1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:05,000 Welcome to Arvid and Tyler Catch Up. I'm Arvid. 2 00:00:05,000 --> 00:00:10,000 I'm Tyler. Let's catch up. 3 00:00:10,000 --> 00:00:15,000 I'm good. I'm good. I'm much, much, much better. 4 00:00:15,000 --> 00:00:20,000 If folks listened to last week, I was coming off of a pretty serious illness 5 00:00:20,000 --> 00:00:25,000 and a whole bunch of dramatic changes in the business all at once. 6 00:00:25,000 --> 00:00:30,000 Frantically trying to just tread water. 7 00:00:30,000 --> 00:00:35,000 I've been spending most of the last week or so just heads down 8 00:00:35,000 --> 00:00:40,000 reviewing applications, talking to founders, all the fun parts of my job. 9 00:00:40,000 --> 00:00:45,000 I'm really good. 10 00:00:45,000 --> 00:00:50,000 I'm happy to hear it. That was quite the week. You got everything at the same time. 11 00:00:50,000 --> 00:00:55,000 It's really bad. I'm glad to see you smile again. 12 00:00:55,000 --> 00:01:00,000 You always try to keep a smile on, I guess, but it comes from a deeper, more healthy place. 13 00:01:00,000 --> 00:01:08,000 These are just our moments to practice being calm. 14 00:01:08,000 --> 00:01:13,000 The universe is just giving us a couple of workouts for that. 15 00:01:13,000 --> 00:01:18,000 There's always this time of year when my allergies start 16 00:01:18,000 --> 00:01:23,000 kicking in. I always get a little bit frustrated with just breathing. 17 00:01:23,000 --> 00:01:28,000 That is also a nice opportunity to just practice calmness because a calm breath 18 00:01:28,000 --> 00:01:33,000 is a less agitated one and it keeps your body in a better mood as well. 19 00:01:33,000 --> 00:01:38,000 I'm certainly glad to just know that 20 00:01:38,000 --> 00:01:43,000 there is a way to deal with all these things. Not that my life was as stressful as yours 21 00:01:43,000 --> 00:01:48,000 over the last couple of days, but it's nice to know. 22 00:01:48,000 --> 00:01:53,000 Total tangent, but have you read the book Breath by James Nestor? 23 00:01:53,000 --> 00:01:58,000 It's somewhat recent, last couple of years. Especially if you have allergies. 24 00:01:58,000 --> 00:02:03,000 Definitely recommend it. Very, very cool book. Literally just all about the 25 00:02:03,000 --> 00:02:08,000 science and practice of breathing. I just read it. It was super timely. 26 00:02:08,000 --> 00:02:13,000 I was dealing with allergies and sinus infections and the whole thing. 27 00:02:13,000 --> 00:02:18,000 It's very frustrating when you literally can't breathe. It's like, "Hey, breathing is super important. 28 00:02:18,000 --> 00:02:23,000 Not doing it well is really bad for you." You're like, "Great. I can't breathe through my nose." 29 00:02:23,000 --> 00:02:28,000 When you get back up and you can do it, there's a whole bunch of practices 30 00:02:28,000 --> 00:02:33,000 and mindfulness around breathing correctly that I found super interesting. 31 00:02:33,000 --> 00:02:38,000 And also just really easy to put in practice day to day. 32 00:02:38,000 --> 00:02:43,000 I would definitely recommend it. Thanks so much. You know the problem with having some sort of disposable income? 33 00:02:43,000 --> 00:02:48,000 Every time somebody recommends a book, I immediately have to buy it because I have no reason not to. 34 00:02:48,000 --> 00:02:53,000 It's the worst. That's a champagne problem right here. Thanks for that suggestion. 35 00:02:53,000 --> 00:02:58,000 I will definitely do this. I look into these kind of books in particular, just trying to 36 00:02:58,000 --> 00:03:03,000 figure out the basic concepts of life. Like Why We Sleep by Walker was 37 00:03:03,000 --> 00:03:08,000 another book like this. And even though a lot of scientists have a lot of opinions, 38 00:03:08,000 --> 00:03:13,000 the specifics of what people in that field that try to make it more popular, 39 00:03:13,000 --> 00:03:18,000 they kind of skim over certain things and certain things may not work as well as they want it to 40 00:03:18,000 --> 00:03:23,000 for the cohesiveness of the argument. But I still love having some level of insight. So thanks for that. 41 00:03:23,000 --> 00:03:28,000 I'm very much looking forward to doing this. I've been amplifying my reading schedule 42 00:03:28,000 --> 00:03:35,000 since we're talking about what we're doing because I'm trying to get back into a writing habit 43 00:03:35,000 --> 00:03:40,000 for the book that I want to write, not just for my weekly writing, which I also enjoy quite a lot. And I get a lot 44 00:03:40,000 --> 00:03:45,000 of fun of. But you know, a more extensive project, my building public book project 45 00:03:45,000 --> 00:03:50,000 essentially. And I've talked about this a lot over the last couple of weeks. There are little things happening here or there. 46 00:03:50,000 --> 00:03:55,000 And I think last week I talked about how well should I self publish or should I go the 47 00:03:55,000 --> 00:04:00,000 traditional route? We had that conversation. And Brendan Dunn has been really helpful 48 00:04:00,000 --> 00:04:05,000 because he's publishing one right now the traditional way. And he's been trying to encourage me to 49 00:04:05,000 --> 00:04:10,000 go the traditional way as well. It was really nice because it's hard to break into an industry 50 00:04:10,000 --> 00:04:15,000 that has certain expectations that for us indie founders, indie creators, they feel 51 00:04:15,000 --> 00:04:20,000 quite outlandish. But like the idea of trying to have mass appeal goes against anything 52 00:04:20,000 --> 00:04:25,000 that we learn as indie hackers to niche down and be specific and have people that 53 00:04:25,000 --> 00:04:30,000 it's for. And some people or a lot of people who it's not for the traditional industry is slightly 54 00:04:30,000 --> 00:04:35,000 different. So the way you even talk to people about this is also different. Right. If you want to pitch your 55 00:04:35,000 --> 00:04:40,000 project to somebody, you don't pitch a book that is for a couple hundred thousand people. 56 00:04:40,000 --> 00:04:45,000 You say essentially this is what James Clear has done, but for a different audience, 57 00:04:45,000 --> 00:04:50,000 right. Effectively be the most applicable way of looking at the thing you're writing 58 00:04:50,000 --> 00:04:55,000 about. So I'm trying to deal with this like getting so much encouragement from people 59 00:04:55,000 --> 00:05:00,000 that tell me that I should go bigger than what my aspirations are right now. So 60 00:05:00,000 --> 00:05:05,000 can't really go into specifics here, but I'm talking to agents now like actual agents 61 00:05:05,000 --> 00:05:10,000 to maybe help me find a deal somewhere. So that is exciting because it's again, 62 00:05:10,000 --> 00:05:15,000 one of these things I have no idea how to even deal with the conversation that I have with an agent, which is supposedly 63 00:05:15,000 --> 00:05:20,000 a win win situation. But I still don't even know how to approach that to not scare them away or 64 00:05:20,000 --> 00:05:25,000 to not over promise. And we can talk about like being honest and not over 65 00:05:25,000 --> 00:05:30,000 committing in the things that we promise in a minute or two. But 66 00:05:30,000 --> 00:05:35,000 it's kind of hard. It's hard to get into a completely new field when you're so comfortable 67 00:05:35,000 --> 00:05:40,000 in the field you're in right now. Right. By any people like I can I can write a book, I can self publish it. And I know that 68 00:05:40,000 --> 00:05:45,000 there's thousands, if not tens of thousands of people who would support me immediately because they like what I write 69 00:05:45,000 --> 00:05:50,000 anyway and they would just give it a try. But there is a level beyond that and it requires 70 00:05:50,000 --> 00:05:55,000 a very different approach. And I'm as scared as I am excited to go into that world. 71 00:05:55,000 --> 00:06:00,000 So I'm trying to grow, you know, like as a person. 72 00:06:00,000 --> 00:06:05,000 Sure. Kind of. Yeah. Right. And even if you decide not to go 73 00:06:05,000 --> 00:06:10,000 that route, having gone through the process and creating the option to 74 00:06:10,000 --> 00:06:15,000 evaluate it is sound like a super valuable process. How did you 75 00:06:15,000 --> 00:06:20,000 is the way you connect with agents still pretty much just through referrals from other 76 00:06:20,000 --> 00:06:25,000 authors? Is it? Yeah. It's all back channel. And that's the thing that I find 77 00:06:25,000 --> 00:06:30,000 kind of it's funny. I want to write a book about building in public the idea of 78 00:06:30,000 --> 00:06:35,000 attracting attention and credibility through your work that you 79 00:06:35,000 --> 00:06:40,000 present to people without going into DMs or behind 80 00:06:40,000 --> 00:06:45,000 people's backs in a beneficial and positive way. And yet to be able to write 81 00:06:45,000 --> 00:06:50,000 the book the way I want it to write, I have to employ these mechanisms. It's kind of it does 82 00:06:50,000 --> 00:06:55,000 introduce a lot of doubt in me and into my capacity to both 83 00:06:55,000 --> 00:07:00,000 hold the thoughts, you know, the cognitive dissonance of wanting to write about this thing, but having to do things that don't 84 00:07:00,000 --> 00:07:05,000 really necessarily align with it to get to the point where I then can do it. It's 85 00:07:05,000 --> 00:07:10,000 a very complicated way. But yes, there's a lot of back channel stuff, a lot of introductions, a lot of 86 00:07:10,000 --> 00:07:15,000 referrals, a lot of asking people to do you a favor and then, you know, promising something in return 87 00:07:15,000 --> 00:07:20,000 and people not even talking to you if you don't have a referral, that kind of stuff. That is very real. 88 00:07:20,000 --> 00:07:25,000 And in the league that I'm trying to play, it is extremely hard to 89 00:07:25,000 --> 00:07:30,000 get anywhere because I thought I might just as well go big. Go go to the people 90 00:07:30,000 --> 00:07:35,000 who have been supporting these extremely popular books and making them real, 91 00:07:35,000 --> 00:07:40,000 helping people that I've seen succeed incredibly. So I 92 00:07:40,000 --> 00:07:45,000 want to be in that league if I even try. So why not? Because I might as well shoot for the stars. So, yeah, 93 00:07:45,000 --> 00:07:50,000 I've been doing this. Yeah. And the other side of this is I still want to 94 00:07:50,000 --> 00:07:55,000 talk to my self-published friends. So we talked a lot about Paul Miller last week. I think even the week 95 00:07:55,000 --> 00:08:00,000 before. We've been mentioning that guy quite a bit. And I got him to commit 96 00:08:00,000 --> 00:08:05,000 to a podcast interview with me, which is nice. I'm going to chat with him next week and then that'll be 97 00:08:05,000 --> 00:08:10,000 on the show. I'm really looking forward to talking to him. He's been quite supportive of this show, 98 00:08:10,000 --> 00:08:15,000 which I'm extremely grateful for. He put it into his newsletter as well and referenced our 99 00:08:15,000 --> 00:08:20,000 conversation there. And from that alone, people have actually reached out to me. 100 00:08:20,000 --> 00:08:25,000 I saw your thing in Paul's newsletter. So here's my opinion, which is one of the best feelings 101 00:08:25,000 --> 00:08:30,000 for anybody who has friends. It's nice to have friends that help you with these kinds of things to reach 102 00:08:30,000 --> 00:08:35,000 more people. So that was cool. So I'm very excited for that. If you have anything that you think I should ask 103 00:08:35,000 --> 00:08:40,000 him, let me know. Like here or through back channels. 104 00:08:40,000 --> 00:08:45,000 I just want to make this an extremely interesting conversation. And I remember that you've actually hung out 105 00:08:45,000 --> 00:08:50,000 with him a couple weeks ago. So if you have anything nice and surprising 106 00:08:50,000 --> 00:08:55,000 that would surprise him, let me know. I'd be super curious to hear you two riff 107 00:08:55,000 --> 00:09:00,000 on maybe almost designing. So it's funny the parallels between 108 00:09:00,000 --> 00:09:05,000 the traditional publishing industry and the traditional venture capital industry in terms 109 00:09:05,000 --> 00:09:10,000 of you have to get everything through a warm intro and all this sort of stuff. 110 00:09:10,000 --> 00:09:15,000 I'd be curious to hear you two riff on maybe designing 111 00:09:15,000 --> 00:09:20,000 a calm fund for books. What would that look like? What would it have? What would it not have? 112 00:09:20,000 --> 00:09:25,000 That sort of thing. How would you maybe have an open application process 113 00:09:25,000 --> 00:09:30,000 for a publisher or something like that? I don't know. Maybe just 114 00:09:30,000 --> 00:09:35,000 as both being prospective consumers of that, what would you want to see? 115 00:09:35,000 --> 00:09:40,000 Not that I can promise that I'm going to do it, but somebody might do it and that would be great. 116 00:09:40,000 --> 00:09:45,000 Any person that would at least be able to teach me how to do it, it would probably be you. 117 00:09:45,000 --> 00:09:50,000 That is really cool. If you wanted to 118 00:09:50,000 --> 00:09:55,000 be involved, obviously I prefer that because I'm the writer and you're the guy who 119 00:09:55,000 --> 00:10:00,000 knows how to do fun stuff. Talk about fun stuff. What's happening in the 120 00:10:00,000 --> 00:10:05,000 calm fund right now? Let me know how your week went with that. 121 00:10:05,000 --> 00:10:10,000 We had a bunch of big changes that we had to work through the last couple weeks and now 122 00:10:10,000 --> 00:10:15,000 I'm back to the good stuff. My calendar looks a lot more like your 123 00:10:15,000 --> 00:10:20,000 calendar with lots of large blocks, no Zooms and no meetings for a while. 124 00:10:20,000 --> 00:10:25,000 Just reviewing applications. Then I did do a ton of 125 00:10:25,000 --> 00:10:30,000 founder meetings this week. My calendar is just with them. 126 00:10:30,000 --> 00:10:35,000 I'm going to go down doing what is really the fun part of my job. I think it's just analyzing new businesses 127 00:10:35,000 --> 00:10:40,000 and then talking to founders about what they need to get to the next level. 128 00:10:40,000 --> 00:10:45,000 Super fun, super exciting. 129 00:10:45,000 --> 00:10:50,000 It sounds so much better than what happened over the last couple weeks. 130 00:10:50,000 --> 00:10:55,000 It's really cool. 131 00:10:55,000 --> 00:11:00,000 I think we should talk about something. 132 00:11:00,000 --> 00:11:05,000 I think so too. 133 00:11:05,000 --> 00:11:10,000 You've been grappling with this much more directly. 134 00:11:10,000 --> 00:11:15,000 I'm curious to ask you the question. 135 00:11:15,000 --> 00:11:20,000 Maybe here's the back story. 136 00:11:20,000 --> 00:11:25,000 Some people might know, way back in the day, I don't even know, maybe seven, eight years ago, 137 00:11:25,000 --> 00:11:30,000 I started writing an ebook. I called it the MicroSaaS ebook. I learned a bunch of things about 138 00:11:30,000 --> 00:11:35,000 bootstrapping these small SaaS businesses, micro SaaS's, etc. 139 00:11:35,000 --> 00:11:40,000 Learned a bunch of stuff, got a bunch of good advice from a bunch of different people and just started aggregating it into this 140 00:11:40,000 --> 00:11:45,000 ebook. I never finished it. The main reason why I didn't finish it, 141 00:11:45,000 --> 00:11:50,000 I did publish each chapter by chapter, so a lot of people did get some value out of the chapters, 142 00:11:50,000 --> 00:11:55,000 but I never finished it as a project. 143 00:11:55,000 --> 00:12:00,000 The main thing that derailed me was this variation of imposter syndrome. 144 00:12:00,000 --> 00:12:05,000 It's so hard to give advice in this space 145 00:12:05,000 --> 00:12:10,000 without starting to feel like you're creeping into the whole nasty, get rich quick scheme online. 146 00:12:10,000 --> 00:12:15,000 There's varying degrees from the super extreme, 147 00:12:15,000 --> 00:12:20,000 obvious fraudster, huckster kind of crowd to people who have pretty good advice, 148 00:12:20,000 --> 00:12:25,000 but are probably embellishing quite a lot and then still selling you stuff on it. 149 00:12:25,000 --> 00:12:30,000 I just felt kind of icky as I started to wade more and more in there. 150 00:12:30,000 --> 00:12:35,000 I just couldn't properly calibrate. 151 00:12:35,000 --> 00:12:40,000 I'd write something and then I would add 17 caveats to it 152 00:12:40,000 --> 00:12:45,000 because I didn't want to come across as a huckster, but then I'd be like, "Well, this is crap writing. 153 00:12:45,000 --> 00:12:50,000 Nobody wants to read this. It's not to the point." 154 00:12:50,000 --> 00:12:55,000 I just kind of got stuck there. 155 00:12:55,000 --> 00:13:00,000 First question I'd like to hear is, you've been writing in a similar genre for a while and very consistently. 156 00:13:00,000 --> 00:13:05,000 What do you think about and grapple with that or does that even resonate with you at all? 157 00:13:05,000 --> 00:13:10,000 Oh, man, it resonates so much with me on so many levels. 158 00:13:10,000 --> 00:13:15,000 From just writing anything that I write, I always have this feeling of, 159 00:13:15,000 --> 00:13:20,000 "Am I even qualified to do this, to talk about this?" Not necessarily to do it because I've often 160 00:13:20,000 --> 00:13:25,000 literally done the thing that I write about. I try to stay very close to my actual experience. 161 00:13:25,000 --> 00:13:30,000 When it comes to making extrapolations from stuff, I always wonder, 162 00:13:30,000 --> 00:13:35,000 "Is this just me trying to act like I know 163 00:13:35,000 --> 00:13:40,000 something?" That's my imposter syndrome. Am I even capable of making 164 00:13:40,000 --> 00:13:45,000 this claim? Not, "Is the claim true?" But, "Should I be making the 165 00:13:45,000 --> 00:13:50,000 claim?" Very, very big problem that I have. I have this not just in writing. I have this in anything 166 00:13:50,000 --> 00:13:55,000 that I do. On Twitter, when I talk about my work, biggest problem. I don't want 167 00:13:55,000 --> 00:14:00,000 to promise the wrong thing. That's one of the biggest issues that I 168 00:14:00,000 --> 00:14:05,000 run into when I market my course, my Twitter course. It's basically me 169 00:14:05,000 --> 00:14:10,000 telling people how to not be inauthentic. That's the course. The course is 170 00:14:10,000 --> 00:14:15,000 just be yourself. Here are the couple of ways that you can engage with people and still be honest. 171 00:14:15,000 --> 00:14:20,000 That's what the course is. Here's a building in public schedule you can use that I've seen people 172 00:14:20,000 --> 00:14:25,000 successfully use. That is real because it actually happened. Here's what an audience is. Here's what a 173 00:14:25,000 --> 00:14:30,000 community is. This is how you can think about this. Where you can go and find people. There's no 174 00:14:30,000 --> 00:14:35,000 promise in the course to like, within an hour, you make $10,000 or 175 00:14:35,000 --> 00:14:40,000 anything like this. That is the Huxter level of stuff that they try to sell you on. 176 00:14:40,000 --> 00:14:45,000 Every day you grow your Twitter following by 1000 people. You could probably do this if you 177 00:14:45,000 --> 00:14:50,000 were to offer people a free MacBook if they 178 00:14:50,000 --> 00:14:55,000 follow you and then never follow through. You could probably do this so you could get a lot of followers. 