Decoder with Nilay Patel

Latest Episodes:

Inside the global battle over chip manufacturing Jan 31, 2023

Show notes

A few weeks ago, President Biden was in the Netherlands, where he asked the Dutch government to restrict export from a company called ASML to China. ASML is the only company in the world that makes a specific machine needed to make the most advanced chips. Apple couldn’t make iPhone chips without this one machine from the Netherlands’ biggest company. ASML doesn’t just shape the Dutch economy—it shapes the entire world economy. How did that happen?

Chris Miller, Tufts professor and author of Chip War: The Fight For The World’s Most Critical Technology walked me through a lot of this, along with some deep dives into geopolitics and the absolutely fascinating chip manufacturing process. This one has everything: foreign policy, high powered lasers, hotshot executives, monopolies, the fundamental limits of physics, and, of course, Texas. Here we go.

Links:

US issues sweeping restrictions on chip sales to China

Japan and the Netherlands join US with tough chip controls on China

Pat Gelsinger came back to turn Intel around — here’s how it’s going

Transcript:

https://www.theverge.com/e/23342471

Credits:

Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network.

It was produced by Creighton DeSimone and Jackie McDermott and it was edited by Callie Wright.

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Our Editorial Director is Brooke Minters and our Executive Director is Eleanor Donovan.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Taylor Swift and the music industry's next $20 Jan 17, 2023

Show notes

I have this theory that music is usually about five years ahead of the rest of media in terms of its relationship to tech—whether that’s new formats based on new tech, like vinyl to CDs; new business models like streaming; or simply being disrupted by new kinds of artists who use new forms of promotion like TikTok in unexpected ways. I’ve always thought that if you can wrap your head around what’s happening to the music industry, you can pretty much see the future of TV or movies or the news or whatever it is, because the music industry just moves that fast.

I was talking about this with my friend Charlie Harding, the co-host of Switched on Pop, and he said that he thinks the upcoming Taylor Swift Eras Tour is itself the end of an era in music — that the age of cheap streaming services is coming to an inevitable conclusion, and that something has to change in order for industry to sustain itself in the future.

So, in this episode, Charlie and I walk through a brief history of the music business—which, despite its ever-changing business models, is permanently trying to find something to sell you for $20 whether that’s the music itself, all-access streaming, merch, and even NFTs—using Taylor Swift as a case study. We map her big moves against the business of music over time to try to see if this really is the end of an era. And maybe more importantly, to try and figure out if the music industry can sustain and support artists who are not Taylor Swift, because streaming, all by itself, definitely cannot.

Links:

Switched on Pop

Charlie’s first appearance on Decoder: Good 4 who? How music copyright has gone too far - The Verge

Why Amazon VP Steve Boom just made the entire music catalog free with Prime - The Verge

Spotify launching in the US at 8AM tomorrow, open to all pre-registered users - The Verge

Metallica sued Napster 15 years ago today - The Verge

Taylor Swift calls Apple Music free trial 'shocking, disappointing' in open letter - The Verge

Taylor Swift versus Ticketmaster: the latest on the tour that may break up a giant - The Verge

The DOJ has reportedly opened an antitrust investigation into Ticketmaster's owner

How fandom built the internet as we know it, with Kaitlyn Tiffany - The Verge

Steve Aoki on the blockchain, the metaverse, and the business of music - The Verge

Transcript:

https://www.theverge.com/e/23322720

Credits:

Decoder is a production of The Verge, and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network.

Today’s episode was produced by Hadley Robinson, Creighton DeSimone and Jackie McDermott and it was edited by Callie Wright.

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Our Editorial Director is Brooke Minters. Our Sr. Audio Director is Andrew Marino and our Executive Producer is Eleanor Donovan.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Breaking free from big tech and big content with authors Cory Doctorow and Rebecca Giblin Jan 10, 2023

Show notes

Last year I spoke with Cory Doctorow and Rebecca Giblin about their new book, Chokepoint Capitalism. It’s a book about artists and technology and platforms, and how different kinds of distribution and creations tools create chokepoints for different companies to capture value that might otherwise go to artists and creators.. In other words, it’s a lot of Decoder stuff.

