Russia crackdown on social media, Amazon buys MGM, and is 5G worth the hype?

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Speaker 6 Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from the Vox Media Podcast Network.
I'm Kara Swisher.

Speaker 7 Do you expect me to talk, Mr.

Speaker 8 Bond?

Speaker 10 No, I expect superior absorption, not that single ply bullshit bounty.

Speaker 12 That's the big story.

Speaker 6 It is. We'll be talking about that story.
That's Jeff Bezos is buying MGM, and that includes James Bond. Can't talk about it now.
The actual answer is, I expect you to die, Mr.

Speaker 13 Galloway.

Speaker 14 I expect you to die.

Speaker 6 I expect you to die. And then it proceeds to tell you his whole plan to how to kill him.
And then James Bond gets out of it. That's how it goes on the James Bond shows.

Speaker 6 In any case, I love James Bond, and this is a really interesting moment.

Speaker 6 So before that, there's a lot going on. There's a lot going on.
Speaking of Amazon, the DC Attorney General is bringing another antitrust lawsuit against Amazon.

Speaker 6 The complaint says Amazon is abusing its power by requiring third-party sellers to offer their products at the same price that they sell them elsewhere.

Speaker 6 So that's an issue.

Speaker 15 So you're in D.C.

Speaker 14 What do you think?

Speaker 6 You know, I use Amazon a lot.

Speaker 6 I think it shows how much power Amazon has. Amazon, of course, makes the argument that people can buy their stuff elsewhere if they don't like it.
You know what I mean?

Speaker 6 That's their argument, as is a lot of people's arguments. Same thing with Apple.
That was essentially saying if they don't like Apple, they can go over to Android or they can't.

Speaker 6 You know, I think it's a tough one. This is a little bit of probably PR on the DC Attorney General's.
part.

Speaker 6 But at the same time, it's going to be a pileup of lawsuits in this area.

Speaker 6 I think they're going to be subject to lots and lots and lots of these all over the place because, you know, ambitious attorney generals, it's a good look to be against Amazon.

Speaker 6 And so that's, you know, with the power they have with the Washington Post here, with,

Speaker 6 you know, over commerce, lots of people use Amazon here. I'd be curious to know what the usage figures in Washington are, but they're probably pretty high

Speaker 6 compared to the general public. I don't know what they are.
But I'm sure lots of stuff will come out and it's a good look for the attorney general. I think it's,

Speaker 6 we'll see how far it goes because they can can make the argument, you can, there's a store over there, go and buy it there. There's a giant, there's a, this, there's a that.

Speaker 20 Your comments, though, are telling, and that is current antitrust law is based off of this kind of bork Chicago notion that as long as the consumer wins, and they always bring up consumer choice.

Speaker 22 And Brandesian antitrust, which I think we need to go back to, talks about market power.

Speaker 26 And if you want to talk about power, regardless of whether or not you have a choice, if one company has such dominance and such access to so much cheap capital that no consumer is really going to choose anything else, thereby cauterizing new business formation, putting good employers out of business, then that is reason for antitrust.

Speaker 19 So just

Speaker 28 a couple points here.

Speaker 17 While everyone is talking about MGM because we're obsessed with James Bond, they missed bigger news this week about Amazon, which highlights just how powerful this company is and just why it needs to be broken up.

Speaker 6 Do you realize Amazon's ad business, which no one ever talks about, their ad business we do we talked about it we're aware it's big other than us other than other than uh 008 and 009 here you're a 00 nothing

Speaker 5 no i'm i'm the jewish nemesis by the way yeah fleming raging anti-semi gold singer blofeld jesus dude be a little bit more subtle yeah he would anyways anyways uh uh i'm gonna get on twitter for that okay so amazon's ad business which no one ever talks about yeah take the ad business of roku Pinterest snap and oh I don't know ad and Twitter just for fun Amazon's ad business is two and a half times bigger than all of those firms revenue combined and it's growing 70% it is it's becoming a real it's gonna

Speaker 6 be I'm just sort of I'm just I'm overwhelmed I'm overwhelmed you're very clamped I'm overwhelmed well Well, double oh nothing. It is going to be an interesting time.

Speaker 6 I think bringing this stuff out, more information, just like the testimony of Tim Cook at the Epic Thing, it may have done him no favors to be so explicit about what was going on.

Speaker 6 And so I think as more of these attorneys, attorney generals or attorneys general, I think it's attorneys general, start to get information, I think that'll be nothing but good.

Speaker 6 This transparency of how these things work will be interesting for people. And they don't want that stuff out at all.

Speaker 6 Interestingly, a bill in Congress is aimed at beefing up resources for space travel may also include a $10 billion bailout for Jeff Bezos' space exploration company.

Speaker 6 Blue Origin, pushed by Maria Cantwell, who's from Washington State.

Speaker 6 His company recently lost out on the bid that SpaceX got, Elon Musk Company. And so, you know, this looks like a gimme to one of the richest people.

Speaker 6 It's getting a lot of attention from Bernie Sanders and everything else because poor Jeff Bezos needs the help for his space endeavors.

Speaker 6 But, you know, it's just Washington as usual. One party wants to advantage someone.
The other is trying to stop it.

Speaker 6 I think they're sort of being dragged right into Washington in ways that's important for their businesses. At the same time, it's going to attract more and more scrutiny.

Speaker 22 Yeah, but I do think it's not business as usual.

Speaker 43 I think the trend is business as usual.

Speaker 45 But at some point, when the most profitable, largest market cap companies in the world continue this regulatory arbitrage of wanting to overrun government and look for additional subsidies.

Speaker 2 I mean, is Amazon 20 billion in profits the last 10 years, average tax rate of 4.5%?

Speaker 13 I mean, it's just at some point,

Speaker 22 there's got to be pushback.

Speaker 38 Now, I don't know enough about the situation.

Speaker 44 I'm curious if you think this is exceptional or just what every other company does looking for.

Speaker 10 I think space exploration using the cheap capital of Amazon shareholders is actually beneficial for American taxpayers.

Speaker 29 But what do you think about this specific situation?

Speaker 6 Well, I think it's interesting because they're also involved in the pushback, which they sort of gotten ahead with Microsoft and the Jedi contract, which looks like it's going to have to be redone, I guess, or if at all.

Speaker 6 And so they managed to put

Speaker 6 a wrench in that. And so it'll be really interesting as they engage, all these companies engage with the federal government on all kinds of contracts, right?

Speaker 6 And they're critically important, especially Amazon with Amazon Web Services, all kinds of facial. Well, they suspended some of their facial recognition stuff.

Speaker 6 But as they move into especially these big cost item things where they're working essentially a vendor for the federal government,

Speaker 6 I think they're going to,

Speaker 6 I think it'll be, it's sort of like on one hand, they have all this influence. On the other hand, this is perfect stuff for Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren to point at.

Speaker 6 You know, they're exposing themselves more, I think, is what they're doing.

Speaker 6 And whether they can argue all you want, but once they get into the Attorneys General thing and into Congress, they get exposed more. And eventually there will be legislation.

Speaker 6 Eventually, I think they're headed for legislation, and it's just going to be a dance of how much they can avoid and how bad it has to be and stuff like that. So it's interesting.
It's an interesting.

