Michael and Johnny look at Zoom, its backstory, the factors that led to its success in recent years, its explosion in popularity during this coronavirus pandemic crisis, and the resulting scrutiny on its security and privacy policies.
In the News of the Week, we look at the US pushing for re-opening, essential sports in Florida, companies that are continuing to flourish, and Amazon’s incredible $10,000/second 2020 Q1 results.
Recorded Date: Sunday, April 19, 2020
Ideas of the Week:
- Drone aided Doctoring - AR-enabled camera drones
- Audio Transcription services on top of Zoom/other virtual conference apps
Time Stamps
- @0:05:53 - The US reopens
- @0:11:35 - Pro Wrestling is essential
- @0:15:28 - Companies that are flourishing in this time
- @0:19:10 - Amazon making huge gains
- @0:27:27 - The intriguing backstory of Zoom
- @0:34:43 - Zoom’s competitors and strategies, shortfalls
- @0:47:31 - Zoom’s security issues
- @0:55:13 - Software Development == Magic?
- @0:59:00 - What would you have done as CEO of Zoom?
- @1:02:00 - The Future of Zoom
- @1:11:20 - Ideas of the week
Highlights
- Ease of use was a key differentiating factor for Zoom’s success - if you had to enter 1 password to join a meeting, would it still be as easy to use? Is that friction sufficient enough to ensure Zoom would not have grown to the level of usage and popularity it has?
- End to end encryption is hard to do, hard to prove, hard to explain
- Zoom’s existence is tied to the behaviors of the current crisis continuing - will Zoom usage and growth fall off a cliff post coronavirus or can they keep the momentum going?
- Zoom has grown from 10 M active users in December 2019 to 200 M active users in March 2020 - will it still retain 100 M active users a year from now?
- Will the extended lockdown lead us to continue to use these virtual meeting apps like Zoom in the long run more than we did before?
- Meetups have become global virtual events that anyone can attend
- Who are Zoom’s competitors? Is it other virtual conference apps or other streaming related apps (e.g. Twitch)?
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