As we were prepping this episode, the Decoder team realized it previews a lot of things we’re going to talk about in 2023: antitrust law. Ticketmaster. Spotify and the future of the music industry. Amazon and the book industry. And, of course, being a creator trying to make a living on all these platforms.

This episode is longer than normal, but it was a really great conversation and I'm glad we are sharing it with you.

Links:

What is Mixer, Ninja’s new exclusive streaming home?

Ninja returns to Twitch

This was Sony Music's contract with Spotify

Transcript:

https://www.theverge.com/e/23311918

Credits:

Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network.

It was produced by Creighton DeSimone and Jackie McDermott and it was edited by Callie Wright.

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Our Editorial Director is Brooke Minters and our Executive Director is Eleanor Donovan.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

‘We might be wrong, but we’re not confused’: how Tomer Cohen, chief product officer at LinkedIn, figures out what works best Dec 20, 2022

Show notes

Tomer Cohen is the chief product officer at LinkedIn, and actually, I talked to Tomer twice. Here’s a little secret about Decoder: we do the interviews, and then often, the guest and I just keep chatting for a while. So after my first interview with Tomer, we were hanging out, talking about the perpetual battles between engineers, product managers, and designers. And he said something that completely jumped out at me:

“We might be wrong, but we’re not fucking confused.”

This isn’t a totally new line — it’s been floating around for a while, you can Google it — but you know I love an f-bomb, and honestly, it’s one of the most simple and clarifying things a manager can say, especially when managing across large teams. So I asked Tomer to come back and really dig in on that idea.

On top of that, we’ve been talking a lot about running social networks lately, and LinkedIn is a fascinating social network because it doesn’t have the same engagement-based success metrics as other social platforms like Twitter and Instagram. Tomer doesn’t care about time spent on LinkedIn; the platform is designed to be successful when people get new jobs. That means his ideas for features and user experiences are just really different.

Links:

Employment Situation Summary (Jobs Report)

December Workforce Report 2022 (LinkedIn)

Vision to values flowchart

ChatGPT proves AI is finally mainstream — and things are only going to get weirder

LinkedIn buys California-based SaaS learning platform

How big companies kill ideas — and how to fight back, with Tony Fadell

RAPID decision making

Transcript:

https://www.theverge.com/e/23281360

Credits:

Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network.

It was produced by Creighton DeSimone and Jackie McDermott and it was edited by Callie Wright.

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Our Editorial Director is Brooke Minters and our Executive Director is Eleanor Donovan.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

How to buy a social network, with Tumblr CEO Matt Mullenweg Dec 13, 2022

Show notes

We have to talk about Twitter, right? Elon Musk bought it. He’s making all these changes, and he’s realizing that content moderation decisions are quite complicated, especially when the stakes are high.

But talking about Twitter in a vacuum seems wrong. There are lots of other social networks and community-based products, and they all have basically the same problems: some technical (you have to run the service), some political (you have to comply with various laws and platform regulations around the world), and some social (you have to get millions of users to post for free while making sure what they post is good stuff and not bad stuff).

So, we’re doing something a little different this week. First, I’m talking to Matt Mullenweg, who is the CEO of Automattic, which owns WordPress, the blog hosting platform, and Tumblr, the social network, which he purchased from Verizon in 2019. Then, Verge deputy editor Alex Heath and I are going to break down a bunch of what Matt told me and apply it to Twitter to see what we can learn.

Okay, Matt Mullenweg, CEO of Tumblr, followed by Alex Heath. Here we go.