Speaker 6 But speaking of it, let's move on to the big story because

Speaker 6 other countries are even more so, you know, all across the world dealing with these tech companies in ways that aren't possible in this country for lots of reasons.

Speaker 6 Russia is cracking down on big tech platforms in an effort to control free speech. This week, Russian regulator, and I'm going to pronounce this Roskomnaz

Speaker 6 Roskomnadzor, told Google, Roskomna.

Speaker 6 Okay, told

Speaker 6 Devushka, told Google to block thousands of unspecified pieces of illegal content that would slow access to the company's services.

Speaker 6 The next day, the Russian court fined Google $81,000 for not taking down another piece of content.

Speaker 11 That was one thousand.

Speaker 6 Look at over in Florida.

Speaker 11 I was going to say Russia and Florida.

Speaker 6 Yeah, right, exactly. Come on.
Russia orders Facebook and Twitter to store all of its data on Russian users within the country by July or face penalties.

Speaker 6 These moves are part of a wave of recent action by the Russian government to get a handle on controlling speech, obviously.

Speaker 6 They're probably worried about Navalny and all the activity there, et cetera, et cetera.

Speaker 6 Back in March, the government made it harder for people to see and send posts on Twitter after the company did not take down content the government considered illegal.

Speaker 6 So, and this isn't just happening in Russia. It's, you know, India, many countries are trying to sort of get their handle around these tech companies.
The old move was shutting them down, essentially.

Speaker 6 That's not really quite working because people use them or find workarounds, but it's a really interesting trend that these, and in the case of Russia and India, they don't have a First Amendment.

Speaker 6 So, you know,

Speaker 6 they can do whatever they they want in these ways. And of course, these have always been top-down countries.
So I don't know. What do you think?

Speaker 6 They're going to see a lot of this pushback across the world in Russia, not just from China, but Russia, India, other countries.

Speaker 35 It's good for Google

Speaker 48 because Google will get to wrap themselves in this sort of freedom blanket and obfuscate the fact that they, in fact, should be moderating some of the more dangerous incendiary divisive content, which they amplify.

Speaker 20 And instead, this will be a big distraction.

Speaker 27 And a bunch of Republicans will use this as a means of saying free speech, and it'll end up being a real advantage for Google.

Speaker 17 I think from Russia's perspective,

Speaker 26 I mean, they want to control the media, they want to control speech, and Google gets in the way of that.

Speaker 43 I think the ideal scenario for the Russians would be if they do what Apple did, and that is, quite frankly, just cave to the government and do what they want.

Speaker 45 Because if they outright ban Google, I think a lot of the didgerati or the, I don't know, the tech set or the affluent set in Russia.

Speaker 6 It's a big set. It's a big industry.

Speaker 29 Well, they would just use, I think they would just use VPNs and figure out another way to access Google.

Speaker 20 So I don't, this, where I come from, this is the following.

Speaker 10 Google really, the revenue they get from Russia just isn't that big a deal.

Speaker 29 This is an opportunity for them to talk about how they are a warrior for free speech and wallpaper over the notion that YouTube continues to radicalize young men by promoting content that is dangerous and isn't getting its natural oxygen of discourse.

Speaker 37 It's being promoted by these algorithms.

Speaker 40 So unfortunately, I think like everything else, I think this will probably end up being good for Google.

Speaker 6 Because next to Putin, everybody looks good, right?

Speaker 24 That's right.

Speaker 20 They can make strident speeches about how they're refusing to, you know, that the Russian,

Speaker 20 they'll wrap themselves in a flag of First Amendment and America, and it'll all be giant distraction from the fact that there's some nuance here.

Speaker 26 And then a bunch of Republican governors will line up behind it.

Speaker 21 I don't know.

Speaker 6 Except the Republicans are the ones passing these laws like in Florida, these social media laws like in Florida, where they're doing fines, very similar, not unsimilar fines of if you continue to do this, if you don't put people on there.

Speaker 6 I mean, they are, it's sort of different, but they're trying to control the speech of these companies and who they can kick off and who they can't.

Speaker 22 You're referring to DeSantis signed a law saying that the platforms couldn't kick people off.

Speaker 19 And the reality is, I just call that his first trip to Iowa.

Speaker 10 He got angry that Liz Cheney was in the news too much.

Speaker 21 And so he decided, how can we get attention?

Speaker 2 I know, let's sign meaningless legislation that's going to have no impact.

Speaker 37 I don't even think it's, I don't think it's legal what he signed to just try and, so I can get more camera.

Speaker 22 He might as well just have gone to Des Moines and said, started, started talking about big tech.

Speaker 19 That was just like such a ridiculous and effective political move.

Speaker 24 But anyways, I think this is, I think this issue in, I think the bigger issue, again, I think the media, I'm going to go out on a limb here, gets us wrong.

Speaker 50 I think the state-sponsored hijacking that looks like it was KGB-inspired of a journalist where a commercial flight

Speaker 38 was in mid-air, escorted down under the falsehood that there was

Speaker 16 explosives on board.

Speaker 20 And then four guys who were clearly KGB agents escorted this journalist off the plane and he was detained.

Speaker 40 That's the kind of shit, that's literally a modern-day Archduke Francis Ferdinand getting shot in the head.

Speaker 32 That's the kind of shit that starts wars.

Speaker 11 Bond movie, really.

Speaker 47 Well, and now America, and now

Speaker 10 Western companies are saying we're not going to fly over Belarus in airspace.

Speaker 19 I mean, that was, in my opinion, that was the real story of the week.

Speaker 40 Not Russia asking Google to do shit.

Speaker 31 I think we kind of missed the bigger picture.

Speaker 29 We missed the bigger picture.

Speaker 11 We missed the bigger picture. And that's just not the tea speaking.

Speaker 6 It's not the biggest. It's not a big deal because this is a country.
You're right. It's not a big business for Google.
Russia is a big business. I think Russia has more to lose here in that regard.

Speaker 6 But it's not just Russia. It's India.
Look, they're doing stuff in New Zealand, Australia. Like, this is Canada.
And then eventually. New Zealand, really?

Speaker 6 Yeah, they're all like talking about about various and sundry things about it. You know, in the in the democracies, it's like hate speech needs to be controlled.
In Russia, it's don't talk Navalny.

Speaker 11 Like, yes, that's right.

Speaker 6 So, it's speech needs to be controlled. Speech needs to be controlled, is really the bottom line.

Speaker 6 Although it's different speech, and I think you and I would probably go, yeah, hate speech needs to be controlled. No, let Navalny speak.
You know, I mean, that's the problem here.

Speaker 8 That's the nuance that no one wants to talk about.

Speaker 6 Yeah, exactly. And so, I think, you know, look, Putin's going to do whatever he wants in Russia.

Speaker 6 I think he's probably got a real problem with Navalny and about the attention that he gets and a creation of that kind of martyr in that country. You're well known for martyrs.

Speaker 6 That's a problem for him. And the more he tries to press down on speech, you don't even have to have the internet.

Speaker 6 If you remember David Remnick's book many years ago about Russia, same thing. They were using

Speaker 6 newspapers and letters and books. And you have Alexander Solzhenitsyn.
And it just was, this is something that's been an ongoing war in

Speaker 6 Russia to keep information out of the hands of people, and then having people

Speaker 6 get through anyway. Like it doesn't really, they get through in some fashion.

