Sunday Snapshots (11/22/20) – The OG Gatekeeper, Kim Ng's Ascent, and YouTube Premium
In which I write about the dark horse of the audio ecosystem wars
Hey everyone,
Greetings from Washington, D.C.!
For my subscribers in the US celebrating Thanksgiving this week – whether you subscribed 18 minutes or 18 months ago, I’m grateful for a slice of your attention. Stay safe and enjoy the time off. If you live outside US, I’m grateful all the same – hopefully you won’t miss the loud Americans on the internet during the latter half of the week.
In this issue of Snapshots, I want to talk about:
FDR’s gatekeeper before there was a Chief of Staff position
Kim Ng’s ascent to the head of the Miami Marlins
Why YouTube Premium is the dark horse of the audio ecosystem wars
Search for photographical truth, Chef culture during COVID-19, and Nick Kokonas of Alinea/Tock fame
Book of the week
Having written about presidential gatekeepers before, I’m surprised that I hadn’t come across Missy LeHand before. She was Franklin D. Roosevelt’s – President of the United States from 1933 until his death in 1945 – secretary for more than two decades. FDR greatly expanded the powers of the Presidency and fundamentally changed the relationship that ordinary Americans had with the federal government. He was responsible for the series of landmark legislation known as the New Deal which pulled an aching nation from the depths of the 1929 Great Depression.
As I discovered in Kathryn Smith’s The Gatekeeper, Missy LeHand was by his side all this time. She was a formidable partner to FDR and was, in every sense of the word, the original gatekeeper of the Oval Office before Eisenhower made the Chief of Staff a formal position to suite his chain of command habits from his military career. She largely followed the rules that Chris Wipple laid out in his book about the White House Chief of Staffs, Gatekeepers:
Speak truth to power: There are very few people who will speak truth to the most powerful person in the world. If you’re a part of the inner circle, one of your responsibilities is to offer a different perspective and go against the grain if you believe something to be true. Missy was often candid with FDR and they built a great functional friendship outside of the Oval Office. This allowed her to speak truth to FDR, even at the height of his popular appeal.
Don't end-run yourself: As the President’s Chief of Staff, you have a lot of power and influence. It is tempting to use this influence towards your own ends. But any influence you have can evaporate in an instant if you are seen to be in conflict with the President’s agenda. Missy aligned her own agenda – to the extent that there was one – will FDR’s. She would recommend her extended families for patronage jobs in the administration, but that was (and still is) common practice. Every thing was in service of the Chief.
Complement the president’s weaknesses: This is probably where Missy was the weakest. She was very much an extension of FDR’s authoritarian tendencies. As great a President as he was, he had his fair share of missteps. Perhaps the two most famous ones are the Japanese internment camps and the attempt to expand the Supreme Court. These earned him the nickname “American Dictator” from his political enemies. Missy supported these policies and even encouraged him to push on despite public opinion.
Political cartoon from his Presidency during his attempt to expand the Supreme Court. FDR was not as popular in his day as his legacy today would suggest.
The Gatekeeper is an interesting book, but it is likely too focused on Missy LeHand for someone who is interested in Roosevelt and his times. For a more broader look at Roosevelt, I recommend No Ordinary Time by Doris Kearns Goodwin or Traitor to His Class by H.W. Brands.
Long read of the week
Kim Ng Has Been Ready for Years
I’ll admit that the last time I seriously watched a game of baseball was the 2016 World Series Finals. That interest was less driven by any interest in the sport and more by the atmosphere of being a college freshmen and all the shenanigans that come with that. Not that this should be surprising. After all, I grew watching the sport’s superior cousin which is less a sport and more of a religion – of which I happen to be a devout follower – in the world’s largest democracy.
But just like The Last Dance and Sam Hinkie’s Trust the Process letter are not just for basketball junkies, the story of Kim Ng’s ascent to the head of the Miami Marlins goes beyond baseball. The means of her ascent have been a decades-long trial under various teams and positions.
And it represents more than just a change of the guard at the Marlins, it’s a sea change for minorities in baseball:
Ms. Ng’s hiring resonated throughout an industry that remains heavily male and white. At the beginning of the 2020 season, only four people of color led baseball operations departments: Ken Williams of the Chicago White Sox, Farhan Zaidi of the San Francisco Giants, Al Avila of the Detroit Tigers and the Marlins’ Michael Hill, whom Ms. Ng is replacing. This stood in stark contrast to the field, where nearly 40 percent of this season’s opening day rosters were made up of players of color, according to the Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport. Latinos, the largest minority group in baseball, made up nearly 30 percent of major-league players, followed by Black (about 8 percent) and Asian (roughly 2 percent).
And while Kim might be the first woman to have the top job at a baseball team, she’ll certainly not be the last.
Business move of the week
Why YouTube Premium is the dark horse of the audio ecosystem wars
This is one of those ideas that I’ve been thinking about for a while. It’ll be a bit more of a stream of consciousness take than most other weeks, so thank you for bearing with me here.
In theory, YouTube has got it all – users, a great algorithm, a business model that includes both ads and subscriptions, tremendous amounts of time spent on the platform, video-first content like the Joe Rogan podcast (until it becomes a Spotify exclusive as per Rogan’s deal). So why has it lagged behind other platforms?
On one hand, the answer is simple. The company has been doing well with its ad-supported, user-generated video offering and has functionally no competitors in the long-form video space. Customers are also reluctant to pay for something that they have come to expect for free – cue Mr. Bezos’ divinely discontent customer thesis. So there is an equilibrium of sorts that has formed. Even as PR struggles like the “adpocalypse” have done little to make that equilibrium unstable.
But as companies grow beyond their original use cases, they have to evolve, and YouTube Premium was supposed to be the first step in that direction. It offered no ads, complimentary YouTube Music, and perhaps most importantly the ability to play YouTube videos in background. This meant that could listen to a video podcast while having your screen locked.
Now, it’s taken steps to build more legitimate and favorable deals with record labels. Doubling down on its algorithmic superiority and the fact that any one can upload music to YouTube, not just approved artists like Apple and Spotify, it could jump the line when it comes to audio supremacy.
And when it comes to podcasts, it’s also not behind:
The bear case here is that the software/hardware integration of Apple Music and the executional prowess of Spotify makes this jumping the line too difficult for even a behemoth like YouTube.
I would love to hear your thoughts here – just reply to this email with your reaction to this section.
Odds and ends of the week
A video about a photo, an article about food, and a podcast about an app:
📸 Was this famous war photo staged? feat. Errol Morris: This is a maniacal focus on finding the truth. I don’t even know how to describe it – just go watch the video.
🥘 How the Pandemic Inspired a Kitchen-Share Scene Among Out-of-Work Chefs: It should come as no surprise to long time readers of the newsletter that I’m interested in the culture around restaurants and chefs. So this piece in the NYTimes hit at the heart of this interest. It’s also a mental +1 to the “The Obstacle is the Way” adage.
📱 Nick Kokonas on Tock: Nick Kokonas has been deeply influential on how I’ve thought about everything from careers, projects, and relationships. On this podcast episode with Patrick O’Shaughnessy, he’s in his best form and talks all things Alinea, Tock, and COVID-19. The rare must-listen podcast.
That wraps up this week’s newsletter. You can check out the previous issues here.
If you want to discuss any of the ideas mentioned above or have any books/papers/links you think would be interesting to share on a future edition of Sunday Snapshots, please reach out to me by replying to this email or sending me a direct message on Twitter at @sidharthajha.
Until next Sunday,
Sid