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We came to this world to reach the stars. to shape our future. Feel the new feel. UAV online. >> UAV online. Good morning everyone. >> You're watching TBPN.
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>> Tuesday, November 11th, 2025.
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We are live from the TVP Ultradum, the temple of technology, the fortress of finance, the capital of capital. Ramp. com. Time is money. Save both. Easy.
2:21
Use corporate cards, bill pay, accounting, a whole lot more all in one place. >> That is right.
2:25
Uh more importantly than ramp. Today is Veterans Day. >> It is. >> It is a holiday. >> Yes.
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>> Uh it is an important holiday. >> Yes.
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>> And we would like to say thank you to everyone that served. >> Of course. Yes.
2:40
Thank you to everyone who served.
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uh missed missed uh missed opportunity to get the secretary general back on the show. >> Yes. Yes. I'm sure there are.
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>> But um >> big events happening in DC and all over the armed forces community.
2:55
Um we we inadvertently did some uh Defense Tech day yesterday with Nuros and Anderl.
3:02
That was fun taking a little tour of both of those companies.
3:04
Uh, and defense tech seems to be just cooking like just on a on a steady state. Yeah. Yeah. Steady state.
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And uh I don't know just much less um much less froth, much less uh you know calls for is this the top of defense tech.
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It's more just like >> it's possible we already passed the top >> of defense tech. >> Yeah.
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you know, well, well, I mean, there had been some rounds maybe earlier this year that felt a little bit frothy. >> Oh, okay.
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>> But like the near nearest round yesterday >> like feels like they're >> probably the best or one of the best teams and let's focus on this problem.
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DJI can make tens of millions of drones a year. We cannot.
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Somebody ideally multiple companies will work on that problem.
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And so it feels like it's just a fair bet >> in the context of our national security. >> Totally. Yeah.
3:58
Uh, and yeah, I mean we certainly haven't seen there's just like way fewer top signals in defense tech right now.
4:05
It feels like like there's no like oh crazy spack going out that's like frothy memes, you know, around this stuff.
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Um, it's it's just a lot it's a I mean it's still like a long way to deliver all the value there and and really scale those companies.
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But uh overall I think uh like a lot of support.
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Uh, you know, I was kind of joking with Saurin like what's it like working in like a non-controversial industry?
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Um, and you were like doing a double take.
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Um but it is like a less controversial industry in my opinion than AI right now in terms of >> than chat bots >> just in terms of like in tech AI is controversial because of the uh the adult content and the IP rights and all and the leverage and the debt and all that stuff.
4:53
And then outside of tech, you have energy prices and politicization.
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Is the AI woke or is it too right-wing or leftwing?
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Uh is it going to be used to manipulate the election?
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Like I think if you actually went AC like just random person on the street like you know poll of uh of popularity like Palmer Lucky who's for a long time been like a contrarian, a controversial figure. Yeah. Right.
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Uh it feels like he would pull more popular than a Sam Alman or a or an AI lab director, AI lab CEO, even though he's like building weapons, like the most controversial thing.
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>> I think part of it is like how hard can you crush a Joe Rogan appearance. >> He did do well. Yeah. Yeah. So may maybe that's it.
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Uh, but just in general, it feels like the idea of like like the the the American populace is not frustrated directly over weapons production right now.
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A little bit, but not not not as much as people as it used to be years ago.
6:02
The idea of like working with the military is much much less of a of a cornerstone issue, a hot debate uh than it was six years ago, eight years ago.
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Um, and the conversation has moved on to job displacement, to energy production, to, uh, you know, internet addiction, that type of stuff.
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Um, anyway, uh, to reream.
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io, one live stream, 30 plus destinations, multiream, reach your audience wherever they are.
6:29
Uh, I was noticing a pattern that everyone has 10-year AGI timelines right now.
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And it and it started we we it started when Sam Alman put out that post like super intelligence is just a few thousand days away. >> Yeah.
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>> And at the time it was kind of odd because >> like when he wrote that post last year everyone was like AGI is one year away. AGI is two years away.
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It was like fast takeoff time.
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Like everyone was very excited.
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And then he came out and was like it's a few thousand days away.
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And if you do the numbers I think Tyler has the the clock.
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How how long is a few thousand days? 3,650 days. How many years is that? 10 years. 10. >> It's a decade.
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Puts us squarely in 2035, right?
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And so Sam came out and, you know, and he he was kind of in his blog post of the super intelligence age talking about, you know, maybe we're a decade away.
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Then Andre Carpathy goes on Daresh just a couple months ago, a couple weeks ago, says AGI is a decade away.
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And then Dwar posts this um this uh this probability density of of when AGI will be achieved.
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There's a chance that America does it.
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There's a chance that China does it.
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And the median the 50 the 50th percentile was exactly 2035. Exactly 2035.
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Could have been any could have been 2030 could have been 20 40 could have been 2050 but it was 2035.
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Then >> and you know that that uh that chart that like very uh skitso chart that says periods when to make money.
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Have you seen this floating around on X?
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And it's like >> it was created >> like I guess about a hundred years ago.
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People references it anytime it like actually aligns to events because it's basically has years in which panics have occurred years of good times, high prices and and time to sell stocks >> uh and years of hard times, low prices, and a good time to buy stocks.
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And so it's basically like um astrology for stock picking, right?
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>> And and what is it saying right now?
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2035 is a year is they're predicting is when a panic will occur. >> Ooh, interesting.
8:28
Well, that certainly aligns with all these AGI timelines. There you go.
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>> The other one that we mentioned on the show yesterday was George Hotz, the founder of KMA uh and generally regarded as like one of the sharpest uh hackers, computer scientists, uh AI developers.
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uh he was looking at the Tesla FSD data and projected that um if the rate of improvement continues, you basically see a doubling in capability every year, you double it out, the if you're if the benchmark is how many interventions happen per thousand vehicle miles traveled and you compare that to how many crashes happen when a human's at the wheel.
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Uh he says Tesla's about eight years away.
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um which puts him like squarely in the 2035 camp, 2033 I guess in his case.
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Um and then I was looking at Meter and this one we'll have to debate a lot more, but Meter has been tracking AI's ability to complete long tasks.
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So they've so they've they've and it's growing exponentially.
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It used to be like 6 seconds, now it's like 2 hours.
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And you know when you talk to uh anyone who's in the AI field they'll tell you that the agents are getting more and more capable of handling longer longer time horizon tasks.
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Uh the question is I feel like humans don't have a time horizon.
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I feel like humans they're just born and the goal is like survive uh be fruitful multiply right. Yeah.
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And so, uh, I feel like if you're if you're tracking the meter data, you need to get out to like 30 years, like a full career, right?
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Like the prompt needs to be like go make money and then it just goes and becomes a lawyer and, you know, lives its full life and retires after after a 35 year run.
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And of course when you track out the doublings uh one in 2035 uh the me meter is projecting based on that log curve that or that log that log graph that um AI will be able to have a time horizon in the in the decades and so you would you would have it some something similar to what a human would have and so uh my my read on the meter data is that you know AGI 2035 again it's kind maybe the messiest, the the least like definitive.
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Um, and all these predictions have different methodologies.
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Some of them are extremely qual quantitative.
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A lot of them, some of them I'm like reading really reading into.
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Some other people are just saying like it's a decade away specifically.
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Um, but what's interesting is that it just feels like 10 years is this consensus right now and there's much less diversity of opinion.
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There aren't that many people saying two years anymore.
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There aren't that many people saying 50 years anymore.
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Everyone's kind of saying 10 years.
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And I just wonder like let's put aside like let's try and accurately predict when this thing happens and let's just analyze it from a psychological perspective and like what does it mean when the tech community all has a consensus of something that's a decade.
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Like a decade away could just be what people say when they don't know.
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Like if you ask me when flying cars are going to happen, I'm going to say a decade.
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If you're going to say when quantum computing, oh that'll be a decade. Oh, uh, Mars. Yeah, that's a decade. It's easy.
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It's like it's optimistic. It's a way.
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When I say a decade, I I'm I'm I'm not saying it's not going to happen, but I'm saying like you're not going to be able to hold me to my bad take >> because because you're not going to be able to clip this in in one year and be like, he was wrong. Right. >> Yeah.
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It it is funny the quote, most people under overestimate what they can accomplish in one year and underestimate what they do what they can do in 10 years.
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And in this situation, we're just like, yeah, we're estimating that we can just achieve AGI in 10 years, but a year >> a year is actually so it's effectively like inverted. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
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And so, but the other weird thing that I was grappling with was like when I personally feel like about AGI, like I'm convinced by these like I feel like AGI is 10 years away and I don't feel like I'm like coping or doing some sort of like mental logic jumps or something.
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It's just like if you actually force me to put a prediction down, I probably would say about a decade.
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And I feel like I've been around there, been on the Kershw timelines.
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Maybe maybe I'm 2045, more like Kerszswall, but still like a decade, two decades, like I feel like it's real.
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I I feel like I do believe it's going to happen.
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I don't I don't feel like I'm I'm like AGI never. I'm not in that camp.
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And so then I go to well well like how should I actually be changing my behavior?
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Like if something big is coming in a decade, it feels like you should actually should not just be acting normally.
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Um, but it it feels like there's some sort of preference falsification going on.
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Like how many everyone's saying a decade.
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How many people are actually acting like it's a decade?
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Like what should you be doing in the intervening years if it's a decade away?
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Like are you just supposed to like build technologies that are fun little dopamine rewards?
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Are you trying to like accumulate as much capital as possible before >> I think Well, yeah.
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So, so when I mean who plans around 10 years at all, right?
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People tend to go for things that they want today.
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Yeah, >> in some ways, right?
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So, somebody like let's say they're in their 20s, they're like, I want to own a home >> by the time by 2035.
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>> They want that thing today.
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And so they they but they might understand, okay, it's going to take some time to get there. >> Yeah.
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>> But actually making real changes in your life for this like impending scenario that's hard to predict entirely.
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>> It's very very difficult.
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And I don't know that I don't know that any you know it was maybe more popular earlier this year to joke about you know uh uh what you know the golden retriever maxing right we we would talk about this right >> um but it feels like that dialogue has kind of >> changed. >> Mhm. >> How so?
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>> Part of it goes back to the the other like enduring meme.
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you know, you have one year to escape the permanent underclass.
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And then everyone woke up and like a few months ago and said, "Okay, maybe we actually have like longer dec uh escape, whatever that means, whatever their whatever their number is."
14:47
>> Yeah, it's a it's an odd time.
14:47
I'm going to tell you about Privy and then we'll get Tyler's reaction.
14:50
Wallet infrastructure for every bank.
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Privy makes it easy to build on crypto rail.
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Securely spin up white label wallets, sign transactions, integrate onchain infrastructure, all through one simple API.
14:59
Uh Tyler, what what do you think about my take?
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What do you think's uh what do you agree with?
15:03
What do you disagree with?
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>> Um yeah, I I think it's definitely interesting that people seem to kind of align around this tenure thing.
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I think there's also some sort of bias, right?
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If you think AI is coming in three years, >> um you're probably not just going to be like writing blogs like you're maybe you're going to start a macro hedge fund, maybe you're going to go work at one of the labs to like really try to influence how it's going to happen if it's going to happen super quick. Yeah.
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>> So I think there's some sense of that.
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Um, and if you really don't believe AGI is coming at all, then like you're also probably not going to be writing blogs about AGI.
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You're just going to be like, yeah, >> doing your normal job or whatever.
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>> So, I think there's some like confirmation bias there.
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>> 10 years, exactly the time of a venture capital fund life cycle. Coincidence?
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>> Tyler's probably the most agi pelled person on the team.
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And so, it's interesting that you're you kind of >> I think day-to-day act like everyone else on the team. Yeah. Yeah.
15:55
What question you've done?
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What's your biggest revealed preference? >> That's hard to say.
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>> Maybe just hanging out on the show. >> Yeah.
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Just hanging out podcasting instead of going to university.
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He's just like, "Yeah, nothing matters, >> I guess.
16:12
I mean, there's a little bit of that." >> Uh yeah. Yeah. Maybe May maybe AGI.
16:15
And it's just it's just hard because like in in the intervening years there's clearly like just incredibly like high leverage work to be done.
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It's so easy to pull forward like okay well like the the the robots are going to be able to do X.
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So maybe you shouldn't spend the next 10 years doing X.
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But if in fact X is very valuable, then the next 10 years you can capture a ton of value as you leverage more and more technology right up until the point where you don't need to do it anymore because it's fully automated.
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Yeah, I think there's some sense of like at least for me it's like okay, maybe I would be working at >> maybe I would have started some rapper company or something like that. Yeah.
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>> But I'm more bullish on AI than I think most people are >> to where I I think that stuff is generally not super kind of long-term oriented.
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>> Um so maybe >> I think something some sort of that kind of >> Do you think do you think we'll be podcasting in 2045? Um, yes.
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But I I I say yes because I think the podcast is to live. >> I I agree.
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I think it might be around way past AGI.
17:32
>> I mean, I don't I think I think everybody everybody wants to believe that.
17:36
Like >> I don't I don't know. I I have yet to see.
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>> I don't know that mining is going to be around forever.
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I don't think people mine for the love of the game.
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I don't think people go in the coal mine and mine and they would do it if they didn't get paid.
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But I think people do play chess.
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>> Children yearn for the mine.
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>> And I think people podcast for fun.
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>> Children yearn for real life game of Minecraft. >> Yeah. Yeah.
17:59
I mean Minecraft for sure. Playing games for sure.
18:02
That's actually sort of where where my take but imagine imagine uh you have an army of robots and you just get to use a computer to control them to mine for for minerals.
18:14
That that sounds like it could be pretty fun and fulfilling. >> Maybe. Maybe. I don't know.
18:17
That sounds like a That sounds like a loophole.
18:19
I was talking about actually like swinging an axe in a in a in a mine shaft.
18:22
Um yes, maybe maybe there will one day be an AI agent for mining.
18:28
We've actually talked to some folks who are doing AI for mining.
18:31
Uh if you're mining value in your codebase, get on Cognition, the makers of Devon, the AI software engineer.
18:39
Crush your backlog with your personal AI engineering team. Um yeah.
18:43
Oh, where where I landed at the end of this was talking about uh uh this clip of Alex Wang that's sort of going viral.
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People are dunking on it.
18:50
Uh because he recommends that kids learn to vibe code.
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And uh and I just disagree with the haters.
18:56
Like I I think the haters are wrong on this one.
18:58
Um and I was thinking about like well I have a kid like would I teach him to vibe code?
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And I was playing with Legos last night.
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and I was assembling Legos and from what I've done vibe coding uh and what I've done in Legos, I'm like this is going to be very fun and this is going to be an activity that we do together and I'm super I I'm like super in agreement that I think uh learning to vibe code is good. What do you think, Tyl?
19:21
Um, I think like the point of view of like the people hating were that like, oh, your your 13-year-old should be like making B2B's ass, which is like not not that's different than saying they should be vibe coding cuz vibe coding is just like it's like basically playing a video game or it's like making a Minecraft mod or something.
19:37
That's like seems totally fine. >> Yeah.
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Some of the criticism some of the criticism was like you should just be doing really hard things. >> Okay.
19:44
>> But then >> you have to ask is like okay, should 13-year-olds like only be handcoding?
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Like if you want to get them into maybe making doing engineering work, is it should they be doing it with a pen and like what what is the alternative or should they just be just doing math problems or studying >> physics?
20:03
I had some sort of uh I had some sort of advanced Lego thing, robotics thing that you could actually write software for and kind of make it drive in circles or you could program it to drive in a figure eight.
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That was really fun as a kid.
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When I was 13, I was working on little iPhone apps. >> Yeah.
20:22
>> And knowing the vibe coding tools that are available today, I would have been able to make way more progress.
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I would have had a lot more fun. >> Yeah.
20:30
>> It would have been like having an expert >> like software engineer sitting next to me kind of like pair programming, right?
20:37
>> And so >> I just Yeah, I'm I'm on your side.
20:38
I think I think people generally just just don't like Alex because he's been wildly successful and uh uh people want to try to >> he's basically the youngest most successful person in the world >> which invites a lot of criticism. >> Yeah.
20:57
Um, and and also it it's it's tough when uh when you build a business that it's not like I think when Evan Spiegel blew up with Snapchat, he was very much loved because people were like, I like Snapchat.
21:11
I got a date on Snapchat.
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I met my girlfriend on Snapchat.
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I use it all the time >> or I use it with my friends or my boys or whatever or like my group in my group chats on Snapchat.
21:19
So, it's very easy to be like, "Yeah, he's rich, but I like the thing he made."
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Whereas with Alex Wang, it's like, yeah, he's rich and I have no idea what the thing he I don't interact with it at all.
21:28
And so it's a lot harder.
21:30
Um, but yeah, I don't know.
21:33
I I feel like I feel like a generic call to action to young people to vibe code, to be entrepreneurial is good.
21:38
I mean, I I I you know, discovered entrepreneurship in some ways through Tim Ferrris, who had a similar sort of like the 4-hour work week was not some like deep understanding of how business and technology works.
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It was more just like, hey, you could set up a business and like it could be a really interesting life.
21:59
And it's very different than like becoming a lawyer or becoming a doctor.
22:02
Like when you're just like a blank slate kid, you're kind of offered a menu of options which is like do you want to become a fireman, >> doctor, >> policeman, like >> construction worker, >> construction worker and and >> businessman >> and Yeah.
22:18
And you hear businessman but you don't really know what that means.
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>> Businessman >> and it's very different to be like >> accountant.
22:24
A businessman is an investment banker or a consultant if you stay on the track and you're just like, I only I always ask for permission, right?
22:33
I I always go into the next thing and there's I always have a boss.
22:35
Um, entrepreneurship is this like sort of vague thing that's like hidden and it's nice when when it's served up. >> Yeah.
22:43
There's so many different flavors of it. >> Yeah. Yeah.
22:44
So, I I enjoy I enjoy a little serving of uh entrepreneurial insight.
22:49
What What do you think, Tyler? >> Uh, fun fact.
22:51
So, in fifth grade, um, in the yearbook, they asked like what you wanted to be. Yeah. I put investor. >> Investor. In fifth grade. >> Yeah.
22:59
>> I didn't even really know what that meant.
23:01
>> How are you sure you didn't put capital allocator?
23:05
>> You put in >> That's what I meant. Yeah.
23:07
>> Uh, I mean, in in fifth grade, uh, they had a uh it was like, uh, bring in a mobile, create a mobile for someone that you respect.
23:14
And everyone in the class brought in like a picture of their dad.
23:19
And I brought in a picture of Bill Gates because I was like, I made the computer.
23:22
Like the computer's awesome.
23:22
And everyone was like, what are you like doing, dude?
23:26
Like, do stop deifying business people.
23:28
I was like, I will never stop deifying business people. It's great.
23:33
>> Ever since the fifth fifth grade, I knew I wanted to get into asset management. >> Love it. I love it.
23:38
Well, speaking of asset management, uh, Masa Yoshi Son is back in the news.
23:43
back in the news. uh SoftBank's big profits jump this quarter came from OpenAI's increased valuation that Soft Bank lifted higher by buying shares from employees uh and selling them at a higher price and so there is a question
23:58
about is this C too circular it's unclear if uh SoftBank was really the price setter on this deal but uh Dar just Daario is certainly uh >> just Dario is saying soft bank books a capital gain on an investment it hasn't paid for and recorded in its assets yet. >> Mhm. >> Mhm.
24:16
>> Uh so uh I guess the narrative here is >> gains on OpenAI shares by designating vision fund 2 to underwrite the second investment trunch at 500 billion value that SoftBank Group cannot pay and created a forward derivative contract worth 8 billion all gadens out of out of thin air. How is this legal? I don't know.
24:36
This doesn't seem that >> there's a scenario where you would do this if you were a company that invested in a fund. Yes.
24:41
And it's called maybe some capital but not all of it yet.
24:44
And so you can show that there's a gain even though you haven't paid actually paid in the capital yet. >> Yes.
24:53
>> Uh but I think the way in which SoftBank is doing doesn't seem illegal but I think it's non-traditional.
24:58
Uh Sophie uh over on X says SoftBank is selling its Nvidia stake to fund companies whose main expense is buying from Nvidia. >> Okay.
25:09
But don't VC firms run into this all the time?
25:12
And there's always a question about like like how they mark to market and if you're marking to market uh an asset that you you invested in twice.
25:22
Um, and that's why a lot of venture firms don't want to do like it's it's it's a little bit iffy to lead backtoback rounds, but because at a certain point your LPs are going to start having questions, but it does happen and it's not the end of the world and as long as you get other buyers um like didn't Founders Fund do ramp backtoback or something like that, right? Yeah.
25:46
But then there was like a secondary transaction that came in pretty quickly and then eventually another firm came in and so once the other firm comes in that mark gets a lot stronger and then ramps actually like mark themselves to market multiple times.
25:59
>> This is I mean yeah this is >> I don't know the the more important the more important >> god dude I tried to slide off the camera the sneeze and the PTZ >> the more important thing here is that this is not the first time Masa has exited Nvidia.
26:15
He exited in 2019 before the runup.
26:20
Uh he was then Nvidia's largest shareholder.
26:24
>> Uh and he had a 5% 5% stake in the company that he sold for 3.
26:28
6 billion and it would now be worth over 200 billion.
26:35
Um so this this was ultimately um one of the big >> How much did he wind up investing totally because he must have made money overall.
26:43
How much has soft >> I don't know.
26:47
I don't know exactly when he actually bought back in >> into Yeah, because if if this was all from that initial slug, I I feel like this this five uh this five billion could be on a basis of like 500 mil or something.
27:05
It's still relatively small for the size of of SoftBank.
27:06
Um but while that's cooking, let me tell you about Figma.
27:10
Think bigger, build faster.
27:11
Figma's design and development teams build great products together. Um, let's see.
27:16
Uh, SoftBank sells his entire stake in Nvidia for 5. 83 billion.
27:18
Uh, Quantian says, "No, they expect one of us in the wreckage, brother.
27:25
Have we started the fire?" Uh, why?
27:26
I don't understand how this links to what's happening here. Why? Who Who's in the fire?
27:35
Like, how is this how is this I I don't understand this meme. Do you understand this?
27:40
I just like the line, they expect one of us in the wreckage, brother.
27:44
>> Yeah, it's funny because it's from the Dark Knight Rises, right?
27:45
But um but like selling Nvidia, selling your stake in Nvidia, like are people mad about this because they think Nvidia is going to rip further >> or do >> selling your stake in Nvidia? >> Yeah.
27:59
to buy to actually buy shares in a company that you've already marked a you're you're showing >> a gain on in the last quarter. >> Yeah.
28:12
>> So basically SoftBank is booking profits. >> Sure. >> OpenAI profits.
28:17
They are then selling Nvidia shares to fund the original investment of which they've already booked the profits on.
28:23
And the number one driving force behind Nvidia's growth is OpenAI. >> Yeah. >> Is that true?
28:37
>> I mean, >> how big how big is OpenAI as a customer of Nvidia?
28:39
I mean, yeah, it's probably the biggest, but I mean, the rest of the hyperscalers still is still buying a ton of Nvidia, right? Um I don't know.
28:47
>> I mean, yeah, I would say like indirectly they're a big customer, but like obviously they're not it's not like they're funding the data centers. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Um, okay.
28:52
So, James Thorne says, "Today we will get the Soft Bank completely sold out of Nvidia.
28:58
Fear from bears on mainstream media and Wall Street.
29:03
Does anyone do objective research anymore?
29:05
Soft Bank initially bought its Nvidia stake through the vision fund in 2017, then exited completely in January 19. They missed it. They lost patience. Not the first time."
29:14
And so, uh, yeah, when did they buy this latest slug? That's the question.
29:20
Um, SoftBank sold 32 million shares of Nvidia in October.
29:22
Also sold part of its stake in T-Mobile for 9 billion.
29:27
Uh, it's not the first time they've cashed out of the chipmaker.
29:31
That's a funny way to put it.
29:31
Uh, despite the sale, Soft Bank remains tied to Nvidia through its other ventures. Yeah, that makes sense.
