A letter to Twitter, Uber's data transparency, and Away proves startup culture is rough

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Hi, everyone.

This is Pivot from the Vox Media Podcast Network.

I'm Kara Swisher.

And I'm Scott Galloway.

And Kara, the big news, that's the winner.

You're not going to take my winner.

It's not thunder.

There's no thunder taking my life.

Hold on, hold on.

The sexiest podcaster alive.

That's right.

Adweek said I'm the sexiest podcaster alive.

Stop, You're stealing my thunder, you narcissist.

Listen, cue the music, Rebecca.

We

are the champions, my friends.

Yes, we are the champions, my friends.

We've got an exciting announcement.

Rebecca, stop playing that awful music.

Listen, Pivot won an award.

We won Thought Leadership Podcast of the Year, which is very funny because we really do need to have some thoughts.

Thought leadership?

I am.

Okay, let me just say, say, I am so sick of not being objectified.

I have my husband and everyone else I know gave me a Peloton and I now have a girlish figure.

I'm sick of being appreciated for my brain.

I'm sick of it.

This is, is this like the miscongeniality award, Daniel?

What the fuck does that even mean?

Thought leadership?

Have they met us?

Literally, have they met us?

We're very thoughtful people.

That's literally like the least sexy award ever invented.

But the sexy award was won by me, Kara Swisher, for Rico Decode, Ad Weeks Tech Podcast of the Year and overall

Podcast of the Year.

I beat Michael Barbero.

I kicked Joe Rogan's ass.

I mean, really, it's really clear.

Seriously, it's clear that Vox is owned.

Does Vox own the company that owns Adweek?

I've read that and almost swallowed my tongue.

I'm like, listen to me.

Podcast of the year.

I'm important and smart.

Did you see I'm smart?

I am just a really fantastic person.

You're like Helen Reddy at the 1978 Grammys.

You're just cleaning up everything.

I am woman.

Podcast writer.

The numbers too big, too.

Listen to me.

That's really good.

All the white guys who yammer away like you win all the time.

It is time for a lady to win the things.

I'm sorry.

No, you cleaned up.

And congratulations.

You are, I think you're officially the godmother of podcasting.

Seriously.

I believe I am.

And by the way, guess what our next stop is?

Pulitzers.

They just announced an audio category for future awards.

You're now, you're like Harvey Weinstein

out there trying to get yourself a Pulitzer.

So I just have a quick question.

I'm getting a Pulitzer, and then you're going to bow down to me.

That's all I'm going to say.

Like I do twice a week.

Anyways.

Yes.

You know what?

I'm just curious.

When did you start podcasting?

Like, what got you into it?

Five.

I just suddenly realized these earphones and everything else.

I think with the AirPods, it was five years ago or more.

I just was sort of like listening to some, and I thought, this is going to be great because you're in people's ears.

These ear things are getting so much,

these devices are getting so much better.

I was starting to listen to them.

And so I grabbed an intern.

I literally was running the Ricode site or doing a lot of writing and recode site.

And I just got tired of the text thing and I thought, I'm going to do this.

And because I was going to take the code conference 365 days a year.

It was just on a whim and Jim Bankoff let me do it and because nobody knows whatever I'm doing.

And that was that.

That was the beginning of it.

Thank you.

That's my origin story

wow that's it that's it I just wanted to do it yeah and and it's a medium that's now I think it's gonna be over a billion dollars it's the only ad supportive medium there you know what was the first podcast I ever listened to

What the podcast of you interviewing me on Rico Decode.

Oh, yeah.

Yeah.

That's right.

And you know what I thought was?

That was you know what?

Because you know, I'm a narcissist as well.

I read, I listened to the whole thing and I had one word reaction.

I'm like, meh, this medium will never work.

What is this show?

Loved that episode.

And that's where you predicted the Amazon Whole Foods thing.

Yeah, that started it all.

That built all this.

This is why I'm in a panic room right now.

Look, they're going to, they're going to, the NPR has been doing, a lot of people have been doing amazing journalism, but we have just stepped in and grabbed all of Thunder.

In any case, what do you listen to?

I'm just curious.

What does Kara Swisher listen to other than herself?

What do you listen to?

I listen to a lot of history podcasts.

I like a historic.

Like radical history, revisionist history?

All of them.

All of them.

I listen to whatever is around.

And I do listen to other interview shows sometimes.

I've always liked Terry Gross.

I listen to a lot of interview stuff, but I do like the historical ones.

And I also listen to historical audio books on tape.

Right now, I'm listening to a podcast about the making of the Brooklyn Bridge, and it's riveting.

John Roebling has just died his father.

God, no wonder we're thought leaders of the year.

Can you turn on the Kardashians?

Jeez, that's rough.

Anyways, congratulations, Carol.

That's wonderful.

Listen, it would be interesting to see if Spotify starts going after prestige journalism more is just the way, and Apple starts putting more money in this because the way Netflix

going for Oscars and Golden Globes and things like that.

It's just, it's an interesting, like they just did it with the Irishman and Marriage story,

which is interesting.

We'll talk about that later.

Let's talk about big stories.

I want to start with a letter you wrote to Twitter's board of directors.

