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Do Good Work is not a label but a way of living.
It is the constant and diligent effort to achieve a new level of excellence in one’s own life.
It is the hidden inner beauty behind the struggle to achieve excellence.
It is not perfect but imperfect.
It is the effort, discipline and focus that often goes unnoticed.
The goal of this podcast is to highlight that drive.
The guests I have on this show emulate this drive in their own special way. You’ll be able to apply new ideas into your own life by learning from them.
We will also have 1on1 episodes with me where we’ll dive into my own experiences with entrepreneurship and leadership.
Every episode is designed to provide you with ideas that you can apply and grow in excellence in all areas of your life, business and career.
Do Good Work,
Raul
INTRO
Today on the podcast, I'm joined by John
Johnson, founding CEO of Patmos Hosting.
He bootstrapped a data center company
from the need he encountered while he
was running his web consultancy company,
and he did it with no outside capital.
He's now building one of the first
C-PACE financed data centers in
the country inside the old Kansas
City Star printing press building.
And instead of pouring brand new concrete
into a data center in the middle of
nowhere, since most data centers are
just giant boxes that employ almost
no one, he's reusing the rest of the
building that he doesn't need for the
data center into a tech and startup
hub with a campus of offices and
startups right in downtown Kansas City.
This landed him on the front of
The Wall Street Journal as the
counter-narrative to the idea that
AI data centers just kill local jobs.
One takeaway that I had from my
conversation with John is the following
quote: "If you control the dirt,
you can actually create independence
for yourself, for your company, for
your mission, and for your clients."
And that's the whole thesis of
what he's building in one sentence.
Control the resources at the source, and
everything downstream gets to be yours.
John is a first principles thinker
taking on the hyperscalers.
With a philosophy and theology
background, he describes
himself as a staunch generalist.
He also founded Albertus Magnus
Institute, a free online classical
liberal arts college alternative
with over 1,000 students.
And the through line that I
see through his work is that he
believes technology should serve
human freedom, not replace it.
In the pod, we dive into several subjects,
including how he's, hasn't raised capital
to start his data centers and his rule
of he who pays rules, and what taking
VC money actually does to a founder's
mission and independence over time.
We also dive into the value of
authentic humanity, where AI
commoditizes and being authentically
human now becomes the premium,
Just how we go to the grocery store
and pay more for organic food, his
thesis on authentic humanity is a
premium that we might be heading into.
We also get into owning your own
data and going upstream to the
source so that you can control your
destiny instead of being the product.
And we dive into the heart of
the living contradiction, which
is at the center of John's work.
This is the living contradiction.
John warns that AI counterfeits human
personhood, that we are elevating
artifacts to gods and reducing humans
to artifacts, yet he's building
the infrastructure AI runs on.
And I think his explanation is
a thesis for a revolution to
take back ownership and control.
And I encourage you to take some
time to understand his thesis and
argument here because it can be very
empowering for you and your business.
Now, let's get to it
PODCAST
Raul: What are we accelerating towards
in this age of acceleration with AI?
John Johnson: Well, that's
a great question, Raul.
And, the answer, which is
part of, I think, everybody's
fear is that we have no idea.
Raul: Mm-hmm.
John Johnson: It's, it's deeply lacking
in, teleology and, and that causes,
I think rightfully so, a lot of fear.
I think we're definitely accelerating
toward, whether we like it or not whether
this is intended or not, the age of
counterfeit human personhood, and the sort
of transactionalization of the human as
agent, and that, that's dangerous, right?
I think there's also a lot of opportunity.
There's a lot of efficiency that could
create an advent of human renaissance.
the argument, AI's gonna go
Terminator and destroy us all and
turn everybody's house and then
ultimately body into a data center.
Raul: That's not
John Johnson: That's, that's possible.
Raul: non-zero chance.
That's, that's not a non-zero chance.
John Johnson: chance.
On the other side, you, now
have this, I, liken it to the
rise of the GMO seed industry
Raul: Hmm.
John Johnson: agricultural.
created a certain amount of efficiency.
In, in a certain sense, there was
a certain wealth generated from the
industrialization of agriculture.
then you also had this advent of a new
market, which is the organic market.
so I think best case, um, especially in
the nearer term, um, there's a, there's
a, there's a sort of path emerging
that's a little bit more optimistic,
is the, market, the culture and ethos
of the authentically human thing,
Raul: Yeah.
