Kara Swisher Rates Tech Leaders — With Kara Swisher

0:00Kara Swisher is here to talk with us about the state of tech leadership, AI, journalism, the media business, and her bestselling burn book. All that and more is coming up right after this.

0:40Welcome to Big Technology Podcast, a show for cool-headed, nuanced conversation of the tech world and beyond. We are joined once again by Kara Swisher. She's the host of On with Kara Swisher and the Pivot Podcast and the author of the best-selling new book, Burn Book, which I just finished and loved. Kara, welcome back to the show. Thank you. You have such a good podcast voice. I wish I had this good one. Hello there. You can do like smooth jazz at midnight. That's what we aim for. As long as people don't fall asleep. Yeah. That's a good thing. Okay. Sometimes. Anyway. You know, I have had some people who are like, yeah, I like to put on your podcast and go to bed.

1:15And I'm like, look, as long as the analytics are complete, then we'll take it. That's actually better. Exactly. So congratulations. Bestselling book. Thank you. You signed a two book deal. This one, obviously a memoir talking about your interactions with the tech community and your reporting over the years. any thoughts on what the second one's going to be about? There are some thoughts. It's about the future tech, really. I spoke broadly about where it's a little more positive. It's a little more where things are going. It's as if I know a lot now and so I want to sort of look at the positive parts of it.

1:50It's not going to necessarily be positive because as usual it's me, but I think it's going to be a very fair-minded look at where things are going, whether it's psychedelics or some of the drug discovery or cancer or or a range of things. I'm doing it with my brother, who's a doctor. I think it's really important, because a lot of it will focus on health care. And, you know, just some of the stuff. I think I'll probably have a little bit of what's been in Burn Book at the end in it. AI is obviously part of it. So something like that, I think. But I might change my mind. I might just write a, I'm fascinated with these, like, you know, I just interviewed Charles Duhigg, who did Super Communicators, and you have the Atomic Habits.

2:29I'm thinking of trying to write one of those and see if I can have a bestseller at that just because I think it's a formula. I have them all. And so I'm like, maybe I could pull this off. I don't know what I'd call it. So what is the formula for those? They're just, there's like not much. I'll tell you that. There's like a few studies that you string together. You know, I just interviewed Jonathan Haidt, for example. You have a premise, then you string a few studies together and then you get in arguments with people. That seems to be the way to do it. Okay, so this wasn't in my notes, but since you're fresh off a conversation with Jonathan Haidt.

3:01Very interesting guy. He brought, he basically, this whole book is talking about how social media has led to a rise in depression among teens. But there's been a very big pushback to him. From social scientists. Bigger than I expected. Not from parents. Not from parents. It's interesting. Yeah. It's a lot of noisy social scientists arguing with each other and he's wrong and they're wrong and I think it's right in the middle. He included some real shitty studies. There's no way around it. And I said, he goes, I go, I characterize them as, and I go, and he goes, how would you characterize them? I go, shitty.

3:31And he goes, oh. And I'm like, they are, John. And he goes, yes, some of them are. I think he's left himself open in that regard. At the same time, directionally, he's correct. And I just think, we could either be in the situation where it's like the video games. Remember, video games were going to make us all killers. And that wasn't the case. Or dirty song lyrics. Thank you, Tipper Gore. Didn't really make us all dirty, necessarily. And so I think some people are worried that he relies on cause, there's no causality versus co-relation. And, and so I think my pushback to him was, you know, there was also COVID and there was also Trump and there was also climate change.

