No, nothing current, nothing, nothing, and also nothing big, nothing like, ah, the meaning of life is, none of that. No, nothing current, nothing, nothing. And also nothing big, nothing like, ah, the meaning of life is none of that. I did get annoyed by some of the music. And I'm like, I don't like this music. And at the very end, it was 40 minutes, I guess. And it felt like 17 hours. That's the other thing. Like, and at the very end, I'm like, I would like to leave now. And I couldn't. And I didn't like that feeling. I was like, okay, I'm done. I'd like to get out of this closet or whatever I'm in, or floating or space, but I felt like I had no control. And that gave me anxiety, like a tiny bit, not much, but that was one thing. The length of it felt enormous for some reason. Did you feel like I kind of I did come out. So your kids came up and when I my kids came up, it did sort of illuminate like, I mean, you know how important they are to you. But yeah, sort of it's almost like it just illuminates this sense of for me, it gave me if me and feel like, oh, you know, you've known this all along. But but these two things are your purpose. Full stop. That's correct. That's it. Your

relationships are important. Work didn't even come up. My parents didn't come up. Did your mom come up? Did Lucky come up? I tried to think of her because we've been, you know, we've been having so much, you know, we're trying to get her settled into her new life essentially. And I tried to think of her and it was like, no, we're not going to be thinking about that today. Like it was not, I thought I'd think about my dad. Nope. And I tried to do it. Like it was like, I tried to lift my hand too, and I couldn't do it. And so just decided not to, my mind decided, no, we're not going to be talking about that. What was interesting is I did, there was a little visualization that I sort of generated myself, I think, you know, Clara's

face, Alex's face, Alex's face, Saul's face, but Louis K. kept coming in with that caterpillar mustache, which I was like, I'd like that mustache to go. That's your trauma? Yes, I was like, and I called him. I'm like, you have to shave that mustache off. Like afterwards, he was pretty excited that I did that. Sounds like overall it was a pretty positive experience.

Yeah, but not again. But I have no interest in doing it again. It's interesting, I kind of feel the same way. I'm kind of one and done. And, you know, part of me is like, should I try? I've never tried mushrooms. I'm like, I don't think I like the lack of control. I don't particularly like it.

That part I didn't like, the lack of control. Yeah, it sounds like, I mean, I couldn't move. Yeah. At one point, I felt guilty that I wasn't talking to my guide. So I started trying to ask him, did he have kids? And I couldn't even articulate the words. I was really high. Yeah, I was really high.

I was really high. That was, I got to tell you, that's some fucking drug. That is some fucking drug. I find it's important to have guides. So whenever I do edibles, I always have Johnny Walker and Doritos to guide me through it. Anyway, now we share something, a ketamine experience. Thank you for doing it because it prompted me to do it. Speaking of ketamine, you should be on ketamine when we're talking about this, but student protests over Israel's war of Mazhar spreading across college campuses

nationwide. The arrests of over 100 pro-Palestinian protesters in Columbia last week sparked a recent wave of unrest at other colleges and campments have been popping up at other campuses. I saw one at AU the other day, although it was quite small, with student demonstrators demanding their schools and financial ties to Israel and weapons manufacturers.

A number of these demonstrators have led to clashes with police and administrators and additional arrests. Obviously, there's one at NYU. You sent me a picture there. Some of the professors were forming a line. I want to know, as a campus person, talk about the campuses, the feeling on the campus, because one of the feelings is that, you know, there's one group for law order, and there's one group for dealing with the oppressed. So it feels a little like the apartheid thing was when I was in college or something, but it doesn't feel like the Vietnam stuff that happened. I don't know how you saw it when you were there.

So I went to the protest late, I think it was Tuesday night, just to kind of check it out, because my phone started blowing up about this protest, and it looked kind of scary. And then I recognized that it was the plaza in front of NYU Stern, so I thought. Stern, right, yeah. And you sent me a text that said, you should go. And so I went over, and then I spent the better part of yesterday at NYU speaking to the students. It is very tense right now, especially among the leadership. They are really trying to thread the needle. And by the way, I think the president of NYU has done as good a job as you could ask. Her name is Linda Mills. Because my general impression while I was there was that it was an entirely peaceful protest. And that is, I don't agree

with what they're saying, but you're not supposed to agree with young people. That's called youth. And I didn't find them to be intimidating. I thought they were just exercising their right to protest. I had heard earlier in the evening, though, that some students became quite aggressive. But I think for the most part, the majority of these universities are actually handling it pretty well. And that is they're trying to thread the needle between giving students the important right and also a nice legacy of colleges being a place where young people can really explore the bounds of their views and be passionate about something and express that passion, even if it's in a kind of an obnoxious way that they may or

