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Kara Swisher Discusses the Tech Industry · Masters in Business

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: This is Masters in Business with Barry Ridholtz on Boomberg Radio.
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: This week on the podcast, I have a special guest.
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: Her name is Kara Swisher. And if you are remotely
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: interested in anything related to technology, media, venture capital, CEO's privacy,
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: the weaponization of social media, and just about anything else
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: you might have seen about technology, well then you're in
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: for quite the treat. We went for about eight hours.
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: We took time out for sleeping and meals and basically
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: covered everything, uh from the rise of technology, how people
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: completely did not see this coming, what technology is going
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: to do to us in the future, and who the
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: hell is this Scott Galloway guy anyway, So I could
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: tell you all about it, but rather than do that,
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: I'm just gonna shut up and say my conversation with
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: Kara Swisher. This is Master's in Business with Barry Ridholts
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: on Bloomberg Radio. I'm Barry Ridholts. You're listening to Masters
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: in Business on Bloomberg Radio. My extra special guests this
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: week is Kara Swisher. She is the co founder of Recode,
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: sold recently to Vox. Before that, she was the longstanding
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: technology journalist along with Walt Mossburg over at the Wall
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: Street Journal. She is the author of a number of books,
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: including How Steve Case Beat Bill Gates and its sequel,
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: There Must Be a Pony in Here Somewhere. She won
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: the Gerald Loebe Award for Excellence in Business Journalism and
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: is the co host of one of my favorite podcasts,
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: Pivot with Scott Galloway. Kara Swisher. Welcome to Bloomberg. I'm
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: very impressive with myself. Well, you have a nice list
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: of accomplishments. I was discussed saying your work with somebody
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: and they said, she's really a journalist, right, And I'm like, well,
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: she's also an entrepreneur. She's been very forward in terms
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: of the conference business, in terms of um, the media business,
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: which she turned into a platform. I don't know if
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: it was ever publicly released. Um what Recode was sold?
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: Was that always private? Yeah? It was. It was a
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: start up. Yeah, we sold ABO four or five years ago.
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: It was we had been funded by NBC and Terry Samuel,
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: who's taken ill now but he uh. We we got
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: twelve million dollars from them, and at the time that
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: was a lot, but pretty soon it was it wasn't
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: a lot. A lot of content companies. It was sort
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: of this big boom in investing in content, and many
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: of my competitors got four or five times what I
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: got six months later as a VC investment. Yeah, we
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: didn't have a VC. It was NBC and Terry he's
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: a media investor, you know. And so I looked around.
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: I said this, I can't compete with this much money.
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: It's it's a bubble. And so I sold Box. I looked,
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: I talked to a number of companies. I sold really
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: quickly after founding Well. No, I was at All Things
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: D for a dozen or more years, which was within
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: the Wall Street Journal. UM, and I was at the
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: in the journal for about a dozen more than a
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: dozen years, and but we had a skunk works inside
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: the journal, so it was owned by the journal, but
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: we ran it without their input. Really yeah, it was great, yeah,
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: and they were good and bad in different ways, but
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: um and then we left because we had some problems
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: with them, and then had it funded and we were
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: going to do it independently, but then I was like,
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: no way, this is gonna things. You have to be
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: really dynamic when you're an entrepreneur and realize, you know,
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: if someone if your competitors all have three times the
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: amount of funding. You do. You have a problem. You
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: can't be that good. And so especially in content because
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: it's about hiring talent. And so we sold really quickly
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: within a year to Vox Media. Like yeah, I was like,
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: you know, I'm I'm really good that way. I know
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: when to move. So that wasn't hundreds of millions of
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: dollars that It wasn't okay, and I just no, I
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: haven't I'm not going to hear but I'm not going
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: to going to it. But it's not. It doesn't worth anything.
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: I own the stock and Box Media whatever Box Media cells.
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: So it was so I won't harangue you about this,
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: but was I'm assuming this was an all stock trans Yes,
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: it was. We decided that O. Yeah, we could have
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: gotten cash, but we I felt like why not, Like
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: if I'm an entrepreneur, I should own the shop. And
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: I so, I mean, I have quite a bit of
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: stock in Box Media. We'll see what happens. I mean
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: obviously now content, uh, content is now the blooms off
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: the rose there and you know Box is quite healthy.
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: But you know the others bezz feed and and Mike
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: of course closed, some of these others closed and so
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: and all of media is under stress and so, you know,
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: especially we're going to a recession and stuff. So it's
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: just whatever the stocks worth. We'll see, we'll see how
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: it goes. Quite interesting. But I'm very well paid, Barry,
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: don't worry about it. I do, okay, you do, okay.
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: So let's talk a little bit about the early parts
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: of your career you come out of. Now, I know
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: you have a mastress from Colombia. Was that the journalism
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: school or journalism school? Yeah? I went to Georgetown School
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: Foreign Service, which was in Washington, d C. It was
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: actually my backup school. Now it's a very top ranking school.
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: But at the time, and can I tell you you
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: and I are not all that far apart in age
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: the people who came into because of the demographics into
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: college forty years ago, we're dealing with um relatively easy admissions.
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: And then the boom followed. It was the echo boom
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: made it much more challenging to get in. I didn't
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: get in. Everybody didn't get at Stanford. I wanted to
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: go to Stanford, but my brother went to Stanford. UM.
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: But I I got into Georgetown, and it was in
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: the school FORIGN service, and I wanted to be I've
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: said this many times, a spy. I wanted to work
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: for the CIA, and I want to do analysis, very
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: similar what I do now, reporting an analysis, just with
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: no one shooting it. Yes, exactly, Well, you never know,
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: um and so and I it was very interested in
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: the military too, in military intelligence. And I was gay
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: at the time. That was impossible you could get into
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: the military. You couldn't you had. It was don't ask,
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: don't tell. Under the Clinton ministry and so I always tell.
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: So it was really hard to do that. Um and
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: then in the CIA, you haven't asked, ridiculous tell. It's
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: such a insane thing. Can I tell you? It's so shocking.
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: What right, It's so shocking to look back just twenty
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: years and say, what the hell are we thinking? Don't ask?
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: What are we still thinking? There's all these attacks on
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: transgender people. Now, well we you know, we're in an
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: alternative timeline. Now I'll discuss that later. We're not you think,
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: so this is just what America is like. I'm sorry,
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: you know, put a mirror to our faces. There's a
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: great there's a great series going on. It's the six
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: nine series in the New York Times, and it's that.
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: Let me just say, this is what we are, and
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: if you it's part of us, it's not every part
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: of us, but it's not this dream of being this
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: incredibly meritocurtency with everybody getting a chance. It's just not. So.
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: So let me fast forward to a question I'm gonna
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: was planning on asking you later. How much of this
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: that we're discussing here is a function that forty years ago,
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: if you were a crazy um nazi, racist, homophobe, whatever
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: it was, you would be the guy mumbling to yourself
• 7:09
  Speaker 1: outside the library, but you didn't have the ability to
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: coordinate nationally well that there were tons of them and people.
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: The things people said to me thirty years ago about
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: being gay was just astonishing. Like today would not be
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: allowed obviously, or in some places it would, but it was.
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: The change has been so drastic around gay people. But
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: at the time, I couldn't be what I wanted. I
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: wanted to be in the military, my dad was in
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: the military, and I just couldn't. There was, you know,
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: I really wanted to be like compared like you know,
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: people always surprised I'm like, I'm really quite. I really
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: think the military can be great in a lot of ways,
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: has a lot of problems like anything else. Um, but
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: you know, yeah that Scott was talking about that the
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: other day, and before the sort of the ability to
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: unify and have have places to meet for people who
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: have issues racists like white supremacists, the Internet has helped
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: them drastically. And I talked about that in my first
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: book in ninety seven. This was a place where you
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: can either gather for good like quilters or people parents
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: and you know, people who want to know, well, these
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: communities about different. What happened is all these people were
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: and wherever Idaho, wherever, they're everywhere, they just were wolves. Yeah,
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: and so now they can find places to gather. It's
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: it's they create these gathering places which and with a
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: lot of tools from video too, and so it's a
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: really great place to radicalize people. You know, that's the
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: problem with the Internet. This tool it can be you know,
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: it's like a knife. It can be used in a
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: lot of different ways, and so in a lot of
• 8:31
  Speaker 1: ways it's used to kill people. So I've watched your
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: thought evolve on whether or not this is in response
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: to most recently to eight chan and read it basically
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: saying we should not be a gathering place for white
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: supremacists and others who are plotting to kill people. You've
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: kind of moved a little bit about whether companies like
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: registrars domain registrars or or I'm moved. I think they
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: should take them off. I don't. I've never that's not
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: an evolution. No, No, I'm actually were more of a
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: First Amenda you misreading it because I think I find
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: the intellectual capacity of most people still on Valley to
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: be light, you know, in terms of ethics, in terms
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: of historical knowledge and everything, and so they have this
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: I call it libertarian light. You know, they're like, I'm
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: a libertarian, I'm a first man. I'm like, explain it
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: for me, and you know, I have studied this so
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: I know what it is. And they're like, anybody can
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: say anything. I'm like, no, that's not what the First
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: Amendment says. It says Congress shall make no law. Just Congress,
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: not Twitter, not Facebook. Not like they're just so like
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: there's many people and they're highly educated in certain ways,
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: but in general, it's libertarian light. You know what I mean,
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: people should do what they want. That's like, that's what
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: a twelve three year old says. I can do what
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: I want, but you can't. And so I think legitimate
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: companies like Facebook, like Twitter, like Google have responsibility. And
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: I've always thought companies, whether they're chemical companies or Wall
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: Street companies or Bloomberg or any or Vox, we have
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: a responsibility to society. You know, legitimate companies the others
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: can create these things. But it doesn't mean that this
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: this this idea that you collect all the money and
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: have none of the responsibilities, okay, because it's not okay.
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: Now they can do it, but I can say this
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: is not okay, quite quite interesting. You know, you can
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: decide who you would do business with. I don't like,
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: you know, I like you can decide who you do
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: business with. And you know, cloud Flare is the company
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: that I wrote about recently in the New York Times.
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: I read a column their weekly. Um, you know, they
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: this guy who I've interviewed several times, Matthew Prince. Um,
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: you know, he he's been sort of he's changed my
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: I've suddenly realized this is terrible, and I'm like, welcome
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: to the world. Like, have you not been paying attention
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: and they cut off a jan um. But you know,
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: people can make their decisions. They just have to live
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: with their decisions. If you want to facilitate white supremacy,
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: own it, like own what you're doing, and that's what
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: they'd like to do. They'd like to do it. And
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: then say, why are you criticizing me? So they you know,
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: expressing my first memory. I love the fact that the
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: Internet identifies all these people who are participating in these
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: white supremacy marches and basically calls out their bosses and
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: gets them fired. Yeah, you want to march here, go ahead,
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: just don't expect to serve star. It's just people. People
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: can do whatever they want. It's just you know, the
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: whole controversy on Alex Jones for example. You know, this vile,
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: vile human being, just on every measure, he's a vile person.
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: He can have a website anywhere on the Internet. No
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: one's stopping him. People who make these tools can either
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: decide to kick him off or not. That's that's the deal, right.
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: So and their commercial businesses and if I people choose
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: not to do business with them, they're not nothing wrong
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: with companies like that. Advertisers pointing out to advertisers pointing
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: out to whatever, it's not it's the way, you know,
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: boycotts have gone on for century. It's not. This is
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: not a new thing kind of thing. And I think
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: it's just becomes so um amplified and weaponized in this
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: time because it's so viral, it's so so the news
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: we get is so twitchy and so quick that people
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: get and and the emotions get so easily in a
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: rage that people think it's different. Um. But what's interesting
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: is that they um, you know, they they have their spaces.
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: When when I was when the Alex Jones things was happening,
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: I was talking to all the major platforms and they're like, well,
• 12:16
  Speaker 1: everybody has a right, you know, to have a place.
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: I'm like, but you're going to kick him off just
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: so you know, because he's broken your rules. Like they
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: made rules. What's the point of your stupid rules if
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: you're not going to enforce them? Well, you know it's complicated.
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: I'm like, no, you made rules, he broke on. Why
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: isn't he off? Like you know, and they had all
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: these weird rules, and it's like, if you're gonna make rules,
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: keep to them. You have a responsibility to the society
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: at large, and you know, in things that are pretty
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: much you know, there's all kinds of edge cases, there's
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: all kinds of like whatever they can be, but there's
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: lots of places where people to go. You know, for example,
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: like with with Twitter, there they've it's been so haphazard
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: with them that you know that we've kicked off Melo whatever,
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: you know, we kick him off, but not the sky.
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: But we kicked this person, but not that guy. It's like,
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: it just doesn't make any sense to people. And I
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: think if everyone understood the rules and then when you
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: break them, that's that what they've managed to do is
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: make people think these things are public squares when they're
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: private squares and they own everything and they get paid
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: for everything, and they don't have any responsibility for monitoring them.
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: So they've made these very filthy public private squares and
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: it's the only place to gather. And then they say,
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: we don't have any responsibility for cleaning. I just happened
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: this morning to be scanning Twitter and I saw sleeping giants.
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: Oh him, Yeah, he's great, right, just mentioned that last
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: night on Tucker Calson show, Dell was advertising, and you know,
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: you think that a big broad name like that would
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: be a little savvy er. Oh you know what, they
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: wait until the things blow over and then they go
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: back that. You know, they just want to sell. But
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: but here's the thing you're gonna get cold out for that.
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: That's right, that's right, this is the world. Guess what.
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: And that's you know that happened before. Remember Anita Brian
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: the orange juice thing with gay That's right, everyone was
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: dumping orange juice? Was that unfair to Anita Brian? It
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: doesn't matter she had her opinion. This is what it
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: costs to have her opinion. And I think, um, you know,
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: every everything costs, and people don't realize that like they
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: We live in a world where everyone's I can say
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: whatever I want, like you certainly can, but it certainly
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: costs the same with me, same with everybody else. Be
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: an adult about it. What you're doing. Let's talk a
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: little bit about what you're doing, um with your career
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: now and how you began. What was it like in
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: the early nineties covering technology. I don't think people there's
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: nobody covering that writes it was me and some other guy.
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: I don't think people really understood how important technology was
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: going to be to society, the economy. Everything it had
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: been covered, you know, chips and Microsoft essentially in software,
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: chips and software. We'd been either covered as a as
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: a as a as a product issue like we made
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: Windows ten. Here's the news story, which is not a
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: news story when they at least something, but it used
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: to be UM and so you know when the hoop
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: la on that was insane. I was at that event, UM,
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: So you know, I think what was interesting. What I
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: thought about it is this was an entirely new industry
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: being created, the Internet industry, and you had to treat
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: it like the beginnings of electricity or the beginning of
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: TV or the beginning of radio. And so that's how
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: I looked at it. And so one of the things
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: I told when I first started covering at the Washing
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: Post and then later at the Wall Street Journal, what
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: I told Manners is I'm not going to tell you
• 15:26
  Speaker 1: how the watchworking. I'll tell you what time it is,
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: and that's what the most important story, like who are
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: these people? And I spent a lot of time understanding
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: the culture that was growing because it was all new.
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: Like the I was there, I wrote one of the
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: first stories when the Internet was commercialized. When I was
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: at the Washington Post. I think, I mean, nobody was
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: paying attention to, you know, what al Gore was doing. Yes,
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: I was covering it then, and so I really there
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: was a moment where I was like, this is going
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: to be the most important change in media and communications
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: in history, like so far, and there's been a lot.
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: I thought, catch on, Yeah I did. I kept saying,
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: you know, two things I spent a lot of time
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: doing is talking about um. I told I tell a
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: story that absolutely was a moment where I downloaded a
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: Calvin and Hobbs book onto a server and I messed
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: up the server. It was so big, you know, and
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: the pictures and the person who was running the technology
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: was like what did you do? And I'm like, I
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: downloaded a book, I put it in Like what you that?
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: And then like he's like so what, I'm like, so
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: what don't you get at you idiot? Like you know,
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: this is gonna everything is going to be digitized. And
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: I kept saying everything is going to be digitized everything,
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: And I say this over and over again. Everything that
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: can be digitized will be digitized. Jobs, everything, It eats everything,
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: not just Mark andres and software is eating the world.
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: Digital is eating the world. You know, you sound a
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: bit like Andresen who describes software software, but he describes
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: entrepreneurs that he knows he's onto something when they're trying
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: to explain their business to a VC and they get
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: frustrated and angry, like, how do you not see this?
