GM. This is Take Off. We're like that unexpected tax refund - pleasantly surprising, rewarding, and making your life just a little bit better.

Here's what we're serving up today:

• AMZN Goes Up-AMZN Goes Down 🎢

• Snap Stories aren't the only thing vanishing 👻

• Asteroids ☄️

• Futuristic Fridays 🔮

AMZN Goes Up-AMZN Goes Down 🎢

This Friday marks the end of the 1st week of our favorite drama show this quarter: Earnings Season!

Yesterday was somewhat of a rollercoaster for Jeff’s company (Yes, we are on a first name basis with him).

Amazon's headline numbers had everyone popping champagne, with their earnings outdoing Wall Street's estimates.

But then, Mr. Party-Pooper, aka Amazon CFO Brian Olsavsky, warned of "optimizations" among AWS customers and a slowdown in growth. Womp Womp! Cue the confetti clean-up!

Their AWS unit grew by 16%, which sounds pretty nice but is slower than last year’s 37% growth. Their CFO told the markets that the economy hit is getting to their AWS customers hinting a slow-down in their cloud biz.

It tried to soften the blow by saying they're not just focused on short-term gains, but building long-lasting relationships. Aww, isn't that sweet?

Here's all the relevant digits for AMZN:

1. Total Revenue: $127.4 Billion (+9%)

2. Net Income: $3.2 Billion (vs loss of $3.8 Billion)

3. North America Revenue: $76.8 Billion (+11%)

4. International Revenue: $29.1 Billion (+1%)

5. AWS revenue: $21.3 Billion (+16%)

Snap Stories aren't the only thing vanishing 👻

Unfortunately, snap stories aren’t the only thing vanishing at Snap. It’s their revenue as well causing their shares to plunge over 20%.

This is the first time their revenue took a dip since going public as they fell short of Wall Street’s revenue estimates reporting a revenue of $988.6 million.

Advertisers and Digital Spend haven’t exactly been BFFs post-COVID and Snap is definitely getting the silent treatment.

Snap's ARPU (average revenue per user) is sliding faster than a greased-up penguin, dropping from $3.20 in Q1 last year to $2.58 now.

Snap's pointing fingers at a "disrupted" ad demand and Apple's privacy shenanigans making it harder for advertisers as their revenue went down 7% YoY.

But Snap’s saying it’s not all tears and puppy filters. They’ve recently fiddled with new friendships such as their $3.99/month Snapchat+ as well as their “controversial“ AI chatbot.

Let's see if they can snap back to success!

☄️ Asteroids ☄️

Dropbox, the OG cloud storage kid, is laying off 16% of its staff : ~500 people. Despite strong results and being profitable, they're choosing to let go of people citing slowing growth and investment in new areas—like hitting the brakes and gas at the same time. 🏎️🛑

“Open”-AI, is attempting to trademark "GPT". This comes after the company announcing that they’ll not be “open”-ing their recent GPT4 model. “Open”-AI does seem like a pretty “closed-off” person for someone who has “open” in their name. 🤖💼

Marvel's Joe Russo envisions AI-directed movies within two years, making us wonder if the next Avengers flick will be called "Age of Artificial Intelligence." He believes that the day is not far when your TV will be able to whip up a Rom-Com between You and Marilyn Monroe. You’d love that, wouldn’t ya? 📼🎥

🔮 Futuristic Fridays 🔮

Nuclear physics may bring to mind secretive labs and shady briefcase exchanges, but today's scientists are actually embracing openness. Thanks to open source software, nuclear fusion research (like the recent "ignition" breakthrough) is making progress, and even the notoriously guarded field of nuclear science is now sharing code. Sure, there's still some top-secret stuff locked away, but overall, openness is proving to be the key to pushing scientific boundaries. 📕⚛️

Hate “No Signals”? Brace yourselves, because Sateliot, a Spanish startup, is on a mission to bring texting to the most remote corners of our planet. Soon, stranded motorists and lost hikers can send an SOS, courtesy of these space-bound cell towers. With big names like Apple, Verizon, and T-Mobile joining the space race, it won't be long before you'll be able to text from the top of a mountain, "OMG, no signal? LOL, jk!" 🛰️📱🌄

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