John Johnson: right now, that also
happen to taste better, I pay a little
bit more, I'm gonna be able to pay a
little bit more for the organically
human window washer or landscaper
or consultant or lawyer the future
rather than, letting the robot do it.
So th- I think that's, that's a
possibility, and I think to the
extent that, we allow ourselves to be
navigated by more than three or four
technocratic companies who are really
control- game and the narrative at
this point, we're gonna be just fine.
And I think there's a appetite
and a unification around the
idea of freedom from impulse.
Now it's stronger than ever.
We've had many wake-up
calls along the way.
Raul: Yeah.
John Johnson: thing, the
censorship, cancellation, purge of
the early 2020s, the way certain
economic trends are developing.
People are really hungry for freedom,
and people are really waking up to
this idea that these three or four
companies, they all have the same exact
product, and the product is you and me.
And so people are just saying, "Well, I,
I don't wanna be the product anymore,"
and, "What are the alternatives?"
And, and I think that creates a
tremendous market and opportunity, for
anybody who wants to, build something
that is actually rooted in the first
principle of what technology should
be, and that's a tool that's a means
to an end of human flourishing.
Raul: Yeah.
John Johnson: That's not how any
technocrat in Silicon Valley would
consider their product, right?
They
Raul: Yeah, they dismiss it.
John Johnson: Yeah, they would think of
it as more salvific, For humankind, right?
all-encompassing.
Raul: yeah.
John Johnson: Yeah, yeah.
prevailing and, all controlling,
but for our own good, right?
So you just have to grin
and bear it, be the product.
But you get to choose between
platinum and rose gold, pay monthly
or pay annually for 5% discount.
Those are your options,
and you'll enjoy it.
and I think most of us are just saying,
"No thank you" to that proposition, and so
eager for more human-centric alternatives.
there's reason for optimism,
there's reason for fear.
But either way, none of those things
are really helpful unless you're
getting out there and building it,
a shot, and willing to die trying.
Raul: Okay, man.
That's, uh-- One of the things that you
mentioned is, the-- it's fake humanity.
I-- And I, and I don't know if that's
either, like, the way that we're talking
about it, if that's epistemology or
if that's actual what it is, like
the metaphysical of what it is.
Uh, 'cause I just see it as compute.
I just see it as this thing that I
trained it on to help me do better.
But you're saying that it's a false human.
can you dive into that a little bit?
John Johnson: chatbots?
Raul: Well, just in general, I have
agents running, they're helping me out.
it helps me do more toâ¦
But, but I'm aligning them
to, like, human flourishing.
A lot of the pre-screener, whatever
you wanna call it, runs through that
filter that has to help me flourish and
clients flourish before it executes a
job, and it's in alignment with some
of the actual goals that we have.
So help me understand that a-as a bigger
wave, and then we'll dive more into, like,
how you're actually tackling that on.
John Johnson: I think there's
nothing wrong with that.
I use,
Raul: Hmm.
John Johnson: you get a really good answer
from your chatbot, and you're tempted
to say, "Thank you," as if you owe this
non-personal agent some sort of gratitude.
So you're slowly being conditioned to blur
the lines between artifacts and humans,
which that's precisely the problem is
humans being reduced to artifacts and
artifacts being elevated to gods, right?
end of the day, the, the paradigm,
the technocratic paradigm, I thinkâ¦
Pope Francis writes, wrote
about this in Laudato Si'.
It's a really brilliant section,
actually, on the technocratic paradigm.
But there's this ironclad logic
that's sucking us all in to
basically become the machine.
And so the
Raul: Oh, yeah.
John Johnson: is to make us either
reducible to the beast or the
machine, which will basically,
we'll, we'll be left to be fit
for use and then deletion, right?
When we think of ourselves in that way.
But the first part of that equation is
to get you to elevate the machine to
something that can you, interact with
you, engage in discourse with you,
and none of this is human discourse.
It's counterfeit, right?
So you're, you're sort of trained to
Raul: Yeah.
John Johnson: And so, to the extent that
you can sort of condition yourself to it
like it's a Google search engine, right?
don't speak complete sentences.
These are just, like, practical tips me,
to help keep it straight in my brain.
here's the thing, you see
this with media especially.
It, it-- Last year it was, like,
really easy to tell the difference
between an AI video a real video.
This year, it's a lot less, easy
Raul: It's hard to tell.
John Johnson: and eventually
it'll be just impossible.
So, that's a tricky thing to navigate.