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: It's so obvious? You basically just said, well it was,
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: and it was. I would run around saying this and
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: everyone's like, what are you talking about. I'm like, there's
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: not gonna be newspapers. There's not gonna be like I
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: would do that like the newspaper people. And then the
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: second part was mobile. And when I got to the journal,
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: I would just wrote a columnist the other day and
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: the Times about no one's going to own a car,
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: which caused quite a lot of consternation because like people
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: in the Midwestern or with pickup truck struck, I want
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: my pickup trup. I said, have your pickup truck. But
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: it's gonna be like only like you don't understand, like
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: even you will not have a car like cities, absolutely
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: not you. Very soon after it'll be all automated and
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: everything else or they'll be floating or whatever and so um.
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: So I wrote a piece when I write when I
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: got to the journal in called cutting the Cord. Yeah,
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: and I had a picture of me with chords and
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: I had a big you know places, and I said,
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: you will not have a landline phone. You will carry
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: around this device. It will get smaller. And because they
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: were big at the time, you know you small and
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: tomorrow there will be your entire computer. It will be
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: on the go, be mobile. You will this will be
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: the center of your news. And it was when I
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: go back and read it, I'm like, wow, that was
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: pretty smart. Good um. But I kept insisting it and
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: it made so much sense, like it obviously like when
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: I think about cars, or when I think about certain
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: jobs being eliminated. Like I was trying to alert the
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: other and I'm like, your job is going to go
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: like it's so patterned match. AI will take over everything
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: you do except for the creativity part. No, it's you know,
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: I think I said, everything you do is digitized, anything
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: that's by road, anything that's mechanical, not just mechanical, it
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: is so much more that really you could apply AI
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: principles to a robotic, any of the coming things, robotics, automation, uh,
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: self driving, um AI. It's just anything that can apply
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: to it does. So I think about though, what can change,
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: what's not going to be here? Whenever I get pushed
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: back when we discuss future technology, my favorite question to
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: ask people is, well, do you think people will still
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: be driving their own cars in a hundred years? No,
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: of course not. Okay, so next year, yeah I'll still be.
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: So really, the debate is weird. When does that transition
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: take place? And people can picture, but they can picture
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: twelve years from now. That's too difficult. Yeah, it's taking place.
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: It's place, and you know, it's the business model to
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: the business model of not owning a car and just
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: using Uber or some other source. Have something come by.
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: That's hard for a lot of people to conceptualize, even
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: though it appears they're already doing it. It's they've already
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: started to do. People do things without realizing. There's an
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: I forget, which I think it's I can't remember the
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: poet Past are made by walking. That's what's happening here.
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: Past made by walking, and so I just like I'm
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: going to write a recap of what's happened since I
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: got rid of I saw in my car and I
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: have no vehicle, Like I have no vehicle, and the
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: other like I called someone, I'm like, oh, we have
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: to go get this. I'm like, oh, I don't have
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: a car. How am I going to do that? Like,
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: you know, it doesn't mean you're not going to drive
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: a car, it doesn't mean you're not going to rent
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: a car. I've just rented a car up and I'm
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: going to try to put put it in terms of money,
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: what I what I spent for that, what I used
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: to buy a car with. And when I called the
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: insurance company, I've had a car, you know, an insurance
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: policy for years forever. And uh, they're like, what's the
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: car you're replacing with? I go, no car, and they're
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: like what I said, I never am going to own
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: a car. And it was the most fascinating discussion. I said,
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: you better watch out for your business because I'm not
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: going to insurance. But then I sat down to breakfast
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: with someone who's a lawyer and said, you know, when
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: you get on a scooter, if you don't have car insurance,
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: who covers if you hit someone when you're on a
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: scooter like tho. I was like, oh my god, I
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: do need interest, so you need insurance something different? Well,
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: but it gets taken away when you don't have a car.
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: It was fascinating and I'm like, oh my god, a
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: whole new business. Like but I was thinking, all car
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: insurance will go away. What will happen to those people?
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: But then there's the only business of people who are
• 20:32
  Speaker 1: on the move. You have to be covered anyway. It
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: was just interesting. Your amex probably covers you if you
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: rent it, rent the scooter, don't know, but it's like,
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: that's the whole thing. But there's whole new businesses to
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: be creative that. Immediately I was like, wow, I wouldn't
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: it be interesting to go into the insurance business without
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: only a car, but having a mobile insurance, a moving insurance,
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: like you physically moving through the world. However you decide
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: to do it. If you get into a vertical lift
• 20:54
  Speaker 1: and takeoff vehicles, you know there's are great, They're going
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: to be cool. I was mentioning, I've been waiting for
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: them for fIF They're coming. They'll be in San Francisco first,
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: so you come and ride them and there are I've
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: been tracking that There are a number of companies that
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: are relatively close, including one that's an old battery electric version. Um,
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: I'm going to stick with it. But we're still I'm
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: waiting for my blade runner vehicle where the projection of
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: the highway is just a three three dimensional hologram that
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: you fly through. But hey, that was supposed to be.
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: Here are Hollywood people telling you, all right, so when
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: are we going to have When are we gonna have
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: personalized VTOL cars and taxis? You will be dead, Berry,
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: you will never experience. They may try one, but you're
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: not going to be So we're see. I agree with you.
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: I think it's less than a hundred years but more
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: than a decade. And I think it will be a
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: slow transition because people very local, lester. They'll be human,
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: that's right, that's another thing life extension. But there'll be
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: human and cars at the same time. Just like here
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: in New York. You know, there used to be the
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: elevated the trains, and when they first started, a lot
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: of people got run over by them when they were
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: down on the ground before they elevated where the high
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: line was. That's why they built the high line because
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: all these people are getting killed because they were like,
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: what's this. We have horses, and so horses would bang
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: into these electric vehicles all the time, and then there
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: weren't horses, and so that's what you know. There will
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: be human drivers, but then there won't be like that's
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: what's going out. And so I think that's what you
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: have to think about, is this transition period when and
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: it doesn't mean people won't drive in certain places or
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: it's not, it'll just be different. It'll be just a
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: different experience. So you go from the Washington Post to
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: the Wall Street Journal, is that Mossberg got me there?
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: My my most important mentor so now he was covering technology.
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: He was the guy het a technology column, uh that
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: he wrote for many years. He started it um. His
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: first line of his first one was called personal Technology
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: in the Wall Street Journal. And as he had covered
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: the Defense Department, he had to the State Department. He was,
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: you know, Washington reporter and he just was st geeky.
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: And the first line of his column, which I think
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: was still relevant today, was technology is too hard to
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: use and it's not your fault, which I loved, which
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: is like so smart because they were sort of testing you,
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: you know, with the products that again. But okay, um,
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: so he started that, and so he was there and
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: I interviewed him for my book on I well, because
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: he was the only person I perceived that understood the change.
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: Like everybody else was like, Oh, it's just online services.
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: We'll still have Time magazine. They're so important. I was like, no,
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: my magazine is over, like you know, like you know,
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: and he's the only one who got it. And he
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: and I really clicked immediately, and uh started. He got
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: me to come to the Journal to write about this
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: because he thought the Journal was not writing about it properly.
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: And I understood it, and I knew them all. I
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: knew Jeff Bezos. I knew Jeff Bezos. Wasn't Jeff Bezos
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: for a long time. Now he's Jeff Bezos Prime back
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: right whatever. He was just a guy. He was just
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: a startup guy that were really bad pants at a pants. Yeah,
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: a lot of plead becky pants. Um, you know, it's
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: so funny. They were all like the Google guys were
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: in a garage, the um, you know, just all of
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: them were like Ellen I met when he did this
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: thing called x dot com. He you know, he had
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: a full head of hair and was kind of geeky,
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: like what was what was elan? Originally? Was he part
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: of the PayPal No, he had a company called x
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: dot com and that was a payment company, and he
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: and they fought a lot PayPal PayPal, there was that group,
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: and then they they so he eventually they did march,
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: but there were two separate companies and they were quite
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: quite unpleasant rivals. And then they got together. So a
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: lot of people told that their big genius wasn't selling
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: it to eBay. Right. A lot of people came out
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: of that PayPal group, Mosque and Peter Thiel and a
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: whole run of folks in the tech world trace back
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: to that. So so I remember Walt's early works specifically
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: as a reviewer of services and computers and technology, but
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: you really came in covering the Internet business, the of
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: of the Internet, not so much as reviewer, but as
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: a straight up economic journalist, financial journal I was a
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: financial journalist. I think I had an interest in the products,
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: and of course, you know, well it was great to
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: have Walter's de partner eventually because it was he had
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: that part of it covered. Um, he's a reporter to
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: by the way, like he was. One of the great
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: things about Walt Musburg as a reviewer was that he
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: was a reporter first and foremost, and so he reported
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: out these products. A lot of people who covered tech
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: we're just fan boys and just you know, just ridiculous.
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: And well, sometimes he loved stuff, sometimes he disliked it.
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: So it was so fair, you know, in terms of
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: how he did it. And I came in and covered
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: the business of it and tried to understand the stock
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: stuff and because there was a lot of you know,
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: early froth around a lot of these companies and what
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: was what was not true, what was true, what was
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: a Ponzi scheme? What was not? And so I covered
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: these early businesses, and I was quite bullish on the
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: whole big air sector. A lot of reporters who covered
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: the media at the time kept calling telling me I
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: was covering CB radio or a fad, and I didn't
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: think it was a bad I remember, those are One
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: of the guys who called the CB rate to me
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: is now working for a digital content company and he's
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: like Mr Internet Now. It's always amazing how how people
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: are still willing to believe whatever it is that keeps
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: their paycheck flowing. Well, I was very worried. That's the
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: reason I left the Washington Post because I was like,
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: when I loved Don Graham, who's the owner of the
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: Washington Post, but when I left, and he's such a
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: like an incredibly cordial and just a fine person. And
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: he said, you know, Carol, why are you leaving? And
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: I said, the waters rising and you're on the lower floodplain.
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: And what was their response to that? And he was
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: like ha ha ha, And I'm like, no, really, you
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: better because I had covered retail. I had covered retails,
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: So I covered Walmart's entrance into the retail space, the
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: death of wonderful retailers like Heckinger's and h. Woody's, Woodward
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: Lowthrop and garf Ankles were the two like the death
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: of depart You could see what was happening in the
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: original problem was Walmart, you know, and the big box stores.
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: But then it became Amazon and you could see glimmers
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: of it with with Craigslist and hitting the classified business.
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: Amazon still wasn't yet they but you could see it
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: see where it was going. And so um, so I
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: was like Wall Street Journal has a more defensible position
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: in media right now. Um, and so I went there,
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: I thought. But then the Washington Post, of course has
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: revived itself with ownership by bring it full circle. He
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: has done a wonderful job. I used to full disclosure,
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: I used to contribute to the Washington Post up until Um.
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: I think that the Washington Post has reasserted itself as
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: one of the three major papers in New York, and
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: you've written for all three figured of economics. They figured
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: out it's not just that it's a rich guy owning,
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: it's actually making money. They it's not none of these businesses,
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: not Times. They're not like massive money making throwing off
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: money business. Street Journal always had a million subscribers, which
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: is online subscribers, which is a lot for probably The
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: Times isn't the best in this area. Well, post Trump election,
• 27:54
  Speaker 1: their subscription base has exploded. Also, they've done a good
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: job with a product like you can't you can't separate
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: the product from the text. Their product is really quite good.
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: And so I think a lot of these people figured
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: it out, and with the help of Bezos, who wasn't
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: going to be a twitchy owner. Neither of the Grahams,
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: whether they were wonderful owners. Um, I think that they
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: sort of made it through the difficult period and it
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: just rationalize what they were doing, and I could find
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: I can tell you every time I get my update
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: from Amazon that my bill for the Washington Post has
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: been passing stuff like that. That's an enormous benefit for
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: stuff like that like that, just great journalism, great product.
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: I think of things always in terms of product. Is
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: that a good product? Like when I make stuff, this
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: is a good product. And if it's not a good product,
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: I stopped making it. And then, unlike a lot of journalists,
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: I'll stop doing something if I don't think it's a
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: it's something that's worthwhile to the users, the readers, or
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: whoever is doing it. What what products? What products do
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: you think are really strong these days that recode box
• 28:49
  Speaker 1: is doing? And what are you watching? Because hey, let's
• 28:51
  Speaker 1: see how this developed? Is this too new? Is this
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: too different? Um? I'm i gonna tell you a new
• 28:55
  Speaker 1: idea I have that I love. We thought it the
• 28:57
  Speaker 1: other night. I was standing there and like, oh, this,
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: well if it's not out yet, but it's not. But
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: I was thinking, this is what I'm gonna do next.
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: I'm always making something else, like I'm always look when
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: I started doing podcasting. For example, UM, when I started
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: doing Recode, everyone was like, what are you doing. I'm like, no,
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: We're gonna have a voicey news based journalistic base but voicy,
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: funny site. Everyone's copied it since like what we did,
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: So it was Walton, I really did pioneer. When you
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: say voicey, what do you mean by that? Like Yahoo?
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: When I was covering Yahoo, Yahoo sucks, here's why narky. No, no, no,
• 29:30
  Speaker 1: we backed it with journalism, you know what I mean?
• 29:33
  Speaker 1: Or blunt blunt like guess what the guy who's running
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: Uber ain't going to be running Uber And here's why.
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean, like saying things journalists say
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: to each other, but backing it up. And one of
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: the things that I had was it used to be
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: at the journal it's the to be sure statement that's
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: always in these stupid stories, to be sure. Like when
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: I was covering this company within it was that's the
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: way they yes, like this online grocery that what was it?
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: That first there was one for it, a lot of
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: money behind it. Listen, it's now figured out itself. At
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: the time, it was an insane like you looked at
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: the numbers, You're like are you kidding me? And Cosmo, Yeah,
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: that one one of them. And in New York City
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: like it was, it was you just sat there like
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: you're losing so much money on every delivery. It doesn't
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: mean it didn't work. Prime to work like you know
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: what I mean, there's not there's ways to figure it out.
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: The idea was a good one. I always try to
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: separate the idea again because he he talks about Chewi
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: being the modern dot com and now ju Wayne Wright,
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: who was the entrepremour behind pet stot com, is now
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: with the real real What an amazing business that is, right,
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: So that's the whole point. And so so when I
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: was writing about it, it was you. I was like,
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: this is this is this is terrible business. They can
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: scant go public. This is insane. And the editor at
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: the journal was like, well you have to, like, you know,
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: point out that this you could be wrong. I'm like,
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: I'm not wrong, this is like and and they were
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: like they're like, ha been And then you have to
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: do this to be sure. Some people say that this
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: business and I was like, to be sure some idiots
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: say and it was like, let me tut these idiots.
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: But but then I ran my own site, and then
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: I could say that like I can say that because
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: it's my site. And so we sort of pioneered that
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: and then it changed like everyone copied it. That's what
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: always happened. And then it wasn't the right like having
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: analog websites that people go to, it's a losing game
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: in in in the advertising business online. So then I
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: was like sitting there and I saw what is an
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: analog site? You mean like meat spaces or what. No. No, no,
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: just like the way we were doing recode ten years ago,
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: we changed it like it shouldn't look like a newspaper online.
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: It should be something not just that. No, we we
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: did something pioneering, but then it didn't work anymore, right,
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: and we tried something else, like I think the ability
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: to try something else, and so it just it's a
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: long way of getting into the podcast. I was sitting there,
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: I'm like, I like these these mobile devices are now great,
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: these apps are now great. I'm gonna do this. I'm
• 31:53
  Speaker 1: gonna do interviews because because I had my code conference,
• 31:56
  Speaker 1: the Code conference at Walt and I did and I
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: was like, why not extend three sixty five days a year?
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: Like I can only do seventeen interviews a CODE. It's
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: always Elon Mosk or Mark zucker from but there's always
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: fascinating people that one like you're doing here, And so
• 32:10
  Speaker 1: I was like, there's so many cool people that I
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: could do the same thing. People love the CODE conference.
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: Why not bring it out and make it free and
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: make it sense. So I started doing these interviews and
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: I remember like I literally had an intern in me
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: do it, and I'm running like I'm the head of
• 32:22
  Speaker 1: the site and I'm like, I'm not doing that anymore.
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: I'm doing this, And so we started doing it and
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: a lot of people had opinions are like, you know,
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: people aren't going to listen for an hour. I'm like, yeah,
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: they are, like you know they I was like I
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: literally had that yes exactly people, And I'm like, you
• 32:35
  Speaker 1: don't know, give me. People are in cars, people are
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: on bikes, and people are in treadmills. Millennials like snack
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: a Well, no they don't. They're smart. People are smart.
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: So it was like, well, I don't want these people
• 32:44
  Speaker 1: who like snack ables. They don't listen to me anyway.
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: So it was like I literally spent a lot of
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: time and I was like, I'm certain I'm right about this.