I don't want to talk about too much.

You got a lot of attention for it.

You wrote a very, you had started this on the podcast last week, but then you wrote a very detailed open letter on your blog, No No Mercy, No Malice,

maybe a little malice.

You actively asked Omit Kordasani, who I know very well when he used to work at Google, who's the executive chairman of Twitter, to remove Jack Dorsey in a no-confidence vote.

And you actually sort of slapped around him.

And just to be clear, you disclosed that you are a Twitter shareholder in the letter.

Talk about this, because it got a lot of attention.

Why did it get a lot of attention?

So look, we talked about this off-mic, and I'm not entirely sure how to approach it, because I want to give the company a chance to respond before piling on.

They're not going to respond to you, but okay.

You never know.

Actually, I think they will.

But anyways,

look, the letter speaks for itself.

I think Twitter needs to start commanding the space it occupies.

I think if you were to look at any company that has the equivalent reach or influence, it's a company trading at 20 to 40x the valuation.

I think there's no company in the world whose opportunity relative to its performance is this out-of-whack.

At the same time,

I do want to kind of move on because

I don't want us to be accused of using this platform to pimp my financial interests.

I get that.

I get that.

But you brought up some very courtinent things.

I mean, I think more to the point besides the stock, let's move away from the stock, is these issues around the CEO not being present, which we talked about last week in detail, wanting to go to Africa and different things.

And you honed in on the idea that he has two jobs, which I think has always been an issue.

and that

it's never been more important than ever, like you talked about it being the Mueller report.

There are a lot of very it's a really smart whether Scott owns the stock or it's a really smart analysis of the situation, and that whether it's doing well enough is another aspect to it.

But one of the things is whether it's running the company well, whether it's making products well, whether with the departure of a lot of executives, it's never been more in the news, and yet it's it's the the management still continues to be up and down, even though Dorsey has done some great things like getting rid of political edge, which I think removes a a pain point off his plate, which he has many.

Well, look,

the primary people have asked me what would you do that's different?

And I think that, generally speaking, activists, investors are frustrated operators that come up with a bunch of recommendations.

And then, if they get on the board, or what's happened to me when I get on boards of companies, is I generally find out that I'm not as smart as I thought and they're not as dumb as I'd hoped.

So I didn't make a lot of tactical recommendations, but I just think it's kind of a basic IQ test of corporate governance that a company that's in the midst of an election year that has potentially been weaponized to huge effect on behalf of bad actors, a company that has the kind of reach and influence and hasn't been able to monetize it.

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say it deserves a full-time CEO.

And the issue is

that the IM is like a regular tree trunk.

Many people feel that.

I think Vigigati or someone like that should probably be.

Well, not only that.

To be fair, I do think Jack Dorsey is a full-time CEO.

Unfortunately, he's a full-time CEO of Square, where he has 85% of his wealth.

But anyway, I've been trapped here.

I'm going down a rabbit hole.

We'll see what management says.

I appreciate you bringing it up.

But let's get to other news.

No, no, no.

I'm not done with this one yet.

What's interesting about this is it reminds me of Chris Saka did a letter like this many years ago, if you remember.

He was saying how I'd run Twitter, and he's a big investor in it.

You're allowed to comment on it as long as you disclose.

And what was interesting is he got a lot of kudos.

You're getting killed by the VCs.

You made a stupid Twitter error this week they piled on that.

The circling of the wagons on this is fascinating to me by a lot of Silicon Valley people in terms of they can do no wrong.

And that's a really interesting issue, I think.

Yeah, first off, I want to apologize.

A guy named Vlad,

I apologize in mind getting his name wrong, but a guy named Vlad put out a tweet early in the morning describing the Peloton ad.

And I used the exact same language, and I should have just retweeted his tweet or given him a hat tip.

And immediately, the same people whose WeWork investment I have queered or have come after Twitter began calling me a plagiarist, which is really nice for a professor.

That feels very good.

But, anyways, Vlad was very gracious and responded, pretty much saying.

But the circling of the wagons part is interesting.

That was just a trendy thing.

Oh, I was expecting it.

I expected, it's interesting.

I expected on this podcast and on Twitter that I would trigger a variety of cohorts.

And the only people I trigger are white males between the ages of 40 and 55.

When I stand, my analysis stands between them and their second billion.

That is when things get really mean and ugly.

Do you have a name for this?

What is this?

Yeah, I call them the third basers, the people who've conflated luck with talent and have decided that basically the arguments back, and you know, I go on my Twitter feed and look at, I wouldn't even call them arguments because I don't respond.

But their basic notion is,

I'm rich, so fuck you.

I must be right.

You don't know.

I call you moronic.

I find it.

I'm a moron.

No data, no response to the argument, just I'm a moron.

And it's literally, it's interesting because young people respond more thoughtfully.

They're a little bit more, they come up with data, they disagree with you.

You get the bots and the crypto guys or the Tesla guys that don't make any sense, but those are just bots.

But if it's an ad hominem attack,

it's always from a 40- to 55-year-old white male, usually in the venture capital alternative investments industry.

And their basic notion is: have you met me?

Do you know who I am?

And there's just absolutely no desire to have a substantive dialogue.