179 00:14:55,000 --> 00:15:00,000 It just wouldn't last. Anything that sounds like this, even remotely 180 00:15:00,000 --> 00:15:05,000 sounds like this. If you take this course, you will automatically 181 00:15:05,000 --> 00:15:10,000 guaranteed grow your Twitter following. I can't say this. I cannot 182 00:15:10,000 --> 00:15:15,000 for the life of me make the promise that this will help you because there's always a chance it 183 00:15:15,000 --> 00:15:20,000 won't. And for that reason my mind is like, well, then you shouldn't ever promise anything at all. 184 00:15:20,000 --> 00:15:25,000 It's a big problem. So I've learned to, like what you said, wrap 185 00:15:25,000 --> 00:15:30,000 my strong statements into qualifiers where I say 186 00:15:30,000 --> 00:15:35,000 from my own experience, this is what I think. Or this might not be 187 00:15:35,000 --> 00:15:40,000 true for everybody, but. Or you still have to put in your own effort to make this happen 188 00:15:40,000 --> 00:15:45,000 but this strategy usually tends to, you know, the stuff that makes it boring, I still put this in. 189 00:15:45,000 --> 00:15:50,000 I then have an editorial step and most of the things I do, both on Twitter when I write 190 00:15:50,000 --> 00:15:55,000 my tweets or in writing when I do my articles or my books or whatever, I still read through and 191 00:15:55,000 --> 00:16:00,000 try to find the points where my imposter syndrome is very, very clearly showing and then 192 00:16:00,000 --> 00:16:05,000 condense them into a phrase that may or may not be less intense 193 00:16:05,000 --> 00:16:10,000 than the thing that I already have written in the draft. But yeah, I struggle with this all the time. Like even 194 00:16:10,000 --> 00:16:15,000 now, talking about the things that we've been talking about, you notice like with me 195 00:16:15,000 --> 00:16:20,000 in publishing and stuff, I still don't feel like a writer that even deserves to get this kind of attention 196 00:16:20,000 --> 00:16:25,000 from agents that work with other writers that have made it. It is bizarre and I 197 00:16:25,000 --> 00:16:30,000 have to actively learn vocabulary to talk about my own work that is 198 00:16:30,000 --> 00:16:35,000 both optimistic and truthful. And that's one of the biggest problems. We can 199 00:16:35,000 --> 00:16:40,000 talk about this later. But I want to be optimistic and promise up. Sorry, what did you say? 200 00:16:40,000 --> 00:16:45,000 Yeah, I was just reiterating that. I like that. Optimistic and truthful. Because it's hard, right? Talking 201 00:16:45,000 --> 00:16:50,000 about anything in the future that you want to do, you cannot be honest about it because it hasn't 202 00:16:50,000 --> 00:16:55,000 happened yet. How are you supposed to make a bold claim about something that you're 203 00:16:55,000 --> 00:17:00,000 probably going to achieve if you put the work into it, but that hasn't happened yet? 204 00:17:00,000 --> 00:17:05,000 I may be overthinking this. I have a strong feeling I am. But 205 00:17:05,000 --> 00:17:10,000 that's what keeps me. I have a lot of optimism in my life and I have a lot of 206 00:17:10,000 --> 00:17:15,000 knowledge that I can do it. I have a lot of hope, maybe, that's the best word here, that I get there. 207 00:17:15,000 --> 00:17:20,000 But since it's not a clear guaranteed thing, I would rather not talk about it than to promise 208 00:17:20,000 --> 00:17:25,000 too much and then be shown or show in public that I didn't reach it. 209 00:17:25,000 --> 00:17:30,000 Yeah. That makes sense. I think 210 00:17:30,000 --> 00:17:35,000 that makes a lot of sense to be very, very careful about promising results or 211 00:17:35,000 --> 00:17:40,000 essentially just don't promise results at all. 212 00:17:40,000 --> 00:17:45,000 How do you think about stuff that is a little less 213 00:17:45,000 --> 00:17:50,000 clear, which would be more extrapolating? And I think specifically 214 00:17:50,000 --> 00:17:55,000 when you wrote the Wuschett founder, 215 00:17:55,000 --> 00:18:00,000 I think grow your audience is 216 00:18:00,000 --> 00:18:05,000 it doesn't quite deliver on maybe people, even though you're not making a promise of results, 217 00:18:05,000 --> 00:18:10,000 people sort of expect that there's some promise of results. But if they don't grow their audience, it's not the end of the world. 218 00:18:10,000 --> 00:18:15,000 Right? Okay. It's important. They did pay money for the thing. They should get some value. But it's not the end of the world. 219 00:18:15,000 --> 00:18:20,000 But if we're talking about how to build a business or what kind of business 220 00:18:20,000 --> 00:18:25,000 to build, it could be that people are going to sink a year of their life or they're going to quit their job 221 00:18:25,000 --> 00:18:30,000 or they're going to put $100,000 of their savings at risk. 222 00:18:30,000 --> 00:18:35,000 How do you think about the same question, but even just 223 00:18:35,000 --> 00:18:40,000 advice? Even, "Hey, here's how to think about niching" or "here's the right way to test 224 00:18:40,000 --> 00:18:45,000 and to know when you validated the product and when to double down. How do you know when to go full time on 225 00:18:45,000 --> 00:18:50,000 a project?" That sort of thing. I don't know. How do you feel about writing around that? 226 00:18:50,000 --> 00:18:55,000 I mean, it's hard, right? One of the reasons that I think my introduction 227 00:18:55,000 --> 00:19:00,000 to the first book, To Zero, To Sold, has been that all of the things that I'm writing about 228 00:19:00,000 --> 00:19:05,000 are drawn from my own experience. So you will find some of these things work for you 229 00:19:05,000 --> 00:19:10,000 and some not. It really depends on the unique circumstances of your own experience. This is both 230 00:19:10,000 --> 00:19:15,000 the book, a kind of a guidebook because it has topics and themes 231 00:19:15,000 --> 00:19:20,000 and a narrative of something that has happened. It's an extrapolation of knowledge. 232 00:19:20,000 --> 00:19:25,000 I've been writing about advice too. It's got meta. I've written two or three articles on my own blog 233 00:19:25,000 --> 00:19:30,000 about how to take advice or not take advice because I struggle with this. 234 00:19:30,000 --> 00:19:35,000 I wanted to have something in writing about my own thoughts that kind of say, "Yes, advice is 235 00:19:35,000 --> 00:19:40,000 useful when deliberately applied to the unique context and circumstances of your 236 00:19:40,000 --> 00:19:45,000 own life." You can look at what is the person doing that is giving that advice? 237 00:19:45,000 --> 00:19:50,000 In what context has this advice been formulated? Where does it originate from? 238 00:19:50,000 --> 00:19:55,000 Is that just a guess that they make or is there some data to back it up? And if so, 239 00:19:55,000 --> 00:20:00,000 is that data applicable to my situation? Could that happen to me? 240 00:20:00,000 --> 00:20:05,000 Context is a big thing. So I always try to give people at least a hint that this is not 241 00:20:05,000 --> 00:20:10,000 a recipe. Even recipes come with phrases 242 00:20:10,000 --> 00:20:15,000 that are quite wishy-washy because they cook the thing. What does that mean? What temperature 243 00:20:15,000 --> 00:20:20,000 should I cook it at? And if you have a temperature range, should I go up or down depending on the size of 244 00:20:20,000 --> 00:20:25,000 the whatever? Even recipes are unspecific and still should 245 00:20:25,000 --> 00:20:30,000 get you to a certain result. And I feel with our advice that comes from 246 00:20:30,000 --> 00:20:35,000 such unique and I guess a high 247 00:20:35,000 --> 00:20:40,000 potential margin for error activities. Most of us, like you and I, 248 00:20:40,000 --> 00:20:45,000 we run several but not dozens of businesses ourselves. But we're 249 00:20:45,000 --> 00:20:50,000 exposed to many businesses, particularly you because you see the insights of all these bootstrap 250 00:20:50,000 --> 00:20:55,000 businesses. Maybe for you it's even more than for me. I try to have a lot of mentees 251 00:20:55,000 --> 00:21:00,000 and other people that I follow on their own journey. So I still have that level of insight that you have just through the fund. 252 00:21:00,000 --> 00:21:05,000 But in many ways, our unique personal history of 253 00:21:05,000 --> 00:21:10,000 entrepreneurial experience comes from a couple of events. I had a lot of things 254 00:21:10,000 --> 00:21:15,000 that didn't work. Exactly. Quite constrained. I had a lot 255 00:21:15,000 --> 00:21:20,000 of experiences where things didn't work out. So that is great. And a couple where it did. But 256 00:21:20,000 --> 00:21:25,000 anything that comes and is extrapolated from that, I kind of have to give people the story of 257 00:21:25,000 --> 00:21:30,000 how this experience came to be with the advice. I think that's how I do it. Which is 258 00:21:30,000 --> 00:21:35,000 why you find in the things that I write about, unless it's about somebody else's story, I 259 00:21:35,000 --> 00:21:40,000 always try to put my own experience in there so that people can, if they're interested in following this advice, 260 00:21:40,000 --> 00:21:45,000 follow the trail of story back to where it came from. That's how I deal with it. It's kind of just 261 00:21:45,000 --> 00:21:50,000 abstracting away this layer of "Oh, I'm great." Which does not 262 00:21:50,000 --> 00:21:55,000 exist. That's where the Huxler thing comes in. Where people just say "I know, so 263 00:21:55,000 --> 00:22:00,000 here is what you should do." And then you ask "Well, where do you know it from?" It doesn't matter. 