Welcome, silicon Sally. All right, we're here with dead
cat. This is Eric newcomer, Tom and
Katie are here, and we have fellow sub, stacker Casey Newton
of platformer. We're gonna sort of just fun
episode talk about a couple different things.
Interesting piece in the new At times about sub stack failing to
raise funding, which Casey is written about snaps stock is
down, 45%, in the last month, another interesting happening in
the sort of social world. And then I feels like we haven't
talked about Elon Musk on this podcast.
Another nice, you know, we thought about other things, even
though that is the dominant story and rating, some dips,
their PCS also got right. You got to do Ilan again.
Casey welcome, thanks. Thanks for coming, on to the
show. Thanks for having me gang.
How are all things that? How are things in platformer
World these days since we're going right into sub stack?
What's, what's the latest from the platformer?
Which I don't read, by the way. Thank you.
But my understanding is that it's like some sort of French
language newsletter. That covers like Algerian
startups doesn't basically it you guys broke the big news
about flanking cajuste. Okay yeah if you want all the
latest on sort of The Tick-Tock behind the Flint.
Could you deal go to platformer dot news and subscribe things
are going really well. Platformer like I truly do wish
I could go back and talk to the version of myself that was
thinking about leaving my job and starting a sub stack and
just explaining like here's everything that's going to
happen after you do this and it would have made the decision, a
lot easier. So very happy to be doing this
independent thing. Well, I can't remember talking
to that version of you is I called I forget if I You know,
we got no phone Casey out because you had your newsletter
The Verge and I, you know, I was a Bloomberg and so I got on the
phone with Casey and honestly I had no idea.
He was about to start platformer though, it made sense.
And I was like, oh yeah, I think I'm gonna quit my job in like,
start a sub stack. Like, do you think that's crazy
in case? He's like Icy Hot.
I'm sure. I feel like they're pretty
different both, right? About tech broadly, but I'm very
money-oriented, you're very platform oriented we have sort
of are different enough spins that we don't feel like
competition. But we also have names worth,
ER, yes. Casey, do you feel competitive
with Eric? Like tell us that she's dumb.
Yeah. And so the whole reason I came
on this podcast is, I want people to hear my voice.
Products. This is doing the upright, need
to run the disinviting competition on.
We need your in the sort of New York Times style daily.
Add, you know, the daily is free.
But what really pays for this is if you subscribe, so subscribe
to newcomer and then if you're already a subscriber newcomer
you can subscribe to platformer. Yeah.
So Katie and I are collecting nothing from this.
I thought that out there now it is I mean, just like be a little
bit serious about this. Yeah, I grew up reading the LA
Times had a lot of really great columnist there and I just
basically lucked out that I lived in an area that the LA
Times Like delivery trucks reached.
And as a result I got access to these great columnist.
They're all these people. Now the you know, particularly
now that the newspaper industry is going through such a hard
time, the don't have access to those people but we have the
internet and so you can just find the columnist that is right
for you and you pay them what I think is a pretty reasonable Low
monthly rate and you keep a columnist that you love and
business. So like I just love that that
model of the world that we're living in, and then the people
who are really good at it, are like able to live lives beyond
their wildest dreams now, does it sad and you though that this
might be gutting? Your beloved LA Times it?
Yes. I know I'm very sad about, you
know, what's happening to newspapers.
I also as somebody who worked in newspapers for the first 10
years of my career was Frustrated by how slowly they
were evolving, right? Even though the writing was on
the wall, you know, some Publications.
Like the New York Times in particular, I would say, Adam
incredible job of remaking themselves and, you know, more
recently Publications like the Washington Post, I think have
really kind of risen to the challenge.
So I think you can do it but it's a lot easier for the big
national International Publications to do it than the
local pubs about. And is it really zero-sum?
Like Katie? I feel like that's sort of the
media old newspaper sort of framed you You see this?
Like do you think really like a dollar going to a sub?
Sack writer is a dollar loss to to a newspaper.
Something that's how I would formulated.
I was just saying that the idea of people getting news from
places other than traditional media, right?
And at large siphons away, well on the local newspaper, look at
everything that the thing that sustained them for the longest
time was the sports section, right?
Like that was, you know, people had a relationship to the beat
writer for the teams that they followed and the columnist
there. And then there was that awful
period. For the athletic, when they were
on their way up and the CEO. Alex Mather said, fairy
inelegantly to the New York Times, you know, our goal is to
bleed all of the local sports, you know like all the local
papers from their Sports sections, right.
At least he's like believes will go like they're trying the New
York Times about the athletic. Yeah.
How did nobody like make that connection when that whole deal
was going down? It was hysterical.
I mean and I like Alex a lot but like it was like this bull
moment of like, well I guess you didn't believe the right
personality to frame the news. Which is really a, not news
story, The New York Times, Ben Mullen reported that, you know,
subset had been out trying to defend Muslims and already
making waves of the times they're media reporter.
Yeah. And the you know they've been
trying to get valued at 750 million to a billion and the
round and come together that they had Revenue about 9 million
in 2021. And you know, I think important
contacts for this is increase in Horowitz as Invest in both sub s
clubhouse, right? And Clubhouse which has like no
Revenue, raised it, a four billion dollar valuation was
extremely Buzzy and sub stack is sort of been sort of I don't
know. Ugly stepchild I'm sure they'd
hate that but you know just isn't as glamorous hasn't got
the attention but I mean subjects producing revenue and
has seems to have more staying power than Clubhouse.
Anyway so Casey is written about this.
He is relieved. Maybe that Sack didn't didn't
get the money. So Casey what sort of your
argument there? Yeah.
I mean you know, we've all read the stories about startups that
raise too much money and investors hopes got too high and
then the investors started to metal and gave them a bunch of
horrible ideas for what they should do next.
