Distribution is king.

Never ever forget that.

What boosted all those channels on cable television… Was their availability on cable. They survived on payments from the cable systems, based on the number of subscribers. Even worse, for customers, the giants scooped up the little players and used their leverage to get inclusion and more money.

But now that’s all done. The internet has leveled the playing field. Everybody can play. But can everybody get eyeballs?

That’s what Facebook has, which Amazon does not. I’m plowing my way through “Bosch,” the cop drama on Amazon Prime, I recommend it, it’s very good, a cut above network fare, but it’s not part of the discussion, few imbibe at Amazon Video, despite it being included with the price of Prime. They don’t know how to get there, there are extra steps involved, but everything’s up front and center on Facebook.

Credit Mark Zuckerberg, he refuses to stand still. He might not be Steve Jobs, utilizing others’ baby steps and blowing them into gobsmacking juggernauts, but whenever confronted with a competitor Zuckerberg joins in, and is always marching forward. And if you think you’re gonna get your television directly from your cable provider in the future, you must not be a fan of on demand, and on demand rules.

We want it everywhere and we want it now. And if you break this rule you’re doomed.

But the problem is there’s too much product. Over 400 scripted shows annually. And it’s a golden age for creators, if you’ve got a track record and an idea you’ve got a better chance of getting it funded than ever before.

And Facebook is not the only company in the game, never mind Amazon and Netflix, but Apple’s in too. And Spotify to a degree. And they all won’t win, and there will be further consolidation, and a fall-off in the market/production, but tomorrow’s winners will not be today’s.

Because these players have deep pockets and they can sustain losses in building their market/mindshare. Hell, that’s how they won to begin with.

And the new entrants, like Facebook and Apple, have learned from their predecessors. YouTube thought they could go it alone, that techies were as savvy and smart as the Hollywood denizens. But that proved untrue. YouTube wasted tons of cash, mostly on unproven providers, and has yet to have a breakout hit scripted show.

But Netflix has.

But the landscape is tilting. Which is one reason Bewkes laid off Time Warner on AT&T. Most people don’t realize Time Warner Cable was spun off long ago, today’s Time Warner is a production house. And AT&T has no potential growth in mobile phones, so like its competitor Verizon, it’s going into content. And so far, Verizon has failed. You wonder who is running the ship. But they do own distribution.

Or does Apple? With its iPhone?

Yes, Apple wrested distribution from the mobile providers. You no longer get crapware on your device. For that you need Android. So Apple is primed to make inroads in scripted TV, and now that they’ve hired experienced executives…

The studios still own their libraries. And content is essentially rented, not sold, so like the major record labels, they won’t be wiped out. But their leverage will decrease. Just as it did when networks were allowed to make and own their own programming.

But two lessons are learned here.

One, Zuckerberg is constantly reinventing Facebook, he’s not standing still. If you think of the site as a place to connect with old friends and share photos of your lifestyle, you don’t realize it’s a new portal and Facebook owns Instagram and WhatsApp too, even though Snapchat gets all the press.

Second, he who has a direct line to the customer has a huge advantage. There’s a reason Amazon patented its one-click checkout software. You want to make it as easy as possible. You log on to Facebook, which dominates eyeballs online, and you see the option to see a new show you’ve heard about and the effort to click is…

Minimal.

How can you make the effort to experience your wares minimal?

That’s the challenge you’re confronting today.

Am I the only person who believes he shouldn’t have been fired?

Now Travis is a prick. Unfriendly and self-serving. Granted, my interactions with him have been limited to two panels, but he exuded a self-righteousness and pomposity that were undeniable. But he built Uber out of whole cloth.

Read Brad Stone’s “The Upstarts.” Uber wasn’t the first in the game, but it won. It wasn’t even the first into everyday drivers, known to many as UberX, it was black car only when competitors leapfrogged in front of it. And you’re gonna throw this guy out the door?

