Since the age of five I've enjoyed peeing outdoors. Forty years later, peeing has become something I must do several dozen times a day, and I don't like the outdoors. But life mimics math, and the product of two negatives is a positive. More math: Grilled cheese or tomato soup as individuals I find boring. But together, they're my favorite thing at the Crosby Hotel bar. God, I miss eating at bars alone, with strangers around me.
I'm staying alone in Montauk at a friend's house while he's in Portugal (something about taxes and quality of life). After my morning coffee and power shake, it's time to water the plants. Look, it's a bayberry plant, and there's a crape myrtle. I hear something and startle. I just came from Montana, where everyone tells you to be mindful of bears. My fear escalates to DEFCON 2 when I see not a bear, but five men standing in the backyard witnessing my divertissement. Four of them are wearing cargo shorts and could be quadruplets. The fifth is in a suit. The only guy that wears a suit on 92-degree Saturday morning is a real estate broker. Now I remember, the broker is showing the house this morning.
They act like my Vizsla when she's done something wrong: freeze in their tracks and avoid eye contact. Who would blame them.
The smartest and most noble people in the world according to the IRS, DC, and CNBC are really, really rich people who made their money in tech. The Jesus Christs of our generation. More than that innovators. So, taking my cues from our role models, I turn to the five men and say:
"We live in a great country. I was raised by a single mother who lived and died a secretary."
This week, the CEOs of the largest tech firms were all under consensual hallucination that an emotional opening statement absolves you of monopoly abuse. Bezos must have thought he was being filmed for his A&E biography. Pregnant teen mom, immigrant father, we get it, you were once poor.
Jesus (i.e., Elon), make them stop.
Scott Galloway
Struck me right away that the GOP seemed to be more prone to questions about a lack of patriotism when questioning the one brown guy, Pichai. The wordAmerican popped up 15 times in questions to Sundar Pichai, a US citizen born in Madurai, India. To Zuckerberg, whose platform has wreaked considerable damage on American elections, American politics, and American news, the word was only used nine times. Representatives on the panel felt the need to remind the witness what country we live in just once when questioning the guys born in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and Mobile, Alabama.
For the first two hours the witness who was subjected to the toughest grilling was Jack Dorsey. Of course, Mr. Dorsey wasn't there. Any problem regarding the rage machine that is Twitter has nothing to do with antitrust. Forcing the microblogging platform to divest Kanye's account, and let it trade on the NASDAQ, doesn't make much sense.
Or does it?
Many of the GOP panelists came to the wrong hearing. Twitter is worth $29 billion; the others are worth an average $1.23 trillion. I know, market cap isn't a signal of monopoly behavior that warrants antitrust. But here's the thing it is. To be fair, if Jack had testified, we'd only really understand the respective scale of the problem if Jack were 2 inches tall and weighed 4 pounds. Pretty sure the last sentence is a hate crime.
Rep. Jayapal stood out as the most effective examiner on the committee. Her questioning of Bezos around third-party seller data was pointed and effective, as well as her grilling Zuckerberg over copying apps. Politicians are sometimes overmatched in these hearings, but Rep. Jayapal demonstrated she was more than talented enough to have been in the opposite seat, testifying in front of Congress about the anticompetitive practices of her firm but instead decided to serve her country.
The Samurais of the world's greatest deliberative bodies increasingly have one thing in common: pantsuits. Reps Jayapal, Porter, Ocasio-Cortez, and Senator Warren have created a super-featherweight class whose fists of preparation and faculty make Floyd Mayweather uneasy. They will likely play a central role in the breakup of the world's most powerful firms. However, this pales in comparison to another contribution there are likely millions of young women who watch them and think, "Why not me?"
When they weren't questioning Pichai's patriotism, most of the Republicans on the committee spent their time complaining about alleged bias against conservatives, rather than addressing the actual subject of the hearing: antitrust. Were they just playing to the millions who watch Fox News? That's half right. They are playing to one person who watches Fox News. It's clear most Republicans still fear Trump and are desperate to please him. The persecution complex plays well, especially on Fox.
Scott Galloway
There is no conservative bias on Facebook. There is a "bias" (open community guidelines) against spreading dangerous health information. It's just that the two (conservative sources and misinformation) are often one and the same. But a "conservative bias" might as well mean, "the best place to get your conservative news, conservative opinion, and conservative conspiracy theories fed to you in a constant drip feed of enragement." In May, a study found that most of the top news publishers by interactions lean right (as they have for years). The top ten political publishers with highest engagement are: Ben Shapiro, Breitbart, NowThis, The Hill, The Western Journal, The Young Turks, The Blaze, IJR, Washington Examiner, and CNN Politics.
Scott Galloway
Two "oops I f----d up and told the truth, corrections coming":
David Cicilline, chairman of the committee, claims he's from the first district of Rhode Island. He's not fooling us. He's clearly from Ronkonkoma and he's a Michael, not a David. Anyway, Chairman Cicilline comes across both very smart and as someone who, when you order a frozen mai tai from a lobster stand in Westhampton, would lean over and recommend an extra rum floater. And he'd be right.
Rep. Cicilline's opening statement gave me hope: "This investigation has been bipartisan from the start As my colleague Congressman Ken Buck recently commented, and I quote, 'This is the most bipartisan effort that I've been involved with in five and a half years of Congress.'" His rhetoric was also powerful: "Our founders did not bow before a king, and we should not bow before the emperors of the online economy."
We should also stop thinking of the breakup of big tech as punishment for doing something wrong, or that they're bad people. We break companies up to restore competition to markets, which is the gangster app for a growing economy that demands better behavior. As a result, there are more options from other players who must then behave better.
So, I've decided to run for the Democratic nomination to challenge Senator Rubio in 2022. I've already drafted my closing remarks for a similar upcoming Senate panel:
"Mr. Cook, you are an inspiration and reek of grace. Mr. Pichai, you are the best of America, an exceptional young immigrant who creates greatness in the agency of others. Mr. Bezos, you are just so damn rich, and even more jacked we should roll. And Mr. Zuckerberg, you are an awful person, but a brilliant business mind. Your successes are nothing short of remarkable. It must be tremendously rewarding to know your grit, intellect, and vision took your firms to heights that made it difficult not to abuse your positions of power. Our separation of your assets will unlock tremendous value for tens, if not hundreds, of millions of people. Well done, and thank you."
This may be (and I've said this before) the beginning of the end of big tech. However, it could also be a new beginning for the country, entrepreneurs, and markets. I find it all quite exciting. It makes me want to venture outside.
READ MORE:Popular NYU professor Scott Galloway has a new course on business strategy anyone can sign up to take I took away MBA-like insights for way less money than going to business school
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