Transcript
Live. Yeah. From a lurky lanky Wednesday. It's a nugget called Biz that we affectionately know as this nuggets. Oh, I like the way you did that. Join as always, by Emma, lurking lurking uh No, no. And Matt Memphis Guardian. I wanted to give you an old-fashioned like pool. Hustler named like that one. Yeah, I want to be known as Dutch. I'm that thing in your recycling bin that you're not quite sure. You should be recycled or not. Is it trash, is it? It's number seven, do we do? Number seven here, could you scrape more out of it to eat. And today is a artificially flavored bag of Biz nugget frosting called February 9th. 2022, we make fun of Peter. Teal and Mark Zuckerberg's relationship. Well, all making fun of new pelotons CEO. Barry Pals with corporate dictators McCarthy. Well, also making fun of the sec's. Justice is done Department. Oh, we do a lot of making fun of things. Who else does this? Everybody loves people actually everybody. It's kind of everybody we're not alone. All right, Matt ready? Yeah, let's do this. I want to get creeped out. Let's get creepy. Both of my stories are open for conversation. So feel free to pitch in. Here we go. You say that I want to hear your third kind of ridiculous. I want to hear you think. Here's a story. Seven, extraordinary details about Creepy Peter Teal's relationship with Dropout. Mark Zuckerberg. Here we go. These are from Max Chiefs new biography, the contrarian Peter Thiel and silicon Valley's pursuit of Power full disclosure. I took the book out of the library several weeks ago. It's right over here somewhere and I still haven't read it and I'm gonna tell you why do doing I'm gonna tell you why I every time I'm about to read it at night, I I don't want to get the Pressed so I just like put it back. I'm like Seriously, I can't deal with it. It's not. Here we go though. Not like Satan's Bible now just read it. Here we go. This is these are actually these actual seven real details from the book. Here we go. Plug. Plug for the book. Here we go. Number one. Teal and Zuck were Kindred Spirits, who connected over their shared, social awkwardness and Cutthroat approach to business. Here's from the book, quote is Zuckerberg's reticent and awkwardness impressed teal who saw in the young man's indifference. A sign of intelligence Jesus, that's a pre-med over shitt, I don't know what it is. Yeah, other difference to humanity. What's really impressive to me? That's a good way to start. I hope that number the second line of the book. Number two, Zuck depended on Teal to keep Facebook's relationship with the right wing alive. Teal helped Orchestra meeting in 2016 with well known conservative figures, like Tucker Carlson and Glenn back. Blah, blah, blah blah. But we knew this one already, right? Yeah, that one's not that interesting. number three, after the social network came out, Teal criticized the films the picture of Zuckerberg arguing that the film inaccurately. Portrayed sucks on herbal motives in starting Fuckbook. Sorry Facebook, sorry. I can imagine that there's anything honorable about that about that that wasn't really that wasn't like the part of the film that I thought was controversial. I thought it was like the rest of the film. That's two number four. This is a good one. I mean I kind of like them all actually, Zuck told teal he should resign from Facebook's board of directors in 2017. This was after the New York Times, published a leaked email from Netflix, CEO Reed Hastings, who's also on the board. Facebook read told teal that his endorsement of trump reflected poorly on Facebook. So Zuck asked teal to step down Teal told Zuck. I will not quit. You'll have to fire me. So nothing happened. So nothing happened. It's about that. It's so weird. It says, if Mark Zuckerberg had full control over, who he picked on the board. That's so weird. That doesn't seem right. This is why I'll never be Peter teal. Because if someone asked me to step down, isn't that kind of being fired? I don't really understand the distinction there. No, I think he just he needs it in writing he needs to notarize before he believes it. Oh well this is all good one proving that Peter Thiel I guess this is an idiot. I don't know what's proven. He number five, teal underestimated, Facebook Facebook's potential and told to sell the company and its second year, despite its success he had never embraced a function or philosophy of Facebook and didn't buy into sucks, conception of the company Jesus when Yahoo offered to buy Facebook for one billion dollars. Teal told Zuck to take the deal when zark said no, Heel dumped around 17 million shares of Facebook stock. I did not know that. That's crazy. Can you imagine how no one would be using Facebook if Yahoo had bought it? That would be wonderful, literally wouldn't exist. Yeah. He's like the death sentence for everything. You know, you're right. So our interpretation of teal is wrong. He tried to save us. He did. He was our priests savior. Number six Zuck may have been CEO but critics saw teal as the Puppet Master behind the company's political dealings. I mean, when you do that, but I like this quote. Yeah. Like this, quote teal had been attracted to zuck's obvious, lack of concern for what anyone else. Thought. That's a nice quote, I like