That’s what I hate about America, those on the sidelines who think they know better. Like the board of Uber. Arianna Huffington? Are you kidding me, one of the worst figureheads of all time! The people who built the “Huffington Post” into a triumphant juggernaut sold it to AOL and moved on, most notably to Buzzfeed. What is the newly-labeled “HuffPo” now? Just another site with little traction and no point of view, it’s the MySpace of news, surfing the zeitgeist one day, behind the wave the next. It was the left wing news site of record and then Arianna expanded into verticals with no traction, kinda like Perez Hilton, and the site was overrun with linkbait and no one goes there anymore. It’s so 2007. And my point is Arianna is on Uber’s board and we have to read again and again how this self-appointed sleep guru is changing the culture of the company. Put a woman on the board, put many, but how about someone with a track record of winning, not a tireless self-promoter, but someone with accomplishments. And boards themselves are notoriously out of touch and overrated. Steve Jobs came back to Apple and cleared house. Apple was almost run into the ground after his firing, by a series of nobodies approved by the board. Never underestimate the power of the individual. Never ever. Van Halen and Genesis might have recovered from the loss of their lead singer, but almost no other band has. From the Doors to Blind Melon. But society says Uber’s culture is corrupt and Travis must go.

Ridiculous.

This is the same social outcry that had Warner Music jettisoning Interscope. Which ended up building the Universal Music Group into a monolith. Hell, let’s go back to that group’s genesis. MCA Records was moribund, they brought in Irving Azoff to save it. And he did! Most famously with black music. But rock too. And after almost a decade Irving moved on and Al Teller replaced him and today MCA Records doesn’t even exist! You bet on people, they’re much more powerful than institutions, especially in tech, where if you’re not thinking about tomorrow, you might as well pack it in today. Hell, I was on CNBC railing that BlackBerry was toast and every single analyst and the host disagreed with me. This was AFTER the numbers started tanking. If you’re being influenced by the press, you’ve already lost your direction.

You kill all competitors. Hell, Google was just sanctioned for this by the EU, but the nincompoops at Uber open the door for Lyft. You know why I don’t use Lyft? Because first and foremost I’m about service. I want a car as soon as possible, especially in the Hollywood Hills. If you think I’m gonna wait an extra half hour for a more politically correct ride, you’re dreaming, or you never use a ride-hailing app. But that’s America also, everybody’s got an opinion, even if they never saw the movie, never used the product, they’re an expert, screaming loudly.

Was there rampant sexual discrimination? Did HR mishandle complaints?

ABSOLUTELY!

Give Travis some time off. Establish guidelines. But you don’t can your leader in the middle of a war, especially during the initial skirmish.

We’re only at the beginning folks. Soon there won’t be any citizen drivers at all, autonomous cars will arrive on demand. Hell, the WSJ says it’ll be in less than half a decade. Kalanick knows this, but the punters going on about Uber’s culture are the same idiots who want to buy CDs and physical books, not believing the future will ever come. Did you see that UK youngsters prefer Spotify to YouTube? I’ve been saying this for over a year, you only have to look at play counts to see this. But no, IFPI and the RIAA and the rest of the Luddites keep complaining about the value gap, and they’re STILL bitching about piracy. We’re not living in 2002 anymore!

And one of the other great advantages of Uber is its no-tipping policy. I want to know what the cost of a ride is. Danny Meyer gets rid of tipping at his restaurants and the blowhards complain that Uber drivers can’t get extra money. Hell, how much do I tip, how does it affect my rating? Did anybody ever contemplate the consequences of adding tips? As for drivers… Come on, ever hear of surge pricing? If remuneration is too bad, drivers won’t, drive that is. Kalanick knows all this, but the lunatics who’ve taken over Uber don’t.

Ignore the bad press. How many times have we heard Amazon is the enemy, now people LOVE Amazon! And who doesn’t love Prime, with its two day delivery.

America can’t handle the truth. It wants it all touchy-feely and then complains when the stock craters and service isn’t up to its expectations. Do women need protection, a leg up? Absolutely, but making Kalanick the poster boy for Silicon Valley’s bro behavior, making him pay the ultimate price, is like singling out one marijuana smoker and jailing him for life for taking a toke.

We’re so HYPOCRITICAL!

Sure, Uber went through a bad patch, but it’s nothing that’s not fixable. And we forgive mistakes all the time, and in today’s fast-paced digital culture what happens today is forgotten tomorrow, if it even takes that long. Uber is a business, not a cultural institution living on charity. You get to vote based on usage. And it’s not the public complaining about Uber, but the press and the digerati and everybody not using the service. It’d be like private jet owners complaining about seat pitch on commercial airlines.

Yup, Travis Kalanick was Uber’s Jack Nicholson. And he and a few good men built a business out of whole cloth, unfortunately too many men, but still they built it. And they’ve fought off challengers and governments and… When I go to a foreign country and there’s no Uber I wince, how the hell am I gonna get around? And if you say by taxi…you must own a cab. Never mind that I’ve got no idea what the price is. Hell, you can go on Amazon and buy all day for a visible cost but an Uber breakthrough is being able to tip??

