by The Ken
The Two by Two podcast is a premium business podcast from The Ken that investigates, discusses and breaks down the most important business stories around you. Hosted from The Ken's newsroom by business journalists Rohin Dharmakumar and Praveen Gopal Krishnan, Two by Two will feature guests and experts from across the industry and academia to talk about issues no one else is talking about.
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April 7, 2025
<p>There's a war for succession going on. Who gets to become the new television?</p><p><br></p><p>There are two challengers. The first challenger is Youtube.</p><p><br></p><p>According to Neal Mohan, YouTube CEO, TV screens have officially overtaken mobile as the quote, primary device for YouTube viewing in the US.</p><p><br></p><p>It is, as Mohan writes in his annual letter from the CEO, an indication that YouTube is the new television.</p><p><br></p><p>It's interactive and includes things like shorts, podcasts, and live streams alongside sports, sitcoms, and talk shows that people already love.</p><p><br></p><p>It is getting there organically by adding things like memberships, monetisation tools, partner programs, and super chats, and it's letting creators play with them to create content that takes eyeballs away from linear television.</p><p><br></p><p>On the other hand, there are streaming companies like Netflix and Jiohotstar, who also want to become the successor for new television, and they do it by owning and producing exclusive content and IP such as live sports, Disney, Marvel, HBO, and a whole lot more.</p><p><br></p><p>All of this came to a head a couple of days back after Jiohotstar live-streamed its Mahashivratri event. It had a lot of the same elements as Youtube live events.</p><p><br></p><p>Viewers could switch between temple feeds, listen to mythological narratives or engage in real-time chanting and live Q&A sessions, transforming passive viewing into active participation.</p><p><br></p><p>Jio Hotstar is redefining live streaming by making shared cultural moments more immersive.</p><p><br></p><p>To discuss this, hosts Praveen Gopal Krishnan and Rohin Dharmakumar invited two wonderful guests.</p><p><br></p><p>Our first guest is Swati Mohan, the ex-head of marketing at Netflix India. She's also an independent advisor to many consumer tech companies. She’s led large business verticals and has had leadership roles in media companies such as GroupM, Nat Geo, and many others across India and APAC.</p><p><br></p><p>And our second guest is Vanita Kohli-Khandekar. She is an India-based media specialist and a contributing editor for Business Standard, where she has written about media and the business of media for over two decades.</p><p><br></p><p>She also writes for Singapore-based Content Asia. The Media Room, her podcast on all things media and entertainment, is hosted on The Core. She has also authored the authoritative book on India’s media landscape titled The Indian Media Business.</p><p><br></p><p>In this episode, we discuss which of these two contenders will become new television.</p><p><br></p><p>What will YouTube do, and how will it get there? What will streaming companies do, and how will they get there?</p><p><br></p><p>Welcome to episode 32 of Two by Two.<br><br></p><p>– – –</p><p><br></p><p>Additional reading:</p><p><br></p><p><a href="https://the-ken.com/the-nutgraf/jiohotstar-is-not-content/">Jiohotstar is not content</a></p><p><a href="https://www.business-standard.com/entertainment/the-linearisation-of-streaming-how-otts-are-becoming-more-like-tv-125022001388_1.html">The 'linearisation' of streaming: How OTTs are becoming more like TV</a></p><p><br></p><p>Additional listening:</p><p><br></p><p><a href="https://the-ken.com/podcasts/two-by-two/netflixs-last-growth-market/">Netflix and its last growth market</a></p><p>– – –</p><p>What you listened to is just the first 30 minutes of the conversation. If you'd like to listen to the full episode, you can do so by becoming a Premium subscriber to <a href="https://the-ken.com/podcasts/two-by-two/">The Ken</a> or by subscribing to Two by Two on <a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/in/podcast/two-by-two/id1757938645">Apple Podcasts</a> via a separate standalone subscription.</p><p><br></p><p>This episode of Two by Two was produced by Hari Krishna. Rajiv CN, our resident sound engineer, mixed and mastered this episode.</p><p><br></p><p>If you liked this episode of Two by Two, please share it with your friends and family who would be interested in listening to the episode. And if you have more thoughts on the discussion, we’d love to hear your arguments as well. You can write to us at [email protected].</p><p><br></p>
