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Does Meta have its long-desired hardware platform? Or at least the start of it?

It’s extended the contract with the Ray-Ban parent company for more years of smart glasses collaboration.

Now, according to Bloomberg, Oakley is joining the crew.

Plus…

Company resumes work on smartwatch and develops AirPods rival

First real AR glasses, dubbed ‘Artemis,’ are planned for 2027

The question used to be: what will replace the smartphone?

But the path now seems to be to replace the interface and turn the smartphone into a personal, portable server for ambient computing peripherals and AI features.

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Doing business on the internet is about convincing people you don’t know that you have something they need or want. Think of a brand as the bridge between the two.

-Jack Butcher

Brands bridge the identity narrative between business and customer.

Brands are bat signals.
Not logos.

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I love this. It’s ridiculous. And it works because it’s ridiculous.

It’s so over the top that it’s not a dark pattern or a trick.

It’s also a great way to figure out who your true fans are.

via Harry Dry

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The best businesses understand and embed themselves into the lifestyles and self-conceptions of their customers.

When you sell a product, you’re not just selling a product, you’re affirming an identity.

-Greg Isenberg

Identity is a narrative.

The brand-customer relationship happens when the narrative the brand is telling dovetails with the narrative the customer is telling themselves.

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This quote from The Daily Upside doesn’t surprise me:

Sales of new homes picked up considerably to end 2024. But sales of old homes are at their slowest pace since 1995.

A big part of the pandemic housing market insanity was older workers buying their forever homes. Locking up the existing inventory at that time and taking a big portion off the potentially liquid market for the near future.

Also, more evidence of The Great Splintering.