# Media Mergers, AI Regulation, and Market Shifts

**Podcast:** Pivot
**Published:** 2026-09-22

## Transcript

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Mesdames et Messieurs, last call for the Air France rendezvous.
They go from being true ballers to true bitches.
Ballers to bitches.
Hi, everyone.
This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network.
I'm Kara Swisher.
And I'm Scott Galloway.
First off, I just want to say, I was right again.
Paramount has reached a settlement with a coalition of 12 states that sued to block its Warner Brothers discovery takeover, clearing the biggest remaining hurdle to the deal.
Paramount will not have to sell off cable channels as part of the settlement, although the full terms of the agreement have not been disclosed.
But it looks like very much behavioral remedies and not structural ones, as promised by Rob Bonta, who looks like a fool here, actually.
A range of concessions reportedly discussed, including a $1.5 billion investment in production in California.
after threatening to leave.
A dingbat editorial board for CNN and CBS to ease concerns over independence, which is completely toothless.
A commitment not to sell either studio lot, I'm not sure what that's about, and a potential penalty is that Paramount fails to produce 30 movies a year, which they already do.
So I want to talk about this a little bit.
I've got some props for you.
Is that okay?
So, you know, I don't know if you know this, but I work for CNN sometimes.
This is a CNN logo that I stole from them when I was there.
Do you like it?
Cool problem.
Yeah.
That logo.
That's going.
Okay.
Oh, wow.
You like that?
Are you making an announcement?
No, not an announcement.
I have a contract with us.
This coffee is delicious.
I'm going to have some in this delightful MSNBC cup.
It is kind of old.
It's not MSNBC.
MSNBC.
No!
Yeah.
No!
Can I just take you into the...
I started a brand strategy firm, Profit, when I was in business school.
I'm just dying to know.
They're in a meeting and they're like, okay, it can't be MSNBC.
It was Microsoft and everybody said, we want to lose MS, but it can't be MSNBC because of corporate reasons.
So MSNOW, NewsRite now.
And then some genius went, no.
We need to make it sound more urgent and wake up the old people.
Call it MS now.
Now.
Put an exclamation point on it.
Stephanie Ruhle does that.
Now.
Put an exclamation point.
No, no.
I just took my Cialis.
I want to see that Ari Melber now.
Now.
He is a sexy beast.
Anyway.
I got the oxygen tank.
I know.
I know.
I just watched a Pam Greer film.
The Cialis is checking in.
Where's that Melber?
Now.
Okay.
In any case, no, my contract, I was just literally reading my contract today, as you might imagine when this news struck because I threatened to leave.
And I have asked my agent to get me out of my contract.
It ends December 31st.
So it's only a few months.
Right.
I'm just I just can't.
I just I thought like I was trying to figure out ways I could work with them and some like licensing.
But then I thought.
Fuck these guys.
I don't want to work for them.
I just don't.
I got too much to do with you, Scott Galloway.
Let me give you a little insight scoop here.
Yeah.
I think there's a decent likelihood when you show up to whoever it is you show up to at CNN and say, I want out of my contract, they jump up and say, congratulations, no problem.
No, not at all.
You're wrong.
I know you think that.
I know you'd like to run me down.
We'll miss you.
Best of luck.
No.
Maybe the Ellisons, that's for sure.
But not, no.
No, they've been trying to keep me.
Very nicely been trying to keep me.
And I have a lot of regard for the executives there now.
I have other things that make more money, that matter more, that have a bigger audience.
Don't let the door hit your ass on the way out.
So anyone with the last name Ellison.
No, I'm just saying, I just don't want to work.
Why is it they don't want me?
I don't want them.
And I have been very explicit.
I'm breaking up with you.
No, stop it.
Stop it.
They just stop it.
They think they have shoddily.
I think they are terrible media owners.
I'd rather work for Rupert Murdoch.
What other media firm do they own?
They own CBS.
And you think they've been— Okay, fair point.
Fair point.
I asked them my own question before I was done with the question.
Let me say, I think they're terrible media owners.
Gotta love Landman.
That's fine, but they didn't do that.
You love Top Gun.
I love him to make Top Gun movies the rest of his life.
I'd be thrilled to watch them, and I will go to Top Gun 3.
So I'm trying to— Incorporate a Top Gun metaphor.
I worry at MS Now.
I worried if you stated CNN that the Ellicens produced along with Top Gun, you would hit the same glass ceiling as Goose.
You'd hit the same glass ceiling.
Oh, well done.
Pretty good.
Pretty good.
I love Goose.
That was a good character.
Yeah, supposedly in Top Gun 3, Kelly McGillis is returning, but you know who is not returning?
Goose.
Oh, I know.
That's very funny.
Anyway, a farewell and a dear.
I can't leave yet, but I will leave as soon as I can.
This is my agent's email.
You sound like you're going to be a great employee.
I'm out.
I'm out.
Until I'm legally.
I'm gone the moment I am no longer legally.
No, seriously.
Yeah, let's invite her back.
She'd be great for the culture.
I am much in demand, Scott Galloway.
I know you are.
You're a baller.
You're a star.
Everyone's afraid of you.
Okay, give me strategy what I should do besides say fuck you.
Yeah, fuck you is my instinct.
Your strategy, Cara, is you invest in your opportunities, not your problems.
That's correct.
Broadcast media is a problem.
And you, like many people, have a fetish for it and think that if you see a CNN or an MSNOW logo over your head, it makes you more credible.
You've already worked for the most credible brands in the world.
You should go direct to consumer.
You make more money than you've ever made anywhere else in your life talking to an irreverent.
Bradborough.
Prick.
You should invest in, you just started something very cool.
And by the way, just so our listeners know, we haven't rehearsed none of this.
You started something really cool called Off with Kara Swisher where you're making all this cultural commentary.
Yeah.
Invest in that and invest less time, energy, and effort in an 80-year-old looking for Ari Melber to come on.
Yeah, I get it.
I agree.
Invest in the opportunity.
I learned how to surf in Hawaii and I thought, I'm an amazing surfer, I'm gifted at this.
And then I tried to surf in Newport where there's real waves or harder waves.
And I found out I am not a very good surfer.
Go to where the snow is good and the waves are great.
And that's podcasting and direct-to-consumer.
You don't like anyone telling you to do anything.
You are a shitty employee.
And I say that affectionately.
As a shitty employee yourself.
I would have made more money if I'd stayed at Morgan Stanley.
I was too insecure and self-centered to work for other people.
It is a skill.
It's not because I'm a baller.
You are that in spades.
Invest in your opportunities, not your problem.
Thank you, Scott Galloway.
I think I shall do that.
I'm going to focus more.
There's so much podcast opportunity.
And I mean the broader podcast stuff and some other stuff I'm interested in.
It's so fun to try things, like doing that off with Kara Swisher.
And that's going to go somewhere.
I have more stuff to do.
I feel like it's right.
But talk about the deal itself.
I mean, this looks like Bonta gave in.
I don't know why he was even doing it in the first place.
What is your overall feel for this, away from my interests in the situation?
Pure regulatory theater.
We decided, as they should have, that two enormous media companies can merge because they need to compete with even more enormous media companies.
There was no legal reason to block this merger.
And, oh, but they extracted from them a promise to make more movies?
That's like letting Goldman and J.P.
Morgan merge if they promised to build more ATMs.
This is, regulators started out saying, This is Godzilla.
It's an existential threat to humanity.
