Elon Musk on Saturday Night Live and the dogecoin tumble

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Kara Swisher: Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher. And I'm here to announce that I am the first musical guest on SNL that has erectile dysfunction. It's out there. It's out there. I'm going to be talking about that. You hold on to me. Because we're going to get to that. It's time.

Scott Galloway: But Kara was right. But anyway, we're going to get to it. What were you right about? I mean, you're always right.

Kara Swisher: He wouldn't be terrible. You said he'd be terrible. What a victory for you.

Scott Galloway: He wouldn't be terrible. He was actually good. He was actually good.

Kara Swisher: Hold on, hold on. Let's just put a pin in that. I promised myself I wasn't going to talk about that. Put a pin in it. Put a pin in it.

Scott Galloway: Do you really think, okay, not he. Do you think that was a good show?

Kara Swisher: Yeah, I do. For them, I watch it all the time. So yes, yes.

Scott Galloway: You thought that was a better than average.

Kara Swisher: Let's get to it in the big story. We're not going to talk about this yet. We're not going to do other things. So just a couple things that are going on. Obviously, the first one, the Pentagon is considering pulling a plug on the Jedi Cloud computing project. It was fought over by Amazon and Microsoft for years. Donald Trump seemed to have put himself in the middle of it, pulled it away from Amazon, went to Microsoft. Both very qualified companies, but Donald Trump sort of tarnished it. And now the Pentagon's like, oh, I don't want to pick. It's been too tainted. So what do you think?

Scott Galloway: Nothing is more impressive than a weak and feeble government. We're unwinding four years of incompetence. And it's a shame because you pointed out this is important work.

Kara Swisher: Yep, important work.

Scott Galloway: So it's just delayed our ability to respond to threats. And they're going to end up probably having to redo the whole thing.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, exactly. I think they were like, hands off. We don't want to defend Microsoft because Trump sort of weighed in there. It's all dirty and we have to redo it. It's a redo. It's a redo. Same thing with this major gas pipeline in the Northeast was hacked by ransomware over the weekend. This is a common thing that's happened to hospitals and other things. The latest attack prompted the Biden administration to hold an emergency meeting, whether to strengthen executive orders protecting federal agencies go far enough. This is another mess. SolarWinds came during the Trump administration, which was a huge hacking of the federal government and others via this other software. It was sort of a, it's hard. We had Nicole on to talk about it. But again, this, she talked about ransomware and these problems. And here it is again. So another cleanup situation, cleanup in aisle two, I guess.

Scott Galloway: Yeah, this is, I know it's several small businesses that have been, I don't know what the term is, their systems get locked and then they get an email saying, I need $80,000 in Bitcoin. And the scary part is a lot of them I know end up paying it. And it's weird, this will have a lot of impact. These are proxy wars, right? So, A, there's great money involved, but B, if you're China or Russia and trying to weaken your perceived enemies at a very cost-effective level, cyberterrorism is the most effective weapon ever developed or cyber warfare. And also, it doesn't lead to nuclear war. I don't care how big the cyber attack is, it's unlikely to escalate to actual bombs or missiles. And so it's very frightening. Fortunately, I think we have a lot of smart people on it. The other thing is I think it ends up being the Achilles heel for crypto because the currency of exchange around ransomware and even money laundering is turning out to be crypto. And I wonder – and this might be the red herring or the excuse the government uses to step in and regulate this. But this is all – the currency for this type of crime is usually the decentralized nature or advantages of crypto.

Kara Swisher: Yeah. What are your thoughts?

Scott Galloway: Well, I think it's just – look, I think there's a lot of problems here with all these vulnerabilities that we have. And I think it wasn't maintained and Trump fired all the people that were involved in it, the good people. And so we're picking up, you know, right as we're having all, the U.S. was responsible for a lot of these people to be able to have these tools and things like that. We have a very porous country in lots of ways. We're very able to be attacked. We were very good at attacking. And so I think this is going to be one of the big issues of the day is how, as we become more interconnected, how we prevent this kind of stuff. This is a major gas pipeline. There was a water system. Some are ransomware. Some are for hacking. Some are for intelligence. Some are for just money. This group says it's only for money and it only does, it seems, it had like a list of like ways they do this. It's still a crime, basically. And so, you know, they're going to have to put systems in place to protect our national infrastructure and to prevent these ransomware attacks from going on. It's really a difficult thing. But yeah, you're right. Everything has become more digitized. It becomes more vulnerable, more and more vulnerable. And, you know, I just assume everything is vulnerable at this point. And, you know, here's the look of the Pentagon having to dump this contract. Same thing. It's really critical that our federal government should have the very best and most hacker proof or attack proof, including in states and local governments and everything else. But there's just too much surface, as they say. There's too much surface.

Kara Swisher: There's too much surface here. And speaking of surface, there was a Wall Street Journal article, surface of attack is what I'm saying, reporting that Melinda Gates first talked to a divorce attorney in 2019, which was around when Bill Gates' connections to Jeffrey Epstein were made public. I thought this – I didn't understand the Jeffrey Epstein part. I see that they were unhappy for a long time. This is not a huge revelation. Usually marriages don't just collapse. And 2019 wasn't that long ago. And maybe the pandemic interrupted. A lot of people are getting divorced during the pandemic or have decided to and escalate. It escalates already existing problems. But I thought the connections with Jeffrey Epstein at this point are very tenuous at best. He visited him, for sure, knew him, went to the house. But still, I find it a strange article.

Scott Galloway: Yeah, it really feels like feeding into this whole, all right, he's— I mean, I think really wealthy people don't deserve a hall pass and the idolatry that exempts them from scrutiny or regulatory standards, et cetera. But at the same time, I don't think being really wealthy means that a legitimate news outlet should start inferring. I mean, basically, let's call this what it is. He had contact with Jeffrey Epstein. So they're inferring that Bill Gates has done something wrong. And it's- I'm not sure what they were inferring because it didn't go anywhere.