And by the way, I would benefit from a substantive dialogue because I get this shit wrong all the time.

And I try to acknowledge it.

The people suggest we have them on.

Is Keith, I've interviewed him on the podcast, and Jason Galcanis has also been.

He's trying to take your place on this podcast, I think.

But one of the things that's interesting, those are among the people that complain about you.

It's really interesting.

It's fascinating to watch them because they never do that to me.

And I'm not sure if you're not.

Oh, yeah, but there's a difference.

I'm.

Okay, so I've been very critical of We and Uber.

And the first individual you referenced is a big angel investor, and you guessed it, we and Uber.

The last individual you referenced is about to go down as Adam Newman minus the charisma of Good Looks, as he is incinerating more capital for SoftBank at Opendoor and DoorDash.

So, yeah, there is a reason why these individuals are.

Wait, who's that?

Who's that?

Jason?

Jason's not at SoftBank.

No, the teal guy.

He's not at SoftBank, is it?

He's not at SoftBank.

Yeah, but he's the founder of Opendoor, another SoftBank

incinerator, and also DoorDash, which will go down as,

again, another one that's not going to get out, that's incinerating literally billions.

So look, you know, I just find it interesting.

I find it interesting because I literally have been tough on many of their companies, and I've never seen them take ad hominem attests.

I think that's ⁇ listen, guys, y'all, Keith and Jason, besides the fact that I have to threaten you physically with my children.

Thanks for that.

Which I hope you know I will have my children take care of it if you'd like.

But you cut, you know, make some, if you're going to do this on Twitter, calling a moron is not really the way to do it.

You look like idiots, and you need to actually have some cogent arguments that he can then respond, Scott can then respond to.

And if not, I will send my children after you.

How's that?

I like it.

Thanks for that.

I feel like you're not.

But I agree with you.

Morani, it's like ridiculous.

It's ridiculous.

They need to make their arguments besides I'm rich and you're not.

They really do.

They need to have some cogent analysis.

And we dare them.

We double dare them because we're award-winning now to come.

That's right.

Sexiest podcasters.

There we go.

We did not win Sexiest Podcast Alive.

It just doesn't exist, although.

We should award it to ourselves.

Listen, the other thing, speaking of Uber, they released a report detailing and analyzing incidents of sexual assault and their ride shares, as they had promised they were going to.

The company disclosed more than 3,000 incidents of sexual assaults that happened on their ride.

That's about eight assaults a day.

Obviously, they do billions of rides.

That was their sort of talking point.

But it's the the first time that any major ride-hailing service has released this kind.

Scott, can you talk about this from a brand strategy or PR perspective?

They just got booted from London for misconduct.

Is this transparency, an attempt to get ahead of the issues, or just a smart brand and optics management?

Well, the first thing is, and

I'm really curious for your thoughts.

The first thing is it's shocking, right?

And then as a data person, you immediately go, well,

is it worse on Uber or is this just a function of someone actually doing the data around what happens with ride-hailing and taxicabs?

But I mean, at first, it really shocks you.

It's already changed my behavior.

I was starting to think that I could have Ubers take my kids to Little Lead practice, and there's just no way I'm going to do that now.

I mean, it really was, it was shocking and upsetting.

But the second that you go to the next thing,

my genuine belief here is that trying to get out ahead of the issue and be somewhat transparent and take the lead around it is a smart move.

And they did, I think, concurrently announce some of the safety safety features they're trying to build in.

So like, I think they get, it's easy, it's easy to, it's a problem.

And they're trying,

is this something specific to Uber about their culture?

I don't think it is.

I think it's something specific to the activity that's creating a dangerous atmosphere.

But to a certain extent, just having the data out there is...

is productive because I do think you're going to see action against it and hopefully a reduction in it.

But again, it's another thing as a male.

I just never would have, you're safe in the back of a car.

People don't start acting weird with you.

I mean, they might take the wrong bridge and then you go insane.

But I've never, as a, you know, a 6'2 male, I've never felt threatened.

So again,

well, welcome.

That is my column in the New York Times this week, oddly enough, about the safety, this idea around safety.

I think what's interesting is you're right.

You're right.

Human beings behave, whether you're in a hotel or a car sharing, you're going to get these kind of behaviors everywhere, like no matter what you're selling, if you have these encounters.

it happens in taxis.

It's happened, you know, taxis would be the most, it's obviously, there's been lots of assaults.

There's tons and tons of assaults in taxis.

No one's really keeping track of those particularly.

And so that's good that they're keeping track.

That's one of the things.

But I think Uber from its early days did not focus on safety in any way, that did not make sure they vetted the drivers, did not ensure, you know, that this was the safest ride, did not vet the cars.

And so this is what's coming to haunt them, I think, in that way.

And I think under Darakosa Shrahi, I think they're trying to do that.

Obviously, there's issues around payments and things like that that are still problematic for this company and economics.

But they didn't do this for the longest time.

And

they didn't do a very good job of vetting.

They didn't do a very good job of safety.

And now they're trying to backfill this problem.

And so, and the reason being,

which is what I'm going to argue in the New York Times call this week, is that these people have never felt unsafe a day in their lives, and therefore they don't understand that like you said.