264 00:22:00,000 --> 00:22:05,000 This is the truth. I would never, ever argue anything like this about 265 00:22:05,000 --> 00:22:10,000 my advice knowing that a lot of the advice that I took as a founder when I was building my business 266 00:22:10,000 --> 00:22:15,000 didn't work out for me. It worked for others. 267 00:22:15,000 --> 00:22:20,000 There is no factual truth to the advice. It is so contextual that 268 00:22:20,000 --> 00:22:25,000 any advice that I take is contextualized, so I assume that people that read mine 269 00:22:25,000 --> 00:22:30,000 have to recontextualize what I tell them as well. 270 00:22:30,000 --> 00:22:35,000 Have you ever had a negative, but maybe just any interaction? 271 00:22:35,000 --> 00:22:40,000 But let's just say negative first question. Along these lines, a negative interaction 272 00:22:40,000 --> 00:22:45,000 with someone in your audience from anything that you've written. Your books, your newsletter, your podcast 273 00:22:45,000 --> 00:22:50,000 recently where somebody says along this specific thing where they're like "Ah, this is 274 00:22:50,000 --> 00:22:55,000 advice." Or "These guys don't know what they're talking about." Or anything like that. 275 00:22:55,000 --> 00:23:00,000 Or do you think you've always given it enough of a rapper that 276 00:23:00,000 --> 00:23:05,000 it just never comes up? Honestly, I couldn't give you a clear example that stuck in my mind. 277 00:23:05,000 --> 00:23:10,000 So I think I've been successful enough in not over-promising 278 00:23:10,000 --> 00:23:15,000 or maybe not even selling to the wrong people because most of the 279 00:23:15,000 --> 00:23:20,000 time this kind of response comes from people who were looking for something else and then 280 00:23:20,000 --> 00:23:25,000 are trying to force the thing that doesn't work for them into their life. It doesn't work and then they get mad. 281 00:23:25,000 --> 00:23:30,000 If you look at most Amazon reviews, there is the saying that 282 00:23:30,000 --> 00:23:35,000 a good book on Amazon can never have a five-star rating because it has to be wrong for somebody. 283 00:23:35,000 --> 00:23:40,000 And those people then tend to give you a one-star review because it was wrong 284 00:23:40,000 --> 00:23:45,000 and it's not their fault because why would it ever be their fault? So they have a good complaint that they pulled 285 00:23:45,000 --> 00:23:50,000 out of somewhere and they put it on Amazon. 286 00:23:50,000 --> 00:23:55,000 I strive for a 4.7 rating on Amazon. That's what I'm going for. I think both my 287 00:23:55,000 --> 00:24:00,000 books are there at this point. I think around in that range. I'm getting responses 288 00:24:00,000 --> 00:24:05,000 from people who it wasn't for because then I can see that the way I wrote it was actually for the 289 00:24:05,000 --> 00:24:10,000 people that quite like it. That are smart enough to see that this is not a recipe. 290 00:24:10,000 --> 00:24:15,000 This is a companion that you can reference and ask a question and they 291 00:24:15,000 --> 00:24:20,000 might give you something back and then you have to still fit it into your reality. 292 00:24:20,000 --> 00:24:25,000 I think I've been successful. I do remember something but you know what I remember about it? 293 00:24:25,000 --> 00:24:30,000 It's not the thing that this person was complaining about. I think it was on Twitter about something that I said. 294 00:24:30,000 --> 00:24:35,000 It was the incredibly strong community response of my followers who just argued 295 00:24:35,000 --> 00:24:40,000 strongly against what that person was saying. It wasn't like a mob that descended on them. 296 00:24:40,000 --> 00:24:45,000 It wasn't like a shitstorm or anything like it. But I think I have curated not only 297 00:24:45,000 --> 00:24:50,000 a good way of talking about the things that I'm talking about but also curated a highly supportive and 298 00:24:50,000 --> 00:24:55,000 positive group of people around my work that will defend it but in a nice and empowering way. 299 00:24:55,000 --> 00:25:00,000 They actually try to teach instead of just hate which is the Twitter default I guess 300 00:25:00,000 --> 00:25:05,000 and object. This kind of thing where people just listen to you to object. 301 00:25:05,000 --> 00:25:10,000 They find something to object to. They were actually trying to convince that person that their perspective 302 00:25:10,000 --> 00:25:15,000 was just undereducated in a certain way and they tried to educate them. It was really nice. 303 00:25:15,000 --> 00:25:20,000 I think leading with kindness gets people that are kind into your boat 304 00:25:20,000 --> 00:25:25,000 and then they start you know if the boat is rocking they try to balance it out. 305 00:25:25,000 --> 00:25:30,000 It's been quite helpful for me. I think so. Yeah. I like what you said about 306 00:25:30,000 --> 00:25:35,000 a good book shouldn't have a five star rating and I've been kind of wondering 307 00:25:35,000 --> 00:25:40,000 if that's a pretty good lens to view 308 00:25:40,000 --> 00:25:45,000 a lot of other media as well. Right. You know that 309 00:25:45,000 --> 00:25:50,000 your tweets shouldn't have like not yours like one's tweets shouldn't have a five star rating. 310 00:25:50,000 --> 00:25:55,000 Your advice shouldn't have a five star rating. Right. Like everything 311 00:25:55,000 --> 00:26:00,000 should be maybe five percent controversial or something like that. 312 00:26:00,000 --> 00:26:05,000 I don't know. I've been thinking about that like because I think I know for sure 313 00:26:05,000 --> 00:26:10,000 for myself I'm like you know biologically sort of hardwired to 314 00:26:10,000 --> 00:26:15,000 try to be as epistemologically correct as I possibly 315 00:26:15,000 --> 00:26:20,000 can. Right. Like here's what I think I know. Here's what I'm pretty sure I know. Here's what I know I don't know. 316 00:26:20,000 --> 00:26:25,000 Here's the area where unknown unknowns might be you know like really not 317 00:26:25,000 --> 00:26:30,000 trying to say anything that I don't know and really calibrate it. 318 00:26:30,000 --> 00:26:35,000 And like a while back I made a small change. I used to write 319 00:26:35,000 --> 00:26:40,000 just tweets with all a lot of those caveats you know in my opinion this or that or the other. And it's kind of like 320 00:26:40,000 --> 00:26:45,000 I think I cannot for the life of me remember who said it but somebody just told me like it's a tweet 321 00:26:45,000 --> 00:26:50,000 like in my opinion is implied right. They know it's not a citation 322 00:26:50,000 --> 00:26:55,000 in an academic journal you know or a line from the New York Times. It's a tweet. 323 00:26:55,000 --> 00:27:00,000 So like just say the thing. And honestly that was good advice. Right. 324 00:27:00,000 --> 00:27:05,000 I mean not only did it make the tweets you know perform better 325 00:27:05,000 --> 00:27:10,000 in any objective sense but it also generated better conversation including 326 00:27:10,000 --> 00:27:15,000 you know incentivizing the most insightful kind of critiques or counter replies 327 00:27:15,000 --> 00:27:20,000 the ideas when you really make something seem like it has the 328 00:27:20,000 --> 00:27:25,000 appropriate amount of uncertainty attached. People don't feel compelled to correct you. They're like oh well this guy's just saying 329 00:27:25,000 --> 00:27:30,000 you know his opinion knowing that it's probably not right. I don't see that if you just assert something 330 00:27:30,000 --> 00:27:35,000 as true you also get like the strongest pushback from the you know maybe the smartest or best counter 331 00:27:35,000 --> 00:27:40,000 argument. So it's been a positive change. I wonder about applying that 332 00:27:40,000 --> 00:27:45,000 to this domain specifically. Right. You know are 333 00:27:45,000 --> 00:27:50,000 and basically I think you are very similar. I mean I don't know if I think you would agree like you're like 334 00:27:50,000 --> 00:27:55,000 there's a whole spectrum you know going all the way from like I don't know who to call out like 335 00:27:55,000 --> 00:28:00,000 Andrew Tate or some of these guys you know is on the far side of just like completely making up all kinds of 336 00:28:00,000 --> 00:28:05,000 stuff. And then there's us like way over here. I think we're like very very very close 337 00:28:05,000 --> 00:28:10,000 and I almost wonder like is that you know like is it actually imposter 338 00:28:10,000 --> 00:28:15,000 syndrome right imposter syndrome is not is a thing that's like not like yeah you're correct you're not as good at this as you think 339 00:28:15,000 --> 00:28:20,000 imposter syndrome is a syndrome where you're supposed to counteract it right. You're supposed to kind of do 340 00:28:20,000 --> 00:28:25,000 like you know you're not you're not ready for this but you actually are 341 00:28:25,000 --> 00:28:30,000 do we have a little bit of imposter syndrome around kind of business advice right. 