Tom's Top 3: June 25, 2024
A Spoonful of Sugar
Hi everyone! Welcome to this week’s installment of Tom’s Top 3 Tuesdays, where I highlight three pieces of content (Podcasts/Shows/Songs/Articles/etc.) that I found interesting or noteworthy from the prior week.
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Let’s get into it:
[Podcast] The Town with Matthew Belloni - Hollywood’s Big Big Tech Problem
If you’ve ever heard Scott Galloway speak before, you know that he is rather provocative. This conversation ruffled some feathers in Hollywood, and for good reason.
Galloway criticized the effectiveness of the writers strike, arguing that the 5% wage increase does not make up for the 40% income loss from the Hollywood shutdown. He aggressively asserts that the studio executives are delusional and are not properly responding to the threat of AI and other technology platforms, like YouTube and TikTok. Basically, this:
Galloway believes industry consolidation is inevitable and necessary: Netflix has a dominant lead in streaming, consumers have endless ways to spend their time, the theater business is in steep decline, and “Also Ran” streaming services are burning hundreds of millions of dollars every quarter.
In order to compete, companies will need to band together to provide a compelling reason to subscribe. We are already seeing this happen with the upcoming VENU, StreamSaver, and the Disney/Max bundles. Continuing to ignore this reality (*ahem*… Paramount) could spell disaster.
I hope Galloway’s cynical view doesn’t manifest, but I think his words struck a chord because we know it’s true on some level. Maybe this is the splash of cold water that the industry needs.
[YouTube] RichboyJhae - We Built EVERY Level from LEGO Star Wars: The Video Game
If that pessimistic podcast is a shot of well vodka, this video is the refreshing swig of lukewarm Bud Light that makes you forget alllll about it.
You don’t have to be a Star Wars or Lego fan to enjoy this video, but you certainly will appreciate it more if you are. Hearing the creators passionately talk about the level of detail that went into this project warmed my heart. This is proof that people in the world are still doing fun stuff just because they think it’s fun.
[Product] Seats.aero
I didn’t travel internationally until I was 26 years old. I’m fortunate now that I have the means to do so, but I still shudder at the thought of shelling out thousands of dollars on overseas vacations. I came across the concept of “travel hacking” after college, and I have honestly enjoyed the rabbit hole of credit card optimization and loyalty rewards. Since then, I have racked up over 500,000 points and miles for future travel.
Thing is, I haven’t used a single point…
Until this last weekend. My friend is getting married in September, and his wedding is in France. Ticket prices for flights alone would’ve cost me over $2,000. I’ve shied away from actually using my miles due to anxiety around the process and actually getting a good value for my miles (I know, what’s it good for then?). I decided to put on my big boy pants and finally figure it out.
Turns out it was a really easy process, in part because of this wonderful tool, Seats.aero. I’ll probably do a larger travel focused article at some point in the future, but I’ll give the gist here. I used Seats.aero to search flights from LAX to Europe that I could book using miles. It aggregated all of the options across multiple airline programs and found me a deal that worked perfectly for the trip.
Virgin Atlantic had a flight from LAX to CDG on my required date for 15,000 miles and $155 in fees. I checked which credit card programs have a partnership with Virgin, and Capital One was on the list. Since I have a stockpile of miles with Capital One, I was able to easily transfer from Capital One to Virgin and book through Virgin’s website. I have Seats.aero to thank for making this trip possible for me.
Best part is: Seats.aero is free if searching for flights less than 60 days out.
That wraps up this edition of Tom’s Top 3 Tuesdays. I’ll be back next week. ✌️