We don't empathize.

Not empathize, because you would.

You're not going to want to go, yay, this.

But there's been enough incidents of them for them to understand that they need to be not perfect, but they certainly need to try harder.

And so this is a great move.

I did talk to Dara about it.

And, you know,

he's sort of every day,

it's incoming, essentially.

But this, I think, was a good thing for them to do.

I think they have to keep doing it.

And then, besides releasing this data, they've got to say what they're going to do about it.

Like very cogent things that they need to do to make this safer because it's going to be on, there's going to be some level of lack of safety, no matter how you slice it when humans come together.

But they could do a better job.

That's my point.

Well, Roger McNami, who I'm a big fan of, he had a tweet that sort of summarized the issue and the problem.

And it goes to the gestalt of big tech.

And that is big tech.

A big component of their value add is innovation, they're incredible products, regulatory arbitrage, where they just bomb into a city and believe they can overwhelm the local authorities.

There's quite frankly exploitation of people where they figure out that a lot of people who aren't working have smartphones so they can put them to work for below minimum wage standards.

But there's also the basic estalt that wraps around all of it is how do we make this process more frictionless such that can scale like

no other business in this category.

So anything that adds friction, checking a driver's background,

a probation period for the driver, right?

Installing a camera in the car, anything that adds friction, it gets a red light from moment one.

And the reality is all of these safety, all of these issues, all of this porous nature that makes the platform weaponized, subject to abuse, that

you can reach out and DM on Instagram, underage girls.

All of these things are a function of, these aren't evil people, but part of their gestalt around building shareholder value, their DNA, is to never acknowledge or greenlight anything that might result in friction of scale.

And the majority of the problems come from their inability to recognize that friction is a component of safety and of responsibility, like

mature construction of businesses.

Two thoughtful words.

Friction and gestalt.

Several.

Friction and gestalt.

There you go.

Friction gestalt.

There you go.

My wife's German.

I use those words for foreplay.

Oh, God.

I knew that would happen.

Sometimes I dress up like

Poland and she invades me.

That's all right.

No, no, no, no, no.

That is not happening.

That's a good Cold War humor.

That's not happening.

That is a good call to take a quick break.

That is your one.

You get one every episode.

That's all you get, and that is it.

See it to scratch.

Horrible Polish sex joke, and it's not going to happen.

Poor Erica Anderson.

All right.

Okay, Scott.

Time for a quick break.

I have had it with this.

Listen, I am the podcaster of the year, so just back down.

Sexiest podcaster alive.

No.

Okay, Scott.

Time for a quick break.

We'll be right back.

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Okay, we're back.

We've tamed Scott.

Kara Swisher,

Podcast of the Year,

has managed to do her excellent job.

Scott, we're going to do a listener man Lau.

You got an interesting email last week from someone who wanted to remain anonymous about their experience at WeWork.

They said that their family member worked as a salesperson at the company for about six months before quitting.

They were paid more on commission than the rent the tenant was paying for WeWork for the entire lifetime of the lease they signed.

Scott, can you talk about this from a management perspective?

Basically, this shows they were indications this model was going to fail long before their S1.

And this is what the listener said.

This is a Ponzi scheme, essentially.

So, what do you think about that?

I'm seriously, my mind's stopped.

I still can't get over the fact you beat out the daily for Podcast of the Year.

Anyways, my brain's just catching up to what's going on today.

But, anyways,

so look, you know who caused this, this listener mail thing?

Amazon.

And that is, Amazon basically reconstructed or reshaped the relationship between investors and the marketplace.

And as a result, absolutely reshaped behavior and capital allocation.

Now, how did this happen?

How are we getting to WeWork?

But go ahead.

Let me see this.

I'll get there.

It's a long, windy road, but I'm a thought leader.

I'm a thought leader.

Let me just do a Michael Berbera voice.

Go on.

Hmm.

No, go on.

So.

Anyways,

you know him.

I'd love to have some dirt on him.

He's very intriguing to me.

Anyways,

for the first time in history, a company got third most valuable company in the world and arguably the most influential company in the world with almost no or negligible profitability.

And what Amazon taught the markets to do, which drive everything as compensation typically drives everything, is they taught the markets to replace profits with vision and growth.

And so all of a sudden, companies...

Companies take a page out of that book and go, as long as we can massively grow the top line, profitability takes a distant number too.

So if we, as a means of growing our top line faster than any real estate company in history, can incentivize brokers to get any

tenant in these 10 new buildings or facilities we're opening up every week and create a top line growth that is unprecedented in the world of real estate.

If we build it, they will come, they being massive shareholder value, even if it means an economic model that makes no sense, including giving 100% of the commission to the broker responsible for growing that top line.

Aaron Trevor Burrus, all right.

So why did it go wrong here?

Like it worked for Amazon.

Amazon was people not, were people not paying attention.

What was different here in this wheat work situation?

Aaron Powell, well, everybody needs a little bit of sugar and then there's diabetes, right?

So what happened

as a species,

it was drilled into us to want salty, fatty, bloody food.

But once it became produced institutionally, our instincts didn't catch up and now we have tremendous obesity in this country.

