Epstein Files: How New Documents Expose a Wider Network | Pivot

Scott Galloway 0:00 There needs to be more prison and more judgment around who was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Kara Swisher 0:05 Yes, I agree, but there's a lot of people who knew exactly what they were doing. [upbeat music] Hi, everyone, this is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher.

Scott Galloway 0:19 And I'm Scott Galloway.

Kara Swisher 0:20 Resist and Unsubscribe

Kara Swisher 0:22 February has begun. How's it going? You, you've been putting up a lot-- You've been really [chuckles] getting rid of shit. I've been getting rid of a lot, but not like you.

Scott Galloway 0:29 Yeah.

Kara Swisher 0:29 I still have Uber. I was just going to pause it and use Lyft instead.

Scott Galloway 0:32 Yeah, it sucks when you've got to walk the walk, um.

Kara Swisher 0:34 I know, I know.

Scott Galloway 0:35 So, I mean, I'm inside-- You'd be a better judge of how it's going than me. I'm, I've literally, I've gotten hundreds, and I'm about to cross a thousand emails of people with screenshots of them unsubscribing. Obviously, you need hundreds of thousands, maybe millions. I'm going on CNN, MSNBC, PBS. I'm doing all-- I'm doing the rounds there. I've heard from about-

Kara Swisher 0:56 I think it's taken off. I have to tell you, I'm hearing it from lots of people.

Scott Galloway 0:59 Oh, thanks. I think-- Well, I hope you're right. You're probably being generous because you like me.

Kara Swisher 1:03 No.

Scott Galloway 1:03 But I've heard from about a third of the companies, either their CEOs, and they've been very polite, but they're like: "You realize that I supported this, and I'm against ICE?" And I'm like: "Yeah, to me, you are, but I haven't heard you say dick publicly."

Kara Swisher 1:14 Right. Not dick.

Scott Galloway 1:15 Um, and what's interesting is through the process, for example, I unsubscribed [chuckles] from Uber-

Kara Swisher 1:23 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 1:23 Or I canceled my Uber account.

Kara Swisher 1:24 That was a big one. I thought that was a big deal.

Scott Galloway 1:25 Oh, my God! Before you go, it tells you, all right, I've ordered thirty-seven times from Uber Eats. How many Ubers have I taken in the last ten years? Guess.

Kara Swisher 1:33 I don't know. Thousands.

Scott Galloway 1:34 Thirty-seven hundred and forty-seven.

Kara Swisher 1:36 Yeah, yeah.

Scott Galloway 1:37 And I did some, I did some math here. When I start-

Kara Swisher 1:39 Everybody thought you had a private driver. I'm like: "He doesn't have a fucking private driver." [chuckles]

Scott Galloway 1:42 Yeah, it's called Uber.

Kara Swisher 1:43 He uses Uber Black.

Scott Galloway 1:43 It's called Dara Khosrowshahi.

Kara Swisher 1:44 Yeah, that's right.

Scott Galloway 1:45 Anyways, I absolutely love Uber Lux.

Kara Swisher 1:47 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 1:47 And this is a story of privilege. Let me do my land acknowledgments.

Kara Swisher 1:50 Right.

Scott Galloway 1:50 Most people don't have the money I have. Anyways, but I've taken three hundred and fifty Ubers a year for the last ten years on average. The average price of Uber Lux has gone from forty to sixty dollars to eighty to one twenty, and this is what these companies do. They do predatory pricing, they price it below market, incredible value proposition. They wait till they consolidate the market, then they start raising prices, which Uber has done seven to ten percent a year for the last decade. So this year, in twenty twenty-five, do you know how much I'm spending a year on Uber?

Kara Swisher 2:19 No. What?

Scott Galloway 2:20 I'm spending thirty-four thousand dollars a year on Uber.

Kara Swisher 2:22 What?

Scott Galloway 2:23 So I figured it out.

Kara Swisher 2:24 Where are you going?

Scott Galloway 2:25 [chuckles] I figured it out.

Kara Swisher 2:26 Where do you fucking go? [chuckles]

Scott Galloway 2:27 Everywhere.

Kara Swisher 2:29 Everywhere.

Scott Galloway 2:29 I go everywhere.

Kara Swisher 2:29 You could have hired a driver.

Scott Galloway 2:31 Anyways.

Kara Swisher 2:31 Yeah. Uh.

Scott Galloway 2:31 Okay, no, better yet, I figured it out.

Kara Swisher 2:34 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 2:34 I'm now taking the tube here. I'm taking the subway. By the way, the subway in New York is amazing.

Kara Swisher 2:38 I love the subway.

Scott Galloway 2:39 And I'm, I'm, I'm filling in the gaps with Uber X, whatever it's called, the cheap one, where you get an air freshener and, um, you know, uh, a guy who can't figure out ways. Uh, that was probably a hate crime. Anyways, and then-- But I figured out the money I'm going to save, I could buy, including insurance and parking, I could lease a Mercedes G-Wagon, a Range Rover, or the new BMW i Series 7. People do not realize how much money they are spending-

Kara Swisher 3:07 Yeah, yeah

Scott Galloway 3:07 ... on these platforms because they get you in-

Kara Swisher 3:10 Mm-hmm

Scott Galloway 3:10 ... they automatically renew.

Kara Swisher 3:11 You're right.

Scott Galloway 3:11 Time goes faster than you think.

Kara Swisher 3:12 Right.

Scott Galloway 3:13 I found out I have three ChatGPT subscriptions. I'm not sure why, but I have three.

Kara Swisher 3:19 [chuckles] A drunken night.

Scott Galloway 3:21 I have four-

Kara Swisher 3:23 Yeah

Scott Galloway 3:23 ... Apple TV+ subscriptions.

Kara Swisher 3:25 Oh.

Scott Galloway 3:25 I'm like: "How do I log on here?"

Kara Swisher 3:26 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 3:26 And I just log on again, or I just-

Kara Swisher 3:28 Yeah

Scott Galloway 3:28 ... create a new account.

Kara Swisher 3:29 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 3:29 I have been-- I switched from AT&T, which has been-

Kara Swisher 3:32 Yeah

Scott Galloway 3:32 ... a supporter of ICE. I'm saving approximately seventy dollars a month-

Kara Swisher 3:37 Mm-hmm

Scott Galloway 3:37 ... on AT&T, switching over to Noble, which I did before.

Kara Swisher 3:40 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 3:40 Anyways, I'm, I'm doing-- I'm trying to unsubscribe from some- from something every day-

Kara Swisher 3:45 Mm-hmm

Scott Galloway 3:45 ... and do some analysis around-

Kara Swisher 3:47 Mm-hmm

Scott Galloway 3:47 ... what I've spent and w- what it's cost, but-

Kara Swisher 3:50 May I ask a question? Because someone did bring this up.

Scott Galloway 3:52 You may.

Kara Swisher 3:52 Would you get rid of your stocks in these companies?

Scott Galloway 3:56 Oh, that's a tough one.

Kara Swisher 3:57 I know. That's what I thought. I thought it was a good question.

Scott Galloway 4:00 Okay, this is the bottom line. Ugh! I think I'm gonna have to.

Kara Swisher 4:06 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 4:06 Um, I'm also thinking about transferring all of my stocks and bonds and assets from, from Goldman [exhales] and, uh, going either to a regional bank or even a Canadian bank.

Kara Swisher 4:20 Canadian bank.

Scott Galloway 4:20 I, I feel-

Kara Swisher 4:21 RBC, whatever.

Scott Galloway 4:22 I just don't want to hate Amer- I don't want to hurt Americans-

Kara Swisher 4:25 Right

Scott Galloway 4:25 ... but I think I might go to a regional bank.

Kara Swisher 4:26 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 4:27 Uh, but I am, I am gonna, I am gonna try and walk the walk here, and every day, I'm s- I'm unsubscribing or canceling from-

Kara Swisher 4:34 Yeah

Scott Galloway 4:35 ... from something. But yeah, it's, it's-

Kara Swisher 4:37 Yeah, it gets easier to harder. That's-- It was a good question from a listener, I thought. Let's listen to some of what our listeners have called in to tell us they've done.

Speaker 4:44 I unsubscribed from Apple TV. [whoosh] I have personally unsubscribed from every streaming service that is currently out there. [whoosh]

Speaker 4:53 Personally, I had given up Amazon three egregious Jeff Bezos acts ago. I had been guiltily keeping the Kindle Unlimited. That is gone as of today, as is Apple Fitness. [whoosh]

Speaker 5:07 This is Michael in Cameroon, and I have canceled my ChatGPT Pro and Amazon Prime. [whoosh]

Speaker 5:16 Amazon acquired IMDb twenty-five years ago. I've been paying for the Pro membership, uh, subscription for the last twenty years. It's a pain, but I can find this information elsewhere, so click.

Kara Swisher 5:29 Good. This is all different. You don't realize how, how we, how much stuff we pay these people-

Scott Galloway 5:34 Oh, yeah

Kara Swisher 5:34 ... everywhere. And also, what's really helpful is you gave examples of what you can go to, helping people go to other things. Now, can I just make one point? Uh, not everything is perfect. No company-- All companies have been involved in all kinds of nefarious activities that you don't like, but you've got to meet the moment for now, and you can always go back to them, right, at, at some point. That's the thing. It's, you're t- sending a message right now, like, uh, I have to give up the Amazon stuff. I gotta work on that today. Like, I u- I use Amazon a lot. My wife's ships shifted to local retailers, which one of the problems is you can't find products because of the tariffs, like, and that's diff- stuff you use every day. Uh, but I'm really, um, i- I think this is a great effort, Scott Galloway. I just want to say.