Speaker 6 And so I think what's it's going to be very difficult for Russia to control a Google. And Google doesn't really have to do anything because it's not that big a deal to them.

Speaker 6 And you're right, they'll get a benefit of it. But I think in some of these other countries, in India,

Speaker 6 in New Zealand, in Canada, and then eventually here, they have a much more significant problem of how they manage their platform. I think that's really what that's all about.

Speaker 28 We got to take a quick break here.

Speaker 26 I'm just for the first time looked at the video.

Speaker 16 Are you wearing a gold chain?

Speaker 11 Yes, I am.

Speaker 52 What the fuck is going on here?

Speaker 6 No, my daughter put them on.

Speaker 51 Are you doing some sort of crazy sex games where you pretend to be a rap star?

Speaker 16 What is going on there?

Speaker 6 These are those beads, like New Orleans beads.

Speaker 6 Yeah, they're Mardi Guard beads. And these are

Speaker 6 my... the golden child's favorite jewelry to put on people's necks.
So I forgot I had them on right now.

Speaker 5 I'm okay with that.

Speaker 44 I didn't know what was going on there.

Speaker 6 You know, though, my son, Louis, wears a gold chain. Like, he thinks he's very Italian.
He goes, right, we have Italian heritage. Right for the gold chain.
He wears it all the time.

Speaker 11 What do you know?

Speaker 22 He's not getting a lot of swipes on Tinder.

Speaker 11 That's a shocker.

Speaker 11 He's doing good.

Speaker 52 Send him my way.

Speaker 11 Send him my way.

Speaker 11 My little butcher.

Speaker 26 I want to be His Cerno de Bergerak.

Speaker 6 He's doing just fine. He's so cute.
He was singing in the shower this morning. Nobody, he didn't realize we heard him as we were sitting on the back deck.

Speaker 11 It was very nice. That's a little awkward.

Speaker 6 I know, it was sweet. We didn't talk about it.

Speaker 14 Talking adorable.

Speaker 35 Back to Navalny.

Speaker 6 And Navalny. Anyway, so it's a bigger issue in very, they're facing, you know, here it is.
The tech is so important to everybody, and everyone's reacting in a different way.

Speaker 6 And so I think this is not as big a deal as elsewhere. That's what I would say, including here in this country.
All right, Scott, time for a quick break.

Speaker 6 We're going to leave international affairs and go to the real stuff.

Speaker 27 You know, Putin's a Bond fan.

Speaker 19 Do you know what his favorite pasta is?

Speaker 32 What?

Speaker 10 I'll have the mini penny.

Speaker 9 Oh, my God. Get it?

Speaker 18 Money penny, mini penny.

Speaker 14 Get it.

Speaker 6 Get it?

Speaker 14 That's good bond humor.

Speaker 6 It's not good bond humor. It's terrible bond humor.
We'll be right back to talk about Amazon buying MGM Studios, then we'll answer a listener mail.

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Speaker 6 Okay, Scott, we're back. You can make all the bond jokes you want.
It's not just bonds, It's rocky. It's other things.
It's not just.

Speaker 5 Are you sincere saying that?

Speaker 26 Because I heard Putin also gets pussy galore.

Speaker 5 Oh.

Speaker 14 You said any bond joke. No.
You said any bond jokes.

Speaker 15 You gave me license.

Speaker 14 I didn't want to go there. You can have a listener.

Speaker 11 I didn't want to go there. You and your two-pack were impressions.

Speaker 6 Anna Top remember Anna Anna Top? Anna Top? Anna Top? Anna Top?

Speaker 11 Do you remember that one?

Speaker 11 It was Jane Seymour. Bond girl.

Speaker 6 She was. She was,

Speaker 6 oh, what was her name?

Speaker 36 Sandy Newton, most beautiful woman in the world.

Speaker 11 Bond girl.

Speaker 6 Anyway, Anatop was my favorite.

Speaker 11 That was my favorite. On a top.

Speaker 6 She was the one who

Speaker 6 strangled people with her legs. You don't remember that one? Anyway, Amazon is buying MGM Studios.

Speaker 8 I think that was my first wife.

Speaker 11 $8.5 billion. Sorry.
$8.45 billion. I'll be here all week.

Speaker 14 Try the veal. All right.
Try the veal.

Speaker 6 I'm going to shake you, not stir you. Okay.
Amazon is buying MGM. We're done with the Bond jokes.
MGM Studios for $8.45 billion.

Speaker 6 This is Amazon's second biggest acquisition since it bought Whole Foods in 2017 for a lot more, $13.4 billion.

Speaker 6 The Once Hollywood Golden Studio has been shopped around for the past few months and has valued it far less than its competitors than Apple, Apple. I think a lot of people are looking at it.

Speaker 6 But among the many titles, it's home to James Bond. It has Rocky.
It's got a whole bunch of stuff.

Speaker 6 And although Amazon will only own 50% of the IP of that one, I think. So what do you think? Is it too much? They paid a lot.
People think they paid a lot. They paid a lot.

Speaker 19 Well, I just think this is evidence that, you know, when you have a 26-year-old retailer buying a 100-year-old storied media and content company so they can sell more paper towels, I just think it reflects that we're in a wonderful age.

Speaker 38 We live in a wonderful age.

Speaker 6 So it's for the news, it's for the paper towels.

Speaker 37 This goes back to what you're saying.

Speaker 41 So a lot of content companies were looking at it who are in the content business, and no one could justify paying more.

Speaker 33 This company was purchased by a company I've done some work with, Anchorage Capital, for about $5.5 billion 10 years ago.

Speaker 41 It was their longest investment.

Speaker 26 And they overpaid then, and nobody could get near the number that Amazon can pay because if it just pulses a little bit of sugar for Prime Video, which is now technically 200 million members bigger than Netflix, it's worth it to them.

Speaker 21 And it brings up the notion of how Amazon has become too powerful because they can come in and make irrational purchases that don't make any sense.

Speaker 6 There's a soft bank going on here.

Speaker 52 And everybody else that got out their pencil said, quite frankly, this thing's probably not worth $6 billion.

Speaker 33 I mean, it's got some assets.

Speaker 40 But I was thinking, okay, they could do some really cool stuff.

Speaker 29 You could have a Bond film for Prime Member seven days before it comes out in the theaters, right?

Speaker 11 I would be thrilled. Yeah.

Speaker 22 But I don't think they're going to be able to do that because it's a joint venture with the heirs to the Broccoli Fortune or the Broccoli IP.

Speaker 26 And I'm not sure they would allow that.

Speaker 20 So here's what this reflects.

Speaker 19 And that is when Anchorage first bought this, I think this is what.

Speaker 19 So you've heard of the greater fool theory. Yeah.

Speaker 22 And that is you pay a stupid price, but someone else, even dumber, will come along and buy it for a higher price.

Speaker 42 I think this is an individual, I think this was an ego-driven purchase.

Speaker 19 I think when non-Hollywood people buy Hollywood assets, they usually buy them for the wrong reasons.

Speaker 22 Specifically, they like the idea of going to the Academy Awards.

Speaker 22 But there's even an individual who wants to go to the Academy Awards even more.

Speaker 21 This was the kind of one midlife crisis passing off the baton to another midlife crisis.