And that almost always comes at the expense of the the user
base, right? And you know earlier this year
sub stack released an app by default that app turned off
email notifications. So like if you downloaded the
sub stack app, you would know Her got platformer in your
inbox. The whole reason I wanted to do
this line of work, was I had this direct connection with my
audience. You could already see that
potentially going away after, you know, I and others wrote
about this sub stack. Wound up walking that back, they
just a match. Stripe people who got the out
from email, which was insane. Like, I agree, but they reverse
course, but you can imagine. You can imagine a world where
they were suddenly, you know, they had an extra hundred
million dollars of venture capital and two years go by and
their investors are getting really nervous and they say, you
know what, actually I think it's time for us to take 20% of your
revenues or like whatever. It's so I think that like,
they're still in this and all of a sudden then platformer is
writing on another platform, you know, instead of an email that
that's the risk, right? You know, I'm actually think
that over the years subjects had percent cut has come to look
more and more reasonable compared to what other people
take wishing is maybe something we could talk about.
But, you know, basically, I'm relieved that they Raise this
money because I think they have sought some basic structural
questions to ask themselves about what they're doing to get
the combat kind of core model working, and I don't think you
need another hundred million dollars to do it, right.
Like, they need to figure out how to live within their means
and, and really figure out how to grow that base of users and
get themselves to like sustainability.
I strenuously disagree with, you know, I mean, it feels like for
once the media business had a chance to have blitzscaling at
its back and then we don't even Even, we don't get the money.
I mean, I mean, what how, what would they do to blitzscale?
They would just go out and pay like 5,000 more people.
A hundred thousand dollars to see if they would turn into,
right? Well, let me see, did she was in
the? I didn't read the full story but
what was the as is my signature on this show?
But what was the plan with the money?
I mean, what did they sort of see as the value?
And I don't know that that was reported.
I do I think a key point is that sub stack has said that they're
toning down their sub stack Pro program.
Their VP of comms was on a Twitter spaces with me.
And she, she said that, and I think that's interesting because
I was really, I mean, I didn't I didn't get money from them, they
offered me like a weird small loan.
That was definitely not like a sign of strong, belief and
newcomer. But, you know, I think it's sort
of incentivizes, you know, sub Stacks that don't have sort of
business front center to start and then potentially not
succeed. But but to answer the question
of how I'd like money to be spent to, To build ways for them
to drive audience, which is the thing that they haven't haven't
done really. Yeah.
So you know you can work out a couple interesting numbers based
on what we know about sub stack so they just passed a million
paid subscribers in November, I believe.
And we now know, according to Ben and Ben's reporting that
they had about nine million dollars in Revenue.
So 9 million in Revenue, I mean just back-of-the-envelope that
assuming 5 million of that is coming from Barry Weiss.
Maybe two million is coming from, like the bundle of
newcomer platformer Glenn Greenwald a Matt Taibbi.
The rest is probably Alex Berenson is that mostly the
revenue breakdown. They have they have more
Publications make making more money than I that I think people
like Ken and your own evening Barry White's.
Barry Weiss is number 6. I just don't want to unfairly
compliment her because letters from an American Kevin and
Heather Cox Richardson is one on politics.
The dispatches to Matt Taibbi, these three the bulwarks for
Glenn greenwald's five and she's six.
Anyway, just fact check there. But if you look at the numbers,
what that means is that most people who subscribe to a public
subset publication or only subscribing to 1, right?
Because most of these things are somewhere in the like 70 to 100
bucks a year range. But you know, it's subsets whole
eating. One of their big promises is you
come be a part of this network and we're going to make it so
easy for you to get customers because they will likely already
be a customer of another sub stack.
From there, it's just a couple of TAPS and all of a sudden, you
know, we charge their credit card for yours as well, you
know, and they even will show you like a graph of where your
people come from and, you know, to hear sub-sect elat.
There's suddenly a lot of like, existing subset customers but
wait a minute, by the way, maybe they are, you know, like, I'm
not saying that I doubt them, but it doesn't seem like most
people are having that experience and they do think
it's like a long-term risk to them.
Hmm. What I mean, we've sort of seen
this particular game play out so many times in the media of
building up a subscriber base. And everyone's looking for the
next wave Going to help you grow the business.
And the obvious one is just bundling, right?
It's all the same Playbook and I'm assuming you're talking
about growing audience growing subscriber base, that's clearly
going to be on the table. They're going to try to bundle
you guys with with other people of similar topics or maybe even
have like a diverse bundle. So you skeptical, I don't think
it's a great idea to be honest. I think it's a way to juice
numbers without juicing Revenue. A key.
A key feature that they've rolled out is recommendations
where instead of Sort of viral algorithm writers can recommend
other writers and that's been driving a bunch of subscribers
to people including myself as a great, great organic feature
where Riders can decide what they want to do.
That's like sort of more like on the right hand side of the page.
I have the blog's I think too long which was kind of like the
pre it's sort of like it's Preparing People psychologically
for bundling Well, yeah, because think about how this has played
out with cable right there was cable.
Everybody hated it. Like, why do I have to have all
this garbage just to get you some pain?
And then there was like Netflix and Paramount plus and Amazon
video and then people woke up one day and they're like, I'm
paying, wow, hundreds of dollars a month for all these individual
stripping networks, and that has to come to an end at some point.
And so how that comes to an end, and how it shakes out is still
being worked out. And I think that for direct to
consumer News. It's sort of a similar idea.
So if I'm paying $150 for newcomer and Casey whatever case
he's charging me $100, it's an insane bargain I probably giving
anything away, it's 33 percent off the newcomer price and so I
haven't I'm helping people so you got money like I am
publishing decks from billion dollars that's $250, just
between the two of you, it's $250 that's my retirement
account and every company case he writes about And say that I
also want to pay Heather Cox Richardson and I also want to
pay you know, Matt Taibbi suddenly I'm like why am I
paying a thousand dollars a year for news but like Casey said,
most I not could I not just pay less money and subscribe to the
Wall Street Journal? I mean, so that's sort of where
you cut what you come to which is why bundling feels like the
natural certainly comes from the New York Times Reporter.
