Scott Galloway · 53:44
On YouTube, and anything we drop gets downloaded be... When you subscribe. And advertisers base their advertising and CPMs based on your built in installed base. So if you have been in the podcasting game for a while, you almost have a natural moat around you because advertisers will only advertise on pods who have a certain amount of scale. So the little guys, the 699,000 podcasts that aren't in the top 1,000, it is difficult for them to make it out of the crib. So you have a plethora. You have a a tectonic shift in the flows of rivers of advertising capital into this new medium, and you actually, strangely enough, despite the fact there's low barriers of entry and 700,000 podcasts put out something every week, there's really only five or 600 of them that have the scale that advertisers want. Meaning, like, almost every other medium where digitization comes in, it's become a winner take most, if not all, environment. What's interesting about podcasting is the two newer platforms are YouTube. More people listen to podcasts on YouTube now than on Spotify or Apple. 20% of my listens at Prof G, because the Prof G market is very visual, is on TVs. It's on YouTube that people airplay to their TV. You're seeing our revenues here at Pivot are comping up for the last seven years at probably 28 or 30% a year. So this is attracting a ton of talent, a ton of capital, some big growth off a small base. And Megan... And... Oh, and by the way, I forgot. You know who's just decided they're getting into the podcasting game? Netflix. Mhmm.
Kara Swisher · 55:27
Yeah. Right.
Scott Galloway · 55:28
So if they put Steve Bartlett or or Pivot or on with Kara Swisher on their front page for a hot minute in front of 300,000,000 people, that podcast is gonna go into the top 10. They're getting into the game. So you're gonna see advertisers switch to the small number of companies that have scale. You're gonna see a dramatic increase in advertising spend. You're gonna see some multi, some 9 figure plus deals in podcasting. You're gonna see some really, really big deals. This is the medium of 2026.
Kara Swisher · 56:01
Let me ask a you question because I was just thinking about this. Like, things were on par with advertising to do really well this year, and now this tariff thing that Trump's doing is fucking with everybody's business. And ads, they're showing a little bit of... Now they're like, ugh, maybe not so much because things were really sort of... Juice was going for a minute there, but they're noticing that when people pull, they're gonna pull from this. Is that a worry?
Scott Galloway · 56:23
Okay. In the short term, yes. It hurts everybody because people go onto a standstill, and we've seen this, and they say, just just, you know, cool your jets, stand down until we figure out what's going on. However, if you look at the shifts in mediums, everyone knew people were shifting money and ad spend from traditional media into search based media or social based media. We all knew that. But what happens is whenever there's an economic shock and media planners at big agencies are forced to rethink their budgets, they typically they typically take everyone down, but then they come back in the new mediums. Exogenous shocks give a company pause to rethink their entire media strategy, and that almost benefits the new guys. So actually, in recessions and in economic shocks, in the short term, it hurts everybody, but in the medium term, it massively expedites the transition that was sort of already happening at a low speed. It expedites it in Google and Meta. When they take their advertising budgets back, it gives them a chance to think, should we be spending this much on newspapers or broadcast television? Maybe not. Let's go... We know we're going back into TikTok and Meta and Alphabet. So while we will absolutely, with these tariffs, see a reduction in our growth
Kara Swisher · 57:40
It's not gonna be there first.
Scott Galloway · 57:41
When the economy comes back Yeah. It's gonna expedite the disruption.
Kara Swisher · 57:46
The shift. Yeah. But people are thinking, you're right. Okay. I wanted to understand that. Alright, Scott. One more quick break. We'll be back for predictions.
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— Predictions segment begins —
Kara Swisher · 59:53
Okay, Scott. Let's hear a prediction.
Scott Galloway · 59:56
Look. The Chinese, see this void. We had spent decades and $70 to $80,000,000,000 a year on USAID helping fund a hospital in Cambodia. Tremendous goodwill in Cambodia. Set up this infrastructure, it was working well, money was being put to good use. We just cut it off. You know who showed up literally the next week? And this is a true story, the Chinese. And they are taking advantage of all the good work that's been done to usurp soft power. And I believe this goes back to the notion that we have a monopoly on our ability to deliver violence. We have, I think, 700 bases in 70 or 80 nations. I think China has two or three. You're going to see a dramatic increase in the number of Chinese military bases on foreign soil. Because they are filling our shoes and getting massive benefit from the organizations, the relationships, and the NGO sector that we were funding, and they'll just slip into those shoes and say, no. No. No. You don't need to close the hospital. The good guys are here. And that is gonna... And and nothing's for free. The next time they show up in a year, two years, three years, and say, look. We'd like to have a naval base here. We'd like to be able to refuel our planes here, and we'll pay for the revenue. And by the way, how's the hospital coming? Is it still working great? So we're gonna see for the first time a dramatic increase in Chinese military bases overseas, which to date, The US really has had a monopoly on. This soft power translates to hard power, and people don't realize, again, these people don't think long term behavior.
Kara Swisher · 1:01:31
Morons.
Scott Galloway · 1:01:32
Well, the whole basis of an elected official, at the end of the day, it goes back to strategy. What are you what are you supposed to do that's really hard? What are you supposed to do that's really hard? You're supposed to prevent a tragedy of the commons over the medium and the long term.