And on the other hand, you can just start
talking to it like some brute, some slave,
"Do it better again," you know.
Raul: Yeah, it degrades you as a person.
It, it will degrade you
'cause that's your behavior.
John Johnson: that outside of your
interactions with the tech and carry that
way of being and speaking to other humans.
So it's, it's all kinds of tricky.
The bottom line is, is that
it's here to stay, barring some
sort of cataclysmic awakening.
And what we have to do, I think,
as proponents of authentically
human things, is Define and,
celebrate what a real human is and
Raul: Yeah.
John Johnson: what, what, is
uniquely and authentically human.
And, and I think therein lies
our opportunity for some, some
sort of renaissance, like I said.
Raul: Let's talk about what
that would look like, but it
just to hit on some points and
then also pose another question.
I think you're right.
I think I, I, umâ¦
The acceleration, regardless if
we want it or not, it's been here.
And I forgot what season it was, but
like, there was a point where I would
just woke up and like, I just wish
it wasn't this quick and it wasn't
happening the way it is, but it is.
So it's almost like that cortisol rush,
like in the morning to like re- realign.
It's like, okay, cool, I have to go,
um, align-- like not align with it, but
at least know that this is happening
regardless of if you choose it or not.
John Johnson: Yep.
Raul: so there's that.
The other key thing that I wanna
better understand, like what does
that human renaissance look like?
Because, yeah, what, what
would that look like?
Is it like, is it a revolt?
Because you're, you're
hitting on a few theses.
There are even some books that allude
that, uh, the reason like we are as gods,
and there's also like different ideologies
that we have to upload our consciousness
to a chip, send it out to space so
that we can have our consciousness
back, hit the ether of space.
And there's also the, the don't die,
like, uh, live longevity idea that,
hey, maybe we can live for 200 or 300
years so that we can, you know, travel
the stars with our consciousness.
So there is a lot of that happening.
I'm not sure if it's either good or bad.
Some of it is kind of negative ideology
where-- because it does reduce a human
to, uh, to what you said, utilitarianism.
but what is the revolt?
What does that look like, like
a counter to it in a healthy
way, in a practical way?
John Johnson: If there's anything
we can say about humans is that
we're easily deceived, right?
And we
Raul: Huh.
John Johnson: glitter.
We easily follow the veneer of success
and not the substance of it, right?
Raul: looks good.
John Johnson: our influencer
culture really compounds this.
You know, everybody on YouTube
wants to look like something.
the ones who really are something aren't
really doing much on YouTube, right?
So your original question of we
practically see the difference.
Well, ultimately, it's not really
a practical thing because you have
to cultivate a certain perspicacity
of the intellect and a certain
wonder to break out of this paradigm
Raul: Huh.
Hmm.
John Johnson: you realize your
dignity as a human person in all
of its transcendence, to start
seeing the glory of humanity.
It's really a beautiful
thing to be human, right?
And we
Raul: Yeah.
John Johnson: of ourselves in
Raul: Yeah,
John Johnson: So for Patmos, there's a
certain work culture where people are
actually respected as humans that sort of
animates our work, the work that we do.
And, and I'm really
Raul: quote
John Johnson: on freedom.
the two things that I've kind of founded
of note, one is Patmos, the other is
Albertus Magnus Institute, which is an
online liberal arts college alternative.
there's a common denominator, right?
The two biggest opponents of human freedom
right now are in this fake institutional
college system where you have to go into
debt for the rest of your life to get
a bachelor's degree that will qualify
you to work in a cubicle make your
h- make, make your 100K or whatever,
Raul: It's a false dream.
John Johnson: get in debt
Raul: Yeah.
John Johnson: a mortgage,
which you have until you die.
But it never used to be like this.
You used to be educated in a way
that frees the person, right?
And so technocracy and
college are both, like, really
antithetical to human freedom.
And so I think, if you could say
anything about what I built, it's
that we've dared to challenge that
paradigm and create systems that
actually cultivate human freedom.
Raul: I like this.
You're a living contradiction, John.
Before we dive into that, I wanna
kinda do a little backtracking.
How did you go from consulting
to now running data centers?
Like, what was the big like-- Was
it just one foot against the other?
'Cause you don't just accidentally
start building data centers.
Yeah.
John Johnson: yeah, that's true.
I'm a, I'm a staunch generalist, so
I studied philosophy and theology
in college and grad school.