And they settled by saying, we'll make more movies about Godzilla.
Yeah, and keep your studios, keep your real estate in Los Angeles.
This is total weak sauce.
This is Rob Bonta deciding he wants to run for governor and giving into populist bullshit.
I don't like the concentration of media, but the bottom line is when you do the math and you look at antitrust law, there was no legal leg to stand on here other than bothering them and trying to extract their pound.
of flesh.
So, fine.
They're going to get, oh, and my favorite, the CNN editorial.
I know, I know.
You know how I feel about that.
That's my favorite.
I sent you what I thought about.
That's like when the WGA, the worst-run union in the world, extracted agreement from the studios to discuss AI.
That's my favorite.
Yeah, editorial board.
You have to have a conversation with us about AI.
Oh, yeah.
That'll save you.
Yeah, exactly.
And the editorial boards just I'm going to read you something I wrote because I just think it's such a dingbat nonsense to do that.
This is what I wrote.
A history lesson.
Do you remember the 2007 five members special editorial oversight board that Rupert Murdoch agreed to form when he bought Dow Jones rent meddling by him?
I do and thought it was a name then.
Within a year, Uncle Satan, my nickname for Rupert, had put his minions in place, moved out Marcus Broccoli and installed longtime factotum Robert Thompson, whom I nicknamed.
the naughty vicar, so no one was there who might complain to the board.
Utterly predictor and painfully stupid.
The committee publicly said as much, pointing out the obvious.
They were powerless.
The Columbia Journalist Review aptly called it the committee of the absurd.
And since then, repeat after me, kids, ownership equals control.
If Ron Bonta thinks such a toothless entity will be effective, he is a knucklehead.
Between, by the way, Murdoch had done the same tricks earlier when he bought the Times and the Sunday Times in London.
Both boards are non-existent today.
Thus, it will be with the Ellisons.
Just, this is like, these things, you know, I would, as I said, I'd rather work for Murdoch, but he did the same game on these people.
And.
And they're far less able owners of CBS who've put in incompetent management so far don't seem capable.
They seem capable of controlling the media very nicely.
That's what they're good at.
I just think these boards, why don't you be on the board?
Cause some trouble.
I just committed to a board that meets six times a year in California.
I know, you're on a good board.
You're on an actually good board.
So look, okay, this is a good merger.
Because in media, media plays a really important role, especially news media.
And unfortunately, news media, unless it's elevating conspiracy theory or that mRNA vaccines, alter DNA, and getting content produced for free and then using AI to addict you and serve you the exact right Nissan ad at the exact right moment, it's become too expensive to do good journalism.
And unless you have a benign billionaire or someone with deep pockets who sees an economic motive in funding this for ego reasons or otherwise, these things are going to go away.
Now, CBS, Paramount, was going to go away faster.
If this merger didn't go through, that company was really going to struggle.
It is subscale.
Warner would stay in business.
It just would go sideways and probably be a shitty place to work or invest, even their subscale.
Together, they got a fighting shot.
I don't think the Ellisons are as – I think the Ellisons like money more than they do Republican politics.
Oh, that's not true of Larry.
It may be true of David.
I think David was sort of more Democratic.
Ellison is on the hook personally.
Yeah, I get it.
But I'm telling you, he is – For about $50 billion in debt.
He is – He's got to make this work economically.
And CNN, I just don't think it's...
I don't think overnight you're going to have the ghost of Lou Dobbs on CNN.
I don't know where I got that.
I know.
The stuff they've done on CBS is pretty grotesque.
But let me just say, let me relate it to related news.
The five major TV networks are suspending their rotating White House pool coverage after Trump administration refused to allow CNN to serve as a pool representative.
This comes shortly after President Trump banned CNN, MS Now, and Politico from the White House, saying media outlets shouldn't be able to report fictions and lies.
Actually, they are allowed to do that.
Donald Trump.
Reporters from all three outlets were turned away Saturday with their White House press passes deactivated or confiscated.
Trump said there was no single story that prompted the ban calling the result of the years of negative coverage and warning that other outlets could be next.
Apparently, Natalie Harp fed him all manner of negative clips from MS Now.
All three outlets are set to sue the administration.
They have an excellent lawyer, Ted Boutros, asking a federal judge to reverse the ban, which it probably will be because it's government.
She'll make no law.
restricting the freedom of the press.
So they'll probably restore access.
He might restore it for the Allisons, I guess.
But everyone's banding together.
This is important because, you know, I think it's the last guess of an autocrat here, what he's doing.
And maybe he was up late with Natalie, you know, shooting the shit.
But it is related.
Like, who owns these things and who has the guts to stand up to this kind of nonsense?
I watched...
Real time with Bill Maher because Jess was on and there was a guy, David Gruff, anyway.
And he said that he was defending First Amendment and said that Robert Kraft, who owns the Gillette Stadium in Boston, should allow McLemore to play and the president should allow all of these media outlets for the White House press briefings.
And I find that that's a false analogy.
Robert Kraft owns Gillette Stadium.
He's a private person.
It's a private.
I get to decide.
who's in my house.
And if they offend me for whatever reason, I can say, fuck you, you're not welcome in my home.
I get to say that.
If Robert Kraft feels that Macklemore is a raging anti-Semite, of which I would agree, he can say, yeah, I'd rather him just not be in my house.
He gets to make that assessment.
The White House is our house.
It's the definition of a public space.
And we have decided that the most important thing that we put, let me think.
three, four, number one in terms of our amendments, that it's important that media has a check on government.
But net-net, this ultimately ends up being a distraction because these White House press briefings, Donald Trump's ego is going to result in him restoring it because he'd rather have a raucous party where occasionally someone offends him than have a sad party that no one shows up to.
And the media, even Fox, is like, okay, this is wrong.
As the media does, and this is a wonderful thing about the media, they do look out for each other.
Finally, yeah.
I was waiting.
I was waiting.
I was like, is Fox?
Because the Fox News person is head of the White House Correspondents Association, and she's been very suck-uppy to Trump.
But she did make strong statements.
You got to give her credit.
You remember, I was so against that stupid White House Correspondents dinner.
What happens when the Biden or the Newsom administration blocks Fox?
I mean— Should not.
Should not.
Agree.
But my point is, they all realize we're next.
I mean, we can't have this.
We've got to have.
Anyways, I think this ends up, you're in this business and have a better gut for it.
My thesis, another distraction.
Ultimately, everyone's back in the room.
Your thoughts?
It is another distraction.
You're absolutely right.
I think he's, you know, he got ginned up by Natalie at night and not in the ways that are fun.
We don't know that.
Could be a lot of fun going on there.
I doubt it.
She's the most influential member of this administration, by the way, because Susie Wells was away.
And that's when this stuff dropped from the reporting.
I think it's it is a distraction.
But boy, Scott, it's terrifying.
You know what I mean?
Like this is.
The autocrat's handbook?
Yes.
I think he's on the last vestiges of an autocrat situation.
And I think it'll be like what happened in Hungary, you know, with Orban, etc.
It's still disturbing in the United States of America.
Hungary doesn't have the First Amendment.
We do.
And it's so dead clear here.
And it does matter who owns these.
things, which is why the Ellisons are ill-equipped to do it.
I don't think they have any backbone.
They'll suck up to anyone that will matter.
I think they're going to get a buzzsaw from the Democrats if things change in November.
And I think that's another thing that's going to happen and hurt that company quite a bit.