Kara Swisher: It was a-

Scott Galloway: Well, that's the whole point.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, but even by, when the Wall Street Journal says something like that, and that's essentially what they're saying. Like, uh-oh, where there's smoke, there's fire. And I just- The only thing that was in there was I think Melinda Gates was made uncomfortable by him and didn't want to do stuff with him. And Gates continued. And at the time before he was convicted, he definitely was a figure in the philanthropy circles and thought of as a genius guy. I don't follow Epstein.

Scott Galloway: Well, okay. I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that this may not be the first time that a wife is uncomfortable with who her husband hangs out with. I just – I've heard that a few times before. I have trouble believing that Melinda Gates – look, I don't know the relationship. It's none of our business, quite frankly. I have trouble believing that their divorce started to fray because she was angry that he was hanging. It just feels like so clickbaity beyond –

Kara Swisher: It was. I don't think it was quite all there. What's your point here? What's your evidence? What are you saying? It just – and I don't believe – I have trouble – and supposedly lawyers are going on background. It just felt really like – it felt really like shoddy journalism. I would like to see actual reporting here if that's the case. And that's the issue. I mean, it was the same thing around vaccines that he was put, all the rumors. Gates has been like a magnet for the vax rumors, which is weird. But this was a little funny. I was just going to say, just before I got on here, someone, I'm not going to go into it, but I was at a dinner 100 years ago, hundreds of people. And Epstein was sitting three or four seats down. Apparently, I didn't even meet him. and someone was insinuating that I knew something. I'm keeping things.

Scott Galloway: Oh, I'm sorry. I don't feel safe around you.

Kara Swisher: It was ridiculous. I never even spoke to him. But again, guilt, it's not even guilt by association. It's guilt by proximity.

Scott Galloway: Yeah, I didn't know quite how to respond because I was like, someone was like, oh, it's so sad, Kara Swisher. I was like, I was at a dinner of hundreds of people and he was sitting three seats down and I don't, I never even met him. Like, okay, what do you want me to do? Like leap the table and kill him at that point? It was weird. It was a weird, I get it. It was like, but what was interesting And it's just Twitter, so I don't really care. But all these people were like, ah, she's involved in the Epstein scandal. I'm like, literally at a dinner of hundreds of people. It was so strange. Which, by the way, many people were at. I don't know how you can make the whole room guilty for being in the same room. There's a lot of this going on.

Kara Swisher: Strange.

Scott Galloway: There's – did you see the – oh, I'm not even going to go. There was a total hit piece in the New York Times on Andrew Yang and Bradley Tusk.

Kara Swisher: I didn't think that was that much of a hit. They're controversial. Bradley Tusk is a controversial – I know Bradley, by the way, and by association. I actually have had lunch with him.

Scott Galloway: Do you think? I don't know. What? What? I don't know. Okay, let's review. This is typical political reporting. Come on. Let's review. People are concerned about his conflict of interest. The only people concerned are people shilling other candidates. And their big smoking gun was that Andrew Yang said he liked scooters.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, that was a joke.

Scott Galloway: And Bradley Tusk has an investment in Lyme. And by the way, Andrew made that statement before he met Bradley Tusk. It's like it was a hit piece where the blows don't land. And it's like, what is the point of this article?

Kara Swisher: Look, Bradley Tusk is a character. You know, I dealt with Bradley a lot because of the Uber stuff. He worked for Uber for a while. And so he's definitely thrown some punches. And he's, you know, he's a fascinating figure. And I think he's, you know, just like a lot of political figures, he happens to be a local one in New York. And he was deputy, I think, governor, right? Or whatever. He was deputy governor in Illinois. He worked for Schumer. He basically was a mastermind by the Bloomberg election. And God forbid, now he's financially very successful. So, uh-oh. I think the idea was, here's the people influencing Andrew Yang, which he's very much a part of that campaign. And so he's a high-profile political operative. And you're going to get that story. And I think it's a totally justifiable story. And if you're a political reporter in doing that. is the question is, is there actual influence? We'll see, but pointing out the relationship, I think is important. Who's the people around the candidate who's ahead for this job, which many people feel he's unqualified for? I know you're a supporter of him, but a lot of people think he's not qualified for this job. And I think that's a legitimate thing to talk about. When you read that- Including his, by the way, let me just finish. Including his entrepreneurial history. And I think they've been doing those pieces. And that's fair game if you're running for mayor for New York, but go ahead.

Scott Galloway: Andrew Yang, the byline on this is Andrew Yang's relationship with Bradley Tusk, a tech investor has raised concerns about conflicts of interest if he is elected. And it literally, okay, so who is not, by the evidence they roll out here, then essentially, unless you're a junior at Berkeley and your only accomplishment is writing for Mother Jones, then everyone is conflicted and raises concerns. It creates this like when you have some platform as credible as The New York Times and you have that sort of headline, it kind of creates this notion that, again, guilt by proximity. The reporting here never – you read it and you go – you kept waiting for something that appeared to be an actual conflict and that might not serve the citizens of New York to a greater conflict than any other campaign ever. It just – like what was the point? It felt –

Kara Swisher: Well, I'll put the question back to you. Okay. It struck me that, okay, the New York Times does not want Yang to be mayor. Is that fair?

Scott Galloway: No, I think he's the frontrunner.

Kara Swisher: No, I don't think that. I think that's unfair. You think it's just scrutiny of the frontrunner?