• 32:50
  Speaker 1: But then when we did the Galloway thing, Scott came
• 32:53
  Speaker 1: on the show because I had heard him at a
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: at a conference. I thought it was brilliant. It's got Galloway,
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: wo would you pivot with? And know I had interviewed
• 33:01
  Speaker 1: Ellen Zuckerberg, like the head of Google everything, and the
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: numbers for Scott when I saw them come in off
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: the freaking chart. And also he predicted the Amazon whole
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: food That thing happened the week that is such, predicted
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: it a year in advance, goes on your show a
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: week in advance and does it, and a week later, bang,
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: and people lost minds. People like, oh, he works in branding.
• 33:23
  Speaker 1: He must have known. He wrote about it literally twelve
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: so anyway, so he so that show went off the
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: charts before that happened too, and I was like, Hey,
• 33:32
  Speaker 1: I'm gonna have one again and see what happens again
• 33:34
  Speaker 1: because it was our rapport, our discussion. He was so
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: insightful and smart, and so I was like, we're going
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: to start another podcast and it's going to be only
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: thirty minutes, maybe twenty minutes, and it's not gonna be long.
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: It's gonna be quick, fast, topical in this and now
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: something like it needs to be an hour. I'm like, no,
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: it doesn't. It needs to be this link because this
• 33:52
  Speaker 1: is what this is what it is, and it creates
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: a little scarcity, keeps people coming exactly. We may do
• 33:56
  Speaker 1: another one during the week. That's it. That's the talks.
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: We've got a lot of advertising. A yeah, um, and
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: so what what you know? You just have to be
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: like you have to know what you are or know
• 34:06
  Speaker 1: what you're It's like cooking, Like I'm making a cake now,
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: and a lot of people want to say what you
• 34:10
  Speaker 1: really should do is be boring you. I'm like, yeah,
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: but I'm making a cake and like, but be burging on.
• 34:15
  Speaker 1: I'm like, yeah, go make your own. And so I
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: think people who are good at product know what the
• 34:21
  Speaker 1: product is and then are willing to make changes to
• 34:24
  Speaker 1: it when it doesn't work. So our conference, for example,
• 34:27
  Speaker 1: I'm still trying to figure out what we've had seventeen
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: years making so much money at these conferences. By the way,
• 34:32
  Speaker 1: podcasts make a fortune because I think of things and
• 34:35
  Speaker 1: would hope businesses all the time. So anyway, so one
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: of the things like I'm Robb rethinking, like what isn't conference?
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: We have seventeen really successful years, but it's changed. So
• 34:44
  Speaker 1: I'm like, I sit along, you know, and even to
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: the point and we're not doing this, But should I
• 34:48
  Speaker 1: keep doing it? Is it the right thing anymore? What
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: is the next thing? And so I'm constantly thinking, and
• 34:54
  Speaker 1: that's why I come up with this new thing that
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: I think is going to make a lot of money.
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: Also tell us what it is. I'm not gonna tell
• 34:58
  Speaker 1: you what it is. It's not that product. Well, when
• 35:00
  Speaker 1: it comes out, you'll have to exist. It exists in
• 35:03
  Speaker 1: Carra Swisher's break. That's it. So you got to be
• 35:05
  Speaker 1: careful crossing. The thing that I think about what Walton
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: I did is like when I think about what I'm
• 35:09
  Speaker 1: really proud of is we created a lot of jobs
• 35:12
  Speaker 1: for people, Like families lived on one idea that Walton
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: I had in nineteen. Whenever we did a two thousand
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: and two, Walton I thought of something in two two
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: and dozens of people have jobs. It's fascinating to me
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: to think that way. Like, and that was the all
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: Things Digital platform for conferences. Yeah, all Things Digital conferences,
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: you know, came out of a single idea how many
• 35:36
  Speaker 1: conferences are you guys do in a year? Now, well, see,
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: what is a conference? Right? Look we did this live
• 35:41
  Speaker 1: a bunch of people in a room. Yeah, but I
• 35:43
  Speaker 1: don't I don't think that way. Like we have the
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: main conference, we have Code Commerce that's coming up in September,
• 35:48
  Speaker 1: We've got code Media. Um. But then Scott and I
• 35:51
  Speaker 1: did a live pivot the other day that was huge.
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: We sold out fourteen seconds we sold that. So now
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: I'm like, oh, live podcast things. You know, the pod
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: saves America? I don't really for two years? Really well,
• 36:05
  Speaker 1: but in a different like what should they be? Three
• 36:07
  Speaker 1: d people? Should be five hundred people? Should you get sponsors?
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: The sponsors were thrilled. Try y is is really been
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: doing that for decades? Yes they have exactly, but but
• 36:20
  Speaker 1: what about moving them around the country? Why not exactly?
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: So I'm thinking about that. So is that a conference?
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: It kind of is. What if you could add other
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: things onto a live podcast? Put comics there, put like
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: make it an event. What if you can add experiential
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: pop ups to it. I'm like constantly thinking, like, what's
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: the next version of analog gathering? That's smart? Smart is
• 36:41
  Speaker 1: the one thing the brand is always The brands I'd
• 36:43
  Speaker 1: like to make are always like what's smart? Like what
• 36:46
  Speaker 1: do smart people want to listen to? What is additive
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: to someone's life? Every time I get a tweet from
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: someone around Pivot, I'm getting a lot of them around Pivot.
• 36:55
  Speaker 1: I just really enjoy it and I always come up
• 36:57
  Speaker 1: with an insight. I'm like, who can ask for more
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: than that? What you're describing what you just did with
• 37:02
  Speaker 1: Scott is quote an evening with I mean, that's how
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: that's been, but it can be seen like and then
• 37:07
  Speaker 1: then the other day I was like, we have to
• 37:09
  Speaker 1: have swag. We can make a lot of money and swag,
• 37:11
  Speaker 1: Like I'm always cut. That's what I want to think about.
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: And one of the things I like to think about
• 37:15
  Speaker 1: in products. Now we're gonna have swag. You can have.
• 37:16
  Speaker 1: You'll give you one free, but only one. Uma. I
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: never give away anything free. Um. The the things that
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: I think about when they were thinking about products, is
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: is it useful? Is it entertaining? Is it must have?
• 37:30
  Speaker 1: If you have one of those things, you usually have
• 37:32
  Speaker 1: a very successful projects. One. You don't need all three,
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: but if you have all three, that's killer. It's a killer.
• 37:37
  Speaker 1: You have two, but it has to be one of
• 37:39
  Speaker 1: those three things, right, And you don't think like a journalist,
• 37:43
  Speaker 1: you think like an entrepreneur, right exactly, And it's evident
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: in your discussion. I am going to uh, I do
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: journalism by the way you do journalism. I consume journalism.
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: My extra special guest today is Kara Swisher. She is
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: in desperate need of a real New York bagel and
• 38:01
  Speaker 1: has been unable to find one. I'm to harsh your grin. Well,
• 38:06
  Speaker 1: apparently that thing is a blasphemy over coming from Brooklyn.
• 38:11
  Speaker 1: I never have lived. Well, there are no bagels in Brooklyn.
• 38:14
  Speaker 1: I don't know what anybody could possibly fell in love
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: with someone in Brooklyn. What can I say? Google best
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: bagels in Brooklyn. You'll find a list anywhere along I
• 38:25
  Speaker 1: know where they are there on Second Avenue in fifty
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: I know where the bagels are so up here. So
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: you mentioned you fell in love with someone in Brooklyn,
• 38:32
  Speaker 1: and you mentioned I just mentioned Google. I gotta ask
• 38:35
  Speaker 1: you a random question. Please your disclosures. You don't mince
• 38:40
  Speaker 1: any words whatsoever. Fifteen years ago we did this. It's like, Hey,
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: here's who my spouse is, Here's who she works. For
• 38:47
  Speaker 1: here's this, I don't get paid. Her money is hers
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: money is There's no conflict. That's like a really blunt,
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: straightforward that was very innovative at the time. It was
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: because we trusted readers and we wanted. You know, my
• 39:01
  Speaker 1: ex was a very prominent executive at Google and then
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: later became CTO of America. UM, I had to meaning
• 39:07
  Speaker 1: she was working for the Obama White House as technology
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: she's the chief Technology Officer in the United States. Um.
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: But before that, she was a pretty prominent executive Megan
• 39:15
  Speaker 1: Smith at Google. She she ran Google dot org. She
• 39:18
  Speaker 1: was she bought things, she bought the Google Earth for them.
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: I mean, she did a lot of stuff over there,
• 39:24
  Speaker 1: and um, and so I wanted I actually urged her
• 39:27
  Speaker 1: to go there when it was very small. Um, hey,
• 39:30
  Speaker 1: these guys are onto something. Yes, I was like, these
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: guys are special, Like you know, she was looking around
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: she was running another company and good advice. So yeah,
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: it was good advice. Thank You're welcome. Megan. She's a
• 39:39
  Speaker 1: very lovely house in Washington, d C. Do to that,
• 39:42
  Speaker 1: so she should have several wish I don't want to
• 39:45
  Speaker 1: go into it. So anyway, she's doing just fine. Um.
• 39:48
  Speaker 1: So so I wanted to disclose and you can't do
• 39:51
  Speaker 1: that in a newspaper, and I thought, why not be
• 39:53
  Speaker 1: cleared everybody? So we trust the reader too. We don't
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: have to say. One of the things General's trying to
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: do is like I'm completely even handed. It's like, no,
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: you're not. You have things that you don't want people
• 40:03
  Speaker 1: to grab onto them. I foresaw sort of this Twitter
• 40:06
  Speaker 1: day where everybody could do gotcha to you, So before
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: anybody could get you, just explain and then we trust
• 40:11
  Speaker 1: the readers to be smart. And so that's Walton I did.
• 40:14
  Speaker 1: We full disclosure on a lot of stuff right as
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: much as we could, and there as much that was
• 40:18
  Speaker 1: relevant I think was it was it and people love it.
• 40:21
  Speaker 1: They just they like it. Again, it's a respect for
• 40:23
  Speaker 1: readers that we think about that well, we don't think
• 40:25
  Speaker 1: they're stupid. Well, that's important to actually let people think, um,
• 40:31
  Speaker 1: you know what you're doing. You have nothing to hide,
• 40:33
  Speaker 1: you know. It goes back to Hunter Thompson basically saying, hey,
• 40:36
  Speaker 1: I'm not unbiased. If you are my biases, I'm Hunter S. Thompson.
• 40:42
  Speaker 1: You'll figure it out. Let's let's talk a little bit
• 40:44
  Speaker 1: about silicon Valley. You've lived in San Francisco for five years, right,
• 40:49
  Speaker 1: we could talk about we can talk about this how
• 40:51
  Speaker 1: much the city has changed. But let's let's go a
• 40:53
  Speaker 1: little south down to the valley. Um, how has Silicon
• 40:59
  Speaker 1: Valley changed over the past. It's just money, just massive
• 41:04
  Speaker 1: amounts of massive amounts of capital and success has sort
• 41:07
  Speaker 1: of and and and the influence and power. And I
• 41:10
  Speaker 1: think one of the things that's interesting, sort of like
• 41:12
  Speaker 1: I would be akin to watching Hollywood go from Orange
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: Groves to the power Louis B. Mayer and stuff like that.
• 41:19
  Speaker 1: And I think it was really you know, most of
• 41:21
  Speaker 1: the people I had covered and now the captains of
• 41:24
  Speaker 1: industry as the richest people in the world, by the way,
• 41:26
  Speaker 1: on every list, the people they weren't that they were
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: just startups. And so I think some of them have
• 41:33
  Speaker 1: stayed true to the people they are. Others have been
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: warped by money and not understanding their power and not
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: understand the consequences of what they've built. Others have been,
• 41:45
  Speaker 1: you know, plunged into these ridiculous wealth bubbles where they
• 41:48
  Speaker 1: go from the airplane to the car to their home
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: and they don't understand what they've done, Like they don't
• 41:54
  Speaker 1: spend They surround themselves by people who's who's interest is
• 41:58
  Speaker 1: in pleasing them. Um, it's often when then I run
• 42:01
  Speaker 1: into him, like Mark Andrees and I have known each
• 42:02
  Speaker 1: other since he was very young and I was very young,
• 42:05
  Speaker 1: and you know, I think very few people he's like
• 42:08
  Speaker 1: the genius, you know, Mark with his giant brain. But
• 42:10
  Speaker 1: by the way, when I did my interview with him,
• 42:14
  Speaker 1: I got all these emails complaining that they could not
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: listen to it on two X because he speaks so quickly.
• 42:21
  Speaker 1: But you know, he's like very few people will say something.
• 42:24
  Speaker 1: I'm like, that's stupid, and he's like what, And I'm like, oh,
• 42:26
  Speaker 1: I'm sorry. He's not used to hearing that, but he is.
• 42:28
  Speaker 1: He's actually one of the people who will go back
• 42:30
  Speaker 1: and forth. But you know, even like you know, just
• 42:32
  Speaker 1: a lot of them, he's actually quite good. He he
• 42:35
  Speaker 1: always thought a lot about himself, like and I don't
• 42:38
  Speaker 1: mind that. Well, you have to in order to go out.
• 42:40
  Speaker 1: And he was confident from the get go. Shouldn't have
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: been um, well, he turned out tinsight bias he could
• 42:48
  Speaker 1: should have. He's achieved a modicum of success, Like whatever,
• 42:51
  Speaker 1: I don't care, right, exactly. But but but he wasn't
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: what my pushback to you is, he wasn't an arrogant
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: jerk about it and Silicon, well do tell but he was, Yes,
• 43:04
  Speaker 1: he was just no, no, no, he's the same person.
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: He's the same person, which I like. I appreciate someone
• 43:11
  Speaker 1: like that. I appreciate like or Mark benny Off. I
• 43:14
  Speaker 1: love talking to Mark ben right or um smart, insightful,
• 43:19
  Speaker 1: insightful and he thinks of himself he does, but I
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: enjoy talking to him. He's really like he is what
• 43:24
  Speaker 1: he is like those people give us the list of
• 43:27
  Speaker 1: arrogant jerks you enjoy speaking with. You know, very different
• 43:29
  Speaker 1: people can be the different ways. You know, Larry Page,
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: I don't know where he's gone to. He's hidden off,
• 43:34
  Speaker 1: kind of disappeared, he has, but he's always was like that.
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: He was always he was sort of a he can
• 43:39
  Speaker 1: now afford to do that? Was it him or Surgery
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: who was more of the serge was more of the
• 43:44
  Speaker 1: quiet one. Larry is Larry, but Paige Rank was really his. Yes,
• 43:50
  Speaker 1: Larry is really so brainy, so smart, so substantive, like
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: really special mind. Um. But you know they're all different
• 43:58
  Speaker 1: that there, they differ read but you know, and then
• 44:01
  Speaker 1: you get all sort of the young startup people that
• 44:03
  Speaker 1: are now older. You know, where do you put Peter
• 44:06
  Speaker 1: Teal in this brilliant, brilliant guy appalling of points of view, many, many,
• 44:11
  Speaker 1: many appalling points of view? Did you get around to
• 44:14
  Speaker 1: reading conspiracy? I read his first of all, not his book,
• 44:18
  Speaker 1: the book about the Gawker litigation, but you know that
• 44:21
  Speaker 1: to me just sent me over the edge, like doing
• 44:23
  Speaker 1: a secret lawsuit against someone if he really cared do
• 44:26
  Speaker 1: it out in the public like that to me was
• 44:28
  Speaker 1: the secret part to me was sneaky and awful. Ryan
• 44:31
  Speaker 1: Holiday's book about that is so fascinating only because you learn,
• 44:36
  Speaker 1: even with two people, it's impossible to keep a secret.
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: It's it's astonishing. The Gawker litigation is just an excuse
• 44:43
  Speaker 1: to describe the history of conspiracies. It's really anyway, it's interesting.
• 44:46
  Speaker 1: You know, he's brilliant, but I don't agree with him
• 44:48
  Speaker 1: almost everything. It's fun and funny, and you know I
• 44:51
  Speaker 1: always I sort of poked at him quite a bit,
• 44:53
  Speaker 1: and you know, he he's brilliant. He is brilliant, but really,
• 44:56
  Speaker 1: some who else stands out to you in the valley
• 44:58
  Speaker 1: visa The reason I think Peter Till's interesting is I'm
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: always like hot, Like he wrote one book and I'm
• 45:02
  Speaker 1: like it was very Yeah. I was like, oh, so
• 45:05
  Speaker 1: many interesting things here, you know what I mean, I
• 45:07
  Speaker 1: can't and then he he says a lot of things.
• 45:10
  Speaker 1: I'm like, are you kidding me? You've got to be kidding.
• 45:12
  Speaker 1: The relationship with Trump, Yeah, kind of surprising. That would
• 45:16
  Speaker 1: you imagine from a guy who's railing about being oppressed
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: as a gay man in Silicon Valley, he doesn't care
• 45:22
  Speaker 1: talk about strange bedfellows. He doesn't care. It doesn't care.
