Kara Swisher · 34:39
And Google, really. You know, Facebook doesn't seem to be wandering around this area, but it's certain... It certainly could. Alright. The... Wins and fails. Wins and fails. I'm going to
Scott Galloway · 34:50
You go first.
Kara Swisher · 34:51
Do mine first. Spotify buying Bill Simmons the ringer largely because it's good for Cara and Scott.
Scott Galloway · 34:56
Do you know what the purchase price was?
Kara Swisher · 34:58
I I have heard a $100,000,000, but I
Scott Galloway · 35:00
do or a 100,000,000 too.
Kara Swisher · 35:02
Yeah. It's the Spotify's fourth major podcast acquisition.
Scott Galloway · 35:05
Offer health insurance?
Kara Swisher · 35:07
They do. And then Spotify, Karen's got her for sale. So that was great for Bill. We had talked about this. You know, I think he... You know, he had some issues around that company. They... There was a union thing going on. I suspect he didn't like running things. I know that feeling. Mhmm. And so this puts me... It'll be interesting to see how they manage. My issue is... Look. It could be a, again, a hot mess inside Spotify with all these different pod... Like, if they don't organize them correctly. But it makes sense on Spotify's part to try to, like, buy up different things because... To differentiate themselves. But I hope they organize it properly because I can just see, like, Gimlet... I think Simmons' thing is gonna be separate from Gimlet. It just... It feels a little bit like, oh, is this could be a problematic mess inside the company. But otherwise, I think it's great for Bill Simmons. Think his products are great. And so, it's interesting that he started this just a few years ago, and he's selling, I think, it's 40 to 50... I forget how many podcasts he has, but he has a lot. And they're all in sports, a lot of sports oriented stuff. And my fail is... It's not my fail. It's Peloton did really well, which is a a plus, but that it it it seemed to have affected SoulCycle's profits. And, you know, as you know, I have this now. I love SoulCycle.
Scott Galloway · 36:18
You love SoulCycle.
Kara Swisher · 36:19
The idiot who owned it gave all this money to Trump, and I stopped using it. But it had its biggest year over year sales decline on record, especially in December because of the people buying Peloton's and stuff. And I I see I... You could see that coming. So that's my two. It's a fail for for sale... SoulCycle not to have sold a bike, for example, and done this.
Scott Galloway · 36:39
And you both... You do both. You have a SoulCycle. Have you found your own?
Kara Swisher · 36:42
No. I don't go to SoulCycle at all. I refuse to give that guy money. I'm sorry.
Scott Galloway · 36:45
Yeah. But even distinct to that, do you think that... Do you see... Do you personally see that trend moving to in home Peloton
Kara Swisher · 36:51
versus Yes. I do. I think they're really good. I think these things are interesting for people who can afford them, obviously. Not everyone can do it. I also joined the Y this week because I think the Y is great, and I want my kids to go there. And I, you know, I just think it's a good... I like community based things like that. So, you know, it's it's of a certain thing. I like to go out and do things with people. So I think it's I think it's I think it's definitely a trend then, for sure, especially that they do a beautiful job.
Scott Galloway · 37:16
Peloton. Let's all go to Scott's and beat them with a hammer.
Kara Swisher · 37:18
Get on my Peloton. Here, Scott. Sit on my Peloton. Let me put it up to 50. So so anyway, so, yes, I do think it's a trend, but that's... We can talk about that another day. What are your wins and fails?
Scott Galloway · 37:30
My win was... I watched... Did you see the scene in New Hampshire town hall?
Kara Swisher · 37:34
Yes. I did last night. Yes.
Scott Galloway · 37:36
I I thought there were some really... I thought there were two powerful moments. First off, I appreciate that Andrew Yang is calling out Facebook and Mark Zuckerberg per your I've been disappointed that thus far there really hasn't been a lot of focus on big tech. And I think they're so busy that it's difficult to learn and be nuanced. And they're also scared to kind of poke the bear. These companies are very powerful and have a lot of money. So I appreciate Andrew just Yang calling the Yang one. The other one for me was Senator Warren I thought had a very powerful moment that didn't get that much attention. And she talked about the AIDS crisis in the context of the opioid crisis and created and said that there was a lot we could learn from the AIDS crisis and that is similar to opioids, that part of the reason the government hadn't intervened and provided the funding and the education and kind of the heft and the mojo to push back on these tragedies. And you need government intervention here. You need the full heft and might and dignity of the greatest fighting force in history and that's the US government. And the reason it had taken too long with opioids was similar to AIDS and that is there's a stigma around both of these things. And she brought up how a young man named Ryan White changed everything, and it immediately took me back to when I first heard about and learned about Ryan White and just how it really, like
Kara Swisher · 38:57
What a dignified young man he was.