Speaker 19 So there's a greater fool theory. This is the smaller penis theory, where essentially one midlife crisis guy sold to a guy in the midst of an even bigger midlife crisis.

Speaker 31 This makes no sense economically.

Speaker 40 With $9 billion, the woman who runs Amazon content could have produced a ton of amazing content.

Speaker 6 With this money.

Speaker 24 Absolutely.

Speaker 16 This is a lot of money.

Speaker 31 But here's the thing.

Speaker 19 Amazon can make irrational purchases and put their elbows out and bump every player out of the way.

Speaker 41 You know, it would have been a great owner for this asset.

Speaker 37 Disney would have been a great asset.

Speaker 11 Yeah, wouldn't it be?

Speaker 7 Would have been a great owner.

Speaker 16 They could have had a bond land.

Speaker 38 They could have done a lot of great things with the franchise.

Speaker 22 What they have done with the Star Wars franchise, in terms of maintaining the integrity and then extending it into cartoons and adjacent programs,

Speaker 26 they've done an amazing, they would have been a great steward of this.

Speaker 11 But Amazon, they also have Legally Bond.

Speaker 6 They've got Rocky and Creed, et cetera, et cetera. A handmaid's tale, Fargo, Vikings.
There's a lot going on here. But you're right.
It's kind of a crazy amount of money.

Speaker 6 But it does, look at all the attention it's gotten already. It's got pictures of him in the MGM logo of Bezos.
He looks like a bond villain in a bond outfit. You know, the whole thing.
And

Speaker 6 I don't think it costs him anything.

Speaker 14 It's not that. Well, that's it.

Speaker 2 But that's the point.

Speaker 26 It's a dilution of a half a percent.

Speaker 13 Right.

Speaker 19 If Jeff likes it, if the person at

Speaker 19 Amazon Prime Video who wants to please Jeff says, yeah, we can do some great things with these assets, they take a half a percent dilution.

Speaker 32 This means absolutely nothing to them.

Speaker 22 But every other media company looking to bulk up to fight back against Netflix and Amazon just can't even get close to it.

Speaker 6 And it's 100% for Prime. That's it.
That's it. It's for Prime.
That's the way it goes. And that's all it is.
It also is home to Thelma and Louise. There's all kinds of stuff here.

Speaker 43 Hey, but what do you do? What are we going to have with Thelma and Louise from the Dead?

Speaker 6 I mean, I do that. I get it.
I don't think that's what it's about. You know, the fact that, you know, Louis B.
Maire used to say,

Speaker 6 I read lots of books about him and sort of the glory days of MGM. That's where Judy Garland, Wizard of Oz, Singing in the Rain, Gone with the Wind, et cetera, et cetera.

Speaker 6 And they're not owned by that. Warner actually owns those, which is interesting.
But he used used to say there's more star than the heavens, if you remember. Sort of the creepy stylings of Louis B.

Speaker 6 Mer, which have become looked like he's a pretty malevolent player in that time period. But it does.
It gives them nothing. And what's happening is like there's a lot of growth with Disney Plus.

Speaker 6 There's a lot of growth with HBO Max and Paramount Plus. You know, you see these ads sort of showing off all their stars, essentially.
Again, just the way MGM used to.

Speaker 6 If you remember those pictures of all the stars of MGM, if you go back and see, you know, they'd sit them all down every every year and you'd see them.

Speaker 6 And it was really breathtaking, actually, when you'd see them.

Speaker 6 But what's important here is it just sells more toilet paper. Like you said, it's just, it doesn't matter.
It doesn't matter. And it will help

Speaker 6 Amazon.

Speaker 14 It doesn't matter. I think it was a bad move.

Speaker 11 You do. Huh?

Speaker 6 I think they're like Sony. Actually, Sony did well with its purchase.

Speaker 6 Some companies, when they come in to buy Hollywood, end up crying at the end. Sony's actually done okay.
Comcast has done okay.

Speaker 6 Which group are they in? Are the ones that sort of run away with their tail between their legs like ATT?

Speaker 26 No, I mean they're in this they're in this business.

Speaker 20 So it makes sense from a strategic fit standpoint.

Speaker 26 I'm just looking at valuation.

Speaker 10 If you look at the successful acquisitions and Disney's made the best, they've effectively not only bought banks, so let's assume they have a good bank here that they can utilize.

Speaker 20 The question is, would it have been easier or less expensive to rent that bank as opposed to own it?

Speaker 42 And because

Speaker 42 they could still run Rocky.

Speaker 22 They could still run Thelma Louise.

Speaker 37 The key is the reason why Disney's made the best acquisitions and content is they've purchased these franchises that are incredibly extendable.

Speaker 14 And that is Marvel,

Speaker 19 Marvel, Pixar, Toy Story 3, and Star Wars is the gift that keeps on giving with Ashoka getting her own series and the Mandalorian.

Speaker 36 Who would have thought The Mandalorian was going to get its own

Speaker 11 series and content stars?

Speaker 9 Whereas if you look at this, the only asset,

Speaker 19 really the only franchise asset here, you could argue Rocky.

Speaker 39 We'll see how long that gets played out.

Speaker 36 The handmaid's tale, I mean,

Speaker 29 there's only so many evil things we can do to the Gilmore girl.

Speaker 16 I mean, that shit's running out of steam.

Speaker 15 And so what you had here, the franchise asset,

Speaker 13 the franchise asset

Speaker 21 was the Bond franchise.

Speaker 50 And unfortunately,

Speaker 9 they got descendants.

Speaker 22 And the thing about descendants of really talented people is they're under the impression they inherited that talent.

Speaker 26 And they're usually difficult to deal with.

Speaker 35 And the idea, wonder what they're going to be able to do because they're going to want Bond to be in theaters.

Speaker 26 The gangster move here would be to say the new Bond film,

Speaker 29 not even do what Wonder Woman did and go on the same day, say it's seven days early.

Speaker 38 It's seven days earlier than in the film.

Speaker 6 That'll drive them crazy. I don't think the broccoli will agree to that.
No time to double

Speaker 6 had to be delayed. It's the 25th Bond film.
What a long time. It's sort of like Saturday Night Live.
It's a really long time.

Speaker 14 That's my point. And you know what the downside is?

Speaker 6 October 8th in theaters. Just say that.

Speaker 28 The downside is not that they overpaid, because quite frankly, it's literally the sweat off of Bezos' back.

Speaker 24 The thing that wasn't worth it here is that it's another point of light.

Speaker 26 It's exhibit 34B and the antitrust trial against Amazon.

Speaker 42 And it wasn't worth it.

Speaker 24 It wasn't worth it.

Speaker 47 So look, I think Jennifer Sulke, with $9 billion, could have created some amazing content, maybe even in my view.

Speaker 37 more enduring content than what they're going to get with the MGM Library. She could have, without raising any antitrust flags, built some amazing franchises.

Speaker 14 Yep.

Speaker 26 I just don't think, I don't think this was a shareholder-driven acquisition when they looked on a risk-adjusted state.

Speaker 6 Well, do they ever think of shareholders?

Speaker 6 I think they do.

Speaker 14 I think it does.

Speaker 6 I don't think he thinks, you know,

Speaker 6 they have long-suffering. And as I noted last week in the Times,

Speaker 6 investors don't mind this kind of stuff. They don't think it's worthless.