It's where it's gonna, I mean, it's coming guys.
There's there's zero chance to my mind that that sub-sector.
I think what you're under it under estimating, is the idea
that like Niche audiences, like, how would I can make more money
off that like I have a sustainable business now, making
more than I make it Bloomberg, I feel like sure.
You guys are my friend media people.
Subscribe to a lot of newsletters because you need to
be stay up on media, but I think you guys are the sort of outlier
cases and subscription Behavior. Most of the people subscribing
to newcomer, you know. Yeah.
I published some exclusive financial information that they
want to read and they sign up to see that.
Like they're very they're there in sort of the VC world, you
know they're interested in. So I just I don't think they're
like subscribing a newcomer because they're like these
general consumers who want want some very sophisticated VC sake
that I think that you that it's probably a good idea and you and
Casey obviously know this better than I do to think about the
financial fortunes of the folks were writing for sub stack
versus the financial fortunes of sub stack as a company.
Sure. So it's true that you two might
be Quite well, but how a sub stack doing overall?
And I think that that's where the decision-making around
something like, bundling comes into play less.
So than how you work, a Seer personally doing, and the
bundling aspect might not be for you, but if there are say, you
could guess hundreds of people on sub stack writing about their
Grandma's favorite recipes, wouldn't it make sense to put
all those grandmas together with all their delicious recipes?
Yes. So, I actually made the example
that we were talking about this. In my Discord server this
morning and food writers was the example that I use.
So what I like to see subset consider is to offer,
essentially optional bundling tools, so that if you are a
recipe writer, a food, writer with a relatively small
following you want to go in with 9 or 10 or 12 other people that
are doing the same thing, help each other grow.
You might actually, sort of come out ahead and all of that.
And at the very least, I like if I were sub-sect, that's where I
would start because, right, because if they come out,
Tomorrow, and they say, we're introducing a Netflix model, and
it's like all you can eat for ten bucks a month.
You know, people like me and Eric Garner going to run
screaming from that would destroy our business.
Yeah, right. And remember Apple tried that
with their news? Bundle with Apple news and they
couldn't get almost any Publications to sign on board
with that. I think just the LA Times And
The Wall Street Journal, but it was a fiasco.
They couldn't get the other big-name pubs that they would
have wanted. But the interesting thing about,
you know, this bundle of Niche products is that in television,
it doesn't work. I mean like the bundle Model
only works because ESPN is the most popular cable channel in
the country, and it charges significantly more than any
other network to the cable Distributors, and they kind of
keep the whole business of float, right?
It's like you want ESPN and we're going to bundle everything
else in there and it's part of the kind of hard-ass
negotiations that the media companies have.
And, you know, with the like different skinny bundles which
was a whole failed model there were attempts to make you known
on ESPN bundles. There is this company still out
there called Philo It was, you know, they would pejoratively
refer to it as the loser bundle because it just had a MC.
And, you know, HGTV and all the discovery.
Other networks viewers were losers or the comp.
Well, I'm not, I'm not casting judgment myself as to who was
the real issue for him but but, yeah.
And so, I mean, it's one of those rare things where
everybody knows is, that's yeah, that happens.
So often in media. But but yeah, I mean, I think
the trouble with the idea, I love the idea of what you're
proposing, Casey and it obviously.
You see is like, you know, helping to Rising tide lifting
the weaker boats. I don't know.
And kind of like a much more organic way to do customer
acquisition. Yeah, but it's just there's no
history of it working and that's enough.
I will say though, slightly related, if somebody offered me
a channel and don't care how it came to me, streaming whatnot,
that was only like murder shows. I'd be very excited.
True Crime shows, if I could get NCIS Law and Order like CSI,
Etc. All in one Panel how much, how
much money do I have? I think all those shows are on
CBS the ultimate, but what about like that shudder?
Like, I mean, shutter is a streaming service?
That's just horror movies, right?
It's probably not like a massive success but I don't know it's a
business. Yeah, it's okay.
It's part of AMC, but but I say, I guess, the reason I bring it
up to you guys is that like it would be a little bit strange to
bundle newcomer with Grandma cooking blogs or or you know
platformer with Auto blogs or something, but they kind of need
those anchor Publications in there to kind of prove larger
value and I think that's where the negotiation happens maybe
eventually they will go to like the very biggest sub stacks and
just offer them a great deal and say, you know, you're making a
million will pay you a million and a half.
If you're part of this bundle, you know, because we know you
probably wouldn't make that as part of the bundle just by the
basic math. But, you know, we want to
incentivize more people subscribing, like, I could see
them doing that. But, you know, We've been
talking about this from the subset perspective, which is
good and fine, but you think about it from The Writer's
perspective. It's like they also just have a
bunch of writers on their platform now who could leave and
just do this sustainably forever and it's not clear that you
actually need a sub stack to keep the business going right?
Like you know journalists are so cynical and pessimistic about
every business model that I think they a memory of under a
now. I see it that I'm gonna just Tom
just uh they underestimate what a great.
Job, this can be right. You think about how big the
internet is? If you can find two thousand
people to pay you a hundred bucks a year, you're making more
money than almost any Media Company would pay you for any
reason. There's a lot of groups of two
thousand people on the internet. So, like to me the really
exciting thing here is, you know, I hope substract is, it
has a long successful run, you know, I have no plans to leave
it. It would be inconvenient to do
so. But like, also, I'm not
terrified about them going out of business because to me the
model works, like I found my few thousand people and I can just
do As long as I want to and we have a direct relationship with
stripe. I mean, part of the reason sub
stack has been able to recruit. Everyone has been the fact that
you can leave II. Don't think they would do a
bundle that would infuriate writers.
