Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer and Bloomberg
Speaker 1: Quick Takes. Tim Stinovic on Bloomberg Radio. Our next guest
Speaker 1: credited and with created the iPod, building the iPhone. He
Speaker 1: founded the smart home company Nasty, spent more than nine
Speaker 1: years at Apple, including being advisor to Steve Jobs, who
Speaker 1: was then CEO and of course co founder of Apple.
Speaker 1: In the past, our next guest has talked and tweeted
Speaker 1: about device addiction and Silicon Valley's responsibility to fix it.
Speaker 1: We're talking about Tony Fidel, the principle at Future Shape.
Speaker 1: He's the founder and former CEO of Nesta Labs. As
Speaker 1: Carol mentioned, he's got more than three patents to his name.
Speaker 1: He's also the author of a new book. It's called Build,
Speaker 1: an Unorthodox Guide to Making Things worth making. Tony joins
Speaker 1: us from Palo Alto. Tony, good to talk to you again.
Speaker 1: How are you great? Thanks Carol, Thanks to Tim for
Speaker 1: having me. Honest. Yeah, great to be here. It's good
Speaker 1: to have you with us. Hey, we gotta start with
Speaker 1: the iPod because the end of an era this week. Tony,
Speaker 1: I know, you know, but Apple, after twenty years only
Speaker 1: discontinuing the iPod um. This is a this is a
Speaker 1: product that you are credited with helping invent. Uh talk
Speaker 1: to us about what it means for Apple to discontinue
Speaker 1: it and the impact that the iPod has had not
Speaker 1: just on Apple but on consumer technology. Well, you know,
Speaker 1: the iPod is it's bitter sweet, obviously if you see
Speaker 1: your baby go. But you know, at the end of
Speaker 1: the day, the march of technology, the drumbeat of technology
Speaker 1: never stops, right, And I've been in this business long
Speaker 1: enough to know that you can't get to you know,
Speaker 1: two wedded to any one thing because you know, you
Speaker 1: might have to eat your own And that's exactly what
Speaker 1: the iPhone did. You know, the iPod um created the
Speaker 1: conditions that Apple to be able to make the iPhone.
Speaker 1: So without the iPod there would have been no iPhone.
Speaker 1: So it feels really good to know that what we
Speaker 1: did in the iPod and brought Apple into where it
Speaker 1: is today. You know, it's yeah, it was last week,
Speaker 1: I guess, the most valuable company on the planet, and
Speaker 1: that was because of the iPods. What's really really wonderful
Speaker 1: to know. Well, and I talked to us about your
Speaker 1: journey because that's so much a part of this book,
Speaker 1: um build and and who you wanted to read this
Speaker 1: book and what lessons you hope are what you hope
Speaker 1: people would take away from reading it? Well, I think
Speaker 1: you know. I stepped back and I thought about the
Speaker 1: mentors that I've had over the years. And that's the
Speaker 1: reason why I'm able to talk to you today is
Speaker 1: those people helped me. And if I didn't get that
Speaker 1: help back in the day, maybe I would not be here.
Speaker 1: And so when I thought about those mentors, most of
Speaker 1: them had died, and I thought, oh, it's now my
Speaker 1: turn to be mentor, And so how can I do
Speaker 1: that at scale and take the journeys through companies like
Speaker 1: General Magic and Phillips and Apple and Nest and all
Speaker 1: the lessons learned on building transformative technology, and really the
Speaker 1: books about human nature, so which so I'm trying to
Speaker 1: really go for you know, what were you if you
Speaker 1: were in high school or if you're in college or
Speaker 1: a new grad. What do you need to know? What
Speaker 1: you look behind the scenes of the product that you
Speaker 1: probably grew up with and and how those were developed,
Speaker 1: But not just like from a technical point of view,
Speaker 1: but from a human nature point of view. Building your career,
Speaker 1: building products, building teams, companies, businesses. So it's all about
Speaker 1: trying to give back to help those those those people
Speaker 1: with their careers um and and hopefully one day they'll
Speaker 1: change the world as well. Well. So how did Steve
Speaker 1: Jobs help you? Well, uh, you know, I think for me,
Speaker 1: you know, he helped one by giving us an environment
Speaker 1: to actually thrive, to be able to create the iPod.
