2 News Stories That Got My Attention

I keep my news time to a minimum. I’ve found that many of the stories that get us worked up today become forgotten tomorrow. And with the polarization of the media, it’s hard to tell if we’re getting the straight scoop. Just take a look at a site like Allsides. It’s fascinating how different the same story is reported by left-leaning v. right-leaning outlets.

Also, we need to think about who represents the media. In the old days, you had to get an article into the newspaper or be on one of the 3 major networks to tell your story. Today, anyone can post a YouTube video, podcast or blog post – even me.

I put out a YouTube video (under my Dog’s name – sorry Rosco) and it got over 11,000 views. Check it out here. I’m the media.

And even a Facebook post could be considered news. We’re all Walter Cronkite.

But, 2 stories that I’ve been following recently got my attention yesterday.

Netflix

While I don’t follow traditional news, I do spend some time each day reading about my favorite companies.

In the late 1990s, I bought a DVD player and with it came a coupon for a DVD-by-mail company called Netflix. I signed up for the free trial and became addicted to the red envelopes.

One day as I was professing my love for Netflix, I wondered whether they were a public company and if I could become an investor. They were and I did. I bought and sold shares a number of times since then, but Netflix remains one of my biggest winners and I still hold a large position today.

Warner Brothers Discovery (WBD)

Late last year, there was some excitement as both Netflix and Paramount entered a bidding war for Warner Brothers Discovery which owns the Warner Brothers studio in Hollywood, owns streaming properties like HBO Max and Discovery, and owns some cable properties like CNN.

There was quite a bit of drama, and Netflix ended as the winner.

Some of the troubling (to me) parts of the drama were

• Trump was vocal early on that he’d be involved. Read here from Reuters. I don’t remember many past Presidents involving themselves directly in corporate mergers or acquisitions
• Jared Kushner, son-in-law of the President, backed out of the deal – he was intending to provide financing for Paramount. Fox News reported that story here
• Billionaire father (Larry Ellison) of Paramount CEO David Ellison pledged financial support for Paramount’s take-over bid. Read the story here.

Netflix has remained the winner through all of his, but this week, there was a quick flurry of new activity.

• Trump called for the firing of a Netflix board member. Read it here.
• Netflix CEO Ted Sarandos visited the White House. Read here.

And then…

For those unaware (I probably should have introduced this earlier) Trump and Ellison have close ties. Read more from Reuters. This close relationship was demonstrated in the recent excitement around the creation of a US version of TikTok. Larry Ellison was chosen to become one of the owners. Reuters tells the story here.

2 Things Struck Me

In following this story, the twists and turns were fascinating. And the final twist surprised everyone.

To me though, the real story was the influence. While our government has a history of exerting influence over businesses – check out my post on social media caving to the Biden administration’s demands here, and here – the way the Netflix-Warner Brothers-Paramount debacle played out seemed unique.

The second big take away is how the Ellison family (did I mention they are tight with the President?) has rapidly gained control of a large chunk of the US media assets. Read here.

And it’s not just Hollywood. Larry’s got TikTok and now David’s picked up:

Read here for the full inventory.

That’s a lot of recently acquired media properties.

Robots

In other news…

Robots!

Whenever I hear the word, I think…

or this

I kinda laugh and write it off.

In case you missed it, Tesla announced earlier this year that it would stop production of both the Model S and the Model X.

With anything Musk says, I take it with a grain of salt.

But check this out.

The newest generation of robot moves like a human. It’s controlled by thoughts…it’s hard to tell from the video if this is live yet, but Neuralink, another Musk company has implanted chips into the brains of paralyzed humans to allow them to control devices with thought. That part is real so even if we can’t control robots today with our brain, it’s coming.

So, think about it. Musk is building an army of Robots. It sounds like the plot of a bad science fiction movie.

And he’s not the only one. Boston Dynamics’ robot dog was the talk of the recent Genesis Golf Tournament. Read here.

Think About That

The technology is here. We can build robots. They get better every day. They can learn from their mistakes or learn from us. There are factories that can produce robots at scale.

That’s something.

Wrap Up

2 stories.

Both make me a little nervous.

What do you think?