Sharp Tech with Ben Thompson

Latest Episodes:

(Preview) Mailbag Monday: Meta and the Smartphone; Upheaval at OpenAI; Dossier Censorship; ESPN and Media Consumption Sep 30, 2024

Show notes

A few follow-up questions on Meta's plans for the Orion glasses and the looming competition with Apple, surveying the past 12 months at OpenAI, a question about X and the decision to limit the distribution of a hacked JD Vance dossier, and a question about the future of media consumption in the wake of ESPN's decision to part ways with Zach Lowe.

To email the show: email@sharptech.fm

@SharpTechPodcast Channel — YouTube

@Stratechery Channel — YouTube

More on Orion, Where Vision Pro Went Wrong, Apple’s Response and Meta’s Motivation — Stratechery Update

An Interview with Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth About Orion and Reality Labs — Stratechery Interview

Turning OpenAI Into a Real Business Is Tearing It Apart — Wall Street Journal

Snap Spectacles, iOS 18 Contacts Crack Down — Stratechery Update

ESPN lays off NBA reporter Zach Lowe over seven-figure salary — New York Post

Get all episodes of Sharp Tech, Sharp China, Stratechery Updates and Interviews, Greatest of All Talk and the Dithering Podcast as part of Stratechery Plus for $15/month or $150/year.

Meta Previews an Augmented Reality Future, Orion and the Apple Vision Pro, A Call for More Live Keynotes Sep 27, 2024

Show notes

An episode of reactions to Meta Connect 2024. Topics include: the lively atmosphere during Mark Zuckerberg’s keynote, Ben’s experience with the Orion AR glasses, the strengths and weaknesses of Apple and Meta in the race to create a platform for the future, Llama 3.2, Snap’s Spectacles, and more.

To email the show: email@sharptech.fm

@SharpTechPodcast Channel — YouTube

@Stratechery Channel — YouTube

An Interview with Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth About Orion and Reality Labs — Stratechery Interview

Meta and Reasonable Doubt — Stratechery

DALL-E, the Metaverse, and Zero Marginal Content — Stratechery

Snap Spectacles, iOS 18 Contacts Crack Down — Stratechery Update

Get all episodes of Sharp Tech, Sharp China, Stratechery Updates and Interviews, Greatest of All Talk and the Dithering Podcast as part of Stratechery Plus for $15/month or $150/year.

(Preview) Mailbag Monday: Sports Gambling Apps; PlayStation’s New Price Point; Robotics and AI Upheaval; Apple’s ‘Intelligence’ Ads Sep 23, 2024

Show notes

Answering listener questions on a tidal wave of sports gambling advertising, Sony’s strategy for the PlayStation Pro, robotics and the potentially destabilizing impact of AI, Apple’s latest ads, Microsoft’s LinkedIn purchase, and more.

To email the show: email@sharptech.fm

@SharpTechPodcast Channel — YouTube

@Stratechery Channel — YouTube

Unity Scraps Runtime Fee, Back to Reality, Sony PlayStation Pro — Stratechery Update

OpenAI’s New Model, How o1 Works, Scaling Inference — Stratechery Update

Copilot Pages, Salesforce Agents — Stratechery Update

Apple store employees hype the iPhone 16 — X: @9to5mac

Apple Intelligence | Custom memory movies | iPhone 16 Pro — Apple YouTube Channel

How to Have Interesting Ideas (The Ben Thompson Playbook) — How I Write

Get all episodes of Sharp Tech, Sharp China, Stratechery Updates and Interviews, Greatest of All Talk and the Dithering Podcast as part of Stratechery Plus for $15/month or $150/year.

(Preview) OpenAI's Latest Model Is Not Like the Others, Copilot Pages and Salesforce Agents, When AI Moves from Copilots to Airplanes Sep 19, 2024

Show notes

Understanding the way LLMs have worked and why OpenAI's o1 model appears to be different, reactions to Microsoft's Copilot Pages and Marc Benioff's vision for agents, and why o1 and a generation of "reasoning models" could provide intriguing possibilities for AI investments across the enterprise space.

To email the show: email@sharptech.fm

@SharpTechPodcast Channel — YouTube

@Stratechery Channel — YouTube

Copilot Pages, Salesforce Agents — Stratechery Update

OpenAI’s New Model, How o1 Works, Scaling Inference — Stratechery Update

MKBHDs For Everything — Stratechery

Microsoft Customers Pause on Office AI Assistant Due to Budgets, Bugs — The Information

Steve Jobs Insult Response — YouTube

Matt Damon and George Clooney in Ocean's 11 — YouTube

Get all episodes of Sharp Tech, Sharp China, Stratechery Updates and Interviews, Greatest of All Talk and the Dithering Podcast as part of Stratechery Plus for $15/month or $150/year.

(Preview) Mailbag Monday: Politics as Monoculture; Startup Anxiety in Europe and China; WhatsApp Spam Sep 16, 2024

Show notes

Questions about politics as America's most dominant pop culture franchise, recommendations for the EU, and more.

To email the show: email@sharptech.fm

@SharpTechPodcast Channel — YouTube

@Stratechery Channel — YouTube

Get all episodes of Sharp Tech, Sharp China, Stratechery Updates and Interviews, Greatest of All Talk and the Dithering Podcast as part of Stratechery Plus for $15/month or $150/year.

The Strategic Logic of the iPhone 16, Services Upside and Downside, Steve Jobs and Modern Apple Sep 12, 2024

Show notes

What Apple's iPhone event signals about priorities for the company, a digression on the App Store and its attendant risks, and thoughts on what Steve Jobs could and couldn't change about Apple in 2024.

