SEMAFOR

Federal Reserve Chair Kevin Warsh made his debut Friday on one of the global economy’s biggest stages, where he appeared to play the hawk — but looks can be deceiving. Eleanor Mueller reports from Jackson Hole: https://lnkd.in/gN2WRbWC

"I think that a lot of the people on the left do not believe in a tech forward future." Taylor Lorenz talks to Maxwell Tani and Ben Smith about the AI data center backlash.

Taylor Lorenz joins Mixed Signals to make the case that the bipartisan push to get kids off social media is less about child safety than it looks. Maxwell Tani and Ben Smith ask Taylor where the actual line is between moral panic and legitimate concern, why she thinks the academic consensus on social media and youth mental health is being drowned out, and her at times surprising anti-anti-AI stance. Listen to Mixed Signals from Semafor Media wherever you get your podcasts, or watch it on YouTube: https://lnkd.in/gDtsnxUp

"It's very dystopian... It's sort of taking the fact that people can't afford these things and using it as marketing." Rachel Karten talks to Ben Smith and Maxwell Tani about some of the best and worst campaigns on social media today. #Marketing #SocialMediaMarketing #Advertising #Campaigns

Blackstone manages about $1.3 trillion, but Jon Gray says investment decision-making still runs "like a small business in a lot of ways.” "The quality of the decisions you make determine your future outcome," he explains. #privateequity #CEO #podcast #business #leadership #executive

Blackstone makes big bets. Jon Gray says the risk is becoming too convinced you’re right. “You keep pressing against what you’re doing to confirm that you haven’t just sort of fallen in love,” he says. Even when “the last five times you’ve done this has been great,” someone still needs to ask: “Are you sure?” That tension matters as Blackstone goes big on AI infrastructure. The firm is investing behind a technology Gray believes could reshape entire business models, while trying to invest “through the lens that this may change.” In the latest episode of The CEO Signal with Penny Pritzker and Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson, Gray explains how Blackstone builds conviction without stopping the questions that could prove it wrong. Watch the full conversation: https://lnkd.in/g5EAVhi2

Reed Hastings explains how Netflix deliberately tries to generate disagreement through a practice it calls “farming for dissent.” Leaders might poll their teams before a decision, but Hastings says the goal was not consensus: “You wanted to be informed.”

The most significant impact of record-breaking IPOs by Anthropic and OpenAI may be felt thousands of miles from Silicon Valley, in towns and cities across Africa. Alexis Akwagyiram explains:

After Netflix laid off a third of its workforce during the 2000 internet downturn, Reed Hastings was surprised to find the company was getting more done, not less. He explains how that lesson in “talent density” helped shape Netflix’s idea of itself as a championship sports team rather than a family.

The Strait of Hormuz may not actually be the biggest problem facing the global oil market at the moment, Tim McDonnell explains.