April 3, 2025
<p>Strap - To live up to their ‘perceived value, ’ companies have gotten creative in extracting more from their customers, resulting in a worse experience for a user.</p><p><br></p><p>You’ve surely heard of the term of the term enshittification? In case you haven’t, it was coined by blogger and journalist Cory Doctorow. He defined it as the pattern in which online products and services decline in quality over time.</p><p><br></p><p>This decline or decay has started to show in Indian Consumer tech products as well, resulting in an experience for customers that is much worse than what was promised. From seemingly unharmful dark patterns to unnecessary cross-selling, the spectrum lies wide sour digital experiences for a customer today.</p><p><br></p><p>And why they’re doing this is quite simple.</p><p><br></p><p>These products first got your trust and managed to delight you by delivering on their promise. Then, they made that promise available for a price. Fair enough, if it’s good, then surely the promise has a price you should be willing to pay. Now, we seem to have arrived at a point where they’re asking more to deliver that same promise. They want to extract more money from a customer’s wallet. What forces them to do so becomes the next question.</p><p><br></p><p>This enshittening and many more ways in which many of the platforms we use have aged badly was the core of the discussion in this week’s episode of Two by Two. Joining hosts Rohin Dharmakumar and Praveen Gopal Krishnan are Aditya Suresh, head of India equity research at Macquarie, and Abhishek Madan, ex-VP of Product at Paytm*</p><p><br></p><p>Aditya brought the market’s perspective to the discussion with his sharp insights, how the experience could be different based on whether a company is public or private, and what gets talked about in both contexts. Abhishek, in his third time on the podcast, added the flavour by explaining why and how the platform decay came about.</p><p><br></p><p>Welcome to episode 36 of Two by Two.</p><p><br></p><p>-</p><p><br></p><p>Additional reading:</p><p><br></p><p>Enshittification is coming for absolutely everything - <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/6fb1602d-a08b-4a8c-bac0-047b7d64aba5">https://www.ft.com/content/6fb1602d-a08b-4a8c-bac0-047b7d64aba5</a></p><p><br>Phonepe spent millions to rival Policybazaar. Its users couldn’t care less - <a href="https://the-ken.com/story/phonepe-spent-millions-to-rival-policybazaar-its-users-couldnt-care-less/">https://the-ken.com/story/phonepe-spent-millions-to-rival-policybazaar-its-users-couldnt-care-less/</a></p><p><br></p><p>Swiggy needs to reclaim its past glory - <a href="https://the-ken.com/newsletters/two-by-two/swiggy-needs-to-reclaim-its-past-glory/">https://the-ken.com/newsletters/two-by-two/swiggy-needs-to-reclaim-its-past-glory/</a></p><p><br></p><p>How will Ola and Uber avoid ‘death by a thousand cuts’? - <a href="https://the-ken.com/newsletters/two-by-two/how-will-ola-and-uber-avoid-death-by-a-thousand-cuts/">https://the-ken.com/newsletters/two-by-two/how-will-ola-and-uber-avoid-death-by-a-thousand-cuts/</a></p><p><br></p><p>First, Cult.fit’s group classes got everyone’s attention. Now “Cult injuries” do - <a href="https://the-ken.com/newsletters/two-by-two/how-will-ola-and-uber-avoid-death-by-a-thousand-cuts/">https://the-ken.com/newsletters/two-by-two/how-will-ola-and-uber-avoid-death-by-a-thousand-cuts/</a></p><p>Additional listening:</p><p><br></p><p>Should you invest the first two years of your career in strategy consulting? - <a href="https://the-ken.com/podcasts/two-by-two/should-you-invest-the-first-two-years-of-your-career-doing-strategy-consulting/">https://the-ken.com/podcasts/two-by-two/should-you-invest-the-first-two-years-of-your-career-doing-strategy-consulting/</a></p><p><br></p><p>How will Ola and Uber avoid ‘death by a thousand cuts’? - <a href="https://the-ken.com/podcasts/two-by-two/how-will-ola-and-uber-avoid-death-by-a-thousand-cuts/">https://the-ken.com/podcasts/two-by-two/how-will-ola-and-uber-avoid-death-by-a-thousand-cuts/</a></p><p><br></p><p>Swiggy needs to reclaim its past glory - <a href="https://the-ken.com/podcasts/two-by-two/swiggy-needs-to-reclaim-its-past-glory/">https://the-ken.com/podcasts/two-by-two/swiggy-needs-to-reclaim-its-past-glory/</a></p><p><br></p><p>-</p><p><br></p><p>This episode of Two by Two was produced by Hari Krishna. Rajiv CN, our resident sound engineer, mixed and mastered this episode.