Speaker 11 Well, it feels bold.

Speaker 6 It's bold. That's right.

Speaker 6 If you're AT ⁇ T and you do this, you're like, what an idiot. If you're Bezos, it's like, like, brilliant, Mr.
Bond, kind of thing. And so, you know, Whole Foods is their biggest purchase, obviously.

Speaker 6 They bought Zappos in 2009 for $1.2 billion. Ring for $1.2 billion.
I think it's just the beginning of tech companies. I actually kind of predicted that I was buying up these things.

Speaker 6 They're going to buy everyone. I did an interview that just published today with Jake Tapper, and I'm like, they're going to own you someday, Jake Tapper, or your version of you someday.

Speaker 14 You have Jake Tapper? What? Yeah, Jake Tapper. What's he like?

Speaker 11 I like him. He's lovely.

Speaker 6 He has a book. I'll send it to you.
It's a wonderful. He's actually a very good fiction writer.
He writes thrillers. I'll send it to you.

Speaker 52 I'll send it to you. There's some, you know,

Speaker 14 everyone talks about income inequality.

Speaker 39 I want to talk about talent inequality.

Speaker 13 That's just not fair.

Speaker 24 That's just not fair that a guy like that should be a fiction writer.

Speaker 6 Yeah. Well, he's really quite good.
He's not just, he's not just a fiction. He's quite good.

Speaker 27 He's like the nicest guy. Is he nice?

Speaker 6 Yes, he's very nice. You should listen to it.
He said a lot. He said a lot.
He said a lot. So what's interesting about that, though, is I was like, they're going to own you someday.

Speaker 6 It's not going to be. They're going to just sit and wait and bleed out even Disney, even Comcast.
You know what I mean? And just wait and wait and wait.

Speaker 6 If they can do this without even a problem, without, you know, they have, let's be clear, they're worth, what is it, $1.64 trillion and they have $71 billion of cash in cash.

Speaker 6 This is nothing. This is a nothing burger for them.
And they could go. I don't know, Kara.

Speaker 47 David Zazloff's coming for them.

Speaker 6 Yeah, right. Exactly.
Come on. They can just bleed that.

Speaker 11 By the way, I don't know that guy at all.

Speaker 2 I have no reason to think he's not a talented executive.

Speaker 6 Yeah, he's a very very talented executive. I'm not saying he's not.
I just don't think he knows digital as well as he needs to.

Speaker 6 I don't think he can learn it.

Speaker 14 You and I are in violent agreement.

Speaker 21 This company,

Speaker 38 it's shitty businesses, not a shitty business.

Speaker 35 It's smaller businesses that no one talks about.

Speaker 22 Are two and a half times the size of other competitors and growing 70%.

Speaker 29 Their ad business is growing 70% a year.

Speaker 2 Facebook isn't growing 70% a year. Google isn't growing 70% a year.

Speaker 15 I mean,

Speaker 20 it's just, it is staggering what this company is able to accomplish.

Speaker 17 I don't think there's ever been a company that is performing on as many thousands of cylinders at this moment, at this, you know, in these areas

Speaker 37 as Amazon.

Speaker 26 I mean, it's just, you look at all these different businesses and there's, there's quarter of a trillion or half a trillion dollar businesses stuck within the business.

Speaker 15 The ad business is probably, if the ad business was spun, they would say, oh, there's a third.

Speaker 33 It's no longer a duopoly, Google and Facebook.

Speaker 17 There's a third and it's Amazon.

Speaker 41 And the third is growing faster than numbers one and two. Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 33 And what kind of market cap would that get?

Speaker 35 What kind of market cap would AWS get?

Speaker 11 Only

Speaker 35 AWS.

Speaker 6 AWS, yeah. Yeah.
It's just

Speaker 6 anyway. I think it's a good word.
I'm sorry. I think it's fine with them.

Speaker 6 They own, also, just so you know, the movies, not just Bond, we made a lot of Bond jokes, but they own Rocky, RoboCop, The Pink Panther, Silence of the Lambs, Legally Blonde, Moonstruck, Basic Intrigues, Thomas Crown Affair, Tomb Raider, and also,

Speaker 6 you know, lots of other things. And one of the things, this is a quote from Rich Greenfield, who you and I have talked about,

Speaker 6 which is a, he runs a media research firm, very well known. MGM didn't have the resources to build and create off the catalog.
Amazon does, and the opportunity to exploit MGM catalog is incredible.

Speaker 6 They also have some movies coming up, like Respect, Aretha Franklin Biopic, starring Jennifer Hudson, Ridley Scott's House of Gucci, starring Lady Gaga and Adam Driver, Paul Thomas Anderson's latest project, which stars Bradley Cooper, first film since The Star Is Born.

Speaker 6 It's not like they're buying this sad little

Speaker 6 studio sitting out in

Speaker 6 the desert kind of thing. I think it's, I think the issue is that they can do this, and it, even if it's a disaster, it's not a disaster for them.

Speaker 14 Look,

Speaker 39 everything you just mentioned is amazing, and it's worth maybe one or two billion dollars.

Speaker 45 Yeah, and it's not worth raising any trust in it.

Speaker 6 Rich people don't care. Like, they, okay, what is that? Is that croissant five dollars more? That's fine, whatever.
I want to eat it right now. Um, but it has also been spending a lot of money.

Speaker 6 It's spent $125 million for Coming to America, $80 million for Burat's subsequent movie film, and $200 million for Tomorrow War, a Chris Pratt adventure that's arriving in July.

Speaker 6 I think they're just going to just,

Speaker 6 it doesn't matter. They want to win here, and it's good for their other businesses.
I don't know. I think it's perfectly fine.

Speaker 36 Well, you know, it's big, old, and rocky. What?

Speaker 8 Sylvester Stallone.

Speaker 6 What does Sylvester Stallone have to say about this? I think their issue is antitrust red flags. I already can buy it.

Speaker 11 That's right. I don't think it's worth it.

Speaker 35 I don't think it was. Anyways.

Speaker 6 Yeah. There's other studios available, possibly.
Someone thinks Sony is. There's a whole bunch.

Speaker 6 These are all going to be sold.

Speaker 24 All going to be sold.

Speaker 10 Yeah, they're all, it's it's really interesting, isn't it?

Speaker 24 All these storied studios.

Speaker 33 They're all becoming like a rounding error.

Speaker 6 Or they're just going to wait and bleed them out and then buy them. That's what's going to happen.

Speaker 11 I think that's right.

Speaker 6 All right, Scott, let's move on to listener mail, roll tape.

Speaker 10 You've got, you've got, I can't believe I'm going to be a mailman.

Speaker 14 You've got mail.

Speaker 55 Hi, Kara and Scott. It's Matt from California.
Is 5G all hype?

Speaker 6 It's barely any faster.

Speaker 55 And the people who promote it say things like, it'll be even more transformative than 4G, which is not how how I would describe the switch to 4G.

Speaker 6 Oh, that's a good point. I'm not like blown away by 4G either.

Speaker 6 You know, I think, you know, look, this is what ATT, the reason they're saying they're getting out of their Warner business, is they want to put everything into

Speaker 6 5G.