29:36
Um, anyway, let me tell you about Vanta.
29:39
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29:52
Warren Buffett says he's going quiet.
29:54
The world's most famous investor warns against corporate greed as he prepares to hand over the reigns of Berkshire Hathaway.
30:01
There are a bunch of interesting post, but there's also a story in the Financial Times.
30:05
I don't think it hit the I don't think it hit the paper edition yet.
30:08
Um, but we can read the paper paper edition always lagging.
30:14
>> It lags three to four days.
30:16
So Warren Buffett has told Berkshire Hathaway shareholders that he is going quiet, quote unquote, as the world's most famous investor draws a line under a career that has shaped corporate American Wall Street over the past six decades.
30:27
As the British would say, I'm going quiet, sort of, Buffett wrote in a letter published Monday.
30:32
The 95year-old will step back from day-to-day responsibilities at Bergkshire at the end of this year when he retires from his role as chief executive.
30:38
Greg Ael, of course, is coming in.
30:40
Um, investors have long seen Buffett, often called the Oracle of Omaha as a corporate folk hero, interspersing guidance on his portfolio company's performance with life and business advice, his frank manager manner with shareholders.
30:54
Both his annual letters and his marathon question and answer sessions during the annual meetings in Omaha has been a hallmark of his tenure.
31:02
Buffett's letter to shareholders on Monday took the same tone with warnings about corporate greed interlaced with calls for kindness.
31:08
He noted, for instance, that requirements for executive compensation disclosures backfired as business chiefs engaged in a race to earn more than rivals.
31:17
What often bothers very wealthy CEOs, they are human after all, is that other CEOs are getting even richer, Buffett said.
31:27
Envy and greed walk hand in hand. Interesting.
31:30
Buffett added that Berkshire should try to avoid future CEOs who are looking to retire at 65 or who want to become look at me rich or initiate a dynasty. Look at me rich.
31:44
What an interesting uh turn of phrase.
31:47
>> Yeah, it's very notable that uh Buffett has never been photographed doing a money spread wearing Balenciaga, Rick Owens.
31:56
>> Does he have any chrome hearts?
31:58
>> Uh probably no chrome. No chrome heart.
32:00
He's never been photographed >> with chrome hearts. >> Chrome hearts on. >> Uh it is cool.
32:03
He's going to continue to do uh his uh thanks thanks a letter every Thanksgiving. Love that.
32:10
>> I thought that was um Thanksgiving of course uh one of the most underrated holidays. >> Yeah.
32:15
So he he took the pledge to give away um to give away his wealth.
32:18
And so, uh, it's going to be a pretty big changing of the guard and and that's going to have a pretty significant >> the thing I'm looking uh forward to seeing is is how many what the attendance will be like in the shareholder meeting next year like is the is >> the draw it or is it Yeah, exactly.
32:40
I my expectation is that they will retain a huge amount of people because it's people that have been going every single year for a long time and it's just like a kind of a meetup for people >> uh that have probably you know that have spent probably decades at least some of them decades visiting and >> uh being a part of it. Yeah.
33:00
I also wonder like to what degree can Greg Ael like actually pick up the torch because there's that interesting stat that like if you go back 30 years ago when Buffett was 65, he was I don't think he was close to the richest man in the world.
33:18
He he compounded a ton in his third 30-year run.
33:23
like from 65 to 95 he had a particularly good run >> that that made that took him from like pretty rich to one of the richest people in the world and so it would be very interesting to see like Greg Ael what if he really goes on a run for 30 years and is just executing executing executing it's very rare we just don't see that many business executives or that many like people broadly where that's like the the highlight of the career is 65 to 95.
33:55
>> You think >> it's exciting?
33:56
>> Do you uh do you think that that he can be fearful when others are greedy?
34:02
They're kind of acting like it right now, right?
34:03
Half like I don't think it's quite half a trillion.
34:06
I think it's more like under under 400 billion of cash, but >> uh they will be getting uh they will be getting calls quite a lot of calls at some point >> for sure >> and uh we'll see how they play it. >> Yeah.
34:18
Uh before we react to some of the reactions on the timeline, let me tell you about graphite.
34:22
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34:24
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34:27
Um, so Howard Angland is taking shots at uh at Warren Buffett.
34:32
So Warren Buffett's talking about his final letter and Howard says Buffett has commissioned no plays, no poems, no symphonies, no operas, no ballets, funded no paintings or sculptures that will outlive him, endowed no theaters, choirs, orchestras, built no monuments, monasteries. Is this true at all?
34:51
I feel like he has to have I feel like Warren Buffett has to have given away enough money to endow at least one theater.
35:00
Like how do you not just get hit up by your local theater in Omaha once and say, "Sure, I'll send a check."
35:06
Like, I would be shocked if he's never done anything.
35:10
And also, he's committed to giving away half of his wealth.
35:12
So, like some of the money is going to wind up with the opera, I imagine, just because it's going to go out and get diffused amongst all the different charity efforts.
35:22
It's not gonna all go into one thing.
35:24
Um, so, uh, Howard agrees with him on this.
35:28
He says he's right that greatness does not come about through accumulate great accumulating great amounts amounts of money, which is what he is known for.
35:35
But beyond that, it's fortune cookie level advice.
35:37
It's not wrong, but it that's about it.
35:39
His partner Charlie Munger's contribution to architecture was to fund factory-like college dorms in which a majority of the apartments don't have windows. The Is was that UCSB? >> Where is that?
35:50
Have you Have you been to that dorm? >> Yeah. >> Did you live there?
35:55
>> Uh I'm trying to figure out which >> we need to pull up a photo of the Charlie Mer dorm.
36:00
The Charlie Munger dorm at uh at UCSB. >> It's Mer Hall. >> Munger dorm UCSB. It is a wild picture. It's so funny.
36:11
And it's like, >> so they aband they they made the donation. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
36:17
>> There's some reference to it on the campus, but they abandoned the plans to build a windowless dorm. >> So sick. It's so Soviet. It's extremely Soviet.
36:26
I don't know why they >> um >> I thought there were fake windows and they were like TVs essentially, but they would show like outdoor scenes.
36:34
It should be vertical TV windows that you can just put Sora on and just watch AI.
36:42
>> He's like, you were complaining about the cost of housing.
36:43
I gave you housing and now you're complaining it doesn't have window. >> Windows. Yeah.
36:47
You give a massive cookie with these people. It is so funny.
36:51
Apparently, it it it's also just so funny.
36:54
Like why are you so involved in this project?
36:57
this project? like uh I thought he was a bigger donator to Stanford first and then also why like like I feel like if I if I donate money somewhere I'm like uh okay it's gone and you enjoy it and it's it's on you like you're the one that
37:14
takes care of it to be in the weeds to the level of like deciding where the windows go is a wild move like I thought you had other stuff to do I would just be I feel like if I was in this position I would just be too busy >> does have other buildings on campus Okay. >> That window is among her residents um
37:28
>> That window is among her residents um that do have windows. So >> I don't know.
37:34
I mean also like is is it safe to take the other side of this and just say that like he was about to create the greatest lock in of >> I mean what if he was basically saying like college students spend very little time in their actual dorms >> because they're out and about in the world. They're studying. They're library. They're at events. Totally.
37:51
>> They're really just using the dorm to sleep.
37:52
Why don't we create common areas that have windows and outdoor area that then you go in your pot?
37:58
>> Yeah, >> just go in your pot. >> Almost like a cave.
38:00
>> Yeah, >> it's like a cave.
38:02
>> Cuz UCSB the the complaint from a housing standpoint is that like nobody has like nobody everyone shares a room almost all the way through.
38:08
Everyone shares a room almost all four years. >> Oh, interesting.
38:11
So you never move off campus? >> Yeah.
38:13
And it's like it's like one square mile that people really live >> and yeah, there's super limited housing.
38:19
And so I think Munger was coming at this like probably like very pragmatically and it's like hey you get you're giving up Windows you're going to get your pod >> but in exchange you get your own private space. >> Yeah.
38:30
>> People call it Dormzilla and they canled it.
38:34
>> They call it Dormzilla. I forgot about that.
38:36
Do we find a picture of Dormzilla?
38:38
Do >> I mean the the the the actual designs I saw it for a second. >> It's so funny.
38:43
Uh, why can't we do a real examination of the rules that state every bedroom must have a window?
38:48
This is uh Eric Adams floated a similar idea to Munger, calling for stripping legislation that promises each citizen each city citizen window access this past March.
39:00
Uh, you don't need you don't need no window where you're sleeping.
39:02
It should be dark, he said.
39:05
Well, that's actually directly in the quote.
39:07
That's this is a direct quote. >> That's from Mer.
39:10
This No, this is from Eric Adams, the New York New York man. >> Okay.
39:14
I was like, that sound that doesn't that doesn't sound like that. It >> is a crazy crazy.
39:18
>> I put a I put a picture of the floor plan in the chat team if you guys can pull this up.
39:22
Um >> they should have called it the Mer Bug Den. >> 14,000 the cave. The munger cave. >> Um I don't know.
39:31
It's pretty It's pretty funny.
39:34
It's also It's also just I mean m maybe UCSB.
39:37
When I think of UCSB, I think of like, you know, it's this beautiful like so just amazing like near the beach, beautiful sunlight.
39:44
Like you definitely don't want to be in a cave.
39:50
It's like I I feel like I to I to I kind of get the Soviet cave, the the Soviet like the Soviet block era like you know big buildings because it's like you don't want to go dormilla. Dormzilla. so good. I love it.
40:09
He was like, "This is what I need to do."
40:12
It's just like also just like, "Can't you just give like a little bit more money and get the windows?"
40:16
Like windows aren't that expensive, right?
40:20
It's such a wild such a wild thing.
40:22
Anyway, uh it's so so funny. So, um I don't know.
40:27
Uh Tyler, did you figure out if Buffett has ever commissioned one play, poem, symphony, opera, ballet, painting, sculpture, theater, choir, orchestra, monument, home, museum, church, monastery, chanty.
40:42
>> So just at UCSB to give him credit, he has the uh Charles Munger Physics Residence. Okay.
40:48
>> Which is a beautiful, stunning building >> with windows. >> With many windows. >> There we go.
40:54
>> And so yeah, he decided to window max on this one.
40:57
Yeah, he's taking a bar rail strategy.
40:59
Some of the buildings have lost but obviously that's Mer. That's Mer. >> Yeah, this is Buffet. So, yeah.
41:02
What What did we learn about? >> Yeah.
41:04
So, I I think >> um basically all of his donations he does do a lot of donations, but they're all they're basically he just gives stock to people.
41:11
So, he's never like saying I want this museum to be built in this way kind of thing.
41:15
He just gives it to a uh you know endowment or institution or or some charity then they like do what they Is that because he wants them to like like kind of try to 10x it again?
41:28
>> Yeah, he wants bag holders.
41:28
Um >> Yeah, but like I don't think he has very strong opinions on like should kids have windows, >> but can you find an example of of when he gave stock to an organization because if that organization went and commissioned an opera, I'm putting this in the truth zone.
41:44
And I'm thinking that I'm thinking that he did in fact.
41:46
Uh oh, the Munger Research Center in Pasadena does have many windows. Credit where it's due. Thank you, Taylor.
41:54
You can't commit to the Munger cave than you are really committed to deliver.
41:59
>> He's given a lot to the um Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
42:03
>> Okay, that's sort of a circular thing.
42:06
It doesn't make any sense to me.
42:06
Uh anyway, let's move on from Warren Buffett.
42:09
Uh let me tell you about Julius, the AI data analyst.
42:11
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42:17
Uh, we have a clip from Scott Bessant on what is this? Newsweek. >> ABC. >> ABC Newsweek. So, >> ABC this week. >> ABC This Week. Okay. I'm learning.
42:27
Uh, the $2,000 dividend could come in lots of forms. Let's play the clip.
42:38
>> You know, it could the the $2,000 dividend could come in lots of forms. in lots of ways, George.
42:43
Um, you know, it could be just the the tax decreases that we are seeing on the president's agenda.
42:50
You know, no tax on tips, no tax on overtime, no tax on social security, deductibility of auto loans.
42:55
So, you know, those are substantial deductions that, you know, are being financed in the tax bill.
43:03
>> Tyler, do you feel like this, >> how is that going to help the day trading community?
43:08
Yeah, I was planning on doing rampant speculation with this $2,000.
43:12
What am I going to do now?
43:14
>> You're actually you you're basically fully You've already committed the funds, right? >> Yeah. >> Yeah.
43:19
I've already placed a ton of parlays. >> Yes.
43:22
>> So, like, what am I supposed to do now?
43:25
>> I can't pay my parlay bill with a tax decrease on auto loans. >> Yeah.
43:30
You're not looking for passive income.
43:32
You're looking for massive income, >> bro.
43:34
I'm looking for massive income.
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43:47
Uh Doomer says they should put a button on the IRS website that allows you to either receive the $200 STEMI check or if you press the button, you have a 50/50 chance of getting either $4,000 or zero.
44:02
I really think a lot of people would press that button.
44:04
Absolutely absolutely wild.
44:06
Uh certified bangers X now has an account called atbangers and it is an account that highlights the the best bangers.
44:17
They're testing something new. Certified bangers.
44:18
We want to recognize the very best post that move the timeline ranked by authentic interactions.
44:22
If your post is featured, you will get a ser certified banger badge on your profile for the month.
44:30
Here are the top five bangers for October. Uh very cool concept.
44:32
Um, very similar to a project that uh, Jordy sort of incubated uh, about 12 months ago, almost a year ago, >> January. It was during the fires.
44:45
I remember I remember they were ripping.
44:48
It was called Banger Archive and Jordy would go and screenshot a post that uh, had done very very well and resurface it and the findings were shocking.
44:56
Do you want to break down what you learned from that project?
45:00
If you take any post that had gotten like a minimum of 3,000 likes and you just screenshotted it and then posted the screenshot and said banger, it would immediately get usually more likes than the original post. >> It was crazy.
45:14
>> There were there were some posts that that had I screenshotted them.
45:15
They had like maybe 20,000 likes and then I posted on there to get like 150,000 likes and like millions of views >> and some of it is like there's there's a timelessness and there's just like a high it's just high quality content is high quality content.
45:28
There's certain certain sentences that just are always funny.
45:33
They're just always funny.
45:33
Some of them get funnier.
45:34
Uh some of them some of them did fall off.
45:36
Some of them would flop even though they were a a banger previously.
45:39
Uh there were a bunch of interesting findings from the uh from the banger archive, >> including at least one person that was that got mad very mad.
45:48
They were like, "You could have just reposted it." >> Exactly.
45:52
And >> the whole But the issue is it doesn't work.
45:54
>> It doesn't archive it then because if they delete it, then it doesn't stay.
45:57
But they want the they want the right to delete.
45:59
So, I understand where they're coming from. Uh, bangers on bad.
46:03
>> Bobby in the chat says, "Don't care about a Donald Boat says, "Don't care about a badge.
46:06
They should come to your house and tattoo it on your body."
46:07
Yeah, having a badge for a month is >> Yeah. I don't know. It's cool.
46:13
I I I think it's interesting because um >> it's also I mean, so looking at the posts that they they have here, they're just kind of random. >> Yes.
46:23
So So, so we were debating this.
46:25
So, first off, I I think what what is interesting about this is that it's not a new functionality in the X app.
46:29
Like there are plenty of ways to surface popular posts, mainly in the discover page on the on the explore page with the little window glass.
46:41
So, you you search there before you search, you see for you, you see trending topics, you see who to follow, business news.
46:48
there's a whole bunch of things that are that are going on uh that are that are like it's basically like new UI, new projects.
46:56
Like they could have created like a separate tab or something like that. They didn't do that.
46:59
They just created a an actual account on X that's native and then they created an organization and they just give you the organization tag tag if you post a banger, which is uh it's just a very interesting use of the of like the the X primitives like the code that's already there.
47:16
Like clearly this did not require software engineering to do which is just interesting way to like uh create some new content on >> Zoom.
47:27
Zoomer says, "Did you guys seriously not include this banger?"
47:33
We honestly need to get Zoomer on the show.
47:36
>> I invited him >> because he's got some truly wild takes.
47:41
Got to put him into radio format.
47:43
>> He's been on a roller coaster for sure.
47:45
But yes, so we were debating uh is the uh is the bangers account going to be teapot tech Twitter uh venture capital related stuff.
47:55
Will you see Naval in there?
47:57
Will you see Mark Andre Growing Daniel Rune posts these posts that go super viral but within tech or will it be more broad?
48:06
will we see something from basketball Twitter or something from you know all sorts of different uh you know sub communities.
48:13
Uh and it was just an interesting way to to check the the the pulse because I feel like we are in a little corner of X but obviously there are folks that use X and they never interact with tech Twitter really.
48:25
They're over they're over in some other they're talking about uh basketball or they're talking about football or they're talking about the Oscars or they're in film Twitter or they're there's so many different little subpockets.
48:35
Um, well, the result was that they went broad.
48:38
A lot of the tech folks think it's slop, but uh, some of these were kind of interesting.
48:42
Uh, the first one that they highlight is from 0x45 and it says, "Can y'all please tell me the lore behind your profile picture pictures pictures and it got 285 million views."
48:57
So, people really enjoyed quote tweeting this.
48:59
It got it got 80 or it got 39.
49:02
>> The challenge there is that in itself is not a banger.
49:04
It just got a lot of reach. >> Yes.
49:07
>> Because people were quoting it.
49:07
Like it has zero value as an individual post.
49:12
>> Well, it starts a conversation.
49:12
It's it creates more content.
49:14
Like it is sort of a viral seed of of content in this weird way in in a way that um there are special words in that post that lead it to generating more content than than an average post.
49:29
If if if you just posted uh like how did you pick your profile picture? Not a banger.
49:37
>> Yeah, >> this the lore it specifically it specifically worked.
49:39
Uh and it obviously did get a lot of a lot of attention, but I agree with you that this is not something that like sparks thought, I suppose, or like laughter. I don't know. What is the lore, Tyler?
49:51
What's the lore behind your profile picture?
49:55
>> Um I think it was my Halloween costume.
49:58
I was dressed up as Julius Caesar. No, >> last year. >> That's fine.
50:02
>> I thought that's just how you dressed back well in during your studies.
50:06
>> Yeah, that's not exactly like deep lore, but >> Okay.
50:08
What's the lore behind your picture?
50:10
It's just a picture of you at Wasn't it like a stock exchange or something? >> Yeah.
50:16
>> There's not really deep lore, but I mean I I could tell a whole story about it.
50:19
how uh it was at the New York Stock Exchange for the uh Clara IPO and it was also the day Charlie Kirk passed away or was assassinated which was horrible.
50:28
Um so there's a lot of lore there.
50:30
I don't know but it doesn't have the same like deep lore as I don't know what I don't know what people expect.
50:38
Who >> do you have any lore behind your >> Now now I'm curious who had the biggest quote tweet of this.
50:42
Did anyone have a really really great uh view post engagements quotes?
50:46
Um, no one Yeah, I'm not seeing anything that was like wild.
50:52
A lot of people did uh did um did actually engage with this.
50:59
Cold Healing says their their profile picture is their apartment in Peoria had a total ivy colored ivy co covered window that I really liked.
51:09
One day in mid-spring, I took all the furniture out of my bedroom to take this photo. Huh.
51:13
I mean, the criticism here, the most common criticism has been, "Congratulations, you brought Reddit gold to X."
51:24
>> It does seem a little bit like gold. It is even gold colored.
51:26
How a mathematician sees the world. I saw this going viral.
51:29
I didn't realize this was this viral. 200 million views.
51:32
Um, what is the uh what is this saying, Tyler? Did you see this?
51:40
Do you know what this why this went so viral?
51:41
Just because it's it's Is it funny specifically?
51:43
Like I >> I don't It's just like they just drew a bunch of lines and like random math equations. >> Yeah.
51:51
Like is this actually how anyone sees >> No, it it was like everyone was quote tweeting it like how a podcaster sees the world. >> Yeah.
51:58
I think people were just spinning off of it on different ways of of So it just became a good meme template.
52:04
>> Yeah, that makes sense. What was the other one?
52:06
When your AI girlfriend was on AWS US East one, 60 million views.
52:11
That really shows you how big the like the tech community is or like the AWS like balln knowowers.
52:17
>> I think this one was is closer to what we would describe as like a normal a banger. >> Totally. Totally.
52:22
I mean uh netcap girl one of the first posts we reacted to on this show. Uh great great poster. Absolutely a banger.
52:29
Um the I'm I'm shocked that 60 million people have the context to enjoy a post about AWS US East1, but I guess it is a dominant technology that lots of people interact with.
52:41
So, uh they must know uh or maybe there's enough context to enjoy it.
52:44
Um >> well, in other news, >> yes. What else?
52:50
Uh there is a JP Morgan AI capex report uh and there uh Max Weinbox says this is a great way to put AI ROI into perspective to drive a 10% return on our AI on our modeled AI investments through 2030 would require 650 billion of annual revenue in perpetuity which equates to $34.
53:11
72 a month from every current >> iPhone user. in in perspective.
53:21
>> Ross Hendrickx says the AI math ain't math and two ways to fix it.
53:23
20x the revenue in the next 5 years or slash data center capex.
53:30
I'll take the latter on 100 to1 odds.
53:30
So what does a capex pullback look like?
53:33
Uh there was another post here I I thought was a solid.
53:39
Hari Ragavan says annual US spend on software is 400 billion.
53:47
Professional services is 2. 8 8 trillion.
53:49
Logistics labor is 1 trillion.
53:51
Healthcare admin 1 trillion.
53:51
Education labor 1 trillion. That's 6 trillion. Globally is probably 3x.
53:55
Every market is up for grabs. All of them.
53:58
If you don't get that, you aren't ready for what's coming. 650 billion is a joke.
54:02
So again, I think uh understand the concern, but uh when you put it in terms of every basically every iPhone user needs to spend $34 a month on >> Yeah.
54:19
Well, obviously it's not correctly. >> Yeah. Yeah. No, I know. I know.
54:22
But it's >> if you're using Uber and on your phone and Uber uh is spending a dollar per user on AI inference just for fraud detection, like that counts, right?
54:32
It's like it's like how much are you spending on cloud computing?
54:36
Like cloud computing is a huge market, but you don't think about it as like oh yeah, everyone spend >> my household cloud budget. >> Exactly.
54:46
It's like no, there are some customers, some companies that spend billions and billions of dollars on cloud hosting and then you interact with services all over the place and the broad cloud computing market is just bigger than the AI market right now and will be for a long time.
55:02
When you look at the AI capex numbers, they're all smaller than just the traditional capex numbers.
55:08
Like the actual just building of a normal data center is still higher than building of an AI data center.
55:12
Um, and that's because they're actually monetizing cloud computing very effectively.
55:17
Uh, because everyone everyone needs a database for something or other or or or a web hosting platform, something like that.
55:23
Everyone needs turbuffer search every bite serless vector and full text search built from first principles on object storage.
55:29
Fast, 10x cheaper and extremely scalable.
55:31
Um, where else did you want to skip skip ahead a little bit or you want to go back to um the AI capex buildout?
55:42
Uh, it is it is very odd to put it in those terms.
55:44
I remember someone putting Bitcoin in the same terms to me uh when Bitcoin was at like 10K or something and he was like, "Look, uh the math is like in order to have like a stable price at like the 100k price targets that people are talking about, you would have to have, you know, billions and billions flowing in every day and stuff."
56:07
And it's like, and somehow that just wound up happening.
56:10
And I remember being very convinced by this um by saying like, "Yeah, that doesn't make any sense.
56:14
Like why would how how could it possibly become um an investment vehicle that is constantly seeing so much demand that uh that it can justify such a huge such a huge price and yet like it just did because it just worked its way into like every single person's pension fund and like every single person's ETFs like have a little bit of Bitcoin in them and like >> Oh yeah.
56:38
you stayed long even if you thought that that scenario was crazy because you were you you were like well I should have some exposure if it's at all within the realm of possibility. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly.
56:48
There were more reasons to like stay long than than actually dip out.