That said...
They have to like know what media ownership requires a certain amount of backbone.
It really these days.
And and and I fear they don't have it.
I again, as I said, like Murdoch's actually his newspapers, whether it's a journal or some others have been very.
good reporting, like really strong.
I wouldn't call it anti-Trump reporting.
It just is really tough on the corruption of the Trump administration.
And you need those things.
And so it is a distraction, but it's also incredibly worrisome that he does this.
Also, because I think he's by himself late at night with this young, stupid woman.
What's incredible to watch a lot of these cabinet members, and we have a very interesting quote right now.
But there's all these cabinet members, you know, just jumped on the thing, of course, because they don't say things.
The worst of them was Scott Besant, who the great coupon man is working my last nerve at this point.
But the press cares more about press than anything else.
Well, CNN is platforming him, Cara.
You know, he is the Treasury Secretary.
Oh, I'm sorry.
I was thinking of Scott Jennings.
Oh, Scott Jennings.
I'm sure he'll get a raise in the new Ellison administration.
But good, he can take my money.
But Scott, they all backed him.
And so when we're on this topic, this idea of quizlings and cowards and people that enable, Trump is clearly off his rocker.
And he loves the press and hates them.
It's the same old story.
But let's hear a clip from Jake Weisberg, who has a book out on all of the people and institutions who have failed to stand up to Trump called Profiles in Cowardice.
Let's listen.
The biggest coward in America today is Jeff Bezos.
The president of the United States is attacking the free press.
He has banned several news organizations from entering the White House.
He's taken their press badges away.
And what is the owner of one of the most important newspapers in the United States doing?
Nothing.
What's he saying?
Nothing publicly, and I suspect nothing privately.
And what makes Bezos such a coward is that he didn't used to be this way.
In Trump 1, he was a stalwart owner of the Washington Post.
He stood up to Trump's bullying.
He said and did all the right things.
So what's happened?
I think the answer has to do with his competition with Elon Musk in space.
That's the thing he cares about.
It's the thing he cares about more than the free press.
It's the thing he cares about more than American democracy.
I used to think that when you had a billion dollars, that was the ultimate fuck you money, pardon the expression.
But it turns out it's I'm fucked money because it gives Trump power over you.
He can come after your assets.
He can take away what you have.
And people in a way who are vastly wealthy seem to be more threatened in terms of what their ambitions are, what they have to lose than people who have a lot less.
Anyway, it is interesting what's going to happen to this class of cowards.
I don't know how you look at it.
I mean, I get going along with the president, but at some point, not to defend the First Amendment, and which was all over, whether it was Mike Waltz, that guy, or any of these Congress people, it's really, that's what worries me, Scott.
That's what really gets me.
Is there like, huh, good point.
They're really mean to you.
It's, I've been thinking about this a lot.
And that is, I think you and I, I've always thought you want just the right amount of money.
I have some friends who I would argue have exactly the wrong amount of money.
And that is they've made enough money so they feel no impetus to take a job and no job meets the bar they have for what they should do.
And they wake up two, three, five years later and they've done fuck all.
But they don't have enough money to retire or live the life they want to lead for the rest of their lives.
They have exactly the wrong amount of money.
So they end up turning down opportunities because they have the wrong amount of money.
There's something to having a right amount of money where you don't let perfect be the enemy of good.
You just get on starting, like making your career, making progress.
It's great to not have economic anxiety.
We have the right amount of money in the sense I was thinking about that.
And that is we have enough economic security, and this is a wonderful thing, where we have independence.
And what it appears is that when you have billions, it creates interdependence.
You start becoming dependent upon the government for contracts.
And that is, fuck you, money turns into wealth that gives you more to protect.
And we were told billionaires would be value-add because they'd be uniquely independent and no one could buy them.
And it turns out the opposite may be true, that they may have more soft tissue.
Rockets need government contracts.
Banks need regulators.
Media company mergers need approvals.
So kind of the bigger the empire, the more windows somebody can throw a brick through.
And I used to always get angry at these guys and say, what's the point of having all this money?
But what I'm more empathetic to is that they build huge companies with a lot of people depending on their shareholder value.
They become obsessed with the success of these companies.
They don't want to be the guy that like.
Amazon or Blue Origin or whatever it is.
And as a result, they go from being true ballers to true bitches.
Ballers to bitches.
Ballers to bitches.
Anyways, I came up with this insight last night under the influence of edibles.
There's a curve of the right amount of money.
A curve.
What is that number?
Do you have a number?
Depends on who you are.
I think about this way too much.
Because you need a lot of more edibles than I do, for example.
But I think that the right amount of money, I have an equation for this and I wrote a book about it.
Times your annual burn, including how much money you'd like to give away.
Take that number times about 25.
And once you have that number, realize that money is ink in your pen and it can write news stories, but it's no longer your story.
And you should be totally focused on relationships.
and enjoying your life.
And beyond that, money becomes another thing you need to manage.
And also, there becomes a fear of losing it.
Right.
That is exactly right.
That's exactly right, Scott.
I think you're right.
That's what I was thinking after I heard this.
I was like, oh my God, no.
I just don't want to even figure it out.
I just want to walk away and make something that's mine.
That's all I felt like.
You know what I mean?
Like, that I own, that I control.
You're a lot easier to manage than all these people.
And totally enjoyable, let me say.
Thank you for saying that.
That may be the nicest thing you've ever said.
Even when we argue, you know, by the way, there is an issue around Robert Kraft.
We're not going to get into it, but it is a little scary.
The issue of Robert Kraft is like he lets Kanye in and not this guy.
Like if you're going to do this, be consistent.
I didn't like him colluding with everybody.
You don't have to be consistent.
You can have whoever you want over for dinner.
I get it.
But the colluding among all of them was hmm, hmm, hmm.
See, I don't know that part.
Who is colluding?
Yeah, he called all the other stadium owners, all the rich guys.
And to me, that's collusion.
I'm sorry.
It's just kind of, oh, wow, that's kind of scary.
Well, that's a little mean girls, but you're allowed to do it.
I know, but it doesn't make me happy.
I think it's just, I think we should let everybody say what they want to say.
That's what I said.
Anyway.
You want to come to my house with a hook nose and make fun of Jews?
You're not coming to my house.
You don't have First Amendment rights in my house.
I would never do that.
Well, I know.
I'm not saying you would.
I'm just trying to make a point.
I don't.
Yes, I get it.
I get it.
It's complicated.
I think that whatever his name is, Macklemore, has a right to go on Broadway with a microphone dressed up however he wants and say very offensive things.
Public space, have at it, brother.
Yeah, yeah.
In this case, what he said wasn't as offensive.
It was the past stuff, I think, that they were reacting to, some of the past.
behaviors and dress-ups and stuff like that.
It's pretty ugly.
Ed Sheeran looks pretty ugly.
It's pretty ugly.
Oh, I didn't believe I have to hear about Ed Sheeran.
Poor Ed Sheeran.
Oh, poor Ed Sheeran.
Poor little Ed Sheeran.
These celebrities try so hard not to get involved and they just get into it.
Yeah, he kind of woke up and like, what the fuck?
Yeah, he then, of course, did a little virtue signaling in his concert.
Anyway, I don't care about it.
I haven't been following Ed.
Oh, he's like, the people in Gaza are suffering, that kind of stuff.
He did one of those speeches.
Oh, wow, you're really going on a limb there.
Yeah, I know.