Speaker 6 I think it is a big business. I think they feel that the internet gap is going to get closed in the United States because of it and that we're going to see

Speaker 6 much, all kinds of things because of it. And I get your point about 4G, but I think this is a big difference.

Speaker 6 Scott?

Speaker 33 Yeah, look, my sense is I don't know the technology, but I think it's an incredible brand.

Speaker 2 I think 5G right now is one of the strongest brands in the world and that everybody hears it and immediately associates very positive things with it.

Speaker 37 And the majority of that brand equity is going to be in the U.S.

Speaker 2 is going to be captured by two firms, AT ⁇ T and Verizon.

Speaker 26 And their boards recognize that.

Speaker 19 They have still figured out a way to...

Speaker 26 you know, put out their elbows.

Speaker 26 I don't know if it's regulatory protection, or I don't know if it's stealing the ground, capex, but so far there aren't, it doesn't appear to be that there's these immediate existential threats to the telco and broadband and cable businesses or the data businesses.

Speaker 22 And 5G, I think it sounds exciting.

Speaker 26 I think anything, I mean, bandwidth is the new oxygen, right? And there's studies showing that a nation's bandwidth is directly proportional to its economic growth.

Speaker 22 So when I think about productivity, When I think about my life and not only that, the productivity that's resulted in more income and more time with family,

Speaker 22 It's a function of bandwidth.

Speaker 6 Yeah, it could be electricity. You don't think about your, in this country, at least, in other countries, you certainly do.

Speaker 6 But, you know, spotty service, we still deal with it, and you're not going to. It's just not going to happen.

Speaker 6 And more connected devices, especially self-driving cars and other things, you know, and including household devices.

Speaker 6 There's still going to be so many devices jacked into the matrix that it's critically important. And I think there will be some day where you won't even think about your connection at all.

Speaker 6 And also Huawei being the dominant force here, others have to be competitive.

Speaker 40 Yeah, but there's something really magical about technology.

Speaker 37 Technology is built in this gestalt where, all right, instead of when our products get better, we increase prices to maximize margin.

Speaker 19 As products get better, we lower the price.

Speaker 22 And they have convinced us all, you know, it's not, they don't call it Cadillac one, Cadillac two, Cadillac III,

Speaker 26 because they assume, all right, the car gets better, but not at the same pace as the iPhone 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, and 12 and 2G, 3G, 4G.

Speaker 19 So tech has done an amazing job of not only improving products, but creating brands in a feel that the obsolescence phenomena here is so strong, you constantly have to be reinvesting and upgrading.

Speaker 9 And it creates just more and more,

Speaker 26 it taps into our competitive instincts.

Speaker 12 I mean, I'm excited.

Speaker 52 I will ask for 5G.

Speaker 43 Maybe it's out.

Speaker 40 It's important to me. I don't understand it.

Speaker 26 I don't need to understand it, but I will pay additional margin for it.

Speaker 21 I think 5G right now is one of the strongest business brands in the world.

Speaker 2 And in the U.S., like I said, two companies will reap the majority of that equity.

Speaker 6 Yep, exactly. And one of the things, let me read from a wired story so you can understand the technology of the promise is that 5G will bring speeds of around 10 gigabits per second to your phone.

Speaker 6 That's 600 times faster than the typical 4G speeds off today's mobile phones and 10 times faster than Google's fiber standard home broad.

Speaker 6 It's just, it's

Speaker 6 the way you think about connectivity now

Speaker 6 will change as these things. A lot of these are riding on 4G networks that you're getting.
You're seeing 5G, sometimes 5G pops up on my phone.

Speaker 6 But this is, you know, getting these to different parts of this country and to move it is critically important for

Speaker 6 all the leading future things, like, again, connected, artificial intelligence, self-driving cars, all these connected devices.

Speaker 6 We are operating on like 10 cans and a string comparatively.

Speaker 6 And so, you know, it's just we have fallen behind

Speaker 6 in connectivity in general for years and years and years and years and years. And so

Speaker 6 we have to adopt this. South Korea has the highest rate of adoption,

Speaker 6 but it's still not that big. And U.S.
users just do not have

Speaker 6 fast connectivity at all.

Speaker 6 And it's always been lagging. And if we don't have this,

Speaker 6 it's critical to everything that's coming, autonomous cars, everything, everything

Speaker 6 that's part of the future. And you weren't going to get there without this.
So yes, it's it once it is,

Speaker 6 John Stanky, for all his wrongness about media, is right about this.

Speaker 11 They've got it.

Speaker 6 Put every bit of shoulder into this. Yeah.

Speaker 20 And what people don't realize is, I mean, 5G, even if it's on your phone, if you don't have

Speaker 20 if you don't have mid-band or if there's not the right infrastructure, you don't get to take advantage of it.

Speaker 27 So there's...

Speaker 19 There's all sorts of,

Speaker 27 so my understanding is mid-band

Speaker 37 is the sort of critical factor that's been missing from a lot of the networks. And there's a lot of capex to take advantage.

Speaker 26 The stat you highlighted, that's if you're in the right area with the right infrastructure.

Speaker 22 So anyways, but look, I think this is, I think Verizon and ATT are going to do really well, which is a focus on, and I told you my story.

Speaker 22 I was asked to come speak to a bunch of Verizon people and I said, well, okay, all I'm going to tell them is double down on 5G and lose the media assets.

Speaker 40 And they called me back and told me that they had a change in scheduling and no longer wanted me to speak there.

Speaker 6 They just took your advice. They didn't need to pay you to be there to tell them something they did themselves.

Speaker 26 Well, they'd already decided and they're like, we don't need this guy to stand up and tell 40% of the people in the room they're about to get sold or fired.

Speaker 29 So, but anyways, I'm excited about 5G.

Speaker 40 I don't know exactly what it means, but that's the wonderful thing about technology is we trust people.

Speaker 27 And you mentioned electricity.

Speaker 10 It's interesting.

Speaker 26 Electricity, you don't think, oh, I've got to upgrade my electricity, do you?

Speaker 49 You don't think, oh, faster.

Speaker 6 Except when there's like wildfires in California or hurricanes or things like that. They're going going to be shuttling down electricity in California.
It's going to be problematic for Dievin Newsom.

Speaker 35 I'm getting a generator.

Speaker 9 Mostly because I like to embarrass the rival dads and talk about my generators.

Speaker 6 Do you have like a closet of apocalypse? Is that another thing you're doing? I just

Speaker 11 in Florida, there are hurricanes.

Speaker 9 I'm getting a big-ass generator.

Speaker 13 All right, okay, get a general.

Speaker 14 From Kohler.

Speaker 48 I didn't even know they made generators.

Speaker 11 Speaking of

Speaker 11 the corporate plan?

Speaker 22 You want to talk about a strong move?

Speaker 10 The other day, I explained crypto to a rival dad in front of his family.

Speaker 17 That's a strong move.

Speaker 49 That's a strong move.

Speaker 6 What is this, crypto, Scott? I can see it on this.

Speaker 7 And then I pulled out my leaf blower.

Speaker 6 Just one of the things that's important to keep in mind here that most of the 5G patents are not owned by U.S. companies.
Qualcomm is the biggest player, but the others are Huawei, obviously, Samsung,

Speaker 6 LG, Nokia, Ericsson, and Qualcomm. But U.S.'s does not have dominance here.
And that's been a political issue, too.