Give me a break.

We love the dirt, and there isn’t any.

This reminds me of nothing so much as David Geffen’s “American Masters,” which he paid for, it’s a tribute to his accomplishments, but it didn’t reveal who he really was.

And Jimmy Iovine did not reveal who he truly was on Stern.

I’m not saying he didn’t tell any interesting stories. Illuminated situations that we thought had been pored over so many times we could gain no insight, never mind facts, just that he was so busy propping people up, taking all the blame, that you got no idea of what truly happened and who Jimmy Iovine really is. You’d think he’s warm and fuzzy.

But he’s not.

Just like his hero Geffen. No one can sidle up to an artist more than David. But go against his wishes, leave him out of the loop, and you’re gonna experience blowback for the rest of your life.

But they don’t print this. They rarely do.

The truth is these people, these winners, are different from you and me. Not only are they whip-smart, which they all are, I’ve never met a legend or CEO who was not, even if they were uneducated, but they all make choices and take opportunities that soldiers would not. They’re leaders, not followers. Admire them, but don’t for a minute believe you can be them.

Now I want to give Jimmy credit for his accomplishments, he shepherded some of the great records of all time. But they pale in comparison with his triumph with Beats. He saw a hole in the market and executed perfectly. It took years for competitors, the established players, to catch up. Sennheiser wipes the floor with Beats on sound, but it wasn’t until a couple of years back that they even got into fashion. And the German company isn’t willing to lay out the big bucks, put it all on the line, whereas Jimmy did. And yes, he traded on the fame of his artists, but he helped build those artists.

So listening to this interview you’re gonna feel inadequate. Jimmy’s accomplished a lot. Kudos.

It’s just that it’s not the real him on the radio.

Sure, luck plays a part. But if you think you can start off a zero and become a hero you know nothing about how the real world operates. How you can go from sweeping up to cleaning up, from making tea to being John Lennon’s engineer. It’s a matter of personality, not only taking advantage of opportunities, but MAKING OPPORTUNITIES!

And you can’t teach that, it’s inborn. Who knows what made Jimmy Jimmy. But he had a dream most of his competitors in the studio did not. He needed to make it more than they did. AND HE DID!

So what have we learned here?

Jimmy triumphed in the second half of the classic rock era, from the mid-seventies until MTV went pop. Those records are indelible, not only do the people who lived through that era know them by heart, but so do many of the younger generation. And to hear how Jim Keltner recommended a shaker on “Refugee” is incredible, yet although Iovine says he tortured Heartbreaker drummer Stan Lynch, he will not crap on him. Iovine will not crap on ANYBODY! And if you know Jimmy, like Geffen he keeps score. And will reach out and decimate you, turn you upside down and negatively impact your career if he wants to.

They’re vindictive.

But you wouldn’t know that by listening.

And no one who knows will go on record. Because they’re fearful of the penalty, even at this late date.

Now Jimmy is fighting an uphill battle with Apple Music, I’m wondering when he’ll just declare victory and exit the Cupertino giant. He’s in the same situation he acknowledges at the start of Interscope, in 1990, he could no longer operate on heart, he lost his feel, he had to rely on youngsters, and the youngsters at Spotify and elsewhere in digital music are running circles around him. Curation? Playlists? Turns out Spotify’s machine learning Discover ones are better than the hand-curated ones, which anybody who read Brad Stone’s book “The Everything Store” about Amazon would know, turns out computer recommendations sold more books than human curators. And where are the Apple streaming charts? And the data? Jimmy’s operating in the land of secrecy in an era of transparency. His cheese has been moved and he doesn’t even realize it.

But come on, you’ve got to give him props for his achievements, even if he achieves nothing more.

But is it about achievement?

That’s what age gives you, wisdom and experience, you realize no one will be remembered and the game of accumulation is flawed.

But Jimmy’s in the sunset of his career.

And if you are too, you’ll listen and feel less than. I certainly did. Jimmy’s my exact age.

But then I turned it off and started reading Don Winslow’s “The Force” and I realized I was someone different, and my only choice is to be who I am, that I can only win if I boost my identity and play to my strengths.

Which is one of Jimmy’s points. Only Elton John can get the Elton John piano sound. All the greats may not be the best technically, but they contain some elusive essence we’re all clamoring for.