4:13And there was also, you know, lists of things. So which one of them is hurting kids more, right? And I do believe I've always been a longtime believer that social media, the deleterious effects will be will know them in 20 years. but I think he needs if he wants to make this broad statement he needs a little more proof I don't think he's incorrect in the end him and uh I can't pronounce yet she was the one he raised some of his work on and then we had a big argument about the stuff around trans making people trans by reading about trans people it's just there's just nonsense there's no proof it's just a right wing trope and I thought he fell into it and he said he used the word in part you know in part it like people read about it so then they know about it and i was like there's literally been no change in the amount of people who do transitioning and i said that in part is doing a lot of work here like you know stuff like that so it was good though but a lot of what he says is absolutely true kids need to play more um the screens are have a deleterious effect on especially girls i think there's no i think directionally he's correct i just think he's got to bring more especially on a controversial topic especially when tech companies are going to push back at him definitely and i've been i've been fascinated by the debate there so i can't wait to listen to that episode i had a question from one of the people i thought was some of them some of the debaters some of the skeptics are just they're just not they're not it's not good faith argument but some of them are and i used one of them who i thought was having a great debate with him about it um to ask him a question as my expert question so i i like the debate about it and i i think in the end probably there'll be it'll be on it won't be on as unclear once we realize the impact on our kids but it's almost like us you know what was the effect of the gutenberg bible what was the effect of telephones what was the effect of cars like it's a it's a significant effect the question is some of the i've heard from like gay teens best thing that ever happened to them back in my day because they got to be able to meet other gay teens right that's a good thing So I think it just has to be a little more, you know, instead of just being a moral panic, which I don't think he's doing.

6:18People are accusing of that. Instead of being a moral panic that we haven't paid attention to and so we feel extra guilty and so now we have to react to it. It's obviously a significant just the way the introduction of cars was or the introduction of the telephone. And the tech companies spent a lot of time not age gating, not giving us the real data. So, you know, I'm in the middle. Right. So let's talk a little bit about the people building these products. It would be fun to just go through a couple of the characters that you have in the book. I'd love to start with Mark Andreessen. Andreessen Horowitz just raised$7.2 billion in a new fund.

6:55Now, Mark is so smart. He's like obviously extremely intelligent and he's so successful, but also so bitter and so interested in shutting out any part of the debate. Like at least like some people in this like is social media hurting us debate are coming out and having the discussion, while some people just don't want to have the discussion. Well, he is on the board of Facebook, I guess. I've never met someone who's so smart, who's so stupid. I don't know how else to say about him. He's such a small-minded person. I hate to say that about people. But, you know, he's frequently wrong, but he's never in doubt.

7:26And it's a really bad way to be when you're, you know. And, of course, he uses his wealth and successes as his shield, which I don't think it is. He's had plenty of disasters himself, so he should know better. And so just to go from one to the next, let's talk about Elon for a minute. What's your read on the state of Elon? I mean, Tesla today, we're talking on Monday, this episode's coming out. Wednesday at 10%, they're cutting 10 % of their workforce. That stock has been cut in half and then some. Yeah. What's your read on the state of where Elon is? And do you have any sense that Tesla is struggling in part because he's distracted by Twitter?

8:00Yes, I think, yes, yes to all. Like, I think, look, Tesla was inevitably going to get its comeuppance because there's going to be, he's let's see what he did that's an accomplishment he create he really did push forward this industry there's no one you could give more credit to than him and pushing forward the electric vehicle thing google tried a little bit but he really did it right and so a lot of people tried he did it and so that was great and he came out with a car that was innovative and interesting it's as if steve jobs invented the imac and then stopped that's what it feels like it's like he hasn't look at he hasn't done he's done he did the y and the x the y but you know then cybertruck come on like come on i'm not going to get a cybertruck no it's a terror it looks terrible like it's fine if someone wants to buy it but it's not a groundbreaking car everyone's going to be in right so he sort of lost the narrative on what was a very innovative company um and a very forward leaning company and inevitably there was going to be it's as if he didn't think there was going to be competition once he created but he felt like just because he created he owned the space, but he doesn't.

9:02You know, the planes are covered with the bodies of pioneers. That's how I look at it in the U.S. Not everyone gets to California, some kind of thing. And so I think he's no question a pioneer, no question a great entrepreneur, business person, more than a technologist, I suspect, is how it's going to end up in history. And, you know, kind of a hand-wavy P.T. Barnum, too, which is part of the package of doing that, you need to be like that, who then curdled into something very strange, right? And he became less entertaining than sort of toxic. And so obviously, he was going to have competition to he wasn't he hasn't kept an eye on the ball on innovation and that there's just hasn't been a great the product line is sad and tired, right?