Scott Galloway: I think he's the frontrunner, and Bradley Tusk is a high-profile political operative. And pointing out their relationship is important. I think they didn't lay a glove on him in this particular one. And pointing out his entrepreneurial history, since he talks about it, is a good idea. So I think this is all about being the frontrunner. and you're gonna get a story about his wife, you're gonna get a story about, and no front runner thinks it's fair, right? Nobody like if whoever it was Maya Wiley they be doing like okay here the things let tell you about her And when it looks like you know a lot of people in New York by the way every time I interview someone who in New York or they like even Fran Leibowitz was like who is this guy Like what? Like, and so I think he's just, I think it's front runner scrutiny. Some of the pieces will land, some of the pieces won't. Look, Olivia Nessie actually wrote a great piece in New York Magazine about the Biden administration. I think she had a great line. She said they, you know, the way that he got attacked by the press through the early campaign, especially being out of touch, he said it made them bitter and brittle and they're still bitter and brittle. Like they don't like the press, even though you think about the Trump administration as being bad with the press. She was making the argument.

Kara Swisher: Yeah. Nobody likes her coverage.

Scott Galloway: No, that's what I mean. And so they're going to, he's the front runner. That's what it says. Some of the stories are going to be good. Some of the stories are going to be unfair, but they're looking for stuff about him to sort of try to put him in a place because they probably think he's going to win. Or he is in front by a lot, really quite a lot. And you have, it's very fair to complain about an inexperienced person running a complex city like New York. He's a very lovely guy. I know you both, I both know him, but I got to say, I'm like, wow, he could have, he could use a little more experience to be doing something quite so serious. That's what I would say. I think that's a fair criticism. I think that would be an interesting, valid story. I think creating this notion of wrongdoing or, I don't know. They didn't land. Neither of them. No one cares about his entrepreneur experience, and this one didn't land.

Kara Swisher: Well, it appears in the New York Times, though.

Scott Galloway: Well, we'll see. Guilt by proximity.

Kara Swisher: All right. Guilt by proximity. You're right. You're right. And I'm sure there'll be now a picture of someone bad sitting next to them 10 seats away at a movie theater.

Scott Galloway: Well, you know what? Andrew Yang uses Microsoft Windows. I don't know if you've heard, but Bill Gates has hung out with Jeffrey Upstead. So this guy is not qualified to be mayor.

Kara Swisher: Oh, Scott. You know, you act like newspapers don't sometimes just not make mistakes. Just like it's a process, let's just say. Anyway, let's go. Speaking of media, we're going to go into big stories. We were live tweeting and the internet watched as Elon Musk's host at SNL and his beloved cryptocurrency Dogecoin took a tumble. Among the moments on the show, Elon called the cryptocurrency a hustle. [Audio clip plays] "My question is, what is Dogecoin? I'm glad you asked. It's a good question. Well, it's the future of currency. It's an unstoppable financial vehicle that's going to take over the world. I get that, but what is it, man? I keep telling you, it's a cryptocurrency you can trade for conventional money. Oh, so it's a hustle. Yeah, it's a hustle." That sent the steadily climbing stock tumbling, crashing by 30%, although the crypto token is still up more than 10,000% in price this year. Almost immediately after Elon Musk made his first appearance, Robinhood was forced to pause all crypto trading order updates. As a reminder, Robinhood had to make a similar pause back during the GameStop frenzy. But then the next morning, Elon tweeted that his space exploration company, SpaceX, which has contracts with NASA, is still launching a satellite called Doge One on a mission paid for with Dogecoin. By the way, this month, the House passed a bill, which is backed by crypto lobbyists, to create a working group to regulate digital assets, which they should be doing. I don't really care who backs it. So what do you think, Scott?

Scott Galloway: He was somewhat funny, correct? You were expecting disaster as we can go to our tape. No, I wasn't expecting a disaster. Look, I think it's a huge win for him.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, talk about why you think this, because you were critical of this appearance. You were.

Scott Galloway: Look, if you had Annie Leibovitz photograph your daughter's bat mitzvah, little Rachel is going to look gorgeous. It's going to be great for the family. And Annie Leibovitz's reputation goes down. So in this instance, Rachel is Elon Musk. And Elon Musk, Saturday Night Live, think about SNL as a concept. Okay. All right. Okay. For 41 years, it has been one of the greatest amalgams of creativity, writing, set design, courage, intersection between politics, society, and economy, venue. I mean, I watched The A-Team for two years. I've watched Happy Days for five years, Breaking Bad for eight years, Game of Thrones for eight years, and Meet the Press for 20 years. And I've been watching SNL for 40 years. What they have pulled off, the talent there. Lauren Michaels. The talent there is extraordinary.

Kara Swisher: Yeah.

Scott Galloway: It's Lorne Michaels. Let's give him this. Lorne Michaels. When Annie Leibovitz shows up to Rachel's Bat Mitzvah, Rachel's going to look great. So it was a huge win for Elon Musk. I mean, this was like, talk about likability police. Like, I have Asperger's and here's my mom. I mean, okay, I thought he was going to talk about his new book on gender balance and personal loss. I mean, it was like literally, it is huge. He was very fuzzy. He was warm and fuzzy. Huge, huge win for him. Quite frankly, I think it was a-

Kara Swisher: It was the charming part of Elon. Let's be clear. There's lots of parts of Elon, you know, and he managed to poke fun at himself. He's the richest guy in the world. He had a good time. He had a good time. It was a, look, it was a big W for him.

Scott Galloway: Did you see that? I was like, wow, barn door horse. I was shocked at that. The guy who said in March of last year, by April, cases would be at zero. I know. And the whole panic over the pandemic was stupid. Yeah. And called stay-at-home orders fascist. Anyways, a huge win for him. He came across as likable. I thought he was funnier than – he was the least funny person who's ever been on that program. And he's probably the funniest guy. He's absolutely the funniest founder of an automobile company. He's funnier than – let me just say what I was saying to you last week was he's a very funny guy. He's actually compared to a lot – most of these people are humorless. Elon is not humorless.

Kara Swisher: No, he's got a good sense of humor. He does. It's juvenile at some points, but it's actually – he did – he was – what I kept thinking was, oh, my God. He put on another costume. He had another costume. Like, he was game. And you know that? It looked like he was enjoying himself. Good for him. It was a nice moment. I thought it was really nice with his mom.