Exactly.
He just I just don't want to think about insurance.
I don't like him.
So it doesn't matter.
You don't like his music?
No, he's just stupid.
It's like elevator music.
That is anti-Palestine.
I know.
Oh, my God.
You must like Taylor.
Oh, my God.
I love you.
You don't like his music?
I don't.
I hate it.
In any case, here's the last thing I would say about this whole thing is where is Elon Musk, the free speech warrior on all this?
Nowhere to be seen.
These people, as Amanda, my wife, says, were pretending.
All these free speech warriors were pretending.
Yeah, no, it's all bullshit.
It's all bullshit.
Anyway, let's get back to the tech of it all.
When we get back after a quick break, we get ready for Amazon Blocks, Meta AI's assistant, Muse.
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Scott, we're back.
It's time for some AI news because, you know, it's not killing us this week, but they're just beefing with each other.
First up, Amazon has blocked Meta's new Muse AI assistant from shopping on Amazon, saying Meta didn't get permission for letting the agent access its store.
Amazon says Muse raises security and privacy concerns because it can access customer accounts and order histories, and it doesn't identify itself as an AI agent while browsing.
It's interesting because you have to, I just downloaded Muse and I gave.
Mark Zuckerberg, almost zero access to anything, including my Amazon.
He wanted to go buy something for me on Amazon, and I said no.
I didn't give it the access to it.
But if I give it the access, it's none of Amazon's fucking business if I want this thing to shop for me.
Not that I would let it.
I didn't let Muse have my...
It's probably going to be very ineffective.
Or my access to my Gmail or access to my calendar or access to my...
Some people are giving their financial stuff, not giving it access.
I just want to see how it does on lots of little things, like I'm going to Vienna tomorrow.
What's a good walk?
That kind of stuff.
What do you think about this pushing back Amazon?
This is going to happen a lot, right?
Correct?
Because they're going to want you to use their Amazon AI, presumably, which I use, by the way, when I use the service.
I like your take, and I'm just sort of processing this real time because, for example, if you use a VPN and you do it at two in the morning or you fool, you say you dial into United Airlines or JetBlue from a different country at a different time, it'll give you a lower fare.
because it discriminates.
And so the airlines want to block VPNs.
Actually, I don't know if that's true, but I would imagine they have an economic incentive.
And Amazon has said, we don't want people super smart, or we don't want thousands of agents coordinating, trying to figure out the lowest price and when to buy, and they're blocking it.
My initial reaction was, I think this is an incredible product opportunity for Amazon, and I want the same Amazon toll booth gate governor to be deployed across every content creator such that when any AI or crawler comes for any of my IP, I set the parameters on whether I want it done, I want to charge for it, and then the bot decides if it wants to come in, if it wants to pay the toll.
Yeah, that's absolutely really smart.
That's a great business opportunity.
Because the model here is pretty basic.
People say, well, AI is effectively ingesting every piece of human IP ever created, strip mining it and selling it back to the people who it's putting out of work.
There's a real legitimate concern there.
And the model is very basic.
When you listen to KROQ 106.7 Rock of the 80s in Los Angeles, which is the greatest radio station in history, and you listen to the B-52s.
At the end of the year, KROQ pays the recording artists, whatever, call it.
Yeah, RIA, I think it is.
They pay them to call it a million bucks because all of the artists have agreed to license their music.
And then the rights association distributes it out.
And then they go, okay, KROQ, you are 1% of our playlist.
And they send $10,000 to Warner Brothers who represents the B-52s.
I think we need the same technology here.
I'm all for AI.
Having access to data.
I would like AI to have access to my data.
I like it when people say write something in the voice of Scott Galloway or what is the lesson on sweating and economic security from algebra.
I just want to be either compensated for it.
Actually, it's a smarter way to get, actually, because it used to be you sort of get a vig if they got, you pay pennies.
And that was always so confusing.
It is a smart way to get paid for content.
I think the issue here is these two beasts fighting, AI beasts fighting each other.
Amazon has a ton of AI in it.
I use Amazon a lot, much to my chagrin and my wife's chagrin.
But it's really effective.
And I'm not quite, I have to sort of stack rank the people I'm offended with in tech.
And I'm focused on Andy Jassy, not Jeff Bezos in this situation, which is a stupid excuse, I know.
But they use a ton of AI, and I find myself using it more and more.
I just bought, it sounds silly, but I want my washers and dryers to move out so I could clean behind them because I'm anal retentive.
And I said, oh, does this hold this much weight?
Or what about this kind of washing machine?
I hadn't answered me.
It was like, instead of me searching around, or how high is it off the ground?
And instead of me, I could have found it, but you'd have to sort of sort out.
you know, scroll, scroll, scroll, click, click, click, essentially.
And in this case, it answered in seconds.
The same thing with Muse.
Have you downloaded Muse yet or not?
You're the most promiscuous person on earth on these things.
Did you not download it yet?
There's a lot of meaning.
I haven't, but it's number one in the App Store.
And I actually, I'm not sure.
And I'm going to think this through more.
I wouldn't be surprised if Muse ends up being the biggest player in AI.
I would agree.
I would agree.
There's another company called Instinct, which is a smaller company that also gets, I was looking at the, someone sent me a list of how good these things are and Muse and Instinct right at the top compared to all of them.
Although I think you're going to use AIs separately.
Like the Amazon AIs, I don't think Muse will be as helpful as the Amazon and what I'm buying, right?
It might be okay, but compared to...
I get better information from Amazon, but it will be a race to see which AI you tend to use as a utility going forward.
I just don't want to give Mark Zuckerberg access to my email.
I worry, what if I have an email in there, something about him that I'm working on?
Who knows?
I can just imagine it.
And that's my worry, is who do you trust?
Do you trust Apple?
I don't trust Apple as much as I used to, that's for sure.
You shouldn't have to trust companies.
You should trust regulators who make laws.
Right.
And I was looking at it very carefully, and I suspect it's easy to hack.
That's one of the things.
But you do have to give permission.
And the more permission you give it to access your stuff, the better it is for you as an assistant.
I called my assistant on Muse Mark, by the way, and then I've now ordered it to look like Mark Zuckerberg so I can order Mark Zuckerberg around.
But it's a really interesting, I would recommend you trying that, and I'm trying Instinct, too, just to try it.
But again, it's not as much efficacy without stuff.
But these guys are going to, these Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Meta are going to battle it out over who your assistant is at this point.
And I guess Microsoft?
I don't know.
I think Facebook could win here quite handily.
The brightest mind in business is Mark Zuckerberg.
And unfortunately, most good CEOs verge on sociopathy.
He verges on psychopathy.
And so think about how brilliant he is.
He makes a good product.
He finds an incredibly attractive person to serve as heat shield and be the comms person and says to him, for $10, $50, $100 million, you, Sheryl Sandberg, Nick Clegg.
And who's the latest heat shield that's reputation is going to be in tatters in about 36 months?
Dina Powell.
Yeah, Dina's about to become the new face of awful, but she knows it.
She's a smart woman and she can surround herself with a lot of people who like her and a lot of Vaseline on the lens.
Well, she is charming.
Sheryl Sandberg is what it was like.
The only argument about Sheryl Sandberg was, was she going to be California governor and president until we figured out she invented a business model that...
where 15-year-old girls were cutting themselves and then tried to cover it up.
And then Nick Klig with his charming British accent.
Okay.
All right, Nick, you're lying too.