• 45:25
  Speaker 1: It doesn't care that those aren't his concerns, and I
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: think they should be a concern. So that's kind of
• 45:30
  Speaker 1: the old guard. What's who? Let's talk about the most
• 45:33
  Speaker 1: recent round of companies. Really interesting entrepreneur. You've written about
• 45:36
  Speaker 1: Travis Um. What are your thoughts about the whole frat
• 45:40
  Speaker 1: scene at Uber. Well, I think he's a Dara is
• 45:42
  Speaker 1: a very thoughtful and interesting person. I think he's got
• 45:44
  Speaker 1: the person who took over Yeah, Dark Coast for sha.
• 45:47
  Speaker 1: I think he's got a really tough economic question to
• 45:50
  Speaker 1: solve there, because you don't think you could just do
• 45:52
  Speaker 1: a whole bunch of rides at a loss, but make
• 45:54
  Speaker 1: it up in volume. I know, I think they've got
• 45:56
  Speaker 1: an economic problem and it's hard, and they've got competition.
• 45:59
  Speaker 1: I believe in moats, you know, I think about moats.
• 46:01
  Speaker 1: Amazon has built so many moats now they still have
• 46:04
  Speaker 1: They're gonna have problems when when Amazon Web Services doesn't
• 46:07
  Speaker 1: do as well. So they've got to really think about
• 46:09
  Speaker 1: what their moats are. They've got a lot of them, um,
• 46:11
  Speaker 1: and I think any business has to have a lot
• 46:12
  Speaker 1: of moats, and I don't think there's as many moats
• 46:14
  Speaker 1: around Ubers and the market saying that right now, right right,
• 46:17
  Speaker 1: the market is si, well, they came out way too late,
• 46:19
  Speaker 1: and they came out very pricey to begin with. The
• 46:22
  Speaker 1: market is speaking if they would have, if they would
• 46:24
  Speaker 1: have come out cheaper and come out earlier, maybe we
• 46:27
  Speaker 1: be talking. I don't know. I think the economics are off.
• 46:29
  Speaker 1: They just you're getting a ten, you're getting a fifteen.
• 46:32
  Speaker 1: You're paying ten dollars for twenty dollar ride. That's what's happening,
• 46:36
  Speaker 1: which is fantastic for consumers. The same thing with you know,
• 46:39
  Speaker 1: I just wrote about we worked this week and your
• 46:40
  Speaker 1: colleague calls it a PONZI. Yes I did. I wrote
• 46:42
  Speaker 1: a long column about it and included Scott in that. Um,
• 46:45
  Speaker 1: you know, I think it just the economics don't make sense, Like, wait,
• 46:48
  Speaker 1: you're telling me if I get a floor in a building,
• 46:51
  Speaker 1: that floor shouldn't be worth more than the whole building itself. Well,
• 46:53
  Speaker 1: they're trying to pass themselves off as a tech company,
• 46:56
  Speaker 1: and I think that's what offense got nine that. Do
• 46:58
  Speaker 1: you remember Regious thirty years ago reduced plus beer equals multiple. Yeah,
• 47:04
  Speaker 1: it just seems sort of one of them has just
• 47:05
  Speaker 1: gone up again. Redis R I C I or something
• 47:07
  Speaker 1: like that. You've got competitors. They that business that that
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: that I p O perspectives was like one of the
• 47:14
  Speaker 1: analysts called a lesson in obfuscation. I read that. I
• 47:19
  Speaker 1: can't recall the last time in S one maybe it
• 47:21
  Speaker 1: was Facebook, the last time an S one came out
• 47:25
  Speaker 1: and it was so completely and totally line by line
• 47:28
  Speaker 1: taken apart, like we works were. Well, it deserved it.
• 47:31
  Speaker 1: I deserved it that. You know, look, it could be
• 47:34
  Speaker 1: a very it's a really interesting disruptive brand. There's some
• 47:37
  Speaker 1: great ideas there, but not enough for what for billion?
• 47:42
  Speaker 1: There's seven billion, great This all comes back to what
• 47:44
  Speaker 1: you said earlier about way too much capital and silicon
• 47:47
  Speaker 1: value chasing way too few deals. Has that completely skewed valuations, which,
• 47:53
  Speaker 1: by the way, Andreeson says we don't pay attention to valuation.
• 47:55
  Speaker 1: Well that's what he says. Yes, you know, I think
• 47:57
  Speaker 1: it's you know, once again in the public markets. Yes,
• 47:59
  Speaker 1: I think it matters. I think you're right. Who cares
• 48:02
  Speaker 1: the vcs throw you know, I always say there's not
• 48:04
  Speaker 1: enough money to shove, not up for ad holes to
• 48:06
  Speaker 1: shove all the money down. And there's that much money.
• 48:08
  Speaker 1: So yeah, there's that much money. And so you know,
• 48:10
  Speaker 1: you've got SoftBank running around now. And look when Andreason
• 48:13
  Speaker 1: came and everyone's like, what's he doing? Overpaying now? And
• 48:16
  Speaker 1: Reason looks like parsimonious compared to SoftBank. That's a good word.
• 48:19
  Speaker 1: So let me push back again on some of the
• 48:22
  Speaker 1: new tech companies. So there's grub Street, which has been
• 48:26
  Speaker 1: doing some really dishonest things. If we've just wrote about
• 48:30
  Speaker 1: that about about the tipping, not just the tipping, but
• 48:34
  Speaker 1: taking phone numbers for um and registering websites that look
• 48:39
  Speaker 1: like the restaurants. If you think Craigslist hurt media companies.
• 48:44
  Speaker 1: Grub Street is really damaging a lot. Actually, it's a
• 48:48
  Speaker 1: it's a bigger question you're talking there's a bigger question
• 48:51
  Speaker 1: you're talking about, which is the ethics behind some of
• 48:53
  Speaker 1: this stuff. Like it goes to the bigger version of data.
• 48:55
  Speaker 1: How your data is being used, how you're being manipulated online.
• 48:59
  Speaker 1: Now you don't get if your data is being used
• 49:02
  Speaker 1: and they're monetizing it, why don't you get a piece
• 49:03
  Speaker 1: of it? How does that happen that your data which
• 49:06
  Speaker 1: you own is being monetized by someone else, Like that's
• 49:10
  Speaker 1: like you have to think about around face, But where's
• 49:12
  Speaker 1: the benefit? Are they paying you for that? Are they
• 49:15
  Speaker 1: disclosing enough? Are you allowed to opt out? And so
• 49:18
  Speaker 1: those are those bigger questions of how all of us
• 49:20
  Speaker 1: have become like you know, if you remember the soiling
• 49:24
  Speaker 1: greens people like you know, that's data is people, and
• 49:28
  Speaker 1: so the question is what do we do about that?
• 49:30
  Speaker 1: And Congress in general, on the bigger question, has has
• 49:34
  Speaker 1: done no regulation of the Internet ever, unlike Europe, which
• 49:37
  Speaker 1: has been very forward on starting to they're a decade
• 49:41
  Speaker 1: ahead of they are there, indeed, but it's still there.
• 49:43
  Speaker 1: Haven't been really comprehensive regulation of the Internet the way
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: there's comprehensive whether whilst she breaks it, there's comprehensive legislation,
• 49:51
  Speaker 1: whether chemical companies violate things and break the lot. There
• 49:56
  Speaker 1: are laws, whether they're you know, emission standards, which are
• 49:59
  Speaker 1: now the Fifornian the drum mininistrator California looks like it's winning.
• 50:03
  Speaker 1: Um oh god, they're there, Sam. You stop and think
• 50:07
  Speaker 1: about this. The automobile industry has invested so much money
• 50:11
  Speaker 1: in everything from hybrids to electric to Cleanerody's going back, right,
• 50:15
  Speaker 1: It's like, wait, we've wasted billions of dollars if we
• 50:18
  Speaker 1: get to play, not going back. They don't want to
• 50:19
  Speaker 1: go back. I want to go back. And the future
• 50:21
  Speaker 1: is these cars. They they have a marketing and branding
• 50:24
  Speaker 1: issues they want to appeal to. Really, you're on the
• 50:28
  Speaker 1: downside of history here like Stop like clean Cole Clean.
• 50:31
  Speaker 1: So what's what's interesting is that like Tony. So the
• 50:34
  Speaker 1: question is where are we gonna regulate like in California
• 50:36
  Speaker 1: right now, there's a privacy bill coming online that's going
• 50:39
  Speaker 1: to be the de facto for the country. It is,
• 50:42
  Speaker 1: and there's twelve others across the country. So then tech
• 50:44
  Speaker 1: companies are going to be like, which one do we like,
• 50:46
  Speaker 1: They're gonna have to follow all of them. I think
• 50:48
  Speaker 1: everybody like longs for an idea of a privacy bill
• 50:51
  Speaker 1: that has some teeth that protects consumers, even these companies,
• 50:54
  Speaker 1: because it's like they don't. I don't. I think confusion
• 50:57
  Speaker 1: really creates problems in markets, right and therefore there should
• 51:01
  Speaker 1: be a really strong national privacy bill that one would thing,
• 51:05
  Speaker 1: but they can't agree on lunch in Congress right now.
• 51:07
  Speaker 1: You'd imagine there should be something around anti discrimination there.
• 51:11
  Speaker 1: You imagine there should be something around Um, there's all
• 51:14
  Speaker 1: kinds of bills. I wrote about this Internet Bill of
• 51:16
  Speaker 1: Rights that they're thinking about, and there's a ten or
• 51:18
  Speaker 1: twelve things, and it's not one law. It's two dozens
• 51:21
  Speaker 1: of laws around the Internet to regulate. And there's only
• 51:23
  Speaker 1: one law right now, and it benefits innet, which is
• 51:26
  Speaker 1: section thirty, which people are now revisiting. Oh, that was
• 51:29
  Speaker 1: your column revisiting an obscure. It's not viscure. It's a
• 51:34
  Speaker 1: critical bill well, but originally it was not well known publicly,
• 51:38
  Speaker 1: and now it's coming. It's been used by it's as
• 51:41
  Speaker 1: a shield. And so what's interesting I have I have
• 51:43
  Speaker 1: a podcast coming out today. I had three people debate
• 51:46
  Speaker 1: it today because I was like, let's talk about this
• 51:48
  Speaker 1: and educate people about it. But you know, that's that
• 51:50
  Speaker 1: bill is helpful to the internet industry and the digital industry.
• 51:54
  Speaker 1: So the question is you can have that and we
• 51:57
  Speaker 1: could you know, getting rid of it's a huge mistake,
• 51:59
  Speaker 1: but figuring out where the responsibility is uh is important
• 52:04
  Speaker 1: and I think so therefore put stuff around it and
• 52:06
  Speaker 1: have some some Everyone is like regulation is terrible. I'm like, no,
• 52:10
  Speaker 1: regulation is worse in many ways because people don't know
• 52:13
  Speaker 1: the rules of the road. And you know, especially with
• 52:15
  Speaker 1: these new technologies are coming cars, some of the healthcare stuff,
• 52:19
  Speaker 1: the censor stuff, the AI stuff, we need good law
• 52:22
  Speaker 1: to to really protect consumers. And many people think, you know,
• 52:27
  Speaker 1: even just the ability to sue is a good thing.
• 52:29
  Speaker 1: Like you know, there are certain laws in place around
• 52:32
  Speaker 1: pornography and everything else, but there this is an industry
• 52:35
  Speaker 1: that needs to be regulated just the way Wall Street
• 52:37
  Speaker 1: is just the way, and regulated they'll be They'll be overreached.
• 52:42
  Speaker 1: There'll be overreached, no question. But the question is if
• 52:46
  Speaker 1: there's none, maybe we need a little Like so you're
• 52:48
  Speaker 1: implying about the right to sue. You know, every all
• 52:53
  Speaker 1: the boilerplate that you shrink, wrap agreements that you sign,
• 52:56
  Speaker 1: have arbitration agreements. In the musicians decency second to thirty
• 53:01
  Speaker 1: does take care of pretty much. They it's been shipped
• 53:04
  Speaker 1: away around uh, sex trafficking in some other areas, but
• 53:08
  Speaker 1: it's not really been shipped away very much at all.
• 53:10
  Speaker 1: And then there's a question of you know, things like
• 53:11
  Speaker 1: Elizabeth Warren was proposing, which is breaking up some of
• 53:14
  Speaker 1: these companies, And that's Elizabeth Warren following again your partner
• 53:19
  Speaker 1: who's been talking talked about that. So there's breakup, there's
• 53:22
  Speaker 1: fees that there's there's fines, there's all kinds of different
• 53:25
  Speaker 1: ways to figure out how to reign in the Internet industry.
• 53:29
  Speaker 1: And it depends on their violations, it depends on their cooperation.
• 53:32
  Speaker 1: Let's do a quick speed round about some of your
• 53:35
  Speaker 1: favorite people, um and since I mentioned Blade Runner, tell
• 53:39
  Speaker 1: me the first things that enter your minds when I
• 53:43
  Speaker 1: mentioned these people's name. Elon musk Um, visionary, visionary, Um, unusual,
• 53:52
  Speaker 1: the whole crazy Joe Rogan thing was blown a little
• 53:57
  Speaker 1: out of No, he shouldn't have done that. He's a
• 53:59
  Speaker 1: seat you have a public company. A little more circumspect
• 54:02
  Speaker 1: would have been better, uh, Jack Dorsey, Oh, also thoughtful,
• 54:09
  Speaker 1: but opaque and disengaged in a way I find troubling.
• 54:14
  Speaker 1: Disengaged meaning not responsive to the current impact of his work.
• 54:19
  Speaker 1: What he's doing, what what are is doing right now?
• 54:21
  Speaker 1: To the national discourse is damaging and he has to
• 54:23
  Speaker 1: think more. He talks about healthy conversations, and I really
• 54:26
  Speaker 1: wish he would stop talking and do something. Okay, speaking
• 54:30
  Speaker 1: of damaging the national discourse, Mark Zuckerbrook ernest really lovely,
• 54:36
  Speaker 1: as you know, the least arrogant considering who he is,
• 54:41
  Speaker 1: really quite thoughtful, thoughtful person, absolutely incapable of dealing with
• 54:47
  Speaker 1: the task he has ahead of him, incapable that that's
• 54:50
  Speaker 1: pretty pretty impressive. Um, what about to use a lot
• 54:53
  Speaker 1: of help? What about the Google guys disengaged? Really disengaged?
• 55:00
  Speaker 1: Is that a function of the just start not running
• 55:02
  Speaker 1: the company? So who is all right? And and whoever
• 55:07
  Speaker 1: is there? What about the entire split between Google and
• 55:12
  Speaker 1: Alphabet or Google projects. It's still the same kind. It's
• 55:16
  Speaker 1: search and everything else is an adult there jumble of blocks.
• 55:20
  Speaker 1: That's what they've always been like Google years ago. There's
• 55:22
  Speaker 1: a fortune magazine covered chaos at Google. It's the same thing.
• 55:26
  Speaker 1: It's a chaotically organized company, and there's there's a lot
• 55:29
  Speaker 1: of obviously practices. It's a big, giant company, makes a
• 55:32
  Speaker 1: ton of money. It's very successful in the way it does.
• 55:34
  Speaker 1: But so from you know, the DNA of any company
• 55:36
  Speaker 1: is the DNA of its beginnings, and that doesn't change. Chaotic,
• 55:40
  Speaker 1: but that's doesn't it's not a messory bad thing. Even
• 55:43
  Speaker 1: at Microsoft, has that DNA changed. Yes, I have a
• 55:47
  Speaker 1: huge respect for such an Adela amazing. I think he's
• 55:50
  Speaker 1: a thoughtful uh measured you know, not as not as
• 55:56
  Speaker 1: exciting screaming and stuff like that, but just a really
• 56:00
  Speaker 1: he's done a great job in defining talk about defining
• 56:03
  Speaker 1: your products. He knows who he is, he knows what
• 56:05
  Speaker 1: Microsoft is interesting read Hastings. Lovely smart. Oh, I just
• 56:09
  Speaker 1: enjoy talking to him. Really, just a great thinker. He's
• 56:14
  Speaker 1: just we don't always agree on things, but boy, what
• 56:17
  Speaker 1: a what a smart man. I like he pulled himself
• 56:22
  Speaker 1: off the board of Facebook. That was interesting. Oh really,
• 56:25
  Speaker 1: I think it was tired of arguing with him. I'm
• 56:27
  Speaker 1: guessing right, And huh, Benny Off you mentioned Earl hysterical, fun,
• 56:34
  Speaker 1: great guy for a drink. You want to go up
• 56:36
  Speaker 1: for a drink with that guy? Always interesting conversation can
• 56:40
  Speaker 1: be blowhardy, but I like it. I like the whole jam.