Scott Galloway: Yeah. But I don't. I think the loser. Asperger's thing. Yeah. No getting around it. A win for him. A win for him.

Kara Swisher: All right. So what do you think about his, the only thing that I called attention to was when he said to the moon, and I think he was, there's a lot of different memes going on. My son informs me. But do you think the SEC will investigate that?

Scott Galloway: I don't think so. I think they're not a glove to put on. No, I don't know if the SEC will investigate. The thing, that was a totally— The hustle was a joke. He could say it was a joke. The, there wasn't a, everything about that show was forgettable. The thing we will see over and over in hearings is when Elon Musk said it's a hustle.

Kara Swisher: Yeah.

Scott Galloway: And if you look at the volatility of Dogecoin in the last week, it doubled. And we're talking about an increase in $30 or $40 billion in market capitalization. And then it peaked that day. And then by the time Weekend Update came on, it had like lost the value of Clorox. I mean, it went down $20, $30 billion. And so the question is, but it's free speech. So I don't know how you go after him for that. If, you know, he's creating to a certain extent that one of the criticisms of Dogecoin is it has no business use. But at the same time, if he starts launching rockets and people pay in Doge to launch their satellites, that creates a business use case. I think he's – it was a joke. He could say it was a joke. I don't know what else to say. I think it was a win for him. He looks – you know, think about – I was – someone asked me who – We're talking about his appearance, not Doge.

Kara Swisher: Yeah.

Scott Galloway: What other person could pull this off among the billionaires? You know, Bezos, maybe. Mark Zuckerberg has been on SNL just for a second when he stood next to Jesse Eisenberg during the social network. Never could do it. Never could do it. You know, Tim Cook, forget it. Jobs is the only one who I think could actually pull it off. And he's not living, obviously. But maybe Gates because he's such a, you know, goofball, that kind of thing. But I'm trying to think of, like, who would be any good? Sergey Brin?

Kara Swisher: Well, yeah, but that's the point. The point is this incredible. Influencer beyond. The point is when you have David Chappelle or you have Adele, you have incredible artists. There's this nitro and glycerin of creativity and artisanship that is fantastic. I think when you bring on Donald Trump or George Steinbrenner or Mayor Giuliani, I think it's great for them. I don't think it's great for the show or it's great for comedy. But anyways. I don't think this was bad for the show. I don't think it was bad for the show. It was a big part of the conversation. A big part. I think they got a lot. I'll be very good. Have you seen the ratings? I'm very curious what the ratings are.

Scott Galloway: Third highest rated show of the season, besides Dave Chappelle and one other. Third highest rated show of the season.

Kara Swisher: God, good for them.

Scott Galloway: Yeah, it did very well. It did very well. Smart for them. The PR team at Tesla and Elon Musk should be feeling very good about themselves. I thought it was a big win for him.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, agreed. Okay. All right, Scott, let's go on a quick break. We'll be back to talk to reporter and author Brad Stone about his new book, Amazon Unbound. And we can ask him if he thinks Jeff Bezos will now go on to SNL as the next billionaire.

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Kara Swisher: Okay, let's bring on our friend of Pivot. Let's move on to another billionaire. Brad Stone is the author of the new book, Amazon Unbound. It's out this week. He is senior executive editor at Bloomberg and of course wrote the book, The Everything Store, which was the first part in this probably multi-part series that Brad has been doing. Brad, welcome to Pivot.

Brad Stone: Thanks, Cara.

Kara Swisher: So tell me about this. Obviously you were going to do a sequel because when did Everything Store and did this begin? I just, I don't recall. What was the, when last we saw Jeff Bezos, essentially.

Brad Stone: Yeah, I'm a glutton for punishment. The Everything Store was really about the first 15 years of Amazon. It came out in 2013, but really it's the rise during the dot-com boom, the near death during the dot-com bust, and then the remarkable reinvention with the Kindle and AWS and Prime, which kind of brings you to 2011 or so. And obviously, over the last few years, with Alexa and with Prime Video and with Jeff's remarkable transformation into a master of the universe and the subject of tabloid interest, I thought there is more of the story to tell.

Kara Swisher: All right. So what are you thinking about the next iteration of Bezos away from Amazon and that period of time now in this? Why are you calling it Amazon Unbound?

Brad Stone: Well, what I mean by that is sort of unbound from the kind of normal rules of gravity that seem to impact most large businesses. You know, the bigger you are, the more complex bureaucracy, the less likely you are to invent new things, the more boring you become. And Amazon has been kind of immune from that, right, with all the new stuff and with the massive acceleration of its core business. I mean, the first thing that I realized as I set out to do this was even the core business has started to grow faster over the past few years. And that's because, well, for many reasons, but, you know, the delivery centers are closer to our homes and they're doing their own transportation and they've been able to keep prices low. So Unbound, it kind of conveys how special the business is and a kind of invincibility, which has been great for fans or investors or customers of the business and kind of terrifying for everyone else.

Kara Swisher: Scott?

Kara Swisher: So Brad, always good to be with you, talk to you. I'm a big fan of Brad's. Anyways, isn't Amazon, there's a lot of interesting things, and you write about this, this kind of regulatory arbitrage where they've decided that they want all of the upside of selling these products and revenues, but they don't want to take responsibility for it. There are a lot of interesting cases right now saying, well, if you sell stuff, you're responsible if the hoverboard blows up. Isn't that kind of their, or one of their superpowers here?