Scott Galloway 6:15 Thanks, and the o- the o... I mean, a few things. One-... I'm not telling people not to go to work or not to buy groceries. I don't think someone who has the blessings I have is in a position to tell people to take risks with their employment or really sacrifice around things like food. What I'm suggesting is, this is a signal and a framework for how you inflict the maximum damage with a minimum amount of sacrifice. And that is, if you were to say, "Stop shopping at Kroger's and reduce your grocery spend," I think you have X impact. When you go after Big Tech, who has the president's and the market's ear in subscription revenue, where these companies are trading at thirty, fifty, a hundred times revenues, you have forty X the impact on the administration-

Kara Swisher 6:57 Yeah

Scott Galloway 6:58 ... with what is, in my view, a fairly minimal sacrifice when you look at how many substitutes there are and when you actually uncover how much money you're spending and what is really required to not participate. It's not as much as you'd think. It, uh, uh, there is-- there's the Tube, there's UberX, there are a ton of streaming media platforms, there are free thirty-day Spotify accounts if you cancel and then resubscribe. It's-- There's a lot of ways here to have a big impact without a huge-- You don't have to take your entire Saturday and go to a protest, and I'm not discouraging pe- people from doing that. But if you want to look at maximum impact relative to the investment or the sacrifice, uh, I think this is it.

Kara Swisher 7:39 Yep. I like the three ag, three egregious Jeff Bezos acts ago. We're in, like, ten at this point. Anyway, keep going. Keep going, and keep putting those things up. I'll keep... W- People, you can find hun- hundreds of dollars that you can take away from them, and, and they will know, and it does add up. Like, a little, tiny drop becomes a great stream and then an ocean. So anyway, we've got a lot to get to today, so let's dig in. The Justice Department

Kara Swisher 8:04 released... This was something over the weekend, three point five million new pages of Epstein-related files late last week. They're not even the worst ones. There's three million more that must be the worst, including two thousand videos and a hundred and eighty thousand images, a mere forty-two days after the federally mandated deadline. By the way, they are not following the law. There are millions more they need to release. They said they weren't going to, but they are gonna have to, I think. Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said the release brings the DOJ into compliance with the Epstein Files Transparency Act. It doesn't. The lawmakers and survivors are calling the document dump inadequate and filled with redaction errors. At least fifty-fi- fifty-three hundred documents mention Donald Trump. A lot of these are unverified tips, but Trump said he's been told the latest release absolves him. It does not. The files show how Epstein's network stretched across Hollywood, Wall Street, Washington, Silicon Valley. That's what's really quite fascinating here, with people like Brett Ratner, who was just at the White House, wh- he did the Melania document. Howard Lutnick, who lied about being in touch with Epstein, he made a big show of not thinking he was awful and then was hanging out with him in his place i, i, in, in the Caribbean. Bill Gates, Elon Musk, all appearing in the documents. Elon Musk looked like he's losing a, mmm, having a, a stroke in real time, um, uh, over these things and trying to pretend he doesn't, mmm, m- mean anything. So talk about this, and obviously, another person that's gotten caught up, someone we've talked about, uh, Peter Attia, a number of really distasteful texts, thousands of them, um, actually. Uh, so lots of people involved, they really strut the gamut, and they're all very social with each other. Casey Wasserman, who's running the Olympic, uh, uh, effort, for example, apologized. Um, I'll take-- note, just so you know, a lot of fake Elon emails floating out there, but it's clear his relationship with Elon is not how he's framed it in the past, which is he wasn't interested. He's been posting on X all weekend, saying he's aware, uh, his emails to Epstein could be misinterpreted. He's also back and forth with Reid Hoffman, who, uh, Reid really got him, saying: "If you really cared about the victims, you wouldn't have spent two hundred and ten million dollars on Donald Trump," and also have all that, uh, non-consensual, uh, uh, uh, stuff on, on, on Grok, which I think is absolutely right. So thoughts, Scott? I mean, it- it's been pretty riveting in a lot of ways.

Scott Galloway 10:22 Yeah, it's, it... [exhales] I mean, there's just so much here. One, I think you have to put on your critical thinking cap and discern between different acts, criminal acts, poor judgment, and people who are just unlucky. Um, any other administration would be taking advantage of the moment to say, "We have appointed a special counsel here, and we are going to prosecute people based on this information." And-

Kara Swisher 10:48 The criminal actors

Scott Galloway 10:49 ... I- if you, i- if, if you had sex with an underage girl, you should be subject to criminal prosecution, and these files seem to, seem to indicate that that absolutely happened here. And it, all this bullshit about concern over the victims, well, okay, the way you bring closure and create incentives such that other people don't do this is you criminally prosecute. There's another group of people that I think is even bigger, and that is the people who have demonstrated really poor judgment by cohort and collaborating, commiserating with a convicted pedophile. Now-

Kara Swisher 11:23 So let me add, Steve Bannon was right up in his group. He was-- They were, like, freaking friends.

Scott Galloway 11:27 Right, and those people should be shamed. Maybe those people, maybe we should not be comfortable with those people in leadership positions. I'd like to think the bar for, you know, president is, i- th- that that would not clear that bar. So b- but people get to decide if they're comfortable with that, those errors in judgment. And then, I think an even bigger concentric circle is a lot of people who are just in the wrong place at the wrong time. And I don't, I, I... You know, I don't wanna-- I'm not saying I absolve them of all, or I, I don't think they're guiltless, but I do think a lot of people got invited to some conference about philanthropy or whatever and ended up in the Epstein files.

Kara Swisher 12:04 Yeah. No, I know. I-- Listen, I, I, oddly enough, I, I, I will say, full disclosure, I-- we sent Epstein a note to go to dive into media because we bought a Ted list, and he was a big... Th- a lot of those people in these files are all ex, they were Ted people. They were-- And so we bought mailing lists, and there's an email, uh, that, which, which is a mailing list email. It wasn't from me. Um, he was on it, and then, for some reason, some of the people around him sent him articles I wrote, and that's, you know... So I searched myself immediately, and that's the pretty-- that's the extent of what I can find. I have been at parties, as I said, where, well, uh, big, huge dinner events at, like, Ted. Ted was where he showed up a lot, um, where he m- apparently was. I never met him, but, I mean, you, y- that's what you're talking about, correct?... But right, mine's even less than that.

Scott Galloway 12:54 Elon Musk, who appears to have been, you know, had a lot, decent amount of interaction with Jeffrey Epstein, immediately goes on the offensive and tries to start pulling Reid Hoffman into it. And Reid looks like he was squarely on the outer circle here.

Kara Swisher 13:08 Mm-hmm. Yeah, I would agree.

Scott Galloway 13:09 But that's how-

Kara Swisher 13:09 I know a lot about his meetings.

Scott Galloway 13:10 That's how gross this is getting. The other observation is that there's pedophilia, and what's going on here in some ways is worse. What do I mean by that? I do think there are pedophiles who have a say, a psychi- psychiatric ailment where they are unnaturally attracted sexually to children. And I think a lot of them, not a lot of them, some of them recognize this ailment and seek treatment. Some do not, and some end up becoming pedophiles and should end up in prison. I think in some ways this is worse in the sense that I think the people guilty of having sex with underage girls here, while the term is pedophilia, what it is, is a group of people who feel they are not subject to laws-

Kara Swisher 14:01 Yes

Scott Galloway 14:01 ... and the standards that everyone else is subject to. I think they think, "Oh, this is fun, it's a party, and if I have sex with an underage girl, I can-- that's fun, and it's a thrill, and I can do it because I am not subject to the same-

Kara Swisher 14:15 Yeah

Scott Galloway 14:15 ... standards and laws as everyone else."

Kara Swisher 14:17 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 14:18 So while I think a lot of these people, if in fact there was, and it appears there was, criminal, uh, rape, I, I'm not sure they're pedophiles. What they are is people who've decided that because of their money, power, and proximity to power, that they're not subject to any standards-

Kara Swisher 14:34 Yeah

Scott Galloway 14:34 ... whatsoever.

Kara Swisher 14:35 No, it's a party. Go ahead. Go ahead, finish.

Scott Galloway 14:37 Well, in my opinion, in some ways, th- that's, that's the sickness that infects our powerful.

Kara Swisher 14:45 Well, what's interesting is how it cuts across lo- party lines, right? You have all these [chuckles] Democrat-leaning people-

Scott Galloway 14:50 Yeah

Kara Swisher 14:51 ... ki- kibitzing with, like, a Steve Bannon, kibitzing with a this and that.

Scott Galloway 14:55 All unified around partying-

Kara Swisher 14:57 Partying

Scott Galloway 14:57 ... and having sex with, with-

Kara Swisher 14:59 Saint Barts. Yeah.

Scott Galloway 15:00 Yeah.

Kara Swisher 15:00 Girls and stuff like that. That's what was gross. I do think... I, I want to zero in on the judgment thing here because there is judgment of what you, what you should and shouldn't do. Like, uh, you know, e- everyone knew what this guy was back then. Trust me, they did, and they went anyway. And so, uh, bad judgment on Bill Gates's part, and I think Melinda Gates has talked about this. Howard Lutnick, like, literally went out of his way to say what a good judgment he had by never-- he had a massage table in his living room, and went, bragged on how he rejected him, and then was at his place, stayed at his house, was, like, super friendly. Fuck that guy! Like, judgment, but I'm sorry, there's, there's more there than not. The same thing with Peter Attia. I, I feel like the, the-- everyone knew what was happening here, and so there should be a... You can decide what you want to do with these people, but there should be a price for this level of, it's in the same genre of we can do whatever we want. Who cares? You know, hahaha, you know, pussy is low carb. Like, are you kidding me? Like, I mean, it, it, it would be a stupid joke if the guy you were talking to was a sexual predator, right? And so that's why I find it a little more like-

Scott Galloway 16:14 I see, I'm, I'm less, and it's safer just to say this is awful and these people should be canceled. I do think that people, when they send private emails, should be granted a lot of license.

Kara Swisher 16:26 Yes.

Scott Galloway 16:27 And if they aren't guilty of a crime, you can decide not to listen to their podcast.

Kara Swisher 16:31 Yep, that's what I mean.

Scott Galloway 16:32 That's fine. But I, I think we have a tendency to mix criminal activity with poor judgment, and I think you have to draw bright lines between them. And I don't-- to me, it, it just is like someone is accidentally mentioned in the Epstein files because they flew on a plane with other people to some-

Kara Swisher 16:52 Mm-hmm

Scott Galloway 16:52 ... nonprofit event talking about technology. And people who might have been, uh, in the files-

Kara Swisher 16:58 Yep

Scott Galloway 16:58 ... there is report of an individual-

Kara Swisher 17:01 Mm-hmm

Scott Galloway 17:01 ... who impregnated an eleven-year-old?