that mostly because teal earlier has no concern for what Zuck thinks. So it's their it's a match made in heaven, really is. And finally number seven We knew about this but a little bit more detail here. Zach met with teal and Donald Trump before the 2020 election to make a secret deal. According to a source, close to teal. Here's here's what the actual deal was about Facebook. Would stop fact, checking political posts. I remember the Trump Administration would ease up on restrictions. Sure. So there were a lot of restrictions, I was gonna say, what does anybody remember? What the restrictions were? Yeah. All right. That's it. That's the list. I mean, I think to call it a relationship. It's is is like a stretch. It's it does feel a lot like Peter, Thiel calls the shows before we move on, I'm gonna, I'm gonna say this. I, I did ask listening audience, if anyone care about the metaverse, no one really responded. But a friend of mine who listens the show did actually respond about the metaverse, so maybe that counts. So I'm gonna try it again. Count say listen accounts, I'm gonna try again. If anyone would like to be part of a free flow, media business, pants book club and read the contrarian and then talk about it, come on here and talk about it. I'm game game, reach out and we don't even need multiple people. Really just takes one nerd. Who wants to read the book and come on the air with us right people. Let's do it. Well, Club. The free flow media book club. All right, speaking of throwing the book of things, Big news today out of the SEC, you like that segue. George Blankenbaker of Indianapolis. Finally has a final judgment after defrauding investors between 2016 and 2019. Finally we're there blank and Blake were going down Blankenbaker raised over 11 million dollars from Mostly elderly investors that said he would use the funds to give short-term loans to food exporters in Asia but instead he used the funds to invest in hemp companies upon these scheme and unsurprisingly pay himself Blankenbaker will be barred from sitting on a board of a publicly traded company and he will pay 1.9 million in a discouragement. The litigation was coordinated by the SEC. The US attorney general, the IRS and the Postal Inspector, we had four massive. Government agencies chasing this down and in other SEC news. Bloomberg reported today that the SEC is bogged down on setting a climate rule. I don't know if George blanken Baker's case was interfering but the rule is set to be finalized by the end of last year. Now may slip into March or Beyond in a statement SCC chair. Gensler said he would finally get around to The Climate rule Once Blankenbaker Affairs come to a close so I guess they are not true, is it? No, that's not true. That's not true. That would be the greatest thing ever. It sounds like a Cary Grant movie. Yeah. Really, what it looks like is the SEC is handing over their legal jurisdiction about forcing companies to actually disclose anything about carbon emissions or climate, right? In fact, here's my favorite part of the climate story. They are worried about one word. And it's a word you and I know. Well and hey materiality. Oh. Always, that's right. That might be the worst that made me. Quit my job. If you are one of my ESG Brethren the SEC, just woke up and realized, they don't know what the fuck materiality means. They literally have no idea. Material is a legal threshold that has to be hit for the SEC to mandate companies, to disclose something, and it's historically, been defined as something. That if you knew it before you made the decision, you might have made a different decision. So, okay, it's like the definition of a negative like if I had known this, I would have done something different, then it's material, right? So it has to have happened. Already for you to be realized materiality is also a word, the ESG Community has been tossing around like a crouton since 2007 to describe everything in ESG and the SEC just admitted that they're confused. What it actually means. I need to activate my rant mode for a second. Can you wait? There's actually a mode above. The motor you're in? Yeah. Okay. Yes, do it. This is real ramp mode. Okay. Do we seriously make decisions in capital markets? About what information investors get based on what I think of as the ice cream flavor basis? Like the wait, there's an ice cream flavor called cake batter and I only thought there was Vanilla that changes everything, right? Like that's the basis by which we get information. Okay. If there were any doubt that the pseudoscience of corporate disclosure and finance were more pseudoeph initiation. That has the SEC Naval gazing in saying that oh it's kind of material that you know, human existence. As we know it may come to an end if we don't stop carbon know, there's been any time being like, well, what if someone sues us and says that carbons, not material, do we have a legal basis for that? This isn't one of those things, you can wait until afterwards to realize its material true. If you wait until afterwards, we are all dead. Dead. But thank God George blank and Baker's finally held to account the book got thrown at him just got done. That's what Levine mascardi. And if you understand that joke, there's something wrong with you. There's