Kara Swisher · 1:01:47
Can I make an interjection here? Because there's just a news story of New York Times today that Trump administration abruptly cuts billions from state health services. This is across our country. States have been told they can no longer use grants that were funding infectious disease management and addiction services. They've cut $12,000,000,000 in federal grants to states who are being used to track infectious diseases, mental health services, addiction treatment, and other urgent health issues. That means these state health departments who are already underfunded are in real trouble. They received notices Monday that the funds, which were allocated, are being terminated. And let me just say, in Lubbock, Texas, public health officials... This is not to... These are red states, just so you know, red state people. They're leopards about to eat your face. Public health officials have received orders to stop work supported by these three grants that help fund the response to the whiting measles outbreak there, according to Catherine Wells. On Tuesday, some health departments were preparing to lay off dozens of epidemiologists and data scientists. This is this is the same thing. This is goodwill and the things that the government does that are effective for people, and it's gonna be the same issue in this country. The question is who's going to come into the into the breach. Right? And which is what you're talking about with the Chinese doing that. I don't know if you'd like to link those.
Scott Galloway · 1:02:59
I like that. No. I think that I think that makes sense.
Kara Swisher · 1:03:02
It's it's it's the same attitude across country, and it will have repercussions.
Scott Galloway · 1:03:07
But the the people or the entities that will fill the void abroad are foreign nations, some of which have... Do not have our best interests at heart. I don't think of China as an enemy. I think of them as a competitor, maybe even an adversary. The the organizations that will fill the void in The US are for profit organizations that over the medium and the long term will probably demand margin. So what happens when the government vacates from these services is pry... And this is what they want. They want private enterprise running all prisons. They want private... They wanna privatize Social Security because then corporations will insert themselves in the middle. In some ways, they're more innovative. In some ways, they're more productive.
Kara Swisher · 1:03:46
In some ways, they're just interested in making money.
Scott Galloway · 1:03:48
That's what they do.
Kara Swisher · 1:03:49
Yeah. I know. And that's not good for the public comment.
Scott Galloway · 1:03:52
They'll get monopoly power on the jails and whatever, this part of the county or this part of the state. They will slowly raise the rates, and we will end up paying more for less. There are certain things that should be delivered at scale. The electricity in a city needs a monopoly. And in order to have monopolies, you have to have regulators such that they don't enact monopoly pricing power. So this is... If abroad, our adversaries will fill the void domestically with these businesses that they're cutting, you'll see private enterprise move in. And over the medium and the long term, the consumer will lose.
— Predictions segment ends —
Kara Swisher · 1:04:26
Lesser services. Exactly. Alright. Elsewhere in the Scott and Cara universe this week on ProfG Markets, Scott spoke with Karsten Brezezewski, a chief eurozone economist for ING. Scott's been talking a lot about Europe, what's going on in Europe. Let's listen to a clip.
Guest · 1:04:44
Debt means the same as guilt. Oh, wow. Yes. And and and I think that is not the only language, but but that is an important one. Yeah. So somehow debt, like government debt, always had had a negative a negative connotation. So Germany was clearly the fiscally frugal country, which could tell the southern European economies to also do austerity.
Kara Swisher · 1:05:07
So interesting discussion about what's happening there. I thought it was. I listened to it.
Scott Galloway · 1:05:11
Yeah. I'm convinced if my cohost on property markets was German, we just wouldn't be successful. Yeah. Let's look... Let's talk about AI in some markets.
Kara Swisher · 1:05:20
In some markets.
Scott Galloway · 1:05:21
Just doesn't have the same ring as when a British guy is talking about it.
Kara Swisher · 1:05:26
Oh, it's a good German joke. But the
Scott Galloway · 1:05:30
thing he was talking about, I don't think you got fully across, the German word for debt translates to guilt in English. Isn't that interesting? Yeah. And they're about to kind of unchain their their fiscal strength or infrastructure spending and military spending, which I think is gonna be a big deal.
Kara Swisher · 1:05:44
But anyways. You know, and you've been talking about the European... And now suddenly I'm seeing stories in the Wall Street Journal how the place you shouldn't should invest in is is Germany.
Scott Galloway · 1:05:54
What was my stock pick? What was my stock pick for 2025, You
Kara Swisher · 1:05:57
were great.
Scott Galloway · 1:05:57
The European value stars.
Kara Swisher · 1:05:59
People who don't speak German, which I do, schuld, schuld is debt, the debt, s c h u l d. It also means blame, guilt, fault, liability, trespasses. So. You know? And when you say, excuse me, or something like that.
Scott Galloway · 1:06:13
Something like that. My favorite German is.
Kara Swisher · 1:06:16
You love that word.
Scott Galloway · 1:06:17
Oh, it's the best.
Kara Swisher · 1:06:18
Alright. Well, that's our show. Thanks for listening to Pivot, and be sure to like and subscribe to our YouTube channel. We'll be back on Friday. Scott, read us out.
Scott Galloway · 1:06:27
Today's show was produced by Lara Nayman, Zoe Marcus, and Taylor Griffin. Ernie Inertod engineered this episode. Ronnie Palladaro edited this video. Thanks also to Jubaros, Miservero, and Dan Chelan. Nishat Kurwa is Vox Media's executive producer of audio. Make sure you subscribe to the show wherever you listen to podcasts. Thanks for listening to Pivot from New York Magazine and Vox Media. You can subscribe to the magazine at nymag.com/pod. We'll be back next week for another breakdown of all things tech and business. That's right. A whiskey emoji dancing and a limp dick. The dog is in the chat.
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