may not regret when they're older, distinct of what you think of their views. The hard part is, I think, and it gets exaggerated in the media, but there is a real component, though, where a couple times a motion takes over and some of these protesters begin yelling at students and harassing people. And it is just totally unacceptable that any special interest group would ever feel harassed or intimidated on campus. I think for the most part, it's really easy to shitpost the leadership of these universities. I think they're in a very difficult spot. And what most of them have done is they've said, okay, peaceful protest, fine. You start sending up tents that are orchestrated. You start sending up tents on, on their orchestrated, you start sending up tents and encampments on private property. We're going to tell you,

you need to leave. And if the situation becomes such that it starts to make small special interest groups, in this case, Jewish students uncomfortable or intimidated, we need to shut this down and you need to leave. And Kara, I was on, it was kicked out of UCLA several times for a lot less, you know? And so I think it's, I think that there, I think to be clear as someone who doesn't agree with them and wants to get emotionally charged around this issue, I think the majority of it is what I'd call protest. And we have a wonderful history of it. What did you think of the teachers? I just was thinking, obviously, you weren't there locking arms in front of the students, but what did you think of the teachers doing that? People had a

really strong reaction to that. Well, look, I think if a faculty wants to protest and be a positive force and be the adult in the room ensuring that these protests stay peaceful, you should be able to say what you want. I think if your speech, and this has happened with several NYU professors, I think leadership needs to draw a bright line between free speech and hate speech. free speech and hate speech. And I think when a professor says, you know, does any sort of chant from the river to the sea or says that they were emboldened and inspired by the activities of October the 7th, I think they should be summarily fired. And the example I used on Morning Joe that has gotten me a lot of shit is that I do believe if I went down to a protest, a kind of white power protest, and I started saying things and protesting, one, I don't think, regardless of how peaceful I am, that I would survive. I think I would be fired unless I had tenure. And if at any point I started yelling at black students

and intimidating them, I think they would, and they lost control of the situation, which has happened a couple of times. I think they would call in the National Guard. And instead, when it happens, and you know, this is my emotion coming through, and I want you to respond and see if you agree, but I think when the target of those limited instances, but they are happening, of intimidation and harassment of Jewish students, that we go to these thoughtful conversations around First Amendment and free speech. And I don't think we'd be having those conversations if those limited instances of harassment and intimidation were being levied against any other special interest group,

which to my mind is a bias and, quite frankly, more dangerously, anti-Semitism. What are your thoughts? Well, you know, interesting. I'll point to something someone, a friend of mine, sent. His daughter's at Harvard, and she had tweeted out, today protesters at Harvard chanted, there is only one solution, the Intifada revolution. One solution clearly evokes Hitler's final solution.

How hard can it be to avoid anti-Semitic genocide? Curious language, which makes Jewish students like me feel unsafe on campus. And I wrote back to him, I said, unfortunately, as heinous as this is, it is kind of free speech, you know, it is makes you feel unsafe, were they blocking her and stuff like that? And I said, I'm so still so sorry. And he then responded, which was interesting. Yes, her response is basically saying the protesters are assholes, which is also free speech, which was interesting. Yes, her response is basically saying the protesters are assholes, which is also free speech, which was interesting. And that's, this is a particularly

thoughtful young woman I know is a daughter of a friend of mine. And I think you're right about this professors if they take there's is a line. And what worries me is making more out of it, not letting peaceful protests go on. Like the ability for people to have protests as heinous things, they may say heinous things, is still, I'm pretty far down that line on college campuses. And with comedians, I'm very far down that line. But I get this feeling of lack of safety. I remember when I was in college, there was a bunch of anti-gay, there were straight people of Georgetown University on the campus. I felt unsafe.

I walked by them. And, of course, the campus didn't do anything about these guys. And I felt unsafe, but in a different way. Unsafe was the wrong word. I felt offended, very deeply offended. And unsafe, I guess, too. But I didn't want them not to talk, I guess. I didn't ever call for them not to be able to do that. One of the things that I think is hard is that you have all these politicians like Johnson

showed up at Columbia, or Hawley or Cotton, probably Cotton, asking for the National Guard to come in. We're not at, this is fucking ridiculous. Well, first off, you highlighted the correct distinction. I think we should offer a really wide berth to a 19-year-old who's exploring the boundaries of free speech. They should not be allowed to intimidate people or harass people. And I don't think most are. I don't think they are. who harass people, and I don't think most are. I don't think they are. The ones who do, you need a life lesson in what it means to call your parents and say,

the $100,000 you're spending on me has been wasted for the next few weeks because I've been suspended for supporting a murderous autocracy. I'd like to listen to that conversation when they call their parents. They should be given a much wider birth, I think, than a professor. Any professor that is doing anything that creates an environment of intimidation or that makes certain special interest groups black, gay, who are born... I mean, the whole point is we have laws that basically say you can't discriminate against people for anything that they're born with. We've just decided that is what it means to be in America. Any professor that does anything to add to that. Yeah. It's a more problematic situation. And guess what? When people sign the front of your check, they get to evaluate you. Like, for what? For being that? As long as they didn't, like, they can stand there and do that. They were showing support for their students in that case. But you're right, there's a different line. Anyway,

