The Best One Yet - “Instagram for your ears” — Zynga’s audio Words. FireEye’s hack-tastrophe. Apple’s creativity crusher.

Episode Date: December 15, 2020

After years of making mobile games for your phone, Zynga’s partnering up with Google Home for a completely new concept: Audio-only games. FireEye is supposed to protect the computers Fortune 500 companies… until it got hacked. And Apple just killed a TV series because San Francisco is the new Los Angeles.$ZNGA $FEYE $AAPL $GOOGGot a SnackFact? Tweet it @RobinhoodSnacks @TBOYJack @NickOfNewYorkWant a shoutout on the pod? Fill out this form:https://forms.gle/KhUAo31xmkSdeynD9Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is Nick. This is Jack. And this is Snacks Daily. It is Tuesday. Tea Boy Tuesday, December 15th. We're kicking things up with a shout out to Sandra Lindsay, a nurse at Long Island Jewish Medical Center, the first American to get the COVID vaccine. Jack, we're talking first inoculation of 2020 looking sharp.

Early favorite for 2021 word of the year. Inoculated. Exactly. In the meantime, honestly, Jack and I whipped up probably our, would you say this is our best snacks daily we've ever done? This is a T-boy for our first story. Zinga just. partnered up with Google Home for something completely new.

Get this, it's games for your ears, not your eyes, not your thumbs, just the ears. For our second story, a cybersecurity company that claims on their website, Fire Eye knows more about cybersecurity than anyone. Awkward timing, Jack, because they also announced last week they just got hacked more than anyone. They got majorly hacked more than anyone. Third. And final story, what do we got, Jack?

And Apple just decided to cancel a TV series that was set up for Apple TV Plus. this is about so much more than just a TV series. This is about canceling a schmovie. They're canceling a schmovey. It's what we're trying to say. It's a schmovey. But Snackers, before we hit that T-Boy Tuesday, it is T-Boy Tuesday,

and we're working on an album at Snacks Daily. Honestly, Jack and I haven't decided on the album art for this thing. What are we thinking, by the way? I know we can't afford that naked swimming baby from Nirvana. No, no, he is, he charges high prices now. He's tough to get. But we're talking about the best of snacks 2020 album we're putting out soon. That's right, Jack and are trying to whip up our greatest

hits from the, you know, the worst year. We want to know your favorite snack story from the past year. Jack, maybe it was, you know, Tesla becoming a young avocado trick. Or maybe you enjoyed Lulu Lemon's pandemic-proof mantra. Or could it have been Chewy's Barking Bundled? Love that one. Or how about one of the 38 times we talked about Casper's mattress, mattress, mattress? Maybe it was Darlene whipping up two pumps of the top shelf hazelnut cheese fantastic.

Dahlene is a Snacks Daily Hall of Famer. Snackers, we want to know what should be in the snack. best of 2020 album. This is the real deal of this album. It's a special podcast that is dropping next week while Nick and I are on vacation. So technically it's not an album. It's actually a podcast. We should clarify it. But you will decide what is in this fake album by responding to a tweet we sent out at Robin and Snacks asking for your favorite pod stories of the year. Or you can hit up Jack and me on Instagram or Twitter at T-Boy Jack at Nick of New York. The album is going to drop before the end of the year. Tour dates post-COVID TBD crowd surfing highly encouraged. Let's hit our three stars.

You're tuned in the snacks daily. We spoke to the lawyers and we got to get something legal out the way. The snacks about the hair ain't food. It's air candy. They don't reflect the views of the robberhood family. It's all informational just so. You know, we're not recommending any securities. It's not a research report or investment advice. Not an offer or sale of a security. Right. Snacks is digestible. Business news for you. Robberhood finance. LLZ, member FINRA slash SIPC. For our first story, Apple, almost launched an exciting, original TV show. This was going to be great.

Then CEO Tim Kick intervened and dramatically killed the deal. So that got Jack and I wondering, who is really deciding what we watch on streaming? But first, Nick, let me throw out some words for you. Gocker. Yep. Jezabelle. Following you. Dead spin.