Speaker 6 So, and then there's all these controversies around the health, like that, there's all these conspiracy theories around it, which also come along.

Speaker 6 Bill Gates is related to one of them, or whether he's trying to put different things in your brain and stuff like that.

Speaker 6 So

Speaker 6 it's a really interesting time, I have to say, and it's critically important. The hype is worth it.
Anyway, let's get to one more quick break and we'll be back for predictions.

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Speaker 57 Savings vary and subject to availability, flight inclusive packages are adult protected.

Speaker 6 Okay, Scott, what is your prediction? We've been very good. We We talked about MGM being bought by Amazon.
We've talked about, what was the other one we got right? You were noting something.

Speaker 41 So we back when Peloton,

Speaker 48 the recall of

Speaker 2 the treadmills, the stock dove to, I think, 63, and we predicted that it would be back to 100 within 30 days.

Speaker 27 And we were wrong. It was back to 100 within 17 days.
See?

Speaker 37 So we got that one right.

Speaker 22 We talked to the SEC.

Speaker 16 We're actually on a roll here.

Speaker 8 Yeah.

Speaker 11 So let's throw up on ourselves. What have we gotten wrong? Anything?

Speaker 14 No, we get a lot wrong.

Speaker 6 Yeah.

Speaker 6 We just forget it and move on.

Speaker 8 Yeah. Well, no.

Speaker 51 Twitter will have a new CEO.

Speaker 5 Tesla stock will be cut in half.

Speaker 11 Carol, you heard it here.

Speaker 6 You know, the day that happens, you'll totally say, I got it right. You won't, you know that.

Speaker 11 Just wait long enough. Just wait long enough.

Speaker 8 Winter is coming. Okay.

Speaker 39 Okay. So the thing that

Speaker 22 I don't think anyone's talking about, and I love,

Speaker 8 I don't know, I love corporate governance, but I'm fascinated by shareholder classes.

Speaker 37 And one of the things that Stankey wanted, because he wanted to monetize

Speaker 2 his Time Warner assets to the greatest extent possible.

Speaker 22 Is he wanted a company, the NuCo, the Spin, to have one class of stock.

Speaker 27 Because generally speaking, two-class shareholder companies gives too much power to people who may not share the same interests as shareholders.

Speaker 22 And they oftentimes, at least theoretically, trade as a discount to

Speaker 21 single-stock companies because single-stock companies can be taken over. So that acquisition premium is sort of already built in.

Speaker 11 Sure.

Speaker 10 So Stanke demanded that the NuCo have a single class of shares.

Speaker 44 And this is what is going to, I believe, play out.

Speaker 11 And that is the requisite investments that Newco, Discovery, whatever they're calling it, Discovery Plus, Discovery Communications, is going to have to make to show that they're a player and meet the expectations around subscriber growth, around streaming is going to require such an extraordinary investment that Newco

Speaker 44 is going to have, is going to miss on earnings.

Speaker 40 And that is they're running around promising everything.

Speaker 45 They're promising that we'll be able to hold on to our ad revenue and pulse a subscriber service.

Speaker 40 They're promising everybody everything.

Speaker 27 Oh, you like the consistent profits of a declining

Speaker 2 sector that's in a company that's

Speaker 22 a business model that's in secular decline, specifically the advertising cable industrial complex?

Speaker 14 Fine, we'll hold on to that.

Speaker 19 But you also want the great taste, the growth of the streaming service.

Speaker 11 Guess what, Bob?

Speaker 45 You can't have both.

Speaker 47 That requires an extraordinary investment.

Speaker 40 They will have to go through this valley of death.

Speaker 45 They will throw up in their second or third earnings call.

Speaker 16 The stock will go down.

Speaker 22 And this company is going to be put in play by Comcast or someone else who will come in and become a larger shareholder.

Speaker 6 Oh, more complex. Why don't they just come in now?

Speaker 11 They just want to get it out in the open.

Speaker 19 My understanding is the deal is pretty airtight.

Speaker 9 But

Speaker 9 once it's a publicly traded stock and, and Kara, it's a single class, it'll be the, think about this.

Speaker 36 NewCo, or Discovery, is about to become the only media company in the world over a $10 billion market capitalization that is in play, that someone could come in and buy.

Speaker 39 No one can buy Amazon.

Speaker 22 No one can buy Disney.

Speaker 27 I mean, this is, it becomes the only media asset.

Speaker 6 A tasty treat, and David Zazlov gets rich, yes.

Speaker 22 That someone could come in and buy.

Speaker 40 So you're going to see, in my opinion, they've over-promised.

Speaker 22 They're going to have to take EBITDA projections down.

Speaker 10 The existing shareholder base.

Speaker 51 that is sort of neither here nor there.

Speaker 19 I don't know if this is a shareholder base that

Speaker 26 wants slow but steady growth or wants the fast growth, but

Speaker 49 losses of streaming.

Speaker 32 The shareholder base will shake out.

Speaker 20 You'll see the stock punt or throw up, and then you're going to all of a sudden see a D or an F filing by a Comcast or someone else.

Speaker 42 Another media company is about to become

Speaker 6 Amazon took the step and they're taking it. They must have made the calculation that they could.

Speaker 5 This story has not been written.

Speaker 6 We keep saying that. This is ridiculous.
This is a ridiculous price for this thing. You and I should make a bid.
What do you say?

Speaker 14 I'm in.

Speaker 6 We would be good medium. We would be so canceled.
I got some Doja coins.

Speaker 6 We would be so canceled.

Speaker 14 I got some Doja coins.

Speaker 6 We could run around and offend the broccolis.

Speaker 5 I got a Discover card with no limits.

Speaker 11 No, no cash limit.

Speaker 6 You would do that, wouldn't you?

Speaker 5 2% cash back.

Speaker 6 Yeah. If I was a Hollywood monkey, I want to be the crazy one, just say crazy things all the time.
Did I tell you my Hollywood story if I was a mogul?

Speaker 35 No, but please.

Speaker 6 Would you like to hear it? So a friend of mine was

Speaker 6 the showrunner and creator of the L-word. And so, I went up to Vancouver where they were taping it.

Speaker 29 Is that like a dream come true for you?

Speaker 11 I tried to Vancouver to see the filming of the L-word.

Speaker 6 Yes, they're very nice. I love that Lacast, Jennifer Beals.
I like them all. They're such lovely people.
Anyway, what a feeling.

Speaker 35 I love her.

Speaker 11 That's Jennifer Beals?

Speaker 6 Yes, that Jennifer. She's lovely.
I'll introduce you to her someday. She's really a lovely egg.

Speaker 11 I couldn't handle it. I just couldn't handle it.

Speaker 6 She's a good egg. She's a good egg.
I met Jane Lynch there. I met all kinds of people.
I love her.

Speaker 11 Oh, Jane Lynch. She's there.

Speaker 15 Oh, my God. Jay Lynch.
She's the friend.

Speaker 11 She are going to be friends.

Speaker 6 She just doesn't.

Speaker 11 I will maybe excuse her.

Speaker 11 I don't know. I love Jay Lynch.

Speaker 6 She's in Marvelous Mrs. Mazel, by the way.
She's amazing.