let's move on. Thank you for this thoughtful discussion. Another one that people are going to get very angry about is right before taping New York's highest court overturned Harvey Weinstein's 2020 conviction on sex crime charges. The court found the judge who presided over the case made a mistake by allowing witnesses who were not part of the charges against him into the case. It's a technicality. That's what it is. And I am sorry to tell everybody, but you got to do it right if you're going to convict someone. Same thing with Trump, same thing with all of them. And we have rules in these courtrooms. And they obviously, the panel decided that he'd have been unfairly convicted, even if he was guilty. He has been convicted in California, too. So he's not out. He's not getting out in any sense. He's a serial rapist, obviously. But I think a lot of people, there's going to be a big reaction here to what is essentially, he's getting off on a technicality. I don't know, Bill Cosby? I mean, this happens. We have a law. We have, and people, anyways, yeah, I don't, I agree with you. I don't think

we're in some manner. Yeah, I don't know what to say. But I think that it will certainly spur a lot of sort of, it'll be interesting because I think, again, I think women are already on a hair trigger around these things, around abortion and everything else. It may be like, they may link it to Trump or, you know what I mean? Like, there's going to be a bigger thing here around this. Even if, even if your sensible person goes, okay, a technicality, your emotional person is like, that fucking rapist, are you kidding me, gets off. Like, that's going to go through the minds of, I've gotten 20 texts from women today that are just beside themselves. And I'm like, well, you know, being sensible is not going to work here.

Anyway, let's get to our first big story. There's a lot of earnings news out there this week. Let's start with Meta's Q1. The company saw revenue increase 27% from $28.65 billion in the same period last year. Net income more than doubled to $12.37 billion. This company is making some money, but Meta's forecast of rising costs related to AI, they've replaced their virtual reality stuff with AI, which is very expensive, sent its share price down 15% in extended trading. It's going to cost some money for them to get into this business. Mark Zuckerberg said on the earnings call that his immediate goal is getting millions or billions of people using Meta AI with revenue coming down the line. They do not have revenue plans.

That's one thing we need to stress. A lot of this AI doesn't have a business plan yet. And or there's a small business plan and there's anticipation of huge profits in the future. So he's doubling down on doing this. And at the same time, his current business is killing it, right? I mean, thoughts? It's arguably, unfortunately for our children, this is one of the best-run companies in the world. It's just the amount of money here they're printing. I thought the most interesting thing about their earnings call relative to Tesla was Tesla's massive investment

in AI. You know, Musk was bragging about how many GPUs they'd ordered because he's trying to create a distraction from the fact his core business is in decline. That's what metaphors. So should he be focusing on the other parts of his business? No, because he's going to have, this is something we were both making fun of his investments in virtual reality and Oculus, et cetera, et cetera. And all the metaverse stuff, and changing the name. We thought that was ridiculous and a waste of money and throwing money down a toilet, essentially. In this case, do you think the spending, which is going to be massive, he's got to be in here, right? This is not a choice. I can't predict if these investments are going to pay off, but I think they have to make them.

When you have the premier technology eating the world and the market seems to offer you a return on investment on the perception that you're investing here, I mean, to a certain extent, even despite the fact, let me back up. Microsoft has spent more money on AI than every other company in venture capitalists, I believe, combined. If you look at Microsoft and its affiliates and its proxies, it is, Satya Nadella is now considered, in my opinion, probably the brightest mind in business. And I mean, there's a lot of them, but his forward-leaning investments in AI have increased the market cap of that company probably $1 to $1.4 trillion off of a huge investment, but relative to $1.4 trillion.

It's the best corporate investment. It's probably arguably the best venture investment in history. And so everyone says we can't be the company that got behind. I mean, quite frankly, supposedly the brightest man in technology, Musk, he's way behind in AI. He talks about it a lot. He doesn't have a single real victory in AI. He doesn't have a single real victory in AI. He's known in AI for walking away from the most successful AI company ever without a single share or anything. So he's trying to play catch up. And everyone, so I think Mark Zuckerberg taking his forward-leaning investments, which he can afford out of virtual reality into AI, that just feels right as rain to me. Yeah. Yeah, I agree. I mean, look, his main business right now is going to carry him through.

Look at these increases. He owns the current business environment, right? It looks like, you know, these numbers are really impressive. And it's sort of like Microsoft's owning Windows and leaning into the future, right? Like where they wanted to lean and when they leaned into cloud, for example. But this is so much more expensive. It's just, he has to do this. And I think people were thrilled when he was making cuts to employees, but this stuff is expensive. And it's also, we have to build new fabs. It's just, there's going to be enormous investment here for this. And as we get quantum computing and he just can't, he cannot miss this turn or else another company will take over the next version of business, even without a business plan that people can foresee at this moment. But it's almost like

shifting from horses to cars. That's what, you know, we're going to have cars. The other big shift that just really blew me away, Meta is essentially a video company. Video now represents more than 60% of time on both Facebook and Instagram. On Instagram- Isn't that your experience now with it? It's pretty much video. But it wasn't that way just two or three years ago. I mean, think about just how fucked TV is. On Instagram, reels makes up 50% of the time that's spent on Instagram. And that's a new product, and it's a video-based product. It's not images. It's not stills. It's video. I mean, people constantly criticize, including myself, Meta for its inability to come up with new products.

