Facebook is in trouble with the media again, guilty of stupidity by apathy. Still, the media itself hasn’t exactly caught up with the reality of the Internet.
BuzzFeed Reorganizes, WhatsApp Eases Privacy Rules
BuzzFeed reorganizes and thus reemphasizes their new business model. Unfortunately, it’s a business model that doesn’t necessarily need news. Then, WhatsApp predictably eases their privacy policy, their CEO’s previous declarations notwithstanding.
The Future of Podcasting
Podcasting is stuck between the open model of the past and the push for monetization in the future. Might there be a third way that actually benefits publishers?
Jeff Bezos at the Code Conference, Recent Amazon News
Jeff Bezos gave a great interview at the Code Conference, and while the whole thing is worth watching, I wanted to highlight a few items that touched on Stratechery topics. Plus, three recent Amazon stories that show how the company is winning.
Disrupting Basketball, Thiel-Gawker Follow-up, Intel and ARM
The Golden State Warriors are kinda sorta disrupting basketball, and making plenty of enemies in the process, which segues to a follow-up on Peter Thiel and Gawker. Then, Intel and ARM have dueling releases that show just how different they are.
Peter Thiel, Comic Book Hero
What Gawker did to Peter Thiel is inexcusable, but Thiel’s response is threatening to the industry that made him rich in the first place.
The Real Problem With Facebook and the News
Facebook is receiving a lot of criticism for allegedly interfering with conservative topics when it comes to “Trending News”. In fact, though, the polarization reinforced by an engagement-driven feed is a much bigger concern.
The Problem with Facebook’s Ten-Year Plan, Is BuzzFeed Struggling?
Facebook’s (in my opinion) misguided attempt to own both public and private social was not the only thing that concerned me about the F8 keynote; I am also skeptical of the 10-year plan. Then, BuzzFeed may have some concerning numbers, but I think there is a good reason: the company is changing its business model.
Tesla Skepticism and Superchargers, Medium for Publishers
Just because Tesla is achieving an Apple-like brand doesn’t mean they will have Apple’s success: the hard part starts now. Plus, why SuperChargers are a big deal. Then, Medium for Publishers is Medium’s play to own the long tail of publishing, and it’s very exciting in what it enables.
Blendle Launches in the U.S., An Interview with Alexander Klöpping, Apple Pay Coming to Websites
A bit of follow-up on why the SE might not succeed in India, and then an exploration of Blendle, the new micropayments platform for news that launched yesterday, along with an interview with co-founder Alexander Klöpping. Plus, Apple Pay for websites.