342 00:28:30,000 --> 00:28:35,000 Should we be trying to move that dial a little bit and 343 00:28:35,000 --> 00:28:40,000 assert things with more less uncertainty bars around them. 344 00:28:40,000 --> 00:28:45,000 What do you think. Well I think there's a good reason why 345 00:28:45,000 --> 00:28:50,000 lawyers or non lawyers let's just say that whenever they talk about legal things put a 346 00:28:50,000 --> 00:28:55,000 disclaimer I am not a lawyer in front of it right. Like if you're not a legal expert but you have a legal 347 00:28:55,000 --> 00:29:00,000 opinion it can get tricky. So you put the disclaimer in front of it and that that is 348 00:29:00,000 --> 00:29:05,000 one of the extremes because anything that has like a legal implication or financial advice 349 00:29:05,000 --> 00:29:10,000 that kind of stuff. There are clear social rules to advise like this 350 00:29:10,000 --> 00:29:15,000 and if it's given in a manipulative way or it's just plain wrong 351 00:29:15,000 --> 00:29:20,000 then you can be held accountable for that advice. And I think we are 352 00:29:20,000 --> 00:29:25,000 with our advice like any business building thing we're kind of in between these two right. Like we are stuck 353 00:29:25,000 --> 00:29:30,000 between accountability right. There's no way that's held accountable for saying like 354 00:29:30,000 --> 00:29:35,000 oh this sector is overrated don't build there and then somebody or vice versa 355 00:29:35,000 --> 00:29:40,000 everybody should be building an X. Somebody goes and builds a business and loses a bunch of money like there's no 356 00:29:40,000 --> 00:29:45,000 liability to me in the way there is like tax advice or legal 357 00:29:45,000 --> 00:29:50,000 advice or whatever. But I don't think there should be either but it is 358 00:29:50,000 --> 00:29:55,000 an interesting kind of opposing end right. Because like we 359 00:29:55,000 --> 00:30:00,000 look at our advice and we try to be careful. We could both be very 360 00:30:00,000 --> 00:30:05,000 like we could be like chat GPT and be very very convinced that what we 361 00:30:05,000 --> 00:30:10,000 say is true. Because chat GPT as it writes it's super convincing. 362 00:30:10,000 --> 00:30:15,000 It's very it feels like the chat GPT knows exactly what it's talking 363 00:30:15,000 --> 00:30:20,000 about in the way that it writes. It's trying to be very clear in that way. 364 00:30:20,000 --> 00:30:25,000 And I don't. So I think there is a level of imposter syndrome in there. 365 00:30:25,000 --> 00:30:30,000 But I was just thinking you mentioning Tate and the kind of scammy 366 00:30:30,000 --> 00:30:35,000 hustle university kind of group of people. People who are trying to sell the dream. 367 00:30:35,000 --> 00:30:40,000 Get rich and actually. Yeah. Yeah. It's crap educators. 368 00:30:40,000 --> 00:30:45,000 Crap educators. You know people who try to. You are 369 00:30:45,000 --> 00:30:50,000 not a student. You are the product I guess in these kind of things. Or you are effectively 370 00:30:50,000 --> 00:30:55,000 part of a pyramid scheme. Like a lot of these get rich 371 00:30:55,000 --> 00:31:00,000 quick things are in their own nature. Schemes where you get 372 00:31:00,000 --> 00:31:05,000 taught to invite more people into the course and you get a commission on every sale. Like 373 00:31:05,000 --> 00:31:10,000 there's a lot of that going on. And I feel I don't want to be associated with that even in the slightest. 374 00:31:10,000 --> 00:31:15,000 I probably wouldn't even want to be in the same industry as these people are. Which is unfortunately 375 00:31:15,000 --> 00:31:20,000 entrepreneurship. So it feels I'm very actively trying 376 00:31:20,000 --> 00:31:25,000 to deflect any association with people like this. To the extent that I 377 00:31:25,000 --> 00:31:30,000 don't follow them on Twitter or social media. If they follow me I block them 378 00:31:30,000 --> 00:31:35,000 or remove them. Like people like this are not welcome in my group. Not because they are 379 00:31:35,000 --> 00:31:40,000 always wrong. Because they are often right. Like they will tell you essentially the 380 00:31:40,000 --> 00:31:45,000 same thing. They will tell you to find people to sell stuff to and solve their problems. Which is kind 381 00:31:45,000 --> 00:31:50,000 of a good thing. But they say this in a way that costs you $5,000. 382 00:31:50,000 --> 00:31:55,000 My book is not that. You know it's a different. It's just they sell the dream. They sell you 383 00:31:55,000 --> 00:32:00,000 on the dream of being like them. And they lie to you often. Like allegedly 384 00:32:00,000 --> 00:32:05,000 about what their life is like. Not a fan. And don't want to be associated 385 00:32:05,000 --> 00:32:10,000 with this in the slightest. But yeah I think that 386 00:32:10,000 --> 00:32:15,000 pushes me into a corner that I also don't like to be in. Which is kind of a person that is always 387 00:32:15,000 --> 00:32:20,000 super self-doubtful about anything I say and super defensive whenever somebody 388 00:32:20,000 --> 00:32:25,000 pokes a hole in it. Yeah it's a tough problem for me. What I'm trying to 389 00:32:25,000 --> 00:32:30,000 say is that when I look at this industry of 390 00:32:30,000 --> 00:32:35,000 education around entrepreneurship. I have kind of made my peace with the fact that 391 00:32:35,000 --> 00:32:40,000 it will always be something that I struggle with. To just find myself 392 00:32:40,000 --> 00:32:45,000 be confident enough to talk about it. Confidence is the word. That's what JetGPT is. It sounds 393 00:32:45,000 --> 00:32:50,000 confident. And that confidence is something that I would have to fake. 394 00:32:50,000 --> 00:32:55,000 And since I don't want to be fake or be around people who like fake. I will 395 00:32:55,000 --> 00:33:00,000 not be fake. And that's the thing. How we act. How we embellish or don't 396 00:33:00,000 --> 00:33:05,000 attract people that are prone to resonate with things that are embellished or not. 397 00:33:05,000 --> 00:33:10,000 And in my community that I think I've gathered or that has gathered 398 00:33:10,000 --> 00:33:15,000 around me. People like honest. People like earnest. And people like 399 00:33:15,000 --> 00:33:20,000 truthful. And those are the people that I want to attract into my world because 400 00:33:20,000 --> 00:33:25,000 I just deal more easily with people who don't lie to me. Or who don't have an 401 00:33:25,000 --> 00:33:30,000 incentive to lie to be on the same level as everybody around them. So 402 00:33:30,000 --> 00:33:35,000 that is the part of our entrepreneurship community that I want to attract. And if there are people 403 00:33:35,000 --> 00:33:40,000 in this community who would rather dream of the Lamborghini life. That is 404 00:33:40,000 --> 00:33:45,000 wonderful for them. And it's unfortunate that the only people who they resonate with 405 00:33:45,000 --> 00:33:50,000 are those hucksters that take their money and then buy themselves a Lamborghini. That's just the unfortunate 406 00:33:50,000 --> 00:33:55,000 reality out there. But I think the audience that you want to serve. That is 407 00:33:55,000 --> 00:34:00,000 how you should act. Be like them. Be appear to them. And if that means being honest and a little bit 408 00:34:00,000 --> 00:34:05,000 doubtful whenever you say something that you think may or may not be perfect for them. Just preface it with 409 00:34:05,000 --> 00:34:10,000 whatever you need. It won't be as shiny as selling somebody. Take this one hour 410 00:34:10,000 --> 00:34:15,000 course and make $10,000. But I don't need to attract people who like 411 00:34:15,000 --> 00:34:20,000 shiny. That's the truth that I've found for myself. I don't want to attract people 412 00:34:20,000 --> 00:34:25,000 who would be attracted by that kind of stuff. That's a good lens. Okay. 413 00:34:25,000 --> 00:34:30,000 So I like that answer. That ultimately it's a sort of selfish act. 414 00:34:30,000 --> 00:34:35,000 In the sense that... Or not selfish is not the right word. But it's self-serving. 415 00:34:35,000 --> 00:34:40,000 It's the idea that... It's self-preservational. That's what it is. You're building the community that you actually want to be 416 00:34:40,000 --> 00:34:45,000 around versus attracting the wrong people. I want to throw 417 00:34:45,000 --> 00:34:50,000 out a very interesting devil's advocate position here. Because I've been sort of 418 00:34:50,000 --> 00:34:55,000 talking about this. I've just found it interesting. I've had a couple of in-person discussions about this 419 00:34:55,000 --> 00:35:00,000 recently. So I think 420 00:35:00,000 --> 00:35:05,000 one thing that you learn when you just get, I would say, like a 421 00:35:05,000 --> 00:35:10,000 little more plugged in. You have a lot of 422 00:35:10,000 --> 00:35:15,000 back channel visibility. Especially in the fund and investing world. 