No Mercy No Malice
Why Peloton Will Win the Biggest Work-From-Home Experiment in History
The fitness company is pedaling its way to over $1 billion in revenue this year
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Before SXSW was canceled, I was planning on going despite the coronavirus. While catching coronavirus would be bad, worse would be passing it to someone vulnerable. But I put my trust in the CDC, which said travel is okay and to wash my hands and not to touch my face. Great, there goes that hobby.
Ozzy Osbourne and Facebook both pulled out of SXSW. Pretty sure Ozzy already has it — he used to eat bats on stage. I was scheduled to do a keynote with Katie Couric and Jim Bankoff. This is something I never imagined, and I’m still processing what connective tissue or butterfly flapping its wings in the Amazon almost brought me and Katie together in the Lone Star State.
I used to find comfort in our leadership during times of crisis — both George W. Bush and Barack Obama were steady hands through 9/11 and the Great Recession respectively. But no longer. The initial response from Western leaders was to manufacture and distribute low-cost testing kits. In the U.S., we cut interest rates, and our president proposed to cut funding for the CDC by 9%. We then had someone who botched an HIV outbreak and doesn’t believe in evolution try to explain why the kits aren’t ready. Then he was tasked with walking back the president’s statement that infected people should go to work.
Note: Before sending hate mail, recognize it’s not partisan to observe idiocy. The government has one job: to overreact. Not declare victory when cases are doubling.
Taking precautions can save respiratory systems and, most importantly, the lungs of people with weaker constitutions. Yet I wonder what has been the cost to our nervous systems during the three months of fear and hype we’ve been through in the shadow of screens with increasingly creative and scary infographics. Media algorithms know: fear = engagement. Your lungs are okay, but how’s your resting blood pressure? Stress affects more than your respiratory system, and the effects are long term.