9:45You know, and it's the design isn't like all these cars are coming out the Rivian so good looking. And, you know, someone who's really prominent said, I don't know why every test has to look like the inside of an egg. And I agree. I don't want to buy it. It's the most unromantic. Oh, it leaves me cold. The car leaves me cold. But but once you see cool ones, you're like, Oh, look at that Porsche, look at that BMW. Like, why wouldn't you and if they're cheaper, I have a Chevy Bolt, so I shouldn't talk about sexy, but I love it. It's fun, you know. And so I just think he dropped the ball on innovation at the company.

10:19I think he he he alienated most of his natural buyers by being such an asshole. And I think that he's indulging his personal need to say, speaking of which, saying anything about everything and offending people. So, you know, if you have a choice and this guy's an asshole, you don't buy and it does not new and it's not a compelling product. It's a recipe for what's happening right now. But it is interesting because like if trying to wrap a like a bow around what Elon is, is sort of very difficult right now because yeah of course struggles with twitter tesla is not doing very well though we'll see what happens it's a stock price thing but then neuralink is pretty impressive so sort of well no let me just tell you there are 10 companies like neuralink he's not the only one so that's the thing he acts like he invented the moon like he just didn't there has been there are other companies who aren't as hand wavy as him so i don't know if it's impressive i'd like to actually get it away from his showing off a guy who can do this is one thing I would like to see the science.

11:17I'd like him to open it up. I'd like people to see it. I'd like reporters to report on the 10 other companies that are doing this, which they don't because it doesn't have Elon Musk attached. But several companies have put electrodes. He's embedded them. They're on the outside, whatever. There's all kinds of fascinating, interesting things. But I think that's hand-waving versus actual, you know, we're a long way from doing what he wants to do. But I welcome it. I welcome it. This would be great. I just, how's he going to monetize it? How's he going to make money at it? He's certainly been innovative at Starlink and SpaceX.

11:53The solar thing, solar is now falling off, so that's going to be a problem. His solar city is going to suffer, even if it's a good company. The digging thing, okay, how's that going to make money, right? I think the space stuff, I think, is the most interesting stuff, where he's got a really great CEO in Gwen Shotwell, who should get more credit than she does, who's managing things. So Gwen is doing a great job. So also on the space thing, let's talk about Starlink for a second. There's been this big debate about whether Elon should be the one controlling Starlink. I mean, he did put it up there in space.

12:27Shouldn't the government, if it was like... His company did. His company did. Not him personally. But don't you think the government, if it's like seeing this as a national security thing, should build its own version of Starlink? And so it's not like... Probably they should have, but he was more innovative and faster. So that was a great idea. So he and his company were. Yes, they should. I think he should be just like any other vendor, Lockheed or anybody else, but he doesn't see himself that way. So it's a private company. So in this case, it's the government's fault. He can do what he damn well pleases, as far as I'm concerned.

12:57Yeah, I'm with you on that. Yeah, I think that the criticism of like, oh, how could Elon have all this control? It's like, well, if this is a public good. Oh, no, I'm worried. Why is some guy who I'm not sure what he's doing at 3 a.m. in charge of this and is not an expert on anything? That's my issue. I guess I would just say that the focus tends to be on him, but really the government has a large role to play here. I guess we agree there. Yeah, I think the government should be running it. I just don't understand why our government allowed this to happen, just like a lot of people. I believe in public-private partnerships, but at some point these are in the public interest.

