What I wrote last week
Uber plans to advertise to riders based on destination data
Business
Forget Netflix and Disney: a local streaming service is king in Indonesia. Vidio is winning because it understands the local audience and what they want from a streaming service.
ESPN, Formula 1 Extend Track With New Rights Deal. Formula 1 has seen its popularity soar high across the globe and in the US in the past two years. Some say that Netflix’s Drive To Survive elevated the sport’s standing. Others say that being one of a few sports organized during the pandemic to entertain folks at home helped too. Whatever the reason is, it’s undeniable that more American viewers know about Formula 1 than ever before. Viewership has never been this high. Next year, the country will host races in Las Vegas, Miami and Texas. There is a strong chance that an American driver, Logan Sergeant, will be on the grid too. The stars seem to be aligned well for the sport I love
($) The Fantasy of Instant Delivery Is Imploding. Some venture capitalists are poised to book millions of dollars in losses. “Along with entering too many markets, they overspent on marketing, with billboards in Times Square and European soccer and Formula One team sponsorships, former finance executives say. During Gopuff’s billion-dollar funding rounds, the co-CEOs had also sold portions of their stock to investors. (Rank-and-file Gopuffers were not allowed to sell shares unless approved by the company.) After they became multimillionaires, they purchased a Gulfstream jet and mansions five minutes from each other along the Intracoastal Waterway in Miami’s Golden Beach. Gola also bought Joe the Jeweler a home in Cherry Hill to replace the one he’d lost when his cash-for-gold business went bust.“
Exclusive: YouTube’s new redesign is built to feel more like TV. Some insights into how YouTube redesigned its User Experience. It must have been a massive undertaking and I’d love to be a fly on a wall of the meetings that led to decisions being made on the new design.
Square sells access to your inbox. No one seems to know if the law cares. Read how Block (Square) collects your email and sells access to said email to hundreds of sellers. The company also goes to great length to circumvent regulations pertaining to consumer privacy.
Apple on iPhones, Chips, Privacy, Working From Home and More | WSJ Tech Live 2022. I like Joanna Stern as a journalist and a tech reviewer. She is smart, funny and knows her stuff. This interview was really good and featured some hard-hitting questions that, unfortunately yet unsurprisingly, Craig and Joz evaded. Their response to Joanna’s question regarding EU mandate on USB-C was more nuanced than what was widely reported on the news. Their opposition to the Metaverse, a concept that Facebook/Meta champions, was noteworthy. Plus, I found it good Joz’s brief explanation on why ATT was introduced. Overall, if you have 30 minutes to spare, you really should check out this interview.
White House hammers economic issues with attack on ‘junk fees’ two weeks out from Election Day. While they are at it, they should talk to AirBnb CEO Brian Chesky on the outrageous fees that hosts on his platform charge to guests.
Other stuff I find interesting
Little rules about big things. Morgan Housel is one of my favorite writers and he struck gold again. “Most financial mistakes come when you try to force things to happen faster than is required. Compounding doesn’t like when you try to use a cheat code. Risk’s greatest fuels are leverage, overconfidence, ego, and impatience. Its greatest antidote is having options, humility, and other people’s trust.”
Voyage of the Gross Even though every other option is better, most of New York’s trash still goes into a hole in the ground. A fascinating piece that describes the journey of…trash in New York
($) The World’s Biggest Source of Clean Energy Is Evaporating Fast. “The water woes of China’s iconic mega-dam are part of a global hydropower crisis that is being made worse by global warming. From California to Germany, heatwaves and droughts have shrunk rivers that feed reservoirs. Hydroelectricity output fell by 75 terrawatt-hours in Europe this year through September — more than the annual consumption of Greece — and fell 30% across China last month. In the US, generation is expected to fall to the lowest level in six years in September and October. It’s a cruel irony that’s forcing utilities to reconsider the traditional role of hydropower as a reliable and instant source of green energy. Dams are the world’s largest source of clean energy, yet extreme weather is making them less effective in the battle against climate change.“
Stats
84% of maternal deaths in the US are preventable
“Only five percent of plastic waste generated by US households actually gets recycled”
One out of four US adults under 30 gets news on TikTok
The FDIC’s 2021 National Survey of Unbanked and Underbanked Households also found an estimated 4.5 percent of U.S. households were unbanked
Online spending in Southeast Asia is forecast to reach $200 billion in 2022 and $330 billion by 2025
Minh Quang Duong 