including myself, Meta for its inability to come up with new products. It's not good at hardware, but technically speaking, their pivot or supplemental or their venture into video has been enormously successful. And also, they're getting a big bump this week from the TikTok bill passing and Biden signing it. I mean, this is a waterfall to all companies, and especially Facebook. There's a great story in The Washington Post as to how these legislators quietly got together to do this, but they got a lot of lift from Facebook. He's been talking about this. He talked about it with me in 2019. He's been aiming at TikTok and China for years, and now he's gotten his reward. But I don't think it's a fait accompli. I think my prediction is that...

Oh, don't tell your prediction. Let's wait. Let's wait. Let's wait. Because let's talk about the Tesla's earnings. You were talking about them investing. Their profit fell 55% to $1.1 billion, quite a small company, from the first quarter of 2023. And the revenue fell 9% to $21.3 billion, the biggest decline since 2012. The drop in sales was steeper than Tesla's last decline in 2020, which was due to disrupted production during COVID. Tesla put the focus on some of its other efforts. He's the jazziest hands of jazz hands on earnings call, including accelerating the launch of more affordable models, which he didn't give any details about, cyber taxis, which he didn't really give any details about, and everything else. He's been

doing a number of things to try to jazz up the stock. And the one thing that did affect people is cuts, job cuts, which immediately, someone asked me why the stock went up. And I said, because he's doing job cuts, and you can do the math, right, essentially. These numbers are rough numbers, but the stock has been going up in the last few days, largely, I think, because of cost savings that you'll see on the bottom line for the next earnings. Thoughts on this? They're trying to create any sort of misdirect or weapon of mass distraction from the fact it's an automobile company that's attracted a lot of competition and will ultimately trade it like an automobile company. So they went out of their way to talk about the fact that their energy storage business would grow at least 75% from 2023, but that's a pimple on the elephant at this company.

And they're just trying, and then they're saying, and we're spending all of this money on AI, and when Elon Musk goes into a new category, watch out, and people should pay attention because he is a genius around innovation. But they're trying to talk about anything, but their core- Yeah, he's far too distracted. Well, that's a different talk show in the sense that, I mean, one of the reasons Meta is performing is Mark Zuckerberg is not launching rockets into space or buying Sky Media or

whatever. He's not buying MySpace. Musk is very distracted with a lot of different things. And this is an automobile company. So they're trying to say, look over here, AI, look over here, our energy business. But here's the thing. If you look at Tesla, Google trades at 20 times, Enterprise Value EBITDA, Google's 20,

Meta's 21, Microsoft is 26. These are both, quite frankly, better businesses. Tesla, despite being the worst performing stock year to date in the S&P, trades at 35 times. Now let's compare that to auto companies. GM is seven times. BYD, their biggest competitor, trades at six times. So if Tesla just normalizes across big tech, it's going to get cut in half again. And if Tesla, if people finally acknowledge, wake up from their hallucination and realize this is not a mobile company, it's probably down 50% to 80% in the next year. Yeah. Well, he does not want to be called a tech arc. He actually, in the call, very noted this. He said, we should be thought of as an AI robotics company if you value Tesla as just an auto company, just the wrong framework. If you ask the wrong question,

then the right answer is impossible. He's really a clever piece of person. AI robotics? Yeah, that's what he said. It's a car. I get it. But he's, of course, pushing the affordable car forward. They were going to have a more affordable car, which they were delayed, and now he's going to do them earlier. He's got to deliver. He can't make these promises.

His mouth is making a lot of promises he can't possibly deliver. But, yes, he's an AI robotics company is what they're doing. And that's his line. That's his line. Okay, let's see it. Let's see. To me, I'm just like, show us the money. Show us the money kind of thing.

He went on to encourage the autonomous non-believers to get lost. Of course, this is what he always does. He can't possibly make a statement without saying something obnoxious. If somebody doesn't believe that Tesla is going to solve autonomy, I think they should not be an investor in this company. And we will, and we are. That is his bet. That is his thing.

He's made a lot of promises he never kept. He really feels that when Tesla switches on full self-driving, he's going to say it's going to be the biggest asset value appreciation in history. So, you know, okay. Sounds like Cathie Wood. Yeah, well. You should go through transition and wear chunky glasses and start a hedge fund that loses a lot of money. Well, you know what? I think if he could come out with more affordable cars, he'd be in a better

position. But the overall market's harder and the China competition and the competition competition, I just... You want to get into an affordability competition with China? Yeah, that's exactly... You want to get into an affordability race with the Ben Johnson of affordability, see above China? Also service. If one more picture of a cyber truck getting hauled away because it got stuck in the mud, he's getting, speaking of video and all, he's getting killed by videos about these trucks. And they seemingly didn't sell very many either. So for a car that only sold, it looks like a couple thousand.

