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About $22 billion of SpaceX’s government contracts are at risk and multiple U.S. space programs could face dramatic changes in the fallout from Elon Musk and President Donald Trump’s explosive feud on Thursday. The disagreement, rooted in Musk’s criticism of Trump’s tax-cut and spending legislation that began last week, quickly spiraled out of control. Trump lashed out at Musk when the president spoke in the Oval Office. Then in a series of X posts, Musk launched barbs at Trump, who threatened to terminate government contracts with Musk’s companies. Taking the threat seriously, Musk said he would begin “decommissioning” SpaceX’s Dragon spacecraft used by NASA. Hours later, however, Musk appeared to reverse course. Responding to a follower on X urging him and Trump to “cool off and take a step back for a couple of days,” Musk wrote: “Good advice. Ok, we won’t decommission Dragon.” Still, Musk’s mere threat to abruptly pull its Dragon spacecraft out of service marked an unprecedented outburst from one of NASA’s leading commercial partners. Under a roughly $5 billion contract, the Dragon capsule has been the agency’s only U.S. vessel capable of carrying astronauts to and from the International Space Station, making Musk’s company a critical element of the U.S. space program. The feud raised questions about how far Trump, an often unpredictable force who has intervened in past procurement efforts, would go to punish Musk, who until last week headed Trump’s initiative to downsize the federal government. If the president prioritized political retaliation and canceled billions of dollars of SpaceX contracts with NASA and the Pentagon, it could slow U.S. space progress. NASA press secretary Bethany Stevens declined to comment on SpaceX, but said: “We will continue to work with our industry partners to ensure the president’s objectives in space are met.” Musk and Trump’s tussle ruptured an extraordinary relationship between a U.S. president and industry titan that had yielded some key favors for SpaceX: a proposed overhaul of NASA’s moon program into a Mars program, a planned effort to build a gigantic missile defense shield in space, and the naming of an Air Force leader who favored SpaceX in a contract award. Taking Dragon out of service would likely disrupt the ISS program, which involves dozens of countries under a two-decade-old international agreement. But it was unclear how quickly such a decommissioning would occur. NASA uses Russia’s Soyuz spacecraft as a secondary ride for its astronauts to the ISS. SPACEX’S RISE SpaceX rose to dominance long before Musk’s foray into Republican politics last year, building formidable market share in the rocket launch and satellite communications industries that could shield it somewhat from Musk’s split with Trump, analysts said. “It fortunately wouldn’t be catastrophic, since SpaceX has developed itself into a global powerhouse that dominates most of the space industry, but there’s no question that it would result in significant lost revenue and missed contract opportunities,” said Justus Parmar, CEO of SpaceX investor Fortuna Investments. Under Trump in recent months, the U.S. space industry and NASA’s workforce of 18,000 have been whipsawed by looming layoffs and proposed budget cuts that would cancel dozens of science programs, while the U.S. space agency remains without a confirmed administrator. Trump’s nominee for NASA administrator, Musk ally and billionaire private astronaut Jared Isaacman, appeared to be an early casualty of Musk’s rift with the president when the White House abruptly removed him from consideration over the weekend, denying Musk his pick to lead the space agency. Trump on Thursday explained dumping Isaacman by saying he was “totally Democrat,” in an apparent reference to reports Isaacman had donated to Democrats. Isaacman has donated to some Republican but mostly Democratic candidates for office, according to public records. Musk’s quest to send humans to Mars has been a critical element of Trump’s space agenda. The effort has threatened to take resources away from NASA’s flagship effort to send humans back to the moon. Trump’s budget plan sought to cancel Artemis moon missions beyond its third mission, effectively ending the over-budget Space Launch System rocket used for those missions. But the Senate Commerce Committee version of Trump’s bill released late on Thursday would restore funding for missions four and five, providing at least $1 billion annually for SLS through 2029. Since SpaceX’s rockets are a less expensive alternative to SLS, whether the Trump administration opposes the Senate’s changes in the coming weeks will give an indication of Musk’s remaining political power. SpaceX, founded in 2002, has won $15 billion of contracts from NASA for the company’s Falcon 9 rockets and development of SpaceX’s Starship, a multipurpose rocket system tapped to land NASA astronauts on the moon this decade. The company has also been awarded billions of dollars to launch a majority of the Pentagon’s national security satellites into space while it builds a massive spy satellite constellation in orbit for a U.S. intelligence agency. In addition to not being in U.S. interests, former NASA Deputy Administrator Lori Garver said canceling SpaceX’s contracts would probably not be legal. But she also added, “A rogue CEO threatening to decommission spacecraft, putting astronauts’ lives at risk, is untenable.” Joey Roulette, Reuters
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E-Commerce
Amazon famously started as an online bookstore. In the three decades since, it has disrupted how people buy, read, and review books through steps like undercutting local bookstore prices, launching the Kindle, and buying the book-review platform Goodreads. Now, Amazon has announced new job cuts, including at its Kindle and Goodreads teams, Reuters reports. In total, the company is reportedly cutting fewer than 100 jobs across its book division. Since 2022, Amazon has laid off about 27,000 employees as part of a cost-cutting strategy, according to CNBC. The online retailer claims its decision should streamline the impacted departments. As part of our ongoing work to make our teams and programs operate more efficiently, and to better align with our business roadmap, weve made the difficult decision to eliminate a small number of roles within the Books organization, an Amazon spokesperson told Reuters. Criticism over Goodreads stewardship Amazon bought Goodreads in 2013 and has since been accused by the publishing industry of neglecting the book tracker and having only bought it to prevent competition. Goodreads hasnt been all that well maintained, or updated, or kept up with, Jane Friedman, a publishing industry consultant, told The Washington Post in 2023. It does feel like Amazon bought it and then abandoned it. The online retailer also has a review system and launched a Your Books feature in 2023 for customers to track all their digital and print titles and get reading suggestions (another option available on Goodreads). Fast Company has reached out to Amazon for comment on how many jobs were cut at Goodreads and whether the online retailer is reducing its investment in the book review platform. Some individuals also dont use Goodreads because of its connection to Amazon, as noted by CBC last year. There are entire Reddit threads devoted to alternatives with comments like, I am doing everything to avoid Jeff Bezos. Thats a bit easier to do these days as far as trackers go. A number of alternatives to Goodreads have emerged over the years, such as The StoryGraph, Bookly, and BookWyrm.
