Kara Swisher · 34:55
I'm in a Rivian. Wow. Why?
Scott Galloway · 34:57
And it was hilarious. This this really funny Twitter handle called v c brags goes, put out my tweet and said... I put out a screenshot of my my confirmation on it, and they put out a thing that said, rest in peace, Rivian, and a picture of me in a Rivian or a picture of me ordering a Rivian. Oh my God. But look, the marketplace, a 1.1, whatever it is, trillion dollar market cap company that it just seems so outsized here, is attracting all sorts of sharks ranging from Tim Cook to Jeff Bezos. And you got to think at some point that puts pressure, margin pressure So on the to their credit, what Tesla has accomplished is incredible. Tesla is now this year probably going to outsell Mercedes, which is just staggering. But it's... Is it worth 5 or 10 times what Mercedes is worth? No. I think
Kara Swisher · 35:43
you're high on your Jack Dorsey situation. I think you're gonna
Scott Galloway · 35:46
JD, I'm high on JD.
Kara Swisher · 35:48
That you won on that one. But as to his And Apple acquires Peloton. Yes. I know. Apple acquires Peloton. Happen more than this is. So as to his More night. Me just answer the question of the listener. As to his vulgar statements and the... And his bot... His stands, I don't know what to say. This is him. He's not changed. So if you don't like that, don't... You can, like, choose not to buy things of companies you don't like. It's a great car. He's gonna make overpromising, under delivering? I don't think so. I think he's delivered a lot more than most people. Of course, you know, he's he's he's like, I wouldn't call him PT Barnum because that's not quite right, but he's like, he get... He... Like, it's it's good to, like, think big. It's good to think big. And so Cybertruck, Tesla Semi, good for him. I don't care.
Scott Galloway · 36:32
Agree.
Kara Swisher · 36:33
It's fine just to be... Like, lots of people have been like that. He's not cheating at all.
Scott Galloway · 36:36
For good for business.
Kara Swisher · 36:37
He's not cheating.
Scott Galloway · 36:38
Good for business. Good for the planet. A visionary. Stock wildly overvalued.
Kara Swisher · 36:42
One thing We
Scott Galloway · 36:42
can hold all of those thoughts in our head
Kara Swisher · 36:43
at the same time. Look. They are what they are. That's... And it's a long time.
Scott Galloway · 36:47
No, a 50 year old man with seven kids acting like an eight year old, that's been a good business strategy because it creates That's a lot of awareness for his
Kara Swisher · 36:54
what he's like. Not a strategy. He's like that. He is a 100% like that. So
Scott Galloway · 36:59
It's been an amazing strategy.
Kara Swisher · 37:00
It has.
Scott Galloway · 37:00
But I mean, I agree it's authentic. But I mean, what he is literally in the public discourse, as evidenced by this conversation, every day, which creates tremendous awareness. I mean, can you name this who's the CEO of Ford? Yeah. Do you
Kara Swisher · 37:15
know? It's... It just changed. Exactly. I mean, Mary Barra Exactly. At GM, right, General Motors.
Scott Galloway · 37:22
Mary Barra, right. Look, it's... The strategy, and unfortunately, I just don't think it serves as a good role model for upcoming entrepreneurs. It's like, just be famous. It's it's sort of a Kim Kardashian... Just be just...
Kara Swisher · 37:35
Although, look. Do you guys have any compliments you might not like? Or same thing with Elon. You know?
Scott Galloway · 37:39
Kim? No. I think Kim's an... I think the Kardashians are underrated, actually.
Kara Swisher · 37:43
Have all along thought that. So...
Scott Galloway · 37:44
I think they're smarter than people think.