Boy, is it an outsized lemon. Like, you know, again, he's getting killed in all ways. Look, good luck, Elon. We hope you become an AI robotics company. That's great for you. Good. But just to, you know, I just feel like I got to- Please, sum it up. I do think I've owned a Tesla. It is a fantastic car. It's just, it should trade at the upper range of automobile companies. It should be the highest multiple on EBITDA of any auto company, which means it's going to go down 60 to 70%. And still, I would argue back, it hasn't had a new thing in a while,

and the service sucks, from what I understand. Is that right? I've never had... Yeah, a lot of people, and a lot of people. I've had this complaint from lots of Tesla owners. Service is not as good as the ones who are good at service, which are the big car companies. Service is an important part of car shop. The other thing is new, fresh things. It has not had a new, fresh look except for the Cybertruck, which is not fresh. It's something else. I can validate the problems around service.

When he called me an insufferable numbskull, I took a big dump in the passenger seat, and no one came to clean it up from Tesla. Do you still have your Tesla? Oh, no. Look, you taught me this. The moment he started being mean, I'm going to virtue signal now and feel masculine. That's okay. When he called you the definition of pure evil, I'm like, look, I give the guy a hard time. No, my heart was filled with hate. That was your heart. Heart was filled with hate. Yeah, seething. When he said that shit. And it wasn't even like tongue in cheek.

It was like he woke up and decided that you're the definition of pure evil. You said something to me that always struck me. Why am I painting this guy's fucking fence? Yeah. I sold my Tesla and I haven't been on Twitter in almost a year now. Yeah. Well, thank you, Scott. I appreciate it.

In any case, good luck, Elon, with your robotics company. And by the way, I now see you a lot better since I took ketamine. Anyway, Microsoft and Alphabet earnings are coming out after record. Any predictions? Microsoft and who? Alphabet. You've heard of them? Google.

Well, I don't know if you've heard this, but big tech is just this great business. They've got this thing. I think it's called SAM, Sericha, Search. And it's a monopoly, and it keeps printing money. Look, the answer is I don't know, but the good money is always on big tech. So I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that the numbers are going to be amazing. Even with Meta, their numbers were amazing, but their stock has accelerated so much that the, I think people were hoping for another like, oh, I fired half the staff and my revenues are still going up.

Yes. Firing people gets you good stock hits. I'll tell you that. All right, Scott, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, we'll talk about the impact of the FTC banning non-competes, your favorite topic, and take a listener mail question about how the TikTok bill might impact the election. 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.

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Scott, we're back with our second big story. The Federal Trade Commission voted three to two this week to ban non-compete employment agreements, which prevent workers from taking positions with competitors. The rule is set to go into effect in 120 days, but the U.S. Chamber of Commerce has already filed a suit to block it, as did Texas-based tax firm Ryan LLC, and everybody's on board, all the business people. They're represented by Eugene Scalia, the son of, I think, son of Antonin Scalia. It's in Texas, their venue shopping here, which they'll probably get a good decision there for them, and it'll move up the chain. So she went out, she went for it. Lena Kahn went for it. It's a decision. If you're someone looking to change jobs right now, it could be a big deal. It limits it to big executives still can have non-competes, but there's non-competes of like chefs and things like that. The FTC estimates the ban will increase worker earnings by up to $488 billion over the

next decade and lead to the creation of over 8,500 new businesses a year. Sometimes non-compete is necessary, but let me hear over on them. We'll talk about where it might be exceptions, like senior executives and stuff like that. Look, if Lena Kahn's not careful, she's going to replace Marguerite Bessier as my brain crush. I think she's having a huge impact.

And all non-competes are, all they are, is a transfer of wealth from labor to shareholders. When you have a small number of companies bidding on your labor, they don't have to bid as much. And two, when they take you out of the marketplace with a non-compete and you can't go naturally to another bidder on your labor who would be most interested in your specific type of labor. It's effectively a transfer of wealth from labor, which tends to be young people who make good money but not great money, to shareholders who tend to be older. I mean, everything is a transfer of wealth from labor to capital and from young to old.

And this rule is absolutely hostile towards labor. It's not as if these companies are hurting and there's huge disruption when people leave and they don't know how to make a shit ton of money. You know, I had a non-compete. My company was purchased for $160 million. They wanted us to sign non-competes. I didn't have to cash their check. It sucks to be a grown-up for that kind of money. I can sort of see, if you will, the rationale, legitimacy for a non-compete. But anyone below,

anyone who's not making literally a windfall needs to have the leverage to take advantage of the competition in the free market that all these companies enjoy, but their workers don't get access to multiple bidders on their companies. I take them out of all my contracts. I'm like, forget it. I'm not signing this with a non-competent. California banned them. And forcibility is also something. They don't tend to come after you, but they can, is the issue. It's just the same thing with nondisclosures. They can, they don't often do it. You know, what you do is what you do, and you should be able to do what you want once you leave a job. You know, if you steal IP or you steal data or you steal software, that's a different story. That's a very different story.