And what's happened here is that investors are starting to catch up with the fact that we are overindulging, or companies are overindulging in this notion of replacing profits with growth.

And Amazon always had positive gross margins.

I mean, in the year Amazon went public, I think it lost $30 million.

It wasn't losing $100 million away.

It was a big deal.

It was called Amazon.bomb.

I don't know if you remember those headlines and stuff like that.

I think a lot of people were talking about it.

People were onto it then.

It's just that Wall Street gave them a pass, and Jeff Bezos just didn't communicate with Wall Street that much.

The Google guys were the same way.

Aaron Powell, Jr.: So,

this this is an idea that worked on steroids and the marketplace has figured out

this isn't just wanting a little bit of sugar, a little bit of red meat, a little bit of fatty food.

This is out of control.

This has come to the point where, and it's a new class of company.

It's a company where

for a short time, a dumb investor or cheap capital fuels valuation as a function of top-line growth.

And they have access to that cheap capital, and they're what I would deem incinerators.

And there's no prospect of profitability.

Amazon always had a fairly bright line path or a fairly obvious path to profitability.

The only other company that's been able to get away with this to the same extent and has managed to replace top-line growth with quote-unquote subscribers is Netflix.

Netflix, you're right.

For everybody else, it's like at one point, at some point, the music stops.

But let me, before we move on to Windsor Hills, what is the differentiation?

Why does Amazon and Netflix get a pass and WeWork and others do not?

Because Amazon, there was a path, I mean, for a lot of reasons.

WeWork was no Amazon.

Amazon got to a point where it was pretty clear if they stopped massively investing in everything from

investment in smart speakers, fulfillment.

I mean, they were making true investments that were going to result in flywheels.

They had Amazon Web Services, which I would argue is the most valuable company in the world right now, which is stuck in another company.

Whereas WeWork, let's look at it, was building no moats.

It was just massively buying top line.

It was

guilty of incredibly poor governance.

Its flywheel effect spun out things like WeWork, We Live, a school.

None of these things made absolutely any sense.

And it was genuinely investing just to create the illusion and burning capital.

Whereas Amazon was investing in moats that would ultimately return shareholder value.

There's just an enormous difference.

I talk about moats a lot.

You have to build moats.

Well, moats flywhat.

Amazon is the moatiest moat.

It's convenience, whether it's price, whether it's logistics.

They have so many.

And they got into operating margin.

They immediately, not immediately, but I think 10 years into their life, they went profitable for a quarter.

I just think as a means to show the market, the moment we want to be profitable, folks, we can get there.

Aaron Trevor Breval,

just to finish this up, back in the day, AOL was always saying, if we just stopped marketing, we'd make money.

If you remember, that was their middle line.

And of course, it's like you can't, the revenue growth, the top line isn't going to grow without your crazy discs everywhere and stuff like that.

Cereal boxes, Jan Brandt, remember her?

Yep.

I know Jan.

Jan Brandt had a whole table made out of discs.

Yeah.

Yeah,

I've actually adopted a lot of her phraseology.

She had a great line that I thought was hilarious.

She used to get on stage at AOL conferences when I started Red Envelope.

You had to go to AOL and basically kiss their ring to try and be the only place that was doing a commerce called AOL Marketplace, run by a guy named Greg Shauvin, ended up becoming a close friend, talking about how the world has changed.

And she used to get on stage and say, to resist is futile.

We're going to to put a disc everywhere.

And it's just, you're going to be impossible.

Jambrant's a great deck is an unsunk character in the history of the internet.

She's quite a bit in my book, but she's great.

She's a great person.

That's right.

You wrote a book on AOL.

Yes, I did.

I know, Jambrant.

But I remember the table.

It weighs like 400 tons.

I think she's tired of hauling it around, but it was made of discs.

Anyway, wins and fails, Scott.

That is a really cogent.

By the way, that was another thoughtful thought leadership position.

Oh, God.

You just feel sorry for me because all your buddies are being mean to me.

I don't feel like you just feel sorry.

Are you kidding?

Yeah.

They're not my buddies.

If you can't stand the heat, get out of here.

They're not mean to you.

They're mean to you and not mean to me.

It's largely because I'm

a finale of Silicon Valley, which you did not note also.

More powerful than me.

Me and Dick Costello were there.

He hasn't attacked you.

That's interesting.

And he was the CEO of Uber of Twitter, excuse me.

So Dick, he's a nice guy, the comedian guy?

The former comedian.

Yeah, I met him in Europe.

I seem like a lovely guy.

He's lovely.

He's quite lovely.

Anyway, so wins and fails.

So I'm going to do my wins first this week besides myself.

And

as a side note,

is two, I can't decide between the Wonder Woman videos and posters, the new trailer.

I love Wonder Woman.

I cannot stand it.

I met through you.

I like that.

I love this Wonder Woman.

And secondly, Ryan Reynolds Aviation Gin ad.

Oh, that was mine.

Go on.

I'll give you this one.

That was great.

You take that one as your win.

I'll take Wonder Woman.

