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Ben and James discuss Senator Warren’s proposal to break up Big Tech, including why its history is wrong, why details matter, and what needs to be done instead. Plus, Spotify’s antitrust complaint against Apple. Links Senator Elizabeth Warren: Here’s how we can break up Big Tech — Medium Ben Thompson: Where Warren’s Wrong — Stratechery Ben Thompson: Amazon’s Price Parity Provision, The Amazon Marketplace Question — Stratechery Daily Update Five Fast Facts About Apple’s Anti-competitive Behavior — Time To Play Fair (Spotify Website) Ben Thompson: Spotify Files Antitrust Complaint Against Apple, Spotify and Warren, More Amazon Marketplace Changes — Stratechery Daily … Continue reading Episode 166 — Fence-building vs. Axe-wielding

Ben and James discuss Mark Zuckerberg’s latest missive, whether Facebook is actually changing anything, and wonder if the company will ever tell the unvarnished truth. Links Mark Zuckerberg: A Privacy-Focused Vision for Social Networking — Facebook Ben Thompson: Facebook’s Privacy Cake — Stratechery Ben Thompson: Facebook, Phones, and Phonebooks — Stratechery Ben Thompson: The Social/Communications Map — Stratechery After an “identity crisis,” Social Capital CEO Chamath Palihapitiya says he’s taught himself how to be happy again — Recode Ben Thompson: The Audacity of Copying Well — Stratechery Ben Thompson: Messaging: Mobile’s Killer App — Stratechery Ben Thompson: Open, Closed, and … Continue reading Episode 165 — Mark Zuckerberg’s Projected Self

Ben and James discuss Amazon, Walmart, and groceries, Google Cloud versus AWS, and why understanding value chains helps evaluate business opportunities. Links Ben Thompson: The Value Chain Constraint — Stratechery Ben Thompson: Walmart’s Earnings, Walmart’s Grocery Business, Amazon’s Grocery Stumbles — Stratechery Daily Update Ben Thompson: Amazon the Black Swan — Stratechery Ben Thompson: Amazon’s New Customer — Stratechery Ben Thompson: Walmart and the Multichannel Trap — Stratechery Ben Thompson: Google Cloud Changes CEOs, Layers of Surprise (or Not), The VMWare Analogy — Stratechery Ben Thompson: The Amazon Tax — Stratechery Ben Thompson: Venture Capital and the Internet’s Impact — … Continue reading Episode 164 — Valuing Value Chains

Ben and James discuss Apple News as it is today, where Apple wants to take it in the future, and why publishers should push back. Links Ben Thompson: The Cost of Apple News — Stratechery Ben Thompson: What Direct-to-Consumer Publishers are Selling — Stratechery Daily Update Apple News’s Radical Approach: Humans Over Machines — New York Times Publishers Chafe at Apple’s Terms for Subscription News Service — Wall Street Journal Ben Thompson: Apple Should Buy Netflix — Stratechery The Report of the 2020 Group — New York Times Hosts Ben Thompson, @benthompson, Stratechery James Allworth, @jamesallworth, Harvard Business Review Podcast … Continue reading Exponent 163 — Publishers vs Apple News

Ben and James discuss Spotify’s move into podcasts and integration and modularity in value chains. Links Ben Thompson: Spotify’s Podcast Aggregation Play — Stratechery Ben Thompson: Lessons From Spotify — Stratechery Ben Thompson: Podcasts, Analytics, and Centralization — Stratechery Ben Thompson: The Future of Podcasting — Stratechery Ben Thompson: The BuzzFeed Lesson — Stratechery Hosts Ben Thompson, @benthompson, Stratechery James Allworth, @jamesallworth, Harvard Business Review Podcast Information Feed iTunes SoundCloud Twitter Feedback https://media.blubrry.com/exponent/content.blubrry.com/exponent/exponent162.mp3Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadSubscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS

Ben and James discuss Apple vs Facebook (and Google!). Links Josh Constine: Facebook Pays Teens to Install VPN That Spies on Them — TechCrunch Facebook’s Onavo Gives Social-Media Firm Inside Peek at Rivals’ Users — Wall Street Journal Ben Thompson: Facebook Versus Apple — Stratechery Daily Update Ben Thompson: Manifestos and Monopolies — Stratechery Andrew Bosworth Memo — BuzzFeed Hosts Ben Thompson, @benthompson, Stratechery James Allworth, @jamesallworth, Harvard Business Review Podcast Information Feed iTunes SoundCloud Twitter Feedback https://media.blubrry.com/exponent/content.blubrry.com/exponent/exponent161.mp3Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadSubscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS

Ben and James discuss Netflix, why it is an Aggregator, and why Disney isn’t actually a competitor Links Ben Thompson: Netflix Flexes — Stratechery Ben Thompson: Netflix and the Conservation of Attractive Profits — Stratechery Ben Thompson: Apple Should Buy Netflix — Stratechery Ben Thompson: Why TV Has Resisted Disruption — Stratechery Ben Thompson: Why Disney and ESPN Will Be OK — Stratechery Hosts Ben Thompson, @benthompson, Stratechery James Allworth, @jamesallworth, Harvard Business Review Podcast Information Feed iTunes SoundCloud Twitter Feedback https://media.blubrry.com/exponent/content.blubrry.com/exponent/exponent160.mp3Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadSubscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS

Ben and James discuss open source in a cloud world, how enterprise value chains have changed, and AWS versus Microsoft. Links Ben Thompson: AWS, MongoDB, and the Economic Realities of Open Source — Stratechery Ben Thompson: How Google is Challenging AWS — Stratechery Satya Nadella on Microsoft — Stratechery Daily Update Hosts Ben Thompson, @benthompson, Stratechery James Allworth, @jamesallworth, Harvard Business Review Podcast Information Feed iTunes SoundCloud Twitter Feedback https://media.blubrry.com/exponent/content.blubrry.com/exponent/exponent159.mp3Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadSubscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS

Ben and James discuss Apple’s revenue warning and the company’s shift to services. Links Ben Thompson: Apple’s Errors — Stratechery Letter from Tim Cook to Apple Investors — Apple Ben Thompson: Two Bears — Stratechery Ben Thompson: Apple’s China Problem — Stratechery Ben Thompson: CES and the Unification of Computing and Consumer Electronics, Google Assistant and Integration, The Modular Competition — Stratechery Daily Update Ben Thompson: The Android Detour — Stratechery Ben Thompson: Apple Should Buy Netflix — Stratechery Hosts Ben Thompson, @benthompson, Stratechery James Allworth, @jamesallworth, Harvard Business Review Podcast Information Feed iTunes SoundCloud Twitter Feedback https://media.blubrry.com/exponent/content.blubrry.com/exponent/exponent158.mp3Podcast: Play in … Continue reading Episode 158 — A Significant Shift

James and Ben talk about the connection between Jobs to be Done and Aggregation Theory, why the consumer and enterprise markets are so different, and discomfort with big companies like Google. Links Ben Thompson: Aggregators and Jobs-to-be-Done — Stratechery Ben Thompson: The Scooter Economy — Stratechery Ben Thompson: Aggregation Theory — Stratechery Ben Thompson: The Jobs TV Does — Stratechery Ben Thompson: The State of Technology at the End of 2018 — Stratechery Ben Thompson: What Clayton Christensen Got Wrong — Stratechery Ben Thompson: Data Factories — Stratechery Ben Thompson: Slack versus Teams — Stratechery Ben Thompson: Antitrust, the App … Continue reading Episode 157 — Clumping and Clustering