something there's a lot wrong. If you understand anything, I just said there's something wrong with you. I'm kind of with you. I'm with you at the end. Whenever you activate your rant mode. I start to understand you. I live in rant mode. Here's another one. Back to Peloton. Elite email from new Peloton CEO. Barry McCarthy talks about the the bitter pill. Of layoffs and outlines his vision for a comeback story. I, I don't you outline the comeback story before you've come back. Let's go over. I I ran this letter through the one of our machines here. Go Before we even get before, we even run it through the machine. Can I just tell you the first thing he says yes this is a quote from the actual letter to it says team I I hate first of all, can I just hate? I hate the 21st century way, the executives always start emails to their employees which is team. I hate that really at least a deer team or something. No, I'm now gonna write all free float media conversations. I'm gonna start them all with Team. Yeah, if you think this is team colon or team, long Dash, em dash, whatever I hate you forever. We say like to my loving team that I worship. Here we go. He says team. I would like to be to begin this email with a. Shout out to my favorite Peloton instructors, Denis Morton and Matt wilpers blah blah blah and I want to thank John Foley in the Peloton co-founders. Starting with a bang, Barry, your friend just got fired. You're scared as shit, but let's kiss the ring acknowledge a couple of sweaty dudes, to help me pedal. That's a weird beginning. I'm just gonna, I'm gonna put that out there. That's not really to team also. That's really not team. Yeah, I don't, I don't know what that is. I don't know. I don't be so excited when you fired a bunch of people. Here we go. All right. Okay. So he then he lists is 10 management philosophy values, which we ran through our business pants, CEO, value translation, snark Nader 15,000, know how many upgrades are there to our machine. So here's our works, I read his value and then the machine just has a random response. Here's the value of Fortune Cookie for business. Here we go. Maybe you want to take notes for us. Be stubborn on Vision, flexible on details. The machine says, we decide you don't decide but we're gonna change our minds a lot. So buckle up for the constant confusion, it does sound like a yearly reorg. That's what it sounds like next value, fast is a slow. As we go, the translation, you better work harder or there will be more layoffs. That's pretty straightforward. Okay, I like that one. Next one, intuition drives testing, data drives decision-making. The translation and speculation and bulshit increases our stock price, which is directly attached to my stock options. So, help me spin this bullshit, please. Oh, now I get it. The Machine Works. Let's play at least next one. You're, this is what he said. This is a value saying to his team. His new team, your comfort zone, is Your Own Worst Enemy. Oh, the translation, your job is about to suck even more and you're scared now. So you know, Wait, is he talking about Matt wilpers comfort zone or the team's comfort zone? It's unclear next value. Talent density is foundational translation. Our previous CEO was more dense than talented, so we gave him a special fancy chair. That that does sound like body shaming. Next value stress contacts, not control, freedom and responsibility. The machine had no response here just says gobbledygook, it doesn't even know how to interpret that. Stress context, not control freedom and responsibility. What the hell is that one? I don't even know what those words mean. And that order. The next value from the new dictator Whisperer, Barry McCarthy over Peloton understand. In order to be understood translation, shut your mouth while I'm talking I like shut your mouth while you're talking. Uh next value, get real translation you might get fired if we don't have another pandemic. That that doesn't get real about. That's straight up, get real. Yeah, real, the penultimate value here. Think from first principles, the machine was had trouble with this one. All put out was Jesus saves, it doesn't really understand what that that's think from first principles feels very Chick-fil-A. And finally the the new value here told to the team right after they fired a bunch of his their colleagues. So that you know, this is a email you read with a lot of trepidation, here's a final value. Put first things first. Translation, always eat your sandwich before, you're stupid cupcake. Oh, he was talking about lunch. I mean, seriously, though, I mean, unless again, unless they come up with a new pandemic, what, what's really, what are they gonna solve for here? How is Peloton gonna, who knows? I don't know. Well, the first things first is is eating children first, or is the tread running on a treadmill first, so I think they're just trying to prioritize. That's all that means. Prioritize on tomorrow's, show I got tease here for you. We're gonna talk about a weird Severance benefit for fired. Peloton employees, you're gonna enjoy this one, and we also gonna cover the slide deck that a major Peloton, investor used to make fun of former CEO, John Foley, before he quote, unquote resigned. So we got more, I like more time for children tomorrow, to make fun of The only show you that will be your teas for the next show. We're trying to get you to listen to us with that. In my second Justice is done news story. The Justice Department apparently finished with George Blake and Baker of Indianapolis seized three points. 