I think they would have to do it in a sort of additive way and I
want to talk about other things, but I do think the long tail
issue is going to be a problem for sub stack.
If I had to make my business case against them, I think you
know in anything you know, influencer economy, sort of
celebrities win and That's the top sort of get sort of really,
really rich and everybody else is sort of screwed.
I mean I feel like I'm sort of I mean we're you can analyze like
the sub stack lists and sort of see and I do think there's a
sharp drop off you know from 1 2 3 4 5 and then by 10 it's
probably much lower and so if they can't get the long tail to
make good money then they'll have less fewer sort of new sub
sex coming in. The shot at being sort of the
celebrity writer or I don't know, Casey, what's your view on
that small. So let's talk about the long
tail. The number one sub stack.
Publication is a guy that writes about how to manage your career
as an engineer. Basically, if you pitch is that
Homer one overall. Yeah.
I'll technology contact. Yeah.
And so if you were to pitch that column to any mainstream,
publication that said that's way too nitzsche get out of here.
Our readers would hate it and this guy's this guy's easily
pragmatic engine 450, 500 thousand bucks a year, right?
So if there are more niches like that, then I think the long tail
is actually going to be really successful.
Now you know we could talk about the characteristics that these
really successful businesses. Have they write for rich people,
continuing education for rich people.
They tend to be something that you can expense, right?
They tend to be something that helps you make more money.
So look not, you know if you're if you want to write a poetry
diary it's probably not going to succeed to the same degree but I
think it's much more productive to think about this in terms of
like What sorts of Publications could work and who, you know,
who is the person that could write the publication?
And at that, I think you'd have a bunch more people.
Make him half a million bucks. Here, I one thing that I really
liked about this part of the conversation is that it shows
that you can be really successful in an online platform
where you have a broad audience for anybody can access you
without being sensationalist and insane person fighting with
people and just being generally wretched.
Aka the Twitter model. Where is he instead?
It's like, use, if you just want to nerd out with a bunch of
people who have your general nerdy interest, that's great.
And actually, I don't know that a poetry version wouldn't be
successful because there's a part of me that's like, well, if
it were Edna st. Vincent Millay.
Maybe I would give them a little bit of money, but that's so
great. That makes me so happy.
And one of the biggest viral hits on sub stack of the year
has been someone who's just sending out chapters of Dracula?
Like, I don't know, if it's want, like, a couple times a
week or every day, but it's become a huge Tumblr meme,
because First Dracula was, or I believe, it's an epistolary
novel, you know. And so, you know, people are on
Tumblr because, you know, because they know what's going
to eventually happen to the narrator are just sort of like,
don't tell me are having and we won't spoil it here on the
podcast, but people are having a lot of fun, just sort of in the
in the lead-up to this met again, you know, that's just
like a public domain work that some ways that record-breaking
bunch of money and I don't know if they're monetizing it or not.
I mean you know it's a public doing work but they still could
be up, you know, people are Being creative with it.
And I appreciate Katie bringing up the fact that like, you know,
we as journalists who live on Twitter all day, you can come to
believe that Twitter is the only way that you could ever do media
and that every single story has to have the elements of Scandal
and outrage, dialed up, as far as they can, possibly go to have
any chance at all of getting attention and like meanwhile
like I don't know, just like go look at the headlines on the
stories that Eric and I right there like beautifully boring,
like they never over promise anything, I try to make them
more board. It's just I don't have a very
yeah I'm not no salacious no I don't like that.
You're most Reds by the way. Just out of curiosity.
Every time there's a battle or is the battle its signal, or
like the war over. What was that?
Other the company you covered so well base camp.
Yeah, exactly. Yeah.
I mean, look, I, you know, and I've written the, the stories, I
would argue that the material in there justifies the headline.
Yeah. But I think like the trick is
just Not to constantly over rotate.
Like I think we could all name Publications.
That just always sort of put the most absurd headline on
everything and it and it just shows their deep insecurity that
there's actually enough material and there to get anyone to
justify cooking. Also works for yeah.
Listen. Sometimes we have to A/B test
those headlines to find out which is the most absurd but we
know when we've hit it I will say something you know just to
both of you guys and generally where the industry is gone over
the last few years. That I also find very hard Thing
is the rise of the reported column.
I think is very much attached to the sub stack model.
And, you know, we saw people at like, Ben Smith at the New York
Times, do a great job at this, but I actually think it's a
great direction for journalism to go because I don't think
there's any turning back the clock on people's opinions being
out there as journalists. I mean, Twitter is fundamentally
broken that and it for for most reporters, I think.
But what I like so much about, you know, newcomer and case a
murder when you Started, I think before it was called platform or
when you started your newsletter and you basically laid out like
here's the way, the Kira here are my views on the world of the
internet and like I believe that Facebook has caused a huge
amount of harm. I think Fox News has caused
more, you probably have other tenants in your, you know, you
know, your Hadith that explains it more in depth but I think
that's an important thing that has come out of this whole
Trend, which is, you know, you can still allow yourself with a
political or social world view. But also get like, you know,
General General Nutrition from it, that is valuable to at least
like supporting your worldview and like maybe giving you
opportunities to think about things.
So there's my, there's Michael absolutely can thank you, thank
you for saying that. But by the way, that idea of
sort of, like, laying out, Here's Where I Come From.
That's an idea that I stole from Jay Rosen and why you Professor
anyone can do it. I highly encourage journalists
to think about doing it. It's, you know, it's enormously
clarified to just like look it up blank Google doc until like
what do I actually think about the world?
Just try to write it. Down and once you have I think
it just it brings real Integrity to your work.