13:30The public part should be driving the car, but he is. Definitely. It's amazing in the Walter Isaacson book where you basically see the Obama administration cede everything space to SpaceX. Totally, and not just SpaceX, Jeff, it's whatever you know i have thoughts on the administration yeah uh zuckerberg so you have some very colorful language about zuckerberg in the book you say uh fuck your metaverse and he did and he's done it yes and he's done so but he did he got he started defunding it so i was right so wait he has pulled back funding yeah he has pulled back from the you have you seen him waving his hands about he's now in mr ai now now he is remember he was mr cryptocurrency that didn't Mark, then he was Mr.

14:12Metaverse. Now he's Mr. AI. Good one. He finally got to the right place. But in some ways, you have to take all these bets. Not that one. Well, but on the other hand, it's also like you have to keep reinventing the company. Clearly, he was seeing that use of the Blue app was fading. I think he didn't have enough people saying no on that one. If he had the right people, they would have said AI is where we need to focus, Mark, a long time ago. When you think about the decisions that he's made on content, for instance, do you think musk has made him look better in retrospect yes that that's a gift to him that keeps on giving he looks like a lovely guy you know it's sort of yeah he is he doesn't he's not a villain like musk is like playing a bond villain it's like he's moving into bond villain territory but um and mark was sort of adjacent bond villain adjacent kind of thing um no i think mark's a good business person he's a little like bill gates and you saw the transformation of bill gates over the years.

15:03He has a sort of Darth Vader character to a much more interesting character in that regard. You know, he's just a businessman. I think we tend to have an idolatry of these people. And honestly, I don't know why we do. And so, you know, he's a flawed human being. He's made good decisions and bad decisions. He's good at making money. He's very, he was good at his product, his one product, which he did a great job on. And now he's trying really hard to stay relevant, like the rest of us, right? And so good for him to do it. He'll make mistakes along the way. It's sort of like, you know, it reminds me of haircuts.

15:37Like, oh, that haircut didn't work out so well. Now this one's good, you know, that kind of thing. And, you know, he's right to move into the AI direction. I think he's been incredibly sloppy and mismanaging of the social network. As you know, I wrote about it in terms of his responsibility and the true costs of what he's doing. I think he's not bearing the true costs. We are. I've said that over and over again. And they're doing it again, cutting off stuff in California because they want to charge for it. You know, or Google is one of them. They're all doing it. Yeah, they take turns. Yeah. They're also getting out of news.

16:14And I've seen you speak critically of that. I think getting out of news is a good thing, like the meshing of news and Facebook. I don't think, I'm not critical. I think they shouldn't be in news if they're going to do it badly. That's my, like, then get the fuck out of it. That said, they have now hollowed out the news business, the business of it, you know, digital advertising they control, and they don't contribute anything back. And I think that's grotesque, but they should be able to do it, right? They've ruined the business, and now they're not going to do it. And before, they ruined the business, and they were doing it badly.

16:47So I guess I want them to do the first and the second. But they, you know, they shouldn't be. And they weren't good at it. And so I think they should. There's a way to do it well. But I guess I can't have them do that. They can't possibly, you know, avail themselves to do a good job at it. And there are ways to do it. It's just costly is what it is. Maybe best for everybody if they're out. Well, except they've decimated the actual business, right? So that's not good. It's also, but this is a thing though, right? Isn't it also incumbent upon the news business to have other models that are not Facebook reliant?

17:19Yes, that's correct. That's what I've done. I don't trust. I remember when Sheryl Sandberg called me and she's like, come on Facebook Live. I'm like, why? She goes, well, you'll be bigger. I said, I'm plenty big. Like, what do I get? And they go, well, we'll give you some money. I'm like, why should I? It's like you're buying friends. I don't understand why you'd give me money to be on it. Like, that makes no sense. If it's a good business, it's a good business. You know, I always felt it was like, I'm like, why should I? No, I didn't say this to her, but I thought, why should I fucking paint your fence?

17:46I'm not interested in that. Well, I was at BuzzFeed News during that time and we exploded a watermelon. Yes, you love painting other people's fences. You love painting. And at the end of the day, that might have been the pinnacle. That watermelon blowing up might have been the top. That was a great moment. I mean, with the rubber bands. Rubber bands. Yeah, that was cool. That was cool. It was, but fleeting. Fleeting, but cool. But cool. Cool. Sundar, right person to leave Google. It's interesting because it's like they're hitting all-time highs. They seem to be getting the ship together with cloud.