Shall we clamor for yours.

“Release, observe, react”

That’s what Reid Hoffman says in his podcast with Mark Zuckerberg.

MARK ZUCKERBERG? He’s more inaccessible than a rock star, harder to hear in an uncontrolled environment than our President, just to hear him talk normally, off guard, telling his tale, is a thrill. We’re long in the tooth in the tech era. Despite Marc Andreessen’s pontifications, I don’t think the future is so bright. We saw incredible innovation for twenty years while we were paying attention, for nearly twenty years before that, but now there’s consolidation and power and that era where you had to constantly buy new hardware, check out new sites and apps, seems to be behind us. Oh, I’m not saying there’s not plenty of runway in front of us, but I am saying WHERE WAS THIS PODCAST WHEN WE NEEDED IT?

Reid Hoffman made his first big score with PayPal, but he’s most famous for LinkedIn, he knows everybody in the Valley, and he’s got them talking on his podcast. But it’s more than that, Reid is delivering his philosophy, it’s a master class for wannabes, it’s just that today it’s so hard to jump that hurdle from outside to inside. And speaking of inside, what they say is true, every industry is small, everybody knows everybody, whether it be tech or music or waste management. Make it, and you’re part of the club.

Now I want you to take advice with a grain of salt. Because it’s rarely particularized to you. Sure, it worked well for the person giving it, but you’re different, you have to play to your own strengths. But still, there are a lot of good transferable lessons in this Zuckerberg podcast.

Like the one above, “Release, observe, react.” First and foremost Hoffman says if it’s perfect, you’ve launched too late. Steve Jobs could get it right the first time, but for the rest of us, it’s best to get the product out there and observe…

I do this all the time.

And so should you.

I put out product, I write something, and I gauge the reaction. Sometimes I get a lot of e-mail, sometimes I don’t. Sometimes I write something I know is great, but it’s not the kind of thing that people would respond to. And then there are the times I hang it out there, wondering if anybody will care, whether I’ll lose subscribers, and the reaction is NUCLEAR! The funny thing is it’s usually about my personal life, or observations, turns out my audience is more interested in me than what I have to say. Of course, not everybody. But Hoffman makes that point too, you play to the majority. And when I write about politics, when I go off point, it pisses some people off, but it resonates with others who forward it and I gain new subscribers, new doors are opened, if you stay in your own vertical you’re not gonna grow.

Assuming people care to begin with. Which is why you should constantly be releasing songs, combing the data, seeing what works. There are so many tools available.

Another aphorism from Hoffman is “Listen and ignore.” Turns out what people do is very different from what they say. They say don’t do this, they hate that, but then they’ll use it ad infinitum. Ignore hatred when your play count is soaring.

You also have to become comfortable with embarrassment. If you’re not willing to screw up in public, you’re best off being a worker bee. You need a thick skin to make it.

There are numerous lessons in this podcast.

But most thrilling is having access to Zuck. You feel like you’re in the room. It’s not that he’s making such incredible revelations, it’s just that he becomes three-dimensional, you can see the path. And he was into computers and networking long before Facebook. Most successful people paid a lot of dues when no one was watching. They look like overnight successes, but they’re not.

And Zuck would rather have a social impact than financial success. And I’m sure he likes the money, but that’s what the new tools afford you, the chance to make an impact. Hell, I deplore Breitbart and the right wing blogs spewing falsehoods, but you’ve got to give them credit, they used the new tools, the internet, to be heard, and their candidate got elected.

And the game is always changing, but one thing remains constant, it all comes down to people. And when you can hear the people speak…IT’S UTTERLY FASCINATING!

P.S. Now I started with Eric Schmidt. He was unbelievably boring, I turned it off, I was never gonna listen to “Masters Of Scale” again. But then one podcast ended and the episode with Crisis Text Line’s Nancy Lublin began and I got hooked. She’s a force of nature, she has grit, which is what the episode is about, so then I pulled up Zuck’s and was even more satisfied. And next comes Sheryl Sandberg, who was in this podcast, not in her I’m an expert on everything mode, but as an employee of Facebook, and just to hear her speak…WOW!

P.P.S. Smart is underrated. Smart is hard to do, as is educated. Sure, not all these people graduated from college, but they paid so many dues that when they finally speak the pearls of wisdom drop right off their tongues. Used to be we listened to musicians, now we listen to techies.

Home

Masters of Scale with Reid Hoffman – Apple podcasts