56:52
Uh the the most interesting point from the semi- analysis uh segment yesterday was uh this I did you pick up on when he when he mentioned uh the Tyler standing up.
57:05
Tyler's rocking the standing desk today. Uh, give us a review. Um, how is it feeling?
57:09
You you you you haven't been standing the whole time.
57:14
You've been sitting down.
57:14
You need a >> I like to move around. Yeah. Like stand up, sit down. >> Yeah.
57:18
Well, we need to get you one of the taller taller chairs.
57:19
Um, but there was uh in this in the semi- analysis interview yesterday, um, uh, our our guest was talking about this idea of putting an H100 index on the stock market.
57:33
market. that was like something he kind of alluded to and I feel like that would be pretty pretty crazy and I I don't even know how mechanically that would work but like if all of a sudden >> just treating it like a commodity >> yeah but actually taking something from
57:51
currently it lives on the balance sheets of Neo clouds and hyperscalers and actually taking a product and just like making it making it a commodity that you can just invest in directly is not really like I don't think it's very simple. I think it I think it actually
58:04
I think it I think it actually is a complex process, but it certainly would potentially generate a ton more liquidity.
58:12
Like there would just be a lot more investment dollars flowing in if if there was like a way to like directly get in on the AI trade by just investing in like the underlying >> AI capex trade is betting on AI and then we need other people betting on the AI capex. >> Yeah. Yeah. I I don't know. I don't know.
58:30
I I mean like >> derivative bets.
58:31
John, so you're saying we're going higher.
58:35
>> I mean, that's certainly what semi- analysis was saying, and it certainly it it just feels like uh the it was foolish to it was it is foolish or it was foolish to uh to sound the alarm bells around the idea of like debt being used at all. It's like debt is fine. Debt is good.
58:56
The question is just like are we actually overlevered?
58:58
There's not like so when I look at like oh Meta has like four billion of debt for this one little side project thing.
59:06
I'm like that's still a very stable business.
59:08
Like that's not like oh they're super indebted like they oh how are they going to pay their debts?
59:13
Like uh like there's just a wild continuum on like how much leverage is in the system, what that leads to in terms of like risk.
59:21
Um we're we're we're now we're at a turning point where we might be going really heavy levered.
59:29
Um, we might be bringing in, you know, more ETF money.
59:32
I mean, I don't even know if there's a NeoCloud in the S&P 500 yet.
59:38
>> Like, that is an interesting break point because once you're in the S&P 500, you like there is way more liquidity because there are funds, ETFs that just buy the S&P 500.
59:48
And so, once you're in the S&P 500, you sort of have like price support.
59:52
you have extra investors that are like lining up and they're like, I'm riding with you no matter what as long as you're in the S&P 500.
59:58
Um, and so, uh, >> yeah, I mean, it's notable that Oracle has fully roundted from before the OpenAI announcement.
1:00:06
So, be leading up to the OpenAI announcement, they were at at, uh, >> 200 $241 a share.
1:00:12
They're now at $235 a share. Yeah.
1:00:17
>> And so, uh, the market is no longer giving them credit for the OpenAI deal. That is interesting. Yeah.
1:00:22
Um well uh >> Nabius is down 10% in the last five days.
1:00:29
Coreweave is down 25% in the last 5 days.
1:00:31
And iron is down 17% in the last five days.
1:00:35
So >> jitters to say the least.
1:00:40
>> Microsoft can't power all of its AI chips says CEO Sachin Nadella. This from Zero Hedge.
1:00:45
I don't know if you want to read through a little bit of this, but >> yeah, the the thing that was notable here is Cororeweave on their earnings call yesterday was Cororeweave was saying that they aren't power constrained.
1:00:54
That that's not that's not their problem.
1:00:57
>> What are they what are they constrained by?
1:00:58
>> I mean, they had a weaker forecast, which is part of why it it traded it's traded down dramatically today.
1:01:03
But again, they they they grew revenue 2x and they still traded down pretty dramatically.
1:01:11
So, >> well, there's more data center news from Joe Weisenthal.
1:01:14
But first, let me tell you about Google AI Studio.
1:01:16
Create an AI powered app faster than ever. >> Get started.
1:01:20
Gemini understands the capabilities you need and automatically wires up the right models and APIs for you. Get started at a. studio/build.
1:01:28
Um, Joe Weisenthal is exerpting a Bloomberg News article uh that says, "Two of the world's biggest data center developers have projects in Nvidia's hometown that may sit empty for years because the local utility isn't ready to supply electricity.
1:01:43
In Santa Clara, California, where the world's biggest supplier of artificial intelligence chips is based, Digital Realy Trust applied in 2019 to build a data center.
1:01:56
Roughly six years later, the development remains an empty shell awaiting energization stack infrastructure which was acquired earlier this year by Blue Al Capital has nearly has a nearby 48 megawatt project that's also vacant.
1:02:09
Me while the city-owned utility Silicon Valley Power struggles to upgrade its capacity. 48 megawatts. What are we doing here?
1:02:17
That seems like that's that's child's play.
1:02:20
>> The data center for ants.
1:02:22
>> That should be that should be child's play, but they're not able to do it. What's going on?
1:02:27
>> Um, uh, Byron Deer was responding to Elon Musk's post saying, uh, Elon was agreeing that every AI application startup is likely to be crushed by rapid expansion of foundational model providers.
1:02:40
Uh, Byron said, "I don't buy it at all.
1:02:42
No chance that four companies deliver all software value in the future, especially as a software TAM is growing 10x to include a labor component."
1:02:52
Um, yeah, I think, um, we'll have to see.
1:02:55
Obviously, the the labs are extremely ambitious, but uh I I tend to side side more with uh >> with Byron here that as as long as the labs don't have uh as as long as the labs are saying like you can access our best intelligence >> Yeah.
1:03:17
>> via API, it feels like there's going to be durable Yeah.
1:03:21
>> Competition while you have open source models, you know, lagging but not lagging by very much at all. >> Yeah.
1:03:28
My current my current way to think about this is that um the labs are new hyperscalers as you as you've put it before.
1:03:36
Uh which means that they will compete in a lot of different categories and there will be matchups and ultimately it will depend on the quality of the teams.
1:03:46
So, uh, the way I think about like browser base versus AWS's competitor is like, well, if Paul at browser base goes up against the AWS project manager and works harder and is more creative and uh, and marshals capital and does the right deals and partners with uh, the one password team, for example, uh, he can create a sustainable business.
1:04:13
Sometimes that might be a duopoly.
1:04:14
Sometimes that might be total victory in and a lot of it depends on the the nature of the market that they're going after.
1:04:23
Like is it possible that in five years uh OpenAI just gets completely destroyed on AI vertical video but AI vertical video as a category wins and that there's actually a different startup that cracks it and makes it great and grows it huge like I think absolutely that's possibility.
1:04:42
Um, it just matters on like there's a there's a matchup that happens in every single category.
1:04:47
And I don't think it's I don't think it's fair to say that the foundation model labs will win every category by default or they'll lose every category by default.
1:04:58
It's like Google happened to win in in email and maps, but they lost in chat and they lost in uh in social networking and in RSS feeds.
1:05:11
they they like they won in some places, they lost in others.
1:05:13
And that's just the nature of these competitions.
1:05:17
It's like if there's a particular team in place at one company and then there's a startup that's, you know, better than that team, then the startup wins.
1:05:24
If the team inside the company is better than the startup, like you get Paul Bukite uh at at Google and he's building Gmail.
1:05:30
I'm sure there were a lot of email founders out there that were trying to compete with Paul Bukite, but Paul Bukite smoked them.
1:05:36
Um and Gmail is what it is today.
1:05:40
And so I still lean on like who are the actual folks working on the project.
1:05:44
Are they are the best people inside the organization or outside the organization?
1:05:50
>> And that's how it actually >> over on the app store charts.
1:05:52
Chat GBT is still number one. Threads is number two. Shout out Connor Hayes.
1:05:56
Uh number three is Go Wish Your Digital Wish List.
1:06:01
Create wishes and get inspired.
1:06:03
>> Number four is Google Gemini. Number five is Sora.
1:06:05
So Sora is sliding down the charts but still in the top five.
1:06:11
We'll have to look if Fubo can overtake Sora. >> Fubo.
1:06:16
>> That would be that would be a win for organic media.
1:06:22
>> Um I am a little lost.
1:06:22
Let me tell you about profound.
1:06:25
Get your brand mentioned in chatb.
1:06:26
Uh reach millions of consumers who are using AI to discover new products and brands.
1:06:30
Um do you want to >> did you go down post?
1:06:37
>> J Boldard one says calm down people.
1:06:39
Masa's son is a male Kathy Wood.
1:06:39
Him selling Nvidia today means Nvidia has plenty of upside left. >> It is. >> It is.
1:06:48
I mean, it just comes down to he will take he's selling Nvidia.
1:06:50
He's going to give that money to OpenAI and then OpenAI is going to give it to Nvidia. So, >> sold. >> We will see.
1:06:59
Um Casey Hammer, who's coming on the show in 20 minutes, says that remember we could automate 99.
1:07:05
99% of of air traffic control if it wasn't deliberately being used as a government funding canary.
1:07:13
So we will have to ask him.
1:07:17
Uh he had another post uh earlier this week.
1:07:20
>> Government canary or funded canary. Canary. He said funding canary.
1:07:26
>> Casey >> the canary in the coal mine.
1:07:27
What is a what is a canary?
1:07:29
Yeah, we have to ask him about this.
1:07:31
I saw I saw his other post uh which was interesting.
1:07:33
I realized the Doom's the Doom graphics engine running on a pregnancy test CPU could handle all of North American traffic control.
1:07:42
I'm going to sit down for a bit.
1:07:44
This needs to be in the bangers.
1:07:47
This get get this man the bangers tag.
1:07:49
This is such a good >> There's an article I was curious.
1:07:53
There's an article here from The Verge that says, "Digital pregnancy tests are almost as powerful as the original IBM PC." >> That's insane.
1:08:01
>> A lot of computer to read an oldfashioned P strip.
1:08:04
>> Yeah, that's what it does. You know that, right?
1:08:05
Like when you see those digital tests, it's literally just like basically pointing a camera at a at a test strip and being like, "Did it turn blue or not?" or "Did it turn red?" >> No way. >> Yeah. No, that's how it works.
1:08:16
So, so in so basically they make a test strip and then it has a chemical in there and when the person like pees on it, it like the the the the human sample interacts with the chemicals and turns a color.
1:08:30
>> And so normally you just look at and you're like oh it turned the color like it's pink so that means one thing or it's blue that means another thing.
1:08:35
Uh but but they to make it digital they just point a camera at it and say like what is it looking at?
1:08:43
I'm pretty sure I might be wrong. Who knows?
1:08:45
This is probably fake news and it'll go viral on Instagram as it always does.
1:08:49
>> In other news, Yan Lun says, "See you." >> He's out.
1:08:54
>> He's out >> from Meta.
1:08:55
He's going to launch his own startup.
1:08:58
>> Tyler, what's your reaction?
1:09:00
>> Um, I mean, this is pretty big news.
1:09:00
I I think people have kind of expected this for a while. Yeah.
1:09:03
Basically, since Alexander Wayne came in.
1:09:05
Um because Alexander Wang kind of in some some sense like took over as like the chief AI person at Meta which was >> not enough room in this town for two AI >> not enough room for >> scientists. Yeah. >> Yeah. Yeah.
1:09:20
>> Uh not enough room in this town for two chief AI scientists.
1:09:24
>> And and so uh Jan is like very goated AI researcher.
1:09:27
He's been in the game for like super long. Yes.
1:09:29
like super long. Yes. He did he uh I think probably his most famous paper is like Lynette which is like the original uh convolutional paper >> Lynette >> Lynette well I I don't >> name it after himself >> I think that's what people call it I don't know what the actual paper is now
1:09:43
that's like the it's like Alexet it's like not actually called Alex um >> but yeah it was like the OG convolutional neural network paper and then that kind of basically led into deep learning >> um and then the main thing is is like >> today he's like very much seen as being bearish on LM. Sure. Sure.
1:10:01
>> He doesn't think they can reason.
1:10:01
He doesn't think they can like do novel tasks or whatever.
1:10:05
>> Um, so he's been like very outspoken about that.
1:10:06
I think that's maybe part of the reason why he's he just has kind of a different vision from from Zuck and Alexander Wang.
1:10:12
Um, but yeah, I mean this is pretty big news.
1:10:16
>> Do you think he will raise a private credit fund >> and get into data centers?
1:10:24
>> I'm no longer interested in research and the science behind it all.
1:10:26
I'm interested in finance.
1:10:29
>> I'm interested in finance.
1:10:31
>> I mean, he he has um I forget exactly what it's called, but he has like another kind of path that he sees to AGI.
1:10:37
He's he's he's still a professor at NYU, which I think is where he does most of his research these days. >> Interesting.
1:10:43
>> Um so, I think he'll probably just stay in academia.
1:10:45
Does he have any active classes going on this semester?
1:10:49
because if he does, we should send you onto the campus to uh to study.
1:10:55
Not just >> not just from the timeline, but in in the classroom and you can do a little little uh >> on the ground reporting.
1:11:06
>> Taylor in the chat says, "Lredit, >> has he has he taken a formal victory lap on scaling laws not holding?"
1:11:12
Uh because from your perspective, it's a preemptive it would be a preemptive victory lap because I know Gary Marcus was sort of taking a victory lap with Richard Sutton after that Dwar podcast and then Andre Carpathy sort of like confirmed that it might be a little bit harder to scale up the current paradigm.
1:11:35
Um >> yeah, I mean I I don't think anyone is saying like scaling up is going to get easier, right?
1:11:41
You just need to you need bigger data centers.
1:11:43
you need to like spend way more money.
1:11:45
>> I I think it if I I don't think today you can just say that like pre-training is dead though.
1:11:49
That's like definitely not true.
1:11:53
>> Isn't Isn't that sort of Yan Lun's take though or Richard Sutton's take or >> I I think um Yan Lun is is generally against all LLMs.
1:12:03
He's not just saying that like LM were they were very promising and then they kind of um fizzled out. Mhm.
1:12:10
>> I I think he's kind of always been against LMS as a way to AGI. >> Yeah.
1:12:15
>> Um I I think it would definitely be preemptive to say that he was like correct though. >> Yeah. >> Okay.
1:12:20
I don't want to cut you off, Tyler, but this is more important.
1:12:22
OTP in the chat says Buffett is low-key a huge boxing fan and I know at least one gym around his state that he has at least had a hand in funding.
1:12:32
Oh, >> and I looked it up and he's a huge fan of Terrence Crawford, the boxer.
1:12:37
Uh, and he will go watch uh he'll go see the fights and he likes the cheap seats because he can see he has a better he feels like he has a better angle. >> That's interesting. I like that. >> That I did not know.
1:12:53
So, he is he's a patron of combat.
1:12:56
We're not ready to say he's a patron of of of the arts, but in some way this is Marshall.
1:13:03
kind of some somewhat of a martial art down on Warren Buffett. This guy's amazing.
1:13:07
>> Uh loves McDonald's, loves boxing, apparently.
1:13:10
Loves allocating capital efficiently.
1:13:12
You know, he he he stays in his lane. Uh it's great.
1:13:18
Uh do we have an update from Brian Johnson?
1:13:20
He came back from his his trip. He was on psychedelics.
1:13:26
I feel like I'm expecting at least one fast food restaurant.
1:13:31
I want him to to flip around on at least one and say, "Okay, yeah, I'm I'm I'm an In-N-Out guy now."
1:13:41
Um he's been he's been quiet.
1:13:41
Um I I do wonder if he'll if he'll update on anything or if he's just like so so powered through that it just will not affect him at all because like wasn't he was kind of framing it as like I'm I'm this is like a big deal.
1:13:56
It seems like he got through it just super fine.
1:14:00
>> Saw a very viral post of somebody saying I don't think it's a good thing that billionaires can talk about taking schedule one >> drugs publicly with no repercussions.
1:14:10
did seem that he was doing it like this seems like such still such a gray area where you can get it prescribed by a doctor but it's still >> schedule one.
1:14:19
>> Um he posted an update uh on on his experience.
1:14:24
He also talked about more about why he says there's potential uh it's potentially a longevity therapy for >> uh psilocybin expands lifespan in mice.
1:14:36
Um, it can, uh, reduce inflation markers tied to aging.
1:14:40
It can increase brain entropy, breaks rigid patterns, and boosts long-term cognition and flexibility.
1:14:49
And >> yeah, I I don't know.
1:14:49
I I kind of agree with that with that uh that person who is uh who is saying like they shouldn't be able to talk about it publicly.
1:14:57
I feel like he should have a disclaimer or something because there's gonna be there's people he has such a huge audience that there's going to be some people that just look at what >> early in the early podcast era >> you had uh Tim >> Ferris >> who to his credit was like doing work on himself >> and would share what he was doing. >> Yeah.
1:15:19
But he would talk about doing things like Ibagane, which is like a cra, you know, super powerful psychedelic. Yeah.
1:15:27
>> And he wasn't directly saying, "Hey, I think you should go take this."
1:15:30
But >> when hundreds of thousands of people like follow Tim for health advice, it sort of is like an indirect uh it's somewhat of an it's it's somewhat of an endorsement even if it's not directly. >> So, no. No.
1:15:45
I mean, I 100% think some people will see this and be like, "Oh, looks like he had a good experience.
1:15:49
Let me jump straight to exactly his protocol, which is clearly not accessible for the average person.
1:15:56
Like, he has been building up a tolerance to this particular chemical for probably a decade.
1:16:04
And so, it's going to hit him very differently than it will someone who's not in the same place."
1:16:09
We were joking yesterday about like, oh, if he wanted to like really challenge himself, he would have been at like a crowded concert or something.
1:16:17
And there are going to be people that see this post and and wind up actually doing that and winding wind up in a very very rough spot.
1:16:24
Um, I feel like there should be more a little more disclaimers on this.
1:16:29
Like, hey, I'm I am running a crazy experiment on myself.
1:16:31
Like, do not try this at home.
1:16:33
He needs It's the It's the You know, you ever watch Jackass back in the day?
1:16:38
the day? remember it opened every every episode opened with like don't do not these are stunt professionals like they do this professionally like yes they just look like random guys but like behind the camera there's a huge team they are stunt men like and and even that was still like was like okay kids
1:16:56
were like you know trying to trying to jump their skateboards down too many stairs and getting hurt um but it wasn't like that bad but there was still like a do not try this at home >> I did I did see some people responding and saying I took a similar dose to this and it ruined basically ruined my year. >> Terrible. >> Terrible.
1:17:13
>> It took me you know months and months to recover.
1:17:16
So >> yeah, I would say stay off the psychedelics.
1:17:18
Stay on linear because linear is a purpose-built tool for planning and building products.
1:17:21
Meet the system for modern software development.
1:17:25
Streamline issues, projects, and product road maps.
1:17:27
That's where you want to be.
1:17:30
You want to be locked in in linear. >> Yeah, I do. I do.
1:17:32
I I have I have joked in the past.
1:17:35
It's like is is uh you know are psychedelics going to fix your life or just doing the tasks that you've been avoiding?
1:17:42
Is that going to make you feel relief? Yes.
1:17:44
You know, is that going to make you feel better about your life?
1:17:48
>> It's like that meme of like the the anime ninja, if you're tired, do it tired.
1:17:52
If you're sober, do it sober, >> right? Just do it.
1:17:57
>> John Kugan, >> if you're sober, do it sober.
1:17:58
Um, well, if you want to help make history, >> Angelist uh is launching a new product uh to fund uh the most creative, hardworking technical founders building the innovations that push humanity forward.
1:18:12
Uh, Angelist is hiring a marketing lead to launch and scale this product.
1:18:17
Uh Eric over at Angelist, a friend of ours and the chief legal officer over there says, "You don't need prior experience running a marketing function, but you do need to be scrappy, data driven, and comfortable in a startup environment.
1:18:29
Uh you'll own marketing strategy across a variety of channels to build awareness and drive growth."
1:18:34
Uh I know what this product is.
1:18:37
I'm very excited about it.
1:18:37
uh and uh but I I uh unfortunately can't share, but if you reach out to Eric, if you DM him on X uh and you're interested in the role, I'm sure he can share more.
1:18:48
Uh but uh excited uh excited for this one to come online uh in the next couple months.
1:18:56
Uh I thought this was good.
1:18:56
Somebody found a post from Sam Alman in 2016.
1:19:00
>> Oh, I didn't realize this is old.
1:19:00
I thought he just posted this.
1:19:03
>> Oh, >> 2016, so almost 10 years ago.
1:19:04
says, "Digital add digital addiction is going to be one of the great mental health crises of our time."
1:19:11
And Blade says, "Un had this thought and immediately was like, how do I profit from this?
1:19:16
The greatest to ever do it." DBH >> hilarious. Hilarious.
1:19:22
>> Of course, Chat GBT wouldn't launch for many many years.
1:19:25
And >> yes, >> uh but in that same he was did when did he write the merge?
1:19:31
>> Uh that that was like around the same time or something.
1:19:33
But also, I don't know, to to be fair, like I like there are lots of things that you could like if you're if you're trying to like layer up like the the Open AI is bad like case, like you don't start with like the product's too addictive, like I don't think that's the claim.
1:19:50
The claim is like it uses too much water or it like it it like oneshots people or it does erotica or it's like AI slop.
1:19:56
But very few people are saying like, "Oh yeah, people are on their phones too much and it's because of Open AI now."
1:20:04
People are like it's people are on their phones too much, but it's because of Instagram and it's because of like social media.
1:20:13
Actually, not the AI >> because of Sora.
1:20:15
>> Well, I think it's a little bit too early to say that.
1:20:18
I don't think it's that I don't think it's working.
1:20:21
>> Certainly short short form video.
1:20:22
>> Have you ever been in in in like the gym or in a coffee shop and seen someone scrolling Sora like over your shoulder?
1:20:29
I haven't seen I meant I meant vertical video broadly. >> Totally. Totally.
1:20:32
W- Which is I guess I guess like a good take here, which is like how do I profit from this?
1:20:36
I got to make an AI version of it.
1:20:37
That's that's probably like more of what they were thinking.
1:20:42
Um but uh but in terms of in terms of actually profiting on uh on like digital addiction, uh it doesn't seem like it's going very well.
1:20:52
>> Yeah, for 40 seems to be extremely addictive.
1:20:55
So much so that >> very for a very small amount of people like absolutely. >> Yeah, for sure. >> Yeah.
1:21:02
And we don't know how many people. >> Yeah.
1:21:03
You know what else is addictive?
1:21:06
>> Doing your sales tax with numeral putting your sales tax on autopilot.
1:21:10
Spend less than five minutes per month on sales tax compliance.
1:21:11
Um I'm also addicted to the Financial Times.
1:21:14
Uh the Financial Times has coverage of Sequoia Capital and uh and what's going on with uh Rolof Boa out.
1:21:25
>> Both of these top top lieutenants pushed Rolof out. >> That's what they say.
1:21:31
Leadership duo prepare to chart a new course at Sequoia after ousting of Imperial.
1:21:34
Both the uh venture capital firms limited partners hope Grady and Lynn can boost strategy and bring super intense period to close.
1:21:46
They want to become less intense.
1:21:46
That is very interesting. I would not think that.
1:21:50
Um um okay let let's run through let's try and understand the level of intensity at Sequoia now and potentially in the future.
1:21:56
So from this article we love seeing uh Andrew Reed there.
1:22:00
They they the Financial Times, let's just say they they had to find a picture where he was pushing where he looked like he was pushing.
1:22:08
They're like, you know, we're going to tell a story about about someone being pushed out.
1:22:12
We need a picture of one of the lieutenants pushing as much as close as we can get to that motion because that's the story we're trying to tell.
1:22:19
Um let's let's figure out what's actually going on.
1:22:23
Sequoa Capitals Rolup Bo was ousted by top lieutenants who lost confidence in his ability to keep Silicon Valley's most powerful venture firm ahead of its rivals.