• 56:43
  Speaker 1: I like it started act. I like his whole commitment
• 56:45
  Speaker 1: to the city. I think it's genuine. I like he's
• 56:49
  Speaker 1: that he's loud about it. Everyone's like, oh, he's just
• 56:51
  Speaker 1: loud about I'm like, yeah, but he does things like
• 56:52
  Speaker 1: I don't care, let him brag, let him. I like him.
• 56:56
  Speaker 1: He's just a really fascinating character. I really enjoy talking it.
• 57:00
  Speaker 1: I always I never not interested in talking to him.
• 57:03
  Speaker 1: Andrewson painting really, but I'm surprised in a good way,
• 57:09
  Speaker 1: in a bad way to some of his new tweets.
• 57:12
  Speaker 1: He's tweeting some crazy definitely, but he took a long
• 57:15
  Speaker 1: tweet vacation, a couple of whatever. He's like Mark whatever,
• 57:19
  Speaker 1: he's I argue with him a lot, but I enjoy it.
• 57:23
  Speaker 1: I hate don't know. I hope he's not listening. Oh
• 57:25
  Speaker 1: he's listening. Okay, Well, what are the vcs are worth
• 57:28
  Speaker 1: bringing up? John Door, Bill Gurley who John's a very
• 57:31
  Speaker 1: thoughtful person. He's not put a book recently, he's put
• 57:35
  Speaker 1: on a book, we did a podcast. He's always been
• 57:37
  Speaker 1: I think, Um, he's John. You know, he's a seems ethical.
• 57:43
  Speaker 1: What what other VCS did I not get to that?
• 57:46
  Speaker 1: That tramp? Do not know him. He's great, He's just
• 57:52
  Speaker 1: a character and sok on Valley. Um, you know, I
• 57:54
  Speaker 1: think you know, there's lots of VCS you don't know about,
• 57:57
  Speaker 1: like my Michael Deering. There's all sorts of interesting Aileene
• 58:02
  Speaker 1: Mary Meeker, there's all sorts of really well you all
• 58:05
  Speaker 1: know who Mary Meeker. Yeah, she's great, she's great. I
• 58:07
  Speaker 1: met her when she was an analyst at Morgan Stan.
• 58:10
  Speaker 1: I used to stay up nights talking about the Internet
• 58:12
  Speaker 1: with her in like the nineties, early nine She got it.
• 58:15
  Speaker 1: She got it in fact too enthusiastic, but she was
• 58:17
  Speaker 1: right directionally she was correct. I've argued that the difference
• 58:20
  Speaker 1: between her and people got into trouble. Like Henry Blodge
• 58:23
  Speaker 1: is she was a true believer who and being wrong
• 58:27
  Speaker 1: is not prosecutable. She was early, She was early, but
• 58:30
  Speaker 1: she was right. She was right in the long term.
• 58:32
  Speaker 1: She was probably wrong several times. The term evaluation his
• 58:36
  Speaker 1: reel cynical. I like Henry, I think he got a
• 58:39
  Speaker 1: He's also a beautiful writer. Um, Who have I missed
• 58:42
  Speaker 1: Steve Jobs? Oh fascinating. I really enjoyed interviewing him. What
• 58:45
  Speaker 1: an interesting and complex person, Um, I always say. And
• 58:50
  Speaker 1: I've gotten to his wife quite a bit. His widow,
• 58:52
  Speaker 1: Lauren Lorraine, who's really really interesting to talk to. She's
• 58:57
  Speaker 1: very active in philanthropy, not just philanthropy, all kinds of
• 58:59
  Speaker 1: all kinds of interesting and I find her to be
• 59:01
  Speaker 1: very interesting in her investment stuff. She's very thoughtful. Another
• 59:05
  Speaker 1: very thoughtful person. Um has a lot of points of
• 59:08
  Speaker 1: view which I like. I like one of the point
• 59:09
  Speaker 1: of you assume Job was you know he was just
• 59:12
  Speaker 1: it would have complicated and interesting person. I know everyone
• 59:14
  Speaker 1: sort of like tried to cartoonize people. He was mean
• 59:17
  Speaker 1: to people. I'm like, yeah, but lots of people are me. No, No,
• 59:24
  Speaker 1: I don't think he was. You know, I have his
• 59:26
  Speaker 1: ratio of productivity was so high, and you know, all
• 59:28
  Speaker 1: those speeches around death were so what an interesting person
• 59:31
  Speaker 1: who challenged himself from a philosophical point of view, I
• 59:35
  Speaker 1: don't think he had a lot of people always say
• 59:37
  Speaker 1: he was heartless. This is what I say all the time.
• 59:39
  Speaker 1: He had too much heart he had too much heart.
• 59:41
  Speaker 1: It was too there were so many things going on
• 59:44
  Speaker 1: with him. I always we did eight Walt and I
• 59:46
  Speaker 1: did eight eight interviews or more with him. Very nobody
• 59:49
  Speaker 1: had the body of interviews that we did with him,
• 59:51
  Speaker 1: and that was every single one of them were fascinating conversations,
• 59:56
  Speaker 1: and of course he's going to be seen as one
• 59:57
  Speaker 1: of the most important. And we did one with Gates
• 59:59
  Speaker 1: and Jobs together. I recall that that was really very interesting.
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 1: That's going to go down in history that you know,
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 1: I'll be forgotten, But not that interview. Larry Ellison hysterical, hysterical,
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 1: really just I just loved talking to him. I mean,
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 1: you know, he's you know, you know, and he's sort
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 1: of the old days of like vaguely sexist, sometimes very
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 1: sexists all Coon Valley, like the old like sells Off
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 1: where everybody like that kind of stuff. I gotta tell you,
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 1: he's a really you know, he's raised two really interesting
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 1: children too, Like what are the kids doing? The kids
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 1: are moviemakers. They make Star Trek and his daughter makes
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 1: some amazing movies. Is like a really interesting filmmaker. And
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 1: his son makes more like Terminator and and Star Trek.
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 1: The recent Star Treks, which are very good movies that
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 1: star trek Ones particularly, And so I don't know. I
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 1: just he's a he just he's one of the few
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 1: titans left kind of thing. Uh. Scott McNeely was someone
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 1: I haven't heard from. I just did a podcast with him.
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 1: Not a podcast, I did a column in York Times
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 1: went around privacy, privacy, get used to it, that kind
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 1: of thing. Um, he's which is the inverse of what
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 1: people used to say. No, he was the first one
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 1: to really identity that you have no privacy, get used
• 1:01:12
  Speaker 1: to it. Um. That was a really prescient thing he said.
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 1: I'm not sure I agree with him on a lot
• 1:01:16
  Speaker 1: of political stuff. He's quite he has a he has
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 1: a problem with Hillary Clinton, is he needs to let
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 1: go of still even to this day he's talking to him.
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 1: I'm like, you know, she's a private citizen, is never
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 1: going to be president. You really can move along, Like
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 1: I feel like you've handled Hillary Clinton, so like, let's
• 1:01:32
  Speaker 1: some people who don't like or really can whatever. It's
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 1: just funny. I was sort of like, can we stop
• 1:01:37
  Speaker 1: talking about Hillary Clinton and start discussing the current state
• 1:01:40
  Speaker 1: of affairs? What? What about CEOs? I haven't mentioned what
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 1: company interesting ones like Brian Chowsky from Airbnb. I think
• 1:01:46
  Speaker 1: he's very thoughtful and interesting. I'll be in such an
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 1: interesting company when that goes public. I think he thinks
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 1: very carefully about stuff, and he understands what I like
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 1: about him as he understands the impact. He may not
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 1: always do the right thing, and they've had a lot
• 1:01:57
  Speaker 1: of mess ups and everything else. They had some early
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 1: mess ups that I think taught them a lot. But
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 1: I think he's extraordinarily thoughtful about his impact and you
• 1:02:06
  Speaker 1: very and I don't think it's just yammering. I think
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 1: he actually knows that his company has negative and positive impacts.
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 1: So he's able to discuss the negative impacts without being defensive.
• 1:02:16
  Speaker 1: And it's a pleasure to talk to him. Tim Cook,
• 1:02:19
  Speaker 1: I love the talk. I didn't get to think Tim
• 1:02:21
  Speaker 1: Cooks are really he's an adult. I've done some very
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 1: good interviews with him. People assumed that when Jobs left
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 1: that would be it for Apple, But here we are,
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 1: what is it six years later? You know they've still
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 1: got the issue. If they've got to have what's the
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 1: next hit? They're like the Rolling Stones, like when's your
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 1: next hit? Like there at some point they can't keep
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 1: making Like it's just like they have such a record,
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 1: you're almost like a good job, you know. I feel
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 1: like that I'm kind of old, but I'm keep making hits,
• 1:02:45
  Speaker 1: so and so they can keep making it. It's a
• 1:02:47
  Speaker 1: really they've done so much amazing stuff that this year
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 1: there's a lot of Yeah, there's stuff around that show
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 1: looks pretty good. Um, we'll see the problem with that show.
• 1:02:58
  Speaker 1: And you brought this up with competing with content between
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 1: Netflix and Amazon and Hulu and everybody else. It's really
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 1: hard to lu I thought they should have brought Netflix
• 1:03:10
  Speaker 1: five years ago when I wrote that, and people gave
• 1:03:13
  Speaker 1: me grief about it. I think it was fifty billion
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 1: dollars and people give me grief. It was like two
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 1: that was a missed opportunity. They could still do it
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 1: so much. Well, it's a rounding era to them. But
• 1:03:24
  Speaker 1: you know there, I liked him cook, I really enjoy
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 1: I think he's been one of the adults in the
• 1:03:28
  Speaker 1: room and has been very toughful. A lot of people
• 1:03:30
  Speaker 1: think he's taking advantage of, like sort of being a
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 1: school marm, but I don't care. I like it versus
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 1: Facebook to some degree. You mean in terms of hey
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 1: to say, you know, I asked him. I didn't think
• 1:03:42
  Speaker 1: he was going to answer, but he did. I asked
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 1: him in this interview I did in Chicago last year.
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 1: Um it was a live interview to school, and I said,
• 1:03:49
  Speaker 1: what would you do if you were Mark Zuckerberg? And
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 1: he said, I wouldn't be in the situation. In the
• 1:03:53
  Speaker 1: first I was like, that's a genus answer, right, that's
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 1: he's not like, that's like he never does that. They
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 1: have a bone to pick with Facebook, Well, yeah, they
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 1: it's also calculated bone because their business is not is
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 1: not advertising. It's an excellent business opportunity to smack them
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 1: and and I think and they believe it. And by
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 1: the way, Steve Jobs was talking about this with us
• 1:04:14
  Speaker 1: ten years years about Facebook, about privacy about very strangely,
• 1:04:18
  Speaker 1: and you can talk about that when it's not your business, right,
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 1: So I guess you could go on about how porn
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 1: talks like and it's it's insulting to women and that
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 1: because it's not my business. So you know, it's it's
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 1: actually good for me if they're competing with me. So
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 1: I think a lot of people feel like Facebook and
• 1:04:33
  Speaker 1: he's taking advantage of the situation. But I'm okay, So
• 1:04:36
  Speaker 1: what meanwhile, did you happen to catch the sixty minutes
• 1:04:41
  Speaker 1: about that Israeli company that basically has licensed the technology.
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 1: I think it's called Pegasus that hack can hack any
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 1: phone anywhere in the world. I assume that's happening already.
• 1:04:52
  Speaker 1: But I mean there is literally an Israeli company who
• 1:04:55
  Speaker 1: was given grief because they licensed it to Saudi Saudi
• 1:04:58
  Speaker 1: Arabia and fearically they use this technology now. But that's
• 1:05:01
  Speaker 1: going to catch up that this It's going to be
• 1:05:03
  Speaker 1: a constant arms race for all this stuff. There's gonna
• 1:05:06
  Speaker 1: be like, look, I assume everything is hacked. That's just
• 1:05:08
  Speaker 1: not the study. And so so LA is right. There
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 1: is no privacy. There is no there hasn't. But you
• 1:05:13
  Speaker 1: can't control your privacy. That's different. You don't own you
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 1: know it's out there, but you can there's ways to control.
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 1: And they haven't done any job whatsoever and helping you do.
• 1:05:21
  Speaker 1: So one thing you even talked about is Trump and
• 1:05:23
  Speaker 1: is tweeting. All the tweeting like that's just such an
• 1:05:25
  Speaker 1: important thing. It's governing by Twitter. So it's funny because
• 1:05:30
  Speaker 1: every time a conversation comes up about g the president
• 1:05:34
  Speaker 1: and and this is just the most recent one. The
• 1:05:37
  Speaker 1: President is haranguing the Federal Reserve chair. Uh, that's never
• 1:05:41
  Speaker 1: happened before. And what the answer to these tend to
• 1:05:44
  Speaker 1: be is, well, it has happened before, just it's always
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 1: been private. And to do it publicly, to do a
• 1:05:50
  Speaker 1: vocation and weaponization that it is provided by these tools,
• 1:05:54
  Speaker 1: these online tools, is really unprecedented. Everyone's like people have
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 1: done from like no, not like this, and and you know,
• 1:06:00
  Speaker 1: just the two examples. I wrote a calm about this
• 1:06:03
  Speaker 1: the when they when they the census thing was happening, right,
• 1:06:06
  Speaker 1: which we'vegotten about. Remember that, Well, it's the the outrages
• 1:06:09
  Speaker 1: come so fast and furious, you can't keep up. So
• 1:06:11
  Speaker 1: he by design they had made a decision to back
• 1:06:14
  Speaker 1: away from adding that question, and suddenly he tweets that,
• 1:06:17
  Speaker 1: oh yeah, we're putting an end. And then the lawyer
• 1:06:20
  Speaker 1: for the Justice Department is like, I don't know what
• 1:06:23
  Speaker 1: he meant in the tweet. We need to call him,
• 1:06:26
  Speaker 1: like what like governing by tweet? And then he did
• 1:06:28
  Speaker 1: it this week with Greenland. Well, wait before we go
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 1: to Greenland, stay with the census question. Governing by twitter.
• 1:06:35
  Speaker 1: Here's the fascinating thing. The last landed gentry in the
• 1:06:39
  Speaker 1: United States are federal judges. What they say goes in
• 1:06:43
  Speaker 1: their court, and you can be in jail as a
• 1:06:47
  Speaker 1: lawyer who's been who's been fined for um, disrespecting the court,
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 1: and eventually the appeal will go your way, and after
• 1:06:54
  Speaker 1: six months of jail you come out. That judge said
• 1:06:57
  Speaker 1: to that lawyer, your answer is this honest and if
• 1:07:01
  Speaker 1: you don't get me the answer I want, there's going
• 1:07:04
  Speaker 1: to be hell to pay. I think he threatened them
• 1:07:06
  Speaker 1: with contempt of court and sending them to jail until
• 1:07:08
  Speaker 1: it's resolved, and he held them accountable. It was fascinating.
• 1:07:12
  Speaker 1: He's like, you're responsible for this, it's your client to
• 1:07:15
  Speaker 1: the lawyers because literally they're saying there like it's Twitter.
• 1:07:18
  Speaker 1: What But literally he's governing by Twitter, Like what do
• 1:07:20
  Speaker 1: you do? Like I can see the person is sitting there,
• 1:07:22
  Speaker 1: like what do we do? Now? Who do we call?
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 1: He just tweeted it, like what does that mean that
• 1:07:26
  Speaker 1: the interpreting it. You're an officer of the court and
• 1:07:28
  Speaker 1: you have an obligation. But I'm talking about on a
• 1:07:31
  Speaker 1: personal level. I mean, like just like Maddest when he
• 1:07:33
  Speaker 1: was tweeting about that transgender So he just ignored him
• 1:07:36
  Speaker 1: right and pulled someone into the office said no, not
• 1:07:39
  Speaker 1: doing But by the way, he twitter resident and you're
• 1:07:42
  Speaker 1: ignoring the residence of the whole thing is saying yes,
• 1:07:45
  Speaker 1: but it's also in you can't do that like that.
• 1:07:48
  Speaker 1: That's called we have a system. So it's really fascinating, Well,
• 1:07:51
  Speaker 1: we have a system, and if you want me to
• 1:07:52
  Speaker 1: do something, give me an official executive order, not a tweet.
• 1:07:56
  Speaker 1: We don't want people anticipating with the president. Nobody's anticipated
• 1:07:59
  Speaker 1: that you could do that, because he did it again
• 1:08:00
  Speaker 1: with Greenland. I'm not going to Greenland. The ambassador to
• 1:08:03
  Speaker 1: Greenland was like, welcome, Mr President, and then he tweets
• 1:08:06
  Speaker 1: that like just at the same time, and then they're
• 1:08:09
  Speaker 1: like they're all scrambling, like somebody had an interesting theory
• 1:08:13
  Speaker 1: that pre scheduled at the end of the month. Is
• 1:08:16
  Speaker 1: Obama going to Greenlands? And he didn't want to be
• 1:08:19
  Speaker 1: compared with the adoring think you know, I think. But
• 1:08:25
  Speaker 1: it's really interesting because it's a perfect medium for this guy.