Okay, I got you. Gizmodo. This was my Chrome browser's bookmarks back in 2011. We're talking blue. blogs that broke the rules of journalism over here. Gawker launched blogs when it was cool to launch blogs. Yeah, which was, I think, before it was cool to launch podcasts? Yes. Now, founded, in 2003, Gawker was an online media company that thrived writing

mostly true things that embarrassed powerful people. Jack was there in a fair. Someone got caught in the line, maybe a leak. That is the juice that Gocker thrived on and what drove the clicks. And Gocker enjoyed a whole bunch of growth from that, but then got destroyed by billionaire Peter Tio, who financed lawsuits suing it into oblivion. That's a whole other story that you can feel free to Google to learn more about. But here's what Jack and I thought was fascinating. A bunch of former Gockers thought that the drama of their former employer Gocker

could make for a pretty interesting TV show. We agree from the founding to the blogs, to the blogs, to the destruction from a lawsuit. That sounds pretty interesting. It could have gone from blog to streaming to podcast, I think is what you're trying to say. Now, these former Gockers, they sold the story. to Apple TV Plus, which really needs another show in this post-morning show era that they're in. Jack, we're living in a world without Jennifer Aniston, and I don't know if I can get through it. So the deal got sold, but then the show got killed because Tim Cook, Apple CEO, heard about the deal.

Turns out, Tim Cook has got some bad blood with Gawker because they added him with an article against Cook's will just a few years ago. Back in 2008, Gawker published that the not yet Apple CEO was gay, and he hadn't announced it yet himself. understandably very upset about this. So then this year, Tim Cook's like, Gawker is not getting a show while I'm running the company. That's right. Tim Cook stepped in, personally intervened to stop this Gawker show from happening. So Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies over at Apple TV Plus? The power in media has shifted from Hollywood moguls to Silicon Valley CEOs. The heads and movie studios used to have huge power on the movies and shows we were all watching and

consume. And these movies and shows that we watch and consume, they shape our culture. Yes, they did. So Jack and I have complained when we used to see movie studios remove elements that, like Chinese censors, didn't like them, including in our movies. Today, however, streaming video is winning. And the streamers, they're all owned by big tech companies. Jack, I'm going over our little whiteboard over here. We got Apple TV Plus, 40 million subscribers in the U.S. You got Netflix, 73 million U.S. subscribers. And then I'm not even going to count everything going on with Amazon Prime. So now the tech CEOs are designed. what movies and shows get made, and art, entertainment, those aren't always the priorities.

No, they're not. Here are the questions, Jack and I think they're asking, does it affect our other business lines? What will the impact be on our international expansion plans? And is doing this show going to invite regulation? In 2014, Sony greenlit and produced the movie, the interview, which parodied North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un. Yes, it did. But here's the thing Jack and I are thinking, that kind of film probably would have been killed by Apple if they were going to put it on their own streaming service. Tim Cook doesn't want to risk Apple's profits, and he doesn't want to ruffle a North Korean dictator's feathers. That means power shifted from Hollywood to Silicon Valley. For our second story, mobile gaming icon Zinga is launching an

unprecedented partnership. Zinga wants to put games in your ears with the help from Google. Okay, Zenga Snaggers. We're talking the OG of mobile games. Jack, bring me back. Words of Friends Farmville? Never played the latter, played the former a bunch of times. Zinga followed the piggyback strategy. Launch a game on Facebook and then grow as Facebook grows. Look, Ma, no hands. Now, Words with Friends Snackers, to those who haven't played, was like Scrabble.

Yes, it was. But there's no tiles you need to very carefully put in place over the double word score. The big question, Jack, were more friendships ended from Scrabble games or from Words with Friends games? I'm actually big on Scrabble. I think it's making a pandemic. come back. Problem, though, when you do the piggyback strategy and you happen to be Zinga. Yes, when Facebook tweaks their algorithm, they can crush Zinga. No more words, no more friends, and Zinga stock fell 80% in 2012. Eight years after that catastrophe snacker, Zinga, it hasn't

fully recovered. It really hasn't. But it is worth one lift, which is impressive. It's doing about $2 billion in revenue per year on their app-based mobile games. Which I'd like to point out has 71 games free to download and play. Do less, Zingga. do less. That led us to yesterday's shocker. Zinga has now partnered with Google Home for new games using the same piggyback strategy as eight years ago. That's what blew us away. Ful me once, shame on you. Fool me twice. Shame on the entire management over at Zinga. The differentiator this time, it's not on Facebook. These are voice-based games. You can talk to the Google Nest, the voice assistant, which controls your home, and play the game with it through your words.

