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Welcome back to Forests Over Trees, your weekly tech strategy newsletter. It’s time to zoom-out, connect dots, and (try to) predict the future.

Here’s the plan:

• Tech News Takes — super-short analysis and commentary

• Strategy Tools — strategy nuggets (for business and life)

• F/T Shoutouts — sharing launches, tech events, and other reads

Discord Opens-Up

Plus: Starlink growth, and Epic copying Apple

⚡ Tech News Takes ⚡

Open Season at Discord

•  What’s up: Discord is opening-up its in-app ecosystem, “Activities”, to developers. They’ll be able to build games for Discord users, paying a 15-30% fee to Discord for any revenue (in-game purchases, premium games, etc.).

• So what: Great idea for two reasons. First, Discord can further monetize their existing users, rather than obsessing about new user growth. Let developers get inspired, building entertaining games for your users while you take a cut. Second, it shows they’re serious about re-committing to their core users, gamers. Earlier this year, CEO Jason Citron said he wanted to refocus on “being a place that helps people deeper their friendships around games and shared interests”. Now, you’ll be able to use Discord to find and play games (rather than just chat about them).

Microsoft Pumps Breaks on Augmented Reality

• What’s up: Microsoft is halting production of its HoloLens 2 augmented reality glasses for consumers, and doesn’t plan to launch a version 3. Separately, They’ll continue their $22B project with the US Army to test the Hololens on the battlefield.

• So what: In the midst of all the fanfare about Meta and Snap’s new consumer A/R glasses, this announcement has to hurt. But Microsoft has already started partnering with Meta on apps and integrations for the Meta Quest, so they’re staying close the space. Plus, they have bigger AI fish to fry right now.

Starlink Somehow Underhyped

• What’s up: Starlink hit 4M customers this week, up from 3M in May 2024. This comes after a string of other good news, including the release of their “Mini” device and deals to provide in-flight internet for United, Air France, and Hawaiian Airlines.

• So what: 4M struck me as small at first (Spectrum and Comcast at 32M each). But only Starlink and similar satellite co’s can economically serve the 13% of the world’s population living in rural areas (~1B people). And every dollar Starlink invests (in new satellites, etc.) helps them deliver internet everywhere, not just in one region like the OG ISPs laying fiber. So I predict this story flips in a few years, with Starlink 8x’ing Comcast.

Epic Copying from Apple’s Playbook

• What’s up: To incentivize developers to list their games in the Epic Games Store, in 2025 Epic will cut royalties from 5% to 3.5% to use Epic’s Unreal Engine (tools for lighting, rendering, physics to make game look real).

• So what: This stuck out. Remember when Epic was locked in courtroom battles with Apple (which it lost) and Google (which it won) about App Store fees? For those cases, Epic pleaded the case of the little guy, fighting big tech co’s and their anti-competitive behavior (high fees, secret deals for select partners, etc). My, how the tables have turned! Now look — I know part of “anti-competitive” stems from having a monopoly, which I don’t think Epic has (neither in game stores nor in game development tools), but it’s fascinating to see Epic grappling with fee strategy from the other side of the table.

A word from this week’s sponsor, HubSpot:

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🛠️ Strategy Tools 🛠️

Discord Embraces the Remora Model

Today’s strategy tip is about win-win relationships between platforms and 3^rd parties.

Earlier, we covered how Discord was starting to let developers build their own games aka “Activities” to sell in the app store, and I listed two reasons why it’s a good idea (1/ better monetize existing users, 2/ re-focus on games/gamers).

But there’s a secret third reason – they’re embracing the remora model. I introduced this in the context of Shopify last year, but here’s a brief explainer.

In the tech world, what does each contribute to the relationship?

The platform (whaleshark) – provides a stable base to build on, drives customer growth to expand the pie, and makes expensive investments to improve performance (ex. $$$ to make a network 1% faster).

The 3^rd parties (remora) – fill-in product gaps too small for the platform to prioritize, and provide extra-special customer service.

Before opening them up, Discord was creating the games/”Activities” on their own. They had chess, poker, and a few other games, but adoption was low (ex. “Chess in The Park” was on a measly 6.4K servers, vs. other 3^rd party apps on 1M+ servers).

Compared to other platform-level problems, I’m guessing chess was a low priority.

Now, rather than brute-forcing it, Discord can let 3^rd party devs discover and build the games that users actually want to play. If some of them fail, it’s no skin off Discord’s back. And for the ones that succeed, Discord shares in the upside.

🌲 F/T Shoutouts 🌲

• $6.6B for co-Founder repellent – Amid the news of the huge new funding round for OpenAI, this TechCrunch write-up on the recent leadership departures was an interesting one (and an irresistible teaser thread here by Alex Heath)

• Crash course in climate – There’s renewed hype around nuclear (and the energy needs AI creates), so it’s good timing to brush-up on cleantech fundamentals. Just in time, Kevin Kuhn dropped a guided list of 12 books to get you up to speed, and he’s breaking them down post-by-post on LinkedIn. Here’s the first. Worth tuning in.

• Waymo debrief – Last week, I asked you to weigh-in on this question:

Really appreciate all the responses! Some interesting takeaways:

1. Most folks said no – car ownership will still be a thing.

2. As for why not, “freedom to leave when you want” got the most votes, followed closely by “rideshare is less useful outside cities”.

3. Voting was annoying and required log-ins (noted! I’ll find an easier way next time).

Want to suggest a shoutout? Send it here.

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