1:22:33
Bo stepped down LA as managing partner of the group last Tuesday following an intervention from Alfred Lyn Pat Grady and Andrew Reid said multiple people with knowledge of the matter.
1:22:45
The trio of senior partners had the blessing of the wider firm and Douglone Sequoia's former managing partner said the three of the people.
1:22:53
Their move came on the back of concerns about both his management style and questions about Sequoia's artificial intelligence investment strategy and followed high-profile clashes between senior figures at the firm.
1:23:05
The people said Financial Times spoke to 10 people close to the firm.
1:23:09
It's a leaky bucket over there in Sequoia Capital.
1:23:11
They got the Financial Times on speed dial, I guess. >> Including investors.
1:23:19
>> One of them was an LP. >> Yes.
1:23:20
You know, also also it says people close to the firm, not necessarily people that are actually at the firm.
1:23:26
It's hilarious to be like, "Oh, sorry.
1:23:26
I can't I have to I have to I can't be on our on our all hands today. I have a call." Oh, with who?
1:23:33
>> I'm going to the dentist, actually.
1:23:34
>> I'm going to the dentist.
1:23:34
Yes, I'm going to the >> You went to the dentist last week. Oh, yeah. I'm going again. >> You're going again?
1:23:40
>> I have another checkup.
1:23:40
I just got to we just got to give props for one second to Shawn Maguire for there being an article about Sequoia and not being in it.
1:23:47
I mean, >> round of applause. >> Whoa, it's amazing.
1:23:52
He's like, >> this is the first >> freedom.
1:23:54
I'm not in the doghouse for once. Oh, thank goodness. I love it. Yeah.
1:24:02
Props to Sean for staying out of the dodging the bullet. You did it.
1:24:03
They said it was impossible. >> Dodging the bullets. Okay.
1:24:06
So, investors who have worked with Botaa and institutions that bankroll Sequoia known as LPs.
1:24:14
So, the LPs are snitching. The LPS are snitching.
1:24:17
Uh, his ousting was motivated by a belief that a new generation of leaders would better serve Sequoa's LPs, they said.
1:24:23
So, yeah, I mean, typically if there's a change in leadership, even a change in the GP structure at all, you would expect an email to go out to all the LPs.
1:24:30
That's probably what uh what they're leaking.
1:24:34
But then a lot of the LPs probably got on the phone with people and then the Financial Times got on the phone with those people uh with those LPs.
1:24:38
One of one of those described the removal as a revolt against both imperial style of leadership following a period of upheaval at one of Silicon Valley's uh most successful and enduring firms.
1:24:51
On an IQ level, he is off the charts. Off the charts.
1:24:58
They didn't say which way he's off the charts.
1:25:02
Are they calling him zero IQ?
1:25:02
Negative one negative one IQ. That would be terrible.
1:25:07
No, they clearly mean he's very intelligent. He's 180, 200, 300 IQ. Who knows?
1:25:12
Uh, but the heart of the matter is that Roloff is one of these people who always needs to be seen as the smartest guy in the room.
1:25:21
Interesting, the person said, adding that both his emotional intelligence did not match his intellect.
1:25:26
Roloff is an uh legendary investor, a leader in human being.
1:25:30
Sequoa's new leadership team told the FT.
1:25:33
>> I mean, it's possible he was using too much Claude.
1:25:38
>> And Claude kept telling him after every meeting he would dump in like the meeting notes and he'd be like, "Claude, >> am I goated? >> Am I goatated?"
1:25:45
>> Like, you're definitely in the conversation.
1:25:47
>> You're absolutely goatated.
1:25:48
>> You're absolutely right.
1:25:48
The reason Sequoia has stayed Sequoa for 53 years is they've refused to cement themselves in hierarchy.
1:25:54
Grady and Lynn will now run the firm while Reed and Grady will co-lead Sequoa's funds investing in more mature startups.
1:26:02
So Reed is going up to the uh to the growth stage.
1:26:06
Uh Lynn and another partner uh Luciana Lexandrew will co-lead uh the firm's early stage investment fund.
1:26:16
So Alfred Lynn will be doing some seedstage investing early stage.
1:26:20
uh BOTA who's run its US and European businesses since 2017 and took over the whole firm in 2022 will remain as an adviser.
1:26:29
The 52-year-old grandson of Rolof Pikbotha um the last foreign secretary under South Africa's aparttheid regime and later a member of Nelson Mandela's first government was hired by PayPal uh by to PayPal by Elon Musk early in his career.
1:26:48
He's led investments in Instagram, YouTube, MongoDB.
1:26:52
Um, Sequoia has raised has returned more than 50 billion uh to its US and European investors.
1:26:56
Despite those successes, partners decided Lynn, who has backed Airbnb, Door Dash, and OpenAI, and Grady, who's behind investments in Snowflake, Zoom, and Service Now, were better placed to lead Sequoia under both the Sequoia has taken a more cautious approach to AI investment than some rivals.
1:27:17
invested a little more than 20 million in OpenAI in 2021 when the chatbt maker was valued at about 20 billion and has boosted that stake in subsequent rounds when OpenAI raised funds at 260 billion valuation.
1:27:33
Sequoia offered to invest 1 billion but ultimately was given a stake a fraction of that.
1:27:38
Oo, so they didn't get their they didn't get their 1 billion position which still would have been less than 1%.
1:27:45
Uh, Sequoia also holds a stake in Musk's XAI, but has focused on early investments in AI application companies such as Harvey, Sierra, and Glean, an approach also advocated by Grady.
1:27:56
This is very interesting.
1:27:58
Well, uh, we have our first guest of the show, Casey Hanmer, in the Restream waiting room.
1:28:06
Welcome to the show, Casey. How you doing? Happy Veterans Day. >> Thank you. It's good to be here. >> Great to be here.
1:28:12
>> Is this a real background? What's going on here?
1:28:16
>> I mean, it's a real photograph.
1:28:18
>> It's a real photograph.
1:28:18
>> What is it a photograph of?
1:28:21
>> Sorry, there's a weird lag there.
1:28:21
Uh, that's a photograph of, uh, some sample containers made last year of, um, pipeline grade synthetic natural gas, uh, made in America, >> uh, fossil carbon free, 100%. >> Yeah.
1:28:34
Uh, g give us the update on on Terraform. How how's it going? What's the latest?
1:28:39
>> Oh, Terraform's going great. Yeah, thanks.
1:28:40
Um we're 23 strong now and uh >> we're like literally putting finishing touches on on our first full scale uh synthetic fuel system.
1:28:48
So this is a machine that takes in sunlight and air and produces pipeline grade natural gas.
1:28:54
>> Also kicked off work on a methanol process which is kind of the other half or the flip side of the coin.
1:28:57
So methanol is in the department of liquid fuel and and natural gas is a department of gaseous fuel.
1:29:03
>> Um so between those two we pretty much covered everything that humans need.
1:29:05
Um and uh yeah, it's just it's kind of a a fairly mindboggling boggling thing to think that you know in in 100 years in a thousand years in 10,000 years humans who need hydrocarbons for any purpose whether that's flying rockets or jets or making paints and fertilizers or you know pigments or medicines or whatever will do so using a a solar synthetic process and that we're building the first one.
1:29:28
first one. Do you fit neatly into any of the current uh the current >> market >> political I was I was going to say like political sk uh like trends or initiatives like uh I mean we had Isaiah Taylor on yesterday from velar he's part
1:29:44
of this like group yeah just raised and there's like four companies that it feels like the administration is really trying to accelerate in nuclear um it feels like solar you know Elon's a solar maxi there's tons of energy around solar generally. Um, but are there specific
1:29:59
Um, but are there specific programs or milestones that are or just conversations that are happening on Capitol Hill that you're like kind of drafting off of?
1:30:12
>> I mean, the the genesis of Terraform, which actually four years ago yesterday, was a uh >> basically very suggestive spreadsheet.
1:30:20
Um, and very early on I said like I don't I don't really want to make this dependent on political, you know, various political whims. And so it hasn't been.
1:30:27
But um but actually across the spectrum like we we deal routinely with you know crunchy coastal liberal elites and and heartland Americans and everyone in between.
1:30:35
And uh I've never met anyone who says they'd like their fuel to be more expensive please.
1:30:40
>> Um so we're on the department of making more fuel uh making it better, making it cheaper, making it locally um making it free of various geopolitical catastrophes.
1:30:47
And I think that actually as I said never met an American who disagrees. >> Yeah.
1:30:51
What about the AI narrative?
1:30:51
>> Yeah. What about the AI narrative? Is there uh is there is is are are you drafting off of that or is it just a uh like a separate industry that's growing or is there is there basically a way to lower your cost of capital by you know doing a deal with someone who wants to buy a bunch of uh synthetically produced natural gas >> press release economy I should I should hire you guys as my
1:31:14
pfin >> I mean I mean like there there's a right way and a wrong way to do it and at a certain point it's like if it's if it's raining make hay right like there's just a little bit of like, okay, maybe there's something, but I I I'm wondering
1:31:25
how you're like tussling with it, like what's real, what would be over your skis to do, what's what's the actual application of the technology, like take me through the various intersections. >> Yeah, one of the really fun things I get
1:31:38
>> Yeah, one of the really fun things I get to do as a as a CEO of this company is is um, you know, basically make spreadsheets and charts all day long and and try and figure out how this stuff will go.
1:31:48
And and I've got a blog post, you know, I like to have ideas and write them down two years ago saying that the way that this is going to go is we're going to need we're going to need solar power to power AI data centers beyond a a significant, you know, significant leap beyond what we're able to do with natural gas.
1:32:01
>> Um and you know, people have paid attention to that.
1:32:03
We've had significant inbound interest from um most of the major players at this point um saying, "Hey, can you help us figure out how to do uh solar plus battery, you know, mostly or or completely off-grid um AI training data centers and inference data centers?"
1:32:16
and we said, "Sure, happy to help."
1:32:17
Um, and we've done done quite well by that.
1:32:19
Um, it's actually a very very strong market signal that that maybe I'm I'm in the wrong job and I should be a energy system design consultant rather than a CEO.
1:32:26
But tough luck to my stars.
1:32:28
I'm determined to figure out how to build a a hardware company and manufacture stuff.
1:32:31
Uh, because >> you can never have enough factories.
1:32:34
You can always have another factory.
1:32:36
More factories is more better.
1:32:39
As far as natural gas goes, yeah, I mean, I think that the primary the primary constraint that the um the AI hyperscalers are seeing right now is in the in the department of of methane destruction, that is to say that the turbons that produce power as opposed to the department of methane creation, which is us and then every driller between here and uh maybe Charlotte or something like that.
1:32:56
Um the United States at this point at least is is uh you know, once again the the great beneficiary of God's bounty when it comes to synthetic fuel.
1:33:03
Uh when it comes to fuel in general, actually synthetic fuel is is a work in progress.
1:33:08
um break down um >> I would can can you say more about the very suggestive spreadsheet? >> Yeah, sure.
1:33:15
Um essentially you look at a chart and you you try and make a prediction for what oil will cost to produce in 5 years, 10 years, 15 years, 20 years, 25 years.
1:33:22
I mean peak oil, it's it's an idea that's been around for a long long time.
1:33:25
And of course over time uh oil drillers are very very studios and hardworking people and they they figure out better ways of getting oil out.
1:33:32
And we've seen the fracking revolution and I think that's just a wonderful thing.
1:33:34
I I genuinely do think it's a wonderful thing.
1:33:36
Yes, it has certain climate you implications, but at the end of the day, the the hum like human welfare benefits to cheap oil are, you know, 100 times better than the than the climate problems caused by it.
1:33:47
Um, it's just a matter of fact that like we will run out sooner or later.
1:33:49
Um, and so oil is unlikely to get radically cheaper in the future.
1:33:53
On the other hand, solar is getting something like 40% cheaper per doubling of cumulative production, and that takes about two years.
1:34:00
So, we're seeing like 20% cost reductions per year.
1:34:02
And when you see something like that, it's a little bit like, you know, um Steve Wnjak and Steve Jobs or with Bill Gates in the 1970s looking at the uh the the arrival of integrated circuits and and consumer grade uh computing systems like very very primitive computers by today's standards and thinking hm you know that this this is a this is a product that has already hit product market fit.
1:34:22
It's already hitting this this uh cycle of of cost improvement.
1:34:25
There's going to be a big wave here.
1:34:27
You know, how do I ride that wave?
1:34:29
How do I commodify that compliment?
1:34:30
How do I build value on top of this platform?
1:34:32
And I'm thinking, what could I what could I use these cheap solar panels for?
1:34:36
You know, like there's already plenty of people out there building large utility scale solar arrays and plugging them into uh plug plugging them into the grid.
1:34:43
And the grid itself even even then was was kind of strained by by that.
1:34:46
And in particular, the kind of grid development bureaucracy was strained by that.
1:34:49
What else can you use it for?
1:34:51
And I was like, well, off-grid off-grid stuff obviously behind the meter build a giant solar array and then have a captive load attached to it for, you know, AI computing type stuff.
1:34:59
That's an obvious one to do.
1:35:00
Uh, and then, you know, fuel synthesis.
1:35:03
Uh, fuel synthesis was was an idea I've been thinking about for probably 30 years at this point because we have to do it on Mars someday.
1:35:08
And, um, I was saying, well, on Mars, it's enormously expensive due to energy cost, but energy cost on Earth is getting cheaper.
1:35:14
I wonder when these lines cross.
1:35:16
You know, if I'm able to surf that wave of cheaper solar and I can pass most of that value onto my customers by keeping my costs under control, um, then at what point should it be cheaper to synthesize fuel rather than dig it out of the ground and ship it halfway around the world?
1:35:27
And the answer then, and I think the answer is basically the same now, was sometime this decade, you know, 2030 at the outside. Uh, okay.
1:35:34
Wonder if anyone else has noticed this. A few people had.
1:35:37
What are they doing about it?
1:35:39
Not what I would do about it. Okay.
1:35:40
Well, I guess I should probably stop, you know, kicking myself in the in the shins at NASA and go and do this at uh go and start a company and at least give it a go. Find out what it's like.
1:35:51
Uh see see if building a hardware company is as fun as everyone makes it sound. And um and here we are.
1:35:57
So uh you know I say it's a infazard to play around on spreadsheets too much.
1:36:03
>> What happens to the price of land as solar uh as as solar energy production costs uh decline?
1:36:14
>> Yeah, that's a good good question.
1:36:14
Um because because ultimately the the value of of land under solar is the value of what people are willing to pay for that power and things they do with that power.
1:36:23
Um and so what we've seen for example is that um the value of land under solar is something like a 50 100 times higher on a per acre basis or per revenue basis than than your kind of average agriculture even in a fairly developed agricultural state like the United States.
1:36:39
And that's the same for synthetic fuel.
1:36:40
Um the the flip side actually and the thing that I worry about in terms of AI safety is that um it's pretty clear to me that the uh economic utility of of land that's being used as solar array to power an AI data center is over $100,000 an acre at present value.
1:36:53
And that's just higher than almost any kind of existing human use other than particularly dense and and large cities.
1:36:59
Um which makes me wonder maybe not in 10 or 20 years but in 30 or 40 years whether the AIS will encroach upon our agricultural land and make it harder for us to eat. >> Yeah.
1:37:09
this runaway AI that just decides it's in my best interest to blanket as much of the US or the world as I can with solar uh to you know further myself.
1:37:22
>> Yeah, I mean it seems to create a strong economic forcing function and maybe we can slow it down a few years with usual regulatory uh stuff.
1:37:27
Um but I think that may be one of the reasons why why Elon has been talking more about um doing large scale AI development in space.
1:37:34
If you can convince the the AIs they're better off doing it in space where they don't have to fight with humans, maybe they'll go there first instead of I mean there's there's there's plenty of land on Earth.
1:37:44
There's there's more land on Earth that's not being farmed than there is land that is being farmed.
1:37:46
But, you know, just not inexhaustible.
1:37:50
>> Um something like a 100 100,000 terowatts uh lands on the oceans and 50,000 terowatts lands on parts of the earth that no one lives on or uses and humans consume about 10 terowatts of energy.
1:38:02
So, there's plenty to go around for now. >> Yep. >> For now. That makes sense.
1:38:05
Uh I want to get into NASA government shutdown, bunch of stuff.
1:38:11
But uh before let's touch the third rail.
1:38:14
>> No, let's let's No, let's go even more skitso.
1:38:16
Uh Tucker had a guest on the show yesterday uh that was uh talking about talking about chemtrails.
1:38:21
Uh what's your take on >> on uh on on uh chemtrails?
1:38:30
>> I'm I'm a pilot and I've I've flown around a fair bit and I've never seen one.
1:38:33
Um I think I think that uh like you know playing around in kerosene is not very good for you.
1:38:39
Um and and we we do see like health impacts from people who live too close to freeways and things like that.
1:38:44
You know there are >> definite health impacts from from burning the longer chain hydrocarbons.
1:38:49
Um as far as chemtrails go >> I must confess I'm not not as deeply familiar with uh >> various conspiracy theories like that.
1:38:56
Although I do think that NASA's been covering up life on Mars. So we'll see about that.
1:39:00
>> Covering up life on Mars. >> Yeah.
1:39:01
Before we talk about life on Mars, the uh chemtrail thing is funny because you have to believe that that you know tens of thousands of people are coordinating to do this largecale operation.
1:39:11
Not not not one of them has ever come out and said hey here here's here's here's evidence that you know this massive operation is is happening without >> there are aircraft which spray chemicals right like they call crop dusters.
1:39:23
you have crop testers >> and they have a very particular look and feel >> of course >> um and then and of course if you if you if you spend much time doing like structural calculations um and you you look closely at say a trip 7 or something it's pretty clear that um that um sorry my son's at work today and he just wanted to see if he'd come in um >> it's a familyfriendly show >> Veterans Day. >> Yeah. Yeah.
1:39:45
His face is not on the internet though nor is he a veteran if he was and hopefully never will be. um uh crop to aircraft.
1:39:51
You know, I fly to Australia every now and then and you're like, >> you know, actually the conspiracy theory that that planes can't contain enough fuel makes more sense to me because it seems unlikely to me that that you could actually keep a plane that big up in the air for 14 hours and cross an entire ocean like halfway around the world. >> Oh yeah.
1:40:06
>> Like where where where are you putting all the all the chemtrails you're spraying out?
1:40:09
Like in the overhead bin, there's never any room in there.
1:40:11
>> So I don't understand >> like Yeah. Yeah. We got plenty of space.
1:40:15
Let's bring the fuel and the and the toxic chemicals or whatever. Yeah.
1:40:17
Yeah, I mean there there are there are levels to the to the conspiracy because there is just the world of like what if it's just like leted gasoline where it's like sort of the chemicals are deranging people in a bad way because it's just pollution.
1:40:29
Like I don't think people really debate that like >> the possibility of pollution is happening.
1:40:35
It's different when it's like okay yes it's like specific chemical that does a specific thing and and triggers a specific reaction from the population.
1:40:43
I mean there are plenty of chemicals that can make you crazy.
1:40:44
Most of them taste very good. >> Really? Like what? >> Stevia, >> diet coke.
1:40:52
No, I mean likeite quite literally like until the invention of GLP1 agonists like something like a third to a half of Americans were going to die quite younger than they otherwise would because of >> you know weight weight related heart disease and obesity. Why?
1:41:04
Because sugar tastes good. >> Yeah. Yeah. >> Okay. So that's a poison.
1:41:08
It's actually poisoning you.
1:41:10
It's it's actively degrading the quality of life.
1:41:12
>> Ray Ray Pete would would disagree.
1:41:12
But uh why are we covering up life on Mars? Yeah.
1:41:18
>> Um, so to be fair, you know, you don't want to be the boy who cried wolf and shut it's aliens. It's aliens. It's aliens.
1:41:25
Um, but so so so what tends to happen in in these um in in scientific fields is it becomes very fashionable to be quite skeptical >> of of things as as it should be.
1:41:34
Um but at the same time, you know, evidence will accumulate over time and and so you'll have this kind of neat cottage industry of people who can explain away any evidence they see um without uh without necessarily updating their their prior prior knowledge or prior assumptions about it.
1:41:50
>> And I I I was trained at Caltech by the geologist um uh I've forgotten his name. This is age.
1:41:56
Okay, it's coming to you.
1:41:57
It'll come back to me eventually.
1:41:57
Uh Kosh Joe Koshank and um a legend legend among men.
1:42:02
And uh and he was the guy who who when he got his sample of ALH84001, a Martian meteorite that was found in Antarctica a while ago now um that uh he he he identified these um cubo like hexahedraledral magnetite crystals um that that were in the meteorite.
1:42:20
It's it's non-controversial that they were found in the meteorite.
1:42:22
Uh and it's also never ever been demonstrated they can be made by any known lab process other than culturing magnetactic bacteria that use them for navigation. um essentially.
1:42:30
So, so you know the meteorites are full of magnetite.
1:42:35
Magnetite is a naturally occurring mineral, but there's a particular configuration of of of it crystallin form which we we only know can occur.
1:42:42
We only know of ways it can occur with biological precipitation.
1:42:43
So, >> um yeah, that's that's it's called the magneto fossil if you want to Google it at home.
1:42:50
And I think it's it's it's about as strong as evidence as you could possibly hope for finding without actually going there and kicking rocks yourself.
1:42:56
>> Are you familiar with this thing, the great unconformity in the Grand Canyon?
1:42:59
Have you ever heard of this? Yeah, I've been there. Yeah.
1:43:02
>> Can you explain this to me?
1:43:02
It Somebody sent this to us.
1:43:04
You got to talk about this on the show, and I was just going to read the Wikipedia, but now we have someone who actually is familiar with it. >> Not an expert.
1:43:12
>> I don't want to pop quiz you, but like it would be cool if >> No, I've been there. I've been there.
1:43:15
I've been there several times. It's it's it's amazing.
1:43:16
I've taken my kids there.
1:43:18
Um so so if you go to the southern rim of the Grand Canyon, uh there's a trail called the Bright Angel Trail, and if you're very very fit and it's not too hot, you can walk down to it and back in a day.
1:43:26
Um but I would recommend starting at midnight, right?
1:43:28
you get down to it in the early morning and then and then um you know after after after daybreak but then you get back up before it gets hot >> or take a couple of days enjoy it.
1:43:35
Um but there's also an exposure just northeast of Vegas at a place called Frenchman Mountain which you can just drive right up to although last time I was there it's unfortunately covered in broken glass.
1:43:44
>> Um okay great unconformity so uh over time you know the the oceans rise and fall due to climatic variations and also land rises and falls due to geological stuff.
1:43:54
Um, and when land is above sea level in general, it's it's eroding.
1:43:56
And when it's below sea level, it's in general accumulating sediment.
1:43:59
general accumulating sediment. And so what you see in the Grand Canyon, that is to say the the most of the Grand Canyon is a series of layers of of carbonates, which means it's it's shallow oceans that are forming reefs and and sand sandunes and sand sandstones, which means it's um you
1:44:11
know, rivering kind of delta environment or something where where the land is gradually sinking relative to the ocean, creating an accommodation space in which um which uh new new uh dirt and soil and rocks and stuff can can come down and fall and and be compacted and form these layers. Um, and then what happens is if
1:44:25
Um, and then what happens is if the if the ocean falls down or or the land gets lifted up, uh, then you then you see erosion.
1:44:30
And what happens is that is that newly formed rock gets eroded away for a while and then it sinks again and then it starts to build up again.
1:44:36
And so you get these like what are called little unconformities, which is where you've got a little period of missing time, a million years here, 100,000 years there, 10 years over here, and maybe 10 million years over there where where the land has been above sea level, and so no new rock has been forming or if it has, it's since been eroded away.
1:44:50
>> Okay, so this occurs at all scales.
1:44:50
And it turns out that the at the bottom of the Grand Canyon or very close to the bottom is a thing called the great unconformity.
1:44:55
And it's kind of mindboggling because the rocks on on one side of this are this kind of the Vishnu shist basement rock.
1:45:01
It's this ancient rock that forms the you know the core of our North American continent at least in this place.
1:45:06
Um it's it's ancient at crystal. It's 1. 6 billion years old.