To email the show: email@sharptech.fm

@SharpTechPodcast Channel — YouTube

@Stratechery Channel — YouTube

Boomer Apple — Stratechery

Everything as a Service — Stratechery

Apple’s Middle Age — Stratechery

iPhone Pricing, DirecTV and Disney, Bars and Sports — Stratechery Update

Get all episodes of Sharp Tech, Sharp China, Stratechery Updates and Interviews, Greatest of All Talk and the Dithering Podcast as part of Stratechery Plus for $15/month or $150/year.

(Preview) Mailbag Monday: Three Apple Questions, Intel and Founder Mode, 230 Follow-Up, China’s Chip Ambitions Sep 09, 2024

Show notes

Answering questions about Apple’s Woj, a cornucopia of iPhone options, founder mode, and more.

To email the show: email@sharptech.fm

@SharpTechPodcast Channel — YouTube

@Stratechery Channel — YouTube

Apple Moves Forward With Foldable iPhone — The Information

Unboxing the new #Pixel9 — TikTok: @google

Founder Mode — Paul Graham

ASML’s China Chip Business Faces New Curbs From Netherlands — Bloomberg

China Warns Japan of Retaliation for Possible New Chip Curbs — Bloomberg

Get all episodes of Sharp Tech, Sharp China, Stratechery Updates and Interviews, Greatest of All Talk and the Dithering Podcast as part of Stratechery Plus for $15/month or $150/year.

Understanding Intel’s Decline, Searching for Structural CHIPS Solutions, The Future of Section 230 Protections Sep 05, 2024

Show notes

Tracing the history that led to the decline of Intel, why Ben is conflicted about the potential solutions to the company's woes, and a Third Circuit verdict on Section 230 that could upend three decades of precedent across the tech ecosystem.

To email the show: email@sharptech.fm

@SharpTechPodcast Channel — YouTube

@Stratechery Channel — YouTube

Intel Honesty — Stratechery

Broadcom and Intel?, Nvidia Earnings, DOJ Investigating Nvidia — Stratechery Update

Intel Concerns, Fubo Blocks Venu — Stratechery Update

Intel Earnings, Intel’s Nadir — Stratechery Update

An Interview with “Father of the iPod” Tony Fadell — Stratechery Interview

An Interview with Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger — Stratechery Interview

An Interview with Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger About Intel’s Progress Towards Process Leadership — Stratechery Interview

Get all episodes of Sharp Tech, Sharp China, Stratechery Updates and Interviews, Greatest of All Talk and the Dithering Podcast as part of Stratechery Plus for $15/month or $150/year.

The Arrest of Pavel Durov, Encryption Explanations and Moderation Questions, Mark Zuckerberg’s Letter to Congress Aug 29, 2024

Show notes

The charges against Pavel Durov in France, the differences between encrypted messaging apps and Telegram, the philosophical questions underlying moderation scrutiny, and thoughts on Mark Zuckerberg's letter to the House Judiciary Committee this week.

To email the show: email@sharptech.fm

@SharpTechPodcast Channel — YouTube

@Stratechery Channel — YouTube

Post from Ethan Mollick — X: @emollick

DALL-E, the Metaverse, and Zero Marginal Content — Stratechery

Telegram CEO Durov faces preliminary charges in France of allowing crime on messaging app — Associated Press

Telegram CEO Charged Over Alleged Criminal Use of App — Bloomberg

The Multitudes of Social — Stratechery

Why Facebook Shouldn’t Be Allowed to Buy tbh — Stratechery

Google, Machine Learning, and CSAM; Takeaways and Tradeoffs; Apple’s CSAM Controversy — Stratechery Update

Mark Zuckerberg's Letter to Jim Jordan — Meta

Twitter, Responsibility, and Accountability — Stratechery

Russia, Google and Apple; The App Firewall; Laptop Assumptions — Stratechery Update

Get all episodes of Sharp Tech, Sharp China, Stratechery Updates and Interviews, Greatest of All Talk and the Dithering Podcast as part of Stratechery Plus for $15/month or $150/year.

(Preview) Mailbag: Disney’s Taylor Swift Expansion, Canva and IPOs, Perplexity in Paris, SaaS for Cars, The Online Recipe Economy Aug 26, 2024

Show notes

Answering listener questions about Disney's massive investment in cruises, follow-ups on Canva and Sarbanes-Oxley, a new Chick-Fil-A streaming service, Perplexity’s advertising strategy, and lots more.

To email the show: email@sharptech.fm

@SharpTechPodcast Channel — YouTube

@Stratechery Channel — YouTube

Disney’s Taylor Swift Era — Stratechery

An Interview with Canva CEO Melanie Perkins About Disrupting Design — Stratechery Interview

Chick-Fil-A Hatches Plans For Streaming Service As Reality TV Comes Home To Roost — Deadline

Chick-fil-A Opens Its First-Ever Elevated Drive-Thru Restaurant — Yahoo! News

Parisian Love (2010) — Google

The world has changed a lot in the last decade...has your search engine? — Perplexity

Perplexity Print ads — X: @jackgwhitaker

This Is What Happens When Tech Bros Attempt to ‘Fix’ Online Recipes — Eater

Get all episodes of Sharp Tech, Sharp China, Stratechery Updates and Interviews, Greatest of All Talk and the Dithering Podcast as part of Stratechery Plus for $15/month or $150/year.

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