Links:

How WordPress and Tumblr are keeping the internet weird

GPL - General Public License

Verizon is selling Tumblr to WordPress’ owner

Kanye West suspended from Twitter after posting a swastika

‘Martin Scorsese’s lost film’ Goncharov (1973), explained

Yahoo acquires Tumblr in $1.1 billion cash deal, promises 'not to screw it up'

Verizon is selling Tumblr to WordPress’ owner

Turnaround Definition

Welcome to Tumblr. Now Go Away.

Work With Us / Twitter – Automattic

Tumblr will sell you two useless blue check marks for $8

Elon Musk is laying off even more Twitter workers

Welcome to hell, Elon

Why “Go Nuts, Show Nuts” Doesn't Work in 2022

How America turned against the First Amendment

About – SHOSHANA ZUBOFF

A Framework for Moderation

First Amendment - Freedom of Religion, Speech, Press, Assembly, and Petition | Constitution Center

America’s Favorite Flimsy Pretext for Limiting Free Speech

Brandenburg v. Ohio

Elon Musk says Tim Cook told him Apple ‘never considered’ removing Twitter - The Verge

The Twitter Files - Matt Taibbi

Elon Musk’s promised Twitter exposé on the Hunter Biden story is a flop that doxxed multiple people

Twitter Blue is back, letting you buy a blue checkmark again

Transcript:

https://www.theverge.com/e/23270126

Credits:

Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network.

It was produced by Creighton DeSimone and Jackie McDermott and it was edited by Callie Wright.

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Our Editorial Director is Brooke Minters and our Executive Director is Eleanor Donovan.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Disney’s CEO drama explained, with Julia Alexander Dec 06, 2022

Show notes

Today, we need to talk about Bob. Two Bobs, actually: Bob Iger, the former and now current CEO of Disney, and Bob Chapek, the man Iger handpicked as his replacement, who flamed out and was fired by the board, and then, on November 20th, was replaced by Bob Iger. Bobs, man.

The heart of this whole thing is total Decoder bait. It’s a story about how to structure a company like Disney. Then you add in the complexity of the shift to streaming, the future of TV and movies generally, and the gigantic reputation of a character like Bob Iger, who many people think could plausibly run for president. There’s just a lot going on here.

Whenever I need to talk Disney, media, and Bobs, I call one person: Julia Alexander, director of strategy at Parrot Analytics and a former reporter at The Verge. Julia pays a lot of attention to the streaming giants, she’s sourced inside all the companies battling for our attention, and she has a lot to say about the Bobs.

Links:

Bob Iger steps back in as Disney CEO, replacing Bob Chapek

Reed Hastings on Twitter

Disney+ launch lineup: Every movie and TV show available to stream on day one - The Verge

Bob Iger steps down as Disney CEO, replaced by Bob Chapek - The Verge

Disney streaming chief Kevin Mayer resigns to become TikTok CEO - The Verge

Disney Plus surpasses 100 million subscribers - The Verge

Meta announces huge job cuts affecting 11,000 employees - The Verge

Netflix's $6.99 per month ad tier is now live

Stranger Things - The Verge

Disney’s major reorganization is good news for anyone who loves Disney Plus - The Verge

Functional Structure: Advantages and Disadvantages | Indeed.com

Pros and Cons of Implementing a Divisional Structure | Indeed.com

Disney Proposal to Restructure, on McKinsey’s Advice, Triggered Uproar From Creative Executives - WSJ

Disney Shows the Limits of Streaming - WSJ

Disney Erases Almost All Its Pandemic Gains After Earnings Miss

‘Strange World’: Beautiful to look at, but not much below the surface - The Washington Post

Watch The Future Of | Netflix Official Site

Kevin Mayer quits as TikTok CEO due to ongoing political turmoil - The Verge

Kevin Mayer Says His Firm Is In Deal Mode After Buying Reese Witherspoon's Hello Sunshine

WarnerMedia CEO Jason Kilar announces exit as Discovery deal nears close - The Verge

Transcript:

https://www.theverge.com/e/23259187

Credits:

Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network.

It was produced by Creighton DeSimone and Jackie McDermott and it was edited by Callie Wright.