6 billion. That's a billion with a B in Bitcoin that a married, couple hacked from a Hong Kong Bitcoin exchange in 2016. The deputy attorney general said in the statement that the arrests quote show that cryptocurrency is not a safe haven for criminals. Side note criminals, what the fuck is the point of cryptocurrency? Then did anybody tell this to Peter, Thiel like isn't cryptocurrency supposed to be the wild west or the liberty and Shadow unregulated meta, perverse, space or whatever wondering, right? Like, I thought the whole point was that you wouldn't get caught by the Department of Justice. Just yeah. I but apparently, that is not true to show you how real the world is this world not the fake one. One of the heckers Ilya Lichtenstein, he's the husband in this power hacking couple, he described himself on LinkedIn as quote, serial entrepreneur. And quote. An irreverent comedic rapper. Wait what? That's that was on his LinkedIn page. Isn't that kind of doing here? Comedic rapper. Yeah, like I don't know if I like the sound of that. I don't know where you put that. Is that the job description? Is that in your like you're just in itself in this, your bio on my YouTube feed that I'm gonna that is gonna go beyond me without me clicking on it. That's where I put. That's actually the name of this episode is just gonna be irreverent. Comedic wrap after moving money around the blockchain. Which in fact was traced by the government. So, lest you think it can't be traced? It can be. They ended up using their gains from this epic hack in the most mediocre way you can possibly spend three billion dollars. They used it to buy gold gold nfts, that's right, like fake Nike shoes and decentraland and quote, a Walmart gift card. Wow, I didn't know Walmart gave cards on increments of three. Point six billion dollars. That's know you either. I'm not sure why that one is like one of the items that they like the itemized list of stuff they bought, there's no Yachts involved. They didn't buy fancy real estate. They have about gold and nfts and a Walmart gift card. Yeah, I can't joke about that because I probably my top drawer in my kitchen. There's probably 3.6 billion dollars worth of unused gift cards. That's what they want. You fell into the Trap when when called for comment George blight, Blankenbaker had no comment on this case unfortunately. So I thought his comment would be Blake and Baker. Is that like pleading the fifth just saying Blankenbaker? I can't even say his last name, consistently, I'm not sure. Maybe maybe that's why I'm gonna get in trouble with the Department of Justice. And finally, to wrap up quickly because we always tell you here that all all disasters lead in ESG changes. So the Jorge Flores racial bias lawsuit, we covered earlier in the week has already resulted in a blackhead coach in Houston and now the reports are that black business tycoon Byron Allen says he's preparing a bid for the NFL's Denver Broncos. I just I don't even know why I'm bringing this up but other than like I feel like I'm trying to tell you. I told we told you so but maybe we didn't, I don't even know. Did we? Know it. This this is amazing in as much as it's so obvious that it's comedic. I'm actually hoping that the NFL does start doing irreverent comedic wraps of, oh, Sensitivity. I mean, I don't know if you might be too young for this but the Super Bowl Shuffle. That's a young for the Super Bowl Shuffle. I actually had the video and that might be one of the first ever. Reverend committed wraps out there. I know it made me feel bad about myself. That was Damian Raul's. I'm at Scotty, we are free float media. Emma lurks continues to lurk, and is lurking about just doing what she does. She's producing in the shadows like a cryptocurrency, blockchain metaverse of free float media, that the Department of Justice will someday Trace to notice that after our show with Emily Chu, the great Emily. Chew, Emma hasn't showed up again. She's like, I could be with people like her. I'm with these chuckleheads, I'm 90% sure. She's alright. Six job interviews in the last three days. I just think it's just like she knows she can do better. So she's just like, oh I mean the bar is not high but I know get you better is basically like here sitting in the company of Emily and then coming back to. Yeah. It's a tough transition. I'm just I know it's all Speaking of Basking in the glow of fancy experts this week, we confirmed we got Bruce Kahn from the mothership msci. He also worked in a couple other places including Deutsche Bank. He is joining us for the good game. This week, another fancy expert playing in with their fancy expert brains, to make us look like morons. So join us on Friday for that. Otherwise, we'll be back here tomorrow with more Biz New Gods talk. Yeah. I gotta say goodbye, before we sign up, Bruce Kahn, just texted me saying that he's actually preparing in a reverend comedic rap for us. So looking forward to game on Bruce we'll see you tomorrow.