Scott Galloway · 38:59
Punched you in the gut, and it kinda changed everything. And I thought As
Kara Swisher · 39:04
a kid. I mean, they should've
Scott Galloway · 39:05
been doing it long before. Just no... There was just regardless of your religion, regardless of whatever bigoted fucked up in the head reasons you had to not feel sorry for certain certain cohorts that were getting ravaged by this plague. You just couldn't ignore Ryan White. You just couldn't ignore it. You couldn't turn away from it. And that's when things changed in the Ryan White Act. And we we act... You know, we have pushed back in a big way. The warm hand of science has lifted a lot of people up from HIV and it's been a huge victory albeit too late. And Senator Warren said we tend to be a dollar short and a day late on these things. And last year, more people died from opioids than died during the peak of the AIDS crisis in the mid nineties. And that she used data, compassion. She has a plan.
Kara Swisher · 39:52
She's fantastic. She's proved so drastically. She's so qualified to be president. You sit there
Scott Galloway · 39:57
and you're like. Has incredible wow. She has incredible blue flame thinking. She's a leader. She's thoughtful.
Kara Swisher · 40:02
Jed Bartlett. I'm like, she's the lady Jed Bartlett. Super impressive woman. Super impressive depressing that people just have to, like, focus on what they don't like about her. She's really quite a brilliant person. Think she's jammed too far over to the left. She shouldn't have because she's really not actually as left.
Scott Galloway · 40:17
Open borders and Medicare Medicare for all have killed it. She's done.
Kara Swisher · 40:20
I mean, she really should've
Scott Galloway · 40:22
She's done.
Kara Swisher · 40:22
Not because she's really quite a...
Scott Galloway · 40:24
Her health care for You know
Kara Swisher · 40:25
what I mean? She's done. She's... She was... She should've been
Scott Galloway · 40:27
true She's to the she's she's the smartest person in the room. She reminds me a little bit... I mean, obviously, a different... Kind of a different character and and moral fabric, but she reminds me of Bill Clinton. I think when Elizabeth Warren shows up, goes into any room, there's a good chance she knows more about the topic than anyone else in the room.
Kara Swisher · 40:42
Yeah. Yeah.
Scott Galloway · 40:43
Yeah. But I went I went to those two.
Kara Swisher · 40:45
Speaking of which, I'm gonna do very quick fail, which was the Barnes and Noble diverse editions for young people. I do wanna mention, this was depressing to see. They used AI to scan the inside of books where there was a specific reference for patriots being white. And they didn't change that, but they they they they literally put, people of color on the front. And it was just ridiculous. It was a ridiculous... For Black History Month. And it was just insane not to just high... Just to just get more people of color as writers, publish more, put them on stores, feature them. It was like... This was just... They should be elevating narratives that reflect these stories. And they just put... It just was depressing. I was sort of like, who in the... What room, what, did that happen in where they thought this was a good idea? It was just... I was just... I was shocked by how... In this day and age, if someone would do something as dumb and pap as that. So thank you. I'm gonna just... It was really... Yeah.
Scott Galloway · 41:42
That seemed that seemed like how did that how did that get through?
Kara Swisher · 41:45
I wouldn't be in that room where I would have been like, stop. Stop. Stop. Stop.
Scott Galloway · 41:48
My fail my fail is... I love the term. Have the straight term you called Pete Buttigiegian a non carbonated gay, which I I always use the term non carbonated or the diet co version of. Casper is pricing today. I think Casper is sort of the non carbonated... I don't wanna call it WeWork. It's more like the non carbonated Blue Apron. Do you remember when Blue Apron went public? It was a cute brand. Kind of a nice business, aspirational. Business made no sense. So Casper is going public. Initially said they were gonna price at 17 to $19 a share. They're saying they're pricing at $12 a share. It's which gives it a market cap of 500,000,000. Its last round was at 1,100,000,000. And it's becoming a bit of a poster child for how the froth around taking a bad business, putting a bright young management team on top of it, putting VCs behind it, calling it disruptive, using the term technology a 130 times
Kara Swisher · 42:39
So many of them.
Scott Galloway · 42:41
Makes makes a great company or a company worth over $1,000,000,000, and it doesn't. And I think this company, if it gets out, and I guess it is gonna get out Mhmm. It's gonna be it's gonna be down 40% in the next six months. This business makes absolutely no sense.
Kara Swisher · 42:54
You did predict it wasn't gonna go public, but it's going for it, Scott. It's saying screw you, Scott.
Scott Galloway · 42:58
See. It... No. I said I said if it did... No. To be fair, I said if it gets public, it's off 50% in the first twelve months. And I
Kara Swisher · 43:04
think it's gonna have to
Scott Galloway · 43:05
it down.
Kara Swisher · 43:06
By our next show. But until then, what is
Scott Galloway · 43:07
it possible for Hold on. Hold on. I wanna put my timing around this stuff. I I don't think... We should move to predictions anyways. Casper No. I want
Kara Swisher · 43:15
So... No. Casper's not a prediction, but so you think it's gonna go out at a much less and then drop precipitously?
Scott Galloway · 43:21
It it might hold because Goldman will good... A good job of marketing. Goldman's now running around institutions and saying, I'll get you in Casper, you can't sell. They're gonna try and find people who won't sell for a while. They're gonna constrict the flow to try and create artificial artificial demand and keep it artificially up. Once the lockup on this thing's come out, everyone at Casper, all the employees are going, yay, yay, and then calling to Bergman going, when is my lockup done here? When can I
— Predictions segment begins —
Kara Swisher · 43:44
sell this companies like Casper? There's so many. Juul, there was a good story in BuzzFeed about Juul today. Oh, the mess that is now in terms of valuations. Alright. What's your prediction?