1:45:10
It's like what 13% of the age of the universe.
1:45:12
And then literally like one thumbs width away from that above it is the the oldest sedimentary rocks in the Grand Canyon which are 500 million years old.
1:45:19
I think they're just after the after the um >> the uh um Cameron explosion.
1:45:26
Um okay, this is stretching my memory.
1:45:29
This is a long time ago now. 535 million years ago.
1:45:30
And it's just kind of crazy.
1:45:32
So, so what happened in there?
1:45:35
>> It's a missing billion years.
1:45:37
>> It's a missing billion years.
1:45:37
And so, >> so, so in that time rock formed, right? >> Sure.
1:45:42
>> And probably entire mountain ranges formed.
1:45:43
Like it takes it takes a 100red million years to form a mountain range and then eroded away to nothing. >> Sure. >> Right.
1:45:47
So like the Appalachian Trail, the Appalachian Mountains were were a mountain range taller than the Himalayas 130 million years ago.
1:45:51
Pretty much eroded away to nothing.
1:45:53
Um so you could form and destroy a mountain range the size of the Appalachian mountains >> in that time.
1:46:00
>> 8 n 10 times in that time.
1:46:00
Entire continents form and sink.
1:46:02
Entire superc continents form and sink.
1:46:04
Probably not dinosaurs back then as far as we know.
1:46:08
But but there was definitely like life in lots of life in the oceans and and some plants and stuff on on land and some insects and things.
1:46:12
Um actually insects I think came later.
1:46:15
Look, don't quote me on this. Check Wikipedia. Ask Grock.
1:46:18
Um, >> but it's all gone. It's all gone.
1:46:20
At least, >> you know, and and and when you look at one of those geological time scales, you see a lot of recent rocks and not so much detail in the older rocks.
1:46:26
And that's just cuz like as you go back in time, you get exponential destruction of of the geological record.
1:46:30
There is actually a corner of the eastern Grand Canyon where what's called the Grand Canyon Supergroup, which is a a series of layers that's inclined like this kind of pokes up.
1:46:38
And that's the only place on Earth that we have rocks from that age.
1:46:40
It's kind of an intermediate intermediate age rock.
1:46:42
Um, yeah, it's just bizarre. So you can go there.
1:46:44
You could just outside Vegas like skip skip the tables for half a day, drive out and uh >> maybe they could put a casino at the great unconformity.
1:46:53
>> I mean on on the Wikipedia page, the reason this is so interesting is because on the Wikipedia on the Wikipedia page it says there is currently no widely accepted explanation for the great unconformity among geoccientists.
1:47:03
There are hypotheses that have been proposed.
1:47:08
It is widely accepted that there was a combination of events which may have caused such an extreme phenomenon.
1:47:11
One example is a large glaciation event which took place during the Neoproto Zoic around 720 million years ago.
1:47:20
Um and so there's like a whole bunch of theories but there's like how did they grind away so much so much rock? >> Yeah.
1:47:29
>> Because because essentially like where this where the rock is forming and being destroyed is very close to sea level almost always. >> Right. >> Yeah.
1:47:36
>> And and so at some point the rock that is on the underside of the great unconformity had to have been lifted up near sea level. Mhm.
1:47:43
>> And then it has to have sunk down a mile or two to form all the rocks above it, right?
1:47:46
And now it's been lifted up again above sea level because the bottom of the of the Grand Canyon, the Colorado River is obviously above sea level.
1:47:52
Otherwise, it wouldn't float to the ocean.
1:47:53
>> Um, so it's kind of crazy that this goes up and down.
1:47:55
Um, yeah, I mean that's geology for you.
1:47:58
There's still work to be done.
1:47:59
Um, maybe you'll figure it out one day.
1:48:02
>> Okay, forming a new great unconformity, right?
1:48:04
Like the the rocks below the Grand Conformity, the Vishnu shift are being eroded by the Grand Canyon as we speak.
1:48:09
So if the Grand Canyon ever fills in and starts to, you know, build rocks again in the future, the the Great Unconformity will be below where it is now >> in that part of the world. >> Okay.
1:48:18
Well, let's let's talk about something we can all agree on, which is three Atlas.
1:48:21
What's going on with that? >> What?
1:48:24
I don't know anything about this.
1:48:26
>> You know, this is a comt. >> Yeah.
1:48:28
Some people think it's a they're saying it's a comet.
1:48:29
A lot of celebrities are saying it's a an alien ship, but what's the Casey Hanmer?
1:48:33
Give us a breakdown on We haven't been following it.
1:48:37
there's been enough uh in technology.
1:48:41
>> Likewise, I've been focused mostly on the finer details of like fixing electrolyer seals and things like that.
1:48:47
>> I would say that these interstellar objects are super interesting and I would like to get a close look at them and I really wish that we had some like maybe Tom Mueller could build a series of spacecraft with like lots of onboard
1:48:57
ISP that we park out, you know, near the moon or something and then when we one of these comes through, we press the button and it immediately like adjusts its orbit and shoots off in that direction and we get a nice flyby. we we get a few photos.
1:49:06
Um, that'd be super cool.
1:49:08
We're seeing them about once a year at this point and that's just cuz our our telescopes have gotten better.
1:49:13
As far as Atlas goes, um, I have a cousin who who routinely texts me updates on like it's an alien ship for sure.
1:49:18
Um, I I don't think it is. I think it's a comet.
1:49:22
I think that actually some of the earlier ones will be better than it.
1:49:25
I think it's a very large comet, a very old comet.
1:49:26
Um, seems to be a comet to me.
1:49:28
But >> but if you were a sufficiently advanced alien, you know, uh race, would you not want to just attach yourself to a comet that was headed in the direction you wanted to go and just ride along with it? >> No. >> No.
1:49:40
I think I think um >> too slow.
1:49:42
>> Well, so I I went Oh, yeah. Exactly.
1:49:42
I went Well, who knows how long the aliens live, but I I went to I went to Celtech to study kind of warp drive to try and understand how to do that, and I didn't succeed, obviously.
1:49:50
Um but someone might one day.
1:49:52
Um, but I think that uh if you've seen Avatar 2, the the spaceships that Jim Cameron puts there for the humans to fly to Alpha Centuri are like kind of what I have in mind when I think like how would how would humans or aliens that are comprehensible and legible to humans travel.
1:50:04
It' be something like that, you know, enormously energetic uh relativistically uh accelerated, very very bright, very flashy, very obvious.
1:50:11
Um or or maybe something like Warp Drive if we can ever figure it out.
1:50:15
Um but I think you know comet that takes 100,000 years to kind of wander its way from the nearest star to here. Very boring. Very boring. Yeah. Boring. Yeah.
1:50:24
>> Uh Moon, Moon or Mars.
1:50:24
This was a debate that we were having earlier.
1:50:27
Seems like uh the Jared Isaacman nomination was kind of reinvigorating some discussion over whether the US should prioritize Mars over the moon.
1:50:38
Elon has been pro Mars for a very long time.
1:50:42
Moon is kind of incidental.
1:50:44
Uh other folks see moon as like a key geopolitical race that we have to address right now and win and then that gets you a ticket to the real the real competition which is Mars potentially.
1:50:58
Uh how are you thinking about the tradeoffs between resources spent going to the moon resources spent going to Mars?
1:51:08
>> Um so initially I was quite pro Mars.
1:51:09
Um, and I wrote a couple of books about uh doing stuff on Mars and realized that, you know, its advantages are actually like both both both destinations are pretty difficult in their own way.
1:51:21
Um, they both have their challenges.
1:51:23
Um, and and actually I think what SpaceX correctly realized is that if you're going to do anything meaningful on either place, you have to develop a rocket system like Starship >> that can basically uh fire hose mass at pretty much any target in mind.
1:51:36
Um, you know, it's not a fair fight, you know, kind of situation.
1:51:40
And um and so once you have something like a starship, you know, doing something pretty cool on the moon is very straightforward.
1:51:45
Um but if you're if you're constantly trying to put together some mission that's like just made of like little bits and pieces and and small puny rockets and very expensive, you know, slow going contracts and stuff, you really struggle to do anything meaningful on either of them ever.
1:51:58
Um, so yeah, I'm I'm very much in favor of of uh, you know, kind of incidentally on the way to Mars, setting up a couple of lunar research stations and putting a few thousand people there and running it like the space station is now, but for more than six people. >> Yeah.
1:52:12
>> Um, and I think we could totally do that for like Antarctica program level budget with Starship. >> Yeah.
1:52:18
My my my theory on it just as you know an outsider has always been uh fire hose mass at low earth orbit.
1:52:24
Get Starlinks going every day.
1:52:27
Tons of I love those montages that are just showing Falcon 9's up and back every single day.
1:52:34
Do that in low Earth orbit.
1:52:36
then do that for the moon and same thing like like dozens of flights to the moon and back every single day and then and then start you know weaving to the to Mars because it feels like Mars is just a completely different uh set of of tradeoffs and cadences based on when we can actually launch. It's not every day.
1:52:58
And so, uh, just getting the reps in of like humans, just even just a human or I don't know, maybe a robot at some point.
1:53:05
Uh, like getting off of a like landing a rocket on a celestial body and then getting out and jumping around.
1:53:10
Like even if that's if that's happening every single day, it's going to be that's a lot of that has to transfer to Mars, I would imagine.
1:53:18
>> What's the most underrated planet? >> Yep. >> H underrated planet.
1:53:25
What's a planet that you think about a lot?
1:53:27
>> I spent a lot of time thinking about Mars.
1:53:29
>> Mars still underrated. >> Mars.
1:53:32
>> Most people would put it at their number two after Earth. >> Yeah.
1:53:34
I had a little little side project where I I built like the highest resolution topo map of Mars using um using a bunch of like NASA data that's kind of in the archives, not not being directly funded.
1:53:45
So I have I have a 6 m resolution global topog topography map of Mars.
1:53:49
Um, and I've been doing some like hydraology simulations and stuff with it to see what happens when we terraform.
1:53:55
>> It's um, yeah, so it's kind of hard to appreciate, but like planets, even small planets like Mars are overwhelmingly big.
1:54:01
Once you start dealing with these planetary scale data sets, it's like 200 terabytes.
1:54:05
You know, I start asking my wife, "Can I please buy another hard drive?"
1:54:07
And she's like, "You've already spent $5,000 on hard drives this month.
1:54:11
Maybe you should slow down."
1:54:11
And I was like, "Well, okay."
1:54:12
But like, planets are really, really big.
1:54:14
And yet I have a, you know, almost photorealistic render of of Mars to, you know, sub 100 meter resolution sitting on a on a spinning platter on my desk at home. It's pretty wild.
1:54:24
>> That's pretty cool >> that we get to do that.
1:54:24
I could never have dreamed of that when I was a kid. It's just unimaginable. >> Yeah. >> Air traffic control.
1:54:29
Should it be run by >> a pregnancy test? >> Pregnancy test. >> No, I don't think so. Um, but it could be.
1:54:38
be. Uh so so you know I mean at the end of the day like the the shoulds the the normative discussion is is kind of beyond my pay grade but the descriptive discussion of like whether whether it could is something that I think I can appine on and um >> and yeah I mean fundamentally what a a
1:54:53
graphics uh you know system does on a computer is it's doing you know roughly a billion collision calculations a second and >> um that that's a much more sophisticated uh graphics engine than than Doom but but still it's something that you can buy in any PlayStation or something today. Um, and ATC is just not that
1:55:08
Um, and ATC is just not that complicated, >> right?
1:55:12
It has it has a bunch of edge cases, but it's not that complicated.
1:55:15
And and it's also a a system that for justifiable reasons is very very um conservative about adopting new technology, but at the same time, you know, the the cost that we endure as a as a civilization to um various uh air traffic control problems and they're not only caused by government shutdowns >> um kind of undeniable.
1:55:33
And there's also an efficiency aspect.
1:55:35
you know, we could probably shave 5% of our uh fuel usage if we were able to have basically weather weather optimal director uh pointto-oint flights for for all aircraft that that wanted them rather than the usual ATC thing, which is, you know, basically follow existing uh instrument approved routes between in many cases like places on maps that were once radio navigation beacons but no longer exist. >> Yeah.
1:55:55
You mentioned uh giving it giving the project to the MAG 7.
1:55:58
Uh, I wonder, do you think that there's an opportunity for a startup to sort of do like the Anderoll flipped model, build it with venture capital dollars, then try and sell it to the government once you have a better system in place?
1:56:10
And also, is the actual software and hardware like actually the problem?
1:56:15
There was that uh Nathan Fielder HBO special that was kind of like >> it's maybe more about pilot communication and human training, human error when something goes wrong and it's not necessarily like a computer system and like a bad line of code.
1:56:31
>> Yeah, I think you probably still want to have have people sitting in in control towers looking at radars. Yeah.
1:56:35
Um I'm not saying like the the solution to our problem is to fire every last air traffic controller.
1:56:40
M >> um quite the opposite but like if you think about what those air traffic controllers are doing a lot of the time it's stuff that could be a few lines of code right like it's one of these things we got I know a thousand corner cases but 99.
1:56:51
99% is just one case it's just the standard like >> did these intersect >> instrument in instrument routing well just like you basically get a clearance to fly to fly a certain route at a certain time and then you know all goes well you'll never see another plane um but you know every now and then you've got to got to keep an eye on things you got to control the airspace.
1:57:08
M yeah >> it's not it's not a complicated puzzle.
1:57:12
I mean like uh Microsoft Flight Simulator 95 had a pretty good simulation of this.
1:57:15
So it's the sort of thing that I think is uh well well within our technical capabilities. >> Yeah.
1:57:19
Something that we actually want to do. >> Yeah.
1:57:21
I guess to some degree you can forecast the entire flight path before the plane takes off and make sure that it does not intersect with any other flight paths at any point in time.
1:57:33
>> Yeah, that's relatively straightforward.
1:57:35
I think I think some people on X were like, "Oh, you know, sure, we should just hand another monopoly to to Starink to do all this stuff."
1:57:40
I think actually I don't think that's the case.
1:57:41
I think that you could actually design a series of algorithms that would run centrally, but also autonomously on every aircraft.
1:57:47
And so you have like everything in in aviation is these like multiple layers backups.
1:57:50
Um so so there's always always something checking the checking the system that um uh sorry and a co-orker just brought in a new baby cuz uh I I start this company and then all my employees start having more children.
1:58:00
I think I'm doing something right.
1:58:03
>> That's that's a great sign. Yeah. Um but um uh yeah.
1:58:08
So so the so the idea there is like your your onboard computer on board your aircraft if you're flying a you know commercial 737 or something should be like getting minute-by-minute updates on weather and tailwinds and headwinds and so on and being like well you know I can save 5 cent fuel fuel if I go up 1500 ft you know route into the jetream.
1:58:24
Sorry about the bumps everyone.
1:58:24
and and we get the rift faster and um and then it just kind of automatically does the flocking thing where it it it sees and avoids and and doesn't uh intersect with other other aircraft.
1:58:35
Um but yeah, just just the the technology adoption cycle at the FAA is understandably and you know airlines and and um aircraft manufacturers understandably are pretty conservative, but it's also very very slow and so we end up with a situation where where you know delays and and actual crashes and stuff are occurring because the system is not as good as it could be.
1:58:54
So, I think the the way I mean it's way beyond my pay grade, but the way you would do this is you would you you'd uh basically commit to buying or purchasing a family of of improved products that are interoperable according to some pretty straightforward standard.
1:59:06
Um you could base it on, you know, Australia and Europe has largely automated ATC at this point.
1:59:10
Um and uh and then you integrate systems automated >> what is there already?
1:59:16
>> Europe automated traffic control.
1:59:18
>> Europe and Australia is a terrible place to be a pilot, right?
1:59:19
Like in the United States, you can you can fly VFR like as when I was a private pilot, I flew VFR visual flight rules under 18,000 ft.
1:59:28
>> You can you can do basically anything you want and I don't know if the uh if the ATC systems could could handle that quite yet, but when I was flying, we didn't have ADSB rolled out very well.
1:59:36
So, you know, basically you had to look out the window all the time and try and spot out the aircraft. >> Yeah. >> Um >> Yeah. >> Do you have a take?
1:59:43
>> Pretty pretty dicey in LA sometimes.
1:59:45
>> Do do you have a do you have a strong take on the AI capex buildout?
1:59:46
take on the AI capex buildout? It feels like um I I I just feel like your company and a lot of the a lot of the companies kind of of your vintage are very much aligned with like do something really ambitious that as it scales it compounds and all of a sudden like once
2:00:07
it's working you're marshalling like I I do imagine when I think about your the story of your business I think about um you know billions and billions of dollars flowing into more and more solar panels and just this crazy flywheel once the technology gets working. We've
2:00:22
We've talked about this in the past.
2:00:24
It feels like that's kind of happening in the context of like token factories right now.
2:00:29
Um, but are there anything that that has given you jitters to the structure or how things are playing out or do you or or do you see it as like um uh as like one narrative is just like it it's felt cool to watch big things get built and I'm wondering like how you're processing like the AI capex build out all the crazy capex that's going on.
2:00:54
Um, I think the United States has always done well when they're able to take a a difficult problem and transform it into a form that could be solved by pouring money on it and then pouring money on it. >> Yeah.
2:01:04
>> Um, >> let's give it up for pouring money. >> Yeah.
2:01:07
And so if um if someone were to ask me like, do you really think that every dollar being spent on hyperscaling right now is being spent the best possible way it can? No, of course not. >> Yeah. Right.
2:01:18
Um but is it nevertheless efficient uh from a perspective of competition to to spend as quickly as they can to ramp this technology up right now? >> Yeah. >> Yeah.
2:01:28
I mean there's obviously a there there I use all the models every day.
2:01:30
It's >> um I'm a discerning customer and I think that's quite transformational.
2:01:33
I mean they frustrate me as well but like >> that the the the direction of improvement is very clearly going in in one direction. Mhm.
2:01:41
>> Um and this is not a a race where United States can afford to be anything but first.
2:01:47
>> And uh and I think it's a real question to wonder like what what does the UN Security Council look like in 15 20 years when >> um uh when you know basically most of them today have their own nukes and I think they actually UN Security Council permanent members all have their own nukes these days.
2:02:01
Um and in the future most of them will not have their own uh AI sovereignty.
2:02:05
Oh, do you think that the AI sovereignty projects are not going to bear fruit because they're under scoped or undercaled?
2:02:16
>> Because I feel like a lot of countries would say like you just answered the question, but a lot of countries >> we're doing a we're doing a one gigawatt data center like we're good.
2:02:25
We're checking the >> United States is is deploying hundreds of billions of dollars in this direction right now.
2:02:29
And and how much is I mean China I I guess is serious about it.
2:02:31
Do you think Russia is serious about it?
2:02:34
>> It does not seem like >> UK and France are.
2:02:35
It does not seem >> some of Russia Russia's biggest clusters are like a thousand GPUs.
2:02:41
>> Australia we did hear is investing in quantum computing.
2:02:44
Do you think that that's going to be relevant? >> No. >> Can you say more?
2:02:50
>> Just sent the market down.
2:02:50
I can I'll say I'll say it in Australia has this has like basically the best solar resource on earth and and it has you know it's a modern western liberal democracy with like rule of law and >> and uh incredible natural resources and and 25 plus million well educated wealthy people. >> Yeah.
2:03:12
>> And and every time there's a new wave of technology they go ah never mind mate we'll catch the next one.
2:03:16
>> We'll catch the next >> and drives me crazy.
2:03:18
Um, so, um, so that's why I'm here.
2:03:22
Um, >> but they have Kira. Yeah. >> You ever surfed? You ever surf there?
2:03:28
>> It's one of the best point breaks of all time. >> Yeah. Yeah.
2:03:31
No, the beach is doing comparable.
2:03:32
And like I live in I live in the San Gabriel Valley, but I come to Santa Monica about once every two years under duress, I will add, and people say, "Oh, Santa Monica, it's the most amazing beach."
2:03:40
I'm like, "Yeah, maybe if you're like from, I don't know, like Canada or something."
2:03:43
But, uh, I grew up on I grew up on Kilk Beach in, uh, in the central coast of New South Wales.
2:03:49
It's I would I wouldn't I wouldn't swap all of Santa Monica for like a single bucket of sand from that beach. >> It's the best sand.
2:03:55
>> Absolutely incredible. >> Best sand on Earth. >> You've been there.
2:03:57
You've surfed in Australia. Australia. I didn't know that. That's good. >> Yeah. Um, >> EVPN down under.
2:04:04
>> Yeah, we need to mark your calendars. >> Down Under.
2:04:06
I I like I like >> I love Australia feels like a just a very large >> Fosters >> California.
2:04:13
It feels like California as a continent. >> A violet crumble. That'll get me going. I love crumble.
2:04:19
>> Last thing I was curious to get your take on.
2:04:20
Uh this company T1 Energy went super viral last week because they're just making a massive amount of solar panels.
2:04:28
Everyone got really excited because including ourselves saying, "Wait, we know how to build things."
2:04:31
uh and turns out it was a Chinese company that was like a forced >> seller of their uh of their manufacturing facility.
2:04:40
Do you think there's anything that we can learn from T1 Energy and and what what the the original kind of builders of this facility facility did in terms of like just scaling that out?
2:04:56
>> I I haven't actually heard the story so I'm not the right person to comment.
2:04:59
>> Yeah, T1 Energy I mean you you would you'd be interested in the story.
2:05:00
It's a It's a eight $800 million stock.
2:05:02
They're making one gigawatt worth of solar a year.
2:05:07
And people got really excited. >> Tiny. >> That's tiny. >> Yeah.
2:05:12
I mean, like globally, we're going to make 1.
2:05:13
4 terowatts of solar this year and deploy about 700 gawatt. >> Yeah. So, >> yeah.
2:05:19
>> Uh, a couple years ago, I used to say it's it's about one megawatt per minute, but now it's it's closer to one megawatt every 40 seconds. >> 40 seconds.
2:05:26
>> So, you know, >> we got to get those kind of nuts. >> Okay.
2:05:30
>> And and so is is Are you like in are you >> two billion modules this year?
2:05:37
>> Like would you encourage one for every family on Earth?
2:05:39
>> Would you encourage America or like the like the venture ecosystem or the government to like to like try and bring you know manufacturing capacity back to America because when we've talked about this before you've always said like hey if China's going to be subsidizing it just buy as much as possible.
2:05:55
And that makes sense like economically, but over the long term like if you need to scale exponentially there there might be a case for reshoring.
2:06:04
Do you think that that's a good a good idea?
2:06:08
>> Yeah, I think controlling supply chain for for solar technology is super important.
2:06:12
Um and uh and just because China currently leads doesn't mean the US can't lead in the future.
2:06:15
I mean we've we've seen this in the past, right? Yeah.
2:06:19
>> Um the the industry is extremely dynamic.
2:06:20
You wouldn't have to try all that hard to if you had like a 5% edge over your competition, you could be the number one in 5 years or something like that, right? Um uh much different.
2:06:32
>> Why didn't you look into that or why aren't you vertically integrating?
2:06:34
Uh is that just something that might happen in the future?
2:06:39
>> I mean, it might be the last thing we vertically integrate.
2:06:40
It's it's a well it's well it's not really a problem for venture or government, right?
2:06:43
It's a problem for banks. >> Sure. >> Right.
2:06:46
It's like buy buy the machine from from Germany.
2:06:47
put it in a shed, put it in a giant building and start turning them up.
2:06:51
So, it's it's it's pretty well understood how to do this scale.
2:06:54
>> Um, it's not really a technology problem.
2:06:56
>> Um, technology development problem, but that's my bread and butter.
2:06:58
My bread and butter is like doing doing weird complicated stuff.
2:07:01
>> Is the reason that it's in China mostly labor cost or environmental concerns or regulation or just the cost of capital?
2:07:09
Do you have an idea of like like I understand like the whole story of Yeah.
2:07:16
the whole story of like why the iPhone landed there.
2:07:18
Like I understand that story a little bit.
2:07:20
I don't necessarily understand why solar panels went there specifically. >> Yeah.