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Our Editorial Director is Brooke Minters and our Executive Director is Eleanor Donovan.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

How Bose compete with AirPods — and why it’s in more cars than ever, with CEO Lila Snyder Nov 29, 2022

Show notes

Bose is one of the most recognizable audio brands in the world: it was famous for the Wave radio in the 80s, it invented noise cancellation, you can see its logo on NFL sidelines every Sunday, and of course there are the popular consumer products like the QuietComfort headphones that reviewers like Chris Welch here at The Verge rate as some of the best in the game. Bose is in tons of cars as well: audio systems in GM, Honda, Hyundai, Porsche, and more are developed and tuned by Bose.

Bose was founded in 1964 by Dr. Amar Bose, who donated a majority of the shares of the company to MIT, where he was a professor. That means to this day, Bose is a private company with no pressure to go public. However, Bose still has to compete against big tech in talent, products, and compatibility.

So today I’m talking to Bose CEO Lila Snyder about Bose’s dependence on platform vendors like Apple and Google, how she thinks about standards like Bluetooth, and where she thinks she can compete and win against AirPods and other products that get preferential treatment on phones.

Links:

Bose QuietComfort Earbuds II review: noise cancellation domination

How Amar Bose used research to build better speakers

List of Bose shelf stereos

Hearing Aids | FDA

Digital signal processor

Functional organization

Bose names its first female CEO as wait continues for new products

Amar Bose ’51 makes stock donation to MIT

Meta announces huge job cuts affecting 11,000 employees

Amazon mass layoffs will reportedly ax 10,000 people this week

Elon Musk demands Twitter employees commit to ‘extremely hardcore’ culture or leave

The iPhone 7 has no headphone jack

Bluetooth Special Interest Group

Qualcomm Partners with Meta and Bose

Bose gets into hearing aid business with new FDA-cleared SoundControl hearing aids

Over-the-counter hearing aids could blur the line with headphones

New Bose-Lexie Hearing Aid to Enter the Over-the-Counter Market

Lexie Partners with Bose to Offer Lexie B1 Powered by Bose Hearing Aids

Bose Frames Tempo review: the specs to beat

Bose discontinues its niche Sport Open Earbuds

BMW starts selling heated seat subscriptions for $18 a month

Seven CEOs and one secretary of transportation on the future of cars

Why Amazon VP Steve Boom just made the entire music catalog free with Prime

Transcript:

https://www.theverge.com/e/23246668

Credits:

Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network.

It was produced by Creighton DeSimone and Jackie McDermott and it was edited by Callie Wright.

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Our Editorial Director is Brooke Minters and our Executive Director is Eleanor Donovan.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

On with Kara Swisher: Can Chris Licht Turn CNN Around? Nov 22, 2022

Show notes

Chris Licht faces an uphill battle at CNN. He got the CEO gig in the midst of a prickly merger between Warner Bros. and Discovery and right after the shocking exit of beloved long-time boss, Jeff Zucker. In his first six months, he’s shut down CNN+, ousted Brian Stelter, and shuffled anchors around, including Don Lemon and Jake Tapper. This week, the network chief held an internal town hall meeting where he faced a staff of thousands and discussed upcoming layoffs. Shortly afterwards, he sat down with Kara — who grilled him, of course.

She asks Licht whether he has any real actual power or if he’s simply executing orders from Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav — who is in search of cuts, as the company stares down the barrel at $50 billion in debt — and billionaire board member, John Malone, who has said he’d like to see more “centrist” programming from CNN. They discuss Licht’s vision for the newsroom, his plan to build trust with journalists who fear losing jobs, and how CNN will cover Donald Trump during the 2024 election.

Before the interview, Kara and Nayeema discuss the challenges facing journalism in an era of disinformation. Stay tuned for Kara’s closing rant on “citizen journalism” and Elon’s latest broadside against the press.