So here's how Zinga and Google see this going down, which Jack and actually thought made a lot of interesting sense. Basically, you just yell out, hey Google, three across is S-N-A-C-K-S. This new game, the first audio game, is called Daily Word Wheel, which basically presents you one fun word puzzle per day. This is going to be a free new voice anagram puzzle. You can play while you're doing something else. So let's say you get snacks. That's a five-letter word that can also become can or sack, or even, Sacks. Gotta love those plurals. Those are where the winners are. But the key here is that you can be throwing all those words around while you're cooking up a lasagna on the side. You can ask your Google for a hint. Literally, hey Google, I don't know, give me a hint. And that's how you can play this new Zinga game. Now, there's a joke over at Zinga game that they're so desperate for new customers. They would put a game on a toaster if it gave them new customers. The best part about this joke is that this is the joke among Zinga employees. Apparently, we've got some PFWTMs. Because the goal is growth over at Zingka.

With this new audio game, they're trying to create gamers from people not playing games yet by catching them while they're multitasking. So, Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies? Search for growth over at Zenga. Smartphones blew up video games. Zinga thinks voice assistants will blow up audio games. Snackers, the app store is like stuff with free smartphone games for you to play all the time, with probably too many games for you to play all the time.

Zinga's been playing against, like, the bajillion free gaming apps on the app store, and they're exhausted. So they're creatively thinking ahead of where customers are today. So radio might be semi-dead right now, but audio definitely is not dead right now. Spotify invested a billion dollars in podcast companies. Clubhouse and audio-only social network is worth $100 million and yet only has one and a half thousand users. Audio is so in, over 100 million people are going to drop 200 bucks this year for Apple's AirPods. We're talking a jump of over 60%.

Zinga thinks that your ears want games just as much. as your eyes and thumbs do. And voice assistants now make that possible. For our third and final story, the most important cybersecurity company in the country just got hacked. But ironically, weirdly, that may not be a bad thing for them long term. No, long term, honestly, this may even be a good thing for them. Snackers, here is the headline that everyone else was looking at. Russian hackers broke into a bunch of U.S. federal government agencies this spring. All right, we're talking about like one of the biggest, most sophisticated hacks on the United States government ever, and it lasted for months just like undetected. We're talking born style. We just learned about it, but Russian attacks on

democracy, that's better covered on other podcasts. That's true. That's not why you guys tuned into Jack and I on Snacks Daily. Here's what Jack and I saw when we saw that headline. A Silicon Valley firm that prides itself on being the best in cybersecurity got hacked. Yeah, they were a victim as well. We're talking fire eye. They got hacked by the hackers. It's supposed to protect us against. Oh, by the way, it seems that Russia saw that we were focused on election security. So they hacked like everything else that we weren't looking at. Razzle-dazzle them on the left, dipsy-doodle them on the right. Now, this is a big deal because the hackers now have FireEye's playbook, which we're calling the Stop the Hackers Playbook. Yeah, basically, this is the toolkit

that Fire Eye uses to protect against the worst kind of hacks in the known universe. This is the toolkit that FireI uses for the other SaaS security as a service. And that's what they do, because FireI's customers include, get this, half of the Fortune 500, they're in big company. And they are doing business with a bunch of government agencies, including the Department of Homeland Security. What we're trying to say is some of your personal information is probably protected by FireI, and it's probably the Social Security number. Now, what FireI actually does, sounds kind of awesome. Honestly, this is such a thrilling business model. This should have been the last-born movie. Fire-Eyes clients ask Fire Eye to pretend that they are nefarious hackers and do their very