Speaker 1: That was the first thing. But the other one is
Speaker 1: really to learn about storytelling in detail. And what happens
Speaker 1: is is you really need to not just create technology
Speaker 1: for technology. Say that's what happened to General Magic, and
Speaker 1: that's what I learned so painfully up the disaster that
Speaker 1: was that company. And so watching him massively tell a story,
Speaker 1: a non fictional story, through marketing and through the products
Speaker 1: that we created and all the customer touch points, you know,
Speaker 1: you get to see a master at work. And then
Speaker 1: we were able to then take those lessons and create
Speaker 1: a company like nest and and change the world there
Speaker 1: with a small, tiny team because we learned how to
Speaker 1: do it right. And uh, Steve really was a master
Speaker 1: storyteller in with using technology. Tony Fidela's principle at Future
Speaker 1: shape also the founder and former CEO of Nest Labs.
Speaker 1: He led the teams that helped create the iPod, iPhone
Speaker 1: and the Nest Learning thermostat Tony. When when people hear
Speaker 1: an intro like that, they think of all the successes
Speaker 1: that you've had in your thirty plus career in hardware,
Speaker 1: But your book also goes into failure, specifically the first
Speaker 1: ten years of your career before you were on the
Speaker 1: team at Apple that helped create the iPod. Um tell
Speaker 1: tell us a about that in the lesson that you
Speaker 1: learned in failing before succeeding well through failure. That's really
Speaker 1: the only way you learn, you know, in school, it's taught.
Speaker 1: You're taught that failure is failure um, and you need
Speaker 1: to learn and get in a right um. In life,
Speaker 1: it's exactly the opposite. When you fail and you keep
Speaker 1: put pushing forward, you actually learned. And so the failure
Speaker 1: that was General Magic, which was creating the iPhone just
Speaker 1: fifteen years too soon, right, there's a whole movie about it.
Speaker 1: What I learned there was that we were making a
Speaker 1: product for other geeks. We were trying to impress each other.
Speaker 1: We weren't trying to to solve pain for customers that
Speaker 1: were in the in the world at that time. Right,
Speaker 1: we didn't even know that there are such things that
Speaker 1: email and downloadable games and all that stuff until fifteen
Speaker 1: years later. So that was one big thing at at
Speaker 1: Phillips where we created the Phillips Vilo and Ninos were
Speaker 1: handheld products. I also learned about sales and marketing and
Speaker 1: how critical was that if you had a great story
Speaker 1: to tell it properly. Hey, Tony, hang on a second,
Speaker 1: We're gonna continue do a little bit more news, and
Speaker 1: then we'll continue with you. Tony Fidel over at Future Shape.
Speaker 1: His new book is called Build. We're going to continue
Speaker 1: that conversation. You are listening and watching on YouTube Bloomberg
Speaker 1: Business Week, Carl Master, Tim Stanevic, This is Bloomberg Radio.
Speaker 1: I want to get right back to Tony Fidel, principle
Speaker 1: at Future Shape, as we talked about, you know, spent
Speaker 1: nine years in Apple, you know, credited with creating the iPod,
Speaker 1: building out the iPhone. He also founded the smart home
Speaker 1: company Nasty. He's got a new book out. It's called Build,
Speaker 1: An Unorthodox Guide to making Things worth making. And Tony,
Speaker 1: what I wanted to ask you is what's worth making
Speaker 1: in today's environment? What what in terms of the environment
Speaker 1: just in general, like yeah, go ahead, I'm sorry, yeah,
Speaker 1: how do you how do you make things worth making?