The latest, highest paid liar in history who's, he's so good at this.
He finds these incredibly attractive people.
I bet the conversation is very straightforward.
Your reputation is about to be ruined for the rest of your life.
Yeah, but.
You get to sit on that sweet, sweet dome.
But you wouldn't do it.
You can console yourself in your villa in St.
Bart's and on your private jet.
He's, and not only that, his ability to go, to skate to where the puck is.
And here's the thing, AI, loosely speaking, in terms of who wins, the three legs of the stool are.
The compute, the model itself, how sophisticated it is.
Your access to GPUs or infrastructure for inference and compute.
And then the raw material is the data or the input.
I would argue that the part that gets commodified is the actual technology or the LLM itself.
Everyone can buy the GPUs as long as you kiss Jensen's ass long enough and you can find the money.
The point of differentiation will be your access to first-party data.
Who has more access to first-party data than anyone in the world?
I agree with you.
I agree with you.
I think it's between Meta and Apple, and Apple's really slow.
I don't think Apple wants to be, I think they're going to outstores it.
As an agent, like creating an agent for you.
Like Siri has been such a fucking disaster.
Anyway, it'll be an interesting fight between companies like Amazon keeping people out because they're not going to want Muse up in their grill, right?
That's the thing.
And it is powerful.
But I have to say, if I give Muse permission to look at my Amazon data, fuck you, Amazon.
But I'm not going to Amazon.
But you just said something, access.
The biggest, people always ask me, what do you do with AI?
And I say, I use it to edit stuff.
I look for data.
But the biggest unlock was I gave Claude Pro or Cowork, whatever it's called.
He's a terrible brand.
Anyways, permission to look at my email.
Oh, my God.
I read about a company I invested in eight years ago, and I have no idea.
Please look at my emails, see how many shares I own, then look at the web and see what those shares are worth in the secondary market.
And it comes back and says, you've lost 80% of your value.
But at least I know.
Yeah, now you know.
Now you know.
It's like that South Park episode.
That South Park episode.
Cartman goes into a bank.
He got a bond from his grandfather.
He's like, I'm here to invest $50.
And it's gone.
What a great show that is, I have to say.
In other AI news, just this is interesting.
Anthropic, OpenAIM, SpaceX, AI, and Google are being sued by a group of AI subscribers who claim the company's illegally agreed to slow down AI development.
The plaintiffs argue that a coordinated slowdown would hurt consumers by making products improve more slowly while subscribers keep paying the same prices.
This is an innovative way to do this.
You know, they're facing heat everywhere.
Slow down, speed up.
We are paying money for this stuff, good money for this stuff.
It's going to kill us, that kind of stuff.
And in related news, Donald Trump says he's creating an AI force modeled on the Space Force while dismissing concerns about AI as a hoax.
He's offered few details about his AI force.
I think he just made it up in the middle of the night.
It's unclear whether it would be military, civilian agency, how it would operate or where funding would come from.
Trump also says he'll name a new czar soon, a position previously held.
by David Sachs.
And grift watch alert as Trump pushes back on the calls for AI slowdown.
He and his family are profiting from the AI boom.
What a surprise, according to The Washington Post.
By the way, even if Jeff Bezos is a coward, the Post news section is doing a great job.
Trump's investment accounts have disclosed nearly 30,000 security transactions since his return to White House.
Transactions include buying and selling shares in companies that provide the chip servers and energy powering AI.
The White House says the investments are handled by independent managers.
I'm sure he's a lot.
I'm sure it's the same the same feeling of paying back the Russian person who paid for Donald Trump Jr.'s wedding.
So talk a little bit of this.
You've got the political part.
You've got the lawsuits that go all kinds of ways.
There's obviously the political elements of of what's happening.
And then over in California, Gavin Newsom just issued an executive order to speed up two AI safety laws and explore requiring AI companies to build a kill switch.
Talk about all this sort of shifting forces all over the place, whether it's legal, political, state.
So a lot here.
I think they've mislabeled this.
I don't think they should refer to it as a kill switch.
I think we need circuit breakers.
And there's just never been a need or a bigger white space for a regulatory body to come in and have.
subpoena power, testing and approval requirements, hold periods, the equivalent of the NTSB, that every incident you have to report immediately.
I believe we can absolutely handle it.
So every CEO can believe AI is dangerous and still be rationally compelled to accelerate because what this is is the prisoner's dilemma.
And I don't think a pause...
is realistic.
I think the incentives are against that.
And also, there are some really wonderful things happening with AI acceleration, including trying to address climate change.
So the strange thing about the industry, the people building the bomb are also the ones telling us the bombs scare the shit out of them, while investors ask for another $100 billion to build a bigger bomb before the other guy does.
And that's why voluntary coordination just doesn't work here.
it's economically unstable and why coordination would instantly create antitrust questions.
The biggest opportunity for the Trump administration, which I think they'll miss, is a really thoughtful administration would have already had several hundred diplomats, economists, technologists from China and the US hold up somewhere in Alaska or in South Korea outlining A memo of understanding around cooperation around AI.
But what about this space force?
He loves to have a space force or an AI force and a czar and this and that.
This requires an enormous, as you said, coordination both domestically and...
internationally.
And instead, he wants to have some guy in charge.
Like, this is my AI guy.
Yeah, that's loyal to me.
Loyal to me.
And it's like so self-interested like David Sachs has been.
And then he himself is buying and selling stocks in this area.
I mean, the fact, you know, the crypto bill collapsed, the Clarity Act, there was a great story in I think the New York Times or the Wall Street Journal about the collapse of it, largely because one.
Brian Armstrong, who was leading at a coin post, is a horse's ass.
That's one.
And two, they couldn't, you know, the grift of Trump was so massive that it gave Democrats an end to, like, torpedo it.
And rightfully so, because they wouldn't do the correct, you know, stopping, you know, this grifter family from taking things.
And they're doing the exact same thing over in AI investments.
Yeah.
So there's two things here.
There's space and there's.
There's corruption.
I think one of the biggest opportunities.
So amongst the many existential threats facing Americans right now, I hearken back to the days when the elevators were going to stop and Y2K or Greek sovereign debt was supposedly going to affect all of Europe and take the global economy down.
I long for the days of just people dying from COVID.
It just this is.
Yeah.
I mean, think about this every day.
It's a mass extinction event.
Mass extinction.
Well, but one of those existential crises is, in fact, our debt.
And I'm writing a lot about this right now.
A third rail, everyone talks about the third rail of entitlements.
We need to have a serious conversation around our military spending.
And there's a big opportunity to take the one word that defines the Ukrainian.
and the war in Iran, and that is asymmetry, and figure out a way to partner with companies like Anderil and say, okay, Northrop Grumman and Boeing, there's just been so much creep.
When you have a weapons program for a plane, which is a great plane that's going to cost one and a half trillion dollars, and the Pentagon hasn't passed an audit, let's think big.
How could we take, how could we turn our military into the most lethal fighting force ever?
that costs $500 billion a year instead of $1.5 trillion.
Because the problem is we associate that number with macho.
And every Democrat is afraid to say, let's take it down to $1.49 because that means I don't have testicles.
Right.
But, you know, it's Hexeth that's trying to integrate AI into it.
It's just that he's a moron and it's not the person you want to be doing something.
Well, that's a confidence issue.
Right.
But there is something about...
