I’m torn here. The Big Story is often smacking you in the face. Big Tech’s reckoning is doing the smacking again, but given regulation rather than break-up are being talked about, maybe the story is elsewhere. We found out the four companies represented in Congress reported a combined quarterly profit of $28.6 billion, during one of the worst economies on record. But tech is uniquely aligned with providing services during that pandemic, hence the surging valuations, and the likes of Pinterest and Snapchat did very well, too.

• Heck, the news that Nvidia is close to buying Arm (for less than the value of TikTok) could be huge, too, just to round out the month.
• Or is it Microsoft, unexpectedly, interested in buying TikTok’s US operations, as it gets close to a ban, as was being reported at the time of writing? (Business Insider).
• But put that aside until it’s a done deal.

The two things I think that might reverberate aside from whatever comes of political wrangling looks like this: Apple’s Mac and iPad sales , and Microsoft’s Netflix of games that seems imminent.

1. Apple announced Macs and iPad sales were way up over the last three months: revenues up 21.6% and 31% respectively, from the same period last year. And Apple said with supply chain interruptions, it couldn’t even meet total demand, even while stores were closed. These devices clearly supported working from home, and education for kids logging into Zoom classrooms, if parents could afford it.

It’s not all about Apple, either. Gartner and International Data Corporation (IDC) both reported growing shipments of desktop computers, laptops and workstations, up 11% (WSJ, $).

There’s no way of knowing the future, but this surge in devices will have lasting consequences. Remote work and education are now possible. I don’t think anyone believes that a University degree is better online, but remote work with optional office days — the dream for many, when we go back to normal — looks more possible. It’s now backed by assets.

2. Xbox’s growing Game Pass. A couple of interesting things here. Project xCloud, which streams Xbox games to other devices including Android smartphones, is now baked into Xbox Game Pass at cost. Microsoft also admitted (and laughed off concerns!) that “Xbox Game Pass is not a big profit play,” and there’s something weird going on with Xbox Live Gold, which is the-optional-but basically-necessary subscription to play multiplayer games. Suddenly, Microsoft isn’t selling long-term Xbox Live Gold subscriptions any more.

The implications are: either Microsoft is making online play free, or it’s all going to GamePass, to create a single payment across Xbox and PC to unlock tonnes of games as a real Netflix model, and a flex on Sony’s model.

Microsoft’s only lack of influence is on mobile gaming. It appears like it’s partnering more closely with Samsung on this. We’ll find out more on August 5. 

But what plays out with Game Pass, cloud gaming, and next-generation consoles, looks really significant for gaming across the board.