Wonder Woman is such a great brand they've done such an amazing thing at it it looks like a sexy as heck movie the the the visuals i love the director patty jenkins she is a huge talent literally what a talent you can see like just from the trailer all i want to do is go see this movie it's crazy in the theater actually so that is my win this week

you may go on with aviation gin everyone talks about agility in the context of a bunch of programmers putting out a product quickly or copying a snapchat feature into Facebook.

That's what agility has come to mean.

But agility and creativity, creativity still matters.

And Ryan Reynolds, who I think is this, I think he's just this incredible talent.

I don't know how much he was involved in the production of this, but they saw an opportunity with the Peloton ad, which kind of documents the heartwarming journey of 116-pound model to 114 pounds over 12 months.

And by the way, I stole that from Twitter and I don't know who you are.

I apologize.

If you reach out to me, I will credit you or hat tip you.

Anyways, it's...

Twitter thief.

But you know what's really interesting?

AJ, oh, God, I wish I, there was a fascinating, I'm going off script here on the Peloton ad.

There was a fascinating

analysis breakdown by, and I'll retweet, I think it's a her, this copywriter saying, why do we hate this ad so much?

And there was a real genius,

I think his name is A.J.

Smolin.

There was a real genius insight.

And that was, it was filmed as if you were the husband giving her that bike.

And they put you immediately in this feeling of like, okay, I'm a fucking idiot, thoughtless husband.

And it made you squirm because it immediately said,

it wasn't done in the third person.

I guess that's the second person.

And you were the husband, which immediately made you feel very uncomfortable.

And I thought, that is just, that was such a genius insight because you see the commercial, don't you immediately go, this feels kind of awkward.

That's what I wouldn't give my wife a Peloton for Christmas.

And they're saying, I am giving, they put you in those shoes.

Anyways, I thought

Aviation Gin's agility, they immediately found her name is Monica Ruiz.

By the way, this is the best thing that's ever happened to her.

She did a good job in that ad, too.

Oh, she was fantastic.

And her friends were,

it was so pitch perfect.

And she did a great job.

We have a mutual win.

I hope it keeps going.

Like one of those old Kodak ads with Marriott Hart.

Are you and I, you and I, I want to hear on Twitter, how many people think, think podcaster of the year, podcaster Podcaster of the Century, and Sexiest Podcaster alive, Thought Leader of the Year, big fucking deal.

Anyways, how many think we should do a Peloton ad?

We should.

You and I should absolutely do a Peloton ad.

Peloton, you have been our sponsor.

We will do a Peloton.

I have a Peloton.

We should do a Peloton.

That would be so good.

I like Peloton too.

I think it's a, you know, it's one of the few consumer tech companies whose stock is actually up from the IP.

I don't care what Wall Street says.

I got to tell you, the product is amazing.

I just drive their treadmill.

No, it's amazing.

I use their app.

I use it for meditation.

I do it for all kinds of things when I'm thinking big thoughts that I need to do because I'm a thought leader.

I use it for exercise.

They have all these exercises.

It's a combination of a Calm app, the seven-minute app.

It's great.

They do a great job.

Apple-like margins, recurring revenue, an app distinct to the hardware.

What'll be really interesting?

What will be really interesting is as they come up on the first year as a public company that disclosed their churn in renewal and dollar renewal rates, this will be really, really interesting.

I think that I would buy it again.

I think Apple should buy it.

That's my feeling.

All right.

Fails.

Fails.

I don't think this is a fail, but I know you will.

This will be mine.

Elon Musk won the defamation case, which I think is a good thing.

I think that's a fail.

No, I don't think it's a fail.

I think it's a win for Elon.

I would agree.

I thought this is just ridiculous to pull this Twitter ScreamFest.

You did not.

You were quite like, how dare he do this?

But I was like, come on.

I want to be clear.

I think you can do things that are wrong.

I think it was wrong for him to call a cave diver who I would argue is a hero a pedophile.

I thought it was wrong, but I don't think there's a legal remedy.

I think you can say mean things and do mean things, and it doesn't necessarily mean you should be in court.

So I don't, I actually think the court got this right.

I don't think it fell under the true legal definition of defamation.

And I think occasionally

people can do mean things to you, and that doesn't necessarily mean that there's a legal remedy.

So I think the court's got it right.

I also, to his credit, on the stand, he said, I apologize.

I just should have said well done and moved on.

So I think there was an actual moment of self- I don't know, self-awareness.

But think about this, distinctive the morality or whether you think it was right.

Should the CEO of a company that's trying to put a man on Mars or trying to electrify the automobile industry, should he be spending time in court defending tweets?

No, that was true.

That was true.

It's just an error in judgment.

And the thing is, no one on his board, I think, has been able to get through to him and go, okay, do you want to think about picking your battles a little bit more here?

Anyway,

I think the court got it right.

And I do think he, I think he handled himself or acquitted himself well on

the stand.

Speaking of of which, he's been driving his cyber truck around L.A.

right now, and he ran over.

Think of that thing.

I'm totally

flummoxed by that thing.

Have you seen it?

Is that a word?

Is that a thought leader word?

Befuddled.

No, he's riding around.

I'm going to try to get a ride with him when I'm in L.A.

I'm going to get him to drive me around.

That's what I'm doing.

Oh, my God.

He hit his pylon, apparently.

He's off to his next thing.

But have you seen it?