Asymmetric warfare that leverages our unique advantage about our ability to haul stuff into space, our ability around connectivity, the fact that we have the best universities in the world looking at this stuff.
And also, also, it might make sense to partner with the EU, Canada.
That would be nice.
And possibly, possibly China.
Also, Ukraine.
Do you see what they're doing, blowing up all manner of things in Russia, which Trump is trying to get them to stop?
Unbelievable.
An $80 billion millet.
Unbelievable.
The most successful fighting force in the world is doing it on a budget of $80 billion.
And we're losing a war in Iran on $1.5 trillion.
How do we have five times the fighting force and lethality of the Ukrainian army for $400 billion or $500 billion instead of $1.5 trillion, where we have literally $1 billion bombers?
May I make a historical point?
Most of the people that fought the Roman Empire had equal amounts.
There was not a lot of innovation in weaponry.
equal amounts of weapons, same weapons.
They did it through organization, discipline, and strategy, really, right?
And in this case, it's not necessarily the weapons.
It's that how do you deploy it?
And we should be able to do this.
It is kind of shocking how much Ukraine is doing with very little money.
And of course, Trump is trying to stop them because he's Putin's bitch.
Anyway.
This is the last thing.
Anthropic is reportedly pushing its IPO from October to November.
Investors are talking about a potential $2 trillion valuation.
Anthropic is expect to reach more than $100 billion in annualized revenue by the end of the year, up from $65 billion as of July.
The company could publicly release financial documents about the offering as soon as a couple of weeks from now.
I'm sure you'll be poring over them.
Those sources tell the Wall Street Journal the decision to aim for November was made before the former Anthropic researcher warned that AI companies...
are moving too fast.
Give us some predictions.
Will Anthropics IPO really happen this year?
Will it be bigger than SpaceX?
It would be if that's the case.
And also, there is, people feel like the latest version of ChatGPT is getting some real traction.
I forget what it's called.
They all have new fucking names.
It drives me crazy.
Do you feel, how do you look at this?
This is a shift, and it was again before this hair on fire stuff around this researcher.
Let me just make one note.
I'm working on a book right now, and I went back and found some old speeches of Sam Altman.
2015, he said virtually the same thing this researcher said.
So this is not new, a lot of these worries.
He wrote an essay, the first sentence of which is essentially AI will kill all of humanity or could kill all of humanity.
Anyway, what do you think about the Anthropic IPO?
But let's buy some stocks, Scott.
What do you think about it?
Well, so.
A $2 trillion valuation is what they're saying and $100 billion run rate by the end of the year.
It's not a company going public.
It's a country's GDP going public.
And that's why Trump has been so compromised.
He wants a piece of it and he sees it as more important.
So he's like distinctive extinction risk, existential risk, go baby, go.
I doubt it gets done by the end of the year because of all of the different.
Well, I think they have to.
To a certain extent, I don't want to say I feel sorry for these guys, but they have their series ABCDENF investors.
There are probably no less than 50 VCs who managed to get into the B or C round of Anthropic who are sitting on a septic tank of shit that just didn't work.
And the difference between them raising Fund 3 and being a hero and being the guy who started a VC fund and it didn't work is whether this thing gets public at the valuation.
So he's got...
In addition, he probably has thousands of people who've put a down payment on a ridiculously overpriced house in San Francisco who borrowed from their in-laws saying, oh, it's going to go public in three months, not going to have $11 million.
There are a lot of incentives for this guy to get public.
At the same time, not having put in place guardrails, not having put in place or understanding the regulatory framework.
I mean, there's a lot of things that just say maybe a pause to slow down that gives them a chance to maybe kind of check back on the capex and report a quarter of increased or gives people greater visibility into where they...
They released one of these ridiculous WeWork-like EBITDA statements saying, well, if you don't look, if you take out inference and compute, we're profitable.
It's like what...
When we were trying to calculate...
Take out the flour, the bread is really...
Take out, yeah, take out...
It's kind of like profits before any cost.
Yeah.
I mean, it's just so stupid, right?
So it feels to me like he's got a lot on his plate to get a public offering done.
So you think a push, a push.
I got to think that if it happens, it's going to be Q1.
We're running out of time.
Do they do January IPOs?
I don't see why not.
Well, I know, but I don't recall a lot.
Like, is it March or?
The honest answer, Cara, is I don't know.
That's a lot of pent up.
That could really be bad, especially if the stock market blows, which, you know, a lot of the stock people feel like they're calling for these slowdowns in order to catch up, right?
Like that it's all faint.
I think they've got to.
I just going public in the midst of insecurity about a mass extinction event.
Yeah, I agree.
It feels, I mean, let me put it this way.
You know what I'm really excited?
I'm really excited to read a section in the S1 called Risks.
Risks.
I mean, how are they going to outline this risk?
Well, the thing is, both Altman and Amodi have so much, I've just been digging into stuff from 10 years ago.
Because I'd said on the stage at Atlantic this week, I was at the Atlantic Conference, which was an excellent conference, by the way.
that like I was at dinner parties where they were all saying these things like very clearly.
Like I was like, I don't know why this young researcher suddenly got to everyone, but these guys were saying it.
And then I went and found a lot of their early writings and it literally says, probably it'll kill us.
This is how much it'll kill us.
The thing we'll probably die from is this.
Like they have so much history of this that it's really, you know, I just want to make sure I was.
I mean, I remember these dinner parties.
But at the time, it was speculative, right?
And now they, I guess, are seeing some proof whether it's Google jumping out of the sandbox or them jumping out of the sandbox.
They haven't yet gotten to a missile silo, but it's only five minutes till that.
So it'll be interesting.
So you think it's going to push till next?
Will it be that big?
Will there be a lot of demand for this?
Oh, God, yes.
I mean, I keep hearing the numbers are doubling every month.
And I'm going back to this big thing.
You'll buy it.
If I could get on the IPO, I would buy it and then flip it on the first trade.
Flip it, see?
Buy it, flip it.
No doubt.
I mean, this is going to be, this will be the most anticipated IPO in history, more so.
But just going back to the metaphor or the analogy used around cooperation, an IPO requires the cooperation of hundreds, if not thousands of entities in people.
And trying to be the first IPO while claiming the moral high ground.
I know.
While saying you might kill everybody.
Yeah, it's complicated.
Yeah.
Anthropic doesn't want to be first.
It's just that going first also happens to serve the safety narrative and the balance sheet at the same time.
Nature doesn't ask the coral and the fish if they love each other.
But there's going to have to be some sort of cooperation and detente and reasonable sense of safety as arbitrated, I would think, by a regulator.
By regulation.
They should have, they shouldn't have this stupid AI force.
There should be significant regulation.
They should back it.
You know, they're always worried about it in a way that this would help them.
You're absolutely right.
By the way, I had heard from someone that they didn't think that.
Open AI would go at all, which was interesting.
That's another topic.
All right, Scott, let's go on a quick break.
We come back with Chinese President Xi coming to the U.S.
American automakers have a warning for Donald Trump.
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Scott, we're back as Donald Trump gets ready to meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping in D.C.
this week.
A coalition of automakers and dealers is asking him to keep Chinese cars out of the country.
That's a damn shame because they're adorable.
The group urged Trump in a letter to keep the door firmly shut to Chinese automakers raising concerns about job loss and national security.
They should be concerned.
Again, these models are fantastic.
Trump recently said he'd be open to Chinese companies building cars here as long as they hire American workers, which they've done many.
foreign countries have done before.