You know, I get so frustrated by all these really talented
reporters that I follow on Twitter, who's like, whole mode
of engaging. With the world is just like,
basically, quote tweeting stuff with LOL and LMAO like, that's
that's their only. If you're a reader of those
Publications and that's all you see those reporters doing.
It's really hard to believe that they're there to do anything,
you know, about the world. But laugh at it.
And I think that that actually Mine's The credibility of
Journalism. So I appreciate what you said
Tom And yeah, I'm a huge fan of the reporter column, like Ben
Smith is basically my North Star.
Every time I pick up the phone. Whoa, same band, but I think he
would love to hear that. I told him the other day and for
me I mean Casey a little further along in his career but for me
like, you know, I don't know if I would have been able to get a
reported column job and so this was a way to sort of Force the
issue. And thankfully you know I got
enough subscribers to justify it but it allowed, you know, that's
a job that's part of in some ways not the case with been but
for a lot of reporters given to reporters once.
They're tired of reporting a little bit but happy to have it
sort of a little earlier in my career that I might have been
able to a traditional media Outlet also you know beyond just
the reported column. We also support the just very
good and informative column which maybe could transition us
to heal on time and and Matt Gene's continuing domination the
most so good, analyses of whatever bullshit Elon is
throwing out us on a weekly basis.
It comes in armed with facts. That's what makes me not really
different from Ela. Will you trust him?
And I like more than the financial system or report, you
know, it's like oh that's guys the decider of what how the
world works and I read it anyway, what should we say about
Elon? Should we, should we go into it?
Should we save it for the end, I sort of jump to it but you know,
we let's do that. I mean, I think it's maybe like
the Or C, Elon thing has been the biggest recent development.
I mean, Casey has a close Watcher of Twitter, like what
the, what's wrong with Jack Dorsey?
I mean, he like, I mean, he's basically betraying the guy he
put in as CEO. It's like, Prague has been CEO
for. I don't, I don't know of the guy
maybe is bad but like he's been in it for like a couple months
and now Jack's. Like I'm glad that were none of
us can. Remember prague's name, we have
a yeah. Jack dorsey's position is
ideally. Twitter would be controlled by
no one and it should be this utopian and artistic world.
But since we can't have that, let's have fascism of Elon Musk
on Twitter instead and Only the strongest Among Us can rule,
like, what if the guy has the most in coherent worldview?
Why? I feel like that was so
crystallized. When after the Elan deal was
finally announced and Jack posts, a link to radiohead's
everything in its right place as like some sort of Arrival point
for this whole deal and is like, do you read the lyrics to that
song? Have you ever listened to that
song before and didn't just look up?
You know, a song name that has the right in it because I would
not call that the, like the utopian ideal of, like, any
situation, why? Yeah, it's, this is makeup
sucking on a lemon. I mean, it's like radiohead's,
just stop it, you know, kid a record.
Nothing is positive that would be referenced in that song or
album, but go. Off check.
There's like also this beautiful Symmetry and just like Jack and
Elon using their companies to just like by things that please
them whether it's Elon using Tesla to buy Solar City or Jack
having Square by title. Like to stick like using these,
like public companies is piggy banks.
But you know, as far as like what is Jack thinking?
You know, I talked a lot of people about this the best
theory that I've heard is basically Jack was all but
forced out of the company, right?
These activist shareholders came on, they said you're not hitting
any of these targets. And so last November, he's
basically told, like you, it's time for you to go, you're not
even trying to do any of the things that you promised to do.
And so he leaves and tells the world that I do, you know, it's
my choice. I'm stepping down and he did get
to Pam pick a successor. And so he picked parag who had
played a big role in this blue sky project, which is, you know,
try to turn Twitter and to some kind of decentralized protocol.
So at the time it seems like Jack thought parag was the Spat
to create the Twitter of his dreams, but then a few months
later, he hears that Elon is acquiring stock and his interest
in the company. And of course, they've been
friends for a while. And so, you know, Elaine starts
Gathering, you know, a position of the company.
And then, if you look at the proxy statement, like the day
after they reach a standstill agreement for Ilan, to stop,
buying shares, and Twitter, Jack goes to heaven is like, why
don't you just buy it? And so like Jack according to
the regulatory filings is the person that upset The apple cart
and and triggered this whole thing.
And it's because he really wants to get this thing off the public
market. And I think that's because he
has all this scar tissue from the fact that he was forced out
of his own company twice. And so it's like if he can't run
it, that no one can. And so it is this very emotional
reaction. Wonderful, there does seem like
this view from Jack through his tweets that like he was the CEO
but he couldn't really do what he wanted.
Because ultimately Sort of there are there are obviously moves
you have to make if you're doing things for the public markets
and so you do those and like you just can't be as crazy as he
would have one. I mean that sort of capitalism
you know but like is he still going to be under capitalism as
a private company? Or I don't know, I guess the
question here is, how much do you let jack off the hook for
the idea that he wasn't able to do what you truly wanted to CEO?
Because he had to be sort of a good Steward of the company as a
public, Company's CEO, right? But I mean that it's such
nonsense, you know. Know it had more of an
opportunity that Jack Dorsey to shape the future of Twitter.
You know, he co-founded it. He was CEO of it twice.
You know, most recently for six years, he was also chairman of
the board. So for this guy to come out
after all of that and just be like yeah, like what about you
know, Twitter never became what it should have.
Its like that is literally or well that could not be more your
fault. Right.
It would be kind of like, if
Dean baquet were like God, well, I was running this show.
We really never did what we should.
Crazy sounding that would sound insane.
Completely. Unlike Jack just gets a past
even though he's, you know, he was he was at halftime CEO which
was also his choice, right? Like that was that's what makes
me even more galling. Why does he get a pass?
It fascinates me so much more than any other executive of any
industry I've ever covered. He gets a pass every time.
Well, I mean, so Elon also gets this pass, right?
