What I wrote last week
I wrote about Square’s acquisition of Afterpay
Business
In the Streaming Wars, Sony Stands on the Sidelines. I think for the short term, it makes sense for Sony to adopt a zig-when-everyone-else-zags strategy as building a streaming service is not Sony’s strength. Of course, no strategy is risk-free. If the big streamers can create content on their own and don’t need Sony any more, the iconic Japanese firm will be in deep trouble. It is a big bet from Sony, but as the market stands today, I don’t think the company has too many options left.
Rappi’s poor service opens the door for competition, but users aren’t leaving yet. Two things from this article struck me: 1/ even though they were horrible incidents with services and customer support, there hasn’t been a customer exodus from Rappi yet. 2/ RappiPay is the most profitable and fastest growing part of the company. If the challenging delivery gig doesn’t work out for the company, it can pivot to be a full blown fintech.
Amazon’s $1.5 billion air cargo hub starts operations. In the arms race to compete with other retailers or eCommerce platforms like Shopify, solidifying or even adding to their advantage in infrastructure and last-mile delivery is the right move for Amazon. Just look at the price tag of the cargo hub. If anyone wants to compete with Amazon on this front, that’s at least what they should expect to spend. And it’s a tall order for many companies. With that being said, having another cargo hub doesn’t guarantee success, so it will be interesting to follow this market in the near future.
Excerpt: How Google bought Android—according to folks in the room. The founders of Google, especially Larry, do seem to have excellent foresight in acquiring Android. I look forward to this book.
What I found interesting
John Gruber’s excellent post on Apple’s new “Child Safety” measures. The nuances and details laid out by John are very enlightening and important in understanding what Apple is doing here.
Reality has a surprising amount of detail. The devil is in the details
Archaeologists discover 4,000-year-old ancient city in Iraqi desert. Imagine you see now something that existed 4,000 years ago. That must be a surreal feeling.
Believing In Yourself is Overrated. This is Better. I am not really a fan of the “fake it till you make it” mentality. So I am very glad that Ryan Holiday wrote about it since he is far more eloquent than I can ever be. In short, the more effort you put in something, the more confident you are in yourself
Stats that may interest you
Momo has 60% of Vietnam’s mobile payments market
Amazon has 11% of the U.S ads market
Amazon spent $6.2 billion on video and music content in the first 6 months of 2021. To put it in perspective, Netflix spent a tad lower than $8 billion on content in the same period
Minh Quang Duong 