One more wrinkle, Xi is expected to bring a group of Chinese business leaders with him to the U.S.
and might include the founder of Chinese EV, giant BYD.
Of course he would.
Thoughts about this?
What do you think is going to happen here?
I don't think there's going to be a discussion of AI safety, is my guess, or it's not going to be a significant one.
Yeah, I think he'll be more focused on claiming stupid shit like, I've got more tariffs and we're going to give people $5,000 back.
Like Detroit wants to summits diplomatic cooperation, right?
They want some sort of a stable truth or they want protection.
And asking Xi to show up as a bonobo and negotiate as a chimp, so to speak.
Look, I hate to say this.
When I was in a BYD in Brazil.
They're everywhere.
And I got in and I thought, oh, this is a Model Y or whatever.
He says, no, it's a BYD.
And I said, how much is it?
And he said, he figured out it was like $14,000 or $16,000.
I'm like, we're fucked.
I thought the same thing when I saw them.
When my first big consulting, this is the best engagement in the world.
When I was right out of business school, I met a guy named Warren Hellman, and he said, I've got a great assignment for you.
I want you to come to every Levi Strauss and company board meeting.
I don't want you to sit next to anybody.
I don't want you to talk to anybody.
I want you to listen for two days.
And then I want you to stand up and tell us exactly what you think.
I was 27.
Wow.
This was the best consulting engagement in history.
That's why you're the way that you are.
That's why I'm the way that I am.
Anyways, I remember this.
We were in Singapore, and they were having this big debate about continuing to manufacture Levi's in the South.
And I said, okay, all this is is a transfer of wealth from your shareholders to the good people in those factories.
But I said, I know how the story ends.
In 10 years, you're not going to be manufacturing denim in the United States because you will eventually opt for shareholder value and reinvest in places with higher paid jobs and grow your company.
I, for the first time, I'm beginning to believe that American cars are Levi's.
I don't know if we're going to be manufacturing them in 20 years.
Because when I look at cars coming out of China and the...
They have cars now that can go 600 miles without a charge, are zero to 60 in two and a half seconds.
All manner of gigas on them that are fun, like all manner of fun features.
Cost $40,000.
And there's some that are $6,000 and $7,000.
Remember, I bought my, I don't know what your first car cost, but I had a Honda Civic for $6,000, $7,000, something like that.
Oh, God, I've had so many bad cars.
I had a Volkswagen Rabbit, then I had a Renault Le Car, then I had a Chevy Chevelle brand.
I had a Rabbit.
Convertible.
Then I had a BMW 318i.
Oh, you moved up.
I went down.
You went up and I went down.
I kept going up and up.
Semiboltz.
Anyways, but my last car was a Range Rover.
120 grand.
It's a cooler brand than what they're producing in China, but China is effectively making a better SUV for 40 grand.
And I just don't think we can compete.
Yeah.
So what should happen at this summit?
Like, there's not going to be any AI stuff.
I doubt it.
I don't think it's within his ability unless he's going to get a gimme.
I don't know.
I can just hope that the political move they could restore if they were truly focused on what would be best for them, America, and quite frankly, in the midterms.
would be to announce, have somebody in the administration who's smart say, we have been negotiating behind the scenes for several months on AI, and we've come to an understanding on the following important things around weapons, around privacy, around, here's what AI is at the end of the day, good AI.
A small rural hospital in Alabama can incorporate the same AI best practices or best practices using AI to reduce sepsis as they're doing at the University of California, San Francisco, which is the best.
hospital in the world.
It levels up.
It can help people treat- Level up.
Level up.
It's a leveler up.
Whether you're in Lagos Lagos or in Lausanne, Switzerland, this is an opportunity to bring middle powers up.
That's a good AI.
The bad fucking AI is that right now only nine nations could produce a nuclear bomb.
We might be at 149 nations in six months.
That's the bad AI.
It's a leveler.
for good intentions.
There are cyber crime organizations of two, 300 people.
There's a feeling with AI, you can start the same cyber crime organization with one person now.
Unless we get together and cooperate specifically with China, you're going to see a leveling up in very bad ways.
And these guys, I mean, this is basically The equivalent of a cybercrime organization, which supposedly is costing the global economy trillions of dollars, is about to go from 200 or 300 people in Russia or Ukraine to one person with a Claude Pro subscription.
So these guys getting together and saying, we are starting the most effective, transparent, multilateral enforcement and regulator agency.
We don't want our kids killing themselves.
And there are chances of this, Scott.
This is the opportunity for a Democrat.
We're going to go the other way.
We're going to create a free trading zone, a non-tariff zone, cooperation around military and AI, the likes of which you have never seen.
And we're going to unlock so much fucking economic growth and reduce the existential risk here because democracies and China.
which deserves a seat at the table because whether you like it or not, they're number two and they have brought 500 million people out of poverty.
We are going to, on a different level, cooperate with them, but we're going to create an indomitable entity of democracies and capitalist societies around economics that will result in massive deflation, prosperity, shared best practices.
Force people to respect their borders.
China's not evading anybody.
I love all this, but you know what?
It's really important to keep Caitlin Collins out of the White House.
That should be our focus, okay?
Because she never smiles.
All right, Scott, one more quick break.
We'll be back for wins and fails.
These shoes are too much.
Do you still have these tight things?
I mean, are not all the shoes so formed?
No, you need Altras.
Altras?
Altras are formed like your feet with a foot-winged 10-box.
Just a bit more comfortable.
You're going to get your feet with 10-10.
Okay, that's a dream.
More comfort, power and dynamic.
All through the Passform.
Altra understands that.
Altra, stay out there.
So like any good millennial, I have a love-hate relationship with Gen Z.
It's the phenomenon rattling millennials.
They just look at you.
They want something bigger themselves.
Lifestyle is a priority.
Motivation is being inspired.
But regardless of how you feel about Gen Z, it's undeniable that they're changing national politics.
Generation Z is increasingly showing less loyalty to traditional political parties, many now more likely to identify as independent.
So what?
is going on with the kids.
I think the biggest misconception about Gen Z's politics right now is that all of a sudden they're all socialists.
That is just not the case.
They are embracing candidates who are offering new, bold ideas in the absence of those ideas from establishment Democrats.
This week on America Actually, Gen Z researcher Rachel Jambaza joins us to separate Gen Z facts.
Versus fiction.
It's not rocket science.
And this is, you know, I keep saying like young voters aren't that complicated after all.
It's pretty simple.
Catch us every Saturday on YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts.
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Okay, Scott, wins and fails.
I'm going to go first.
I have a lot of fails.
I'm going to do them all at once.
I have one win.
I know people have issues with the New York Times, all my inner issues, but what an amazing media organization.
Congratulations on your birthday.
And thank you for letting me hear Janelle Monae up close.
That was really cool.
And it was a really fun party.
So congratulations.
That's my win.
The fails are so many, I don't know where to count.
First, why did Amazon cancel Ride or Die with Hannah Waddingham and Octavia Spencer?
It was their number one show.
Someone buy it.
Apple, I don't care.
It's such a good show.
And it was like ladies with guns are my favorite thing.
That was a fail.
Another fail was obviously all the quizlings that went along with Trump on the First Amendment stuff.
You know, you better like the First Amendment because it's coming for you if you don't protect it.
That's the number one amendment.
You should protect it above.
all things of the many rights we have.
It's one of them, that First Amendment with lots of stuff in there is the most important of all of them.