Kara Swisher · 37:45
And we're gonna pushed back on that, but I don't care. So one of the things he does, like, recently told employees at SpaceX that the company faces bankruptcy due to production delays. He did this at Tesla. He gets... Did you get that? What's He going on gets that. He gets all worked up. He did that. Remember a couple years when he was exhausted, and then he cried at the New York Times and was talking about that the the companies... I think he did an interview with me kind of right after when he got some sleep, where he's like, I just get all up in people's grill and this... It's his... That's a tactic of his for sure. And I think it's genuine again, but he sleeps on the floor of the production facility, etcetera. He's an intense dude, people. So if you don't like his jam, don't buy his car. I don't know what
Scott Galloway · 38:22
But just going back to the business side of this, that I look at Tesla and I think there's all sorts of well capitalized great companies coming for that pie that he has grown dramatically. Whereas, whereas I think SpaceX is highly differentiated. And if you look at essentially, if you look at satellites, the number of satellites that we're going to need to launch, it's going to go from like 3,000 to 50,000 over the next ten years. And what Tesla's differentiation is quickly eroding. I think SpaceX has massive moats in differentiation. Specifically if you look at the cost per kilogram to put stuff into orbit, SpaceX is just killing it. So I and this is going be another one of my predictions. Think within I don't know what the time frame is. I think SpaceX is going be worth more than Tesla.
Kara Swisher · 39:08
Interesting. That's a good prediction. We'll get to
Scott Galloway · 39:10
that in
Kara Swisher · 39:10
a second. Let me just say, this guy isn't a real entrepreneur. Everyone, you know, there's all these people who are like, you know, he's all
Scott Galloway · 39:16
No doubt.
Kara Swisher · 39:17
No. Mm-mm. And he can't control it.
Scott Galloway · 39:20
You know something you said? I'm sorry to interrupt you, but I'm gonna quote you. You said something that really struck me and I let my emotions get in the way of kind of irrational thought. You said once, I think about a year ago, you said, it's not like he's invented a photo sharing You know, he's trying to put people on Mars. He's trying to create electric cars. He is doing very important work.
Kara Swisher · 39:38
Nobody liked Edison. Let's try to keep that in mind. What an asshole he was. Is that right? Ugh. A brasshole.
Scott Galloway · 39:42
I didn't know that.
Kara Swisher · 39:43
Totally. Go go back and really look at stuff he... And also hyped everything. But, you know, the light bulb. So thanks, Edison. Like, it's... And and the movie camera, and the this, and then that. So Edison was just... He is so much like Edison. It's crazy. It's not, you know, not as tinkery, of course, but still. Edison was terrible about doing stuff like this and always doing sneaky stuff. Anyway, you can read some very good biographies of him. Anyway, that was a good question. Send us more. If you've got a question you're curious about, go to nymag.com/pivot and submit it to the show. Alright, Scott. One more quick break. We'll be back for predictions.
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— Predictions segment begins —
Kara Swisher · 41:12
Okay, Scott. Give us this week's prediction. You just sort of gave it. Right? SpaceX or maybe not?
Scott Galloway · 41:17
Oh, there's so much. SpaceX well, this is like probably a three to five year. I think SpaceX ultimately ends up being worth more than Tesla. We were talking about CNN. I think that within twelve months the new discovery is it plus as it's envisioned is going to be either broken up or taken over. This thing's just going to be so ripe it's going to fall off the tree. And I actually think in the next ninety
Kara Swisher · 41:41
days What's falling off what tree? To what hand? To what ground?
Scott Galloway · 41:44
Well, if you look at the new Discovery plus as it's envisioned, it just doesn't make any sense. It's just not going to survive as an independent company because the shareholder base is used to the dividends and the steady growth of an analog digital company or an old media company that's ad supported, which is steady cash flows. And the costs they're going to, the investments they're going to need to make to move to streaming, their shareholder base isn't going to be able to stomach. It'll throw up in an earnings call. The And stock will get it's the only media asset in the world right now that has these assets. I mean, come on, HBO, CNN, that is in play because everything else is dual class shareholders. It's just kind of every shark in the world.
Kara Swisher · 42:23
So Twitter, as you said last week.