That's property theft. Property theft. And if you're a high-level executive, you do have secret. You do know sort of secret sauce stuff. And even then, I'm like, no. No, you don't get to keep. You're done with your relationship. You should be able to do whatever you want. I'm, again, very loose on this kind of stuff. And, you know, lots of people have left my employee,

they can do whatever they want. They just, they can, they should be able to do what we train them to do. It absolutely restricts innovation, it restricts job creation, it restricts people being able to express themselves through labor the way they want to. Of course, they are suing and saying it's taking away something from us. And they're venue shopping by doing this in Texas, in the East Texas federal courts, because they're so pro-business. But, you know, and it'll be it won't go into effect. They'll do a stay pretty quickly from what I understand. But eventually these will succeed. And I cannot imagine a Supreme Court that will not vote in favor of workers here. professors and chefs. What's next? Not competes for domestic workers, where if you sign up to take care of my kids and take care of my house, you can't work for another family for a year, two years after you leave me, basically making you a total- Slave. Yeah. I didn't want to use that word because people get angry, but totally, you have no one

bidding. How about a not compete for babysitters? You can only watch my kids. Oh, and I'm only going to pay you nine bucks an hour because you don't have any choice. I mean, those are exaggerated. It gets ridiculous when you actually do it. Another transfer of wealth from American workers and youth to shareholders who tend to be older. This is the next thing I hope she goes after, and she's my new hero here, is non-solicitations. Interesting. And this notion that when someone breaks off and starts a business that they can't hire people from there.

That they know. I agree. I agree with that. I don't even get that one. All of those seem so. Whenever I see them in my contracts, I X them out. And I'm like, well, then I won't work for you. I don't know what to say.

If the company wants a non-solicitation, they should pay their people more. Yeah, that's exactly right. That's exactly right. We are pro people being able to move around and do whatever they want, even if it impacts us. I mean, there's, I think of all the different people,

I don't want them not to do what they should, even if they copy things I do. Like, okay, good luck. That's what I say. Bonne chance. See if you can beat me. You know, I think you should be competing on the quality of what you make and not on stopping people.

It's like tying people's shoes in a race. It's just stupid. Anyway, good Lena. I ran into her the other night at an event. She was doing well. I bet. She's feeling her. Well, she's got to win.

A lot of these, she may not win. She's going to have these big legal fights. And everyone thinks just because she's, I think the greatest part here, two things that she what a lot of people think is that if they try to start this, legislators are going to take this up and make it a rule, like get rid of non-competes as a legislative thing, you know, and then that's that, then they're done with that. And so they think that's the benefit of what she's doing is she's signaling them to do something about it or challenging them to do something about it. Anyway, and I think that's just as good to bring up the issue and make people realize what a scam this is. Anyway, let's pivot to a listener question.

This question comes from Eric. Let's listen. Hi, Scott and Kara. This is Eric from San Diego. How do you think the TikTok bill is going to influence turnout from young voters in the presidential election? There are key constituent Biden needs to win the election, and Trump has already taken a position against any legislation. How might it affect young voter turnout for Biden and Trump? And how do you think the Biden campaign is planning to spin it to them? Thanks for thoughtful answers. I'll start. I don't think it's going to have any impact. I think people are. Gaza, yes, definitely. People are upset. Young people are definitely upset, including my young

people. I would, but I think they're still going to vote for Biden. I think, you know, at least my sons are. I don't know what they're going to vote for. But, you know, it was interesting because I saw a picture of, I just recently saw Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez with sunglasses with Biden. She was doing a lot of stuff with Biden around climate change in this case. moderate Jewish people to vote for, even though they thought initially they thought she was challenged from the right a little bit in the Democratic Party, a more conservative group in the Democratic Party. I think they're going to vote. Gaza will be an issue, but I don't think TikTok will. I just don't. I just think you're not going to lose your TikTok. You're going to still be able to use it. It's a long time. I think Trump is just being opportunistic. I don't think people think he's for young people on much of anything. And you could hang around his neck that he was for it before. I don't know. Your thoughts?

or the unknown knowns, Jesus, whatever it was that the defense secretary said. But we know that immigration is going to be probably a big deal in the election. We know that bodily autonomy is likely going to be a big issue. I think the two biggest issues that will determine the president or have an impact on the presidential race that we're not talking about are one, Ross Perot and Ralph Nader elected Bill Clinton and George Bush, respectively. And I don't think we're talking enough about RFK Jr. Whatever happens with RFK is probably going to determine who the next president is. And we just don't like to admit it. No, he's up to double digits in some states. Yeah, he's in the teens. So whoever he draws from is going to lose.

