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Nike Needs Its Next Michael Jordan


In the seven months since I last wrote about Nike, the company has undergone some changes. Elliot Hill, a long-time Nike executive, came out of retirement to replace John Donahoe as CEO. After a 60-day observation period, which involved talking with Nike’s various stakeholders, Hill’s diagnosis was that Nike had lost its “obsession with sport.” In addition to revised marketing, more sales-focused endeavors will include reinvesting in its existing brands to create…

Getting Consumers to Pay in Tech Is Underrated


Last week, Netflix announced its latest round of subscription price increases. As usual, the hikes didn’t go over well on social media with the most common responses being either “I cancelled a few months ago” or something related to turning to piracy. I think both reactions underestimate what remains a legitimately impressive feat by Netflix: Getting more than 300 million people to pay for video content. Taking a step back, several Big…

Meta Excels at Copying, but at What Cost?


Innovation is an intriguing word. Every tech company thinks of itself as an innovative leader while claiming innovation is in short supply at their competitors. Last week, frustrated at continuing to need to go through Apple to reach his users, Mark Zuckerberg made the outlandish claim that Apple hasn’t innovated in decades. It’s an especially bold claim as Meta’s claim to innovation has been excelling at copying and then monetizing features from…

Big Tech Got Its Pivot in 2024


When reviewing 2024 from a technology perspective, it’s tempting to assume something related to AI must have been the story of the year. After 18 months of talk, we began to see the first wave of consumer-facing AI features built in response to generative AI mania. However, such developments felt measured relative to a much larger event that took place in November. The U.S. presidential election, resulting in President Trump returning to…

Bitcoin Is a Middle Finger to the Establishment

As generative AI mania matures, we find ourselves in something of a Bitcoin bonanza. Partially due to expectations of a friendlier regulatory and political environment, Bitcoin pricing has been bid up by 40% since the U.S. presidential election. There is no shortage of grand prognostications as to where Bitcoin pricing goes from here. Look deeper, and although the story’s allure with the mass market is up for debate, the past few months…

Elon Musk’s Influence Was Misjudged

The past few years have been a whirlwind in social media land. Our experiences online pre-pandemic feel like a generation ago. The rise of short-form video has not only transformed the social media giants (Instagram, YouTube), but also pushed video on what had been text-first platforms. Elon Musk’s Twitter purchase in 2022, which many predicted to not pan out, continues to be misjudged based on its subsequent influence. It is not an…

Why Apple Is Tripling Down on the Mac

Apple’s Mac line has never been stronger. Thanks to Apple Silicon, Apple is pushing the Mac forward with industry-leading power efficiency and hardware redesigns that are resonating with tens of millions of customers. It’s a dramatic turn of events for a product category that seemed positioned to play second fiddle to mobile devices a decade ago. We are seeing Apple place a big bet that the Mac will remain a critical machine…

Big Tech Should Embrace Trump’s Pro-America Platform


Earlier this week, President Trump won a second presidential term in a blowout election. The signs were there all along that such a result was likely. Big Tech sure seemed to anticipate such a result. 
 
The past four years have been alarming to Big Tech as the U.S. lost geopolitical and regulatory standing on the global stage. President Trump’s pro-America platform offers Big Tech a reset opportunity, and it should be…

Video Podcasts Are Having a Moment

The U.S. presidential election has put a spotlight on video podcasts. On both sides of the aisle, video podcasts are being leveraged to gain an edge by connecting with voters. The various implications arising from this change are significant and include everything from video podcasts breathing new momentum into the podcast medium to the role media is playing in our lives continuing to evolve.
 
This past Friday, Joe Rogan had former…

Something Has Changed With the Tesla Community


Last week, Tesla held its highly anticipated robotaxi event. From an analytical perspective, there wasn’t a whole lot to talk about. The event was geared more toward building aspirations and dreams than unveiling concrete product strategy.

The most interesting takeaways and observations weren’t from the event itself, but rather from what unfolded after the event. It was impossible to miss a vibe change within the Tesla community. The noticeable lack of enthusiasm…

Passive Investing’s Impact on Big Tech Is Being Underestimated


Big Tech continues to have a very strong year on Wall Street. On a collective basis, Big Tech has seen about $4.5 trillion of market capitalization gains since January. While the move has led to some valuation diehards, usually those in academia, becoming louder in opposition to the move, the role passive investing is playing in Big Tech’s rise is flying under the radar. 

Thanks to passive investing, Big Tech is receiving…

Apple vs. Meta Is the New iOS vs. Android


Last week, Meta held its Connect 2024 developer conference. During the keynote, Mark Zuckerberg unveiled Orion, Meta’s AR glasses prototype. Seeing that the device had no viable path to market, Zuckerberg decided to turn it into a prototype project. That decision was part of a broader Meta PR strategy aimed at one company: Apple. Zuckerberg has spent the past few years trying to start a new kind of tech holy war…
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