(Preview) Meta and Its Messaging Problem, The XBOX Reset, Q&A on Token Costs, American Soccer, Starlink in Nature

**Andrew Sharp** (0:00)
Hello, and welcome to a free preview of Sharp Tech. Hello, and welcome back to another episode of Sharp Tech. I'm Andrew Sharp, and on the other line, Ben Thompson. Ben, it's great to be back. How you doing?

**Ben Thompson** (0:20)
I think it's great to be you. It looks like you are in the locations, location change, summer surroundings.
You have a beach, a picture of a beach with an umbrella over your shoulder.

**Andrew Sharp** (0:31)
In the back, just living life here, working remotely for the next several weeks. So yes, life is good for me. How was the fishing boat?

**Ben Thompson** (0:39)
It was great. No complaints.
Happy to be back, happy to be there. I'm just a happy guy, Andrew. What can I say?

**Andrew Sharp** (0:46)
Did the Starlink hold up for you while you were out there?

**Ben Thompson** (0:48)
Oh, of course. I actually have a, I have an addition to my tech stack abroad, but I can save it. I know that someone wants to castigate me for taking a Starlink.

**Andrew Sharp** (0:58)
That's right.

**Ben Thompson** (0:58)
So I think we have a bit of a mullet section today, but I do have a new product recommendation that goes with the Starlink, which I will get to at the end.

**Andrew Sharp** (1:07)
Okay. Well, I look forward to that. We will be returning to Starlink discussion. We do have a robust mullet section. Party in the back today. For now, we will begin. I thought you wrote a fabulous article on Tuesday, just surveying the current state of meta generally, and you used the words of a version of Mark Zuckerberg, who's a bit better at telling his company's story.
So before we get to the substance, what prompted you to write that piece and approach it the way you did on Tuesday?

**Ben Thompson** (1:37)
I mean, there's been a meta piece to write for ages. It's like the regular meta check-in, and I have a very good track record of writing, actually this company is fine.

**Andrew Sharp** (1:49)
Calm down.

**Ben Thompson** (1:50)
When they're at their bottom. I have found them very frustrating, Mark Zuckerberg specifically, and that frustration is a long running one. This isn't just a frustration over the past few weeks. This is a frustration literally over the last, like as long as I've been writing Stratechery.

**Andrew Sharp** (2:07)
Ten years.

**Ben Thompson** (2:07)
Right. And I feel like it's been particularly bad in the last year, year and a half, but at the same time, I'm not a meta bear. Like I wrote a couple years ago about how AI is already the biggest opportunity for meta of anyone. I still think that's the case, but there's a real juxta.
I don't know that I could fully come out with the everyone outside is stupid. Obviously, this is a great investment. I think it is, but there is a consistent pattern by the leadership that at some point had to be addressed. That's what I wanted to address, and it's just suddenly occurred to me how to address it is what I want Mark Zuckerberg to say.

**Andrew Sharp** (2:53)
Yeah.

**Ben Thompson** (2:53)
And what I want him to say is downstream of what I want him to believe. And I'm not sure he fully does. And that was what I was trying to say.

**Andrew Sharp** (3:03)
He doesn't necessarily grock the ultimate upside and the clarity of the opportunity here.

**Ben Thompson** (3:09)
No, I think he does. I think he probably does. But to me, all the frustrations that I've had from the outside looking in with Mark Zuckerberg are all the exact same frustration repeated again and again. And that's what I sort of wanted to articulate, which is this desire to be something that Facebook isn't. That's what it comes back to.

**Andrew Sharp** (3:39)
Well, I mean, there's an implicit criticism of Zuckerberg's leadership in the format you adopted because you were basically doing his job for him, at least as far as messaging is concerned. But I also found the piece, again, broadly positive on the state of Meta.

**Ben Thompson** (3:55)
That's good. I can bet how I felt. I'm positive. I'm positive on their opportunity. And it's not even fully saying that.
This is what I'm frustrated with Mark Zuckerberg about, is not sins of commission. There's lots of people that are mad about sins of commission, things that he's done that they don't like. My problem is a sin of omission, in that I don't believe he has fully embraced what Meta is, and because of that has not delivered the messaging that would give him the freedom to do what has to be done. And by the way, has led to some sins of commission, spending tons of money on stuff that was the wrong direction.