Dispatch 042: TikTok & Twitter
The curious case of the un-authored Bloomberg report on China exploring the sale of TikTok to Elon Musk – perhaps without the knowledge of ByteDance, or TikTok, or Elon Musk! And since denied by TikTok! Sounds wild, but there are any number of things potentially going on here. And that's in part because it's not a completely crazy idea given all the players involved...
M.G. Siegler
I Think...
🔊 Sonos CEO Out After Botched App Revamp Led to Customer Revolt – Hard to recall such a software-based clusterfuck. But that's the thing, Sonos' hardware is and always has been fantastic. But the software has always been pretty bad – I've personally been complaining about it for well over a decade at this point. Part of it is due to the fact that Sonos was so early in the space – it's easy to forget now, but synced music around the house wasn't a common thing back in the day, certainly not wirelessly – and the technology evolved under them so quickly, with mesh networking now becoming common. So they had to try to build new technology that was still compatible with old technology. And ultimately, it blew up in their faces and cost Patrick Spence his job. Interim CEO Tom Conrad (who, disclosure, is a friend of mine) is a longtime board member and partner to the company (he was on the founding team of Pandora way back when), and truly cares about Sonos and the problem (as troubleshooting text messages can attest). It's the old, "if anyone can fix this" – his intro memo to employees is pitch perfect – but I don't envy the position Tom is stepping into here. [Bloomberg 🔒]
🏀 With Venu Sports Dead, DirecTV Bets That MySports Can Live – If Venu made little-to-no sense at $43/month, MySports makes zero-to-no sense at $70/month. But hey, I guess the death of the former gave some oxygen to the latter – as did YouTube TV continuing to up their pricing. Still, that vMVPD features over 100 channels, this package will have "more than 40" – so you'll save $13/month but lose 60 channels. Including, notably for sports, by which I mean the NFL, CBS. A sports bundle without a good portion of NFL games feels... well, like how Venu was going to feel. Which is why it wasn't going to work. Which is why it's now dead. Still, I'm open to the option of more options – that's what I really want from YouTube TV. In fact, if I could get what MySports is offering for, say, $43/month, I'd probably take it in our world where YouTube TV keeps jacking up rates! Sadly, that's not the MySports deal. So we'll have to wait for the stand-alone ESPN to see if they can offer a true and truly good sports bundle... [THR]
🗣️ Amazon Races to Transplant Alexa’s ‘Brain’ with Generative AI – Yeah, not great when Amazon opts to give an interview to the FT which amounts to: we know everyone is waiting on the next Alexa, but it't not ready yet and it may still be a while... And then every source reveals the obvious reason why: they're completely hamstrung because of the success of the legacy systems – actually not too dissimilar to the Sonos situation above! Prediction #5 for 2025 is looking on point right now, though I appreciate Amazon not shipping until they feel good about what they're going to ship (perhaps Sonos actually taught them a lesson there). And it's even more complicated because they're trying to monetize Alexa at the same time. Good luck with that. [FT 🔒]
🐣 'Free Our Feeds' Wants a Social Media ‘Resistant to Billionaire Influence’ – Yeah, I mean this sounds great on paper – though their website could use some work – but such things rarely work in practice. For all the obvious reasons but namely, people pick products, not protocols. If 'Free Our Feeds' makes a better Bluesky, then we can talk. Until then, it's just the same talk we have had every year for the past two decades. And yet here we are, still on Facebook. Still, without question, the timing is interesting. The complete and total vibe shift at Xitter has opened one door. Meta's recent moderation changes and other strange shifts, another. Meanwhile, the small but steady rise of the Fediverse makes the case a bit more compelling. But even there, competing protocols – this group is backing Bluesky's AT – make it more complicated than it needs to be. I agree with the stance that Bluesky's recent funding likely makes their overall mission untenable, but chicken and egg problems remain. [Verge]
🇪🇺 EU Reassesses Tech Probes into Apple, Google and Meta – Yeah, zero surprise here. (And I really meant for this to be one of my predictions for 2025 – I've been on it for almost a year! – but I forgot it, and really, it was almost too obvious.) While Trump is clearly a key factor, and likely the key factor, it felt like the tide was turning even before the election, with a changing of the EC guard. And before that, the damning Draghi Report in September firmly planted in the minds of many that the EU needs to change their approach if they truly wish to be competitive in the current landscape. That meant being tech-forward, not backwards. And in order to do that, they have to play at least somewhat nicely with American Big Tech companies, rather than trying to fine them out of existence. Per this article though, it sounds like some within the commission are still of the old mindset – and worse, seem to be most concerned that they don't appear to be bowing to pressure from the US and Big Tech here. To that I say, move on. Enjoy the fruits of American tech labor. And try to build with it, not against it. [FT 🔒]
I Wrote...