Fair point. There is no reason why Bill Clinton, an unknown governor from Arkansas, should have won against an incumbent president who was actually fairly popular. But Perot pulled from Bush. And that's why he had 18% and something like 11 to 7. I miss him. Ross. How you doing? I talked to him a bunch of times.

I really enjoyed every time I talked to him. Yeah, my favorite stat about Ross was that in the cafeteria, he would always say that people were supposed to call him Ross, but his senior executives that reported to him were told to call him Mr. Perot. Anyways, but no, in the cafeteria, call him Ross, call him Ross. Anyways, interesting character. I think RFK is, not RFK himself, and by the way, he's the guest on Bill Maher, which I'm going on tomorrow. Who is? RFK Jr. What?

Yeah. Oh, my God. I'm curious if he's going to be on the overtime panel with me and Don Lemon. Oh, I'm sure he is. Oh, Scott, I cannot wait. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know.

Yeah. I'm going to bring a fucking vaccine and I'm going to jump at his arm. You know what I'm going to do? I'm going to take a vaccine live on air. I'm going to say, oh, guess what? I've decided I don't have my head up my ass. Gink and do a vaccine. Can you please make some trouble there? That is good trouble. I want you to make some trouble there. Anyways, I doubt he's going to. I wonder if he'll be on the overtime panel. We'll see.

He's not going to get away. That's a small room there at Bill Maher. You're running into him. That is happening. I want to meet his wife. I think his wife is really, she seems really nice to me. Sure. Hines, yeah. Yeah. Anyways, and then the other thing we're not talking as much about is that in pretty much every election, we look back and we go, this medium absolutely had a disproportionate impact with Kennedy and television, with Obama and Google, with Trump and Facebook. This is the TikTok election. And I think whoever, so the legislation against TikTok, I agree with you, no impact. Having said that, TikTok itself, and specifically whoever is most deft in their use of TikTok. But Biden's staying on TikTok, just so you know, with security measures in place. Just

be clear, he's not coming off of it. No, with security measures in place. Just be clear. He's not coming off of it. But whoever behind the scenes is spending money, manipulating, weaponizing, figuring out that algorithm to the greatest use, that TikTok, this is the TikTok election, Cara. It's going to be whoever masters. And Reels. I would think Reels, too. Call it video.

But that's the impact it's going to have. It's not going to be, oh, well, they're banning TikTok. I'm not working for it. I mean, fucking Trump wanted to carve it up and give it to his Republican donors, and now he didn't be exactly what he said, the third party and also the use of it. I do think abortion and immigration are the obvious two that are, and the two that are going to sort of fight it out. Crime is sort of pulled back a little bit. I don't think these protests will be that much, but Gaza certainly will, or Israel. You do think Gaza is going to play a role in the election? I don't know. I don't know if it's going to get, you know, things will calm down. I think we're in such a, speaking of like the way we live, we're in such a next news story cycle. Like it's fast.

Things don't hold. Things don't stay with people the way they used to. I do think abortion and immigration do. I think people are thinking about them. And I think abortion is a lot more powerful than you think. thinking about them. And I think abortion is a lot more powerful than you think. And I do think this Harvey Weinstein thing will remind women what a pig Donald Trump is with women. And the fact that rapists get away with it, and we can't do what we want with our bodies. And, you know, they just, in Arizona, they're getting rid of that 1864 law. I think the House passed it. Now the Senate has to.

But it's still, it's very, it's a very good issue for Democrats. That's for sure. Anyway, we'll see. Do you have anything else, Scott? No, I just wanted to point out that the Republicans have softened their stance in Arizona and across elections.

Yeah. But be clear, folks, this is the equivalent of a Supreme Court nominee saying that this is, you know, this is decided precedent and lying. And then the moment they're in office or in the seat deciding to overturn Roe v. Wade, these hard right Republicans running or which is any Republican right now on this issue. The moment they're elected, just be clear, you're going to get what you you're going to get what you voted for, and you're voting for a lack of access to family planning. If Donald Trump has a federal abortion bill in front of him, he will sign it. 100%.

100 fucking, and he will help pass it. They've all said, keep it to yourself until I'm elected, and then all of a sudden we'll decide that, oh, wait, no, federal ban. And billionaires, you're getting a tax cut. He's going to do all the things that he says he's going to do. And we're going to close the borders. They're going to do all those things. So if you want that, vote for him. Anyway, if you've got a question of your own you'd like answered by us, send it our way.

And thank you so much for the question this week from Eric from San Diego. Go to nymag.com slash pivot to submit a question for the show or call 855-51-PIVOT. All right, Scott, one more quick break. We'll be back for predictions. Okay, Scott, you were almost saying a prediction, but then you held back. So let's hear your predictions. Such a tease. Mine's simple, and I've said this before.

We are going to see, we predicted this, we are going to see the quote-unquote forced divestment or what is being labeled a ban of TikTok. It's going to go through. You're not going to lose your TikTok. It's not going to happen. My experience in business is that it's always good to bet on money, and money will win here, as it always does. And there's so much money on the line.

