Welcome back to The Daily Courant, your afternoon medley of the best new work at Puck.

First up today, Lauren Sherman gets the inside story behind the anticlimactic NikeSkims debut, which Beaverton claims was their most successful in history—and yet, somehow, still gave the impression of a semi-flop. As Lauren reports, both camps are feeling more relieved than triumphant, while questions continue to swirl about product-market fit and whether Kim Kardashian’s star power was actually necessary for Nike to reclaim mindshare in the women’s activewear market.

Plus, below the fold: Bill Cohan offers a tidy primer on the Genius Act, the game-changing stablecoin legislation that nobody on Wall Street is talking about. Matt Belloni breaks the news about a $1 billion studio venture backed by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. John Ourand chronicles the blowback to billionaire booster Cody Campbell’s quixotic vision for college sports rights. And Scott Mendelson explains how Tron: Ares became Disney’s latest franchise fumble.

Meanwhile, on the pods: Dylan Byers connects with TBPN’s John Coogan and Jordi Hays on The Grill Room to dissect how their livestreamed podcast became the soundtrack to Silicon Valley. On Fashion People, Lauren rings up Laura Brown and Kristina O’Neill to discuss their buzzy new book, All the Cool Girls Get Fired. And on The Powers That Be, Peter Hamby and Abby Livingston assess the two-week-old government shutdown—and potential paths for a resolution.

As it turns out, despite the rather anticlimactic debut of one of the most-hyperventilated-about brand mashups in modern history, Nike recorded its most successful apparel launch ever, at least in dollar terms. The question is, why didn’t it look that way?

An illuminating conversation with Chris Land, the general counsel to Wyoming Senator Cynthia Lummis, about the Genius Act—the potentially game-changing stablecoin legislation that nobody’s talking about.

A new $1 billion studio backed by entities tied to Mohammed bin Salman and run by producer Erik Feig likely marks the largest investment in a traditional entertainment company by the controversial kingdom.

The billionaire oilman, former jock, and Texas Tech trustee has been on a mission to allow conference executives to pool their college football rights and sell them off like Powerball tickets to the streamers. Herewith, the blowback to the blowback.

Disney’s Tron: Ares shows what happens when studios keep resurrecting half-dead I.P., mistaking brand recognition for audience demand, and doubling down on nostalgia plays that nobody asked for.

John Coogan and Jordi Hays, co-hosts of Technology Business Programming Network, join Dylan to discuss how they scaled their podcast from a one-hour weekly show to a five-day live juggernaut pulling in roughly $5 million in ad revenue. They explain how they’ve managed to captivate both Silicon Valley and, increasingly, Wall Street—not to mention the CNBCs and Bloombergs of the world marveling from the sidelines.

Lauren’s guests are Laura Brown and Kristina O’Neill, authors of All the Cool Girls Get Fired: How to Let Go of Being Let Go and Come Back on Top. They discuss the core tenets of their manifesto, what it was like to get fired from their big-time editor jobs, and why your career does not define you. (Really!) They also get into the Victoria Beckham doc, the Chanel show backlash, whether fashion hates women, and the existential question: Did you girlboss too close to the sun?

Abby Livingston joins Peter with the latest intel from Capitol Hill on the now two-week-old government shutdown. As Abby explains, unlike shutdowns of the past, this one is unique: Neither party seems particularly worried about political blowback, and leaders aren’t anywhere close to a deal to reopen the government. As we barrel toward what could be the longest shutdown in U.S. history, Abby discusses the factors that could actually lead to a breakthrough.

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