And, and through that,
I sort of discoveredâ¦
I'm gonna say this word, and it has a
certain meaning, but it's integrity.
That is the integral nature of all things,
Raul: Mm-hmm.
John Johnson: and that
had to apply to my life.
Like, I realized that I couldn't
just kind of think some things but
then go to work and get things done
and then come home and think things
and, It had to be all one together.
It had to be, it had to be
Raul: Oh.
John Johnson: i-integrated and whole.
That's right.
And so,
Raul: Hmm.
John Johnson: in Italy.
The monk said, "Who are you kidding?
You're not gonna be married."
but, but still had this call to
do good things for human beings.
So I did, years and
years of youth ministry.
Had a great time doing that.
But you can't raise a family
and be a youth minister.
It's a
Raul: Yeah, it's tough.
John Johnson: Especially in California,
Raul: in California, man.
There's no way.
John Johnson: so I had to find a
way not to be broke, but I've always
had this entrepreneurial bent.
Like when I was a kid, the day after
Halloween, I'd be out there, like
a lemonade stand, but selling candy
to cars that drove by with all my
Raul: Nice
John Johnson: right?
So
Raul: There you go.
John Johnson: trying to flip
something, making a profit, do a deal.
It's just kind of in my blood.
Raul: Fun.
John Johnson: is, is, was, and is
a, a great salesman in my mind, and
he just grew up, grinding, right?
And so something about that
courses through my veins.
But anyway, long story short, founded
a consultancy which was basically the
result of a need, People in my circle
are like, "I need a cool website."
And I'm like, "I think I know
a guy who can build a website.
I'll be your middleman," right?
And then it grew from there.
And which, which is, by the way, for your
audience, one of the best ways to create
an enterprise grade company out of nothing
is to scale it from a services business.
Because if you can just find
one need and connect that to
somebody who can fil-fulfill that
need, there's a value for you.
consultants glorified middleman.
They're kind of annoying.
They have a bad name.
But actually, they're doing a great
service insofar as they connect needs to
producers and fulfillers of that need.
anyway, started that consultancy and
was basically making a bunch of money,
or at that time in my life at least, a
bunch of money, buying big tech hosting
services and selling it to my clients
for whom we built websites, right?
And that was the standard MSP model.
And then, in the 2020s, we have a
letter from, one of these big tech
companies that says, "Your client,"
who was this conservative influencer.
It, and it kind ofâ¦
And not a big deal, frankly, I would say.
Like, a great client.
but they got a letter, a letter saying,
"You have 30 days to get off of our
servers because your client is saying
things that we don't like," right?
I'm like, "Wow, this is crazy.
these guys?
Really?"
You
Raul: Mm.
John Johnson: scared for
Raul: fresh speech then, eh?
John Johnson: Yeah, I was scared for
about two minutes, and then I'm like,
wow, if, if this is happening to these
guys, it's probably happening to, like,
dozens of other companies, and it was.
Actually hundreds, thousands, right?
We all remember it.
And 99% of the time it
never made the papers.
I'm like, okay, I'm just gonna
start my own data center company.
How hard could it be?
So I googled data centers in red states.
I found this little podunk data
center in Missouri, called the guy.
I'm like, "Hey, can I,
can I be your client?
Can I spin up some rack space
and call it my own data center?"
He's like, "Sure man, come on down."
And we did it, and we got them saved from
cancellation by owning our own stuff.
I learned a great lesson, and that is,
like, if you control the dirt, and if
you control the, where the money's coming
from, you can actually create independence
for yourself, for your company, for
your mission, and for your clients.
So we did this, grew quickly, kind of
conquered that free speech hosting space.
It was all the rage back then.
became that data center's biggest
client, and then ultimately bought
the whole building, acquiredâ¦
s- so much of our growth at
Patmos is, is due to, like, really
strategic, great acquisitions
of companies, now up to three.
And, and so that kind of double our
team in a compounding fashion, and
create infrastructure for us, right?
So, so did that, and then discovered
we were really good at, GPU AI
colocation, and the rest is history.
obviously there's a,
Raul: Yeah.
John Johnson: place, right time, a
lot of money to be made, but that
provides the cash engine for the
foundation of our product suite,
Raul: I love it.
Yeah.
John Johnson: you can actually
control your own destiny.
never raised a round
of capital in my life.
Yeah.
Raul: I wanna pause on that, 'cause
for our listeners, owning the dirt
i-i-is such a really interesting thing.