Kara Swisher 17:03 Yeah. Yep.

Scott Galloway 17:04 I mean, one is spend the rest of your life in prison.

Kara Swisher 17:07 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 17:07 The other was, "Okay, maybe you should do more diligence on the planes you're on."

Kara Swisher 17:11 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 17:11 And it feels like it's all been wrapped up into one amorphous blob.

Kara Swisher 17:15 I get it. I agree. I agree, but there are some very clear lines when I'm talking about Lutnick. He went out of his way to say how much he hated the guy, and then right in the emails, he did. Just we, all we know-

Scott Galloway 17:23 Trying to rewrite history.

Kara Swisher 17:24 Yes.

Scott Galloway 17:24 Yeah.

Kara Swisher 17:24 He's a liar.

Scott Galloway 17:25 Yeah.

Kara Swisher 17:25 So that, that we know.

Scott Galloway 17:26 Yeah.

Kara Swisher 17:26 Same thing with Musk. He was e-- just fine. Just you made it-- Can't you just say, I made it? You know who did that? Katie Couric went to a dinner at this, at Epstein's house, one of these dinners. He used to have these, like, influencer dinners. She went, she said, "I should have done more research. I apologize. I abhor him." Like, she just took, she just took responsibility for her stupid judgment there, right? And I think that's fine. I don't think we should, like... She, she-

Scott Galloway 17:51 But, but it brings up a point. Should Katie Couric do research on every dinner invitation?

Kara Swisher 17:55 [chuckles] No, not necessarily, but when it, when it was came to pass, when it was very clear, she just-

Scott Galloway 17:59 She apologized.

Kara Swisher 18:00 She apologized-

Scott Galloway 18:01 Yeah

Kara Swisher 18:01 ... and said: "Oh, so dumb." You're not hearing from Howard Lutnick. You're not hearing from Peter Attia. Like, I'm sure he's engaged a very expensive crisis manager, uh, here. But, and then Elon, sp-- he is spinning so hard.

Scott Galloway 18:12 He's gone on the attack.

Kara Swisher 18:13 On the attack.

Scott Galloway 18:13 He's trying to pretend that-

Kara Swisher 18:14 Right

Scott Galloway 18:15 ... he somehow was protected or, like, was, uh, uh, just, just so offended by Jeffrey Epstein. And can you believe what Reid Hoffman did meanwhile? [chuckles]

Kara Swisher 18:22 Yes.

Scott Galloway 18:22 I mean-

Kara Swisher 18:22 Yes, over-

Scott Galloway 18:22 Look-

Kara Swisher 18:23 Look over here. Yeah. Yeah, I'm glad Reid slapped him back to last Sunday because he's right. Elon, if you actually cared about women, you'd, you'd have helped the victims financially instead of giving money to Donald Trump. You'd have gotten your non-consensual sex off of Grok, but you don't care. You don't care. You don't care. Like, you don't have an interest in-

Scott Galloway 18:41 But again, the really shocking thing to me is, and I know very powerful and wealthy people, just the belief that they can just do anything-

Kara Swisher 18:51 Right

Scott Galloway 18:52 ... and they're going to be immune.... I, I mean-

Kara Swisher 18:56 They do, they're like that.

Scott Galloway 18:57 I have friends who are, who are, um, fairly famous actors, and if they walk into a scenario with a lot of women or a party scene, they're like: "I can't be here. I, I, I can't be here. I'm, I, I'm not gonna do anything. I'm not even gonna flirt with anybody, but I can't be here because-

Kara Swisher 19:13 Yeah

Scott Galloway 19:13 ... if it hits the press, it'll upset my wife. It will create, um, talking points that aren't good. They will insinuate..." I mean, I know people who are so careful and shape their lives realizing that unfair, unfair or not-

Kara Swisher 19:28 A picture, a photo of you with-

Scott Galloway 19:30 And then these guys-

Kara Swisher 19:32 Jeffrey Epstein, yeah.

Scott Galloway 19:33 These guys go to an island and start having sex with underage women and aren't worried, are, like, believe-

Kara Swisher 19:39 Yeah, yeah

Scott Galloway 19:39 ... that this isn't gonna come back to haunt them?

Kara Swisher 19:41 There's also a lot of people that enabled them, and one person that po- by the way, I searched you immediately. Um, [chuckles] you were-

Scott Galloway 19:48 In what, in the Epstein files?

Kara Swisher 19:49 Of course. [chuckles]

Scott Galloway 19:51 Yeah, no. That's one party I wasn't invited to, Kara.

Kara Swisher 19:54 Yeah, you weren't. Um, but, uh, [chuckles] I searched every-

Scott Galloway 19:57 Did you really search for me?

Kara Swisher 19:58 I searched everybody. [chuckles] I searched-

Scott Galloway 19:59 Did you really search for me?

Kara Swisher 20:01 I did! I had to. I work with you. I have to make certain. [chuckles]

Scott Galloway 20:04 Okay. All right.

Kara Swisher 20:06 Thank God.

Scott Galloway 20:06 Yeah, I'm, uh... Yeah.

Kara Swisher 20:08 [chuckles] Come on, I searched every-- I searched, like, 20 names of people I know.

Scott Galloway 20:11 Season two, gay hockey with the dog, Protti.

Kara Swisher 20:15 [laughing]

Scott Galloway 20:15 That's what you gotta worry about. I'm gonna be an extra. My next career, fluffer for gay, for gay badminton, the new original series on HBO.

Kara Swisher 20:24 I welcome any joyful, consensual sexual expression you wanna have with Scott Galloway, as long as-

Scott Galloway 20:28 Oh, God

Kara Swisher 20:29 ... everybody is of age.

Scott Galloway 20:29 At this point, at this point, when I orgasm, it's just mist coming out.

Kara Swisher 20:32 [laughing]

Scott Galloway 20:33 There's just literally... It's gotta be a Pam Grier film, a cattle prod up my ass-

Kara Swisher 20:38 [chuckles] Oh, okay

Scott Galloway 20:38 ... and literally-

Kara Swisher 20:39 The cattle prod is back

Scott Galloway 20:39 ... like a Cialis shake.

Kara Swisher 20:41 Yeah, okay.

Scott Galloway 20:41 And I gotta snort Viagra-

Kara Swisher 20:43 All right, I'm gonna mention one more thing-

Scott Galloway 20:44 And watch Jackie Brown, and then it's go time!

Kara Swisher 20:47 I'm moving you on.

Scott Galloway 20:47 It's go time.

Kara Swisher 20:47 I would say the people that are worse are s-- uh, not even worse, they're just as bad, are some of these enablers, and I will name them. [chuckles] John Brockman is throughout it, and I ur- urge you to look up. He was a guy who was involved with all these intellectuals who were, hey, who Epstein was funding. He ran a billionaires' dinner at TED. I have attended that. Uh, he obviously... Fac- the facilitators, these kind of people, uh, have to be looked at, too, the way they, they sort of facilitated what you're talking about, which is this very easy-peasy, let's get together and talk intellectual stuff, which they love. Let me tell you, the reason you're seeing a lot of tech people in this group, and you are, is 'cause they desperately sought out, um, y- validation through intellectual discourse. They used to love having these events, whether, whatever they happen to be, and thank God. W- you know, one thing, I did have our, our staff for our code conference look every- him up. He was on the wait list of D5, the one with, uh, Gates and Jobs, and [chuckles] we didn't let him in. I, I remember not, particularly not letting him in. Um, but he did somehow show up and talk to Tim Cook on the sidelines of one of my conferences, which I wasn't aware of. It was in the files, too. But he was wait listed-

Scott Galloway 21:56 Yeah, my view is you go, my view is you go much harder-

Kara Swisher 21:59 Mm-hmm

Scott Galloway 22:00 ... on the people who are criminals.

Kara Swisher 22:01 Yes.

Scott Galloway 22:02 And quite frankly, you go much lighter on the people who, like, i- i-

Kara Swisher 22:07 Mm

Scott Galloway 22:07 ... you get invited by a billionaire to go party on an island, if you see crime, you leave. But I don't-- I think a lot of people-

Kara Swisher 22:14 Some

Scott Galloway 22:14 ... for a lot of different reas- this guy had a big sphere around technology.

Kara Swisher 22:16 He really did.

Scott Galloway 22:17 Yeah.

Kara Swisher 22:17 He was, he was like an octopus in terms of trying to meet people, and a lot of people facilitated that for him. Um, so-

Scott Galloway 22:24 So, but there needs to be more prison and more judgment around who was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Kara Swisher 22:29 Yes, I agree, but there's a lot of people who knew exactly what they were doing. So I think there, there's a, there's, there's, it's a stack ranking of what people were doing-

Scott Galloway 22:37 Yeah

Kara Swisher 22:37 ... uh, in some cases. And people like Peter Otty and others really deserve some... You can censure him or not, but I think he's grotesque. Anyway, uh, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, Trump's new Fed chair. [whooshing sound] Support for this show comes from BetterHelp. Sometimes February can make it seem like everyone has the perfect love life, that they've got it all together, but plenty of people out there are just trying to figure out what they want in a relationship and what makes them happy. Whether you're married, dating, single, or focusing on you, BetterHelp says therapy can help you see that more clearly and help take some pressure off yourself. BetterHelp does the initial matching between you and a licensed therapist, so you can focus on your therapy goals. All you need to do is fill out a short questionnaire that helps identify your needs and preferences, and BetterHelp's twelve plus years of experience and industry-leading match fulfillment rate means they typically get it right the first time. If you aren't happy with your match, you can switch to a different therapist at any time from their tailored recommendations. With over thirty thousand therapists, BetterHelp is the world's largest online therapy platform, having served over six million people globally, and out of one point seven million client reviews, BetterHelp's average rating is four point five out of five for a live session. You can sign up and get ten percent off at betterhelp.com/pivot. That's betterH-E-L-P.com/pivot. [whooshing sound] Scott, we're back. President Trump has

Kara Swisher 23:54 made his pick for Fed chair. I predicted it being the most handsome of the white guys, and [chuckles] I was right! The best hair.