I literally, if someone gave you a million chances to sketch what the pickup truck from Tesla would look like, it looks like something, it looks like that Simpsons episode where Homer gets to design a car.

And I just I look at the thing, I'm like, that's a pickup.

It's either genius or it's going to be the biggest fail.

I can't figure it out.

What is your fail?

What is your fail?

Well, my fail is more of a rant.

All right, about a way.

It is a fail.

It wasn't a good story.

This is a story about The Verge published a story about the history of bullying from the CEOs of a way, largely one of the CEOs.

And then the company sent out an email telling employees not to talk about it or share the story.

It's, you know, it's a tough environment.

And

this was a piece about how tough the environment is.

And

it just wasn't a very attractive photo

of a company.

It was not a good picture of the company, and it seemed rather accurate for all.

They seemed to be insane on Slack.

So what do you think?

You do not think this is a fail in this story.

I think there's a word for that kind of stressful, unfair, high-pressure.

full-body contact company that is that you're not going to find justice in and it's called startup and I think that we like to think there's this Hallmark channel version of startups and that we can build amazing value and billions of dollars by giving everybody paternity leave and having snacks and saying to everybody, oh no,

you're not feeling well, go home.

I have never been involved in a company that's been able to get out of infancy and create real value without management being

all over everyone all the fucking time and creating an atmosphere of what I'll call productive chaos.

And then, and then some people, and then some people,

and then some people obviously emerge and become managers themselves.

But I startups, if you're looking for quality of life or balance and it's not aspirational, do not go to a startup.

And I meet it, quite frankly, I read it and thought, oh, I would invest in that company.

Interesting.

It's not aspirational, but folks, and maybe other people have.

I have never worked in a company that's created billions of dollars in value from zero without, quite frankly, the sausage getting made.

It is is a

tense environment.

Go ahead.

We had them on the stage at Code Commerce,

as you know.

And, you know, they have, they sort of have this happy, shiny look.

Yep.

Anyway,

they sort of try to do this, hey, we have all these values.

They do put, it's sort of like Google pushing this don't be evil line and then really presiding over really egregious sexual harassment, egregious treatment of women, you know, and then not doing anything about it.

And so, or whatever they do, whatever they do.

I mean, I just, you know, one of the things about the, I'll go to the Google story in the fail, is that this investigation continues at Google over what happened around a number of executives there and how they handled a number of executives badly, it looks like.

And I think there's no, like, they sort of get out of it because, you know, they get to leave with this sort of kudos, the founders are leaving and this and that, but there's more there.

Like, you know what I mean?

The timing is not

coincidental, for example.

And so what I do think, I agree with you that

there's a startups ain't pretty, like starters ain't pretty kind of thing.

But it is irritating to sort of push this idea of your specialness and how much you care about your employees when just say like this is going to be hard.

It's inconsistent.

Jeff Bezos never pretended it was a rose garden over there.

Neither did Microsoft really.

So

I just don't like when they do this like happy, shiny people thing, the way Google has done.

And it's not so happy.

It's not so shiny.

And that's my irritation.

And that's where the fail is.

I agree with you, though, on the thing.

That said, you can push employees way too hard and be like insanely non-professional.

I agree.

And also, there is something to be said just in terms of competitive advantage.

If you can provide people who have different needs and aren't maybe young and

can't focus 110% of their time at work, if you can create an environment where you do give certain people more flexibility, and quite frankly, they probably aren't going to make as much.

But I think if you do offer those opportunities, you end up with a better company.

But I mean, I just look back on every startup, and maybe I'm a bad manager.

I look back on every startup I've been on that worked, and oh my gosh,

it was full body contact.

It was ugly.

Balance wasn't a word we ever used.

Yep.

Yep.

I used to work late at night at the Washington Post and places like that.

I don't recall it being like,

there is an interesting mentality of people now being able to speak out on Slack or wherever they can talk out or Twitter or wherever, where they like the complaints are.

hate to like differentiate, there are legitimate complaints, and there are other ones, especially around sexual harassment and behavioral issues and abuse.

And then there's, oh, just suck it up.

You know what I mean?

Like, that kind of thing.

It takes this long to do this.

And so it's a really, it's, in this environment, I think it's, you cannot be hypocritical saying one thing on one hand and behaving a different way.

You just say, you know what?

Just like you're saying, start, it ain't pretty.

The sausage, it ain't pretty.

And so I don't think it was a very good look for them,

especially because it's these two women running it and everything else.

It wasn't a good look.

And they're under enormous pressure because everyone is trying to copy

their business.

Well,

they have to support a tech valuation on a luggage company.

I think the most recent valuation is $1.4 billion, which is greater than what Toomey was.

I mean,

this is a company that's got to, again, pull off this kind of yoga babble illusion that it's a tech company, not a company that shapes plastic

into a thing you put your toiletries in.

So

they found an area of the market that wasn't taken advantage of.

Yeah, it's a great product.

And by the way,

if you're ever in an airport with a bunch of cool-looking aspirational people, half those suitcases are away.

It's just whether or not I, I want to be clear, I love the company.

I just don't love the valuation.

I just think the valuation's gotten a huge difference.