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E-Commerce
Legend has it that Talking Heads played their first-ever show on June 5, 1975, in New York City, opening for the Ramones at CBGB on the Bowery. Now, 50 years later, stickers, wheatpaste posters, T-shirts, subway buskers, radio takeovers, an airplane banner, and billboards popped up along the Bowery, all with a variation of a single line: “Fa-Fa-Fa-Fa.” The cryptic street campaign is a throwback marketing push to celebrate the anniversary and a first-ever video for the bands hit song Psycho Killer, released this week. Directed by award-winning filmmaker Mike Mills, and starring Saoirse Ronan, the video chronicles the ups, downs, mundanity, absurdity, and joy of an everyday life. In a world in which CBGB is now a John Varvatos store, and the ability to reach millions of eyeballs is a small matter of algorithmic wizardry, simply seeing the Bowery plastered with less-than-obvious Talking Heads marketing is, frankly, refreshing. Modern throwback Created by experiential studio De-Yan, working with Warner Music, the goal of the work was to celebrate the iconic song of a legendary band in a way that felt a bit more 77 than social network. Jason Kreher, De-Yans chief creative officer, says this wasnt a project aimed at marketing innovation, instead the goal is to capture a sense of wonder, fun, and curiosity. The brief from Warner was simple: Build buzz around the Talking Heads as a band for people who might not have heard about them, and for people who may have forgot about them. For younger people, a guerrilla marketing music campaign is as novel to them as the song Psycho Killer by the Talking Heads, says Kreher. You don’t have to reinvent the wheel every time to delight people. De-Yan is known for creating mesmerizing, technologically-driven live experiences for artists like Alicia Keys and Lady Gaga, as well as brands like Louis Vuitton and La Mer. Here, though, the means were decidedly lo-fi, but the goal remains the same. I don’t imagine this is going to win awards, because it doesn’t have to, says Kreher. The song says fa-fa-fa a lot. I thought that was funny. So we put it everywhere we possibly could until we ran out of money. I don’t know if that’s innovative but it’s the correct thing to do, and I’m really excited about it. There are bootleg T-shirts in a Chinatown shop, neon signs at indie record stores, local radio takeovers (WFAFA, New Yorks only station that only plays Psycho Killer), an aerial banner that just says FAFAFAFAFA, and iconic subway buskers playing the song all day on the F(A) train line. [Photo: courtesy De-Yan] Limits > Limitless Talking Heads fans may be pissed off that this anniversary brings only a new video and this fun campaign, rather than a full-on reunion tour (the band reportedly declined an $80 million offer from Live Nation last year). Here we have an iconic band and a hit song, but what impresses about this work is actually the restraint of keeping its promotion distinctly street level. Or at least as close as you can in 2025 (see: DudeWithSign). Its part of a growing trend among brands looking to create experiences to go along with their algorithm investments. According to a study from agency Archival, 74% of Gen Zs think IRL experiences are more important than digital ones. [Photo: courtesy De-Yan] Stats like that and work like this remind me of a recent edition of James Kirkhams Inked In & Iconic newsletter about the old Nintendo Game & Watch handheld gaming devices from the 1980s. As we hurtle toward Zuckerberg’s ‘infinite creative’ future, where AI spits out endless variations of soulless content, Game & Watch reminds us what you get from limitations, simplicity and constraint, Kirkham wrote. Sometimes the most valuable thing you can offer isn’t more. It’s enough. Maybe that’s what we’re really searching for in our underground raves and our no-phone policies and our limited edition everything: the Game & Watch promise. A finite universe we can master. Boundaries. Limitations that set us free. Virality may be every brands goal, but the process behind it has become so mechanized that words like authentic and organic have seemingly lost all meaning. Kreher appreciates the limitations and constraints of budget, time, and production to craft something different. Experiences are a marketer’s fastest shortcut to meaningfl attention, he says. This was as gritty as I could get so we can make a moment that feels like a very specific time and place.
Category:
E-Commerce
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