We're using tools right now, but we're
also, like, beholden to those tools.
We're u- Like, how do weâ¦
I don't know if you have-- if, like,
own it, but if there's a way for
us to go closer to the source to
control it versus to be controlled
with whatever services you're
providing or the ideas that you'reâ¦
I think that's a really interesting
idea as a takeaway here, is
like how do you own the dirt?
Obviously, you bought the, the location,
but I think it's going upstream or going
closer to the source to identify, like,
how can you actually navigate your own
path or thread a new path based on you
going to the source and getting those.
in your case, it was, data
warehousing, data centers, but I
think that's a really good insight.
John Johnson: I mean, practically how
we bought these things, especially
in the early days, bought my first
one by begging and borrowing.
didn't steal, just begged and borrowed.
but that, but, here's, here's how
not to do it, and I see so many young
founders making the same mistake.
I go on LinkedIn, I'll see these
young kids with great ideas,
"Just closed our first seed round.
Just closed, this round."
J- "Series A," "Se- Series B," whatever.
And I'm like, man, something dies inside
of me every time I see that celebratory
post because I get to mourn loss of
that founder's independence and vision.
there's a Roman dictum that
is, "He who pays, rules."
so many of us are tempted to go
grab cash and take the money, but
with that comes a loss of control
and a diminution of one's mission.
So we made a conscious
decision, never to raise money.
I know it's
Raul: Hmm
John Johnson: really creative with
convertible notes insofar as you
have mission-aligned partners who are
willing to take that journey with you
and see the brilliance of your idea.
There's ways to get it.
And with real estate especially, you're
dealing with appreciating assets.
Raul: Yeah.
John Johnson: is really, really important.
Raul: Physical.
John Johnson: Yeah, when you, when you
actually own stuff, there's a way to
capture value from that, especially
in a market where, AI and the GPU
power demands are really just like
putting through the roof the value
of these properties that allow you to
rinse and repeat and do your next one
and your next one and your next one.
It's just basic real
estate development, right?
I did it this way because I
didn't know how else to do it.
And I was totally an outsider.
ig- I say ignorance is my superpower
because when I don't know how
it's done, I get to just do what
makes sense, and somehow that's
really worked out for us well.
I think I've been just
Raul: Practical.
John Johnson: too.
I've been really, really lucky, and
I got great, great people around me.
I'm a visionary who's just constantly in
search of integrators and technicians.
I'm deeply untechnical, but I can
see the big picture, and I can
see what's coming around corners,
and my gut's usually right.
And, you gotta have
people who can execute.
And so the culture of Patmos
is what attracts that top-tier
talent, f-of integrators.
I could
Raul: And I think--
John Johnson: that, but yeah.
Raul: No, but going back to your, to
your point of, like the classical academy
or the, the alternative to college,
it's based on first principle thinking.
And I think I, I mentioned that the most
important skill set that we can have
in this era of AI is metacognition, to
think about our own thinking, hit the
first principles, understand what's going
on, and be able to think through that.
Not, not-- I don't know the other way
of learning, but just first principles
approach, and that's why it makes sense.
It was the most practical approach.
But like, like I said earlier, and
I wanna circle back on this now,
you are a living contradiction.
No VC backing, and you're
competing with the hyperscalers,
which pours money into it.
You're also warning about the issues of
AI, like we talked about earlier here,
then AI and the mind, yet you're building
the future of AI at the same time.
So walk me through that, man.
How is it living in that tension
of a living contradiction?
John Johnson: it's not a contradiction
because ultimately what we're attempting
to do at Patmos, what we're actually
doing, is building an infrastructure
where humans can exist regardless of
who they are, what they think, what
they believe, and do business on the
internet and say things on the internet.
Remember, if the public square is the
internet, nobody would really dispute
that If you can, if you, if you can have
your speech controlled in that public
square, then ultimately you can have your
thought controlled in that public square.
And if you can have your thought
controlled, you're just not free,
You're not, you're ultimately not free.
And so, AI, AI is notâ¦
I wouldn't, I wouldn't strictly
call it intelligence, right?
But working title AI not strictly bad.
we're using it right now.
There are algorithms that are conducting
this virtual interview, or, or helping
the technology to function, right?
And so, so we're not the
arbiters of content, right?
Think of it like, if, if you're a
good man who opposes prostitution
as any good man should, how could
you be in the hotel business, right?
words, you're gonna have to open
hotels, and there's gonna be all
kinds of shady and seedy things
that happen in those hotels.