Scott Galloway 23:59 [chuckles]

Kara Swisher 23:59 Uh, Trump nominated, uh, former Governor, uh, Kevin Warsh on Friday, calling him central casting, and says he'll go down as one of the great Fed chairman, maybe the best. Of course, he did say that about Jerome Powell. Although, uh, Tr- when he picked him, Trump also joked during a speech this weekend that he would sue Warsh if interest rates didn't get lowered. Warsh is set to take the reins from Jerome Powell in May, but he needs to get through the Senate confirmation process first, which might be hard because, uh, Rep, uh, Republican Senator Tom Tillis, who suddenly found his balls, is already saying he's a no until the DOJ probe, uh, into Powell is resolved. Good for him. To- Tillis is really on fire. He's gonna use up all his troublemaking, before he leaves. He was sort of shoved to the side by Trump, uh, by threats from Trump, but now he's st- but he's still in power, so he can do something about it. So talk about this pick. Um, Warsh v- very briefly popped up in the Epstein files, and we were remiss in not saying. He was on a guest list, St. Barts, Christmas 2010.

Scott Galloway 24:54 Yeah.

Kara Swisher 24:54 Again, what you were talking about.

Scott Galloway 24:56 Yeah.

Kara Swisher 24:56 I get it, I get it. In that case, that's it. So, uh, I don't think that should necessarily be a, it shouldn't be a factor unless more stuff is found out. But, uh, talk about this, this pick. What do you think about Warsh?

Scott Galloway 25:08 ... I think it's, I, uh, to be blunt, I think it's a great pick.

Kara Swisher 25:11 Okay.

Scott Galloway 25:12 Uh, given the context of who he could have selected.

Kara Swisher 25:15 Right, [chuckles] that's true. Um, that's true.

Scott Galloway 25:16 I mean-

Kara Swisher 25:16 Could have been Don Jr. Go.

Scott Galloway 25:19 Yeah, I wouldn't be surprised if he picked, uh, um, you know, Lara Trump. I, I-

Kara Swisher 25:25 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 25:25 He does-- my, to give credit where it's due, I think around these, these big financial appointments, I think he shows greater judgment around these appointments than he does around others. But essentially, this guy, he's, he's very qualified. Uh, he's been described as a hawk. The fear around this appointment was that it was someone who would be subject to the political pressures of the presidency, would immediately start cutting interest rates and begin an upward spiral of inflation, and that fear was sending metals to record highs. Silver and gold have exploded, and the best indication that the market likes this pick is that when the pick was announced, metals crashed, or they pulled back. This guy's known as a hawk. He served as liaison between, uh, Bernanke and the Wall Street community during the '08 crisis, which most people think was handled really well. I like the fact he has a reputation as a hawk. I love the fact that these appointments, I believe, are for-

Kara Swisher 26:22 Explain what a hawk is. He's got, he's, he-

Scott Galloway 26:24 Well, someone who's more worried about inflation than lower growth, someone who will keep interest rates high longer than maybe they should. They err on the side of lower growth, but less risk of inflation, and everyone is really worried that Trump is putting pressure and would rather err on the side of inflation.

Kara Swisher 26:42 Do you think he can resist the pressure? He's, he, he saw what happened to Powell.

Scott Galloway 26:46 That's what's great about these appointments, is that they're, they're fourteen-year tenures.

Kara Swisher 26:51 I, I get that, but, like, he could be under- go what Powell's been undergone, fake criminal probes, et cetera.

Scott Galloway 26:57 As far as I know, Powell's serving out his term and hasn't-

Kara Swisher 27:00 Mm-hmm

Scott Galloway 27:00 ... bent an inch.

Kara Swisher 27:01 Right.

Scott Galloway 27:01 I mean, and that's why it speaks to the importance and the independence of the Fed, but-

Kara Swisher 27:04 Well, you wonder what this guy said to Trump, right? And why did he say he's gonna sue him, you know? That's all weird, and I find it weird.

Scott Galloway 27:11 There's something about the power, and we've seen this on the Supreme Court. A lot of people show up with a history or say one thing to the Senate, and then they get on the Supreme Court, and they take advantage of their lifetime appointment, and they behave differently.

Kara Swisher 27:25 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 27:25 Uh, so-

Kara Swisher 27:26 Not in a good way.

Scott Galloway 27:27 Well, actually, some of the older appointees-

Kara Swisher 27:30 Mm-hmm

Scott Galloway 27:31 ... became, and from our viewpoint-

Kara Swisher 27:33 More liberal

Scott Galloway 27:33 ... much more progressive.

Kara Swisher 27:35 Well, look at Earl Warren. Remember, I mean, think about him.

Scott Galloway 27:37 I mean, they really did over time. Uh, think about what an incredible luxury it is to just focus on... To be granted the tenure, and this is, this is the basis of tenure in colleges-

Kara Swisher 27:52 Mm-hmm

Scott Galloway 27:52 ... to just try and pursue the truth re-- and, and to screen out as many external forces as possible.

Kara Swisher 27:57 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 27:58 That is a luxury, and it's reserved for what people think is the most important positions in the world, including what may be the most important position in the world, and that is the Chairman of the Federal Reserve. So I was actually quite relieved when I saw this.

Kara Swisher 28:10 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 28:10 I have a bias. I like Morgan Stanley. Anyone who ran M&A at Morgan Stanley has a pretty serious, uh-

Kara Swisher 28:15 Well, he's a serious candidate, right?

Scott Galloway 28:17 He's a serious guy.

Kara Swisher 28:18 That, that asset had been, like-

Scott Galloway 28:19 Oh, God

Kara Swisher 28:20 ... genuflecting. He had knee pads on at one point, although he was very considered a very prominent-

Scott Galloway 28:24 I, I was worried it was gonna be the MyPillow guy. I just wouldn't put anything past this president right now. This is, I think, a good pick. The markets like it. He's an adult. He has a command of the, the markets, has a really good relationship with Wall Street, and I just hope that he shows-

Kara Swisher 28:41 I suspect they'll drop the Powell, the Powell, the Powell probe to get him through. That's-

Scott Galloway 28:46 Well, here's the thing. Powell's gonna still be on the board of governors.

Kara Swisher 28:49 Yeah. Well, that's-

Scott Galloway 28:49 And-

Kara Swisher 28:49 ... what they're trying to do.

Scott Galloway 28:50 I don't, I don't care who the chairman is.

Kara Swisher 28:52 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 28:52 I don't care who the chairman is. The biggest voice [chuckles] in the room is still gonna be Powell's.

Kara Swisher 28:56 Yep, yep, yep. We'll see. Anyway, good hair, Kevin, and I picked-- I knew the handsome man would win. Also, besides the handsome man, I was right

Kara Swisher 29:04 about Elon planning to merge SpaceX and xAI. That's precisely what happened. The acquisition will give the combined company a valuation of one point two five trillion. Flimflammery works for Elon Musk. Investors have also been pushing the idea of bringing Tesla into this. Um, obviously, he had already merged Twitter or X, the service, into xAI, sort of to hide it away in there, all their losses. So now it's Twitter, SpaceX, and xAI, and you can just imagine Tesla being next. In, in the scenario, xAI shares would be swapped for SpaceX shares. Um, just for people who don't know, SpaceX is weighing a June IPO listing, could seek to raise as much as fifty billion dollars, making it the biggest IPO of all time. Um, and again, if that sounds a little familiar, guess what? Kara Swisher predicted it last April, 'cause I know how this guy thinks. [whooshing]

Scott Galloway 29:57 I've been doing research. You blew my mind with the notion of-

Kara Swisher 30:00 Oh, you like that?

Scott Galloway 30:00 ... a combined Tesla, xAI, and SpaceX. Uh, uh, you know, and I'm, I'm just like, that has totally blown my mind about [chuckles] -

Kara Swisher 30:09 Good

Scott Galloway 30:10 ... what the-

Kara Swisher 30:10 As long as you attribute it to me. Just attribute it to me.

Scott Galloway 30:13 I, I, I do, but that, the idea of him merging all of those companies, like-

Kara Swisher 30:17 Has to

Scott Galloway 30:17 ... I can't wrap my head around what that would mean. [chuckles]

Kara Swisher 30:19 He's got to. He's got-- it's the only move. [whooshing] So let's talk about that. I-- the reason I thought about that was because he's an eternal flimflam man, and he needed a new narrative, and this works out for hiding. When he did the first Twitter, xAI merger, he just got rid of the problem of everyone talking about what a shitty business Tes- it was. Tesla's obviously troubled. xAI is being [chuckles] upheld by the valuations of, of AI companies, and SpaceX is a, is a real winner. So w-what do you, w-- and, and, and you could make an argument that they all fit together, right? Sure, why not? Like, data things moving, blah. Um, and he'll do it. So what do you, what do you think?

Scott Galloway 30:57 After the disaster at Chernobyl, uh, where radiation leaked for, I guess, hundreds of thousands of square miles, there was a lot of farmland and a lot of, a lot of livestock, and what they found was, okay, a lot of the, the beef and lamb and chicken had traces of radiation from the radiation leak at Chernobyl.... and the Russian officials decided, "Okay, we're not going to throw away this meat. We're just going to parse it out and send small amounts mixed in with non-radiated meat to different, to different grocery stores, because a little bit of radiation, as long as we mix it with non-radioactive meat, is okay."

Kara Swisher 31:35 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 31:35 This is Musk basically taking his radioactive meat, and that is Tesla, which isn't ten X the value of what it should be trading at. xAI, which is sort of working, isn't, and then wrapping it in the non-radioactive meat, which is SpaceX, which in my opinion, is one of the most impressive companies with the greatest differentiation in history right now. Ninety percent of launch capability, two-thirds of low Earth satellites, and he's basically going to take all of it and say, "Okay, autonomous, AI, space launch capability-

Kara Swisher 32:07 Man, yeah, moving.

Scott Galloway 32:07 -and take it all into one-

Kara Swisher 32:09 Boom!