Brad Stone: Yeah. So it's a theme running through the book. And obviously, you know, your guys' and our coverage of all big tech. And, you know, at Facebook, they put it, you know, move fast and break things. And Jeff was always like, move fast and don't break things. But the fact is that they built systems, really self-service systems, to get operating leverage. That was the marketplace where any seller could just sign up and start selling, or the transportation network where any driving, any small delivery company could sign up and start delivering packages. And what you saw in both cases was, you know, kind of havoc resulting. The exploding hoverboards, the knockoffs, just an onslaught of activity that came from overseas, often from China, where costs could be lower because sellers were closer to the factories. And then Amazon slowed down and tried to build systems to account for all this and to create a little bit of friction. But of course, it was too late. That's why you look at a period of a couple of years earlier last decade where there was real chaos in the marketplace and real chaos in the delivery network. So it turns out that Amazon isn't all that different from some of the other big companies.

Kara Swisher: No, it's exactly, it's just things, not speech necessarily, or things, not propaganda. I would say the stakes, right, that makes the stakes even higher because it's the physical world. But as we saw with Facebook and Google, the stakes there, the integrity of democracy, are just as high. But certainly, yeah, there was a lot of impact from Amazon's very rapid growth. So can you talk a little bit about this transition that's happening now? He gave his last letter, right? And he was talking about where is... He stepped away from Amazon for several years, I think, or it was being run by a lot of these same people who are now going to be leading. So talk and sort of sketch out what it's been like. And he sort of returned during the pandemic a little more actively. Or maybe I'm wrong about that. That's what I understand. Can you talk a little bit about what it's been like the past couple of years and how he's sort of obviously moved away from it slowly?

Brad Stone: Yeah, I mean, I sort of chart this path in Amazon Unbound where, yeah, for a couple of years, he was really actively involved in the new businesses, really micromanaging the Amazon Go stores and Alexa and Prime Video. He would call the teams in there to run through the documents for what shows and movies they wanted to pick up. So really hands-on in that respect. And in the larger businesses, kind of letting Andy Jassy and Jeff Wilke, who left the company, roll with it. But in terms of – that was inconsistent. I have this great scene in 2017 where during the OP1s, he comes in and blows up the core business because he determines that the retail business is relying too heavily on advertising and he wants to see them profitable in their own right. But you're right, Kara, in 2020, he really did come back in a major way in terms of the pandemic response. But I think that antitrust congressional hearing where he had to appear alongside Tim Cook and Mark Zuckerberg and Sundar was pivotal. Jeff does not want to spend his time answering those questions, right? He wants to float above it. And I think probably that had a lot to do with him handing over the reins to Andy Jassy, but saying he's going to stick around to continue to, you know, he loves to be an inventor, like Taylor Swift loves to be a songwriter. They don't necessarily get to pick that, but he wants to be an inventor, and that's where he wants to spend his time.

Scott Galloway: Brad, you know Amazon as well as anyone that's not working there. Tell us something we don't know about Amazon or make some predictions about what businesses they're going to be in that they aren't already.

Brad Stone: Well, first, I just want to say, Scott, that I'm excited for you to read this book because you cameo a couple of times. And during the HQ2 saga, I have the memos, the internal memos where the HQ2 team selects Raleigh, Chicago and Philadelphia as the finalists. And Jeff blows up the whole process. But they also identified the critics who they're really wary of. And you're in there. And by the way, everything that you were saying back then about Amazon going where Jeff wants to be, I think was fundamentally true. And I show how the helipads that blew up the Long Island City initiative were really there because Jeff had bought a helicopter and himself was taking flying lessons. So I just wanted to say that.

Scott Galloway: Thank you. It's interesting. They do listen to this stuff, this criticism.

Brad Stone: Oh, they do?

Scott Galloway: Are you kidding? Oh, yeah. I come off of CNBC, and if I say something sideways, I get a call within 15 minutes. It's creepy, frankly.

Brad Stone: Yes, they watch us all. They're probably somehow listening to this recording right now.

Scott Galloway: Yes, yes. But, okay, so that was a tangent. What was the original question again, Scott? Well, tell us. You know the company really well. What are they going to surprise us with? And what are they going to be doing?

Brad Stone: Well, they've got a couple of high-stakes initiatives that Jeff hopes can be sort of meaningful growth opportunities. One is this Project Kuiper, which is satellite internet access. I'm sure he thought Blue Origin could send those Amazon satellites into space, but Blue is tardy and its orbital rocket is behind. So they did an agreement with ULA. But of course, this is in big competition with Starlink from SpaceX, and those satellites are already in space. So Amazon is a latecomer there. And then healthcare is the other big initiative. And they are showing some promise with some of these telehealth initiatives that started out rolling out for employees that are now opening to the employees of other companies. They have some in-person clinics they're trying out. I believe it's in Texas. And in a very Amazon-like way, they're developing devices, products that could go and somehow support that ecosystem, or what they would probably call it, a flywheel of Amazon services in healthcare. So that's another growth opportunity. But we're also talking during a week when Amazon just announced a massive multi-billion dollar debt sale. And the reason Amazon does that is for, well, the money is cheap and it's for expansion. So more fulfillment centers, more countries, more AWS data centers. And that's really about intensifying the rather large advantages they already have. So the easy bet is that Amazon is bigger. It makes more of an impact on physical retail. We'll probably see more Amazon supermarkets in the future, perhaps other kinds of retail supported by technology.

Kara Swisher: What about their own transportation systems? That's been back and forth and back and forth. And just, you know, the JEDI contract, that's separate. But, you know, the JEDI contract that Amazon was trying to do, AWS was trying to do, now they're going to suspend that and probably redo it again, which is good news for Amazon because they had lost it. Can you talk about—and then, of course, Jeff himself is fighting the government over Elon's moon base or moon initiatives. So give us some insight of, like, how they're sort of parsing out Jeff Bezos from Amazon and moving them apart. Is there going to be a moving apart? Because he owns the Post. He has Blue Origin. He's got a lot of things going on that are just Jeff Bezos. And then there's stuff that's important to Amazon, including these government contracts.