423 00:35:15,000 --> 00:35:20,000 You see a lot of company data and stuff like that. 424 00:35:20,000 --> 00:35:25,000 Also just having a peer network that has more visibility. You start to learn 425 00:35:25,000 --> 00:35:30,000 that there is a lot of... You have the obvious hucksters 426 00:35:30,000 --> 00:35:35,000 on one end where everybody can see this as kind of BS. 427 00:35:35,000 --> 00:35:40,000 There is a very murky gray area where there are a lot of people 428 00:35:40,000 --> 00:35:45,000 on social media who significantly embellish 429 00:35:45,000 --> 00:35:50,000 either their own success or the performance of their 430 00:35:50,000 --> 00:35:55,000 "playbook" or guides or masterminds or 431 00:35:55,000 --> 00:36:00,000 whatever the product is. There's a lot of people out there that you know, 432 00:36:00,000 --> 00:36:05,000 well I know for example, that's completely not true. Either the premise 433 00:36:05,000 --> 00:36:10,000 that you're sort of selling this on or the performance metrics that you're asserting this 434 00:36:10,000 --> 00:36:15,000 sort of strategy has. There's a lot of people out there that are doing to a 435 00:36:15,000 --> 00:36:20,000 varying degree kind of like everywhere from light to heavy embellishment while 436 00:36:20,000 --> 00:36:25,000 being still well clear of the outright fraud or just complete crap. They have pretty good ideas 437 00:36:25,000 --> 00:36:30,000 but they are really nudging the needle in their favor in a lot 438 00:36:30,000 --> 00:36:35,000 of slightly questionable ways. They're playing 439 00:36:35,000 --> 00:36:40,000 fast and loose with the truth, let's put it that way. So here's the thing 440 00:36:40,000 --> 00:36:45,000 which is looking at the 441 00:36:45,000 --> 00:36:50,000 contour of the consequences for this. On the one hand, there seems to be 442 00:36:50,000 --> 00:36:55,000 almost no downside to doing this in the sense that these folks are 443 00:36:55,000 --> 00:37:00,000 still very accepted among professional peers even when people know they're doing this. 444 00:37:00,000 --> 00:37:05,000 They're not shunned, they're not only associating with other hucksters, they're still welcome 445 00:37:05,000 --> 00:37:10,000 to do whatever, speak at events, join groups, etc. Show up 446 00:37:10,000 --> 00:37:15,000 at dinners, nobody's like, "Oh, that person is like, they embellish all the time on Twitter or wherever else." 447 00:37:15,000 --> 00:37:20,000 There's just kind of no tangible downside to doing 448 00:37:20,000 --> 00:37:25,000 this and there seems to be real meaningful upside which is that this kind 449 00:37:25,000 --> 00:37:30,000 of embellishment tends to grow audiences very fast. 450 00:37:30,000 --> 00:37:35,000 And you often see these folks that you know are just making stuff up left and right, 451 00:37:35,000 --> 00:37:40,000 building kind of platforms, brands, for example something like the Calm MBA, 452 00:37:40,000 --> 00:37:45,000 you know it's just very clear that doing this is a very effective growth tactic, right? 453 00:37:45,000 --> 00:37:50,000 All things equal. If your content is good, shading the truth to make everything look 454 00:37:50,000 --> 00:37:55,000 better just works on the internet because it's just impossible to verify 455 00:37:55,000 --> 00:38:00,000 and like if you go and look at, sorry this is getting a little rambly but I'm going to wrap it up here, 456 00:38:00,000 --> 00:38:05,000 which is there's a YouTube channel called We're the Coffeezilla and it's this guy 457 00:38:05,000 --> 00:38:10,000 who just takes down these hucksters, right? He just goes and does this kind of pseudo-investigative 458 00:38:10,000 --> 00:38:15,000 journalism where he kind of just calls out these people for being total frauds and 459 00:38:15,000 --> 00:38:20,000 nothing happens. There's just no example of this YouTube actually 460 00:38:20,000 --> 00:38:25,000 taking down one of these folks. 461 00:38:25,000 --> 00:38:30,000 The kind of devil's advocate question here is, I mean obviously we're kind of, 462 00:38:30,000 --> 00:38:35,000 we can't really do this because we're doing this on a podcast and people are going to know, right? But like 463 00:38:35,000 --> 00:38:40,000 is it a good idea to do it a little bit? It just seems to be 464 00:38:40,000 --> 00:38:45,000 only upside and almost no downside in a world of the 465 00:38:45,000 --> 00:38:50,000 internet. What's our best argument for not doing it, I guess? 466 00:38:50,000 --> 00:38:55,000 I mean there are great arguments to do it because there are immediate wins. 467 00:38:55,000 --> 00:39:00,000 That's what you said, right? You built your audience more easily. 468 00:39:00,000 --> 00:39:05,000 You're like underlying we think you have a good mission and good content. 469 00:39:05,000 --> 00:39:10,000 It might just be self-delusional in some ways and in the way that we 470 00:39:10,000 --> 00:39:15,000 dream. Most dreams that we have for our lives aren't delusions until they are either 471 00:39:15,000 --> 00:39:20,000 true or proven wrong. So in many ways our entrepreneurial 472 00:39:20,000 --> 00:39:25,000 mission and division that we have, they are just as 473 00:39:25,000 --> 00:39:30,000 delusional as what these people do in embellishing their stories. It's just a different way 474 00:39:30,000 --> 00:39:35,000 of being delusional. But I'm so happy you mentioned Coffee Silica 475 00:39:35,000 --> 00:39:40,000 because that's one of the few things that I actually, or a few YouTube channels that I actively support on Patreon for example. 476 00:39:40,000 --> 00:39:45,000 Because I think what this guy is doing is massively important journalism. 477 00:39:45,000 --> 00:39:50,000 And that's the thing. There are traces of these things all over the place. And maybe YouTube has 478 00:39:50,000 --> 00:39:55,000 an incentive to keep these channels with people like Logan Paul, with the whole crypto 479 00:39:55,000 --> 00:40:00,000 zoo thing that is a debacle. You should 480 00:40:00,000 --> 00:40:05,000 watch this. Coffee Silica did a trilogy on just that one guy 481 00:40:05,000 --> 00:40:10,000 scamming a lot of people, allegedly. Not just allegedly. I think there is now a lawsuit. 482 00:40:10,000 --> 00:40:15,000 There are legal actions to this, but they have to come 483 00:40:15,000 --> 00:40:20,000 from somewhere beside the platforms that these people used to amplify their 484 00:40:20,000 --> 00:40:25,000 or just even facilitate their scams or their questionable activities. 485 00:40:25,000 --> 00:40:30,000 Let's just say that. So that's why I support Coffee Silica because he's a great 486 00:40:30,000 --> 00:40:35,000 YouTuber. He just does it really well. And he's very outspoken about 487 00:40:35,000 --> 00:40:40,000 not just truth, because that is always a questionable thing to begin with, but integrity. 488 00:40:40,000 --> 00:40:45,000 And I feel that we are moving in the world of creators that I'm 489 00:40:45,000 --> 00:40:50,000 part of and that you're also part of, we are moving to a much more trust-centric 490 00:40:50,000 --> 00:40:55,000 even business world that we're in. Because these people, they get a lot of attention and in the attention 491 00:40:55,000 --> 00:41:00,000 economy, that pays a lot of money. But I think particularly with the admin 492 00:41:00,000 --> 00:41:05,000 of AI, generative AI and conversational AI, this will shift a little bit. 493 00:41:05,000 --> 00:41:10,000 We're going to shift from just mere attention to intimacy. Intimacy 494 00:41:10,000 --> 00:41:15,000 being like having actual relationships with people or with AIs. That's the thing. 495 00:41:15,000 --> 00:41:20,000 I watched a video, I think I wrote about it last week, of AI researchers talking about 496 00:41:20,000 --> 00:41:25,000 the big problems that we have with social media. Everything is attention focused. 497 00:41:25,000 --> 00:41:30,000 Every metric is optimized for attention. Well, what's that going to be for an AI? For things that can 498 00:41:30,000 --> 00:41:35,000 be like people and they can get into your mind. They can build a relationship with you. And that's going to be intimacy. 499 00:41:35,000 --> 00:41:40,000 Who do I trust? Do I trust this thing that is just a virtual person? Is it real? 500 00:41:40,000 --> 00:41:45,000 Is there a person behind this? Is there a Turing test somewhere? 501 00:41:45,000 --> 00:41:50,000 A social shift from just mere attention to actual intimacy. Supposedly. 502 00:41:50,000 --> 00:41:55,000 Who knows? That's an estimate, a guess somewhere. But I think it's true. 503 00:41:55,000 --> 00:42:00,000 And I see this. I'm going to write about this this week because I see this in how 504 00:42:00,000 --> 00:42:05,000 marketing happens for creators. There used to be a time where you could just get somebody's ad and run it on 505 00:42:05,000 --> 00:42:10,000 your show and they would be happy with it and your audience would maybe click it, maybe listen to it, maybe do something about it. 506 00:42:10,000 --> 00:42:15,000 But that is over. I think now we have so much like creator centric advertising 507 00:42:15,000 --> 00:42:20,000 and sponsorships where the creators are acutely aware of the fact. I'm taking away from my own 508 00:42:20,000 --> 00:42:25,000 podcast here by talking about this. That they are the 509 00:42:25,000 --> 00:42:30,000 people who run sponsorships or ads on their podcasts or newsletters or whatever. They're not just purchasing 510 00:42:30,000 --> 00:42:35,000 the eyes of the audience. They're actually purchasing a small part of that person's credibility. 