18:17but still seem to... Well, you know, I think the thing on him, they think he's indecisive, right? I think that's most of the complaints you hear from internally from them. I mean, he's certainly better than Larry and Sergey. That's for sure. I mean, those two. Like, okay, that would be a disaster. Why a disaster? Because they've lost the narrative, the two of them. Really? All their whack stuff they're doing. When they got to floating showrooms out in San Francisco Bay, I was like, and scene. That was their watermelon moment. That's what rich people do when they get bored. I think he's a very competent executive.

18:55Probably could have someone a little more aggressive, I guess. They have so many assets, like you could imagine. They should be like at the – he and I had an argument years ago when they weren't in cloud. And I said, why are you letting Amazon take your natural business? And he's like, well, we're using all our capacity, right, for our products. And I said, well, get more. Like you shouldn't let them have – that's your business kind of thing. And, you know, he's just a cautious person. They should be dominating in so many areas. I think they're probably hindered by regulatory issues in terms of buying things.

19:24They have to be very careful about what they buy. I like Sundar Pichai. I think he's a really thoughtful person. But I see why people think he's cautious. Yeah, I was in the room when you were interviewing him. And he said that line about AI being akin to fire and electricity. And everyone's like, that was a weird thing to say. But it turns out that he was right on that. No, he is. He's a very thoughtful and thoughtful. I met him when he was a product manager when he did the browser. So the Chrome browser. And I always thought he was very careful. You know, people in tech don't like careful people.

19:57So he's probably boring to them. And Tim Cook has managed to get over that because the stock is so hot. You know, it goes up and down. But it's about 10x from when Steve Jobs ran it, right? So, you know, he's managed to escape. But he still has. my head was somewhere and they're like tim cook is just not inspiring i'm like it's worth 10 times more than steve jobs 10 times like i don't know i feel like that's a very good performance you know they're just not inspired by the airpods i guess right but it does it is a good question about tim cook as well it's the next on the list actually because it's like 10x it's 10x that's all i have to say if you're a shareholder you think it's great you're happy like i all right what do you expect them to do give you a magical unicorn every year they're not it's not happening it's And it didn't happen under Jobs either, by the way.

20:42No, I think the main question is, so Tim Cook has kept the culture that they had under Jobs that's helped them build this iPhone, refine the iPhone. He's improved it. He's improved just the way Satya does too. But there's, you know, you look at Apple's ability to build the next big thing and you wonder, no car, right? They failed there and the AI, apparently we're going to have a big announcement about AI from Apple. Well, they don't collect information the others do. They don't have those assets. So that was their business plan was to not do that. So that makes sense. They have to partner with someone.

21:17They don't collect information the way the others do. They're not information thieves the way the others are. Do you think that they'll be able to figure out the products though under Cook when it comes to AI? Yeah, I think you'll see. It'll be something so subtle. I know you're expecting some like beautiful, gorgeous thing. But yeah, I think your phone will talk to your AirPods better and then it'll all coordinate. If they do that, that'll be, look at everyone's software and services have grown enormously under Tim Cook. It's not that exciting, but it sure does make money, right? That kind of stuff.

21:47He's not as exciting. I just think it's, he's just not as exciting. And at the same time, business processes are just as important as products. And I think to expect some wow event is something of the past. That's not going to happen. A lot of it will be incremental. and the incremental since they're such big businesses is enormous so third in a row in terms of leader who's taken over from a founder and sort of isn't as exciting jassie jassie at amazon as his uh we can do satya next uh has jassie's vision for amazon come through to you are you sort of do you think you have a good picture of what amazon's going to do under you the health care moves i think are really interesting we'll see where they go right I think it's smart.