Brad Stone: Yeah, I think when it comes to Jeff spending his time, probably apportioning more of it outside of Amazon. He doesn't need to write the shareholder letter every year, run all the S-team meetings. I think he'll still continue to have an impact. The Washington Post is running just fine all on its own. He's got to pick a new executive editor. But Blue Origin is limping along a little bit. So I do see him spending a little bit more time there. But I also report in the book, he's building this vast super yacht. And so I think that, you know, Jeff in retirement, with Lauren Sanchez.

Kara Swisher: Hello, Midnight Crisis.

Brad Stone: Exactly.

Kara Swisher: Oh my God. Why do they all build these super yachts? Even Steve Jobs had one.

Scott Galloway: Because they can't, Kara. Listen, listen, you wrote an article about Jeff Bezos and the tabloid. But you didn't answer my question, but I want to know about the tabloid.

Kara Swisher: Well, it was a multi-part, so I was going to get to it, yeah.

Scott Galloway: All right, go ahead. Go ahead, and then I want to ask about this tabloid piece you wrote.

Brad Stone: Well, I don't think he's leaving Amazon, but I think he's spreading his time elsewhere. And on the AWS thing, they lost the JEDI contract because Bezos bought the Post and Trump hated the Post. But miraculously, they might get a second shot at it. So that's a huge market, and Amazon and Microsoft will be winners there. And it's a further consolidation of this massive piece of tech toward the big tech companies.

Kara Swisher: Right, absolutely. So you wrote a piece about Jeff Bezos and the tabloids last week. Can you talk about his transition from sort of background CEO, khaki pants? You know, you remember the pleated khakis and the kind of shitty button-down shirts. And now he's like super buff guy. It's such a weird... And a family man to blowing up his personal life. But the most remarkable piece of it, and I had to go, unfortunately, deep into this squalid saga, is how sort of naive he was in early 2018 about how much the world would care that Jeff Bezos had a relationship.

Brad Stone: And the funny thing is Michael Sanchez, the brother of Lauren Sanchez, is of course obviously kind of the villain in this saga because he gave the information to the National Enquirer. But the funny thing is how he saw it more clearly than anyone. Jeff and Lauren were having a relationship really out in public, going to restaurants, going to Blue Origin events. And he recognized that they couldn't hide this. And he, in some weird way, tried to get ahead of it. Of course, it's seen now as a kind of remarkable betrayal.

Kara Swisher: I thought that was a brother, right?

Brad Stone: Yeah, it was a brother.

Kara Swisher: But I thought it was great that he got ahead of it. I kind of was cool with it. You say got ahead of it. What do you mean? He wrote that piece. He's like, screw you.

Brad Stone: No, he leaked all the information to the National Enquirer. It's totally ham-handed. He got money for it. He claims to this day that it must have been someone else. It couldn't have just been him, that maybe it was a political conspiracy or the Saudis. And what I found diving into it was – and also the Southern District of New York investigated this because Jeff claimed that he had been extorted. And the prosecutors and the FBI ultimately concluded – well, they dropped the case. So it appears they have concluded that it was a much simpler saga, that in fact, Michael Sanchez was the sole source. I would be surprised if any information were to come out that contradicts that.

Kara Swisher: But what does it say about Jeff? I mean, that he somehow had a blind spot for how interested the world might be in the very visible changes in his life that were happening quite out in the open. Now not, because he does pose. He does poses. He does, you know, he does flexes, essentially. Looking good. He's courtside at Wimbledon. He's sort of enjoying that. Where does that go from your perspective? Because it's such a different Jeff Bezos than you and I grew up with.

Brad Stone: And I think that's really primarily Lauren Sanchez and her impact. And he's dressing well, and he's at these events, and he's on Barry Diller's yacht. And, you know, we'll see what happens post-COVID. But I would imagine that in this new world, he is moving in those circles once again.

Kara Swisher: Is he going to pull an Elon, essentially?

Brad Stone: Well, Elon does it effortlessly and was always like this. I don't know that Jeff could pull – I was thinking about this during Saturday Night Live. I don't know that Jeff could pull that off. Elon has a magical way of turning the customers or the people in his orbit into fanboys. And Jeff has never – probably to the detriment of my book sales – Jeff has never been able to do that in quite the same way, even though his impact on the world in some ways is just as big as, if not bigger than, Elon Musk.

Kara Swisher: Well, you'd have to decide which one is. They're both quite impactful. I have one more question, and Scott has one. When you look at Amazon going forward, obviously Andy Jassy, who you and I have known for a long time, is taking over, a very low-key guy, right? But a Jeff acolyte at the same time, but does speak his mind, is a very talented executive. What does Amazon look like really under Andy? Or is it just, is it a Ballmer after Gates or is it a Satya after Gates, after Ballmer?

Scott Galloway: Yeah, or a Tim Cook, right? On the Ballmer to Cook spectrum. Where is Andy Jassy's Amazon?

Kara Swisher: That's a really good spectrum. Yeah, right. Give us some insights about Andy. I know him pretty well, but what do you want to say?

Brad Stone: He's humble, right? And he presents a humbler target for Amazon. When you've got Jeff sitting there in the hot seat in front of Congress, the wealthiest guy in the world, that's a big target for critics and for legislators. Andy is, in his modest suit, speaking in modest tones. And so I think in some ways he's a better figurehead for the company as it moves into this next stage, which will be all about regulation and examination of Amazon's market power, as it should be. But in terms of the operating performance of the company, he's so cleaved from Jeff's rib that I don't know that it makes much of a difference. The one big difference is Andy's just not an inventor or a technologist in the way that Jeff is. And so Jeff's saying, well, he's going to stick around and continue to invent. But when you look at the S-team right now, there are many fewer technologists on that team than there used to be. There are a lot of operators. And so the big question for Amazon post—to the extent it is post—can it continue to create new things in the way it has?

Scott Galloway: Oh, I get to ask a question now? Brad. I get to actually ask a question?

Kara Swisher: Oh, my God. Stop it, you big baby.