511 00:42:35,000 --> 00:42:40,000 Of that podcast host's credibility, newsletter author's credibility. And that is not new. Obviously 512 00:42:40,000 --> 00:42:45,000 every advertising is kind of credibility based. But now people 513 00:42:45,000 --> 00:42:50,000 know that there are coffee zillows out there that will look at them and they will be very 514 00:42:50,000 --> 00:42:55,000 acutely aware if somebody is actually just running a perfectly fine ad like I don't know 515 00:42:55,000 --> 00:43:00,000 Squarespace or something as a sponsor or if it's FTX. Something that has 516 00:43:00,000 --> 00:43:05,000 the crypto world, a very questionable authority to begin 517 00:43:05,000 --> 00:43:10,000 with and people just get a lot of money. There was this thing with these 518 00:43:10,000 --> 00:43:15,000 Scottish titles. Do you remember? Do you have any idea about that? I think coffee zilla was talking about this too. 519 00:43:15,000 --> 00:43:20,000 You can get a Lord or Lady title by purchasing a $50 520 00:43:20,000 --> 00:43:25,000 certificate by some company from Hong Kong that owns a tiny 521 00:43:25,000 --> 00:43:30,000 little parcel of land in Scotland because there's an old Scottish law. That's great. It's 522 00:43:30,000 --> 00:43:35,000 bizarre. And it's actually not true. If you are 523 00:43:35,000 --> 00:43:40,000 in your own land in Scotland, you're technically a Laird, which is the Scottish version of Lord 524 00:43:40,000 --> 00:43:45,000 or a Lady of that place. If you own that for residential purposes, that is 525 00:43:45,000 --> 00:43:50,000 kind of Scottish law. Everybody that owns a house is a Lord. Everybody who owns property 526 00:43:50,000 --> 00:43:55,000 that is not just like novelty square meter or something or a 527 00:43:55,000 --> 00:44:00,000 square foot of Scotland. But these companies sell a square foot of 528 00:44:00,000 --> 00:44:05,000 Scotland so you can legally call yourself a Lord or Lady. It's kind of a novelty gift. But 529 00:44:05,000 --> 00:44:10,000 the thing is in their advertising, which they paid a lot of money for, sometimes six figures 530 00:44:10,000 --> 00:44:15,000 for a couple months of running it on popular podcasts and YouTube shows, they were talking 531 00:44:15,000 --> 00:44:20,000 about as if, or they were giving those creators scripts and approval 532 00:44:20,000 --> 00:44:25,000 of scripts as if it was actually a legal title. So they were technically 533 00:44:25,000 --> 00:44:30,000 selling something that they would not be allowed to sell because there is a bylaw in Scotland about 534 00:44:30,000 --> 00:44:35,000 these novelty titles not actually amounting to real titles in terms of Scotland. 535 00:44:35,000 --> 00:44:40,000 So the coffee cellar and the field of YouTube 536 00:44:40,000 --> 00:44:45,000 investigators, which is hilarious that that actually exists as a profession that people can make a living 537 00:44:45,000 --> 00:44:50,000 from just from YouTube money that comes in. They discovered this and they called 538 00:44:50,000 --> 00:44:55,000 out so many creators and so many creators were just taking 539 00:44:55,000 --> 00:45:00,000 in those five figure deals, 20,000, 50,000 for running this for a couple months 540 00:45:00,000 --> 00:45:05,000 looking at it saying, yeah, this is kind of weird, but I'll still say it. That's fine. I mean, it's a novelty 541 00:45:05,000 --> 00:45:10,000 gift item. What are you going to do? And there were like hundreds of high profile YouTubers 542 00:45:10,000 --> 00:45:15,000 who fell into this and were called out and had to cut ties with the advertiser, had to 543 00:45:15,000 --> 00:45:20,000 publicly apologize on the YouTube channels, which is always hilarious to watch because you can kind of feel 544 00:45:20,000 --> 00:45:25,000 how they kind of trying to save their reputation, but still not really commit to having 545 00:45:25,000 --> 00:45:30,000 not done enough research. And that's the thing that now creators do more and more is actively 546 00:45:30,000 --> 00:45:35,000 research. When I get a sponsor on my newsletter, my podcast, I'm now digging into them. 547 00:45:35,000 --> 00:45:40,000 I'm doing due diligence for every single sponsor that goes 548 00:45:40,000 --> 00:45:45,000 onto my podcast or my newsletter. And if there's anything that looks like a red flag, it's a no 549 00:45:45,000 --> 00:45:50,000 for me because I know that my trust that I have with the people that I serve with my 550 00:45:50,000 --> 00:45:55,000 content is so slowly earned but so quickly destroyed that one ad or 551 00:45:55,000 --> 00:46:00,000 just running one little 20 second segment by the wrong people could 552 00:46:00,000 --> 00:46:05,000 completely disrupt or destroy my reputation. And that's something that that is intimacy 553 00:46:05,000 --> 00:46:10,000 because only somebody who actually cares about me would be disappointed when I give 554 00:46:10,000 --> 00:46:15,000 them Scottish titles or whatever that was good. Nobody thing was called right. If I'm just some guy 555 00:46:15,000 --> 00:46:20,000 peddling something talking about certain things, I'm kind of entertaining. Yeah, that would be different. 556 00:46:20,000 --> 00:46:25,000 Yeah, he's just trying to sell this skip. But if they have a relationship with me, just like I want to have 557 00:46:25,000 --> 00:46:30,000 a relationship with everybody that listens to me or watches me, then I cannot do this. 558 00:46:30,000 --> 00:46:35,000 And this is why I will never even go into this territory because I feel I value 559 00:46:35,000 --> 00:46:40,000 this potential intimacy with somebody that shares my brain for the hour that they 560 00:46:40,000 --> 00:46:45,000 listen to me so much more than the hundreds or thousands of dollars that I could be making. 561 00:46:45,000 --> 00:46:50,000 I still need to make money, but I will try to make it on the exact side of 562 00:46:50,000 --> 00:46:55,000 like the exact opposite of where hucksters are. I want to be as clear, as transparent, and as 563 00:46:55,000 --> 00:47:00,000 honest as I can. And if the people that want to sponsor my work are not, then they're not going to be on there. 564 00:47:00,000 --> 00:47:05,000 Yeah, interesting. 565 00:47:05,000 --> 00:47:10,000 Yeah, I think maybe the argument that you're the counter argument that you're making to my to be 566 00:47:10,000 --> 00:47:15,000 clear, this is a devil's advocate. This is not what I actually think, but I just thought it was an interesting thing to sort 567 00:47:15,000 --> 00:47:20,000 of spar with is that ultimately there are consequences, right? 568 00:47:20,000 --> 00:47:25,000 The sort of like arc of Internet karma might be long, but 569 00:47:25,000 --> 00:47:30,000 it sort of bends towards justice and eventually 570 00:47:30,000 --> 00:47:35,000 eventually it comes back around to bite you. Although some people do seem to be very effective at just 571 00:47:35,000 --> 00:47:40,000 continuously chasing the next audience and the next audience. 572 00:47:40,000 --> 00:47:45,000 That's the thing, right? They burn bridges wherever they go. And at some point, I'm sorry for the background noise. I'm having people do some 573 00:47:45,000 --> 00:47:50,000 work in my house at this point. So you are live with my basement being finished. 574 00:47:50,000 --> 00:47:55,000 I have an example for this. When I started writing, 575 00:47:55,000 --> 00:48:00,000 I was reaching out to a lot of authors that I really admire and had a chat with 576 00:48:00,000 --> 00:48:05,000 one of them, obviously not going to name them, but they tried to kind of sell me 577 00:48:05,000 --> 00:48:10,000 on maybe building some kind of MLM online education 578 00:48:10,000 --> 00:48:15,000 system with them. 579 00:48:15,000 --> 00:48:20,000 One of those moments was like, "Yeah, I love your books, but boy am I never going to talk to you 580 00:48:20,000 --> 00:48:25,000 again." And they have since moved on to greener pastures, different fields 581 00:48:25,000 --> 00:48:30,000 of writing. And I'm like, "Yeah, this kind of reputation, it's not just that you 582 00:48:30,000 --> 00:48:35,000 burn your reputation with your potential customers, your prospects, which is bad enough. 583 00:48:35,000 --> 00:48:40,000 And then you need to move to a different market and kind of rediscover that to begin with if you do these kinds of things. But you burn 584 00:48:40,000 --> 00:48:45,000 reputation with people in your industry that could generate massive, hopefully, opportunities for you. 585 00:48:45,000 --> 00:48:50,000 Like potential collaborators, partners, people who are also just as interested as you are 586 00:48:50,000 --> 00:48:55,000 in making money, maybe not using the same methods, but they still try to build a business 587 00:48:55,000 --> 00:49:00,000 in that field. And boy, every time somebody in private 588 00:49:00,000 --> 00:49:05,000 talks to me about that author, they get the story. I will not shut up about the story because 589 00:49:05,000 --> 00:49:10,000 this is just, "Don't meet your heroes." And they are obviously projecting to be somebody 590 00:49:10,000 --> 00:49:15,000 completely different from who they actually are. And that is something that 591 00:49:15,000 --> 00:49:20,000 in an industry, people will know. And if you want to be known as the person who 592 00:49:20,000 --> 00:49:25,000 tries to scam their way around their audience, go for it. But I don't want 593 00:49:25,000 --> 00:49:30,000 to be that. I don't want to close my opportunities. I don't want to make ten dollars today 594 00:49:30,000 --> 00:49:35,000 if I can make a couple thousand a year from now. I don't think 595 00:49:35,000 --> 00:49:40,000 of it as finite games. I don't want to play finite games. I don't want to scam. You don't see me 596 00:49:40,000 --> 00:49:45,000 do giveaways or that kind of stuff because I know I could get a lot of followers, get a lot of 597 00:49:45,000 --> 00:49:50,000 attention, get a lot of hype, but why would I? I was just going to try to get these people one at a time by just 598 00:49:50,000 --> 00:49:55,000 having a nice interaction with them because that is what builds intimacy. I want to attract people 599 00:49:55,000 --> 00:50:00,000 who want to respond to me on a personal basis, who want to build a relationship with me. 600 00:50:00,000 --> 00:50:05,000 That's my rant and my story. 601 00:50:05,000 --> 00:50:10,000 That seems really helpful. I feel like I'm coming to a sort of loose conclusion on this topic. 602 00:50:10,000 --> 00:50:15,000 I'm going to try and summarize it and see what you think. 