Hey people! 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.

What is Elon teaching Zuckerberg?

In case you missed it, Meta’s executives are fashionable now. The chain-rocking CEO is leading the charge, but his deputies are right there with him, rocking gold chains and ditching hoodies for classy, designer jackets.

And this might just be the latest phase for Zuckerberg, who in the last 5 years has been in the news for foiling, grilling meats, and jiu jitsu (no, he’s not learning jiu jitsu from Elon…).

But if I’m being honest, I think the sudden change of style is a mix of intentional PR and genuinely discovering that fashion exists. And he has a reason to be intentional about it. To learn it meticulously, so that whoever is dressing him can get a break...

Because having a sense of style is key to his next strategy play… one that I don’t think enough people are talking about.

Why does style (suddenly) matter?

This is pure speculation, but I’m 90% sure it’s because of the Ray-Ban Meta Smart Glasses, which launched in Fall 2023, start at $300, and look like this:

Wait, aren’t those just wayfarers? Exactly.

In the past, companies launched smart glasses that bombed, miserably. And one key reason they failed is that they looked ridiculous. When Google Glass came out, people were getting heckled and even attacked for wearing them! That reaction was partially an aesthetic reality, and partially a sign of a population way less comfortable with being recorded…

But I digress!

To avoid falling into that same trap, rather than asking fashion to adapt to tech’s view of the world, tech is adapting to fashion’s view of the world.

Google built their own glasses, fitted them with cool tech, then tried to make them look amazing. Meta partnered with an amazing brand (Ray-Ban), took the most popular style (wayfarer), and tried their best to fit cool tech inside it.

That’s a subtle, critical difference.

By going that route, you’re minimizing the amount of customer behavior change you expect, which is good because…

People don’t like to change!

Meet them where they are, do something slightly better than the status quo, and you’ll attract users.

Which brings me to my second question.

Does adding a camera really make them “smart” glasses?

Well, not to be that guy, but it’s not “a” camera, there are 2! It’s also got 5 microphones, speakers, and a bluetooth connection… so you can take calls and tell your friends about your cool new glasses…

But I understand the critique. Glasses with cameras and speakers are fine, but not revolutionary. Certainly nowhere close to the audacious mixed reality goggles other companies have been putting out (with mixed reviews).

That’s exactly the point!

Let me refresh us on a core strategy concept I’ve written about before, Clay Christensen’s disruptive innovation – it says that:

So in this case, the goal isn’t to replace the smart phone, or to pull a rabbit out of a hat and immediately nail augmented reality glasses. The goal is to take a first step in the right direction, price it cheap enough that people can try it, and iterate from there.

Plus, there’s good reason to prioritize cameras…

AI and cameras are a match made in heaven

Despite my criticisms of Tesla’s FSD approach – and Musk’s stubbornness when it comes to only using cameras – I’ll be the first to admit that the progress they’ve made is incredible.

It’s a testament to the power of an army of users, a few cameras, and AI models hungry for data.

You know who else has those things? Zuckerberg and Meta.

They have a boatload of users on their social products (~4B per Statista), Llama models on par with ChatGPT (per Techcrunch), and fashionable, affordable glasses with cameras (per me).

Plus, they’re already putting AI to the test in the glasses. You can say “hey Meta, what’s that?” and it looks at what you’re looking at, using video context and AI to answer questions. It’s like Siri, but actually helpful.

It’s a great idea to start packing AI into the glasses, even in this early state, because users will be helping make the models better while they use it. And think of how powerful Tesla’s AI has become, despite only having ~3M cars on the road. A lot more people wear shades and glasses!

Bonus Bullets

Quote of the Week

— Larry Page

Quick News Reactions

• Big fat lidar – In a Tesla supplier’s earnings report this week, they mentioned $2M+ in sales to Tesla. What did they sell? Lidar sensors… the same sensors Musk and Co have been vehemently opposed to for self-driving because they’re costly. If they’re really pivoting away from camera-only FSD (for Tesla’s and/or for the new Robotaxi), then that’s a big deal. And as I wrote about a few weeks back, it’s also a great idea.

• Uber falls back – Into losses, after finally notching a profit-earning year for 2023. The reasons cited by analysts seem like good (investments) and/or temporary (legal) things. But the legal side might not actually be temporary. They’ve been facing growing driver backlash, including in Minneapolis, where new minimum wage laws for drivers are being negotiated. That upward pressure on margins can’t be comfortable when you’re treading water to try to avoid losses.

• Cruisin’ for a bruisin’ – OpenAI just likes stirring the pot. They announced a plan to launch a search product to compete (even more explicitly) with Google. It’ll have links and citations similar to how Perplexity works. I definitely appreciate the innovation that’s happening, but you have to wonder if strategically they are trying to fight too many battles at once (taking on TikTok with Sora text to videos, taking on Apple by partnering with Masayoshi and Jony Ive on “the iPhone of AI”, etc.)