Speaker 1: So I always start with the pain. I'd much rather
Speaker 1: go their customers have pain. I don't want to give
Speaker 1: them vitamins, customers who some of like vitamins, not everyone
Speaker 1: needs them. When you have pain, you need to, you
Speaker 1: need to, you know, just squash that pain down. And
Speaker 1: it's even better if you if you give them a
Speaker 1: pain killer and a superpower at the same time, so
Speaker 1: they can do things with the product or service that
Speaker 1: they never thought possible before, and they feel like there's
Speaker 1: they have new new superpowers. And so you really have
Speaker 1: to focus on the pain and do it in a
Speaker 1: way that people feel really amazing about it. Okay, so
Speaker 1: it's clear how you did that at Nest with the
Speaker 1: Nest Learning thermostat, a product that continues, I think to
Speaker 1: solve a pain point in many consumers lives. We both
Speaker 1: have them, Yeah, we both have them, and um, Tony,
Speaker 1: but but where's the pain? Where's the pain today? Because
Speaker 1: I look around and I see the innovation at a
Speaker 1: company like Meta Platforms, for example, and that's the metaverse,
Speaker 1: or do we feel pain in the real world and
Speaker 1: need to be in the metaverse. I feel real pain
Speaker 1: from the climate crisis we have, in the health crisis
Speaker 1: we have, and our social crisis is we have that
Speaker 1: we're generated out of this intermediation between humans. It first
Speaker 1: started with text and video and photos, and now we're
Speaker 1: gonna say we're gonna go in the metaverse and we're
Speaker 1: gonna get connected and dance and have meetings. To me,
Speaker 1: that's toxic. We've seen what it's done in the past.
Speaker 1: You're not going to get into the metaverse. People are
Speaker 1: not gonna want to go and live in there and
Speaker 1: dance in there and and connect. We need to have
Speaker 1: controls on that stuff before we ever. You know, we've
Speaker 1: been talking about controls on text and Twitter, all these
Speaker 1: other things, these social platforms. Why we want a new
Speaker 1: environment where disconnects us even more and allows more toxicity
Speaker 1: to grow. Let's fix the social problems we have on
Speaker 1: the with the technology we have, Let's not create even
Speaker 1: more of them. So let's go and also let's fix
Speaker 1: the problems in the real world, the climate crisis that
Speaker 1: we have. There are so many things that we need
Speaker 1: to address right now and this, these these goals that
Speaker 1: we have are coming so quickly. If not, we could
Speaker 1: lose at all. It's it's, it's it's it's absolutely astonishing
Speaker 1: to me that we are diverting incredible, smart, brilliant brains
Speaker 1: and resources to things that are not solving the real
Speaker 1: problems that we have today. So, you know, you talk
Speaker 1: about social um and the social universe, do you think
Speaker 1: Elon Musk is someone who can fix Twitter to some
Speaker 1: extent um and some of the downside of that social
Speaker 1: media platform. And I don't think I'm saying anything subjective.
Speaker 1: I think many would argue that it can do a
Speaker 1: lot of good, but it can also do a lot
Speaker 1: of harm like other social media. Absolutely, it's not just Twitter,
Speaker 1: there's so many things. But um could he could he
Speaker 1: fix it? He could fix it if he wants to
Speaker 1: fix it in the right way. I think what we
Speaker 1: have to understand here is we can't just go putting
Speaker 1: people back onto the Twitter platform if we don't change
Speaker 1: the environment at which they come back onto it with.