603 00:50:15,000 --> 00:50:20,000 I do think probably you and I have a light version of imposter syndrome on this 604 00:50:20,000 --> 00:50:25,000 in the sense that probably we are over-correcting 605 00:50:25,000 --> 00:50:30,000 in terms of over-caviating, over-calibrating and saying 606 00:50:30,000 --> 00:50:35,000 "I'm going to get a lot of information on this." 607 00:50:35,000 --> 00:50:40,000 Just basically adding even more uncertainty in there than maybe there actually is. 608 00:50:40,000 --> 00:50:45,000 Probably we could dial that back a little bit and just do a version of what I started doing 609 00:50:45,000 --> 00:50:50,000 with my tweets by just saying, "Look, 610 00:50:50,000 --> 00:50:55,000 it's assumed that entrepreneurship is a tricky domain. There's no correct 611 00:50:55,000 --> 00:51:00,000 thing that we say is in my experience to the best of my understanding as far as I can tell, 612 00:51:00,000 --> 00:51:05,000 blah, blah, blah, blah." I'm not going to repeat that over and over and over again. 613 00:51:05,000 --> 00:51:10,000 I think maybe we're making the case for building public here as well, which is to have 614 00:51:10,000 --> 00:51:15,000 a public conversation about the underlying epistemology of 615 00:51:15,000 --> 00:51:20,000 what is knowable and what's not knowable and how we approach that and then just letting 616 00:51:20,000 --> 00:51:25,000 folks understand that framework. Hopefully they consume 617 00:51:25,000 --> 00:51:30,000 both of those things simultaneously. Maybe we clip this and it's 618 00:51:30,000 --> 00:51:35,000 part of the common BA as Arvind and Tyler talk about what they know and don't know. 619 00:51:35,000 --> 00:51:40,000 But yeah, build in public. Just say how we're thinking about it and put that out 620 00:51:40,000 --> 00:51:45,000 there as well and then that maybe gives you license to not certainly not embellish 621 00:51:45,000 --> 00:51:50,000 or anything but to not feel like you have to constantly caveat 622 00:51:50,000 --> 00:51:55,000 and feel like, "Oh, well, can I really say this or not?" 623 00:51:55,000 --> 00:52:00,000 You just say what you think as long as you've told people how you think about it. 624 00:52:00,000 --> 00:52:05,000 I think that's one of the things that you've done so well over the last couple of weeks, with things not working out 625 00:52:05,000 --> 00:52:10,000 as you expected in your own business there. Something you said a couple of weeks ago, 626 00:52:10,000 --> 00:52:15,000 is you shared everything, you talked about everything in public, your decisions were out there, 627 00:52:15,000 --> 00:52:20,000 your assumptions were out there. It's hard to fill in the blanks if there are no blanks. 628 00:52:20,000 --> 00:52:25,000 And blanks usually are things where people put in the worst of them because they have their own 629 00:52:25,000 --> 00:52:30,000 doubts and their own things internally that they project on others. 630 00:52:30,000 --> 00:52:35,000 By us just talking about our own insecurity, I think we defeat some of the insecurity because we can always 631 00:52:35,000 --> 00:52:40,000 reference this as us honestly sharing our opinion on the topic. There's no pretense here. 632 00:52:40,000 --> 00:52:45,000 What's the pretense in being vulnerable? Can you fake vulnerability? 633 00:52:45,000 --> 00:52:50,000 It's probably much, much harder to fake being vulnerable than it is to fake being invincible. 634 00:52:50,000 --> 00:52:55,000 To cut only the finest things and show them, that is much easier than to show the whole thing 635 00:52:55,000 --> 00:53:00,000 or make up things to represent that. Yeah, I think you're right. Building in public is a great 636 00:53:00,000 --> 00:53:05,000 way out of there because it also invites not just a conversation, but empathy. 637 00:53:05,000 --> 00:53:10,000 It invites empathy of the reader, the viewer, the person on the 638 00:53:10,000 --> 00:53:15,000 other side to see that you are a human being trying to make something happen. 639 00:53:15,000 --> 00:53:20,000 Most of the time when you read a book, you read thoughts. And if you don't think of them as just 640 00:53:20,000 --> 00:53:25,000 something that comes out of somebody's mind, you take them as gospel. 641 00:53:25,000 --> 00:53:30,000 Most of the time, unless you're reading the Bible or the Quran or whatever holy book you're reading, 642 00:53:30,000 --> 00:53:35,000 you're not reading the words of God. You're reading the words of man. And the words of man are as fallible as 643 00:53:35,000 --> 00:53:40,000 the person is behind them. And if you forget that, then you 644 00:53:40,000 --> 00:53:45,000 have no empathy for the writer or for the author. So I guess maybe I'm asking for my 645 00:53:45,000 --> 00:53:50,000 empathy by people who consume because 646 00:53:50,000 --> 00:53:55,000 that also makes them less prone to take advice that was not meant for them in the first place. It's to understand 647 00:53:55,000 --> 00:54:00,000 where this is coming from. Maybe I'm renting here, but I just want to teach people to 648 00:54:00,000 --> 00:54:05,000 teach people to take less 649 00:54:05,000 --> 00:54:10,000 advice differently. I just want people to see advice 650 00:54:10,000 --> 00:54:15,000 and see, "Okay, here's an option." Not, "Here's a surefire way to do X in one hour." Or not, "Here 651 00:54:15,000 --> 00:54:20,000 are 10 ways that are guaranteed to XYZ." I just hate these kinds of things because they are never true. 652 00:54:20,000 --> 00:54:25,000 Literally, they can't be true because if they were, you wouldn't need to state them or you wouldn't 653 00:54:25,000 --> 00:54:30,000 state them that way. You would be more elaborate in actually transporting the information. 654 00:54:30,000 --> 00:54:35,000 Looking at anything as potential, not as a guaranteed 655 00:54:35,000 --> 00:54:40,000 way, that would be a good start. I really like this topic. I could go on about this forever, but I don't think we 656 00:54:40,000 --> 00:54:45,000 should. 657 00:54:45,000 --> 00:54:50,000 We got a little bit off track with the Calm MBA scheduling, the origin 658 00:54:50,000 --> 00:54:55,000 of this podcast. That's my fault entirely. 659 00:54:55,000 --> 00:55:00,000 I think what did we decide between now and the next episode of this? 660 00:55:00,000 --> 00:55:05,000 The last thread we left it on was basically wanting to run some slightly 661 00:55:05,000 --> 00:55:10,000 more experimental, more workshop versions of things. It might be either one day or a couple of days or 662 00:55:10,000 --> 00:55:15,000 a weekend or something like that. 663 00:55:15,000 --> 00:55:20,000 I think between now and the next one, we commit to doing the first one. Basically, how long is it going to be? What's the rough agenda? 664 00:55:20,000 --> 00:55:25,000 Which exact dates are it? 665 00:55:25,000 --> 00:55:30,000 That is a good topic for weeks of reflective work. 666 00:55:30,000 --> 00:55:35,000 Most importantly, probably when are we going to start this? Because I thrive on deadlines and I 667 00:55:35,000 --> 00:55:40,000 fear deadlines at the same time, so this is going to be fun. 668 00:55:40,000 --> 00:55:45,000 We both need to shuffle around probably a couple of things or make sure that we overlap and are present for that. 669 00:55:45,000 --> 00:55:50,000 Let's think about that. Let's reconvene here in a week and 670 00:55:50,000 --> 00:55:55,000 have an extended conversation about this. Maybe cut our big 671 00:55:55,000 --> 00:56:00,000 exploratory topic a bit short and get back into the Comm MBA a little bit. 672 00:56:00,000 --> 00:56:05,000 It's so nice for us to be able to talk about whatever we want in whatever way we want to. It's really 673 00:56:05,000 --> 00:56:10,000 enjoyable. But see if we can actually focus on the project that we are intentionally 674 00:56:10,000 --> 00:56:15,000 building here again. Let's find a time, 675 00:56:15,000 --> 00:56:20,000 a length and a really rough bullet point content 676 00:56:20,000 --> 00:56:25,000 situation. Let's work on that and talk about it next week. 677 00:56:25,000 --> 00:56:30,000 Do we have anybody to shout out? I don't want to shout out 678 00:56:30,000 --> 00:56:35,000 Paul Millard again because we've been doing this forever. But I've been reading his work and it's been so 679 00:56:35,000 --> 00:56:40,000 enjoyable. Do you have anybody you want to give a big shout out to? 680 00:56:40,000 --> 00:56:45,000 Yeah, you know who comes to mind is Elizabeth Yin. She's an investor at the 681 00:56:45,000 --> 00:56:50,000 Hustle Fund. Her Twitter handle is 682 00:56:50,000 --> 00:56:55,000 very funny. It's dunkhippo33 683 00:56:55,000 --> 00:57:00,000 D-U-N-K. Anyway, Elizabeth is at Hustle Fund. 684 00:57:00,000 --> 00:57:05,000 I just refuted a thread that she had earlier today that was great. Just 685 00:57:05,000 --> 00:57:10,000 basically on the state of fundraising. 686 00:57:10,000 --> 00:57:15,000 More of a traditional VC, I would say. 687 00:57:15,000 --> 00:57:20,000 Coming through things through that lens. 688 00:57:20,000 --> 00:57:25,000 Also one of the few people on Twitter from that kind of perspective that really just says it like it is. 689 00:57:25,000 --> 00:57:30,000 Very bluntly, doesn't embellish or anything like that. 690 00:57:30,000 --> 00:57:35,000 She had a bunch of great advice for founders on how to think about fundraising this year. 691 00:57:35,000 --> 00:57:40,000 Elizabeth. 692 00:57:40,000 --> 00:57:45,000 I love her tweets as well. It's nice to have a view into the VC world through her. 693 00:57:45,000 --> 00:57:50,000 That is both instructive and intriguing. 694 00:57:50,000 --> 00:57:55,000 I don't have many people that I enjoy reading from that world as much. 695 00:57:55,000 --> 00:58:00,000 That's a wonderful suggestion. 696 00:58:00,000 --> 00:58:05,000 And work on the Com MBA because I really want to see this progress that we are about to 697 00:58:05,000 --> 00:58:10,000 make over the next week. Well, I guess let's catch up again a week from now. 698 00:58:10,000 --> 00:58:15,000 Talk to you later. See you. Bye.