Hey, Alexa — you’ve got competition

Time to cry over unspelled milk: a Costco wholesaler is recalling nearly 80K pounds of butter after it failed to mention on the label that the dairy delight contained milk.

Markets finished mixed yesterday as some stocks continued to run hot on the Trump bump and others cooled. Traders upped bets on a December rate cut after October inflation #s were in line with expectations.

🎙️ Fresh pod: Tune in on Spotify or Apple Podcasts for the latest episode of “Sherwood Ten”: 10 questions in 10 minutes with entrepreneurs, entertainers, and thought leaders.

Home sweet iHome… Apple’s preparing to launch a wall-mounted smart-home tablet as early as March, Bloomberg reported. The device, said to look like an iPad, can control AC and lighting, host video calls, answer questions, and play music. Apple’s infusing it with features from its new generative-AI platform, Apple Intelligence, which was released last month in the latest iPhones (reception’s been lukewarm, though users are entertained by goofy AI-generated notification summaries). Apple’s hoping its AI-powered features (feat. a smarter Siri) can help it make a splash in the smart-home market.

Is the smart home in the room with us?… Techies have long touted the prospect of connected smart homes (picture: showers that turn on at your preferred temp when your alarm rings, health sensors that order Advil). But futuristic vibes haven’t yet landed. The market’s still fragmented, with smart speakers like Amazon's Alexa and Google's Home Mini, plus thermostats and security cams. Amazon’s tablet-headed home robot, Astro, hasn’t taken off, and this year Roomba maker iRobot let go of half its workforce. 

Failure’s part of the profit process… and Apple can afford to fail. As its hardware sales slow, Apple’s made big, expensive bets to enter new markets. It hasn’t always gone well: it axed its decade-long effort to build a self-driving EV. And sales of its $3.5K Vision Pro VR headset, rolled out this year, have disappointed (it’s said to be considering ending production). But the Apple Watch was a hit, making the company a leader in the connected fitness market, and it’s hoping for a repeat in the smart-home space.

’Tis the cheese’in… It’s a jolly time to be making movies about small-town bakers falling for fictional princes during a blizzard. Hallmark’s streaming service — and two dozen or so other niche streamers in the specialty category — have been thriving. Overall, genre-based streamers like Hallmark (romance), Shudder (horror), and Crunchyroll (anime) have outpaced the subscription growth of massive rivals. Subs to specialty streamers grew 27% last year and are up 20% this year, compared to 8% growth for industry leaders.

Big + problems… A lot of large streaming platforms are struggling to turn consistent profits, while their parent companies get dragged down by flailing cable businesses that their streamers are helping to destroy. Pricey productions and hefty sports deals have also weighed on bottom lines. To make up for losses, streamers have been slashing original-content spending, raising their prices, and flooding their apps with ads. It’s led to more subscription pausing. Through September, over a third of premium streaming subscribers had rejoined a service they’d already canceled within the year.

Specialists can swim upstream… Staying small and targeted has allowed niche streamers to keep budgets low while winning over fans. That success has attracted large rivals too: Netflix recently made a deal to add more content from AMC+ (AMC Networks’ streamer).

The island’s main utility is decrepit and its bankruptcy fight means locals’ electricity rates could go sky high. Read more. (Lea este artículo en español.)

Deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon has dropped to a nine-year low

Authors of this Snacks own shares of: Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Disney, Robinhood, and Sony

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