📰 "Bob One Returns, Trump Can Tweet Again, And [More]"

Podcast’s Essential Bites:

On Ticketmaster:

[3:08] KS: "Concert goers want to see some swift antitrust action. Last week, Taylor Swift fans tried to buy tickets to her upcoming tour, but crashing websites and [...]  turned the sale into a disaster and many were left empty handed. On top of that the tickets on resale websites [...] were priced at $26,000. Now fans and politicians are pointing the finger at Ticketmaster, the nation's largest ticket seller, and [...] the Ticketmaster 2010 merger with Live Nation."

[4:52] SG: "The unexpected regulator for Meta was Tim Cook and I'm starting to believe that the unexpected Head of the DOJ is gonna be Taylor Swift. Because what this has brought attention to is that in 2010 Live Nation and Ticketmaster merge creating a behemoth that controls [...] 70% of live event tickets."

On Elizabeth Holmes:

[18:31] KS: "Elizabeth Holmes has been sentenced to over 11 years in prison. The judge announced Holmes was responsible for defrauding $120 million out of 10 victims [...] and that a refusal to take responsibility played a part in her sentencing. She has to report to prison in April. Sunny Balwani is set to be sentenced on December 7. [...] It'll be interesting to see what happens with Sam Bankman-Fried versus Elizabeth."

[19:30] SG: "I think it's troubling and I think it warrants scrutiny that it appears the only one we're locking up for more than 10 years has ovaries. And I think Elizabeth Holmes is a very unlikable person and I'm not suggesting she shouldn't go to prison. But if she's going to prison, I don't understand why a lot more white dudes aren't also going to prison. [...] Elizabeth Holmes didn't make a lot of money herself. She lost a billion dollars of investors' money. The difference between Adam Newman, the reason why she is going to prison [...] and he is going to Coachella, he lost 13 billion, is that that goes to state of mind. They believe that she knew she was lying. They believe that Adam bought into his bullshit and thought he was just going to change the world that he genuinely believed it. But the big difference [...] was Masayoshi Son did not want a loss of face."

On Disney:

[22:34] KS: "Bob One is number one again. In an abrupt move, Disney announced that former CEO Bob Iger, [...] will return to his old job. Iger explicitly told me that would never happen. When I asked him about it earlier this year. [...] He replaces [...] Bob Chapek, who took the job in 2020. He had so many misses during his tenure. He angered Disney staffers when he offered late resistance to Florida's don't say gay bill, after first not. He clashed publicly with Scarlett Johansson [...]. But most importantly, Disney missed earnings and revenue last quarter leading to a sharp stock drop."

[25:49] SG: "A lot of this was self-inflicted injury, but more than anything, this was timing. [...] Bob [Chapek] got handed a kind of a shitty hand, between COVID, [...] the stock was probably overvalued, so it's come off about 45%."

[32:10] SG: "If I were Disney, I'd have my pencils out and I'd be looking at Pinterest. [...] I think Pinterest is the most aspirational and least toxic of the platforms. They could use it around marketing their film franchise. And I also think they could use it as vertical distribution around ancillary sales, sort of the equivalent to Disney Stores."

On Twitter:

[36:41] KS: "It may be unthinkable, but Donald Trump says he doesn't want to tweet. [...] Elon Musk reinstated Trump's Twitter account. [...] Musk brought back other suspended accounts including Kanye West. [...] [Elon] complained about bots on Twitter. So then he does a bot-filled Twitter poll. He said he was going to have a content moderation Council and then [...] he made the decision [...] to re-platforming Ye, Trump, and Project Veritas."

[38:41] SG: "The biggest business mistake Musk is making is [...] the more moderation, the more profitable the platform, full stop."

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