That's true. Another thing that they have in
common but this is a big reason. Why the activist investors came
on in T20 to begin with, was that they were sick of it.
And it was clear that Twitter was underperforming in part
because they had a terrible CEO who was barely paying attention
to the company. So it did actually wind up.
There was a consequence for him which was that he lost his job,
but he can't stop meddling with it.
And, you know, now the the Twist and The Saga this week is that
he's apparently going to roll his Equity over into the new
Elon company, you know, and that'll probably be a big
position and he may be able to actually, you know, continue to
exert control on the future footer.
Everything you just ABS is in so many ways, like very vindicating
of the Nick Bilton book on Twitter where he describes Jack.
Dorsey is basically like a scheming moron and it's what I
remember when that book came out.
People are like, that's so mean Jack.
Such a good guy like, but I don't know.
Like, I would say that that book is not looking so terrible.
And I wonder what was it about Jack Dorsey that for that huge
chunk of time people, so wanted to defend him and Text him.
I did. I kind of don't get it.
I mean, why don't you know when you tell Nick, Bilton, who you
are believe them. The first time there.
Look, there there is a tradition in of founder worship and in
Silicon Valley. And if you go back to 2013, 2014
Jack really did look like this transformational figure who had
two incredibly powerful ideas, right?
Twitter and square. And, you know, till very
recently like square look like an even more amazing company
than Twitter and it basically, every way, Right?
So there's this idea that once you're lucky twice, you're good
and by that standard, how could Jack Dorsey be anything but
good, but I think the past five years or so, I've really taken a
lot of Shine off of that because he's become so disconnected.
You know, he's remotely managing these companies in between
meditation Retreats, it is just not.
He just doesn't seem to be as serious as a person as he didn't
like 2013 2014. But that point of view is why
it's probably so convenient for him to have this removed.
Move from Twitter as you know, the CEO and kind of say why is
it not achieving its full potential?
What is going on here? It's like well you first of all
are distant from the company physically for a time when he
decided he was going to move to Africa.
But also it's just so it's such a perfect microcosm of this era
that people are refusing to take any responsibility for their
actions. And instead speaking very, you
know, for like an illusory way of how they are, you know what
is the sphere of influence that they have on things and who is
responsible for the largest? Sequences of the world.
I mean, it's perfect. He is a man of our time.
This deal is still not happening, or do you have a bet
Casey. I mean, the stock market is
clearly not certain it's happening but sort of the the
odds seem like they went out this way.
I mean it's a really weird thing about this week as last week was
the week of chaos and Eli making it seem like the deal was never
in happened this week. He got rid of the margin loan
that he was going to take out against his Tesla shares
suggesting. He was going to leave her light
up more. People to take equity in the
company. So, I mean, this week, it was
like a completely different Elon Musk.
He stopped, you know, tweeting, weird stuff about the company
for the most part, and started tweeting about Elden ring
instead. So, you know, if you want to
have like a musket M, that's like, How likely is this dude is
like this week, you know, it's sort of swung over to the end.
Maybe it goes through side of things.
Do you think? Is it?
He can get outside money. Yeah, I mean, he's already lined
up. You know, billions of equity
been a lot of reasons is right. What's up?
Yes. A lot of the deal was supposed
to be done. Yeah, I think I'm a
accommodation I've done Equity but like, I would like Andre
some. I think was going to take
everybody. Yeah, yeah.
And Sequoia, but they weren't that big.
And if you are an employee at Twitter right now, how do you
what exactly is your commitment to this company?
And to whatever Mission, you think you are attached to you
right now. I just it blows my mind.
It's one thing to sort of see the circus playing out on TV or
wherever, but to decide that you are part of Something greater
that there is still, you know, beyond just like clock in and
out and, you know, pushing code like actually feeling like there
is a light here. That's going to result in like
the greater, good of the company and maybe even the world like,
what, what where is your brain at?
Well, I mean, you know Twitter is, is very important product.
It's important every day. I mean, you know, all the
horrible things that happened this week and how essential
Twitter has been to understanding those events in
real-time. So I'm sure plenty of people who
work at the company are just happy to continue doing that at
the same time. I also know a lot of Our people
are looking for other jobs right now.
A lot of other Executives have quit in the past few weeks.
We're going to see a lot more of that in the weeks to come.
You know, keep in mind probably had what three months running
this company before this whole catastrophe started to unfold.
So he didn't really have much time to rally the troops.
And as soon as he did start talking to his troops on a
regular basis, it was, you know, trying to manage their feelings.
Around this guy with a kindergarten level understanding
of content. Moderation saying he was going
to come in and blow up the company, right?
So Prague has not been popular among the rank and file.
I'll just a very difficult situation, so Prague is not
popular either. I mean he was, it was well-liked
when he was named Twitter CEO, he's a known quantity, there
he's been there for over a decade.
People did respect him but he has not been able to do much
since he got to the company in terms of improving it and making
people feel better about their jobs.
He's been firing a lot of people.
We got any that's or your do you know what?
That's cute. Always mean, I think it's fairly
standard like new CEO comes in and cleans house a little bit
and wants to pick their own deputies and lieutenants, who
are more loyal to them. Great timing.
Yeah, I mean it couldn't wait until after the deal went
through to start accessing favored top-down univ.'s.
That would make sense to me. I mean, you know, he eventually
came forward and said, I have to be prepared for any eventuality
and you know, and I think the subtext there was if this deal
falls through. Like, do I want to squander
three or six months while I I have these people who I don't
really trust in these positions of high Authority.
I don't know what give to me the most optimistic outcome.
Like if you were to say everything, you know every Lon
cleans up his act, the deal goes through.
What does the ideal version of Twitter?
Look like six to eight months from now.
I mean I think like the best case scenario is that as Elon is
confronted with the everyday realities of running Twitter.
He sort of speed runs the past Decade of all of us learning
about why content. Moderation is good for business
and whines up not changing that much of the core product, right?