And the last one is this insane fucking, I live in Washington.
I'm getting a little sick of this, President Trump.
You're making a mess of everything, but your plan 200 and...
50-foot triumphal arch that is going to be on my way to the airport, which I already have to see your big-ass golden horses, which is irritating enough, will now double as a military complex because nothing says democracy like housing drone snipers and large amounts of ammunition in your monuments.
I just don't know what to say.
This is insane if we let him build this.
I hope we stop him.
Same thing with the Kennedy Center.
There was a lot of people.
Just the whole manner of things is just a massive fail here.
And so I just, I don't know what to say about it, but I hope there's enough legal moves to stop him from doing all of this manner of things because it really is, again, working my last nerve.
I have two wins and a fail.
My first win is New York.
I spent the entire weekend here and did my favorite thing.
Roamed around Jack's wife Frida, bought T-shirts at James Purse, sunglasses at Warby Parker, shoes at On.
Went to Blank Street Coffee and mocked all the Gen Zers or whatever they're called waiting in line two hours for yogurt at this weird place called Mimi's.
New Yorker Nowhere has a line of an hour.
I'm telling you, Cara.
You don't recognize you're in a golden age when you're in it.
This is a golden age in New York.
Really?
Packed.
I was there too.
Packed.
Crazy packed.
Packed.
Everywhere.
Last year, 65 million people visited New York, 80 billion in economic activity.
It supports 400,000 jobs.
It used to be 54% of New York's economy.
Now it's 60%.
We've created 1 million jobs since COVID.
There's always an asterisk.
Most of those jobs are healthcare.
So most of the jobs are looking after old people.
But wow, has this.
I went to Sartiano's.
I went to, as usual, Zero Bond and Chez Margot.
Everything is packed.
Everyone is friendly.
No one's at home planning the extinction of the human species.
People are not at home gambling on whether the Fed raises interest rates.
Also, neighborhoods that are usually quiet are down near the memorial.
I was down there.
Tons of people.
You have that festival, San Geronimo, whatever the fuck it is.
I went there and I bought baked oysters.
I mean, it just.
Or fried oysters.
Oh, the Italian one, yeah.
The city, the Disneyland of democracy and capitalism right now is New York.
And it is wonderful.
Trump is visiting his best friend.
It's got after fucking Lutely to do with nothing with Mom Donny.
No, I know it doesn't, but I'm just saying he gets the credit.
He'll get the credit.
Well, okay, fine.
He'll get the credit.
He's doing a good job.
But if you were going to credit anybody, it would be Eric Adams.
And after Mom Donny's out of office, anyway, there's a lag period in government.
That's my whole point.
Fine.
He's still going to get credit.
Because he fills the potholes.
I agree he will get the credit.
My point is New York is just on fire right now.
And the bad news is our inflation is 4.6% versus 3.4%.
It's sort of a metaphor for America.
And that is if you're the right place at the right time, you are just killing it.
If you're the kind of person that shows up for jury duty, your rent's going up too much and you're incurring inflation.
But anyways, it always has to be an asterisk.
My second win, I stumbled on what I think is the coolest nonprofit in the world, and I DMed them and I haven't heard back.
And there's some virtue signaling here, but I'm going to do it anyways.
I have finally found the nonprofit that I was born to support.
It's called Giving Words.
And it's a Virginia nonprofit organization that fixes up, donated used cars, and then gives them away to single mothers.
And one of the biggest barriers to economic independence for single mothers is they can't afford to get to job interviews.
They have to take public transportation in rural areas.
There is no public transportation.
It is a huge barrier to economic independence.
This isn't 1-800-CARS-4-KIDS, right?
That song.
It's not that one.
No, this is not that.
This is not that.
This is...
Edie Brown, this husband and wife, Edie Brown and Ginny, established the charity in 2018 after identifying reliable transportation as a critical obstacle for single mothers trying to access employment, education, and healthcare.
You're going to love this.
They partner with the local high schools and the organization partners with the Automative Technology Program at Louisa County High School in Mineral, Virginia, where students gain hands-on vocational experience repairing the donated vehicles.
And they've refurbished and donated more than 60 free vehicles to families in need.
So Eddie and Jenny, reach out to me.
I'd like to be supportive.
This is about single moms.
It's about economic opportunity.
It's about teaching young men vocational skills.
I just, I read this and I thought, oh my God.
Oh my God, it was designed for Scott, single mom.
I feel like, I'm like, I wish I'd thought of this.
I wish I'd thought of this.
Anyways, my second win and I'm serious, Eddie and Ginny reach out to me.
If you Google me, you get way too much information and can reach out to me.
Oh, my loss.
or my fail is there's all this scuttlebutton reporting about Democratic elders trying to talk Vice President Harris out of running for president.
Vice President Harris, outstanding senator.
I think she'd been outstanding justice.
I thought she was a lousy presidential candidate.
She didn't make it even to Iowa in 2020.
I thought...
She was given a raw deal in 2024, and I will give her this.
I thought she had one of the most outstanding political performances of the last 50 years in her debate with Donald Trump.
I can't imagine the pressure on her.
I do not think she's a good candidate.
The poll sure is number one right now.
I think that's mostly name recognition.
The majority of people who take those polls just say, oh, I've heard of her and I've heard of that handsome guy in California.
I don't think she will make it very far this time, but let her.
Cook.
That's correct.
Thank you, Scott.
I thought you'd say, yeah, that's a good idea.
I hate when elders visit people.
I hate it.
When the Democratic or the Republic machine pick a candidate or try to get Bernie out or say, McCain, you're the right person, it never works.
Let me give you who the people polling number one were in the Republican presidential elections at this moment.
At this moment, polling number one was Rudy Giuliani.
At this moment, polling number one was Herman Cain.
At this moment.
Polling number one was, oh, this is my favorite, Fred Thompson from Law & Order.
He was actually polling number one.
He was good on Law & Order.
The full body contact violence of the primary process not only services the right person, but for the right person for the moment.
Nobody thought Nixon had any business running for president again, again, and again, and he won.
So while I personally don't think Vice President Harris would make a good president.
Let her cook.
She might make a good president.
She doesn't make a good candidate, right?
Who knows?
And guess what?
Are you kidding?
It's such a full fucking bar at this point.
The primary process is like Navy SEALs training.
It produces a fucking warrior when you let it run.
Great, Scott Galloway.
I love that.
I thought you'd say go with the elders.
And the Democratic Party elders.
Don't have a great track record.
Do you know who was at that party?
Chuck Schumer.
He actually looked good.
He looks good for 131.
He looks great.
He looked good.
I would agree with you.
He's got his Wheaties going.
And the only thing the Democratic elders should be doing right now is saying, how can I help?
Have at it.
Also, they should be saying, I'm going to select a retirement community now and move along.
Anyway, we want to hear from you.
Send us your questions about business, tech, or whatever's on your mind.
Go to nymag.com slash pivot to submit a question for the show or call 855-51-PIVOT.
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See you soon.
I don't know what that means.
Today's show is produced by Lara Neiman, Zoe Marcus-Taylor Griffin, and Todd Wiseman.
Kate Gallagher and Brad Sylvester fact-checked this episode.
We'll see.
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We'll be back later this week for another breakdown of all things tech and business.
Governors, representatives, senators, former presidential candidates.
Business people, let them cook.
Have at it.
We'll get to decide.
Altra.
Stay out there.