Iterate Weekly - Issue 41
This week we're discussing the demise of CES, The New York Times acquiring The Athletic, monitoring kids' health with wearables, a new chapter for Topps trading cards, and getting Artcurious!
Welcome to issue 41 of Iterate Weekly!
Just a reminder that you can always reply to this email or leave a comment on the web version. I read all of them, and I appreciate the feedback, questions, and insights from you.
Let’s jump into this week’s stories.
🤖Tech
Does CES Still Matter?
The Consumer Electronics Show (CES) has been touted as “the most influential tech event in the world.” The show started way back in 1967 in New York City and has found a home in Las Vegas for most of my lifetime.
I’ve had the pleasure of visiting CES a few times in person, and there was always a particular product or experience that left me astonished. However, there are really some things that need to be experienced in-person vs. a promotional video on YouTube.
The last few years have been a major struggle for CES. Attendance for 2022 was down 75% from previous years, and they even ended a day early due to COVID concerns. Let’s look at 3 reasons why CES has recently lost some of its luster.
The Pandemic - This may seem obvious, but a global pandemic makes it challenging to bring thousands of people together in a convention center. CES 2021 was an entirely virtual event with no in-person component. In 2022, the show floor re-opened in Las Vegas to far fewer people. This is partly due to the Omicron variant of the virus, but I think that many people just didn’t think the trek was worth the effort this year.
Unique Brand Events - These days, it’s easy enough for companies to throw together their own event without having to share the stage with all the other companies involved with CES. Google, Samsung, and Apple have all popularized their respective events held to announce new products throughout the year. So why should they be forced to wait until January to abide by the CES cycle?
Expense - Sure, the big companies have the money to set up a booth and fly a team of people to Las Vegas each year. But CES also relies on the hundreds of tiny companies with big ideas that deserve to be seen. These companies don’t always have the marketing budget to make a big splash at CES. With the many media outlets at their disposal, they can generate buzz without having a physical presence at a trade show like CES. The economics just don’t make sense anymore.
How will CES rebound for 2023? Should it pivot to a new format? How else could it reinvent itself?
🎓Education/Media
The New York Times Buys The Athletic
After many months of speculation, The New York Times has acquired digital sports publication The Athletic.
The total for the acquisition is estimated at $550 Million and puts the media giant back in the game of sports coverage. However, as someone who regularly reads The Times and is an avid sports fan, I never really put the two together.
Newspapers are dying slowly, but online portals for print publications are still thriving. But they haven’t been a major destination for sports fans. A subscription to The Athletic costs a little more than $70 per year. If they’re able to build that into the cost of a subscription to The Times, it could be a solid value proposition.
Where The Athletic shines is the art of long-form sports journalism. This domain used to be owned by Sports Illustrated. While it seems that SI is fading into the Sunset, The Athletic has a huge opportunity to become the authority on sports writing with the backing of The Times.
🩺Health & Nutrition
Do Kids Need Wearable Tech?
I’m a huge advocate of adults wearing fitness trackers of all sorts. Track your steps, track your water intake, monitor your sleep. But how young is too young to start strapping these devices on our children?
A company called Kiddo is betting that putting these wearables on your kids each day will become as common as brushing their teeth or tying their shoes.
They are now focusing on four specific health concerns to monitor: Autism, asthma, diabetes, and CVS. So no, we’re not yet talking about forcing kids to hit their step counts or target heart rate on the playground. Instead, they’re trying to better monitor kids who already have some medical issues.
Kiddo just received a $16M round of Series A funding to help expand the ailments that they aim to monitor. I’m eager to see how this space grows, and kudos to Kiddo for leading the charge.
🛍Grab Bag
Topps Trading Cards Gets Acquired
In case you weren’t aware, sports trading cards have made a massive comeback in the past few years. I’m having flashbacks to my youth, where I spent every spare dollar I had on packs of basketball and baseball cards. These days, trading is far more high-tech and incredibly lucrative for companies capitalizing on the resurgence.
One such company from my youth is Topps. They were just acquired by Fanatics for $500 Million. Fanatics is an e-commerce company that has become the place to buy officially licensed merchandise for nearly all professional sports.
Topps has been making trading cards for decades and still owns a lot of cache in the minds of older collectors. Infamous former Disney Chairman Michael Eisner has owned the brand for the past few years (Interesting career move for him, right?)
Let’s hope that Fanatics keeps the nostalgia of classic Topps cards while having the foresight to usher them gracefully into the modern landscape of digital collectibles.
💬Quote of the Week
“If the highest aim of a captain were to preserve his ship, he would keep it in port forever” - Thomas Aquinas
📕Content Recommendation
Artcurious
Recently, I read Jennifer Dasal’s fascinating book “Artcurious: Stories of the Unexpected, Slightly Odd, and Strangely Wonderful in Art History.”
Dasal hosts a podcast with the same name as the book if you want to get a feel for her style before jumping in. Each chapter in the book breaks down a famous Art history myth or conspiracy.
Did van Gogh really commit suicide, or was his murder covered up? Is the copy of the Mona Lisa in The Louvre actually the original or a cheap knock-off?
If you’re an art lover, you won’t be able to put this book down. And if one of your new year’s resolutions is to read more books or appreciate more art, this is absolutely perfect.
Thanks for reading, I’ll see you next week!