Speaker 1: If we continue to drive you know, revenue based on
Speaker 1: amplify um, misinformation and and and these kinds of things,
Speaker 1: then we have not done anything to fix Twitter or
Speaker 1: fix these social networks, we have to divorce the amplification
Speaker 1: mechanism from the revenue mechanism. If we don't do that,
Speaker 1: the toxicity will only grow. And we can't just let
Speaker 1: anyone on to say free speech, free speech in the
Speaker 1: in the town square was never amplified. Should not amplify
Speaker 1: that for revenue purposes? Do you think some of these
Speaker 1: big tech companies have just become too big and kind
Speaker 1: of too controlling in terms of the narrative? Uh, and
Speaker 1: the trend of where technology is going. I think with
Speaker 1: great power comes great responsibility, and if they can't rain
Speaker 1: themselves in, then they're going to need to be reined
Speaker 1: in by the government or what have you. The inectuity
Speaker 1: is growing so dramatically and the concentration of powers growing
Speaker 1: so dramatically, not just then the people who use the
Speaker 1: products or are used by products, but who also the
Speaker 1: ecosystems they create, and they continue to extract so much
Speaker 1: revenue from apps or what have you. It needs to
Speaker 1: be rebalanced. If not, we saw this in government. When
Speaker 1: there's an equity, there's revolution. They're going to have revolution
Speaker 1: against them if they do not ringing themselves in so
Speaker 1: I do see the power growing too strong, and they're
Speaker 1: going to have to modulate down otherwise they will be
Speaker 1: they will be forced to do so. Tony. Last time
Speaker 1: you and I spoke was I believe back in and
Speaker 1: you were at that time pushing for controls on Apple products,
Speaker 1: specifically monitors monitoring how much we were using those products
Speaker 1: to give Apple customers an idea of just how much
Speaker 1: time they were spending on their phones. Apple has since
Speaker 1: done that. In each week I get a really depressing
Speaker 1: report that shows how much time I'm spending on Apple devices.
Speaker 1: Are Are you satisfied with with that type of disclosure
Speaker 1: that you're seeing from Apple right now? And and what
Speaker 1: have you learned after taking on that project? Well, you
Speaker 1: know that was that was something that they implement and
Speaker 1: based on public reaction to you know this this social
Speaker 1: or the screen time addiction. Um, I think we're only
Speaker 1: of the way there. It was a good start, but
Speaker 1: there has been really no innovation and continuing to take
Speaker 1: it to the next steps. So I think they still
Speaker 1: need not just Apple, but Google, all the different platforms,
Speaker 1: you know, PlayStation even, They need to go after and
Speaker 1: and start looking at this the what they can do
Speaker 1: for the screen time limitations and the information, so not
Speaker 1: just the tools and the control tools, but also the
Speaker 1: information by which we disclose what these apps can do
Speaker 1: not just two kids, but also to adults. And if
Speaker 1: you look at it, you know we now they now
Speaker 1: added over since that they added privacy labels to tell
Speaker 1: you what are the privacy things that these apps do
Speaker 1: and don't do. Why don't we have um digital nutritional
Speaker 1: information about what these apps can do to kids or
Speaker 1: what have you when you do consume them? You know,
Speaker 1: do they have toxic ads inside these free to play games?
Speaker 1: You know, sure they might be might be get games
Speaker 1: that kids can play. The ads that pop up. I've
Speaker 1: seen it with my dark it can be very toxic
Speaker 1: and my Dada comes to me, you know, screaming, going
Speaker 1: what is this daddy? So I think we need to
Speaker 1: be much more on what's going on and what we're consuming.
Speaker 1: Just like nutrition labels on the side of a on
Speaker 1: the side of a food product, we need to have
Speaker 1: that for our apps. For this kind of addictive um
Speaker 1: qualities of certain apps. We run out of time. I
Speaker 1: wish we had more. Please come back because we would
Speaker 1: love to continue this and really pick your brain to
Speaker 1: about thoughts when it comes to health and climate and
Speaker 1: things that we could definitely do in a better way
Speaker 1: and really address some of those errors where there is
Speaker 1: pain in our society. Tony, Thank you so much Tony
Speaker 1: Fidell for principle at Future Shape his new book check
Speaker 1: it out, Build and Unorthodox Guide to Making Things worth
Speaker 1: Thank you. Good stuff. Yeah yeah, very thought. Well, uh,
Speaker 1: and considering all that's going on in our world,