• 1:08:28
  Speaker 1: He's like the troll in chief. He's twitchy, he's raging,
• 1:08:32
  Speaker 1: he's it's everything about the way Twitter is designed, and
• 1:08:35
  Speaker 1: the way they've architect it is perfect for Donald Trump,
• 1:08:39
  Speaker 1: and he's that's why he's so good on it. Now,
• 1:08:41
  Speaker 1: then you see someone like AOC who's also good on it,
• 1:08:43
  Speaker 1: but he's good in a different way. Future president, he's
• 1:08:46
  Speaker 1: exactly he broadcast or possibly he broadcasts, and she speaks
• 1:08:51
  Speaker 1: the language. So I find her fascinating in that way.
• 1:08:54
  Speaker 1: And I don't know. I think Nancy Policy is right,
• 1:08:55
  Speaker 1: you just gotta get the votes. I think she's got to.
• 1:08:58
  Speaker 1: She's a natural. She's of that general minds. If she
• 1:09:00
  Speaker 1: combines the ability to communicate beautifully on social media with
• 1:09:05
  Speaker 1: an ability to get votes and really actually do the
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 1: mechanations of democracy which you need the votes, like that's
• 1:09:12
  Speaker 1: really it, that will be very powerful. I think Trump
• 1:09:15
  Speaker 1: just he just creates havoc, and that's that's also a
• 1:09:17
  Speaker 1: talent to create havoc. He uses, but it's he has unique.
• 1:09:23
  Speaker 1: Just the way John F. Kennedy used the television, He's
• 1:09:26
  Speaker 1: using Twitter and social media, no doubt about it. We
• 1:09:30
  Speaker 1: have been speaking with Kara Swisher. She is the co
• 1:09:33
  Speaker 1: founder of Recode and the author of numerous books on technology.
• 1:09:38
  Speaker 1: If you enjoy this conversation, be sure and check out
• 1:09:40
  Speaker 1: our podcast extras, where we keep the tape rolling and
• 1:09:43
  Speaker 1: continue discussing all things tech related. You can find that
• 1:09:47
  Speaker 1: at iTunes, Spotify, Google Podcast, Overcast, Stitcher, wherever your find
• 1:09:52
  Speaker 1: our podcasts are sold. We love your comments, feedback and
• 1:09:55
  Speaker 1: suggestions right to us at m IB podcast at Bloomberg
• 1:09:59
  Speaker 1: dot net. Check out my weekly column at Bloomberg dot com.
• 1:10:03
  Speaker 1: Follow me on Twitter at rid Holts. Sign up from
• 1:10:07
  Speaker 1: my daily reads at rid Halts dot com. I'm Barry
• 1:10:10
  Speaker 1: rid Halts. You're listening to Masters in Business on Bloomberg Radio.
• 1:10:16
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the podcast. By the way, Kara, thank you
• 1:10:18
  Speaker 1: so much for doing this. You were tough to track down.
• 1:10:21
  Speaker 1: I had to pull in some favors. Galloway who um
• 1:10:25
  Speaker 1: has been on my podcast. I've done to fifty something now,
• 1:10:29
  Speaker 1: more than any five years two really and that doesn't
• 1:10:34
  Speaker 1: count Pivot. That's a lot, but minor roll three four hours,
• 1:10:37
  Speaker 1: so it's a little so. By the way, just so
• 1:10:40
  Speaker 1: you know, I've been a listener to Pivot from the beginning.
• 1:10:44
  Speaker 1: When I'm I'm up early early East Coast time working
• 1:10:47
  Speaker 1: on my my various and sundry things, my my frippery,
• 1:10:51
  Speaker 1: UM and I like to have something playing in the
• 1:10:54
  Speaker 1: background and you guys, you guys are well. We really
• 1:10:59
  Speaker 1: didn't get into the podcast much, but I love the
• 1:11:04
  Speaker 1: combination of you as who you are and Scott as
• 1:11:10
  Speaker 1: an alpha male East Coast weirdest chemistry people. It's it's
• 1:11:15
  Speaker 1: fantastic anywhere I go there, Like where Scott, I'm like, no, no,
• 1:11:18
  Speaker 1: we're not married, Mary, we don't hang out, but we
• 1:11:20
  Speaker 1: sound like a married couple. It's sort of like I
• 1:11:21
  Speaker 1: was trying to think of, like is it Kathie Lee
• 1:11:23
  Speaker 1: and Regis is remember moonlighting? You know what I mean.
• 1:11:27
  Speaker 1: It's that kind of thing that's going on there. It's
• 1:11:29
  Speaker 1: a really interesting, um it's a really interesting chemistry we have.
• 1:11:33
  Speaker 1: And I think it's because I'm like, like, he's being
• 1:11:35
  Speaker 1: alpha male on purpose, right, he's allowing the testosterone poison,
• 1:11:41
  Speaker 1: but he's also like sort of sort of like he's
• 1:11:44
  Speaker 1: a woke alpha yeah exactly, kind of like, oh God,
• 1:11:46
  Speaker 1: I said something stupid and I'm like, you're an idiot.
• 1:11:48
  Speaker 1: Like he says stuff to you that I just like,
• 1:11:51
  Speaker 1: crack up, and he's trying to provoke you. I was like,
• 1:11:54
  Speaker 1: your one statement away from the end of your career.
• 1:11:56
  Speaker 1: All the time, like I'm trying to protect and you
• 1:11:58
  Speaker 1: can see me trying to protect. It's a really good
• 1:12:01
  Speaker 1: it's a really interesting thing, and we're going to try
• 1:12:03
  Speaker 1: to do more of them. And it's just you can't.
• 1:12:06
  Speaker 1: You cannot capture that with just about anything. I had
• 1:12:08
  Speaker 1: that report with Walt in a different way too, So
• 1:12:10
  Speaker 1: it's really hard to do that. And I was I'm thrilled.
• 1:12:13
  Speaker 1: I enjoy doing it, which I can tell you know
• 1:12:16
  Speaker 1: it comes across he enjoyed. We enjoy it like it's fun.
• 1:12:19
  Speaker 1: And I think that's what's most important, is to you know,
• 1:12:23
  Speaker 1: love the life you live right kind of thing like
• 1:12:25
  Speaker 1: we love it, And that's that's how you make great things,
• 1:12:27
  Speaker 1: if you really enjoy yourself once an episode, I here
• 1:12:30
  Speaker 1: hold me, Kara. You know it, you know it's coming.
• 1:12:33
  Speaker 1: He has all kinds. I'm a gangster. Hestake me a texting.
• 1:12:36
  Speaker 1: Barry's a gangster. I'm like, oh Jesus, can I tell you?
• 1:12:40
  Speaker 1: Can I tell you the gangster? Can I tell you?
• 1:12:42
  Speaker 1: The funniest thing he's ever said I ever heard him
• 1:12:45
  Speaker 1: say so. He knows I'm a car guy. We were
• 1:12:48
  Speaker 1: talking about cars and I misheard him. I thought he
• 1:12:50
  Speaker 1: said g wagon. I didn't realize he had a g
• 1:12:54
  Speaker 1: L wagon. That you wagon is I don't even know
• 1:12:56
  Speaker 1: what you're talking, all right, So Mercedes start bring up football.
• 1:12:58
  Speaker 1: I'm going to Mersey's makes this military vehicle that looks
• 1:13:02
  Speaker 1: like a giant jeep on steroids. It's like a hundred
• 1:13:06
  Speaker 1: and fifty thou dollars. Why do you need this? Nobody
• 1:13:08
  Speaker 1: needs it. It's the worst dumbest thing in the world.
• 1:13:11
  Speaker 1: And when I heard him say g wagon g L,
• 1:13:14
  Speaker 1: I thought he said g wagon, what would that be?
• 1:13:17
  Speaker 1: So g L is like a normal STV g L
• 1:13:19
  Speaker 1: wagon is this? Well, like that's what I thought. I go,
• 1:13:24
  Speaker 1: I go, Scott, I don't know about you and this
• 1:13:26
  Speaker 1: g wagon And his answer was no, no, g L,
• 1:13:29
  Speaker 1: not g wagon. He goes, I'm insecure, not pathetic. I
• 1:13:33
  Speaker 1: still get emails from people about that. Silly. It's funny
• 1:13:36
  Speaker 1: he goes, and when he when we go places. And
• 1:13:38
  Speaker 1: what's really striking about that podcast is I am stopped
• 1:13:41
  Speaker 1: so much on the street, like tell Scott to screw it,
• 1:13:44
  Speaker 1: like and really, yeah, I feel like we don't have
• 1:13:46
  Speaker 1: a TV show because it's really funny. People like he
• 1:13:49
  Speaker 1: was walking on the tarm and of course he's going
• 1:13:51
  Speaker 1: to the Hampton's and a helicopter. I'm not doing that.
• 1:13:53
  Speaker 1: I'm like, I'm in a car with my kids. And
• 1:13:56
  Speaker 1: really he was shoppering and I'm literally driving a car
• 1:14:00
  Speaker 1: card to Province down with my pregnant girl, right and
• 1:14:02
  Speaker 1: my two teenage sons. And it's like and he and
• 1:14:05
  Speaker 1: the guy who does the waves the helicopter down with
• 1:14:08
  Speaker 1: the two batons. He has the earphones on and he
• 1:14:12
  Speaker 1: sees Scott and he goes, where's Gara? Which was really funny.
• 1:14:16
  Speaker 1: Kara is driving like a car up to the cape,
• 1:14:20
  Speaker 1: is what Kara is doing? Anyway. That's that's very He's
• 1:14:23
  Speaker 1: in Nantucket, of course, because he's the elite. Is Nantucket
• 1:14:26
  Speaker 1: considered the Oh my god, been there? That I'm not.
• 1:14:31
  Speaker 1: I'm in the top ten percent. I'm not in the top.
• 1:14:33
  Speaker 1: One color in your house is everything has to look
• 1:14:35
  Speaker 1: the same, the wooden shingles, and you need to not
• 1:14:38
  Speaker 1: go to Nantucket in a province town, you gotta pick.
• 1:14:42
  Speaker 1: I'm a Fire Island guy. I'm very Fire Island faddle
• 1:14:46
  Speaker 1: classic out there exactly all right, So I have to
• 1:14:50
  Speaker 1: let you go eventually. So let me jump to my
• 1:14:53
  Speaker 1: favorite questions that I asked all of my guests. I
• 1:14:56
  Speaker 1: know you don't own a car now, but what was
• 1:14:58
  Speaker 1: the first car you ever owned? Hot a Civic, good, good,
• 1:15:01
  Speaker 1: reliable car. Shift. I have a ship. I always have
• 1:15:03
  Speaker 1: shift car, me too, cars, my jeep. Everything is a
• 1:15:08
  Speaker 1: stick shift. And my wife is now a better driver
• 1:15:11
  Speaker 1: with a stick than I am. It's really uh swagon
• 1:15:14
  Speaker 1: for years, which one bug or something? Later and then
• 1:15:18
  Speaker 1: I had a rabbit. When it was a rabbit, it's
• 1:15:20
  Speaker 1: called something, it's called and then and then I had
• 1:15:24
  Speaker 1: a minivan. I had a hont Of minivan when I
• 1:15:26
  Speaker 1: but not before I had kids. I had a Honey Minivan.
• 1:15:28
  Speaker 1: Then I had a less Bru of course a super
• 1:15:32
  Speaker 1: You saw there was a big article not too long
• 1:15:33
  Speaker 1: ago about how Subru became the car of choice of lesbians,
• 1:15:38
  Speaker 1: and I think it was vany fair. It's a very
• 1:15:40
  Speaker 1: interesting less Brue. I had a less Brut and then
• 1:15:42
  Speaker 1: I never heard of call. I had a jeep for
• 1:15:45
  Speaker 1: New York Manager. They're the worst, terrible, although to be fair,
• 1:15:49
  Speaker 1: they're unstoppable in the snow. I had I had one
• 1:15:52
  Speaker 1: with the with the with the like a real jeep.
• 1:15:55
  Speaker 1: And I had one that was had a hard top,
• 1:15:57
  Speaker 1: and I hated both of them, and then I had
• 1:15:59
  Speaker 1: an Then I started getting into masses. I love masses
• 1:16:02
  Speaker 1: and I love the Mazda. I wanted a Masta too,
• 1:16:04
  Speaker 1: but mosta three, and the three is a happy car.
• 1:16:07
  Speaker 1: It's a good car. It's had a great happy fix.
• 1:16:09
  Speaker 1: That was a great car. And then I just recently
• 1:16:11
  Speaker 1: had a Ford Fiesta Turbo. That's why I'm so sorry
• 1:16:14
  Speaker 1: there was no I'm telling you that's a great years ago.
• 1:16:17
  Speaker 1: I hated, no the Turbo. It really is a good car.
• 1:16:20
  Speaker 1: Don't insult the Ford Fiesta. I will tell you. I
• 1:16:22
  Speaker 1: rented a Ford Edge the other day and I was
• 1:16:24
  Speaker 1: surprised at how good car. Herbo was a different car.
• 1:16:26
  Speaker 1: Everyone made fun of me, and then they got in
• 1:16:28
  Speaker 1: it with its stick shift and we're like, oh, I see, Oh,
• 1:16:30
  Speaker 1: this is wonderful little car. It was a great little car.
• 1:16:33
  Speaker 1: But I do not have any cars. I had a
• 1:16:34
  Speaker 1: Vespa for many years, but I never wrote it. I
• 1:16:36
  Speaker 1: had what do you mean you never drove it? I
• 1:16:38
  Speaker 1: just in Sanrancis was too cold. I had it in
• 1:16:40
  Speaker 1: San Francisco. My my ex gave it to me as
• 1:16:42
  Speaker 1: a Valentine's present. But I love scooters. I write scooters
• 1:16:45
  Speaker 1: all the time, and I love I love scooters. What's
• 1:16:48
  Speaker 1: the most important thing people don't know about? Kara Swish
• 1:16:52
  Speaker 1: and I love scooters. No, people know that, No, that
• 1:16:55
  Speaker 1: I love. I love action films with really bad action
• 1:16:59
  Speaker 1: films like I just I just love those I love.
• 1:17:02
  Speaker 1: I go to all of them and I go by myself.
• 1:17:03
  Speaker 1: I don't want to like, how are you with people
• 1:17:05
  Speaker 1: about how they are? Really? I just go I love them,
• 1:17:08
  Speaker 1: I love them, I love them, I love I love
• 1:17:10
  Speaker 1: Mission Possible. I love Bond. I'm so excited the new
• 1:17:13
  Speaker 1: Bond film is coming out and Drew Elba going to
• 1:17:16
  Speaker 1: be No, no no, it's gonna be Daniel Craig again. Well
• 1:17:18
  Speaker 1: that's this one. I've seen every Bond movie ten times,
• 1:17:21
  Speaker 1: even the bad ones, and uh, I love all those movies.
• 1:17:24
  Speaker 1: I like. I'm excited for Kristen Stewart and Underwater. I
• 1:17:27
  Speaker 1: like anything action and I also love Fast and Furious franchise.
• 1:17:31
  Speaker 1: I love and I love the rock Jack Reacher. Have
• 1:17:33
  Speaker 1: you seen the joke? Yes, so I'm not going to
• 1:17:35
  Speaker 1: name something. How about Night and Day? Yes, of course,
• 1:17:38
  Speaker 1: with me without me, I love it. Let's talk about mentors.
• 1:17:42
  Speaker 1: Tell us about your mentor that's it. One name. Bang.
• 1:17:45
  Speaker 1: He recruited you to the journal. How did he affect
• 1:17:48
  Speaker 1: how you developed as a journalist. He was so generous
• 1:17:51
  Speaker 1: with his power. He had so much power and was
• 1:17:53
  Speaker 1: so generous and and and really it's such a good
• 1:17:56
  Speaker 1: mentor to women in the in the way never air
• 1:18:00
  Speaker 1: to mentor a woman, never early he has. There's a
• 1:18:04
  Speaker 1: group of women he's mentored in a way that has
• 1:18:06
  Speaker 1: been and specifically made sure he did that because he
• 1:18:09
  Speaker 1: understood they were they there were there were issues. Always
• 1:18:13
  Speaker 1: had my back. Um just and I can I can
• 1:18:16
  Speaker 1: be uh difficult, not difficult? No, no no difficult. That's what
• 1:18:21
  Speaker 1: Scott told me. He said, you were difficult. No, I'm
• 1:18:22
  Speaker 1: not difficult. I'm not difficult. I think. I know what
• 1:18:24
  Speaker 1: I want and I can say it very loudly and
• 1:18:26
  Speaker 1: I don't you know, I think and I do it
• 1:18:28
  Speaker 1: around powerful people like Rupert. Mark said time to me,
• 1:18:31
  Speaker 1: I was like no, and everyone was like WHOA, what
• 1:18:34
  Speaker 1: do you do? At one point it was let me
• 1:18:37
  Speaker 1: tell you this very very so we would meet with him.