Like when you look at what you'll want to do with Twitter
aside from what he said about Free Speech, there are not a lot
of big changes that he is proposed.
So there's a world in which he runs the company and it doesn't
change all that much. I think that's about as good as
you can hope for like, I don't think he's going to be a
transformational leader. You know, Twitter was working
fine for him. He's the, you know, number one
user on the platform is businesses or helped
tremendously by the fact that, you know, he can promote them
there. So why would he change it that
much? Yeah, as a side note, that is
why it killed me that there was like a Spate of op-ed saying,
like, what we're seeing here is billionaires, controlling the
media. And, you know, Elon Musk is
going to turn Twitter. And do a megaphone is like 80
million followers. What more megaphone does he
need? Like, how does that pass as like
smart analysis? Twitter has already a megaphone?
Yeah, I do not. And the liberal worry about Elon
Musk taking over Twitter at all. Like I just don't see what he
does. It's so bad and I would love,
I've said this a billion times already, but I'd love for Ilan
to be culpable for every bad thing that happens on Twitter,
like especially if he's burning himself, is like a Republican.
And so, you can say, oh, this is for once, like conservative has
to actually govern something people care about and can be, I
even like all the Kangas and and shoots a school full of children
and post all the photos and videos.
Is on Twitter or something like that?
Maybe maybe who knows be there or I don't know what's the?
But you're saying like if he's going to loosen things up and
let the puppies, are thinking about what they post on your
rate and not sensor and a bunch of crazy-ass, shit shows up like
people being beheaded over. So you always had the red, it
cou Shawn, you know, had that whole tweet storm that was very
popular, which basically had the idea that ultimately, you know,
people are forced to Satisfy the consensus of the mob, right?
Is that how you would characterize it Casey or I mean
basically like there's just a level of public pressure that
even the most like True Believer conservative wouldn't be able to
stomach. Like you're saying Katie and
therefore they would make the same decisions that the good
Liberals are making giant. People don't want to believe
that there is consumer demand for Content moderation.
But there is a promise you like, consumers, love contact,
moderation. I don't want to open a social
media app and see. Something, insanely Dreadful.
I don't want that in the most moderate consumers like that,
that they're the ones who want content moderation, because they
don't want to be annoyed by the insane extreme behavior of the
fringes. That's what never made sense
about Iran's you. It's The moderates Who on
content moderation, not the far left or the far-right like this
is all, we all know, like, just hurtling towards a scenario,
where Tucker Carlson is, you know, arguing Lee arguing
vehemently towards the need to see beheading videos on Twitter.
Right. It's just going to be him
saying, like the big media companies.
Tell you, you don't want to see people's heads being chopped
off, but actually you really actually want, you didn't want
to see it. My family wants to see it and
your family wants to see it too. Yeah.
When the families of those who have been beheaded, they also
want to see that again. We're thinking when I should be.
So yeah, yeah, Casey I mean, this is like the Tom's getting
at. I mean and you touched on this
earlier that like you think that in your mission statement that
fox Was worse than Facebook. And it's like, I think a lot
about, I mean, I don't know, like, but yet, there's so much
more interest in, like, understanding how social media
companies behave than yeah, like fox or, I don't know, how is
your thinking on that sort of grow?
Well, in on this is like, in this, it is, so, we like, Fox is
very straightforward. Like, you just have a bunch of,
you know, people going on and like, saying horrible things and
it's not anything other than what it pretends to be.
You know, Facebook is not that it presents itself as a sort of
being this neutral forum for Todd, their these algorithms,
that rank things that are extremely difficult to
understand people assume the worst about them.
They're collecting a lot of data about as personally, they're
using it to Target ads. So those are like very different
things and it's, it should not surprise us that like Facebook
has drawn so much more scrutiny. It's also much bigger.
Right? Facebook's audiences like
workers of magnitude bigger than Fox News.
Same time, you do a study of like, what actually shifts the
politics in a country and it seems like it's much more Fox
News than a Facebook, you know by itself.
Elf. So, you know, I like everything
multiple things can be true. Facebook is a very important
subject for study. I write about all the time, but
I'm very leery of people that want to find very simple
solutions, to systemic problems and like, over the past year, I
just feel like we've seen in so many ways that our problems are
so much bigger than freaking Facebook, like, you could unplug
that thing tomorrow, and you would still have the majority of
the Republican Party who's turned against democracy.
Like you cannot solve that problem at the level of like
putting the algorithm on GitHub, but a lot of people still tweet
about that as if that's the case and if you want more space I
mean sorry if you unplugged Fox News, it does feel like, I mean,
I think we definitely want to try it.
Yeah, we should try it. Yeah.
Katie and I are no comments on that.
Yeah I just I see that I'm like the worst thing in the world to
say I'm no commenting because I actually I had somebody who Who
watches probably a lot more Fox News than you do Eric.
Well, I watch a lot of Tucker Clips or only, but yeah, that's
not the same. You're defending Fox News from
first print from your actual point of view.
Yeah. As somebody who has to watch it
all the time, who works with Fox news, reporters in The Newsroom
at the justice department, who sees what they report, who reads
their stories? I think that the blanket
statement, let's try shutting down.
Fox News is not something that I would actually agree with.
Wow, now it's shocking me. There's something deeply wrong
with what's going on on Tucker Carlson show.
Let me point you to the 20,000 words that my colleague just
wrote about this very issue where he talks about how Tucker
Carlson is mainstreaming. Seen the most virulent and ugly,
white supremacist and homophobic ideas into mainstream America.
All happy, we should also say, like the quote-unquote news
division of fox has done so much to mainstream ideas about, you
know, grooming and CRT and all of these frickin boogeymen Like,
that is not contained a Tucker Carlson, right?