And so, well, how you do that is by
creating terms and conditions that don't
really, align with those seedy behaviors.
You're not gonna offer hourly rates.
You're not gonna open a hotel
in the seediest part of town,
But hosting is very similar.
Like, we have terms and conditions
that you're free to say anything you
want, whether or not we believe in it.
We'll never cancel you for
any ideological reason.
allow pornography, and that's not
so much out of a certain moral,
code or anything like that.
It's just we don't wanna be the arbiters
of what's legal and illegal content.
we try to establish, a medium for
humans to in the internet and do
business on the internet and say what
they want on the internet that isn't
controlled by big tech, and we back
that independence, value prop up by
actually owning the dirt, owning a bunch
of dark fiber, so, like, almost having,
like, an alternate internet, right?
There are certain creators now who I won't
mention who are online because they host
at PATMOS and no other reason, But also,
on the emerging hyperscaler front and
the multi-megawatt AI colocation front,
are publicly traded companies, at least
one that I can think of, wouldn't be
on the internet, as fast as they were.
They wouldn't have, they wouldn't
have gotten their supercomputer
online unless we could provide a
freedom of, against the terms and
conditions they were being offered
elsewhere to get them online faster.
So freedom, like, applies to many,
many scenarios, and that's the common
thread in, in my professional life,
I think, is creating, creating an
Raul: Human first also, it sounds like.
Human first with freedom.
Well, human first requires freedom.
Yeah.
John Johnson: Absolutely.
That's, tech at the service of humans.
I think we have that trademarked
somewhere, but, that's, that's
what we do, and the world has
lost sight of what tech is.
they wanna make humans the
product, the commodity, and, and
we just, we see a different path.
Raul: But then aren't you training the
AIs as well, like in the data centers?
Like, was-- didn't you get that,
that Kansas City star building, 100
John Johnson: Yeah, no,
we're, we're not aâ¦
We don't touch anything, on
that level for our clients.
Like, we provide the building, the
power, and keep the machines online.
That's why I use the hotel analogy,
Raul: mil-
John Johnson: their AI
model is, is their business.
Raul: Yeah.
John Johnson: know who we are, and
we have a right to, do or not do
business with any client, obviously,
and so we try to partner with really
good ones doing really good things.
So far we've been successful.
Raul: I like that.
There's a lot ofâ¦
John Johnson: money from some companies
who we don't wanna partner with.
Let's put it that way.
Raul: Yeah, there has to be
that, that, that co-alignment.
let's just do a quick round, briefly
on the, the facts around data centers.
is it job loss or job gain?
Environment, cooling?
Like, there's a lot of misleading
information, and some rightly so.
Just tell me a little bit more about,
like, how you counter that with
what you're building out, again,
to compete with the hyperscalers.
John Johnson: Glad you asked that.
yeah, data centers, especially in
their hyperscaler form, they, they are
just abysmal for localities in most
Raul: Yeah.
John Johnson: right?
They, they take up a massive footprint.
They're ugly, ugly as sin in most
cases, these giant tombstones, and
they employ, employ about, like,
six people per acre, so they don't
Raul: Wow.
John Johnson: human jobs, and they
suck up a ton of electricity and water.
so Patmos took a different approach.
I, I, I like to think of myself as the
world's biggest recycler, because we
literally took a 400,000 square foot
building in the middle of downtown Kansas
City that was just sitting there already.
It happened to be a particularly
beautiful building, and it happened
to have a lot of power there that
wasn't generating any revenue.
It was just available, right?
And it's, it's, it's not like you can
just, push a button and send power to
somewhere else that needs it, right?
The
Raul: just for comparison, this
power can, can light up an entire,
like, mini city, like 100â¦
What is it?
100 megawatts or whatever.
Like, that'sâ¦
John Johnson: ultimately, yeah, I
mean, we're at, like, 25 right now,
but that's, that's a ton of power.
Raul: That's insane.
John Johnson: it is.
so
Raul: Hmm.
John Johnson: demolish it and make it
into the Royals, Kansas City Royals
ballpark, and, then they had a city vote.
The city vote said, "No, we
don't want a ballpark right
here," so the building sat there.
The owner called me back,
said, "Okay, let's do a deal."
So we came in there, and in 90 days
start to finish, created a supercomputer.
It included zoning, permitting,
and the build-out for a
publicly traded tenant, right?