Scott Galloway · 42:25
Well, and that's my next I'm making a lot of predictions. Within ninety days, Kara, within I'm ninety days
Kara Swisher · 42:30
going to do it. There's
Scott Galloway · 42:32
going to be an offer for Twitter because all this bullshit with Jack and Elliot kind of ossified the company or put it into a period of stasis. Now that they have a new relatively owned CEO from internally, the stock's down,
Kara Swisher · 43:01
company execs have been unable to grow the business, many think a link with a larger entity would spur Twitter's potential. Guess who wrote that, and guess when?
Scott Galloway · 43:09
Kara Swisher.
Kara Swisher · 43:11
Kara Swisher, 2016. Same thing. And when Salesforce and Google Kara
Scott Galloway · 43:15
Swisher, the jungle cat?
Kara Swisher · 43:16
I'm just saying, you could write that sentence.
Scott Galloway · 43:17
The Sultan of Kalorama.
Kara Swisher · 43:18
That sentence could be written
Scott Galloway · 43:19
Let me introduce you to my seventh wife.
Kara Swisher · 43:22
I'm sorry. Go ahead. I'm just saying the same sentence could be written today. This has been this has been an issue since way back when with this company. Always. Anyway,
Scott Galloway · 43:30
good news. It's time for Twitter to command the space it occupies. It's been a disaster for shareholders.
— Predictions segment ends —
Kara Swisher · 43:34
Stand up straight, Twitter. Stand up straight. Yeah. Speaking of standing up straight, one thing we wanna say, we had a lot of responses to our interview with John McWhorter. We love hearing from our listeners. Some people were upset. Let's talk about what we hope to gain from our guests. And, Scott, you can weigh in in a second. Hosting people doesn't mean you agree with them, and I very openly disagreed with them. I disagreed with his definition of cancel culture. I disagreed with his supposed targets of cancel culture. I disagreed with his conclusions. We have a... And Scott was was much more in agreement with him, but but, but had a really great discussion. We've had lots of smart people on the show, and smart people can disagree. Even Scott and I, like today, frequently disagree. We're very obstreperous today. Now there was a review in the in the Washington Post, which said, and I thought it was quite good. I think you should go read it. McWhorter never engages in any of the actual movements that are threatening American democracy. He likewise never engages in actual religions. The ones that get tax breaks and supreme court justices who hold power to take away human rights from pregnant people and civil rights from the LGBTQ community. McWhorter managed in the course of 200 pages to claim the woke are perpetrating a reign of terror, a phrase he uses twice, but devoted only three paragraphs I counted to the actual insurrectionist to attack the capital and try to overthrow the government. Again, you could debate that opinion, but it's good to do so. One thing that we can't agree on, how our society balances free speech, justice, and accountability, and it's an unresolved issue and deserves debate. So we'll keep debating smart people on this show with curiosity, courage, kindness, and questioning. Scott, what do you say to all this?
Scott Galloway · 45:04
Well, my question is more for you, and that is do you feel the need to issue these non apology apologies when we offend conservatives?
Kara Swisher · 45:11
Yes.
Scott Galloway · 45:11
Why are we apologizing for this?
Kara Swisher · 45:13
Because I actually get
Scott Galloway · 45:14
Because we had a centrist on the show?
Kara Swisher · 45:16
Well, some people don't think he is. So I just... I think it's good debate. They've been people push back on us. We should say, we're trying to have really interesting debates on the show. It's not an apology. It's not an apology by any means. It's an answer to
Scott Galloway · 45:27
But why do we need to clarify It's
Kara Swisher · 45:28
a clarification. What we do. We're not saying we shouldn't be. We liked having him on the show. We thought he was great. It's not a clip.
Scott Galloway · 45:34
And by the way, that post that post review, yeah, I felt it was unfair. It basically said something to the effect of that he has elevated the term racist to a compliment. I have never heard him in any way. I I felt that... I mean, and by the way, that's fine. They're allowed to do that, and we can discuss it. But I don't... And here's the thing. Centrists centrists are really vulnerable because if we had some total whack job from the write on, we would just write them off. But when a centrist comes on, I'll know. Again, throw them into the purity fair.