The entire news division, the entire news division is oriented
around finding grievance bait to feed to conservatives and poison
their minds into thinking that Democrats are, you know, trying
to destroy civilization. I would, I would argue that.
That's first of all, not unique to only Fox.
But I would also say that I think that there is a difference
between what's going on in the sort of op-ed hours the The
Primetime hours and what's happening during the day.
I'll only issue I take is Eric wants to say that the reason I
don't support. His blanket statement is simply
because I'm too afraid to say that I agree with him which is
not true. Okay.
I it's shocking to me. I have to meet you for it to me.
Fox News is clearly the worst thing in American culture at the
moment in would certainly be. The first thing I would want to
pull the plug on with with little ambiguity and I'm
struggling to respond to the argument style that I just need
to watch more of. No, I'm not.
I'm not saying to make tibia, but I'm not even saying you're
wrong. I'm just saying I disagree with
you but for not for the reason, you're going to say yes, one
talk about snap to close it out. I can talk about snow Erik
Alma's, not to say that. I refuse to say hate
Republicans, because I'm too afraid to what Eric doesn't
understand is that most of my family's Republican and I have a
lot of friends who are Republicans, which is why I will
not say out of hand. Hate all Republicans.
I grossest thing. So I think they're diluted like
I've spent tons of time with them like and I'm not and I'm
just saying it, like, I guess my preference that you don't say
something is because it's your beat makes me more comfortable
with than the fact that I have a friend who's fine.
Just sort of with terrible people.
So yeah, it is a set out of a place of trying to protect you
from saying the things that are going to make me.
I'm spending all Memorial Day with I'm about to I'm about to
get into a car tomorrow and go spend my whole weekend.
It house with Republican, we Republicans can be nice to have
his company as yeah as someone who like commits.
Very strongly to The Fringe view that the Channel that I would
unplug the first to CNN that is based entirely know that is
based entirely on my having to go visit my parents all the time
and seeing their obsessive watching.
CNN my mom, it's not an Aussie anyway nauseating.
It was Great talking to you. Unfortunately have to run to
this other call but Casey was good to see you enjoyed it to
see you Katie. Why do you want to just finish
up like five minutes with SNAP? So we can end the episode in a
normal Place. Casey, you're a cipher, I don't
know what your thoughts are at the.
No. I mean I'm ready to go.
They got reamed after Evan Spiegel, put out an internal
note and filed with the SEC that they are likely to fall below
their projections in terms of Revenue next.
Citing economic headwinds and the massive downturn.
And look, I don't cover this company anymore.
It's been a long time since I've talked to sources there.
I have nothing new to Surly. Say about the current state of
affairs, this seems like an insane over reaction.
Yeah. It in my mind, I mean, snap is
still a growing app, although I still don't fully understand its
ad promise. And, and that side of the
business is still kind of confuses me.
It makes us at least 80% as much sense as any other digital
media. Accompany.
So this is kind of a crazy time where the market is really
severely overcorrected against this company, but I don't know
how long it'll take for stuff to normalize again.
Yeah, I don't know that either. I'm like, you know, I have
nothing smart to say about like why investors do this thing and
don't do that thing. You know, like reporters
famously, do not play the stock market.
So we're like insulated from this and but, you know, if he
thought that Snapchat was Like a valuable app and snap was
valuable company. Six months ago, I don't know why
you'd be applying a 40% discount to that today, you know, I guess
the only argument is that like multiples of been so inflated
for so long that it's like time for them to come back to earth
and that, you know, maybe you're going to sort of like over
correct. Just a little bit but yeah, I
think I think snap is probably going to be just fine for the
next three or five years. Yeah, there's nothing
fundamental that changed about its business or its stickiness
with users. I guess.
Maybe my One criticism is like its growth is a little bit
eyebrow-raising not like in a suspicious way but it's probably
coming from less valuable users. That maybe don't denote that
they're going to be able to hugely monetize them.
But again this is like the Playbook that social media
companies have run for the last decade so there's nothing new
here. Yeah well I mean I will also say
that the like Snap has been really bad at predicting its
revenue for the past couple years, right?
And I think that investors might just be saying the hell with
this because they they've been so flight far from their
guidance so many times. Are they you know first they're
like app tracking transparency. Blake is isn't going to affect
us but like that, affected them but like then they bounce back
but like then they issued a, you know, corrected guidance.
And so may just be that investors are saying, we have no
idea what's gonna happen with this company?
Yeah, justjust hold for a bit. You guys are much closer to it
than I am but it does, it feels like a company, you know, that
never wanted to run ads and never got comfortable with the
fact that it's business is running ads.
I don't know it like Like, yeah, I don't know, it's always going
to be an ads business, right? Or there's no escaping this sort
of AD situation that they've got themselves in.
I mean, there they made a big bet on e-commerce.
You know, like they want to make everything shoppable within the
app and they're recording creators, which you can monetize
in ways that go beyond ads. So, I think there's like, you
can imagine some different businesses for them but ads are
the heart of it, right? As I've said on this show before
and I stand No one wants to run ads ad stink as Ur ads, make
everything that you've ever liked worse.
And so I had complete, you know, I related as much as I ever
could to heaven when he believed very strongly that he didn't
want to have ads on the platform, but at some point, you
just have to give in to the business and every media
business in the world consumers are cheap, you know, Netflix is
going to do ads. Yeah, it'll be worse for it and
we're worst world because we live in that eventuality.
But yeah, I don't think they're going to dump as anytime soon.
And I guess my final line here is just by now is the time to
buy snacks full endorsement. That's my that's my my analyst
rating. Cool.
Casey thanks. Thanks so much for coming on.
Everybody should subscribe to platformer.
Yeah, nice. Nice to hear from you.
Yes, thanks for having me on those fun the tussling with you
all. Thanks, Casey
goodbye. Goodbye, goodbye.
Goodbye.