2:07:25
I mean, Australia invested a bunch of money into developing this technology and and then Germany spent a bunch of money on manufacturing it at a steep loss >> and both of them basically gave up at some point.
2:07:34
And meanwhile, China looked around and said, "hm, we just had the Beijing Olympics.
2:07:37
We're kind of a big deal now."
2:07:38
And uh um you know we we'd like to do something about Taiwan sooner or later, but the last time anyone got uppety in the East Eastern China Sea area.
2:07:46
Um they they they did a lot of damage until until the United States curb stomped them with uh by choking their supplies of of energy.
2:07:54
>> And it turns out that neither Germany nor Japan had had anywhere near sufficient supplies of of the domestic energy sources.
2:08:00
And once the combined bomber offensive and the the um the the submarine war took out their ability to transport oil from where it was being made to where it was being used, >> basically both war efforts collapsed within months.
2:08:10
So if you're China, you'd be like, "Hm, where's my oil coming from?"
2:08:14
You know, 16 12 million barrels a day is coming from uh coming from Middle East >> a long way away via via like the straits of Aman straits of Malaca, straits of the straits of Malaca, which we don't control, can't control.
2:08:26
Don't have a deep water blue water navy.
2:08:27
deep water blue water navy. um you know via via our you know historical and and current geopolitical adversaries uh who kind of allow the oil to pass by because they're they're playing nice today right like hm maybe maybe it's actually something we should spend you know because the US sorry the Chinese um political economy is is much more kind
2:08:44
of expansionary and it's spending it's much more um supply driven rather than demand driven um so if we're going to spend a bunch of money on like you know more or less inflationary projects may as well spend them on giant solar panel factories and they got really good at it >> and you know all credit to them like it's It's a bloody lot of hard work to do that and they did it. Um and um now
2:09:00
Um and um now basically we all benefit from that you know if we willing to buy from them but that doesn't mean it's something that's like intrinsically impossible for the United States to do.
2:09:09
Um you know it's it's just a question of will.
2:09:12
It's just a question of who who actually wants to go and do this at scale. >> Mhm. >> Always a pleasure. >> Always a pleasure.
2:09:21
>> Thank you for taking the time.
2:09:21
after you after you create abundant energy, uh we're going to require that uh or we're going to make a a bid for you to become a uh >> you know a more uh invest more of your time in podcasting. >> Yes. Yes, we do enjoy this.
2:09:37
>> That' be hard to do at this point.
2:09:37
I've been showing >> Yeah, you have. You've been on a tear. Congratulations.
2:09:41
You've been uh you've been all over.
2:09:43
Uh >> I know your secret that sitting around talking about stuff is is incredibly fun. >> It's so much fun. >> It really is.
2:09:49
>> Well, thanks for doing it with us today. >> Great to see you. coming by. >> Uh, talk soon. >> Happy Veterans Day. We'll talk to you soon.
2:09:56
>> Uh, let me tell you about Finn.
2:09:56
AI, the number one AI agent for customer service, number one in performance benchmarks, number one in competitive bake offs, number one in ranking on G2.
2:10:05
Uh, we have a surprise guest joining us in just a few minutes.
2:10:07
We'll see if he can join in the uh, Reream waiting room.
2:10:13
He says he's down to join.
2:10:13
Um, in the meantime, let's go through some more post. What else? Back in the timeline.
2:10:21
Um, there's some news in the Wall Street Journal.
2:10:25
>> You see some of these images leaking from Nano Banana 2. >> No. What is this?
2:10:30
>> Uh, they are a little too uh photorealistic for for my >> interesting.
2:10:36
>> Uh, for my preference. >> Okay. What's going on here? >> Oh, wow. Okay.
2:10:40
So, it's got Jeffrey Epstein and >> with Diddy Diddy together.
2:10:45
>> These are very accurate images. These seem remarkable. Third term.
2:10:47
Um yeah, is this uh so this is from Roberto Nixon who's who came on our stream at Meta Connect.
2:10:55
He says, "Wild Times Nano Banana 2 apparently leaked a few hours uh today on some platforms and the limited results by a handful of users have been pretty insane.
2:11:04
The model was apparently from an uncensored slightly older checkpoint.
2:11:09
when it actually launches, it won't be this uncensored, of course, but crazy to think what a handful of engineers at the Frontier Labs have access to and the chaos they could cause if they so wished.
2:11:17
Um, I wonder Yeah, it's so it's so interesting where I I would love to actually trace where these leaks came from, what the whole flow is, because um it's possible that uh like it's possible that there's like some Photoshop in here as well.
2:11:36
Like if you're in the business of creating a leak or a fake leak, you can uh you can do all sorts of funny things.
2:11:43
Um there was a uh what what was it?
2:11:46
There was someone who what what did they do?
2:11:49
They went and they they filmed something normally and then they went into After Effects and they made it look like they were on a green screen for it and they made fake behindthe-scenes footage for their real footage.
2:11:59
So it looked like they were ser.
2:12:01
So they actually went surfing and then they and they and then they made a a CGI version behind the scenes.
2:12:05
Uh just like that there there's that Apple uh trailer now for the for the introduction to uh Apple TV and they say we made it all uh practically.
2:12:16
We did it all practically.
2:12:18
Um let me uh see we need a uh we need an image for uh uh for our next guest because we are not doing video.
2:12:28
We are just doing >> he is semi non but we have growing Daniel in the reream waiting room.
2:12:33
Let's bring in Growing Daniel into the TV.
2:12:38
>> Growing Daniel, how are you doing? >> Doing really great. How are you guys doing? >> Fantastic. >> You're doing well.
2:12:43
It's great to finally have you on the show.
2:12:45
It only only took you three invites, but you've been busy and you finally made it.
2:12:53
>> It's an honor to be here.
2:12:53
I didn't I didn't have anything to say before. >> I'm glad. Now you do. >> I'm glad. Yeah.
2:12:59
>> You're launching the moral discernment company of San Francisco.
2:13:02
>> Getting into moral discernment.
2:13:02
Uh finally I would love to know what that what that means.
2:13:07
Well, like is this is this is this a vibe shift for on your part or do you feel like this is a continuation of your you know affinity for moral discernment?
2:13:16
for moral discernment? walk me through how you evaluate like what is or is not a good startup idea or like a virtuous like uh Trace Stevens says that good quests philosophy like how how do you think about judging the the work of the
2:13:32
technology industry that we see every day on display on X >> I guess it's not really complicated to me I mean okay so if you're selling like uh gambling then uh you're basically um selling drugs to people >> uh like and everyone knows that right. Uh I
2:13:48
Uh I I didn't think it'd be a big thing to say, but you should want to build things that are good for people.
2:13:54
And I think that's exactly what the pope was saying.
2:13:58
Um if you are engaging in the act of creation, then you should try and create something that's actually good for people.
2:14:03
And I think over the past uh 10 years, we've had this like really weird, I guess, school of moral philosophy that we all collectively call woke. >> Sure.
2:14:16
It's been really dominant and it's had an extremely aggressive uh priest class that tries to get every it tries to coersse everyone into bending the knee to it.
2:14:25
Um and nowadays that's not a very popular perspective thankfully.
2:14:29
I think that that fever kind of broke.
2:14:31
Uh but I don't think what replaces it is nothing.
2:14:37
I don't think that's a good solution.
2:14:39
I think everyone should want to should want to help.
2:14:43
>> Actually, you cannot criticize technology at all.
2:14:44
If it's software, you cannot criticize it.
2:14:46
We're banning you you we're making it illegal to identify negative externalities of any technology product.
2:14:56
>> And a lot of this stuff is even externalities.
2:14:57
It's literally just you're selling drugs to people in terms of the economic transaction, right?
2:15:00
Like it's the core product.
2:15:02
It's not like somebody got, you know, left fielded walking down the street by gambling. It's funny.
2:15:07
People people used to be criticized, you know, 3 years ago it was like stop building enterprise SAS and people were like okay I'll build gambling apps. >> Yes. Okay.
2:15:16
But on the gambling issue uh walk me through how you think about the utilitarian calculus of like what is or is not gambling because uh when I think about like like putting money in an S&P 500 ETF in an IRA that I hold for 30 years, I don't think of that as gambling.
2:15:34
Um, but then if I'm if if you're a professional fund manager and you're managing retirements, like that's not gambling.
2:15:41
There is risk, but then you go down to like zero day options and it's starts to look a lot like gambling.
2:15:47
Uh, and so do you believe in this like moral relativism?
2:15:50
Do you think that there's a clear line, a bright line like what is or is not gambling these days? Passive income.
2:15:56
>> I mean I mean yes, sometimes there just interface with it, but is it is it I is it I'll know it when I see it.
2:16:03
Uh, I don't even think gambling's wrong, by the way.
2:16:05
Like it's like I think it's fine to get together with your friends and play poker on a Sunday or something like that's totally fine.
2:16:10
Um, uh, so as far as like gambling goes, I'm I'm saying that if you're going to dedicate your life to building something, which is what you do when you start a company, it's not like you're just like, you know, doing something as a hobby.
2:16:22
Uh, then what I'm saying is that you should reflect morally. >> Yes.
2:16:28
if you get like I I don't think I'm not here to tell you what is right and wrong.
2:16:32
Um but the pope's entire point was that you should think about that and try and do good things and uh I didn't think anyone on earth I guess one person for sure had a problem with that.
2:16:43
Um and so I I don't have the moral guide book.
2:16:50
Uh there is a guide book. I I uh I own a copy. It's called the Bible. Yes.
2:16:53
Um but uh I do not I cannot uh you know extrapolate that to every modern situation.
2:17:00
Um but I do encourage everyone who's building anything to think about what they're building. What good is it?
2:17:06
Is it actually helping people?
2:17:08
And by the way B2B SAS doesn't get me up in the morning but hey that's honest software that actually you know solves people's problems.
2:17:14
That's a great thing to build. I think >> I like that. I like that.
2:17:17
Um, I mean, so le let's get into steel manning the other side of this because, uh, that's what's fun.
2:17:25
Um, >> it's okay to it makes for good content.
2:17:30
So, uh, it so it's okay to it's okay to, you know, hit the casino, the crafts table like once every couple years, you know, on a on a vacation or something.
2:17:40
Uh, isn't that what Andre's doing?
2:17:40
like like by by total by net asset value by the actual deployment of the capital like 99% of the dollars are going into honest B2B software data bricks it's going into things that feel virtuous and then yes they do have speedrun which is an incubator and yes within speedrun there are some crazy crazy companies and I'll give you that but as a percentage of the capital that has allocated we are in the uh Yeah, once a year he goes to Las Vegas.
2:18:13
We're not in the he only funds gambling.
2:18:16
So, how do you react to that?
2:18:20
>> I think that if you are uh if you're going to Vegas, uh then you're there's nothing the whether or not you're betting black or red is pretty it's it's an extremely amoral situation. Okay.
2:18:33
>> Um when you come out and you put $15 million into CLI, I think that is not an amoral situation.
2:18:38
you made a decision there uh about what you want to fund, what you want to see in the world. >> Okay.
2:18:44
>> Um and so what I see uh if he if he wants, you know, and again that's, you know, obviously A16Z will do what it's do what it wants, right?
2:18:52
Like they don't have to listen to me.
2:18:54
Um but for a lot of people, I think the CLY investment was a real moment.
2:18:59
At least for a lot of my founder friends, that was a moment where it was like, oh, okay, like we're just literally going to fund whatever thing now.
2:19:07
Um, no matter, you know, whether or not it's good, uh, it's just more vibe, more more, you know, bigger tweets. Come on.
2:19:15
And, you know, just trying to keep this constant, uh, sense of excitement going. Uh, and for what?
2:19:22
For for this cheating app. Like, this is stupid. Like, what are we doing?
2:19:26
Um, I didn't come out here to build cheating apps.
2:19:29
I didn't come out here to build uh gambling apps that advertise that they can, you know, help people gamble under the age of 21.
2:19:37
uh like these things do not seem um they don't seem they don't seem immoral to me.
2:19:43
They seem actually immoral and that's a decision they're making and I would encourage them to not make that decision.
2:19:48
>> Well, the good news is that it does feel like Cle has pivoted to just B2B SAS I guess.
2:19:53
So maybe maybe it's total victory victory for for honest sass.
2:19:56
Uh I have one more I have one more steelman that I Daniel helmet.
2:20:04
>> I should get the helmet out. Although I don't know.
2:20:06
Can you see us or is or can >> I can see you right now. >> Okay, good.
2:20:09
So, John's going to throw on the the helmet.
2:20:12
>> The helmet for the second helmet is the steel >> second steelman.
2:20:14
Uh I was really I was really hoping it'd be a crusader helmet. >> Yeah.
2:20:20
So, this is the steelman helmet, which is which is for when you're steel manning a point.
2:20:24
Um and so it's very hard to wear, but um >> as it should be. >> Yes.
2:20:30
Uh heavy is the head that wears the steelman helmet.
2:20:32
So the second steel man is uh is while I agree with you that you should not mock the pope, you should not try and dunk on the pope. It's kind of rude.
2:20:44
I I would say that potentially it is okay to uh critique the pope for uh trying to set regulatory frameworks around business.
2:20:57
And I would cite the the Wall Street Journal's postmortem uh like you obituary on the previous pope and kind of look back on some of the stuff that the pope had done that was uh maybe leaning too heavily into some of the environmentalist trends and maybe caused too much of a shift that actually sort of hurt the quality of life in Europe and America and uh and it was not it it wound up being incomp compatible with human flourishing.
2:21:28
And so the pope is maybe not always correct.
2:21:31
And so there does need to be some level of dialogue between even Catholics and the Pope.
2:21:40
>> John, did you just say the Pope isn't always correct?
2:21:43
>> I'm saying I have the Steelman Hamlet on for a reason.
2:21:47
>> Yeah, of course you could say that.
2:21:47
Of course that's a totally You don't even have to wear the helmet.
2:21:50
It's a totally reasonable take.
2:21:52
Of course, the pope's going to say things that are incorrect and especially I think on uh temporal issues on on political issues.
2:21:57
Um the uh the Pope does not just raise supreme.
2:22:01
We can't disagree with them.
2:22:03
Um I do I do think that if the pope makes a very like you know anodine and earnest post about how we should care about the things that we're building and the effect it has on people, uh then you shouldn't mock them. Yes.
2:22:17
I think I especially especially I mean if you're some you know lobby that's whatever but if if you're Mark and come on man.
2:22:23
Um so I guess seeing it from him I was like that bothered me but no absolutely uh obviously I disagree uh with you know probably many things the pope believes on on political issues. >> Sure.
2:22:35
Uh we do have a question from the chat.
2:22:38
Why is the pope above being mocked?
2:22:40
I we touched on this but is it just is it just purely respect?
2:22:42
Do you think all people should avoid mocking the pope or specifically Catholics, specifically religious people, specifically Americans?
2:22:49
Is there any more nuance to who gets to mock?
2:22:50
It sounds like lobies maybe could mock the Pope if they're, you know, some sort of a non silly young growing Daniel.
2:22:56
Young growing there's a young growing the future growing Daniel.
2:23:03
>> Would would you have mocked the pope two years ago? Probably.
2:23:06
Um >> I think I think my my view is just is not to interrupt but I'm guessing you agree >> just like it it should be okay to >> expect like the technology industry broadly has so much power.
2:23:19
It impacts our lives in so many different ways >> that people within the industry should criticize it.
2:23:25
People outside the industry should criticize it.
2:23:27
We should we should expect that people understand the weight of their work even if it's not in defense tech or national security related etc.
2:23:36
Like the work impacts our lives and it impacts people that are outside the industry and to basically I don't even know I mean part part of this is like this was such a new meme format I was trying to clock like okay what does he actually mean by this?
2:23:51
This is like this is like a >> he was so bad at applying it.
2:23:53
Did you watch the full interview, the GQ Sydney Sweeney interview?
2:24:01
It was very interesting because it was an interview for uh an event that GQ holds that's called men of the year and it and and it was an interview between two women and so I I I I think that they have like genericized the term but they stuck with giving an award for men of the year and then they give it to whoever or something something like it was very confusing branding for me. Can't say man.
2:24:26
>> But then uh but then also like there was a very weird uh it felt like a little bit of a roar shock test actually watching the interview because when I actually went and watched the YouTube video, it feels like they're having a
2:24:37
ton of fun with each other for like 10 minutes and then they do get into that one question that's kind of sharp sharply worded and she kind of dismisses and says like look I'm not >> Why would you even try to understand the source material, John? It's just a meme. It's just a meme. >> I I I get it. I don't know.
2:24:50
No, that that was that was part of my like uh you know Mark Mark applied it in a bunch of different ways in a very short period of time, right?
2:24:58
So it's he was he was a little trigger happy with it. >> I don't know. >> Oh well.
2:25:04
>> I think I think Mark got excited that he thought there was a new image that you could quote tweet someone with and it would just own them every time.
2:25:10
and he wanted to go apply that in as many places as possible before the cool points ran out because of people like Mark applying it and and running down the cool clock.
2:25:21
So, he wanted to get as many of these out as possible and that's what he was trying to do and I don't think he understood the source material.
2:25:28
Um, but >> he paid the price. Yeah, >> it was.
2:25:35
It was definitely Anybody out there that was thinking about mocking the pope, I think, is gonna is going to at least think twice.
2:25:42
>> Yeah, the pope is like level 9,000.
2:25:45
>> Have you been Have you been leveraging that prayer?
2:25:46
We We covered We covered the prayer uh I I forget which church it's in exactly, but the prayer >> Star of the Sea. >> Yeah. >> Yeah.
2:25:54
Have you leveraged that at all?
2:25:57
>> Oh, I leverage that every week. Absolutely.
2:26:01
That seems like some some serious alpha that that should have become the current thing.
2:26:05
There should have been lines at the door.
2:26:08
>> It's insane that it's available uh for a 50 cent candle.
2:26:10
Uh you can go and uh pray for St.
2:26:14
Carlo to intercede for you who is in heaven by the way hanging out with God >> and he will intercede on your behalf for your technical problems. Incredible. Incredible.
2:26:26
Star of the Sea Parish, San Francisco, everyone.
2:26:29
>> I could see VCs, you know, actually putting that in term sheets going forward.
2:26:33
You need to take 50 cents.
2:26:35
>> Who's the patron state of of capital allocation if it's like I think I'm going into a down round.
2:26:39
I think my I think my portfolio is about to tank. I need to pray. >> What do you think?
2:26:46
What do you think tech is getting right right now? Anything? >> Oh, yeah. >> Uh oh.
2:26:51
I think we're in a way better place. So, I don't know. I came out here in 2018.
2:26:56
Uh from then till 21 uh most of tech Twitter was crypto Twitter and that sucked.
2:27:01
Um and so now we're actually building tools that are useful.
2:27:06
>> Many AI tools are actually legitimately useful which is a radical change from when I was out here in those three four years.
2:27:12
Um so I think a lot of things are going really well in tech right now.
2:27:15
Um, I think that uh AI will continue to creep into every crevice of uh our capital structures and our processes throughout society.
2:27:26
Um, I think that's awesome.
2:27:29
I think it's going to save people a bunch of time.
2:27:30
It's going to make people's lives much better. Um, so yeah.
2:27:34
Uh, I think tech's doing really great overall right now.
2:27:38
>> Why do you think there's so much darkness on the timeline?
2:27:41
>> John and I were talking this morning.
2:27:41
It feels like more more infighting than ever. >> Close.
2:27:45
It feels like it es and flows, but right now Yeah, it feels like there's a lot of infighting right now. >> Infighting like what?
2:27:52
>> I mean, the you and Mark going at it was pretty much the the pinnacle of infighting, but it does feel like there's just generally been like a little bit more spices.
2:27:59
And from my perspective, it feels like it's because there are actually questions about like like is the is are we in a bubble? Is this about to pop?
2:28:06
people are getting like sort of defensive like oh like maybe I shouldn't be uh e even if you're not like like oh I I I have my entire net worth in this one thing.
2:28:16
Uh there's even just like I don't want to look stupid for being overly promoting something that's about to sell off by 20% or 50% or something like that.
2:28:26
And so it just feels like people are in a little bit more of a defensive posture online.
2:28:32
And I was wondering I don't know do you feel that or do or do you not feel that? I don't feel that.
2:28:36
The only thing that I feel is weird lately and it's in San Francisco and in tech is that >> uh it we attracted a lot of like kind of grifty signaly people >> and um there's like people messaging me about how to like you know establish their image in San Francisco and stuff.
2:28:56
I'm like what are you talking about?
2:28:56
I'm like what are you doing?
2:29:00
Like literally like if you like building things then come find some guys or whatever.
2:29:04
come find some people that like building and talk to them and and if you vibe then you can work on something, right? Like I don't know. It's how it always was.
2:29:12
>> And so there's a lot of people that are like now moving in and trying to like, you know, get their head shots done like they're moving to LA and you don't have to do that.
2:29:20
You don't have to do that, man. >> Yeah. Yeah.
2:29:21
I said earlier I think it won't be the top until you have founders doing pitching at demo day and chromearts and Rick Owens.
2:29:29
When that happens, it's over. Sell sell everything.
2:29:35
>> Uh >> I hope the top comes before the end.
2:29:37
>> What is uh what is the correct way to launch a new startup today?
2:29:43
>> Is it a is it a is it a 90 second vibr?
2:29:47
>> I feel like a lot of stuff played out, but like is there anything that you think is like actually the correct way to do it?
2:29:54
>> Um I think first you should have a Twitter account with 175,000 followers. >> Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Step for sure. post until you do that.
2:30:04
>> Yeah, post constantly.
2:30:07
>> No, I uh I don't know.
2:30:07
It's different for everyone.
2:30:09
Like that's the thing is like I don't know.
2:30:10
I always hate like startup advice because it's like literally everything is different.
2:30:13
Like literally if it were automatable then it would be uh and so it's like what is your situation? Like I don't know.
2:30:19
Um but you got to figure out the way in which you're weird, you know, and uh and work on that.
2:30:26
That's usually your uh your comparative advantage. >> Yeah, I like that. I like that.
2:30:30
Just just the advice is like avoid the templates basically.
2:30:34
>> Do you get any inbound do you get any inbound customer interest?
2:30:36
Like do any any any uh anybody ever put it together?
2:30:42
>> The least monetized account with $179,000.
2:30:47
>> I got one >> one customer shocking to me. >> Let's ring the we go. >> Hell yeah. customer from X.
2:30:58
Congratulations on your one customer.
2:31:01
>> I mean, that's probably >> it's great.
2:31:05
>> It's one more than I thought I would get.
2:31:06
I uh we won't talk about my industry here, but I definitely work in an industry that is um >> a Twitter industry. Yeah.
2:31:12
Um and so, uh I never expect I really should have built DevTools or something.
2:31:16
I should have done something wrong.
2:31:18
Um but, uh yeah, so my uh Twitter is not really uh related to my real life at all.
2:31:24
Um, but yeah, we did get one out of it.
2:31:28
>> I think uh I I think at some point you could uh just just all the people asking you for advice uh you know on personal branding.
2:31:37
Just say fine, I made I made a course. It's $10,000.
2:31:41
>> I I the $10,000 course. The $10,000 course.
2:31:44
It's effectively non-dilutive funding for the company.
2:31:48
>> Yeah, you can do it as a joke.
2:31:50
>> I don't think that would be good for I don't think it would be good for the world. >> That's true.
2:31:53
>> Wouldn't actually make it good.
2:31:53
And I feel like I'm just ripping people off and I don't want >> moral discernment strikes again.
2:31:58
>> I am I am the most I am the least probably except no except Rune uh the least uh under monetized uh person on Twitter which is pretty amazing.
2:32:08
I see people with 20,000 working hard so inspiring brother get out there.
2:32:16
>> Um I will say we have an announcement >> uh from my real life.
2:32:19
Uh the council has met and we've decided We are hiring an engineer. >> Wow. >> Congratulations.
2:32:28
>> So, uh, DM growing go on X the it's the everything app in case you forget which which app X is.
2:32:36
Go and find growing Daniel and you can send him uh your uh LinkedIn or your uh your resume.