And what people don't appreciate is they think of a ban as being zero and one. This isn't a ban. This is giving the president authority within nine or 12 months to force them to divest. And what people aren't being thoughtful about is there is a ton of light, sunlight in between that, because they're dealing with the White House. And they might say, hey, okay, Mr. President, is there an opportunity for us to come to some sort of accommodation, dual class shareholders, data stored here, whatever it might be. dual-class shareholders, data stored here, whatever it might be. Folks, you are not going to lose your TikTok. And the reason they will come to the table and figure out an accommodation is that on the American side, a lot of people love TikTok, and there are a lot of very influential American organizations, including General Atlantic Partners and Sequoia Capital, who have tens, if not

hundreds of billions on the line here. And also, the Chinese want the money. There's no reason they shouldn't find some sort of accommodation. Money wins. It'll win here, folks. The platform will not effectively be banned. You're not going to lose your TikTok. And there will be lawsuits just for, there'll be lawsuits, but it's a waste of time. They got, lawsuits are a negotiating tactic here. And so they've got to get to some company.

It's not going, this is not being turned back. And maybe they'll win and the thing, but it'll kill their business if they're spending all their time doing lawsuits. It'll just kill TikTok. That's what'll kill TikTok, spending all their time doing lawsuits. It'll just kill TikTok. That's what will kill TikTok, spending all their time doing it. They got to come to a place where they can keep moving forward with their business because this is the cards they're dealt with. Yeah, but this is the CCP.

This is not a negotiation between ByteDance and the White House. It's a negotiation between Xi and Biden. Well, they should do it because it'll end up not being popular. You'll stop using it is what will happen anyway. And you'll abandon it. By the way, in the end, you'll abandon it anyway because kids, that's what you do. Anyway, that's the show. I'm off to interview your not-girlfriend, Senator Maria Cantwell. Tell her I'm a huge fan and we were meant to be together. I shall not. I shall do none of the things. We were supposed to be set up. That's a true story. We were supposed to be together. I shall not. I shall do none of the things. We were supposed to be set up. That's a true story. We were supposed to be set up. And it's never going to be said

by me to her in any way because she's a U.S. senator. I'm going to treat her like a U.S. senator. The first dude of Washington. We're going to talk about TikTok, among other things, because she was integral

to moving this forward, and talk about her privacy bill. And, you know, she was a marketing executive at Real Networks when I met her. She was a dot-com millionaire. That's what she was. And that's how she sort of vaulted herself into the Senate. Been there a long time. Really smart person. And so I'm excited. I haven't talked to her in a long time. Anyway, I'm very excited. We'll be back on Tuesday with more Pivot and so much more to talk to. There's all kinds of earnings coming up, all kinds of things.

And let's say everybody go out and buy Scott's book. I want him on the top of the New York. I tell him he's going to be number one. He doesn't think so. As usual, he has to denigrate himself. But he is going to be number one in the New York Times bestsellers. He is actually competing against a lot of books. Just so you know, Doris Kearns Goodwin has a book.

Salman Rushdie has a book. There's a lot of books out there. But I have this feeling if you're not one, you'll be two. Me, Doris Kearns Goodwin, and Salman Rushdie. Yeah, you got to see who's running against you at the time, who's up in the nonfiction stuff. You've got a lot of competition. That's literally the throuple from hell. That's a throuple. Oh, my God.

Jesus. Doris Kearns Goodwin. She could be at the number one. Oh, my God. Jesus. Doris Kornskirwin. She could be at the number one. She could, too. Yeah. And not only that, Doris deserves it. Yeah. Yeah.

She does the work. She does the work. Yeah, she does. Yeah. So that's a big book. There's a couple of big books coming out. But you are going to be right up there near the top. So everybody go buy Scott's book and buy his audio book, because I bet that's selling really well, too.

And make him a bestseller so we can be bestsellers together. That's right. I am desperate for your affirmation. And by the way, this offer still holds. If you buy my book and post the receipt on any social, I will donate $50 to Charity Water that continues to bring potable water to Sub-Saharan Africa. Wow. Whoa, Scott, that's good. What a good technique. Right? Pretend I actually care about the world, but just get daddy at the top of the list. The top of the list. Anyway, go buy his book. Okay, Scott, we'll be back on Tuesday with more Pivot, so read us out. Today's show was

produced by Lara Naiman, Zoe Marcus, and Taylor Griffin. Ernie Andretat engineered this episode. Thanks also to Drew Burrows and Neil Severio. Nishat Kerouac is Vox Media's executive producer of audio. Make sure you subscribe to the show wherever you listen to podcasts. Thanks for listening to Pivot from New York Magazine and Vox Media. You can subscribe to the magazine at nymag.com slash pod. We'll be back next week for another breakdown of all things tech and business. Surround yourself with friends that call you and save you from yourself. Yesterday, Kara called me and told me

I was being a fucking idiot. You need people in your life. You need guardrails. Hold on to those people.