Meta needs Walmart to wait out Amazon; Expedia's middle layer; where is Google?
One new item dated September 23: Stratechery on Meta needing Walmart to wait out Amazon, Expedia's fight to keep its place in the middle of travel booking, and where Google is in the same story.
Your Gmail queue picked up one new item dated September 23: a Stratechery Daily Update. Lenny's Newsletter published nothing new in the same window, so this edition carries a single entry.
The Update returns to Muse, Meta's personal agent, one day after Amazon blocked it. The September 22 Update called that block predictable and left room for a deal on the strength of Amazon's physical-world investments, which it calls an AI moat. 12 September 23's three topics are the retailer Meta needs next, the travel site defending its place in the middle, and the company the Update asks about by name.
Platforms: Muse's next round — Walmart, Expedia, and the Google question
"More on Muse, Amazon, and Walmart; Muse and Expedia; Whither Google?" — Stratechery
Published September 23, 2026. Ben Thompson's subscriber Daily Update. The public page carries one summary line and the Update's own post carries the three topic markers; the argument behind both sits behind the subscription. 34
- The next counterparty is Walmart, and what Meta wants from it is time. The summary line opens with "Meta needs Walmart to wait out Amazon", and the first marker names all three companies. The September 22 Update had already called Amazon's block predictable and left room for a deal, so the weight in today's line sits on Walmart's willingness to hold out — which makes the retailer's next move the one to watch. What Walmart gets in return is subscriber text.
- Expedia's fight is over staying a layer that agents must pass through. The second marker pairs Muse with Expedia, and the summary says Expedia "seeks to keep its middleware position". Expedia's business sits between travellers and the hotels and airlines that supply them; a personal agent that books travel can route through that layer or go around it. The summary states the aim, and the Update's terms for holding it are subscriber text.
- Google is the question the Update asks and leaves open. The public line closes with "meanwhile, where is Google?", and the third marker reads "Whither Google?". Meta, Amazon, Walmart and Expedia all appear in the week's moves; the Update's framing is that Google, whose search and advertising business is the layer a shopping agent would come for, is the one that does not appear in them. The Update's answer sits behind the subscription.
Where to start
Open Stratechery if you follow who ends up owning the consumer agent's entry point into shopping and travel. Only the summary line and the three markers are readable without a subscription, so the entry shows where to look and the argument stays with subscribers. Lenny's Newsletter filed nothing in this window, so there is no second item to weigh it against. The queue picks up again when either publication posts.
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