• 1:18:39
  Speaker 1: Mark loved Walt Moss Burt love, He loved reading him.
• 1:18:42
  Speaker 1: He was thrilled when he bought the journal. Always had
• 1:18:44
  Speaker 1: Walt to lunch and everything, and I was always with him,
• 1:18:48
  Speaker 1: right like I was there. I'm certain Rupermar didn't know
• 1:18:52
  Speaker 1: my name. He thought you were hit Walt's assistant. He knew,
• 1:18:55
  Speaker 1: he was aware that I was his partner, you know
• 1:18:57
  Speaker 1: what I mean, But he didn't know. I was like
• 1:19:00
  Speaker 1: he didn't and so he never he'd be like wall, Wall, Wall,
• 1:19:04
  Speaker 1: how are you? How are you're doing? You know? Mumbles?
• 1:19:06
  Speaker 1: And I was always with him, and so he later
• 1:19:10
  Speaker 1: knows who I am. And he used to call me
• 1:19:11
  Speaker 1: a lot during the Internet thing like what do you
• 1:19:13
  Speaker 1: think of this company? What do you think that? Which
• 1:19:14
  Speaker 1: was interesting. I'd get a call like four in the
• 1:19:16
  Speaker 1: morning for moving Rupert's call on the phone and I'm like,
• 1:19:18
  Speaker 1: all right, sure or whatever. But um, but he we
• 1:19:23
  Speaker 1: were in the office one day and he's like wha
• 1:19:25
  Speaker 1: and he goes, well hello, and I go listen. I
• 1:19:29
  Speaker 1: don't think you know my name, but it's Kara Swisher.
• 1:19:33
  Speaker 1: Next time I come, I'd like you to say hi, Kara,
• 1:19:35
  Speaker 1: because I want you to remember my name if you
• 1:19:36
  Speaker 1: don't mind. But I don't think you know my name
• 1:19:38
  Speaker 1: right now. And I'm sorry to be rude, but I'm
• 1:19:40
  Speaker 1: just wanting like why pretend? What was the reaction He's like,
• 1:19:42
  Speaker 1: I know your name. I'm like, well, I said, all right,
• 1:19:46
  Speaker 1: if you know what you do, but I don't think
• 1:19:47
  Speaker 1: you do. I know it, and I go, all right,
• 1:19:49
  Speaker 1: I don't think you do. And I was like, what
• 1:19:51
  Speaker 1: was like? Stop at Carol and the next time you
• 1:19:53
  Speaker 1: showed up, he said, you always knew my name after
• 1:19:56
  Speaker 1: That's very, very funny. Let's talk about books. We've touched
• 1:19:58
  Speaker 1: on a few books and will include your books. What
• 1:20:01
  Speaker 1: are some of your favorite books, tech non tech? What
• 1:20:04
  Speaker 1: do you like? I'm reading I've been reading ron Cherno
• 1:20:07
  Speaker 1: Hamilton's book for six years now, can't finish. He ends badly,
• 1:20:12
  Speaker 1: um no no, and I'm gonna play on Broadway. It
• 1:20:15
  Speaker 1: worked out well so early. But I think the book
• 1:20:17
  Speaker 1: is great, and I'm really I love historical books. I'm
• 1:20:20
  Speaker 1: right now reading um List. I just finished I'll Be
• 1:20:23
  Speaker 1: Gone in the Dark. Michelle McNamara's book about the Golden
• 1:20:26
  Speaker 1: State Killer. Just a really interest. I love dogged people,
• 1:20:29
  Speaker 1: and she was how that eventually got solved. But yeah,
• 1:20:32
  Speaker 1: well DNA That's why I was interested. And I'm sort
• 1:20:35
  Speaker 1: of super interested in DNA right now. So I just
• 1:20:36
  Speaker 1: read that book, but it turned out to be a
• 1:20:39
  Speaker 1: fascinating book. Um. I am reading uh, Taffy Acnear's Fleishman's
• 1:20:44
  Speaker 1: in Trouble. I had her on the podcast and I
• 1:20:45
  Speaker 1: didn't fan me great novel. She's a great feature writer
• 1:20:49
  Speaker 1: and she's trying her hand at novels. Um. I read
• 1:20:52
  Speaker 1: a lot of the books I have to do podcasts on.
• 1:20:54
  Speaker 1: I'm reading Andrew Marin's's book about Disinformation because he's going
• 1:20:58
  Speaker 1: to be on the podcast my Isaac's book. I'm giving
• 1:21:01
  Speaker 1: him his book party for the Uber book. Although I
• 1:21:02
  Speaker 1: don't want to know more about Uber, I know a
• 1:21:04
  Speaker 1: lot about it. You know how that ends. But it's
• 1:21:06
  Speaker 1: a good book. It's a good book. Um. Yeah, and
• 1:21:08
  Speaker 1: so that's interesting. I read a lot of nonfiction more
• 1:21:11
  Speaker 1: than fiction I wish I read. I'm reading this book
• 1:21:15
  Speaker 1: that's amazing and I'm going to blank on her name. Julia,
• 1:21:18
  Speaker 1: Julia Gabby Rivera's new book. It's I can't remember the
• 1:21:22
  Speaker 1: name of it anyway, you hear, very new book and
• 1:21:25
  Speaker 1: it's amazing. It's really wonderful. Juliana takes on something or
• 1:21:28
  Speaker 1: that she's she's really great. She's a beautiful writer. And
• 1:21:32
  Speaker 1: I'm trying to read more fiction because I think everybody
• 1:21:34
  Speaker 1: wants to read more fiction. It's very stupid fiction. I
• 1:21:37
  Speaker 1: just really, you know, really, I like fiction. I mean
• 1:21:41
  Speaker 1: for work, don't you have to do a ton? I
• 1:21:43
  Speaker 1: do a ton of reading. I read the Internet all
• 1:21:44
  Speaker 1: day long, and I read a lot of stories. Um,
• 1:21:46
  Speaker 1: but I tend to I like I like feature writers.
• 1:21:49
  Speaker 1: Some of my favorite feature writers Jessica Pressler, Olivia Nuzzy.
• 1:21:52
  Speaker 1: They're all women. It's interesting, Taffy Acner, Um. I like
• 1:21:56
  Speaker 1: them all. I find them really wonderful. I love their writing.
• 1:21:59
  Speaker 1: I think they're great. Tell Us about a time you've
• 1:22:01
  Speaker 1: failed and what you learned from the experience failed nobody
• 1:22:05
  Speaker 1: bats at thousand. I don't look at it as failure.
• 1:22:08
  Speaker 1: I hate to sound like a Silicon Valley person, but
• 1:22:10
  Speaker 1: it sound like Ray Dally keep going. I don't look
• 1:22:14
  Speaker 1: at them as failures. I don't think I'm trying to, well,
• 1:22:16
  Speaker 1: what did you learn from the experience of something that
• 1:22:19
  Speaker 1: we can just do something else. I have a very
• 1:22:21
  Speaker 1: good ability just to like okay, next, next, like thank
• 1:22:24
  Speaker 1: you next, um uh, it's it's I just don't think
• 1:22:28
  Speaker 1: of it that way. I don't think. I don't think
• 1:22:30
  Speaker 1: I The only failures I can think of is with
• 1:22:32
  Speaker 1: my children, like I should have given also right, I
• 1:22:36
  Speaker 1: should have done more of this sometimes like I should
• 1:22:40
  Speaker 1: have made decisions faster. It's all related to my children. Um.
• 1:22:43
  Speaker 1: And even then, I think I'm a very good parent.
• 1:22:45
  Speaker 1: I think I'm a really good parent. So no failures ever,
• 1:22:48
  Speaker 1: I know that's not but I don't like, Well, my
• 1:22:51
  Speaker 1: dad died when I was five. That's not a failure,
• 1:22:53
  Speaker 1: but it's certainly it for me. And I think I'm
• 1:22:56
  Speaker 1: very resilient because of it, even though I would rather
• 1:22:59
  Speaker 1: be less resilient in him alive. So you know, sometimes
• 1:23:03
  Speaker 1: I lose my temper with my mom and I wish
• 1:23:05
  Speaker 1: I had and it's a lot of that kind of stuff. Um.
• 1:23:08
  Speaker 1: But big career failer is, you know, I think I'm
• 1:23:09
  Speaker 1: really good at career. I'd have to say I've timed
• 1:23:12
  Speaker 1: it well. I think I think I've done a good
• 1:23:13
  Speaker 1: job on my career for sure. And that's in a
• 1:23:15
  Speaker 1: very And also, you know, when I had a stroke,
• 1:23:17
  Speaker 1: I thought, wait, what I had a stroke with five
• 1:23:20
  Speaker 1: six years ago? Hold on a sex. So the answer
• 1:23:22
  Speaker 1: to the question, what's the most important thing we don't
• 1:23:24
  Speaker 1: know about you? Oh, the stroke. People do know about it.
• 1:23:27
  Speaker 1: I don't know, but I didn't listen. I do a
• 1:23:29
  Speaker 1: ton of research into every guest. I didn'tng on my
• 1:23:32
  Speaker 1: way to do a make money for Rupert Murdoch. I
• 1:23:34
  Speaker 1: did an All Things Digital D China and Asia D
• 1:23:37
  Speaker 1: so from the flight on the flight. Yeah, and it
• 1:23:39
  Speaker 1: turned out I had a hole in my heart, which
• 1:23:41
  Speaker 1: many people have dated me have said, no, I'm kidding,
• 1:23:44
  Speaker 1: I'm pretty good. That is a mark. Yeah, yeah, I
• 1:23:48
  Speaker 1: to hold my heart. It's called the PFO. And I
• 1:23:50
  Speaker 1: had sticky blood, as I found out through twenty three
• 1:23:52
  Speaker 1: and me and I was Mediterranean, but it's a kind
• 1:23:57
  Speaker 1: of it's a condition for the But so, so, what
• 1:23:59
  Speaker 1: were the what was the impact of the stroke? It
• 1:24:03
  Speaker 1: reinforced my feeling that life is short and you better
• 1:24:06
  Speaker 1: get going. True, But what was the biological What were
• 1:24:10
  Speaker 1: the medical sets? I like the philosophical Yeah, I mean,
• 1:24:14
  Speaker 1: I'm with Steve jobs on that I had a hole
• 1:24:16
  Speaker 1: in my heart and there's nothing I can do about
• 1:24:17
  Speaker 1: it's much So wait, your stroke was cerebral stroke or
• 1:24:20
  Speaker 1: cardiac cardiac I probably be dead. So so you have
• 1:24:24
  Speaker 1: a stroke with no limitations and no, it just was
• 1:24:27
  Speaker 1: amazing no cognitive function, physical very short amount of time
• 1:24:31
  Speaker 1: that day, and then it was done. I was like
• 1:24:33
  Speaker 1: talking like this, and was the hole in your heart
• 1:24:35
  Speaker 1: discovered post stroke investigation. So you got a little lucky
• 1:24:39
  Speaker 1: with a minor stroke that discovered this leakage in one
• 1:24:42
  Speaker 1: of your valves or what was it was? It's a
• 1:24:44
  Speaker 1: hole in your heart's got a PFO. And when you're born,
• 1:24:46
  Speaker 1: there's a flap where the emotic fluid goes back and
• 1:24:49
  Speaker 1: forth and supposed to close, it closes up. It flaps
• 1:24:52
  Speaker 1: over and then seals. And people doesn't seal. Human doesn't leak.
• 1:24:58
  Speaker 1: It just is there, just a lap. It's flaps and
• 1:25:01
  Speaker 1: doesn't on a clock got through. If there's no clock
• 1:25:04
  Speaker 1: getting through, it doesn't matter. So I'm not a doctor,
• 1:25:07
  Speaker 1: but I wrote a big column on that actually in
• 1:25:09
  Speaker 1: the Times Perry died. Oh yes, I wrote saying I
• 1:25:13
  Speaker 1: had a stroke and my brothers saved my life. My
• 1:25:15
  Speaker 1: brother is a doctor. And when I was in Hong
• 1:25:16
  Speaker 1: Kong and I was well, I was, I was there
• 1:25:19
  Speaker 1: and I suddenly couldn't talk. I had a dysphasia. And
• 1:25:22
  Speaker 1: I was like and I was in a hotel room
• 1:25:24
  Speaker 1: and I was like, well, I can't call anybody. And
• 1:25:25
  Speaker 1: I felt, okay, a little headache, could you. I had
• 1:25:29
  Speaker 1: a little bit of tingle in my hand, but yeah,
• 1:25:30
  Speaker 1: I was writing a story about Yahoo, and I was like,
• 1:25:32
  Speaker 1: you know these idiots that, yeah, who once again are
• 1:25:34
  Speaker 1: screwing up or something, And it was my finger tingled.
• 1:25:38
  Speaker 1: I tried to eat something. It fell out of my
• 1:25:39
  Speaker 1: mouth and then I was like wow. And I was like, huh.
• 1:25:42
  Speaker 1: And I thought I had a migraine side migraines for years,
• 1:25:44
  Speaker 1: which is a sign of a stroke among women. Realized
• 1:25:47
  Speaker 1: that not everybody was migraines gets a stroke, but it's
• 1:25:49
  Speaker 1: one of the signals. And and I've been traveling and
• 1:25:52
  Speaker 1: I thought a lot and I was like, oh, I
• 1:25:54
  Speaker 1: just I'm just so tired, that's what it is. And
• 1:25:56
  Speaker 1: so I wrote my brother. I texted him and it
• 1:25:58
  Speaker 1: was a different time, and I think it was in
• 1:25:59
  Speaker 1: the middle the night in San Francisco and he's an
• 1:26:01
  Speaker 1: anesthesiologist and he said, um, like my father was an anesthesiologist,
• 1:26:05
  Speaker 1: and he he texted me. I went up to breakfast
• 1:26:08
  Speaker 1: and by the time I got to breakfast, you know,
• 1:26:10
  Speaker 1: I'd woken up at four in the morning, Hong Kong time,
• 1:26:12
  Speaker 1: and then I went up or whatever, and then went
• 1:26:13
  Speaker 1: up to breakfast. By the time it was gone, it
• 1:26:15
  Speaker 1: was sort of talking like this, like I had like
• 1:26:17
  Speaker 1: teeth surgery and I and I got up to the
• 1:26:21
  Speaker 1: thing and and my brother called. He says, get yourself
• 1:26:23
  Speaker 1: to a hospital right now. You're having a stroke. And
• 1:26:25
  Speaker 1: I said, are you crazy, Like you're such a bad doctor,
• 1:26:28
  Speaker 1: how ridiculous that I'm you know, whatever, years old. I
• 1:26:31
  Speaker 1: was not old. And so I think my late parties
• 1:26:33
  Speaker 1: and or maybe fifty in and it was for late parties.
• 1:26:38
  Speaker 1: And so he said, you were having a stroke. Get
• 1:26:40
  Speaker 1: get to a hospital now now. And I was like okay,
• 1:26:43
  Speaker 1: And so I did, and he was right, and I
• 1:26:45
  Speaker 1: was having a stroke. And it wasn't a minor stroke.
• 1:26:47
  Speaker 1: It was a stroke. And so you know all strokes,
• 1:26:49
  Speaker 1: I mean there's things and t M I whatever they're called,
• 1:26:52
  Speaker 1: um and uh. And they medicated me immediately and I
• 1:26:57
  Speaker 1: didn't have any repercussions. He flew to Hong Kong immediately.
• 1:27:01
  Speaker 1: But he saved my life. He did. That's amazing, you know.
• 1:27:04
  Speaker 1: Now he's never let me live it in to day.
• 1:27:07
  Speaker 1: I don't that's the trade off for saving your life.
• 1:27:09
  Speaker 1: I'm gonna hold this over you for a great doctor. Um,
• 1:27:12
  Speaker 1: tell us what you do for fun? Oh, I don't
• 1:27:14
  Speaker 1: have fun? What's that? No? I I have a lot
• 1:27:17
  Speaker 1: of friends. I have a ton of friends. Um. I
• 1:27:19
  Speaker 1: love spending time with my kids. My kids are amazing.
• 1:27:21
  Speaker 1: My two sons are astonishing. And I'm about to have
• 1:27:23
  Speaker 1: a baby with my girlfriend who is having a little girl. Uh.
• 1:27:27
  Speaker 1: So I was family. I spent a lot of time
• 1:27:28
  Speaker 1: with family. I think that's fun for me doing family stuff. Um.