Scott Galloway 32:09 -giant, one giant Musk AI innovation space.

Kara Swisher 32:15 Robots. Tell me about robots.

Scott Galloway 32:16 That will get robots, that will say, "This is... You have to own this company," because when you look at the-

Kara Swisher 32:22 Yeah, beep boop, boop, boop, boop, beep. [chuckles]

Scott Galloway 32:24 That's right. When you look at Tesla, it's like, okay, it's an automobile company that should be trading at thirty bucks a share, not four hundred or whatever it's at. When you look at xAI, all right, it's a distant seventh LLM. When you look at robots, those make no fucking sense. But if you wrap all of that AI-

Kara Swisher 32:41 You forgot Twitter

Scott Galloway 32:41 -autonomous stew-

Kara Swisher 32:43 Forgot Twitter.

Scott Galloway 32:43 Oh, and Twitter, you know, a platform that's probably worth ten billion, not what he paid. Wrap it all into a communication, satellite, space launch, AI, automated driving, and it's the kind of stock that everyone has to own. So this is an attempt to create, you know, individual in-ingredients, which some of which are amazing and some of which have real problems, and put it all into one stew. I think it's a smart move, quite frankly.

Kara Swisher 33:08 Turducken. That's what I thought. I think like a, a really, a fucked up flan plan man. That's how I think, right? That's a-- I was like, "What?" I sit there and I go, "What will he do? Oh..." That's how I thought of it. That's exactly. I was like, "Of course."

Scott Galloway 33:19 Let's go brainstorm about it on an island.

Kara Swisher 33:22 [chuckles] On an island.

Scott Galloway 33:23 [chuckles] I got this guy's really smart.

Kara Swisher 33:26 For the record, I was not on the island. I did not go to the dinner party.

Scott Galloway 33:27 And he puts together these amazing parties with, like, thought leaders and-

Kara Swisher 33:32 [chuckles]

Scott Galloway 33:33 ... and by the way, I am so shocked I am not on that list, because the only reason I get invited to Davos, I get invited-

Kara Swisher 33:37 Yeah

Scott Galloway 33:37 ... to a place like that, we're called- I refer to us, I say to-

Kara Swisher 33:40 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 33:40 I saw Jonathan Hyde, and I saw Adam Grant at Davos.

Kara Swisher 33:42 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 33:42 I'm like: "You realize where we are?" And they're like, "What?" I'm like, "We're intellectual support animals. We're here-

Kara Swisher 33:46 That's correct

Scott Galloway 33:46 -to make people feel-"

Kara Swisher 33:47 You're dancing fucking dogs. [chuckles]

Scott Galloway 33:48 Yeah, we're fucking poodles. We're dan-- we're Phoebe the Dance.

Kara Swisher 33:51 [chuckles]

Scott Galloway 33:51 We're like, "Dance for you to dinner. We have CEO, BlackRock, and Chairman of Finland. Now, dan-

Kara Swisher 33:56 Dance

Scott Galloway 33:56 ... now tell us something about young men."

Kara Swisher 33:58 [chuckles] Can I tell you? So many powerful people texted me and was like, "Scott's so amusing." [chuckles]

Scott Galloway 34:03 Amusing? That's the word I get, amusing?

Kara Swisher 34:05 You know what I mean, like, "He's so interesting." I was like: "Oh, my God, he's totally your dancing monkey." [chuckles]

Scott Galloway 34:09 Yeah, that was my moment at Davos. I sit next to a woman I have never met before.

Kara Swisher 34:13 [chuckles] Yeah.

Scott Galloway 34:13 And all of a sudden, she starts going, "Kara's texting me and says I'm next to you."

Kara Swisher 34:17 [chuckles]

Scott Galloway 34:17 I'm like: "How the fuck does she know I'm here?" [chuckles] You're like-

Kara Swisher 34:21 Because all the rich people are writing me.

Scott Galloway 34:22 You're like the East German Stasi.

Kara Swisher 34:24 I think I like him. [chuckles]

Scott Galloway 34:24 You know every move.

Kara Swisher 34:26 Well, because they call, they text me.

Scott Galloway 34:28 Who is... What's her name? She was lovely.

Kara Swisher 34:29 Dina Powell.

Scott Galloway 34:30 That's probably sexist.

Kara Swisher 34:31 Was it?

Scott Galloway 34:31 I wouldn't say that about a man.

Kara Swisher 34:32 No, she is lovely. She is.

Scott Galloway 34:34 She's lovely.

Kara Swisher 34:34 She's the new president of Meta, just so you know. [chuckles]

Scott Galloway 34:37 No, so she started telling me what she was doing, and she was very measured. I'm like: "Why are you choosing your words so carefully?" And then about five minutes later, I'm like: "Oh, you're a shill for Meta."

Kara Swisher 34:43 Oh, she's not a shill. She-- We'll see. We'll see.

Scott Galloway 34:46 She's trying to organize the bailout.

Kara Swisher 34:48 I hope.

Scott Galloway 34:48 She's going to organize the bailout of tech.

Kara Swisher 34:50 I hope, [chuckles] like anybody, anybody-

Scott Galloway 34:52 Yeah

Kara Swisher 34:52 ... who can get him away from like-

Scott Galloway 34:53 She's married to a senator. Talk about a power couple.

Kara Swisher 34:55 She is. [chuckles] David. Yeah, David. Yeah.

Scott Galloway 34:57 Thank God.

Kara Swisher 34:58 Yeah, he's McCormick. He was with, uh, Ray Dalio, right? He was with Ray Dalio. That's his-

Scott Galloway 35:02 Really?

Kara Swisher 35:03 Yeah. Yeah, I think that's-

Scott Galloway 35:04 Yeah

Kara Swisher 35:05 ... who he was with.

Scott Galloway 35:05 I can't believe you searched for me in the files.

Kara Swisher 35:08 Why wouldn't I? Are you kidding? [chuckles] That was numero uno.

Scott Galloway 35:11 You searched me in the files.

Kara Swisher 35:12 Uno. You-- Oh, come on.

Scott Galloway 35:14 Oh, God.

Kara Swisher 35:14 Whatever. In any case-

Scott Galloway 35:15 I pay for my sucks.

Kara Swisher 35:16 All right, we know why he's doing it. All right, we're going to take... [chuckles] I had to.

Scott Galloway 35:19 [chuckles]

Kara Swisher 35:19 You know, trust but verify. Uh-

Scott Galloway 35:23 There we are.

Kara Swisher 35:23 Scott, let's go on a quick break, when we come back, tons of AI news. [music] Support for the show comes from Framer. You know that moment when your marketing team wants a new landing page, so the design team mocks it up, and then your engineering department responds with, "Yeah, we'll get to that"? Thousands of businesses, from early-stage startups to Fortune five hundreds, are choosing to build their websites in Framer, where changes take minutes instead of days to solve this very problem. Framer is an enterprise-grade, no-code website builder used by teams at companies like Perplexity and Miro to move faster. With real-time collaboration, a robust CMS, with everything you need for great SEO and advanced analytics that include integrated A/B testing, your designers and marketers are empowered to build and maximize your dot com from day one. Changes to your Framer site go live to the web in seconds with one click without help from engineering. So whether you want to launch a new site, test a few landing pages, or migrate your full dot com, Framer has programs for startups, scale-ups, and large enterprises to make going from idea to live site as easy and fast as possible. Learn how you can get more out of your dot com from a Framer specialist, or get started building for free today at framer.com/pivot for thirty percent off a Framer Pro annual plan. That's framer.com/pivot for thirty percent off. framer.com/pivot. Rules and restrictions may apply. [music] Scott, we're back now on some rapid-fire news, AI news, because

Kara Swisher 36:43 there's so much. Let me go through them. Amazon is reportedly discussing an investment up to fifty billion dollars in OpenAI. Meanwhile, NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang is pushing back on reports that his company is looking to scale back on its investment in OpenAI, and that was in The Wall Street Journal. I thought it was an excellent article. This all comes as OpenAI is seeking to raise over a hundred billion dollars. It prepares for a public listing in the fourth quarter. It's trying to beat Anthropic to that punch, and Anthropic is clashing with the Pentagon over whether its AI would be used for surveillance and autonomous lethal operations, putting two hundred million dollar contract at risk. Um, your choice, Scott, any of the above?

Scott Galloway 37:18 I think the most fragile company with respect to its valuation right now, maybe with the exception of Palantir-... is probably OpenAI. I think OpenAI is racing to establish a leadership position. Uh, but if you look at the fact it doesn't have the firehose of billions of people built in that, that Alphabet has, uh, I don't think... And you look at-- They're getting, I think they're getting attacked from the top, and that is Alphabet and Gemini, which has doubled its share, I think, in the last eighteen months.

Kara Swisher 37:50 Yeah. Which was inevitable, right? Inevitable.

Scott Galloway 37:52 But if you have a billion people or two billion people a day coming to your interface-

Kara Swisher 37:56 Yeah

Scott Galloway 37:56 ... and you start introducing AI, that's just very powerful. And then you have Micros-

Kara Swisher 38:01 It has a Netscape feel to it.

Scott Galloway 38:03 And then you have, um, Microsoft, which has a recurring revenue relationship with ninety-nine point nine percent of the corporations above a million dollars in revenue. They can introduce really seamlessly different things. And then you have, uh, an adjacent competitor, and that is Anthropic, which has gone after the enterprise market. So to, uh, uh... I think I've told you this, and it's the weakest flex in the world. I was on the board of Gateway Computer, and about twenty-five years ago, if you asked analysts who had better prospects, Gateway or Dell, it was split, and Gateway was at seventy bucks a share. Anyways, fifteen years later, it was at seventy cents a share because they went consumer, and Dell went small and medium-sized business, and we know how the story ends. This story may be unfolding the same way, and that is, OpenAI has a consumer offering, but less than five percent of the people actually go to the paid offering, and Anthropic has gone after the enterprise market, and quite frankly, looks to be beating Anthropic in the enterprise market.