Speaker 6 So anyway,

Speaker 6 I had a great time there. But when I was on the set, one of the things was I needed internet access.
And at the time, internet access wasn't.

Speaker 11 Were you a special consultant? No, a lesbian wears a gold chain

Speaker 11 and yells out

Speaker 51 famous lines from Dorothy episodes before I do my wife.

Speaker 6 No, my friend Eileen Chaikin is great.

Speaker 6 She's had it all kinds of hits. She was Empire.
She has another one.

Speaker 6 Oh, The Equalizer? One of them. I forget.
One of them. She's got another one.
I don't know if it's Equalizer.

Speaker 43 How many seasons did the L word?

Speaker 6 A lot. It's still there.
It's still going on. Now it's the new L-word with new lesbians.
And the old ones are still there, too.

Speaker 6 You've got to follow it. You got to invention our relationship.

Speaker 29 Literally, there's just so many jokes I just can't say right now.

Speaker 11 Literally. Literally.

Speaker 6 It is my Hollywood story. I'm on the set.

Speaker 11 Read my mind.

Speaker 11 Read my mind.

Speaker 6 And they, of course, there's assistance running everywhere because it's ridiculous, these, these, these hierarchies on these Hollywood sets. And the citizen came and said, what do you want for lunch?

Speaker 6 And, you know, I'm like, whatever you have is fine. Like, I'm not like that.
I'm not that kind of person.

Speaker 6 And I just wanted to see how far they'd go because I heard, you know, you could get any, you could ask for, you know, you asked for anything. And I said, I'd like a shark sandwich.

Speaker 6 And she was like, what? And I said, a shark sandwich. And she's, she, instead of saying, what the fuck are you talking about, lady? Give me a minute.

Speaker 6 Okay.

Speaker 6 On what bread? I go, obviously, ciabata.

Speaker 6 Like, I was like, what are you talking about? And with Aioli, come on, get on board a shark sandwich. And she literally started to go to try to find one.
And I stopped her.

Speaker 6 I was like, please, if someone asks you for a shark sandwich, never get it. A turkey sandwich is.

Speaker 17 Okay, I'm going to go out on a limb here, but I'm going to ask the next time you have a behind-the-scenes story about filming at the L-word that it's a little bit more exciting than the sandwich you ordered.

Speaker 7 I mean, don't build up my hope and my expectations like that.

Speaker 19 Jennifer Beals, L-word, behind-the-scenes story.

Speaker 11 That was all working.

Speaker 6 She's so nice. She's the nicest person.
All right, here's. I'll give you a Jennifer Beals.
She, I took her around at CES one year, and we kept pretending she was an eBay executive.

Speaker 11 No one recognized her.

Speaker 6 She's stunningly beautiful and lovely and smart and everything. But we kept putting her off as an eBay executive the whole weekend.

Speaker 6 That was some fun.

Speaker 11 That was a fun time.

Speaker 6 Okay, that's it. That's my old story.

Speaker 22 No, grandma, tell us more stories about you at the L-word set.

Speaker 11 Jesus Christ. Snooze around.

Speaker 6 Anyway, you should watch the L-word. Together we'll watch.
I'll come to Florida. It'll be really fun.
That's what we should have watched instead of the Boston.

Speaker 27 Aren't you just so fucking weird?

Speaker 14 You and me watching the L-word together?

Speaker 15 Seriously. No, you know what?

Speaker 22 You can do, you're going to come down here, and we're going to watch I Dream of Genie.

Speaker 11 Okay. Genie, go to your bottle.
Oh, my God. Yes, Master.
Yes, Master.

Speaker 11 I wonder if MG. I watched two hours of I Dream of Genie.

Speaker 6 Who owns I Dream of Genie?

Speaker 38 By the way, I sat next to Barbara Eden on my interview at Margaret Scene.

Speaker 10 She's a lovely woman.

Speaker 11 Smart, nice.

Speaker 6 Who owns the IP for i Dream? Now, that could be something Jeff Bezos could get into.

Speaker 11 Who owns it?

Speaker 14 That's our entree into the media world.

Speaker 6 Who owns it? NBC.

Speaker 29 The Jungle Cat Dog SPAC has announced the acquisition of the IP to I Dream of Genie and the A Team.

Speaker 5 And we couldn't get the L word, but we're starting something called the M word.

Speaker 11 Yeah. All right.

Speaker 28 We got to close this up. We got this.

Speaker 13 This is digressing fast.

Speaker 6 Scott, I'm I'm going to have you read the entire thing out.

Speaker 2 So I have here, we'll be taking the long weekend.

Speaker 50 So next week's show will be published on Wednesday morning instead of Tuesday.

Speaker 37 That doesn't make any sense.

Speaker 6 Anyways, I'm going to a wedding in Knoxville.

Speaker 35 A wedding in Knoxville?

Speaker 23 That sounds kind of fun.

Speaker 6 Yeah, it's my nephew's wedding. It should be fun.

Speaker 8 And I'm glad it's in person.

Speaker 35 Yeah.

Speaker 20 Congratulations.

Speaker 10 What's your nephew's name? Shout him out.

Speaker 11 Give him a shout out.

Speaker 6 Will Swisher. And he's marrying Lee, and they're wonderful.
And I'm very excited.

Speaker 11 Will and Lee Swisher.

Speaker 16 Congratulations.

Speaker 6 Yeah. He's going to Harvard Law School next year.

Speaker 44 Well, I'm sorry.

Speaker 37 He's getting married and going to Harvard.

Speaker 6 Yeah.

Speaker 7 So things aren't working out for this kid.

Speaker 5 I hate, Will, I hope things turn up for you.

Speaker 11 Don't worry, boss. Hang in there.

Speaker 6 We're getting in the car and driving my mom, the whole gang to Knoxville. It's going to be great.

Speaker 22 So I'm going to go out on a limb here, but any kid going to Harvard who's getting married in Knoxville, that'll literally be one of the last things he ever does in Knoxville.

Speaker 11 Goodbye, Knoxville.

Speaker 7 This might as well be a goodbye, Knoxville party.

Speaker 6 It's where his lovely bride is from. Anyway,

Speaker 6 in any case, we'll be gone. But please send us your listener mail mail questions.
We love them. Go to nymag.com slash pivot to get a chance to be on the podcast.
Scott, read us out.

Speaker 19 Today's show was produced by Rebecca Sinana.

Speaker 37 Serni Andreta engineered this episode.

Speaker 19 Thanks also to Drew Burroughs.

Speaker 22 Make sure you've subscribed to the show on Apple Podcasts, or if you're an Android user, check us out on Spotify or wherever you listen to podcasts.

Speaker 2 If you like the show, please recommend it to a friend.

Speaker 26 Thanks for listening to Pivot from Box Media. We'll be back next week for another breakdown of all things tech and business.

Speaker 1 Nana, tell us more stories about you on this set.

Speaker 6 I'm going to Dollywood. I'm going to Dollywood.
It's near Knoxville. I'll tell you those stories when I get back.

Speaker 18 Take pictures.

Speaker 43 Take pictures, Kara. Enjoy the wedding.

Speaker 22 Congratulations, Will.

Speaker 14 And what's his bride's name?

Speaker 39 Lee.

Speaker 26 Congratulations, Will and Lee.