Scott Galloway: You think I'm your Andy Jassy, don't you? You go out, you get pumped, you build a big fucking super yacht, and I get to run the cloud division.

Kara Swisher: She said that you were her Steve Ballmer, actually.

Scott Galloway: Do you see what I have to put up with here, Brad?

Brad Stone: I do. I know.

Scott Galloway: You guys just got to start investing in this relationship. Anyways, nothing from Mother's Day yesterday. Nothing. Anyway. Okay. Do you think Amazon should be broken up? And if so, do you think it'll happen?

Brad Stone: Yeah. That was a good question, Scott. Let me just compliment you. Thanks so much. What's going to happen? Right. Because I'm not, you know, I don't see myself as a sort of advocate either way. Let me answer it this way. I think the case is so much more difficult. When I hear the critics, the main street advocates out there talking about Amazon, I sometimes feel like they do not understand the complexities of this business. They don't understand how competition works on the internet. The fact that Amazon operates in these vast markets with a lot of competition. Shopify is on fire right now, in large part because of Amazon's failures with brands. Enterprise computing is huge. Microsoft and Google are major competitors. So I think it will be really difficult. And when you listen to the hearings, the quality of the discourse and the questions isn't all that high. So I think the impediment to breaking up Amazon is that it's enormously complicated. Frankly, they should all read my book and listen to this podcast to understand the issues better. And so it's really hard to get there. When you look at the slam dunk case that they once had against Microsoft and Microsoft has never been broken up. I don't think Amazon is broken up unless it's voluntary.

Kara Swisher: So unless it's voluntary, and do you see it being voluntary?

Brad Stone: Not anytime soon because they just have no interest in that kind of financial engineering. And Amazon, core Amazon, derives so many advantages from AWS. For example, Alexa is really an AWS product. Its brains are in the cloud. That was the intuition that Jeff originally had. So no, I don't see them ever voluntarily doing that. But a couple of steps down the road when maybe Jeff steps away and if investors are really clamoring for it because the stock price has stagnated, then you could kind of see it in a different era, but not anytime soon.

Scott Galloway: All right, but what will happen to them? What's their biggest threat?

Brad Stone: Their biggest threat is, well, the regulatory attention, even if it's not a breakup, can lead to all sorts of distraction. That's number one. Number two is we're seeing a lot of turnover in the higher ranks of the company because the stock price has gone up, maybe because of some disillusionment with Jeff or the fact that he's stepping aside, less excitement there. It's an idiosyncratic place. So you need people who understand how it works. And I think the turnover is a problem. And then just the chaos that comes with being a huge retailer and the fact that there's still so much chaos in the marketplace and the fact that the search results are clouded with ads and private label products, it opens up room for disruption. And that's why Shopify has had so much success and maybe even Facebook Marketplace. So I do think just sheer competition is always going to be a danger to Amazon.

Scott Galloway: Interesting. What's your third book called?

Brad Stone: Well, this was actually my fourth book, Kara.

Kara Swisher: No, I know. What's your third Amazon book called?

Brad Stone: Right. What's the third Amazon book called? Amazon, The Fast and the Furious.

Kara Swisher: I, you know what? Kill me now. President Bezos? Kill me now because I cannot imagine that. You are writing this whole call to Amazon. Oh, my God. It's not like AOL where it just falls apart. I don't have any options on that one.

Brad Stone: If this is The Empire Strikes Back, then Return of the Jedi. But no time soon. I need to decompress.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, but what would it be if you had to guess? We're making you be a Professor Galloway here.

Scott Galloway: Yeah, Return of... What would it be? President Bezos?

Brad Stone: Yeah, it's hard to imagine him as an effective politician. I think what happened with this book is enough time went by, and I was very proud of The Everything Store, that I thought I need to update my history if I want it to continue to be definitive. And if in 10 years I feel like there's much more of the story, and if Bezos comes back in some dramatic way or has another chapter or saves us all from climate change, then there's going to be a better story to tell. The reason why I did this is because the last 10 years of Amazon are one of the best business stories of our time. And I felt like that was a great story that needed to be told.

Scott Galloway: Dude, let me help you here. Your next book's on Tesla. Just stop it already. There have been many great books, including my colleague, Ashley Mances. Let me help you command the space you occupy, my brother. Your next book's on Tesla.

Brad Stone: All right. Well, thank you, Scott. So nice of you guys helping me write it.

Kara Swisher: I look forward to you helping each other. Two guys just helping each other.

Scott Galloway: We met on a super yacht.

Kara Swisher: Two tech bros. Pros helping.

Scott Galloway: We met on a super yacht. Never happens. Never on a super yacht. Anyway, Brad, good luck with this book. Brad is a wonderful writer. Have you sold it to Hollywood, all these things yet?

Brad Stone: That has not happened yet, Kara.

Kara Swisher: It may be that Jeff is too powerful.

Brad Stone: Oh, that's true.

Scott Galloway: If you want advice on how to go to LA and get nothing done, I'm your man.

Kara Swisher: Okay. Great. All right. Again, his first book was called The Everything Store, and his new book is called Amazon Unbound. It's on sale today. Is that correct? Or now?

Brad Stone: It's on sale, yes, Tuesday, May 11th at your friendly local bookstore.

Kara Swisher: That's when this appears. All right, it's on sale now. All right, Brad Stone, as usual, you're a class act in tech journalism. Thanks.

Brad Stone: Take care, brother.

Kara Swisher: Okay, Scott, one more quick break. We'll be back for wins and fails.

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Kara Swisher: Okay, Scott, wins and fails. What are your wins and fails this week?