Kara Swisher 39:00 But it, but it is fighting with the Pentagon. It's interesting because he's becoming the most interesting character, Dario Amodei, in terms of-

Scott Galloway 39:06 Yeah

Kara Swisher 39:06 ... talking about safety. He's sort of-- Everyone sort of attacked him for that, especially that dope, David Sacks. But I think actually he's, he's opening a lane as the safe AI company, right?

Scott Galloway 39:16 Well, that used to be Altman's lane.

Kara Swisher 39:18 Right, exactly.

Scott Galloway 39:19 [chuckles]

Kara Swisher 39:19 But now he's got it, right? He's opening a lane where everyone's like, "All right."

Scott Galloway 39:23 Agreed. They're the, they're the clean, well-lit corner of-

Kara Swisher 39:27 Yeah

Scott Galloway 39:27 ... the AI bookstore right now-

Kara Swisher 39:28 Right

Scott Galloway 39:29 ... is Anthropic. And also, going after Enterprise looks to be the smartest thing, and my-

Kara Swisher 39:32 'Cause Enterprise wants that. Enterprise, you know, why be in the surveillance and autonomous lethal operations business if you can do just as fine selling things to Costco?

Scott Galloway 39:40 Yeah, just get your media buyers at L'Oreal to be more productive. So my friend Greg Shove is the CEO of Section, which helps enterprises upskill for AI. Has-- He said something that just struck me. He said, "OpenAI has basically twelve months to get massive consumer adoption because... Or enter, or, or start," which he doesn't think it's gonna do because people like, there's too many free LLMs, "or they're gonna have to come up with incredible enterprise adoption, or there's absolutely no way they can justify this, this consensual hallucination-

Kara Swisher 40:12 Yeah

Scott Galloway 40:12 ... that they're gonna go public at one or one and a half trillion dollars."

Kara Swisher 40:15 But, but aren't-- Isn't there a desperation for such stocks? Do you think you'll have a situa... You know, with Elon merges all these things, everyone's gonna buy it. Will everyone not buy this?

Scott Galloway 40:24 [sighs] The only thing is-

Kara Swisher 40:27 I mean, would you-

Scott Galloway 40:28 Okay, they're getting-

Kara Swisher 40:29 Would you, Scott Galloway, want... Of course, you just got rid of ChatGPT, so you're not allowed to, 'cause they want you to virtue signal the right way.

Scott Galloway 40:35 Yeah, but you forget I'm a whore.

Kara Swisher 40:36 I know, exactly.

Scott Galloway 40:36 Once, once March one comes along, it's back to Big Daddy Warbucks whore. [laughing]

Kara Swisher 40:40 [chuckles] No.

Scott Galloway 40:41 But this is what-- This is the existential risk to OpenAI right now. They wanna be the leader. Uh, I think Sam Altman, maybe correctly, has said, "There's-- there can only be one in the world of AI," but he's getting attacked from above, and that is big, big industrial strength, conglomerates, and tech that have a built-in multi-billion dollar consumer base, that they can, s- they can point that firehose of people at their AI offering. They're getting attacked from below, and that is Chinese open weight models, which are free, which, by the way, are technically pretty close.

Kara Swisher 41:13 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 41:13 So the fear is the following, or the, the bull case is that this company is an incredible product. It's growing like crazy. It's doing all these big visionary deals. It is an amazing product. I was using it every day, and everybody feels like they've got to go in on the market leader in AI, which Altman has done a good job of associating brand leadership with OpenAI and ChatGPT. The risk is that before they go public, in the disclosure documents that the SEC mandates, it's gonna be clear that everybody else is starting to eat their lunch.

Kara Swisher 41:49 Yep.

Scott Galloway 41:49 Right? That Gemini continues to-

Kara Swisher 41:51 Especially Gemini, Gemini.

Scott Galloway 41:52 Gemini continues to gain market share, that there's an entire market of people that go for the open weight free models.

Kara Swisher 41:58 Right.

Scott Galloway 41:58 And people say, "Okay, this is a great little company, but it should be acquired by somebody not worth a trillion and a half dollars-

Kara Swisher 42:04 Yeah

Scott Galloway 42:04 ... as a standalone company."

Kara Swisher 42:05 Who would be the acquirer from your pers- perspective?

Scott Galloway 42:06 No one at this point. It's too expensive.

Kara Swisher 42:08 Yeah. Right, yeah.

Scott Galloway 42:09 But unfortunately-

Kara Swisher 42:10 I was just thinking that the other day

Scott Galloway 42:11 ... unfortunately, it'd have to be written down-

Kara Swisher 42:13 Mm-hmm

Scott Galloway 42:14 ... a lot, and then there'd be all sorts of antitrust arguments.

Kara Swisher 42:17 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 42:17 But he has, and he knows it, too. He's doing big deals, he's spending a ton of money, he's trying to get the best talent, because there's a general belief here that there's the gold medal. Th- th- this literally is-- When we call this Hunger Games economy, the Hunger Games is the right analogy, and that is, whoever wins here gets all sorts of parades and li- gets to live a wonderful life, and whoever doesn't win is gonna die a slow death. And that's the approach he's taking.

Kara Swisher 42:43 You're right. I think you're right here. Absolutely. We'll see what happens. Um, he-- They are headed for the IPO, though. Um, Trump and his family, this story, uh, we have-- we cannot stress this story of corruption

Kara Swisher 42:54 and the Trump family enough. He has now pulled in four billion dollars linked to his presidency. Much of that comes from crypto and foreign deals that leverage his presidential status. Last year, an investment firm with ties to the UAE bought nearly half of the Trump family's crypto company, making the two business partners. Eric Trump signed the agreement with the firm for five hundred million dollar investment days before, uh, Trump's January twenty twenty-five inauguration. We did a chip deal with them. He r- he recently said he, he found out nobody cared about his international business activity while in office. You know what? We do care. You, you know, this is a guy, as I say, accusation is a confession, who went on and on about Hunter. Hunter Biden didn't have enough imagination as doing corrupt things and didn't have much pull. This is a, a full-scale...... corrupt regime that is using their status, uh, to, to, to, to feather their nest. It's also bad for national security. Um, all manner of things i- i- is hurtful to the United States. Uh, you know, he does it all the time, whether he's suing the IRS for ten billion or closing the Kennedy Center 'cause he ran that into the ground. But this is really-- You know, he does-- That's all ha- uh, you know, jazz hands compared to what's happening here. Thoughts?

Scott Galloway 44:09 Yeah, the Republicans thought it was an impeachable offense or required a special counsel because, uh, President Biden, implicitly or explicitly, used his influence such that his son, Hunter Biden, could get on the board of a Ukrainian energy company and made about four or six hundred grand. There is no reason why Hunter Biden should be on the board of any company other than his proximity to the President-

Kara Swisher 44:31 Mm-hmm

Scott Galloway 44:31 ... even if he leveraged that contact or didn't, and there's no evidence he did. But everyone's hair was on fire, and now [chuckles] we have an individual who is raking in billions. And it's not only him, Witkoff's kids! And Witkoff was investing-- getting people, the UAE, to invest in a, a, a crypto company that his kids control. And then what do you know? A few weeks later, the sale of our most sensitive chips that are a security concern for fear that the UAE, who has a strong relationship with China, begins to leak that sensitive information that powers nuclear guidance systems, power submarines. I mean, the level-- I, I got to give it to him, they're like, "Here's the problem. In America, if you run a stop sign, you get shamed. I- if you, if you start killing hundreds of people, there's some sort of weird leadership quality around it." It's, it's like, "Don't commit a-- For God's sakes, don't commit a misdemeanor."

Kara Swisher 45:30 Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway 45:30 "Commit, c- you know, commit mass murder-

Kara Swisher 45:34 Right

Scott Galloway 45:34 ... and be unashamed about it, and then the next day, commit another crime where it all gets lost in the noise."

Kara Swisher 45:39 Mm-hmm. Well, that's what he said. Found out nobody cared, especially internationally. But, y- you know, and then killing all those people through USAID, the millions of people who will die. I mean, the kind of damage and, and, and feathering, nest feathering is really quite astonishing. And that leaves out all the pardons he gives to people who are, who's-- Who knows? I mean-

Scott Galloway 45:58 I sat next to one of those guys.

Kara Swisher 45:59 Oh, pardon him.

Scott Galloway 46:00 Gives him three million bucks? Uh, I've said this before, Kara, if, if Louis or Alex or Alec or Nolan, our four sons, I'll, I'll do, uh, go with the older ones. If one of them fucked up and ended up in prison, I'm a hundred percent confident that with a million to three million bucks, we could get him out of prison.

Kara Swisher 46:19 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 46:20 Find, find an indirect route into a meeting with one of Trump and his acolytes and say, "I'm about to buy one to three million dollars in Trump coin," or, "I'm about to give you a two million dollar gift for the new East Wing," and I think within three to six months, they're out.

Kara Swisher 46:34 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 46:34 That's where we are.

Kara Swisher 46:35 It's really-

Scott Galloway 46:35 And here's the thing, it creates... You're going to have more Epstein Islands.

Kara Swisher 46:39 Yep.

Scott Galloway 46:40 You're going to have fewer small businesses that fe-- start because they're worried about the rule of law. You know, the rich are protected by the law, but not bound by it.

Kara Swisher 46:48 Yep.

Scott Galloway 46:49 All the rest of us are bound by the law, but not protected by it.

Kara Swisher 46:51 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 46:51 And in addition, foreign companies aren't going to want to invest in American companies-

Kara Swisher 46:55 Yep

Scott Galloway 46:55 ... for fear that the rule of law is not going to apply to-

Kara Swisher 46:58 That is exactly right

Scott Galloway 46:58 -American investments.

