3 charts for you today:
This week pretty much every major tech company released their earnings results. Apple, Amazon, Microsoft, Google, Facebook... all of them reported decent (or great) numbers and if we charted them all, they'd mostly all look the same: up and to the right. The latter of those 5 tech giants, which happens to be the most reliant on advertising revenue, reported particularly impressive results.
Reports of Facebook's death...
Have been greatly exaggerated. The kids might think Facebook is dead, but they obviously didn't read the report in which Facebook reported $26bn of revenue in a single quarter. Indeed, Facebook has gotten so good at targeted advertising that in the first 3 months of this year it has raked in more than $48 per user (US & Canada). That works out to about $16 a month for Facebook — more than what many streaming services charge — and it goes without saying but we're going to say it anyway: Facebook doesn't pay a dime for any of the content you see in between those ads.
Peak Facebook ads?
This may be as good as it gets for Facebook's targeted advertising biz as Apple's new privacy feature limits what data apps can share. The fact that Mark Zuckerberg spent a lot of his time this week explaining how Facebook planned to deal with the changes (e-commerce was basically his answer) tells you how big a deal this change is.
The Millennial generation is fully into adulthood. At some point this year the youngest member of the Millennial generation (born in 1996 per most definitions) will celebrate their 25th birthday.
A generational wealth gap
According to data from the US Federal Resesrve, Millennials currrently own about 5% of all US household wealth. Without any context that might seem reasonable, considering the majority of Millennial careers are probably only just starting to generate significant income or assets.
However, when the youngest member of Gen X turned 25 (in 2005) that cohort already had a 9% share of all US household wealth — almost double what the Millennial generation has accrued. Going even further back, when the youngest Baby Boomer turned 25 (which was in 1989), the Baby Boomer generation had already amassed more than 21% of all US household wealth. In relative terms, Millennials are the poorest generation for quite a while.
In the last decade, Netflix has made a pretty clear move towards beefing up its TV show roster. Known more for movies back in 2010, Netflix has roughly quadrupled the number of TV shows in its US library since, as its movie library has shrunk (data from ReelGood). That means that if you just want a series to dip into on a couple of weekday evenings, you've got 2000+ shows to choose from (and that's just Netflix) — a decent chunk of which you probably have absolutely no interest in. That makes deciding what to watch quite hard.
Netflix, hit shuffle
Netflix has launched a new feature, which they're calling "Play Something", which the company hopes will take the dithering out of deciding what you want to watch. The button, which is being rolled out this week to all of its users, will choose something from Netflix's content that it thinks you'll like.
This is a pretty big test of just how good the Netflix algorithm is. Can an algorithm really make a better decision about what you want to watch on a regular basis? Or is this button only going to help those houses where arguments over what to watch boil over every night? Time will tell.
1) Fascinating study on the 7% of Americans who do not use the internet, and therefore are not eligible to receive our newsletters until we physically start mailing them out.
2) NASA astronaut Michael Collins died this week aged 90. Collins took one of the most famous photos of all time, which had every human in the frame — except himself.
3) President Biden has announced another spending proposal, this one focusing on spending another $1.8 trillion on education, child care and paid family leave.
4) According to Gallup, 51% of people can't think of a source that reports the news objectively. That's where 1440 can help, with its unbiased daily newsletter. 100% free, 100% factual — sign up here.**
5) Microsoft is on the lookout for a new default font. If it's a slow Friday, check out their 5 contenders, which — if you're a big Microsoft Office user — you might be staring at for a good number of years to come.
**This is sponsored content.