</p><p><br></p><p>If you liked this episode of Two by Two, please share it with your friends and family who would be interested in listening to the episode. And if you have more examples of enshittification, do tell us about them. You can write to us at [email protected].</p>
March 31, 2025
<p>Everyone’s lives would be better if we were rid of spam calls and messages, but we don’t live in that reality. So most people rely on caller-ID apps or services to save themselves from the ordeal. In September last year, Bharti Airtel launched a spam fighting network free of cost to all users who have a VoLTE-enabled smartphone.</p><p><br></p><p>Airtel says its AI-powered systems come across a call or message that seems sketchy based on call patterns, frequency, duration and other parameters to flag them as ‘suspected scam’.</p><p><br></p><p>But like any anti-spam service, it has been showing a few cracks—all of which have consequences for both businesses and customers.</p><p><br></p><p>Legitimate calls from businesses are flagged as suspected spam by its system, while calls from similar businesses are not. The other troubling problem is that it’s a one-way system where the customer can’t do anything about it. They cannot opt out of the service either.</p><p><br></p><p>If your network operator says it's a suspected spam call when there's a number flashing on your screen, are you going to pick it up?</p><p><br></p><p>And then there are businesses like Truecaller, which built their business using the crowdsourcing model and built a two-sided business where they made money from both individuals and businesses trying to reach these individuals. Truecaller helped legitimate businesses which were being marked as spam be validated as verified businesses for a fee.</p><p><br></p><p>Something in all of this feels broken. What should ideally be free and reliable to save all customers from being scammed is not fully reliable or free.</p><p><br></p><p>What’s at stake? Where are the solutions?</p><p><br></p><p>In episode 31 of Two by Two, hosts Rohin Dharmakumar and Praveen Gopal Krishnan try to find the answers with our guests for the week—Parag Kar, former vice president of government affairs at Qualcomm India and Southeast Asia; Chaitanya Chokkareddy, co-founder and CTO of Ozonetel, a cloud-based communication platform providing call-centre solutions for businesses; and The Ken reporter Rounak Kumar Gunjan.</p><p><br></p><p>– – –</p><p>Additional reading -</p><p><br></p><p><a href="https://the-ken.com/story/truecaller-beat-trai-to-the-punch-with-spam-call-fix/">Truecaller beat Trai to the punch with spam-call fix</a></p><p><br></p><p><a href="https://the-ken.com/the-nutgraf/airtel-finds-the-gap-between-truecaller-and-trai/">Airtel finds the gap between Truecaller and Trai</a></p><p><br></p><p>– – –</p><p>Help us find interesting women guests by filling out this survey - <a href="https://theken.typeform.com/to/KH0EOLGo">https://theken.typeform.com/to/KH0EOLGo</a></p><p><br></p><p>– – –</p><p>What you listened to is just the first 30 minutes of the conversation. If you'd like to listen to the full episode, you can do so by becoming a Premium subscriber to <a href="https://the-ken.com/podcasts/two-by-two/">The Ken</a> or by subscribing to Two by Two on <a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/in/podcast/two-by-two/id1757938645">Apple Podcasts</a> via a separate standalone subscription.</p><p><br></p><p>This episode of Two by Two was produced by Hari Krishna. Rajiv CN, our resident sound engineer, mixed and mastered this episode.</p><p><br></p><p>If you liked this episode of Two by Two, please share it with your friends and family who would be interested in listening to the episode. And if you have more thoughts on the discussion, we’d love to hear your arguments as well. You can write to us at [email protected].</p>
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