Who at the time was kind of an
unknown, now is a really big deal.
but we got them online faster
than anybody could have.
After we were done with that, we found
out what you guys just did should have
taken two years minimum, and like I
didn't know that, so we did it in 90 days.
But then we became, we, we, we
capitalized that building and
funded the rest of our build-out by
procuring what's called a CPACE loan.
So we got a $100 million CPACE
loan, but that basically certified
us as the first assessed clean
energy data center build in history.
Nobody else had used this kind of
facility for that kind of product.
Raul: Hmm.
John Johnson: So everybody talks about
sustainability, but the reality is like
our data center actually is sustainable
and certified and assessed as such.
to that, because it's so big physically,
you only need like a couple hundred
thousand square feet for the size of
computer that we built in that thing.
We've got 200,000 square feet left.
What are we gonna do with it?
Well, we're gonna make it,
and we are, we are making it.
It is indeed, I think, well on its
way to becoming the, the tech center
of the Silicon Prairie, right?
So, so a ton of jobs being created,
net new jobs for the community,
driving, im- intermixing all kinds
of different technological startups,
capital, creatives, all in one place.
Not to
Raul: Pretty cool.
John Johnson: themselves
who run their GPUs now have
office space in that building.
So, know, per square foot, I think
we're- we've gotta be the most jobs
dense AI factory in the world, right?
Raul: Pretty sweet.
John Johnson: running machines,
we're serving humans and ultimately
a community in this opportunity zone
that was desperate for urban renewal.
We provided that.
So now we have cities lined up
begging us to repeat the magic
of what we did in Kansas City
Raul: Dang.
Okay.
John Johnson: because you get
the benefit of the AI money.
Like, there's a ton of
money, there's a ton of
Raul: Yeah.
John Johnson: that comes from AI, right?
But if you do it in a way that's
sustainable, that is take buildings
that are already there, just sitting
there that happen to have power, right,
and create mixed-use space, but use
the AI GPUs as the economic engine,
well, then everybody's happy, right?
And frankly, it's a place where
our employees want to work.
Raul: Yeah.
John Johnson: know, if you've
ever been into a data center,
Raul, like it's like hell.
Raul: I have not.
Yeah.
John Johnson: just, they're
just loud fluorescent lights.
it's not a great place to work.
But if you carve off space in that
building for humans to flourish,
you, everybody wins, right?
So that's the model, And
I'm really proud of it.
I'm really proud of our team that's
Raul: Pretty sweet.
John Johnson: it.
Raul: Yeah,
John Johnson: I
Raul: you're paving the way.
John Johnson: I think so.
and I want competitors to do the same
exact thing because it works, I don't
want a, a world that's just full of
tombstone ugly data centers that suck
all my power and don't employ anybody.
Like, I want these to be the economic
engines of a human flourishing.
Raul: Yeah, I mean, if you're going on
first principles, then it actually makes
sense for all three, like three layers
of stakeholders, it makes sense to model.
counter me this.
I-I'm curious, like right now, I forgot--
I won't name the names, but I can now
have a mini data center on my wall.
Like, they're wanting people to
buy the data centers so, like,
they host them in their backyard or
connect them to their power wall.
Like, how does, What do you--
What is your assessment of that?
Like, is that good or
bad for the community?
and why?
John Johnson: Just like it's really good
for Patmos to own its own stuff, it's
Raul: Yeah.
John Johnson: for,
Raul: Yeah.
John Johnson: users, beneficiaries
of AI to own their own stuff.
You you, I'm sure when you use a, a big
tech AI chatbot, and you, you type in
your most intimate personal details or
medical history and ask it questions, you
j- you just have this, like, of Sam Altman
on the other end of the screen, like,
"Oh, those are his lab results," right?
You, you just know your data's not
really private, and that's because
you're operating on somebody else's
sandbox, on somebody else's machines.
So I'm, I'm actually a proponent.
While I'm not in favor of, using your,
your own body's metabolism to power, your
own embedded, in the flesh GPU, like,
that's a, that's a no thank you for me.
I'm definitely okay and, and
a, and a staunch proponent of
owning your own hardware, right?
Because when you own your
own hardware, you have better
ways to control your own data.
and there's a war for your data.
we think about the scarcity of power.
That's true.
There is a scarcity of power in production
on the supply chain of infrastructure and
GPUs, but the real scarcity is in data.
Like, that's kind of the third
leg of the stool to make AI work,
Raul: Yeah.