Kara Swisher 46:59 He is-- It's all going to be for the Trumps' benefit, but not for the United States of America. That's really-- You have to understand this, everybody. This is, this is the actual game. Besides all the, everything else, [chuckles] this is the actual game. Anyway, one more quick break. We'll be back for wins and fails. [music] Support for today's show comes from Upwork. One of the biggest growth hacks is realizing you don't have to do it all by yourself. Upwork makes it easy to bring in the right freelancer when you need them, so you can stay focused on what you do best. Upwork is a one-stop platform to find, hire, and pay expert freelancers across the web in software development, data and analytics, marketing, business operations, and more. They help grow your business by giving you fast access to specialized talent across a hundred and twenty-five plus categories, so you can fill skill gaps, launch projects faster, and scale up support or down without committing to a full-time headcount. You can browse profiles, review past work, and get help scoping the role, so you can hire with confidence and get started quickly. And with Business Plus, you can access the top one percent of talent on Upwork, and with AI-powered shortlisting, you'll get matched to the right freelancer in under six hours. No endless searching required. You can visit upwork.com right now to post your job for free and connect with top talent ready to help your business grow. That's U-P-W-O-R-K.com, upwork.com. [music]

Kara Swisher 48:21 Okay, Scott, wins and fails. You want me to go first?

Scott Galloway 48:24 You go first.

Kara Swisher 48:25 Well, I was going to do the Kennedy Center, but I don't really like the Kennedy Center. I never did, but he's, he's going to close it and fix it after he ran it into the ground with his stupid minion, uh, Rick Carnell. Nobody wanted to go there, um, you know, whatever. He just, he's failed the business, and so he's closing it down. It's like Trump's steak or something. I don't know if he can close it down. We'll see, but, um, just gross. That's just a gross sidelight of the, the many things he's done. Um, and, uh, we'll see. We'll see what happens there. But actually, you know, I want to get more serious. Congresswoman, uh, Kelly Morrison of Minnesota posted the following on, uh, on, uh, Blue Sky: "My office has been flooded with reports of cruel, unsafe, unlawful conditions inside the Whipple Detention Facility in Minneapolis. This weekend, I was finally granted access to perform oversight." And when she went in, it's grotesque. I mean, i- it's absolutely grotesque of how they're... They're not just abusing these populations, and they're about to go do that in Ohio, but they are, um, they're, they're abusing them once they get in there, to, in order to get them to self-deport. Um, the cruelty, uh, these-- Let me just tell you, all you people, people will-- you will-... You will be judged someday. Maybe not today, but someday, you will-- this will all come out, and what you've done here is so heinous, uh, to young people. The young, the young kid with that adorable hat did get out, uh, finally, but it was only under pressure to get him out, um, who was taken in Minnesota and brought, I think, to Texas. Um, but there's-- He's just one kid, and the only reason he got out is so much of the attention because of that photograph. But there's other kids sitting there, thousands and thousands of children, and, uh, what you have done is so shameful, um, and so horrible. And I just hope there's more photographs and more for people to understand the level of depravity, um, in what they're doing to those people, um, who are here, most of whom are here, worked hard, have contributed to our country. Um, and, uh, it's just-- it makes me sick to my stomach. Um, for a positive thing, uh, I really enjoyed the Grammys. I did. I watched them last night. I thought they were really fun.

Scott Galloway 50:30 Oh, did you enjoy it?

Kara Swisher 50:31 Yeah, I did. It was fun. Although President Trump is threatening to sue Trevor Noah over his Epstein joke, uh, at the Grammys. I thought he was great. Trevor Noah was great. I found it very entertaining. I thought the performances were terrific. I thought Justin Bieber was-- did a great... I mean, he was sort of naked. He was-- He looks good. Um, he was wearing silk boxers only, and I thought that was quite beautiful. I thought Lady Gaga was amazing. Reba McEntire performed, and I love Reba McEntire, so I liked it. It felt really good, and it wasn't virtue signaling the way the Oscars can be. I found the speeches very heartfelt and, um, simple. They kept it simple. They-- A lot of God-loving, too, by the way, uh, but I liked it. I really enjoyed it. I thought it was great.

Scott Galloway 51:11 I stopped caring about the Grammys-

Kara Swisher 51:12 I know

Scott Galloway 51:12 ... when Michael Stipe stopped singing and opened a [chuckles] health food store in Athens, Georgia. Rich Ocasek died, and George Michael died. I have no interest in... And Tom Petty died from an opioid overdose. Music is dead to me.

Kara Swisher 51:25 Sabrina Carpenter didn't get anything, but, uh, and I thought she was delightful also, by the way. Anyway, go ahead.

Scott Galloway 51:31 Well, uh, I'll start with my loss or fail. I interviewed Niall Ferguson, who I really like and is a friend, but he has a narrative which I disagree with, and it's a narrative that's been adopted by the Trump administration, and also, and I would argue, it's just parroting a Russian talking point, and that is this, this notion that this war is unsustainable for Ukraine, it's unwinnable, and they should strike the best deal they can right now. And that is the same narrative that was expectorated and vomited all over the media three years ago. And guess what? Since then, in the last two years, Russia has only increased their occupancy or their, uh, acquisition of land by one percent. A snail could literally, and this is true, move faster than the Russian army. And if you want to talk about unsustainable for somebody, this is unsustainable for Russia. And there are days where they are losing a thousand men a day. Their wartime economy is running out of money. So this war is unsustainable, but it's unsustainable for Russia. And this narrative that somehow that Ukraine has been backed into a corner and needs to come up or swallow hard and accept a peace deal that is just scheduling the next war, not preventing it, is bullshit. This war is unsustainable, but it's unsustainable for Russia as long as the West continues to support pushback on a murderous autocrat. And it really bothers me, this narrative of, "Well, Ukraine should just take the deal they can right now because this war is unsustainable." Bullshit! They have been kicking Russia in the nuts, literally and figuratively, and they are, in my view, they are winning this war. And so this narrative from straight out of Sergey Lavrov, that it's unsustainable, it's unsustainable for Ukraine, they can't manage this. Well, guess what, folks? They seem to have put all that to rest, all those doubts for the last three and a half years. This is unsustainable for Russia, and we should start speaking as if the Ukrainian army is speaking from a position of strength, which they are.

Kara Swisher 53:27 I love it-

Scott Galloway 53:27 Anyways

Kara Swisher 53:27 ... Scott. I know you like Niall Ferguson. I find him to be a contrarian for contrarian's sake, and I like your contrarianism better.

Scott Galloway 53:33 Yeah, but Niall, Niall brings history, and it's important to have this type of dialogue. And he and I, again, agree on almost nothing geopolitically, but I learn from him, and quite frankly, it, it, it strengthens and creates texture around my beliefs, and I think that's important. And plus, he's a huge, he's a huge-- We both are really upset about the, the, the World Cup, um, draw for Scotland. We're in the same group as Morocco and Brazil. Anyways, both he and I love Team Scotland. Anyway, my win-

Kara Swisher 54:02 [chuckles]

Scott Galloway 54:03 ... because I'm canceling Paramount Plus today, [chuckles] I watched all episodes of Landman.

Kara Swisher 54:09 Uh-huh.

Scott Galloway 54:10 Oh, my God!

Kara Swisher 54:11 It's good.

Scott Galloway 54:11 I think I'm Republican now.

Kara Swisher 54:12 [laughing]

Scott Galloway 54:14 It's, it's, he's literally, whoever that guy is, he's Rupert Murdoch of entertainment. He's like: All this fucking liberal, crazy bullshit-

Kara Swisher 54:21 Oh

Scott Galloway 54:22 ... with all this redistribution of virtue-

Kara Swisher 54:25 Yeah

Scott Galloway 54:25 ... on, on primetime streaming programs, I am the Fox News of scripted entertainment.

Kara Swisher 54:31 You know what?

Scott Galloway 54:31 And it is-

Kara Swisher 54:31 He's much more complex than that, but, uh, go ahead. He's not, actually. [chuckles]

Scott Galloway 54:35 I don't think so. I think basically-

Kara Swisher 54:37 No, he's not. He's not, actually.

Scott Galloway 54:38 Oh, come on. This is-

Kara Swisher 54:39 I'm telling you.

Scott Galloway 54:40 This is basically-

Kara Swisher 54:40 I've heard from many a person.

Scott Galloway 54:41 I'm sure you've interviewed him. I'm-

Kara Swisher 54:42 No, I haven't. [chuckles]

Scott Galloway 54:43 This is basically succession if nobody went to college or HR was a rumor.

Kara Swisher 54:48 It's a great, it's a great show.

Scott Galloway 54:48 It's-

Kara Swisher 54:49 It's a great show.

Scott Galloway 54:49 And I love the fact that all the, the fem-- every female character-

Kara Swisher 54:53 It's crazy

Scott Galloway 54:54 ... exists solely to roll their eyes, sleep with the wrong man-

Kara Swisher 54:57 Yeah [chuckles] hot mess

Scott Galloway 54:57 ... or remind us that feelings are inconvenient.

Kara Swisher 54:59 He's really bad on women.

Scott Galloway 55:00 And that every woman is in a state of perimenopause. I mean, it is-

Kara Swisher 55:03 Did you not watch Yellowstone with the daughter? She's a hot mess.

Scott Galloway 55:07 I can't, I can't do Kevin Costner.

Kara Swisher 55:08 Okay.

Scott Galloway 55:09 I've just never loved him.

Kara Swisher 55:09 I'm just telling you, [chuckles] he loves hot mess ladies. I like-

Scott Galloway 55:12 Yeah

Kara Swisher 55:13 ... I do like, I love it. I like his stuff, but he's a little more complex than that. But good, I'm glad.

Scott Galloway 55:17 I love it.

Kara Swisher 55:17 I'm glad.

Scott Galloway 55:17 It makes me feel better about myself because it's like every crisis can be solved by a phone call, a threat-

Kara Swisher 55:22 Mm-hmm

Scott Galloway 55:22 ... or Billy Bob leaning back and explaining why windmills-

Kara Swisher 55:24 Are you liking Demi Moore? I like her character.

Scott Galloway 55:27 ... I don't buy that Jon Hamm would be in a relationship with her.

Kara Swisher 55:30 Oh, okay.

Scott Galloway 55:30 I don't buy it.

Kara Swisher 55:31 Well, all right.

Scott Galloway 55:32 He's so good-looking.

Kara Swisher 55:33 Well-

Scott Galloway 55:34 He's so-- God, he's a, that guy's a tall drink of water.

Kara Swisher 55:35 He was in one with Jennifer Aniston on The Morning Show. He played an Elon Musk-like character, as you know. I liked Jon Hamm.

