Ben Fritz
Appearances
WSJ What’s News
Fed Warns of Increased Uncertainty, Holds Rates
Abu Dhabi was in the heart of the Middle East, which is a region where Disney doesn't have nearly as much of a presence as it does in the rest of the world. It's a region where there's a growing number of middle class people and is a huge tourist destination. There's already a bunch of other museums, parks, etc. there that draw a lot of tourists.
WSJ What’s News
Fed Warns of Increased Uncertainty, Holds Rates
Abu Dhabi is in the heart of the Middle East, which is a region where Disney doesn't have nearly as much of a presence as it does in the rest of the world. It's a region where There's a growing number of middle class people and it's a huge tourist destination.
WSJ What’s News
Fed Warns of Increased Uncertainty, Holds Rates
And Disney both thinks there's a good theme park business there. and also is hoping that by establishing a theme park there, it will make people more interested in Disney's brands, which will get them more likely to use Disney+, watch Disney movies, buy Disney consumer products and toys, etc.
WSJ What’s News
Fed Warns of Increased Uncertainty, Holds Rates
Sure, so it's unusual. So usually Disney partially or entirely builds the theme parks itself and then owns them, which costs many billions of dollars, but obviously has a huge upside eventually from the ownership. In this case, Disney is partnering with Miral, and Miral is going to entirely pay for the theme park.
WSJ What’s News
Fed Warns of Increased Uncertainty, Holds Rates
Disney is licensing its IP to them, and then Disney is going to do the actual design of the rides and attractions, and it's going to consult on how to operate the park. Working with a local company in a foreign country where Disney has done very little business kind of helps it to navigate things there.
WSJ What’s News
Fed Warns of Increased Uncertainty, Holds Rates
And then also, Disney has a big but limited amount of capital, and they're making a lot of other investments.
WSJ What’s News
Fed Warns of Increased Uncertainty, Holds Rates
So the Experiences division of Disney, which is primarily parks as well as consumer products, has a growing share of its operating income especially. And Disney said that last quarter, despite some economic uncertainty that we're all familiar with, the domestic parks attracted more guests and higher spending from the visitors who came.
WSJ What’s News
Fed Warns of Increased Uncertainty, Holds Rates
So the operating income for the Experiences business rose 9% to $2.5 billion, which is some of the best growth for any business within the company. And the entertainment streaming business outside of sports reported a profit. It was $336 million last quarter compared to $47 million a year ago. But the big streaming question for Disney this year is going to be what happens to ESPN.
WSJ What’s News
Fed Warns of Increased Uncertainty, Holds Rates
Disney is planning to launch ESPN. A standalone ESPN streaming service that has everything you can get from ESPN on TV. Currently, ESPN Plus basically just has the sports that don't make the cut for ESPN cable. Bob Iger said on the earnings call today that Disney is going to announce the official name for it and announce the price for it next week.
WSJ What’s News
Trump Defends Tariffs, Budget Cuts in No-Apologies Address
Chinas Premier Li Qiang sagte, dass KI die Grundlage für die Verbesserung der digitalen Wirtschaft in China wäre. Er beklagte, dass China die Unterstützung für Applikationen von großen KI-Modellen und KI-Hardwaren wie Smartphones und Robots eröffnen würde. Und Chinas Top Economy Planner sagte auch, dass
WSJ What’s News
Trump Defends Tariffs, Budget Cuts in No-Apologies Address
The country aims to develop a system of open source models while continuing to invest in computing power and data for AI.
WSJ What’s News
Trump Defends Tariffs, Budget Cuts in No-Apologies Address
In the AI world, those wrong answers, expressed with total confidence, are known as hallucinations.
WSJ What’s News
Trump Defends Tariffs, Budget Cuts in No-Apologies Address
Es ist dieser unvergessliche Paradoxus, wo je klüger die AIs werden, desto mehr sicherer werden sie. Die Art und Weise, wie sie programmiert werden, um komplexe Probleme zu lösen, ist es, sich sicher zu sein, dass sie es tun können. Die Programmer sind alle in einer kompetitiven Runde mit einander, um den klugsten AI zu haben, der die coolsten Dinge machen kann.
WSJ What’s News
Trump Defends Tariffs, Budget Cuts in No-Apologies Address
Und sie haben bemerkt, dass es besser ist, auf der Seite davon zu gehen, als auf der Seite davon zu sagen, ich weiß es nicht. Es gibt einige Versuche, das zu tun. Ich dachte, das Interessanteste war, dass AIs auf der Grundlage der Trainingsdaten gebaut sind und dass sie mehr Informationen einsetzen müssen, training data that includes people not knowing things.
WSJ What’s News
Trump Defends Tariffs, Budget Cuts in No-Apologies Address
Usually they're learning from data, from facts, things people know, people talking about stuff they know, writing about stuff they know. So can you find a way in the earliest stages to introduce this concept to a new AI? Of course, it's complicated.
WSJ What’s News
Trump Defends Tariffs, Budget Cuts in No-Apologies Address
If you teach it, I don't know too much, then it's going to start doubting itself and it's going to not come up with answers that it actually could come up with. But clearly right now, a growing number of people think it's going too far in the other direction.