2:32:43
Um, if you want to live in San Francisco and you can pass an FBI background check, both those things have to happen.
2:32:51
and you are a good engineer.
2:32:53
Uh then you can come work with growing data.
2:32:58
>> Every everyon poster was just qualified.
2:33:03
>> It is never you are the most doxable person in the world.
2:33:07
>> Thank you for taking the time to come on.
2:33:09
>> No, we will we protect this.
2:33:10
>> We will protect we protected. We protected.
2:33:13
>> Thank you guys so much. >> Very exciting role.
2:33:15
Uh, I'm gonna I'm gonna message some people and say, "Hey, go go go go go join the moral discernment company of San Francisco."
2:33:23
>> I respect it on so much.
2:33:23
Like I don't even save like full names in my phone or anything.
2:33:26
The first time the first time growing Daniel sends me his email for some reason.
2:33:31
Uh, it's just his full full name in his email.
2:33:34
Like just first name, middle name, last name.
2:33:37
Like dude, you just >> If I could do it again, if I could do it again.
2:33:43
>> Thank you guys so much for having me. Great to see you. Great to see you. Great to talk to you.
2:33:46
I love love love watching you build and and have fun on the internet and >> you know how to do it.
2:33:53
>> We both we both come a long way.
2:33:53
I think we uh we met up at >> very had a very LA meeting many years ago. Got together at Arowan. There you go.
2:34:01
>> I don't remember what we got but uh >> but uh it's been it's been fun uh to watch you you build and uh entertain us all. So I think >> fantastic. >> See you guys. >> See you. Goodbye.
2:34:11
Let me tell you about some honest B2B software.
2:34:14
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2:34:22
We have JD Ross from with coverage in the Restream of Openor.
2:34:28
>> Co-founder of Open Door.
2:34:28
We're back with Open Door Week here. >> How you doing, JD? Good to see you. >> All right, guys. What's happening? >> Oh, wow. I love the effect.
2:34:37
>> Sometimes it's uh it's a little bit of a jump scare getting you into the Ultra Dome from the Reream waiting room.
2:34:40
You can see you're on display here.
2:34:42
Uh, you got some news for us. What's What's up?
2:34:46
I'd love to ring the gong.
2:34:46
First, why don't you introduce yourself?
2:34:48
Why don't you give us a little bit of background?
2:34:50
>> He says he likes one sound effects. >> Matt sound effect. You got an America. You got the bald eagle.
2:34:55
Let's hit the bald eagle.
2:34:57
Let's have some >> bald eagle. I'm in Texas. >> He's in Texas. >> There we go. How you doing?
2:35:00
What are you working on these days? >> Yeah.
2:35:05
I I mean, I'm working on honest B2B software.
2:35:07
I'm working on extremely honest software. >> Fantastic.
2:35:10
>> Fantastic. I I think uh you know you had Cass on yesterday by the way talking about the importance of having like a leader the right leader in a business you know he's he's really amazing um >> that is a hard business like open door is I think we >> like we had a core value called we eat
2:35:28
basis points for breakfast >> and like a basis point is a 100th of a percent and so you were like fighting for each edge of a percent to cut off the cost to make the business good back in the day um he's obviously a better operator than I Uh, so I'm working in the opposite business now. It's an
2:35:42
It's an insurance business where you have like 99% retention and 99% gross margins. Wow.
2:35:50
>> Um, because I'm I'm lazy and I don't want to fight anymore.
2:35:52
Uh, and it's all coverage.
2:35:54
And basically the background was a couple years ago, you know, I was talking to my my buddy Max who's my co-founder and I was like, look, in every company I've started or been in, we've had great like legal counsel.
2:36:07
I've liked my tax council.
2:36:10
My insurance guy and everyone else I know's insurance guy is kind of an idiot.
2:36:14
Like they don't really know what we do.
2:36:15
They don't really know what is for our business. Yeah.
2:36:20
>> And so we're like, we could probably do this better.
2:36:22
Um let's just mess around for a bit and see what we can make happen.
2:36:26
And it's now two years later.
2:36:26
We have uh well over 500 clients, 10 million revenue, profitable the whole way. >> There we go. That's great.
2:36:36
what uh >> profitability not not not something you see we're going to hit the gong for profitability.
2:36:43
>> Um real quick before we dive more into coverage I wanted to ask you about uh Open Door's new feature.
2:36:48
Uh Cass was talking about uh you know introducing uh returns to uh home buying.
2:36:54
Uh I I think you could make the case that it would just increase overall sales velocity if people knew like hey I can buy this and if I don't like it I can return it.
2:37:05
But when you talk about eating basis points for breakfast like you know returns end up being like a huge like line item or expense for a lot of companies that sell uh physical goods. Um but what's your take?
2:37:24
My my view is you always want to have the right incentives in a business >> and returns is a good incentive in a business.
2:37:32
Like if you know that you can be returned, you are going to keep your quality bar high.
2:37:35
You're going to make sure that you are selling with integrity, that there's a true value in the product.
2:37:41
And if you can't return it, you can sell it.
2:37:43
You're going to sell as cheap as you possibly can. >> This is lemon law.
2:37:45
Lemon law in cars, right?
2:37:48
It's like you you don't want to sell lemons because you you would be forced to buy the car back if there is a problem with it. Exactly.
2:37:55
And the same thing for a house.
2:37:57
Right now, everyone's biggest fear when buying a house is, did I buy a lemon?
2:38:00
Because it's every dollar I probably have.
2:38:03
>> It's, you know, it's by like 8x the largest purchase I'm going to make in my life versus like a car or anything afterwards.
2:38:10
>> Uh it's scary and you only do it a few times in your life.
2:38:12
And you're kind of trusting this person you met probably a month ago to as your adviser who's very incentivized to get the deal done.
2:38:20
>> And so you want to be able to have that confidence point.
2:38:21
And if you're like, "Hey, this is going to affect the bottom line."
2:38:24
Well, only if you're selling bad product. Sell the right place.
2:38:27
>> I had a friend who bought a house who had gets into it and like a year in discovers that like it has a bad foundation and I was like that sounds like a catastrophic loss of that house.
2:38:38
Like >> of the house you want to have a bad issue. >> Exactly.
2:38:41
It's like if if the if the if the chimney on the top protects >> Okay.
2:38:44
Just pick up the whole house, we'll fix a foundation.
2:38:47
>> Fixing the roof feels way easier than the than the foundation. >> Yeah.
2:38:50
Just just get under there. >> Yeah.
2:38:52
Uh so so what what are what what are your clients actually looking for on the insurance side?
2:38:56
Uh I mean we have a variety of insuranceances here. Is it all one deal?
2:39:00
Like uh does it get crazier as the as the companies get bigger and bigger and bigger?
2:39:05
bigger and bigger and bigger? um how we had we had an experience getting insurance for uh TVPN >> that I couldn't tell you how many times >> they would come back for a new signature and I was like I've signed I've signed for this insurance like six times now
2:39:22
it's like oh there's another doc you missed you you didn't do this one doc and I'm like oh well >> didn't know this doc was coming >> in one dock put all the docs in one dock >> you didn't know about this doc or the last one or the last one or the last one I got to keep signing uh So >> yeah. >> So I I think the way first of all the
2:39:38
>> So I I think the way first of all the the hardest part of our business by far is just getting the first call >> because it's something no one wants to care about.
2:39:44
Unless you're talking about our our insurance clients in construction where it's a huge deal for them.
2:39:50
>> Uh most clients it's just like just get the first call.
2:39:52
Once we have that they're like oh wait this is much much better.
2:39:55
It's like ramp before you know versus any expense management system you had in the past.
2:40:00
No one was thinking about changing out the expense management system.
2:40:02
But then once you have a much better risk management system in our case now your entire life as sort of a CFO or you know GC gets a lot easier because this whole thing that you know is very important and are very afraid of but don't understand is taken care of.
2:40:17
And so our view is we replace the traditional broker with a tech platform.
2:40:22
uh we pair them with an industry expert who's basically your fractional risk manager.
2:40:26
And instead of commissions, we try to align the incentives with a fee so that our job is to save them money instead of making them spend more money year-over-year.
2:40:35
>> And those three things, the platform, the plan, and the team driving savings has generally worked really well.
2:40:41
And the types of insurance depends on who we're talking to, right?
2:40:44
like for a restaurant and or a manufacturing company or like a next generation defense manufacturer, it's workers compensation.
2:40:52
Typically, there's contractual risk.
2:40:54
Um, if you're talking about fintech, it's like cyber insurance and errors and omissions and things like that.
2:41:00
Uh, for tech company, it's usually DNO and then benefits.
2:41:03
And so, our job is just like build a point solution at each stage of this.
2:41:08
Software has gotten so much easier to build than years ago, right?
2:41:12
AI makes it so you can just you can launch new features when you have the right foundation.
2:41:15
It's not cracked and you don't have to return it a few years later.
2:41:18
Uh when you have the right foundation as a business, you can build these things much easier now than you could in the past.
2:41:24
And our clients really like they get a lot of value from that. >> Yeah.
2:41:31
>> Uh >> have you thought about buying existing insurance agencies?
2:41:35
I've heard I've heard uh I heard at least one company that uh a portfolio company of a of a fund M&LP in.
2:41:45
>> It's just a hot trend right now with the AI thing is like pull forward by your investors legacy thing.
2:41:49
JD, it'd be great if you could figure out us a way for us to give you another $50 million.
2:41:54
I do not like how profitable you are.
2:41:56
This is a big problem for us. >> Yeah, literally.
2:41:59
I think that's part of it.
2:42:00
I think people are chasing opportunities with dollars before understanding the opportunities. >> Sure.
2:42:05
Look, insurance is a very like inquisitive space these brokerages because it's been the only way to grow.
2:42:11
I think we might be the only one I know of who's doing purely organic growth where you're saying, "Hey, >> you know that guy you golf with every weekend? Forget him. Come on over to us."
2:42:20
>> And having that work and I think it's because the whole industry is broken.
2:42:24
Like everyone kind of feels fleeced by their guy.
2:42:26
>> Uh but no one in that space actually wants to innovate because they're it's the most one it's the most boring industry on earth.
2:42:32
like no one wants to talk about this or think about it.
2:42:34
Even if it's your job, you generally don't want to think about it.
2:42:36
And now with AI, it's finally like right for disruption on a platform side.
2:42:40
But if you're acquiring brokerages, you have to convince this 50-year-old golfer, whatever to change their operations. Like, no way.
2:42:51
>> Uh I noticed you don't have the words AI agents anywhere on your website. >> Is that intentional?
2:42:58
>> Even had a website until like a month ago. >> Yeah. Yeah.
2:43:01
But no, no, but it feel but it feels intentional where there like other people building this business would say would have would be selling this as like we're bu we're building AI agents for finding and insurance and risk management.
2:43:14
But it feels like businesses don't really care.
2:43:16
They're not used to using agents that are awesome yet.
2:43:20
And so that's not really a selling point.
2:43:22
I'm curious how you think about how software is evolving and how you think about like integrating AI for the user as well as kind of back office and actually to to deliver value.
2:43:35
>> Definitely I I think right now the storyline for AI on the foundation model side is really obvious, right?
2:43:42
side is really obvious, right? It's just increasing general capabilities and I think the AI software pure kind of play where you're just saying hey we're selling AI into businesses to make them more efficient isn't working as well as people want in certain areas it's really going gang
2:43:57
busters like engineering um software engineering others it's and content you know generation things like that in others it's just not performing as well our view is that you it's much easier to build an AI native business than it is to build the software and sell it into people who don't know how to even adopt this stuff yet. Um, over time, I think
2:44:14
Um, over time, I think maybe it'll get easier as the the uh the entry points make sense in each of these businesses, but it's very experimental right now.
2:44:24
>> And so, we're very very focused on from the ground up, how do we build a business where it works from an AI native way, right?
2:44:30
Like where our clients can just say, "Okay, I'm buying something I already understand."
2:44:34
And behind the scenes, yeah, when you request a certificate of insurance, an AI agent does that, right?
2:44:39
It reads through this 200page PDF and says, "Are you qualified to get this data or not?" Okay, great.
2:44:46
We're going to email your insurance carrier, blah blah blah, and it comes back and works to the customer. It's just magic.
2:44:51
They just get what they want.
2:44:52
They don't need to know how.
2:44:52
Like, it's like explaining.
2:44:54
You don't want to know where the the sausage meat comes from.
2:44:58
You just want to get your sausage. >> Last question.
2:45:00
Do you have any mattress companies that you're working with?
2:45:05
>> We work with this incredible business called Eight Sleep. >> Let's go. That's my next ad read.
2:45:08
Thank you so much for coming on the show. I'm going to transform. >> Amazing uh setup.
2:45:13
Well, you're you're our new uh insurance correspondent, so anytime there's some hard-hitting >> insurance news, just a risk guy. >> Risk guy.
2:45:24
>> Whatever just call me in. >> Yeah.
2:45:26
Uh >> uh if something I mean careful what you wish for.
2:45:30
>> I mean the big the big question actually is uh is is the like the how how uh like who is it?
2:45:35
Deutsche Bank is like creating insurance products around the AI data center leases to try and hedge the risk there.
2:45:43
That's a fascinating story, but we'll have to jump into it another time because we're we're running late.
2:45:48
But thank you so much for coming.
2:45:49
>> Great to finally have you on and come back on anytime.
2:45:51
>> Yeah, we'll talk to you soon.
2:45:53
>> Have a great >> How did you sleep last night, Jordy? I got a 76.
2:45:57
>> I still am away from my eight. Oh, yes. >> I gotta move it over.
2:45:59
Um I'm I'm fighting against myself then.
2:46:01
Uh let's get to Tyler's cam.
2:46:03
Just check in with Tyler. Oh, what? What?
2:46:05
What happened to your Oh, oh, what happened here? >> Oh, you can't see it. You can't see your desk. >> He He He backed down. He backed.
2:46:12
You can see that the c the microphone is moving upwards because he he uh lost the strength to stand at his standing desk and put his standing desk down.
2:46:25
>> I didn't lose the strength.
2:46:26
>> You lost the strength.
2:46:26
You >> I like to move around.
2:46:27
Sometimes I like to sit down. Okay.
2:46:29
Well, you can sit down then. That's No problem. No problem.
2:46:32
Our next guest is Josie Zer uh who is uh building a literal unicorn >> using DNA editing to >> I will be right back >> to modify horses. Is this correct?
2:46:43
I mean welcome to the show. How are you doing? Good to see you. >> Hey, what's up John? How's it going?
2:46:52
Yeah, I mean we're gene editing animals.
2:46:55
I think animals are kind of like the, you know, software of reality. >> Fantastic.
2:47:00
>> And uh >> software of reality. What a turn of phrase. I love it.
2:47:03
Uh what like what does this actually mean? Uh is it >> I know.
2:47:08
Especially nowadays with all these people.
2:47:13
>> Sorry, there's a little bit of a delay.
2:47:14
>> No, it's not theoretical. Here's the thing. Yeah, I know. >> Okay. >> Where am I?
2:47:20
I'm in my lab in Austin, Texas. >> Oh, fine.
2:47:25
>> Doing is the delay still there? Can we go? >> Yes, it is.
2:47:28
uh why don't you give me uh an introduction on the company kind of where you are and I'd love to know uh how what your actual timeline is for building this actual you literal unicorn that going through >> yeah so you know the company I run is called Embryo Core and we're working on gene editing animals I'm kind of just like I'm tired of people investing in AI note-taking apps And I look at universities and how science isn't going forward. So I'm like, it.
2:48:03
I'm going to build a startup company that people actually care about and like and I'm going to science that I can invest my blood, sweat, and tears in.
2:48:13
And to me, that's gene editing the future of life, you know. >> Amazing.
2:48:21
Uh I think we have some Is there anything we can do about the delay or or should we come back to this?
2:48:25
I I think we might need to have you back on the show another time.
2:48:29
The that the delay is just a little crazy right now.
2:48:33
Um but uh uh but I'm I'm glad we got to check in a little bit and talk about the story somewhat.
2:48:39
Uh I'm sorry we couldn't get it figured out.
2:48:41
Somehow we can edit animals DNA and yet we can't get the the the Wi-Fi to work. It happens.
2:48:45
Um but the chat is loving you and uh they're they're very excited about this. Uh but I'm sorry.
2:48:52
I'm sorry that we uh that we ran into technical difficulties, but we will check in with you soon.
2:48:56
Have a good rest of your day. We'll talk to you soon.
2:48:59
Um let's bring in our next guest after I tell you about public.
2:49:02
com investing for those that take it seriously.
2:49:05
They got multiasset investing industryleading yields and they're trusted by millions.
2:49:08
Our next guest is Scott Shapiro from Coinbase.
2:49:11
Let's bring him in from the reream waiting room into the TBP Ultradom.
2:49:15
Scott, how are you doing? >> Great. How are you guys?
2:49:20
>> We're doing fantastic.
2:49:20
a little uh recovering from some technical difficulties, but hopefully there haven't been any technical difficulties in your life recently. Uh give us the update.
2:49:29
What uh what what is the latest news in your world?
2:49:34
>> Probably our token sales announcement from yesterday morning.
2:49:40
>> I think that was in the Wall Street Journal. Correct.
2:49:41
Can you give me Can you give me the full story >> guys got in the journal the sacred text? >> I I think so.
2:49:46
is is Coinbase launches site for so for token sales.
2:49:48
Blockchain startup Monad will be the first to sell its digital coin on the new platform.
2:49:55
Coinbase Global is launching a new platform to allow individual investors to purchase digital tokens before they are listed on its exchange.
2:50:01
You tell me, is this fake news or is this the truth?
2:50:06
>> That is probably the realest news in the whole journal yesterday.
2:50:08
We are for the first time bringing token sales to the full US retail community since 2018. >> That's fantastic. Okay.
2:50:14
So, yeah, break down the different levels because I know you guys just acquired Echo.
2:50:18
That serves a different use case, but what what are the different types of offerings?
2:50:26
>> Yeah, you know, we're trying to go full life cycle when we think about asset issuers, right?
2:50:30
We have a great exchange.
2:50:32
It's been around for a long time for secondary trading, but we announced yesterday introduces primary issuance right before it starts trading on the secondary market.
2:50:40
Echo and a related company, Sonar were acquired by Coinbase a couple weeks ago.
2:50:46
Coincidental, we were playing this token sales product working with Monet already.
2:50:49
That is even further upstream what Echo is doing kind of pre-sales before a token is even ready to be traded or used. >> Awesome.
2:50:59
So, so this new product you could compare to uh uh certain you know companies like Robin Hood and Public will take an allocation in different IPOs and give an allocation to everyday investors, people that are non-investment banks or sort of established uh investment firms.
2:51:15
Is that like a good comp?
2:51:20
>> It's a it's a fair comp.
2:51:20
I'd say the two biggest differences these are not IPOs. These are token sales.
2:51:24
Purely crypto, no stock exchange involved.
2:51:29
Second difference is it is only distributed to retail investors on Coinbase.
2:51:33
So there's not a little IPO allocation for retail and then a big allocation for institutions.
2:51:38
This is 100% just focused on a sale to the retail community and then post sale the real float that comes will be from these folks who bought uh tokens on Coinbase in that primary sale. >> That makes sense.
2:51:52
uh what uh why why was now the right time to bring something like this to market?
2:51:57
I know I mean if you look back through the history of crypto, there was an era where these kind of offerings to retail were much more popular and then there was a lot of pro you know kind of like problems and regulatory gray area from that uh time that uh is starting I feel like to be a bit more clarified but you know maybe you could talk about the timing.
2:52:19
>> Yeah, there's a couple things here.
2:52:19
One is just our ambitions have gotten much broader in terms of becoming what we call the everything exchange.
2:52:24
So being able to offer every asset class at every stage of its development and what I focus on is really making that tailor made for the retail community all around the world.
2:52:34
Second thing is the regulatory environment is much better.
2:52:37
And so where a company like Coinbase was being uh not not so favorably looked upon by the SEC a couple years ago um that regulatory environment has improved to the degree where we feel much more comfortable offering this type of product not just to the US community but in dozens of other countries around the world and that's a really new thing uh for crypto. >> Yeah, it makes sense.
2:52:59
Uh what about uh what do you expect the volume of offerings to look like?
2:53:04
Monad is is going to be the first.
2:53:06
Is this something that's happening on a on a weekly basis? You know, monthly basis.
2:53:11
What are the plans there? What can you share?
2:53:16
>> Probably more like monthly than weekly.
2:53:18
We're really not trying to maximize volume.
2:53:20
This is definitely a quality over quantity play.
2:53:21
over quantity play. So it really depends on the types of issuers and the depth of those teams involvement and really their willingness to do this in a way like the Monad team has agreed to where they're not just going to turn around and sell
2:53:34
all of the you know insider allocations right away but they're looking to develop long-term incentives and hold themselves to a standard of longerterm lockups and longerterm vesting schedules uh that really puts control in the hands of the retail investors. uh and you know
2:53:48
uh and you know you look in the past a lot of these token sales on backwater types of markets have not done that um and so we think that if issuers are willing to do that we'll we'll engage with them.
2:54:00
>> How does how does pricing work?
2:54:00
Is it is it a function of supply and demand or is an issuer you know setting a valuation uh and and a specific allocation amount like what can you say around that front?
2:54:13
>> It's it's exactly the latter we described.
2:54:14
So the issuer sets the token price, they set the allocation to uh what goes in into this primary sale.
2:54:20
Uh we make sure that it's a team of high quality and that they're willing to be transparent about their unlocks investing schedules and that they're really committed for the long term.
2:54:31
Um and then it's really up to the retail audience.
2:54:34
They can invest as little as $100 um or six figures uh paid in USDC, of course, stable coins uh to be involved in the sale.
2:54:46
If I'm doing if if I'm starting to sell tokens through this through through this process, uh are there like ad units around this?
2:54:55
Like we when we go to an IPO in New York, we'll often see uh taxi cabs will be wrapped with we were at the Clara IPO for example, there were pink taxi cabs everywhere.
2:55:05
At Figma, they really like went all out.
2:55:08
There was like a DJ outside.
2:55:10
there was a lot of celebration big uh like you know massive canvas that gets hoisted and there's a lot of attention that comes to it and the New York Stock Exchange and the NASDAQ too to some extent uh sort of offer effectively like marketing packages to celebrate the moment.
2:55:24
Uh is that something that you'll have like an analogy to in the digital realm at some point? >> I love that idea.
2:55:32
I I worked in ads for a decade uh in Silicon Valley before coming to Coinbase.
2:55:36
Follow my crypto passions. >> Thank you.
2:55:38
Honestly, powers modern American economy.
2:55:43
>> Yeah, Cheryl Cheryl Sanberg used to say, "It's the Lord's work."
2:55:46
>> It is the Lord's work.
2:55:48
>> Back in Facebook, >> finally, >> um, we do not have that today.
2:55:51
I think that's an interesting idea.
2:55:52
This is something that if you go to the Coinbase app, you will see it pretty prominently.
2:55:57
And right now, so the sale actually starts on the 17th.
2:55:59
Right now is the time when people can come learn about it and get reminded so that we can notify them.
2:56:05
Um, but there's no paid media involved and that's something that we might consider longer term.
2:56:10
>> Uh, >> I think that'd be fun.
2:56:12
>> What uh has any details released on on pricing? >> Yeah, the price is 2. 5 cents per token.
2:56:20
>> Um, the FD FTV, the fully diluted valuation is 2 and a half billion.
2:56:23
So, you can do the math on the number of tokens out there.
2:56:26
Um, the allocation to Coinbase is $187.
2:56:29
5 million uh worth of monad tokens.
2:56:32
And again, that will represent the bulk of the float uh once it's tradable.
2:56:36
So, the actual market cap that's floating is going to be a small fraction of the total long-term fully diluted valuation. >> Fascinating. >> That makes sense.
2:56:46
Uh well, very very interesting new product and uh I'm sure uh hopefully we can get the the Monad team on uh as we get closer to them to learn about uh the protocol and what they're working on.
2:56:58
>> Yeah, that'd be awesome. Thank you so much. >> Thank you guys.