Scott Galloway 55:40 His career has really taken off.

Kara Swisher 55:41 I loved him. I met him at the Morning Show party. He's a lovely guy, I have to say. We had a lovely chat.

Scott Galloway 55:46 Uh, Mad Men is still, for me, my second, probably my f-

Kara Swisher 55:48 He is a handsome man

Scott Galloway 55:49 ... second favorite scripted drama after-

Kara Swisher 55:51 I have to say, he's a handsome fucking man

Scott Galloway 55:52 ... after Breaking Bad.

Kara Swisher 55:53 Yeah.

Scott Galloway 55:53 He's al- he's a, God, he's so good-looking.

Kara Swisher 55:55 He's a, he's hugely tall, too, just so you know. Very tall.

Scott Galloway 55:58 Yeah. He was also great in the most recent, uh, series of, uh, or season of Fargo.

Kara Swisher 56:03 He was also-

Scott Galloway 56:03 That was really good.

Kara Swisher 56:04 Yeah, he's a, he's a very vers-- he's, he's, he does a lot better work than he should 'cause he's so good-looking. He could do a lot less good work 'cause he's so good-looking.

Scott Galloway 56:11 Yeah.

Kara Swisher 56:12 If that makes sense.

Scott Galloway 56:12 No, I learned that in Oil Patch is, everything about an Oil Patch, it's brutally honest. They're-- also, oil is unfairly maligned-

Kara Swisher 56:19 Yeah

Scott Galloway 56:19 ... and it's also run by a bunch of people who've been divorced exactly once.

Kara Swisher 56:23 [chuckles] Okay, all right.

Scott Galloway 56:25 It's-- anyways-

Kara Swisher 56:25 Okay.

Scott Galloway 56:26 I, it, it, it-

Kara Swisher 56:27 That's your win

Scott Galloway 56:27 ... I love it because-

Kara Swisher 56:28 It's a good one

Scott Galloway 56:29 ... it gives me hope, because it's a story-

Kara Swisher 56:31 It's a good one. Just, just-

Scott Galloway 56:31 ... it's a story about men who are never wrong, but always get laid.

Kara Swisher 56:34 Yeah. [laughing]

Scott Galloway 56:35 It's just the perfect, [laughing] it's the perfect series for a man.

Kara Swisher 56:39 Oh, God.

Scott Galloway 56:40 And-

Kara Swisher 56:41 I do

Scott Galloway 56:41 ... I, I, it, this guy is the Rupert Murdoch of scripted television.

Kara Swisher 56:45 Kind of.

Scott Galloway 56:45 He came in, he recognized the biggest opportunity was just to go the other fucking way.

Kara Swisher 56:48 You know, he left Paramount. He's at Universal now with all the virtual signalers. He likes them better.

Scott Galloway 56:53 It's really-

Kara Swisher 56:54 He's left. He's gone from Para- that was one fuck-up by David Ellison, I have to say. He's left to go over to dot the, into the, into the more elegant, uh, relationship with Donald Langley over there. Cheap over there.

Scott Galloway 57:06 Uh, it's Billy B- Ba- Bob Thornton telling us why the oil business is the last honest thing in the world. [chuckles]

Kara Swisher 57:11 Yeah, I know, I know. But I, it's just a story. Anyway-

Scott Galloway 57:14 Anyway, I, my win-

Kara Swisher 57:15 Okay, good, good

Scott Galloway 57:16 ... I did, I did basically eighteen hours of [laughing] Landman this weekend.

Kara Swisher 57:19 Now, Heated Rivalry.

Scott Galloway 57:20 I am Republican!

Kara Swisher 57:21 Now-

Scott Galloway 57:21 I am now-

Kara Swisher 57:22 Now, now we need you back. Watch Heated Rivalry. [chuckles]

Scott Galloway 57:24 And I immediately made a campaign donation to Senator Ted Cruz as soon as I was done. [laughing]

Kara Swisher 57:29 [laughing] No, you didn't.

Scott Galloway 57:30 But it's entertaining.

Kara Swisher 57:31 Yeah, it is entertaining.

Scott Galloway 57:31 I mean, it's really, really good.

Kara Swisher 57:32 Bill Bob Thornton's fantastic. Anyway, uh, that was good. That was really good. We want to hear from you. Send us your questions about business, tech, or whatever's on your mind. Go to nytmag.com/pivot to submit a question for the show, or call 855-51-PIVOT. Elsewhere in the Kara and Scott universe, this week on On with Kara Swisher, I spoke with Ben Collins, the CEO of The Onion. We talked about the importance of not being afraid to stand up against the Trump administration right now. Let's listen to a clip.

Speaker 57:56 The people who have caved since the start of this, universities, news organizations, everybody who, who is like, "Okay, sir, what do you need?" They just kept stepping on them afterwards. They just kept going.

Kara Swisher 58:08 They did. They did.

Speaker 58:09 I'm not gonna te- I'm not going to tell this staff to change what they're doing-

Kara Swisher 58:13 [chuckles]

Speaker 58:13 ... at all.

Kara Swisher 58:14 Mm-hmm.

Speaker 58:14 Like, they are doing, uh, they're going as hard as they want.

Kara Swisher 58:17 Mm-hmm.

Speaker 58:17 Um, and if they come to me with a fifty-fifty ball, I say, "Go for it." Like-

Kara Swisher 58:20 Yeah

Speaker 58:20 ... and if they come to me with a big idea, I'm like, "Let's find funding. Let's find a sponsor. Let's find a thing to, to, to make sure that this thing can happen."

Kara Swisher 58:27 Yeah. And Scott, before we go, we wanna hear one more thing. Let's listen to a voicemail we got.

Speaker 58:33 Hey there, Kara. I heard the-- I heard you talk about the, uh, message the woman left on your voicemail. Uh, what a cunt, really. I mean, you are fantastic. I'm in love, and if you weren't already married, I would be courting you. So smart, so ruthless, so truthful, so refreshing. Love you, love you, love you. Scott, you are a smartass.

Kara Swisher 59:08 [chuckles]

Speaker 59:09 Uh, I can listen to some of the stuff you say, and I agree with some of the stuff you say, but honestly, dude, some of it is just like, oof, ugh. Anyway, Kara, love you. Scott, [clears throat] you're lucky you're working with this one.

Kara Swisher 59:25 [laughing]

Speaker 59:25 That's it for me.

Scott Galloway 59:27 Yeah, so le- let me guess who picked that clip?

Kara Swisher 59:30 [laughing] No!

Scott Galloway 59:31 I love that.

Kara Swisher 59:31 That was so- [laughing]

Scott Galloway 59:32 Look, look at how happy you are.

Kara Swisher 59:33 Well, because the other woman said I was a bag of shit or whatever. [chuckles]

Scott Galloway 59:36 Literally, look at a-- it's like when I... It's like when my ex-wife-

Kara Swisher 59:39 Michelle Obama

Scott Galloway 59:39 ... and I decided to get therapy, and my therapist, within ten seconds, is like, "You're selfish and have unreasonable expectations of what marriage is about."

Kara Swisher 59:45 [laughing]

Scott Galloway 59:45 And I'm like, "Well, I'm enjoying this. I'm enjoying this."

Kara Swisher 59:49 [laughing] Oh, that's because Michelle Obama liked you. I just said, it was very funny, it was a reaction to that.

Scott Galloway 59:53 Yeah.

Kara Swisher 59:53 Anyway, thank you for that call. [chuckles]

Scott Galloway 59:54 So what if I want to have sex with other women? [laughing] My God.

Kara Swisher 59:58 Anyway, I love our listeners. Anyway, we, come on.

Scott Galloway 1:00:01 Uh, you lo- yeah, you love that one.

Kara Swisher 1:00:02 Some people hate you and love me, and some people love you and hate me.

Scott Galloway 1:00:05 I-

Kara Swisher 1:00:05 It's perfect. [chuckles] Some people love us both.

Scott Galloway 1:00:07 You know, something for everybody.

Kara Swisher 1:00:08 Yeah, something for everybody.

Scott Galloway 1:00:09 Sweet or savory. [chuckles]

Kara Swisher 1:00:10 [exhales] Oh, I enjoy our listeners. Anyway, that's the show. Thanks for listening to Piv-

Scott Galloway 1:00:14 Look at how happy you are.

Kara Swisher 1:00:16 [chuckles] Look at-

Scott Galloway 1:00:16 Look at you. Look at, look, look, I've never seen-

Kara Swisher 1:00:19 You were not-

Scott Galloway 1:00:20 You're giddy!

Kara Swisher 1:00:20 ... in the Epstein files.

Scott Galloway 1:00:23 You're giddy.

Kara Swisher 1:00:23 Yay!

Scott Galloway 1:00:23 You're giddy.

Kara Swisher 1:00:24 It's a good day. You know what? I was so happy when I saw you. [laughing]

Scott Galloway 1:00:26 I can't believe you're actually worried about that.

Kara Swisher 1:00:28 Why not? It's like it's so-

Scott Galloway 1:00:29 I'm not that interesting.

Kara Swisher 1:00:31 So many people were in those fucking files. You had to look.

Scott Galloway 1:00:34 I stay home, and I watch Euphoria. That's the most sexual experience I have.

Kara Swisher 1:00:37 [chuckles] That's the show. Thanks for listening to Pivot, and be sure to like and subscribe to our YouTube channel. We'll be back on Friday. Scott, read us out.

Scott Galloway 1:00:46 [upbeat music] Today's show is produced by Lara Naaman, Zoë Marcus, and Taylor Griffin. Ernie Nitot engineered this episode. Rich Shibley edited the video. Thanks also to Jabril Myers, Vera, and Dan Chalan. Nishat Kurwa is Vox Media's executive producer of podcasts. Make sure to follow Pivot on your favorite podcast platform. Thanks for listening to Pivot, from your magazine of Vox Media. You can subscribe to the magazine at nytmag.com/pod. We'll be back later this week for another breakdown of all things tech and business. Action absorbs anxiety. Resist and Unsubscribe February.com. [upbeat music]