Scott Galloway · 43:52
So this is... We... You like these quizzes we were doing. I'm gonna give you a quiz, and it's a little bit... It kinda moves through prediction about Tesla, and it's sort of a Thank I think it's sort of a Inspector Clouseau or a clue quick. How could Tesla... And this is my prediction. How could Tesla be the catalyst or a product? I'll give you a hint. A product from Tesla. How could a product from Tesla ultimately be the catalyst or the spark of an economic crisis?
Kara Swisher · 44:19
What? What is this? I don't know.
Scott Galloway · 44:24
You don't know?
Kara Swisher · 44:25
No. I don't know. Tell me. Please illuminate me.
Scott Galloway · 44:28
Okay. This is my prediction. The next in the next... I don't know. I I get... I'm I'm usually pretty good with predictions. It's a timing where I get it off. But I think in the next two to five years, Tesla launches a coin. Because if you look at the people who are responsible and are attracted to Tesla stock, it's the same crypto weirdos. It is literally the same demographic. My brother
Kara Swisher · 44:50
has a Tesla, but okay. Alright.
Scott Galloway · 44:51
I have a Tesla too. So Elon Musk is a visionary, super intelligent, and he is unafraid, and he is gonna launch a Tesla coin. And the Tesla coin is gonna become this crazy speculative currency. And I used to think that Amazon was gonna launch a stable coin. Now I believe that Tesla is gonna wade into the waters and launch their own coin. It's just gonna become the speculative asset, the likes of which we've never seen before, which will be good for Tesla and the initial issuers of the coin. And I still don't entirely understand the dynamics behind issuing a coin and how they limit supply. And some coins are based on a right Right. To purchase a product which would obviously fit well to Tesla. But if Tesla launched a coin and every coin gave you the opportunity to be first in line for their upcoming products and created a currency, if you will, which is when... Just when two people agree that a certain Fiat vehicle has value, the Tesla coin could go after the monopoly that is now controlled by Bitcoin. So my prediction is Tesla in the next few several years is gonna launch a coin.
Kara Swisher · 45:55
That is a crazy prediction, Scott. I like it. Not Amazon. Not Amazon.
Scott Galloway · 46:02
Well, the stablecoin from Amazon would be really interesting too. I think it could be Amazon, a stablecoin, but I think that
Kara Swisher · 46:08
get for your Amazon coin.
Scott Galloway · 46:10
Well, here's the thing. You can't... If it represents in any way ownership, it has to go through the SEC. And the SEC has said 90% of all coins are fraud in places like Coinbase are basically trading in fraud other than Bitcoin. The only one that survived and people can get their money out of has been Bitcoin. And every other coin has ended up being just a pump and dump fraud. So they're very very worried about these coins. So you can't... It can't represent ownership in an asset because then technically it becomes a security subject to regulation. And Facebook tried to do... Tried to make it subject to regulation and make it backed by a currency, a basket of currencies, a genius idea, regulatory body. They did everything right except unfortunately it's from people you can't trust who who prostitute their personal events in in People Magazine to soften their danger. But anyway, sorry about that. Sorry about that. Back to this... Back to the Tesla coin. Tesla could potentially say, alright, in exchange for a coin, you get to be front of the line on any upcoming products, which would just be an excuse to create some sort of initial value. Very. And then traders would come in on both sides and you could see this coin turn into a global, basically a default currency. And he's the guy that could probably, he's not only smart enough and visionary to do it, he's got kind of the... He's got the backbone and the sack to do it. This would be pretty... I I think Amazon's board might go, I don't know. This could be scary. You know, Tesla's board is Elon Musk and Elon Musk. Yeah. So, anyways, I think the Tesla coin is coming our way.
— Predictions segment ends —
Kara Swisher · 47:39
Alright, test. That's a big prediction, Scott Gallery. Like... Speaking of a sack, that was really big prediction. Big prediction. Big prediction. So sad.
Scott Galloway · 47:48
The dog was not fixed. The owner said, let him roll. Let him run.
Kara Swisher · 47:52
In some way.
Scott Galloway · 47:53
He runs to the park on his own, but he did not fix him.
Kara Swisher · 47:57
You have been given another week before I come up there and hurt you so that you have a catastrophic illness. No. Anyway, Scott,
Scott Galloway · 48:03
you
Kara Swisher · 48:04
need to read our credits. You need to read
Scott Galloway · 48:05
our credits. Rebecca Sinanis is our producer. Our executive producer is Erica Anderson. Special thanks to Drew Burrows and Rebecca Castro. If you like what you heard, please subscribe on Apple or iTunes or on Spotify if you're on Android or anywhere you get your podcast from. If you want to hear more from us or you have a specific idea or a question, please email us. And also, please leave a review or suggest our podcast to a friend. We appreciate all your evangelism for the show and your support. Tune in next week for a breakdown of all things business and tech.
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Scott Galloway · 49:38
online
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