You can find Kara and Nayeema on Twitter @karaswisher and @nayeema.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Phil Spencer really wants you to know that native Call of Duty will stay on PlayStation Nov 15, 2022

Show notes

Phil Spencer, CEO of Microsoft Gaming, is in charge of Xbox and all the game studios that Microsoft has acquired over the years. Phil came to talk to us hours before the European Commission announced an in-depth investigation into Microsoft’s proposed 68.7 billion dollar acquisition of Activision Blizzard, which makes the enormous Call of Duty series, as well as Candy Crush on phones.

So I had the chance to ask Phil: Will he make the concessions that regulators want in order to close this deal? And is the deal really just about Call of Duty, or something else? Is Microsoft committed to keep Call of Duty available on Playstation?

Phil’s a candid guy. He’s been on Decoder before. I always enjoy talking to him, and this was a fun one.

Links:

Microsoft’s Phil Spencer on the new Xbox launch - The Verge

Microsoft to acquire Activision Blizzard for $68.7 billion - The Verge

Why Microsoft bought Bethesda for $7.5 billion

Microsoft announces big, multistudio push to create more Xbox exclusives

Bethesda’s Starfield and Redfall have been delayed to 2023

Tech antitrust pioneer Lina Khan will officially lead the FTC

Sony says Microsoft’s Call of Duty offer was ‘inadequate on many levels’

Microsoft: Xbox game streaming console is ‘years away'

This is Microsoft’s Xbox game streaming device

Google is shutting down Stadia in January 2023 - The Verge

Razer’s Edge is one sharp-looking cloud gaming Android handheld

Logitech G Cloud Gaming Handheld review: terminally online

Steam Deck review: it’s not ready

Steam Deck, one month later

Tech Leaders Discuss the Metaverse’s Future | WSJ Tech Live 2022

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella on the business of Windows

Microsoft partners with Meta to bring Teams, Office, Windows, and Xbox to VR

EU opens ‘in-depth investigation’ into Microsoft’s Activision Blizzard acquisition

Transcript:

https://www.theverge.com/e/23223230

Credits:

Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network.

It was produced by Creighton DeSimone and Jackie McDermott and it was edited by Callie Wright.

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Our Editorial Director is Brooke Minters and our Executive Director is Eleanor Donovan.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Why Figma is selling to Adobe for $20 billion, with CEO Dylan Field Nov 08, 2022

Show notes

Dylan Field is the co-founder and CEO of Figma, which makes a very popular design tool that allows designers and their collaborators to all work together right in a web browser. You know how multiple people can edit together in Google Docs? Figma is that for design work. We just redesigned The Verge; we used Figma extensively throughout that process.

So for years, people have been waiting on the inevitable Figma vs. Adobe standoff since Figma was such a clear upstart competitor to Photoshop and Illustrator and the rest. Well, buckle up because in September, Adobe announced that it was buying Figma for $20 billion. Figma is going to remain independent inside Adobe, but you know, it’s a little weird.

So I wanted to talk to Dylan about the deal, why he’s doing it, how he made the decision to sell, and what things he can do as part of Adobe that he couldn’t do as an independent company.

Dylan’s also a pretty expansive thinker, so after we talked about his company getting the “fuck you” money from Adobe, we talked about making VR Figma for the metaverse and AGI, which is artificial general intelligence, or the kind of AI that can fully think for itself. This episode takes a turn. I think you’re going to like it.

Okay, Dylan Field, CEO of Figma. Here we go.

Links:

Welcome to the new Verge

Adobe to acquire Figma in a deal worth $20 billion

A New Collaboration with Adobe

Designers worry Adobe won't let Figma flourish

WebGL - Wikipedia

How big companies kill ideas — and how to fight back, with Tony Fadell - Decoder

Dylan Field on Twitter: "Our goal is to be Figma not Adobe"

College Dropout Turns Thiel Fellowship Into a $2 Billion Figma Fortune

Generative adversarial network (GAN) - Wikipedia

GPT-3 - Wikipedia