Scott Galloway: Well, I just want to hide. If anybody wants to understand retail or the internet age, Brad's first book, The Everything Store. When I was writing my book before and I had to write a chapter on Amazon, I read his book and I thought, shit, I just can't do better than that. It really is the, if you want to understand Amazon. Anyway, okay. I'll start with my fail. I think this guilt by proximity movement, I think it's just out of control, incredible. I understand we expect it from TMZ, we expect it from blogs, but when the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal start writing these articles. I think those platforms have so much credibility. I think they should act with more discretion and realize how much impact they have on people's lives when they start inferring that there's something really up with Bill Gates, with his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein, and don't provide any substance, don't provide any evidence other than, yeah, he met with him, and then start talking about confidential divorce filings. I don't think that lives up to the credibility that is the Wall Street Journal. And I think, anyways, this guilt by proximity bothers me. I think it's a dangerous trend.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, okay. My win is just the unbelievable talent that unfortunately was overshadowed of Miley Cyrus. When she did that opening, that tribute to Mother's Day, her voice, she has a lyrically beautiful and powerful voice. Didn't love her other songs, but that was beautiful.

Scott Galloway: Yeah, I agree. But I just remember sitting there thinking, God, we're so fortunate to have artists like that brought to us.

Kara Swisher: Do you know Dolly Parton's her godmother?

Scott Galloway: Yeah, I think she's an extraordinary talent.

Kara Swisher: She is. She's compelling. She's another compelling person. Wrong show. You know, she should have been the host. It was a shame it was overshadowed.

Scott Galloway: I think she's an extraordinary talent. She was in that Chad one. That was funny. The one with Chad. I think she's just an incredible talent. And it was my win as the extraordinary talent of Miley Cyrus.

Kara Swisher: All right. Well, I'm going to celebrate a woman, too. I'm going to win, which was, there was a skit on Saturday Night Live, Murder Durder, which was about Mare of Easttown.

Scott Galloway: Oh, I watched that last night.

Kara Swisher: Oh, it's so good. It's really good, yeah. It's so good. It's so bad that it's good. And I have a lot of relatives in that part of Pennsylvania, a lot of them. And I was like, oh, my God. And I was born in Philadelphia. People don't forget. Really good. Yeah. It's so good. And then the takeoff on it was hysterical, was hysterical. My daughter and a baby daughter and a murder-der! Murder-derder, an extremely Pennsylvania crime show.

Scott Galloway: Yeah, that was the funniest part. Murder-derder. Don't put your wah-wah hoagie on the murder victim. You know what they're doing? They're doing what The Undoing is really good at. They are so cagey, those writers. Do we know who did it? Every 10 minutes, you're like, oh, he did it. Oh, wait, no, she did it. Oh, wait, he did it.

Kara Swisher: I know. Which one do you think did it? They set up all these people.

Scott Galloway: This is not over. So it's three more episodes. But who do you think did it?

Kara Swisher: Well, I'm hoping that it's the priest and that we continue to cement the reality, which is the greatest institutionalized pedophilia that is the Catholic Church.

Scott Galloway: I said this. I think the boyfriend. I think the boyfriend.

Kara Swisher: You think the boyfriend? There could be two. It could be the priest killed her and the boyfriend is the one hiding the ladies away in the bar kind of thing. I'm going with, I know this is going to be weird. I'm going with the daughter.

Scott Galloway: What?

Kara Swisher: Yeah, I think the daughter did.

Scott Galloway: No, not the lesbian. She has that new hot girlfriend.

Kara Swisher: No, no, no, no, no. Here's the deal. It is a great show. And you should also watch the Murder Durder thing. And by the way, if you want a Victorian murder durder, watch The Nevers. So there's all these-

Scott Galloway: Yeah, you like The Nevers.

Kara Swisher: All these badass women in shows. Badass women is a real area of, and also The Equalizer with Queen Latifah is doing really well. So a lot of badass women kicking some ass. I really enjoy it.

Scott Galloway: Yeah. Murder, durder. You're right. It's a really, it's a great show. It's HBO Max, right? Is that right? Is it HBO?

Kara Swisher: Oh, it's HBO. Yeah, it's HBO. HBO Joey Bag of Donuts. Joey Bag of Donuts. HBO Diet.

Scott Galloway: All right. I don't have any fails this week. I'm going to be positivity this week.

Kara Swisher: Positivity. Nice. Positivity for me. But that's-

Scott Galloway: Wait, wait, wait. Most importantly, oh my God, big story breakdown. How was the weekend with the in-laws?

Kara Swisher: Good. Great. Oh God, speaking, that was, they were great. They were great. And in fact, my son was like, they're really nice. And I was like, I know, we're not nice people.

Scott Galloway: Yeah.

Kara Swisher: So it was a win.

Scott Galloway: What nice people?

Kara Swisher: And it was like, it was a win. They were lovely. They took care of Clara. We hung out with my son. We went out for, Amanda's birthday is coming up. We went out for a birthday dinner. We had a great time. They're wonderful people.

Scott Galloway: Do they know you're close with Jeffrey Epstein?

Kara Swisher: You know what? Oh, that was good. That was good. That was good.

Scott Galloway: I am not close with Jeffrey Epstein. I sat four seats away from him at his seats. I was being ironic.

Kara Swisher: Okay. All right. This has been a wonderful show, Scott. Brad Stone is brilliant. He is brilliant. He's very good. We'll be back this week. That's the show. We'll be back Friday. He's Miley Cyrus level. Miley Cyrus. Okay. Kate Winslet is who I say. Go to nymag.com slash pivot to submit your question for the Pivot podcast. The link is also in our show notes. We love great questions. Scott, can you read us out? Today's episode was produced by Rebecca Sinanis, an intertaught engineer in this episode. Thanks also to Drew Burrows. Make sure you're subscribed to the show on Apple Podcasts, or if you're an Android user, check us out on Spotify or wherever you listen to podcasts. If you like the show, please recommend it to a friend. Thanks for listening to Pivot from New York Magazine and Vox Media. We'll be back later this week for another breakdown of all things tech and business. Miley Cyrus, an extraordinary talent.

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