• 1:27:32
  Speaker 1: I don't have a lot of weird hobbies. I used
• 1:27:34
  Speaker 1: to roller blade. I don't do that anymore. Um. You
• 1:27:37
  Speaker 1: know I did sell cycle that I'm not gonna do.
• 1:27:39
  Speaker 1: I'm gonna try it something else. You're out pound coast
• 1:27:41
  Speaker 1: of it. I was gonna say, Peloton is really the
• 1:27:44
  Speaker 1: best need my thousands of dollars. It's it's not a
• 1:27:46
  Speaker 1: little money. It's not like I get a one Starbucks
• 1:27:48
  Speaker 1: a week gets a lot of money their thirty dollars session.
• 1:27:50
  Speaker 1: I don't have to give them the money, you know whatever.
• 1:27:52
  Speaker 1: People can make their own decisions. I don't care. I
• 1:27:54
  Speaker 1: don't have to. But they can also leave me the
• 1:27:56
  Speaker 1: hell on if I want to do something else. So um,
• 1:27:59
  Speaker 1: so I know it's virtue signing. I don't care. I
• 1:28:01
  Speaker 1: don't want to spend the money there. I hate the
• 1:28:03
  Speaker 1: phrase virtue signaling. Christ really I can add hominum attack.
• 1:28:07
  Speaker 1: It's not about the argument who I am. And people
• 1:28:09
  Speaker 1: have pushed back about that, and you go back to
• 1:28:11
  Speaker 1: the person who created the phrase and he describes it
• 1:28:14
  Speaker 1: as a personal attack against people whose ideas when I
• 1:28:16
  Speaker 1: just I just want to do it, like leave me,
• 1:28:18
  Speaker 1: but you know, mind your own business and I won't
• 1:28:19
  Speaker 1: be money who I spend my money, my money. I work.
• 1:28:22
  Speaker 1: I work so hard and I could okay, no, I
• 1:28:26
  Speaker 1: mean or people who are politically I just want to
• 1:28:29
  Speaker 1: spend the money. When I spend my most things you
• 1:28:30
  Speaker 1: can't figure ever, And then they're like, well this is
• 1:28:33
  Speaker 1: this and like you can't figure everything, but that's a
• 1:28:35
  Speaker 1: clear one. That's a clear one, Like I get that
• 1:28:38
  Speaker 1: has signaled. You know, if I eat like a Hersheibar
• 1:28:41
  Speaker 1: this money, I can't figure all that, of course, but
• 1:28:43
  Speaker 1: in this case, this guy made a prominent gesture, and
• 1:28:46
  Speaker 1: I'm going to make a prominent gesture back. So that's
• 1:28:49
  Speaker 1: you know, and that's why there's no lot of logic
• 1:28:51
  Speaker 1: to it's care Swisher logic. And by the way, carrocial
• 1:28:53
  Speaker 1: logic applies to cars. Can I tell you there is
• 1:28:56
  Speaker 1: logic to it when someone is going to be a
• 1:28:58
  Speaker 1: very visible patron of someone whose beliefs not just disagree
• 1:29:04
  Speaker 1: with yours, but are actively oppressing your UM identification care.
• 1:29:11
  Speaker 1: I just don't like it. I don't like I don't
• 1:29:12
  Speaker 1: want to give money. That's all. That's it's It's not
• 1:29:14
  Speaker 1: even that complicated. By the way, I feel terrible for
• 1:29:16
  Speaker 1: mentally well, and it's Soul Cycle. I'd love to have
• 1:29:18
  Speaker 1: on the podcast to talk about it. I think, I
• 1:29:19
  Speaker 1: think the people of Soul Cycle, I'm so sorry that
• 1:29:22
  Speaker 1: they have to go through this. But you know what,
• 1:29:23
  Speaker 1: I'll spinning out to a separate entity. I was like,
• 1:29:25
  Speaker 1: I want to call the rain Jobs and say, Lorraine,
• 1:29:27
  Speaker 1: who does love Soul Cycle? But then you're behavi ares.
• 1:29:32
  Speaker 1: I can do something about it, you know, but then
• 1:29:35
  Speaker 1: you reward. You're going to reward for fun. I hang
• 1:29:38
  Speaker 1: out with friends. That's it. UM tell us what you're
• 1:29:42
  Speaker 1: most optimistic and pessimistic about your chosen field of technology
• 1:29:46
  Speaker 1: and journalism. I am optimistic because there's so much exciting
• 1:29:50
  Speaker 1: stuff going on and so much innovation happening in journalism.
• 1:29:52
  Speaker 1: And I think that even though people sort of declared
• 1:29:55
  Speaker 1: the end, when people were declaring the end of the
• 1:29:56
  Speaker 1: world and stuff, I remember Barry deal or saying, you know,
• 1:29:59
  Speaker 1: it's just it's never that, it's never. You can't whine
• 1:30:04
  Speaker 1: and give up on things like it's been a losing
• 1:30:06
  Speaker 1: bed for five yeah, you know. And journalists tend to
• 1:30:08
  Speaker 1: like not check like sometimes, like I was talking to someone,
• 1:30:11
  Speaker 1: They're like, Oh, this is what's happening, and this is
• 1:30:12
  Speaker 1: what's happening. I'm like, did you check if this is
• 1:30:14
  Speaker 1: what's happening? Because you're just making that up. And so
• 1:30:16
  Speaker 1: I think you have to really feel, you know, anyone
• 1:30:19
  Speaker 1: who has children has to believe in the future, anyone,
• 1:30:22
  Speaker 1: you know. And I have a lot of children, so
• 1:30:24
  Speaker 1: I believe in the future. I don't want to have
• 1:30:26
  Speaker 1: children if I didn't. So what are you pessimistic about? Um?
• 1:30:29
  Speaker 1: The autocracy? On one hand, I feel like autocrats always
• 1:30:33
  Speaker 1: end up dead in the dantage drainage ditch. I studied
• 1:30:35
  Speaker 1: the Holocaust quite heavily and propaganda and stuff in the Haga,
• 1:30:39
  Speaker 1: so it can get really bad. And when's the point
• 1:30:42
  Speaker 1: where it stays bad and it hasn't so far in
• 1:30:44
  Speaker 1: our history. There's always someone who looks at Joe slamcars
• 1:30:47
  Speaker 1: dand says, have you no shame? And it ends like
• 1:30:50
  Speaker 1: it doesn't end totally, but it stops. The fever stops.
• 1:30:52
  Speaker 1: You have someone at the Salem which right, the Salem
• 1:30:55
  Speaker 1: witch trials, they were terrible. They ended the You know
• 1:30:58
  Speaker 1: that I was around when I was a formative years,
• 1:31:01
  Speaker 1: AIDS was terrible. During the Reagan administration. The stuff the
• 1:31:04
  Speaker 1: Reagan administration was doing was appalling. James Watt said trees
• 1:31:07
  Speaker 1: caused cancer. What everybody's seeing trees caused pollution? Remember him
• 1:31:14
  Speaker 1: carbon die right? Whatever? James Watt where. I'm sure he's
• 1:31:17
  Speaker 1: not living anymore, but he It was just there's there's
• 1:31:20
  Speaker 1: there's always these people that are retrogade, and I use
• 1:31:24
  Speaker 1: I'll end on this one of my favorite. Um, I
• 1:31:26
  Speaker 1: see the thing. You know what I do for fun?
• 1:31:28
  Speaker 1: I go to the theater. I love I'm seeing Mulan
• 1:31:29
  Speaker 1: Roustena and stuff like that. Have I gotta say, have
• 1:31:32
  Speaker 1: you seen to Of course I did. I've seen every
• 1:31:35
  Speaker 1: one of them. Talk about powerful. I love theater. Make
• 1:31:39
  Speaker 1: It's transformative for me as a person. I've always since
• 1:31:41
  Speaker 1: I was a kid. My mom brought us. It's a
• 1:31:43
  Speaker 1: real gift. My mom gave us to love of theater.
• 1:31:45
  Speaker 1: And so I was Angels in America is one of
• 1:31:49
  Speaker 1: my favorite ones, and I've seen it at least a
• 1:31:52
  Speaker 1: dozen times. Tony Kushner's two parts and the end of
• 1:31:54
  Speaker 1: the play, Um, it's a wonderful play. It's such a
• 1:31:57
  Speaker 1: beautifully written play in such a time. It's harder than
• 1:31:59
  Speaker 1: this time to remember for it. But it was terrible
• 1:32:01
  Speaker 1: during the AIDS. Christ is terrible, terrible, terrible people dying,
• 1:32:04
  Speaker 1: these wonderful people dying like way before their time. And um,
• 1:32:08
  Speaker 1: and the last line of the of the thing, they're
• 1:32:11
  Speaker 1: standing at the fountain in Central Park, the Bethesda Fountain,
• 1:32:16
  Speaker 1: and uh, she said, he's the line he gives is
• 1:32:20
  Speaker 1: the world always spins forward, and this is our time.
• 1:32:22
  Speaker 1: We will not be silent anymore. And I remember being
• 1:32:25
  Speaker 1: a gay person then just coming out, and you people
• 1:32:28
  Speaker 1: don't remember when it was hard to be gay, and
• 1:32:29
  Speaker 1: it still is in many parts of the world, but
• 1:32:31
  Speaker 1: it's easy. I have kids better in the United States,
• 1:32:33
  Speaker 1: so it's like you can't believe it, you can't believe it.
• 1:32:35
  Speaker 1: And so I remember that really impacting me. The world
• 1:32:39
  Speaker 1: always spins forward. And that's why I thinking everyone's like
• 1:32:41
  Speaker 1: Trump's gonna reverything. I'm like, is he he can't, Well,
• 1:32:45
  Speaker 1: he'll do damage for four years and hopefully then he can't,
• 1:32:48
  Speaker 1: and like, and we'll fix it. We can fix it
• 1:32:51
  Speaker 1: and we can pick it up. And I think that's
• 1:32:52
  Speaker 1: where I get up. The same thing with journalism, the
• 1:32:54
  Speaker 1: same thing with anything, is that people they always end up.
• 1:32:59
  Speaker 1: These people that want to push us back to old times,
• 1:33:01
  Speaker 1: which brings people down. There are people that stand up
• 1:33:04
  Speaker 1: and say enough is enough, no more. When is that
• 1:33:06
  Speaker 1: going to happen? It will all right. I hope you're right.
• 1:33:09
  Speaker 1: Last two questions and a millennial or college grad comes
• 1:33:13
  Speaker 1: to you and says, I'm interested in the career in journalism.
• 1:33:15
  Speaker 1: What sort of advice would you give us? Start writing?
• 1:33:18
  Speaker 1: Just start looking around and start writing, start reporting, Start writing.
• 1:33:22
  Speaker 1: So much amazing journalist is being done right now and
• 1:33:24
  Speaker 1: again because these times are harder, same thing happened during
• 1:33:27
  Speaker 1: the last time we had something like this. So just
• 1:33:31
  Speaker 1: get out your pen, whatever, whatever, get out whatever you
• 1:33:36
  Speaker 1: can and start telling stories. And I think telling stories
• 1:33:38
  Speaker 1: is the greatest talent that humans have, is to tell stories.
• 1:33:43
  Speaker 1: Quite interesting. And our final questions, what do you questions, Barry,
• 1:33:48
  Speaker 1: I come prepared. What what do you know about the
• 1:33:51
  Speaker 1: world anymore special about That's true. That's a fair po
• 1:33:57
  Speaker 1: serial killer, right, you know, that's what I used to
• 1:33:59
  Speaker 1: do before with this. My son's name is Louie. There's
• 1:34:01
  Speaker 1: nobody named old Jewish Louis. Yeah, well, okay, there you go.
• 1:34:05
  Speaker 1: So you named your kid after Louis's name, that is
• 1:34:09
  Speaker 1: a digression. I did not. His name is Lewis. I
• 1:34:12
  Speaker 1: did not name it after one of my favorite seafood
• 1:34:14
  Speaker 1: places is Louise in Port Washington. I grew up in
• 1:34:18
  Speaker 1: um Oh, so I'm in Locust Valley and I went
• 1:34:22
  Speaker 1: to Portlage. Oh. Portlage is literally vilege thirty seconds from
• 1:34:27
  Speaker 1: my I live in and can I tell you when
• 1:34:31
  Speaker 1: whenever people visit me, they're like, I didn't know Long
• 1:34:35
  Speaker 1: Island was like this. I'm like, well, you made a
• 1:34:37
  Speaker 1: you made a left and you went to Connecticut. This
• 1:34:39
  Speaker 1: is this is the US. So my sister's kids want
• 1:34:42
  Speaker 1: to say that I don't know. You grew up in
• 1:34:46
  Speaker 1: very interesting. What was I saying? Our final question, what
• 1:34:49
  Speaker 1: do you know about the world of technology today that
• 1:34:51
  Speaker 1: you wish you knew. However, many years, thirty years ago,
• 1:34:55
  Speaker 1: when you first started, I know about it today. I
• 1:34:57
  Speaker 1: wish I knew. Gosh, I forget more about technology than
• 1:35:00
  Speaker 1: most people know. So um in an hour. Mm hmmm,
• 1:35:05
  Speaker 1: I don't. I think I didn't quite on the damage.
• 1:35:10
  Speaker 1: I think I wish I had understood the damage earlier
• 1:35:12
  Speaker 1: so I could start writing about it and stopping it. Privacy,
• 1:35:15
  Speaker 1: social networks, damage, all of it, the idea that these
• 1:35:18
  Speaker 1: the impact on humanity, and how you know. I studied
• 1:35:22
  Speaker 1: propaganda at Georgetown. That was my area of expertise in
• 1:35:25
  Speaker 1: the Foreign service schools the US. As a propaganda I
• 1:35:27
  Speaker 1: should have understood having studied the Nazis, and especially the Nazis,
• 1:35:31
  Speaker 1: how they used propaganda to um to to to in
• 1:35:36
  Speaker 1: the roll up to killing so many people. The way
• 1:35:39
  Speaker 1: they used it, it was not a one day thing.
• 1:35:41
  Speaker 1: You can't just sloater millions. You gotta prep you gotta
• 1:35:44
  Speaker 1: prep it, and you gotta get the population. Comparing it
• 1:35:46
  Speaker 1: to the Holocaust, but there's damage being done that is
• 1:35:49
  Speaker 1: very It's a similar thing is how we make people
• 1:35:52
  Speaker 1: the other and I think the internet, and I think
• 1:35:55
  Speaker 1: the Internet is very effective at thought. It is and
• 1:35:57
  Speaker 1: I thought it was gonna be Star Trek. I thought
• 1:35:59
  Speaker 1: it was gonna be We're all gonna have communicators and
• 1:36:00
  Speaker 1: love each other, and we're all going to be on
• 1:36:02
  Speaker 1: a ship. But it's both. You have the good and
• 1:36:04
  Speaker 1: the bad. That that's right. So the question is are
• 1:36:06
  Speaker 1: you a Star Trek person or a Star Wars person?
• 1:36:09
  Speaker 1: Star Wars it's very dark. It's dark, and Star Trek
• 1:36:12
  Speaker 1: is very hopeful. I was a Star Trek person far
• 1:36:14
  Speaker 1: far too long. That's very interesting, fascinating stuff. Thank you
• 1:36:18
  Speaker 1: so much with your time. We have been speaking with
• 1:36:22
  Speaker 1: Kara Swisher. She is the founder of Recode. I mentioned
• 1:36:26
  Speaker 1: you want a Lobe award right, and she writes a
• 1:36:28
  Speaker 1: weekly opinion column now for the New York Times. If
• 1:36:32
  Speaker 1: you enjoy this conversation, well look up an Inch, Down
• 1:36:35
  Speaker 1: an Inch on all of our previous two and fifty
• 1:36:38
  Speaker 1: plus conversations and I'm sure you'll find something that you'll enjoy. Uh.
• 1:36:43
  Speaker 1: We love your comments, feedback and suggestions right to us
• 1:36:47
  Speaker 1: at m IB podcast at Bloomberg dot net, Go to
• 1:36:50
  Speaker 1: Apple iTunes and give us a lovely review. Be sure
• 1:36:53
  Speaker 1: to check out my weekly column. You could see that
• 1:36:56
  Speaker 1: at Bloomberg dot com. I would be remiss if I
• 1:36:59
  Speaker 1: did not thank the crack staff that helps us put
• 1:37:01
  Speaker 1: together the easiest podcast to record UH in podcast Land.
• 1:37:06
  Speaker 1: Charlie Volmer is my audio engineer this week. Attica val
• 1:37:10
  Speaker 1: Bron is our project manager. Michael Boyle is my producer.
• 1:37:14
  Speaker 1: Michael bat Nick is my head of research. I'm Barry Retults.
• 1:37:18
  Speaker 1: You've been listening to Masters in Business on Bloomberg Radio