best to hack the company so that they can identify weaknesses and then protect against them. Snackers, Jack has been desperate to use the word nefarious at some point this year. I'm so glad we got this in before the end of 2020. Fire-Eyes clients are like, come at me, bro. Give me your best, bro. Come at me, bro. Now, the optics here of Fire Eye getting hacked themselves is not good. Yeah, because the service they're trying to sell customers they can't even use to protect themselves with. Fire Eye's stock is down 13% since the announcement because the top pest control guy in town, his whole house has been overrun by Ferrets. Nothing more adorable, nothing more scary. So Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies over at FireE? The best thing to happen to cybersecurity stocks was this major hacking. Funny thing Jack and I noticed

yesterday after the biggest hack of the year, cybersecurity ETFs exchange traded funds, they actually rose. The companies in that ETF, like Palo Alto Networks, Z-Scaler, and Fortinette, those are the big cybersecurity stocks, and they all jumped yesterday. That's because the whole Russian hacktastrophe highlighted a weakness in FIREI,

but that weakness was overwhelmed by something even greater. In a world where people are working from home, using the cloud, using their computer to do all of their work, everything. Cybersecurity is more important than ever. No company, though, is 100% hack-proof, even

the hack protector. Fire-Eyes failure just emphasizes the risk that we all face to cybersecurity. But then Jack and I think fire-ey's failure could ironically drive even more business. Jack, can you whip up the takeaways over there for us? Apple just killed a show about Gawker because Tim Cook is in charge. Silicon Valley, not Hollywood, is deciding what shows, what movies, which movies are getting made. For our second story, Zinga's latest game piggybacks off Google's new voice assistant. And we're thinking voice assistants could do to audio games with small. smartphones did to video games. For our third and final story,

Fire Eye fell victim to Russia's latest attack on America. It ironically just might actually boost the entire cybersecurity industry. Now, time for our snack facts sent in by snacker Fabian B in lovely Turlock, California. Turns out the Hula Hoop. You know the thing where you wiggle your hips? I'm doing it right now. Always every pot. The Hulu hoop was originally marketed as a fitness device to jiggle away the fat.

Well, apparently they found some nice products market fit because 100 million. and Hulu Hoops were sold in just the first six months of 1958. That is crazy. But today, Hulu Hoops are marketed as a device to get attention at the beach and to potentially make you nauseous. Also apparently powerful drivers of growth. Snackers, we need your help. Building our Snacks Daily, Best of 2020 album.

So make sure to reach out to us on Twitter at Robin Hood Snacks. Yeah, Jack and I want to drop this thing. You got to let us know your favorite story, your favorite, mattress, mattress. mattress. You can also DM us on Instagram at Nick of New York or T-Boy Jack. You look fantastic today. We'll see you tomorrow. And before we go, Snackers, we got to do this first time ever, our first ever Snacks Daily Gender Reveal on the pod live. Rucci in Chicago is having a baby boy. Congratulations. It's a baby boy, Rucci. Congratulations. Chicago does logistics. Rucci does boys. Also, big shout out to ER doctor Joseph Chek, who has worked 300 straight days in the ER in Trumbull, Connecticut.

And to Armin, Luca, Philip, James, and Casey, congrats all brown bears finishing their exams up in Providence. Big shout out to Oz and Sue, who just got married in Massachusetts, who hail from Turkey. And to Diane and Eric, happy anniversary over in Queens, New York. And happy anniversary to Dax and Emily in Pilsson, Kansas. And to Oscar Seeger and lovely Egan, Minnesota, Happy birthday. Oscar, any relation to Bob? Happy birthday to Aria in Ulaan Bata, Mongolia and Rodrigo Amaya in Jacksonville, Florida. And Tuvar in Norwalk, Connecticut. This is Jack, Nick owned stock of Apple, I own stock of Amazon, and Nick own stock of Lulu Lemon. The Robin Hood Snacks podcast you just heard reflects the opinions of only the hosts who are

associated persons of Robin Hood Financial LLC and does not reflect the views of Robin Hood Markets, or any of its subsidiaries or affiliates. The podcast is for informational purposes only and is not intended to serve as a recommendation to buy or sell any security and is not an offer or sale of a security. The podcast is also not a research report and is not intended to serve as the basis of any investment decision. Robin Hood Financial LLC, member FINRA, SIPC.