On the topic of Alexa's launch problems (and the legacy challenges Sonos faces), I feel like my analysis from June pretty much nailed it...
M.G. Siegler
I Note...
- In other launch news, a look at New Glenn, the rocket made by Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin in the hopes of competing with SpaceX in the private commercial space race. The nickname of the booster? "So You’re Telling Me There’s a Chance" as with the launch, they're trying to land the reusable part on the first try. But first, they have to actually launch; they keep getting delayed for various reasons. 🚀 [NYT]
- The UFC is about to start negotiating with ESPN to renew their rights deal. The supposed price they're looking for? Over $1B – more than double the current deal. And they're likely to get it given the other suitors waiting in the wings: Amazon, YouTube, WBD, and Netflix, which just partnered with TKO's sister property, the WWE and is clearly ramping on such live content. (Meta is no longer a player in such rights, sadly for Zuck.) Seems like something Disney would want to lock up for the flagship ESPN streaming launch later this year. 🤼 [Bloomberg 🔒]
- It sounds like Nintendo may be gearing up to announce the Switch 2 this Thursday. The rumor notes that it would be a hardware-only showcase (following all the apparent leaks), with games coming later (February or March). An actual launch date would obviously follow that, so perhaps late Spring/early Summer? 🕹️ [VGC]
- Also coming soon? The ability for anyone (not just Switch Online members) to buy the cute/weird Nintendo Alarmo gadget. ⏰ [Verge]
- It sounds like overheating (water-cooling, so hot right now, sadly, perhaps too literally) and glitch issues are causing some customers to pull back immediate spend on NVIDIA's new GB200 racks. But it also sounds like they're just waiting until the issues are sorted later in the year and for now will buy the chips directly and/or older racks. Heads, NVIDA wins. Tails, NVIDIA wins. 🥵 [Information 🔒]
- IAC is spinning off Angi and oddly, their CEO. And while some of Joey Levin's old direct reports will now report to Barry Diller (with others reporting to COO Christopher Halpin), he explicitly isn't taking the CEO title back. So they currently have no CEO. 💼 [CNBC]
- Per the link up top, while the EU is reassessing interactions with American Big Tech, several investigations are ongoing – Apple's tweaked and obfuscated fee structure being one focal point – with some nearing completion. They probably have about, say, six days to do something without facing immediate blowback. 🇪🇺 [Bloomberg 🔒]
- The creator of Succession, Jesse Armstrong, has locked in his next project: not a new show, but a movie for HBO, centered on "four friends who meet up during the turmoil of an ongoing international financial crisis". 🎬 [Deadline]
I Quote...
"I would rather stare at a language I can't understand than to ever use a social media that Mark Zuckerberg owns."
-- Candacce, a user of Xiaohongshu, a Chinese app which shot to the top of the US App Store in a sort of protest vote against the impending banning of TikTok. That's one answer to the question as to why Instagram or Threads or Facebook itself isn't siphoning off those users – at least not yet.
We're now in a full-on Zucklash, it seems!
It really is sort of wild for the app to go #1 overall on the US chart since it's entirely in Chinese. And while it's sort of fun to read about Chinese users trying to help the American app refugees navigate the app – which is more like Instagram than TikTok and focuses on recommendations – you have to imagine that if it were popular enough, it would also be banned for the same reasons that TikTok is being banned. (Or sold, per above.) Interestingly enough, Lemon8, the ByteDance-owned service which is clearly being set up as the "life raft" from TikTok is more or less a Xiaohongshu clone. Though if Xiaohongshu is likely to be banned, you can bet Lemon8 will be.
Fun/strange times in social media.
I Spy...
Robert De Niro in... cargo shorts. No, this wasn't made by AI. It's the marquee photo in the NYT profile about De Niro's new Nobu hotel in the Caribbean.
Aside: I had no idea De Niro was involved in making Nobu a thing 30 years ago.