Kara Swisher · 46:01
No. No. We would discuss it. That is not true.
Scott Galloway · 46:03
John McWhorter's... This is an important dialogue.
Kara Swisher · 46:06
I agree. I agree.
Scott Galloway · 46:07
Let me reassure you. Even if we have John McWhorter on, your master of fine arts book club is gonna invite
Kara Swisher · 46:13
you back. I do not... You know what? Once again, you would act like I spent a lot of time in political debate. I think we respond to lots of letters. I think it's good. I'm just... I'm trying to support your whole point, Scott. And as usual, you're cutting me off at the knees, but it's not
Scott Galloway · 46:26
You are making No. Or no. I'll say we. We are making professor McWhorter's point right now.
Kara Swisher · 46:31
No. We're
Scott Galloway · 46:32
not. There needs to be more tolerance and less sensitivity around robust dialogue.
Kara Swisher · 46:37
Here. Scott.
Scott Galloway · 46:38
Okay. Good. Can we agree?
Kara Swisher · 46:40
We don't agree because
Scott Galloway · 46:41
you're is taking you down in this shark cage.
Kara Swisher · 46:44
You're trying to pull out all kinds of words on me to try to look. What was the one you used back there? You used purity. Purity test on Chris Cuomo.
Scott Galloway · 46:51
Salt Lake Calorama?
Kara Swisher · 46:52
He lied to his bosses, and he committed journalistic malpractice. It is not a purity test. Thank you.
Scott Galloway · 46:59
You're
Kara Swisher · 46:59
Thank you. This is just to show you... Just just to show you this is what you're gonna get here. We do not agree on things, and yet we could... And yet we endure. And I'm staying at his apartment this weekend in New York, and I'm gonna trash the place. I'm gonna put Clara on the couch with grape juice. That's my that's my plan.
Scott Galloway · 47:14
Good segue. Good segue. You got out of that house, that fun house of
Kara Swisher · 47:20
the laundry have room, a about
Scott Galloway · 47:23
climbing wall. Claire? Claire is so young.
Kara Swisher · 47:26
I have a climbing climbing You know, to be honest with you, Amanda's a little worried that your apartment is like a a danger zone for children. That it could be sharp edges.
Scott Galloway · 47:33
A lot of sharp edges. I like that Northern European
Kara Swisher · 47:36
I know.
Scott Galloway · 47:36
Because Danger for children.
Kara Swisher · 47:37
I was like, didn't you like his other house? Because she loved your house, by the way, in Florida. But she's worried about that. And I said, do not worry, but I'm bringing all the all the soft things you put on edges of tables just to stick them there.
Scott Galloway · 47:49
No. No. No. Just wrap, Claire, and bubble wrap, and everything's good.
Kara Swisher · 47:52
Anyway, I appreciate it, and I will I will I will take pictures from there. I'll do woke pictures from there. Like, I'll have all all the woke people in, and we'll drink your expensive champagne.
Scott Galloway · 48:03
My goodness.
Kara Swisher · 48:03
Anyway, we'll be back on... That's the show. That's the obstreperous show for today. We'll be back on Tuesday for more. Read us out, Scott.
Scott Galloway · 48:12
Today's show was produced by Lara Naiman, Evan Engel, and Taylor Griffin. Thanks also to Drew Burrows and Mia Silverio. Ernie Indertot engineered this episode. Make sure you subscribe to the show on Apple Podcasts or be an Android user. Check us out on Spotify, frankly, wherever you listen to podcasts. Thanks for listening to Pivot from Vox Media. We'll be back next Friday for another breakdown of all things tech in business. What is our job in the media? What is our job in academia? It's to provoke a debate such that we damage that muscle in between your ears. And regardless of where you end up, you make better, more thoughtful, more empathetic decisions. We're gonna keep doing that. We're gonna keep doing that. Don Kusto.
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Kara Swisher · 49:38
custom flex temp drawer switches from fridge to freezer. With more than
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Kara Swisher · 49:41
gonna
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Scott Galloway · 49:54
See you
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