22:33It's smart for you to trust Amazon as your provider of. You know, he took a little while to get out of that stupid store thing. But I'm sure it was compelling to them in some fashion why they were doing that. I think he probably doesn't know what to do with Whole Foods. Like, what are we doing this for? Yeah, apparently that's a disaster. Well, it's supposed to be probably a delivery. It should have just been a delivery warehouse of food, right? I guess to make, because they're good at delivery. You know, I've always thought of the company as a logistics company. so I'm not like waiting for some mind-blowing situation.

23:04But of all the companies I use, I use that most actively and regularly and it works really well. And again, it's not as exciting, but I don't see anyone challenging it. I don't see anyone challenging Amazon in the food and product delivery space of any heft whatsoever. It's not Uber. That was gonna be Uber, if you remember. It's gonna be this and that, but I don't see anyone challenging them. And so you're not on the Shein and Timu train? I will see. you know if you want to buy cheap shit and get it delivered too quickly i suppose yeah no that's logistic i mean they're very good at logistical stuff amazon doesn't make as much stuff as she does that's a different slightly different business um but you know that's a different business if you want to buy a certain product that's you know here in front of me i got these from amazon these are these ginger chews you know i'm not getting them from she i'm not going to eat their ginger chews either no way um you know so i don't know i feel like it's i haven't seen anyone supplant Amazon as yet in that area.

23:59But you'll get more of your stuff from them. They did get into fast fashion at Amazon and they just didn't do a great job of it. And Shiana does a better job. So in that area, sure, they'll do better. We'll see how they do on all the other products too. They're already seeing growth problems, that company. Right. And then in terms of the pattern, I actually think Satya Nadella stands out a bit in that he is more exciting than the previous three, talking about how he wants to make Google dance, really changing the culture of Microsoft, have changing the focus do you think he tied himself too closely to open ai because now it seems like they're trying to hedge um no i don't no i think they've got it i think that was a smart move i think he's got to do it himself i think picking up great information and great computing resources that company sure should be right in the middle of this um no i thought that was smart he affiliated himself he's going to do stuff on their own um he's placing bets in several different in good places that makes sense to me you know I don't I don't know I think if they not invented here is a stupid way to behave and I think he knows that in this case towards the end of the book you talk about Sam Altman also and Sam kind of strikes me as an earnest leader in the real deal what's your perspective on Sam oh I think he's super aggressive I've met him when he was 19 so I have a long history with him you know he's like the rest of them he's super aggressive he's much more thoughtful.

25:19He has much calmer voice and everything else. He at least, you know, leans in the direction of there could be problems here. You know, none of them ever said that. So that makes him a unicorn, like when he actually admits possible mistakes. I don't think he wants to be an oracle of everything. I appreciate that. I think he, I like the people he affiliates himself with. I think he's sort of a counterweight to Elon in that regard. At the same time, he's an aggressive entrepreneur. So he's going to do everything in his interest. Again, I don't, One of the real mistakes people make is to make these people, any of them, into saviors or that they're going to change everything.

25:53They're just business people to me. They're not unlike the people who provided us with Coke or Twinkies or anything else. And I didn't praise them, so I'm not going to praise them. You know, they're good at what they do. I think he'll do whatever's in his interests. I don't care. I don't mind that. He doesn't pretend he's not. You know, he can go on and on about changing the world if he wants. You know, maybe he will, maybe he won't. But he mostly is pretty honest about his aims, which is to build the biggest company. And boy, he's got a lot of challenges from a legal point of view. And he has everyone on his ass.

26:24So, you know, he's got to raise a lot of money, the chips thing, the expense. And he's got to make money. I mean, you have subscriptions, but I suspect it's not a very big business. You brought up a couple of times, but this notion of these people aren't saviors kind of goes to like the first sentence of your book. So it was capitalism after all. Yeah. Because they talk a lot about saving the world. And of course, like it is a lot of this stuff has been motivated by capitalism. But then again, like, you know, sort of like seems like none of this could have happened without it, whether they were trying to save the world or not.