2:57:01
>> Have a great rest of your day. >> Thanks, Scott. >> Cheers.
2:57:04
You know, if you do want to take out an ad, you got to go to adquick. com. That's right.
2:57:08
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Out of home expertise and data to enable efficient, seamless ad buying across some new billboards. >> We're cooking. We're cooking.
2:57:21
>> We've heard your complaints.
2:57:21
Not enough TVPN billboards.
2:57:22
Haven't seen one in a while.
2:57:25
>> We The funny thing is we actually have been getting that complaint. Very silly.
2:57:29
Uh we have Lawrence Allen from Tteranova in the reream waiting room.
2:57:31
Let's bring him in into the TVPN Ultra Done.
2:57:34
Lawrence, >> what's happening? Look at that. Look at that flag. Look at that. The flag, the suit. Wow. Royal flag.
2:57:38
Isaiah looked so dapper yesterday.
2:57:41
I I figured I had to put a suit on. >> You look fantastic.
2:57:43
Give us the news and then I want to go into what the >> Florida ceiling flag.
2:57:49
>> Yeah, this is it's amazing. This is a great time.
2:57:51
>> So, some of these flags are just too small, you know?
2:57:52
It's like hard to even tell if they're they're real or not. American flag.
2:57:56
>> I'll I'll let you in on a secret.
2:57:56
If you want to win the game for the biggest flag, you got to put it outside. Go on the roof.
2:58:03
Everyone's putting the flag inside the factory.
2:58:05
If you hang the flag outside the factory, uh also the world's biggest flag, they they bring it out at uh like the halftime of the Super Bowl every once in a while. There's one of them.
2:58:15
It's like the huge And you can get it for like 500K. >> Only 500K.
2:58:20
>> It's not that much, right?
2:58:20
If you if you got 7 million, >> I mean, it's a lot of money, but it's a lot of flag.
2:58:24
>> It's a lot of money, but it's a lot of flag. Anyway, sorry.
2:58:25
Uh, it's great to have you.
2:58:27
Great to have you on the show. >> Weirdest. >> Weirdest office ever.
2:58:29
And the the outside of the part that's my bedroom is painted rainbow.
2:58:33
So, I was thinking we just repainted American flag. >> Okay, there you go.
2:58:36
So, you sleeping in the office, too. >> Absolutely.
2:58:41
You know, it's I think it's becoming the standard. >> Where Gundo? >> We are not. We're We're in Berkeley. >> Cool.
2:58:49
>> The flag would be a little smaller in Gundo because the the price is like 320 a square foot there. >> Oh, yeah. >> Great.
2:58:55
bringing American dynamism to Berkeley, >> going on the offensive behind enemy lines.
2:59:00
>> Um, uh, anyways, great to have you on the show.
2:59:02
Congratulations on the launch yesterday.
2:59:04
Uh, breakdown, maybe give some background on yourself and then let's talk about the company. >> Yeah, >> sure.
2:59:10
Yeah, I'm a recent Berkeley grad, dropped out of Stanford grad school.
2:59:12
Um, I worked at SpaceX before and I am CEO of Teranova.
2:59:19
So, we just launched out of stealth.
2:59:22
We probably had the longest stealth mode you've seen.
2:59:23
And we >> How long the the There are companies that have been in stealth for like a decade.
2:59:30
>> Longer than you've been alive.
2:59:32
>> Maybe not the longest you've seen.
2:59:33
>> I mean, humane humane humane humane I've been in stealth for like seven years. >> Yeah. How how long? A couple years.
2:59:39
>> I've been working on this since I was at SpaceX, which is like late 2021.
2:59:41
So, I was in school until under a year ago at Berkeley. >> I stay corrected. Serious stealth mode. >> Serious stealth mode. >> Serious stealth mode. Yeah.
2:59:49
So, we're we're we're officially out.
2:59:51
Um, proud to announce our $7 million seed round led by Congruent. >> Great hit. Great hit. >> Congratulations.
3:00:03
I was excited for that one.
3:00:04
>> And Outlander as well. >> Fantastic. >> Awesome. >> Yeah.
3:00:08
Who funded Valor and also Ponderosa and Gothams? >> Uh, very very cool. What?
3:00:14
Uh, so what are you working on?
3:00:18
Yeah, we're building terraforming robots.
3:00:20
So, usually when you hear about terraforming, it's some in the sky stuff like what Augustus is working on at Rain Maker.
3:00:26
Here, we're talking about very physical on Earth terraforming where we are lifting land physically out of flood zones.
3:00:35
I think this launch video captures it very well.
3:00:37
Um, but we're basically injecting really, really large amounts of material underground to just directly lift land.
3:00:43
So this would be really useful for you if you are currently in a coastal area.
3:00:47
I think lots of places all over LA, even parts of Gundo have this issue uh where you were just too low.
3:00:54
Long Beach was called the sinking city for years and the reason is because it just sunk about 10 or or 20 feet due to subsidance and from that subsidance you have flooding.
3:01:04
So it's not just sea level rise, it's usually petroleum extraction or groundwater extraction or being built on fill.
3:01:11
So cities all over the world are facing this issue and there's just really not much you can do about it.
3:01:15
You already have the infrastructure in place. What do you do?
3:01:18
You know, there's no way to lift that infrastructure up.
3:01:22
You can't put it on some little stilts like you can do a small, you know, singlestory house.
3:01:25
You can put a giant seaw wall in.
3:01:28
Usually you're looking at hundreds of millions of dollars for things like that.
3:01:31
Sometimes levy systems will work, but usually what's happening now is they're just demolishing the infrastructure, putting a ton of filter on it, waiting, you know, a year, year and a half for it to compact and and moving around dirt on the surface to make that happen.
3:01:44
And then they're rebuilding that infrastructure.
3:01:46
And so, you know, maybe that's fine if you have, you know, some inexpensive property, but we're talking highways.
3:01:52
These are, you know, 8 billion projects for Highway 37, which is, you know, a few miles north of here.
3:01:58
You're talking about mass displacements when you're doing this to whole cities. I'm from Sanfell.
3:02:01
We are facing this problem.
3:02:04
Sanfell has about 60,000 people and they're facing a 500 to900 million bill for the seaw wall system that they need.
3:02:12
There's just no way they can afford that.
3:02:14
And so we took a a super first principles approach.
3:02:16
How could we save our hometown?
3:02:18
And this is what we came up with.
3:02:21
So you're injecting dirt and rock into the ground in order to uh uh effectively move uh move move like an area uh or a facility or a town uh higher.
3:02:36
How much uh how much dirt how much mass do you need to do that effectively?
3:02:43
>> Yeah, you wouldn't believe it, but dirt is actually way more expensive than what we're using. We're using wood.
3:02:46
So wood chips are free delivered in whatever category you want.
3:02:51
Um you can get this anywhere in the world. It's abundant.
3:02:56
It's usually free delivered because it's such a large waste product.
3:02:57
And so we're taking this wood chip slurry, pumping it directly underground.
3:03:03
It compacts in about 2 hours to pretty much the full consolidation.
3:03:08
And then you would just 3 ft higher or whatever you wanted to be at the end of the day.
3:03:15
It's hard to wrap my head around how much wood chips you need to raise a city in height.
3:03:20
Uh, but our shipping container is sized to process 20 semi-truck loads of wood a day.
3:03:28
>> So, we're basically moving 20 semi truckloads of wood chips through our system.
3:03:31
We have a bunch of robots that run around the site that deliver that final fluid underground and then that processing unit that we call our arc.
3:03:38
So the Prometheus system, that's the the robot, we call it that because it's bringing something fundamentally new to the world, is delivering that final injection pressure.
3:03:49
And you're basically just moving as much material as possible underground because really what you need is volume, not, you know, mass or something like like you would expect.
3:04:00
>> Uh these wood chips, what what is the primary source? This is a waste product.
3:04:04
when people are getting trees removed from properties, manufacturing processes, where where does it actually come from? >> Lots of sources.
3:04:13
You know, if we were going to do the Santafell project, for example, uh there's a place called Marin Sanitary right across the street from the place that floods the most.
3:04:19
They ship eight semi-truck loads a day of wood chips to be burnt in biomass energy plants, which are subsidized by the state because they're non-economic.
3:04:27
and they would way prefer to instead of, you know, polluting the air up in Stockton to just pump that right underground.
3:04:33
So, you can get it locally.
3:04:35
You can also get it from sawmills, you can get it from um fire trimmings all over the state.
3:04:42
Obviously, we have huge fire issues here in California and so they're doing massive clearing of of forest and then they really just don't have anything to do with that wood. >> Okay.
3:04:50
So, goal is to save San Rafale or save them from this, you know, massive uh infrastructure bill.
3:04:56
How do you start small and prove that the company can you know execute on this type of operation?
3:05:04
Are there specific sites that are uh you know much smaller scale where you can kind of start uh proving out uh the the thesis? >> Yeah.
3:05:14
So I I just got this text from our team.
3:05:16
They are all at our pallet site right now uh doing some drilling, doing some pumping.
3:05:21
Um you can see we use like augur drill bits and uh you know big injection machines to do our our pumping and have our shipping containers.
3:05:29
So we are deployed this works.
3:05:31
We've been doing this for about a year and we are looking for more commercial projects to do right now.
3:05:38
>> So what site what site are they on specifically?
3:05:40
Is that like a testing ground?
3:05:42
>> They're undisclosed site near Sacramento um that is primarily a testing ground but they also have huge drainage and subsidance issues that we are are fixing. Huh. Fascinating. >> Wild.
3:05:52
So, so what what are what what's like the the dream customer right now?
3:05:58
>> Yeah, we would love to do strangely some wetland restoration projects and also some new home development projects.
3:06:03
So, things that don't already have a lot of infrastructure in place are very ideal.
3:06:09
Uh we've seen a customer willingness to pay slightly higher there because their risk appetite is a little more because there's there's not much to go wrong.
3:06:15
Uh we feel ready to do some roadway projects as well.
3:06:19
Sorry, break that first one down.
3:06:21
It's basically like I have a bunch of land that's undeveloped.
3:06:25
I'm thinking about putting a bunch of houses on it, but there's a problem because there's like a marsh in the middle of it and you can kind of get rid of the marsh. Is that roughly correct? >> Not quite.
3:06:34
So, in the bay, it's usually you've dyed or levied off an area and then because it's organic, it's subsided.
3:06:43
>> So, there's an example.
3:06:43
It's an 80acre parcel uh right on the water infell near the target. This has subsided 2 m.
3:06:48
And so because of that, if you were to break the dyke, it'd be under sea level, of course.
3:06:55
And so they want to do two things.
3:06:57
They want to put some wetland on that.
3:06:59
To do that, you have to lift it so it can become title.
3:07:01
And they also want to put um about $100 million worth of homes on that property on the more upland section.
3:07:09
>> And so that you would also need to lift it because that section is also too low.
3:07:13
So both are fixed by the same solution which is ours which is just directly lift it and make it so you can develop it and make it into higher quality wetland. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
3:07:21
That makes a ton of sense.
3:07:23
>> Uh how long until you have uh you're getting death threats from conspiracy theories. >> Yeah.
3:07:30
Modifying the world easy. >> Yeah.
3:07:33
People, you know, obviously Augustus has been on the show.
3:07:36
>> You're going to get blamed for earthquakes.
3:07:37
That's what's going to happen.
3:07:38
Like there's going to be an earthquake.
3:07:39
>> We actually think we're going to help with earthquakes as well.
3:07:41
We haven't been publicly claiming this cuz we're still doing testing.
3:07:43
But this performed dramatically better.
3:07:45
Um, this underground looks very much like particle board.
3:07:49
It doesn't look like wood chips. It's compact.
3:07:50
And so this is better than normal earth.
3:07:54
>> Uh, this is very controllable. It's very physical.
3:07:57
>> Get ready to go on info wars, buddy.
3:08:00
Because I I no matter what the science says, you are going to get blamed for uh for earthquakes because people are just going to be like they were doing something and then the earthquake happened.
3:08:10
you have you have Augustus as as as a as a model.
3:08:12
Augustus, you know, was was in the hot seat, >> but he's done a great job.
3:08:16
And I think that there is a path for communicating with all constituents, not just tech, not just Twitter.
3:08:22
Augustus has done a great job getting to, you know, AM radio listeners and and random uh random shows that uh do not break through in tech Twitter.
3:08:32
He's done a great job there.
3:08:32
Uh but yeah, communication across all the constituents has to be really important for this business.
3:08:37
But >> yeah, I think it's important to say this is not like a blue state solution.
3:08:40
This is very much red and blue. Totally.
3:08:42
We pitch this all over Florida.
3:08:44
Of course, Miami faces some of the worst flooding issues.
3:08:47
And this is also not just a US problem.
3:08:50
This is something that's happening all over the world.
3:08:51
Uh Southeast Asia is particularly bad.
3:08:55
We've had ministers from Indonesia, from Cambodia come here.
3:08:58
They're saying like, "I'm moving my entire capital city of Jakarta. Help me."
3:09:02
And this is very much going to be the fundamental way that you solve large scale flooding problems.
3:09:07
And so I I hope that conspiracy theorists don't come for us.
3:09:10
Um we definitely are willing to show them what's happening.
3:09:15
You know, this kind of looks like a black box underground, but actually we have systems where we can measure this to like a a 2 millimeter level precision.
3:09:22
And so you can have very good idea of exactly what's happening. >> That's amazing.
3:09:26
>> Uh one more question just because I'm trying to wrap my head around the scale.
3:09:30
How many like you know truckloads or shipping containers worth of wood chips would you need to let's say raise a square mile like uh call it like five feet.
3:09:46
>> I will do that math for you right now.
3:09:48
Um so let's do acre to square mile.
3:09:50
So basically, you need 20 truckloads per acref foot, which is actually much better than fill because with fill you're >> an acre an acre foot is an entire one foot like picture an acre and then one foot. >> Okay.
3:10:07
So one foot deep, acre wide long. >> Yeah. >> Yeah.
3:10:11
So um you want >> uh we're doing math on TV right now.
3:10:16
I got >> Well, while he's doing the math, let me tell you about Wander. Find your happy place.
3:10:22
This book a wander with inspiring views of photography cleaning a 24/7 concier services vacation home but better.
3:10:27
Uh and you know maybe in the future your wander will be on terraformed property.
3:10:31
We might be increasing the number of of vacation homes. >> Absolutely.
3:10:37
So a square mile lifted by 5T is a lot. Of course you know that.
3:10:42
>> Um this would actually be uh 64,000 truckloads of >> Let's go. Let's go.
3:10:47
>> However, however, as much as it sounds, there is >> way way more than that.
3:10:51
just in California, we could absolutely source that much.
3:10:54
Okay, we looked and it is very straightforward to source a thousand semi truckloads a day in the Bay Area.
3:10:59
Um, so that would maybe be a two-month project if you were really about your logistics and maybe a two-year project if you didn't care quite as much. >> Okay, fantastic.
3:11:07
Well, we're looking forward.
3:11:09
Yeah, you're taking taking something that people want to get rid of and saying we'll take it. >> Yeah, lot of people.
3:11:14
>> Thank you so much for taking the time to to stop by. >> This uh fun.
3:11:16
The chat was mentioning you.
3:11:18
How how are you guys not talking about this?
3:11:20
And we did we did sort of miss the the the the announcement, but we're really happy to have you join and really appreciate >> Thank you for having me, John.
3:11:26
I've been watching you since you're making YC videos instead of tech startup videos. So, >> that's amazing.
3:11:32
>> Well, uh well, thanks so much. >> Well, super exciting.
3:11:34
Uh congrats to the whole team. >> Good luck. We'll talk to you soon. >> Talk soon.
3:11:40
>> Uh before we move on, let me tell you about bezel. getbbezzle. com.
3:11:44
Your bezel concier is available now to source you any watch on the planet. Seriously, any watch.
3:11:46
And in tariff news, Switzerland has been making moves. >> Oh, yes.
3:11:55
>> The luxury watch market might be in turmoil again.
3:11:57
We might need to call get them on the show again.
3:12:00
>> And Switzerland are working on a deal to slash the 39% tariffs and try to get them um to 15%.
3:12:04
Uh Rolex got uh Trump a oneofone desk watch clock >> that has been photographed on Trump's desk.
3:12:17
Uh and >> that might win him over.
3:12:20
>> And uh yeah, 101 Rolex and win a lot of people over. >> That's pretty cool.
3:12:23
>> Kind of uh >> uh So, >> didn't didn't uh Barack Obama get a Rolex as well?
3:12:28
I believe he got some sort of watch from his secret service agent.
3:12:32
His Secret Service agent probably might have been an Omega.
3:12:35
might have been a Speed Master, but uh but it became the watch that he wore. He wasn't a watch guy.
3:12:39
Then one of his Secret Service guys was like, "You got to wear this watch." And he did. >> Yeah. >> Very cool.
3:12:44
>> Uh did you see this post? Jeff Davies in 2016.
3:12:47
A lot of posts from 2016 uh these days.
3:12:50
Jeff Davies in 2016 said Apple should buy Nvidia and lock up VR, AI, and autonomous car tech for the next decade.
3:12:59
Look back 10 10 years from now and great use of cash.
3:13:02
And Apple would be a uh >> a10 trillion dollar company >> basically. >> Wow. Wild.
3:13:09
Uh looking also back this uh Fireflies. Is this AI noteaker?
3:13:14
Someone was talking trash about AI noteakers today on the stream.
3:13:18
Uh I I I don't even remember who at this point, but uh so Shiel Monot says, "This is wild.
3:13:24
It's about a screenshot of a LinkedIn post by Sam Udotong, who's the co-founder and CTO at Fireflies AI.
3:13:32
This is an AI note-taking startup.
3:13:35
I think they're doing very well.
3:13:36
I think they've raised money recently.
3:13:37
Um, and uh, and they say, "Came across this post on LinkedIn.
3:13:42
Turns out the first version of Fireflyy's AI uh, the AI meeting assistant doesn't even have AI.
3:13:46
It's just founder joining the calls, taking notes manually, and sending a summary back. Sounds crazy."
3:13:53
Uh, and that is exactly what Sam wrote on LinkedIn 10 hours ago when this screenshot was taken.
3:14:00
said, "We scaled Flyerflies to a1 billion dollar valuation after six failures from our original crypto food idea, food delivery idea." Um, that's hilarious.
3:14:09
Uh, >> if you're if you're working on a crypto food idea, pivot to AI noteaker, get to a get to a billion dollars, uh, uh, a billion dollar valuation.
3:14:18
And so, uh, he says, this is the key segment.
3:14:19
When when when customers scheduled a meeting, we'd manually dial in as Fred from Fireflies. ai.
3:14:26
We'd sit there silently taking detailed notes and send them 10 minutes later after taking notes for a 100 plus meetings and falling asleep in many.
3:14:35
We were finally able to make enough money to pay the $750 per month rent for a tiny SF living room.
3:14:39
That was the point where we said, "Let's stop and automate everything."
3:14:43
And so this is being put in this is being put in like a dunk because they're saying like, "Oh, this billion dollar AI note-taking company doesn't use AI."
3:14:52
It's like, yeah, this was in 2015 or 2016.
3:14:54
Like I actually I actually knew Sam at the time and I DM'd with him.
3:15:00
I was a customer and I was completely fine with this because I was like this is awesome.
3:15:04
I get somebody to take my notes for me.
3:15:08
It's basically like an outsource noteaker.
3:15:09
Um but it's being sort of like reframed as like as like this is what how they would do stuff now.
3:15:15
And it's like no obviously it's been a decade almost since they did. >> Yeah.
3:15:19
I think if you're a customer and you didn't know, you have the right to be frustrated that you were just inviting a human and no no uh >> hilarious hilariously scrappy. Hilariously scrappy.
3:15:29
But yes, they they were >> and as long as they were being transparent with the VCs at that time that yeah, we're just using couple guys to do this.
3:15:38
>> It's so crazy looking back on this uh this conversation with Sam in my DMs.
3:15:43
Uh, and he just says like, "Hey, uh, like I'm working on I I needed notes from something.
3:15:48
Like, can you uh can you send in, uh, and transcribe everything?
3:15:52
I've been using Rev, this, uh, this this manual transcription service that would take an audio file and just give you a text text file back, but it was done by humans."
3:16:00
Um, and so here he says, "You can add Fred at Fireflies to the calendar invite and Fred will join." >> Give it up for Fred.
3:16:09
>> Let's give it up for Fred.
3:16:09
I was like just I I was like hey just got my grow first transcript pretty solid like and he's like how would you com how comparable would you say it is to rev lots and ums and captured uh I I I know the exact comparison in a day because I sent the recording to Rev earlier so I was doing like AB testing actually seeing like what was what was useful what wasn't.
3:16:30
It was just funny like actually seeing this company grow so much and having been an early adopter and then uh and then see people get the story wrong. So, you know what?
3:16:38
If you're using Firefly, of course they're using Whisper.
3:16:41
Why would they be using humans still? It makes no sense. The technology is good.
3:16:44
Uh, >> um, Tim Sweeney is landmaxing. >> Oh, what?
3:16:49
>> And behind Fortnite has bought over 40,000 acres of US wilderness not to build to keep it forever wild. >> Forever wild. I love it.
3:16:55
Where else are you in the in the timeline? Are you deep in there? >> Uh, Mr.
3:16:59
Beast says 2% of human time is now spent on YouTube.
3:17:02
M Well, thank you to everyone who's been spending at least >> We spend way more than We spend way more than that. >> Oh, yeah.
3:17:09
>> Because we're doing like 15 easily 15 15 to 20 hours a week. Oh, yeah. >> 50 weeks a year.
3:17:15
>> And uh you know, that's we're we're getting the goal should be to get into the double digits, right?
3:17:19
Somewhere around >> somewhere around seven or eight% now.
3:17:22
Um >> Dean Ball had some uh support for your take yesterday.
3:17:30
He said, "I don't think you should th just throw del at someone who's identifying a negative externality of a new technology.
3:17:35
That's not necessarily decelerationist."
3:17:39
Dean Ball says it's heartening to see such eminently reasonable takes making their way into prominent protect new media.
3:17:44
There's something very well or actually neotrad media uh to be clear, but he says there's something very old man about the terms of AI policy debates and per and perhaps this is because it has been largely old people who have set them.
3:17:57
When I hear certain arguments about how we need to let the innovators innovate and thus cannot bear the thought of resolving negative externalities from new technology, it just sounds retro to me like an old man dimly remembering things he believes.
3:18:09
Milton Friedman once said, "Whereas anyone with enough neuroplasticity remaining to internalize a concept as alien as AGI can easily see that such simple frames do not work."
3:18:18
Um, Ronda Santis says, "We might have to see if we can get Pelosi to run Florida's pension fund."
3:18:28
She's showing, uh, this is pretty incredible.
3:18:31
Generated $133 million of profits and a 16,930% return.
3:18:40
>> I don't believe that number. That's 16,000%.
3:18:44
I mean, I guess this is since 1987.
3:18:47
She was probably making money and adding to it.
3:18:50
consistently over that time.
3:18:52
Uh >> what if she just invested like >> she just invested once and then >> I'm I'm very I'm very skeptical of that second number.
3:19:00
>> You don't believe she could just 10x it and just 10x that again and then 10x that again >> and then 16x that last time.
3:19:04
Uh it's possible, but it's like I don't know.
3:19:07
I I I would just imagine that you're adding to it every year and you can't just like take the current net worth and divide it by the the amount of money that she had when she started investing, right? Like uh what is 133?
3:19:23
>> Uh anyways, that is a good place to end the show.
3:19:26
We will be not be getting into the fifth hour today.
3:19:28
So, sorry to disappoint everyone, but uh tomorrow we have some uh fun guests.
3:19:34
We have uh Brian uh Halagan, CEO of HubSpot coming on.
3:19:40
Also uh a partner over at Sequoia and then uh Fay Lee from World Labs.
3:19:48
>> So very excited for all of that and we hope you have a wonderful uh Veterans Day uh at home wherever you are and we'll see you tomorrow. >> See you tomorrow. Goodbye. >> Cheers. Thank you.