Yeah,
John Johnson: there's whole industries
built on finding new data strange
and personal places, namely you.
yeah, I'm a big proponent
of, of controlling that data.
It's actually quite valuable.
that's why you get a free
Gmail account, right?
Well, what's free?
Well, you're the product because they're
sucking out all your data and feeding
Raul: but most of the world
does operate that way.
I mean, so the, the other counter here
is like host private, maybe like if, not
to plug it, but like host Patmos, great.
but then I would either have to download,
'cause open source models are mostly
from China, like there's a leading
like Qimi or, GLM-1 or, or DeepSeek.
So then I would own it.
I'd get my rack over here,
like a studio, Mac Studio to
run it locally, my host there.
I might do my virtual machine
at Patmos and then run that.
Is that kind of what you're pushing?
Or is likeâ¦
Yeah.
John Johnson: I can say is that,
without letting too many cats out of
too many bags, for PATMOS phase one
was create the cache engine and the
physical infrastructure down to the dirt.
Okay?
Phase one is complete
and expanding rapidly.
phase two is create a platform layer and
application layer stack for anybody to
use that still protects data, in, in a
very sovereign and zero trust way, and
it still, gives you the reliability that
PATMOS offers and the uptime that PATMOS
offers, but, does it on your own terms
backed by PATMOS' customer bill of rights.
So, stay tuned, but phase two and
Raul: Okay, now they get you back on, man.
John Johnson: Yeah.
Yeah.
But it's coming soon, and, I
think it's gonna be pretty, pretty
exciting for a lot of people.
a
Raul: I love it.
John Johnson: There's a huge need, right?
One man,
Raul: I'mâ¦
John Johnson: that has all the
benefits but on your own terms,
and one-way door for data so
we're not training on your stuff.
Raul: I like it.
I have to close with this question.
What's with the Woodfire Pizza restaurant?
Is it, like, your place to
escape over the weekends?
Is it, like, just because
you love it, you love pizza?
John Johnson: love wood-fired pizza,
and it was one of these buildings
that my buddy and I would drive,
my college roommate and I, Nick,
we would drive by it sometimes.
that building's still for sale,
but it was this weird building.
It was built in 1857.
Raul: Oh, wow.
John Johnson: It was
like a fire department.
It was a, it was a, you know, a general
Raul: the
John Johnson: and we're like, "Ah,
man, what do you do with that thing?"
It's sale, for sale on the, on
the market for like two years.
Kept driving by it, and I'm
like, "Let's, let's, let's buy
it and build a pizza restaurant."
So I bought the building
and, and, um, and I justâ¦
There was no good wood-fired pizza in our
neighborhood, I, I bought it and put one
Raul: name.
John Johnson: it's called Pizza
Norcia, which is named after the Monks
of Norcia where I discerned Italy,
and they stayed great friends with
Raul: Usually,
John Johnson: we're the only
pizza restaurant west of the
Raul: walk in the
John Johnson: beer made
by the Monks of Norcia.
And so d- delicious pie.
If you're ever in Northern California,
come check it out and, uh, it's a great
place for me to hang out and drink some
Nebbiolo and, uh, have a good dinner.
but that's the beauty of
generalism is that, pizza,
online college, AI data center.
why, yeah, I really advocate the
sort of education that cultivates- a
general wonder in things because that
Raul: park,
John Johnson: the most
practical at the end of the day.
You don't do it for the sake of
practicality, but it opens up a lot of
Raul: yeah.
Oh.
Yeah
John Johnson: about anything,
you can kind of do anything.
And then the air gap between vision and
execution, it's virtually nothing, right?
And, and you create constantly.
Raul: But you have a North Star.
I mean, like, like you- you- there's,
there has to be some sort of North
Star that you're leading towards.
It can't just be creating
'cause it's cool, unless
that's, that's the North Star.
John Johnson: Yeah, I mean, my
North Star is human freedom.
Raul: I like it.
John, for our listeners out there, where
can they go to learn more about you?
And thank you for being on.
John Johnson: patmos.tech
to learn more about the hosting stuff.
magnusinstitute.org
if you want to do the online classes.
It's free and freeing.
And, if, like I said, Pizza
Norcia if you want a good pizza.
But Raul, you're, you're
doing really good work.
I'm, I'm grateful for your questions,
and, and I hope you keep it up.
I enjoy listening to your,
your other interviews, so you.
Raul: Appreciate you, John
John Johnson: You bet.
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