Well, let me give full disclosure.

Away is advertising with us this week, spending some of that money.

But it's really,

it's an interesting,

they have found an issue in the marketplate at the same same time that this is the kind of thing they're going to have to accept.

And at the same time, employees are going to be, it's a really,

it's sort of, it's typical of so many Silicon Valley companies

in terms of how they behave.

And it's a really, it's a, it's a fascinating time.

Anyway, Scott, predictions?

What's your question?

I don't have one this week, Carol.

I'm going to predict that you're going to be impossible now with all these wins.

I can't believe I'm still, I still can't believe you beat the Daily and Joe Rogan.

I did.

And I didn't use weed, and I don't have that smooth jazz voice as I said in my tweet.

Oh my God.

Congratulations.

I mean this sincerely.

Congratulations.

That's a nice moment for you.

Thank you.

I'm going to go in the Pulitzer now.

I'm already focused on the Pulitzer, my friend.

I shouldn't even say that because you're not supposed to now won't get one because

they're very much snottier than I supposed to be.

Super impressed.

Something, anything, think about it.

We're in the only ad-supported medium that's growing.

You're literally the person of the year in a medium.

In a medium.

Right.

And you're done.

Ring the bell.

Peace out.

Drop the mic.

I have, speaking of which, I have a great interview today with Neil Catiol, who is the Supreme Court litigator, solicitor, and that's, and he used to be a solicitor general, I think,

about the impeachment, and he also does a lot of tech law.

So it was really, I just want to say I'm going to continue to do, someone was oddly enough saying, Kara, get in your lane.

Like, stay away from politics.

What is your lane?

That's what I want to know.

Oh, my God.

I was so furious.

Your lane is a fucking 405.

Your lane is a a San Andreas fault.

Define your lane.

I hate when men say that.

It's only men that say that to me, by the way.

Stay in your lane.

I was like, you know what?

Tech affects everything.

Uno.

Dose, I'm going to interview anyone the fucking thing.

Here comes the Spanish.

Here comes the Spanish.

Here comes Mayamo Cara.

Oh.

Speaking of which, it was the first time.

Go to the Bibliotheca, Cara, and collect your awards.

We're going to close soon.

But listen, I went to see Knives Out, and the funniest part was that discussion of immigration that Don Johnson had with the actress.

I don't know her name.

I forget her name.

Mariana Delmar.

Alma Del Mar.

Are you from Paraguay?

Are you from Ecuador?

Like, it was like, Knives Out was brilliant.

Cute movie.

Really nice movie.

Yeah.

I can't believe you gave me a movie recommendation that I took up on.

Do you liked?

It's a cute movie, isn't it?

Yeah.

I watched Deadpool 2 with my son.

It was just me and my son this weekend.

It was really nice.

Oh, Deadpool 2 is great.

Brian Reynolds is a great movie issue.

But I'm saying that was a great movie.

I'm thrilled that it's doing so well.

I'm thrilled that it's doing so well because it's a smart movie.

It was a complex movie.

It was a movie like it used to be.

Good for the whole family.

97% on Rotten Tomatoes.

It's really good.

We recommend it very much.

And it's also super funny.

It's super, the whole thing is a wonderful movie.

It's hard to follow, which in a good way,

it's good.

It's interesting to follow.

Anyway, I really appreciate it.

But that one, the whole scene around her,

the woman who's the nurse, it's just

with Don Johnson was very funny about immigration.

Anyway, it was very funny.

Scott, it's time for us to go.

We're going to be back on Friday for a week's wrap-up.

We still have more to talk about and more kudos.

I say for me mostly, but you too.

I was literally in that moment.

I literally was registering an emotion.

I'm like, well, I actually think I care about care because I'm actually proud of you.

And then you just spoiled it.

I love that.

I'm trying to do it.

Kudos to me.

That's it.

Yes, kudos to you.

We have

the thought leaders.

We're going to be

Rebecca Sonata.

We're going to have to

shirts.

We're going going to have thought leader t-shirts.

TL, we're the TL.

We are thought leadership leaders.

God, I just, thought leadership.

Everyone loves me for my brain.

It fucking sucks.

All right.

Sexiest podcaster.

I will give you that award.

I will give you that award.

But it's a lot.

My brain can't wear high heels and date Brad Pitt.

What is going on here?

What is going on here?

Podcaster of the year, Kara Swisher, 2019.

Yes, that is my favorite.

All right, we got to go.

All right.

It's time for us to go.

We'll be back Friday for a week wrap up.

In the meantime, we loved your feedback.

Tell us what you think by tweeting to us at hashtag pivot podcast or email us questions at pivot at voxmedia.com.

Today's show was produced by Rebecca Sinanis.

Eric Anderson is Pivot's executive producer and thought leader.

Rebecca, by the way, is best producer of the year.

Thanks also to Rebecca Castro and Drew Burroughs.

Make sure you subscribe to the show on Apple Podcasts.

And if you're an Android user, check us out on Spotify or frankly, wherever you listen to podcasts.

If you liked our show, please recommend it to a friend.

Thanks for listening to Pivot from Vox Media.

We'll be back next week with another breakdown of all things tech and business and a lot of leading thoughts.

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