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20% of the authors make 97% of the money and the top people make even more.
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>> I want to ask you about the Monger book because you started out writing that just for yourself which I thought was super cool.
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>> As a tribute during the internet boom things were crazy and I was worth a lot of money on paper and I had to make a decision about secondary sales.
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>> What did you have to change when you decided you were going to publish the book for other people to read it?
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nothing really because I wrote the book for me and as a tribute because it'll be true to you and the reader will pick up and say, "Wow, that's something this person really believes." Well, hello everyone.
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It's Jim Oanessy with yet another Infinite Loops.
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Today I have back one of my favorite people. Tren Griffith is back.
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You know him from our earlier conversations.
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You know him from his brilliant 25 IQ and his wonderful book on Charlie Munger. Tren, welcome back. Nice to be here.
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It's It's great to have this conversation because you are both a writer and a publisher. >> That's right.
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I'm on both sides of the table.
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>> Goes on a long ways and it helps you get perspective on you know there all jobs are hard as someone once said and being a publisher at hard and being an author is hard. >> Yeah.
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My my kids joked uh dad why are you going to open a publishing company?
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you do realize all of the problems that publishers are facing?
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And I said, "Yes, and I see a lot of solutions."
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You're writing your eighth book right now. >> Yes.
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>> And I I was rereading your 2017 essay on half a dozen lessons on getting a book published.
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Um, what's changed from then to now?
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>> Well, the publishing industry has changed quite a bit.
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you know, it's it's it's moving from more a uh you know, this royalty model, you get in advance and maybe you earn it out, usually you don't.
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And there was a power law and the new model they've sort of adopted at many firms is no, we're going to treat this as a joint venture.
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You're going to write this book and we're going to do the editing and publishing.
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We'll get it out there and then we'll split the proceeds.
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And so the the upside is much higher. >> Yeah.
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uh but there's not not this guarantee and so it appeals more to people like me who don't write for money.
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Um you know uh I I've given lots of books that I've written.
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I've just given all the money to charity.
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Um but even then it's just it's writing a book is not a way to make money.
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You know writing a book has many other great things.
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You know you can write a book because you want to get these ideas down.
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You can write a book because you want to be a mentor.
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You write a book because you want to leave something behind.
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Uh, you know, we've discussed before the concept of paying it forward.
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Um, you know, a lot of people help me.
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Most people help me or dad.
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And so, the best thing I can do is help other people.
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And so, if you could do those things, you know, writing is great.
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And there was a period you will recall when when blogs were like huge.
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And now the web is is shrinking. >> Yep.
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>> And the number of non-fiction books is shrinking.
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There's AI is competition now.
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There's all of the old back titles.
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And so it's harder in in many ways to write a non-f fiction book. That was a long answer.
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>> No, but it's a good answer because there are so many different reasons people write books, right?
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Like the first couple of books I wrote, I wrote to help my career. That was my objective.
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Uh invest like the best and what works on Wall Street.
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And I still maintain to this day that what works on Wall Street in particular put me on the map and made my career possible.
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I think the a lot of people underestimate the power of books. What do you think? >> I I agree with that.
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And then also, you know, there are some categories, finance might be one of them, but there's some c categories within finance that you're appealing to a very small number of people and you're educating a very small number of people, but those people are decision makers.
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And so, and so that can help you, you know, with your somebody's got a wealth management practice, you know, somebody's got trying to establish a fund, somebody's trying to raise money, you know, from LPS, all those things.
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And so, um, you don't have to sell that many if you're just doing content marketing.
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Um, but you know, if you want to sell something like I mean the psychology of money by Morgan, it's just unbelievable.
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I think I saw the other day it was 10 million, but it's probably higher than that now. >> Yeah.
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>> But, >> um, you know, there are people like that and the good news is there are people like that.
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The bad news is it's probably not you, >> you know, because the guy can just flat out write and he knows how to tell stories.
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Um, and you know, people love to read stories.
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They don't want to be lectured to.
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They like to read stories.
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And then the other thing is all these new formats, book talk and and you know, reals and all these things, YouTube, they're short.
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People's attention spans are shorter. They have other actions.
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There are a lot of screens they can turn to. I got a laptop here.
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I got a phone right here. You know, good.
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The TV is over over there.
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You know, it just a lot of competition.
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So, you got to stand out somehow.
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And that's that's not easy.
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And and you're working with Harry Mittman House, right?
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That's more part of McMillan.
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>> Yeah, they are great guys.
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>> They are and and they know business books and you know that's important because if you're going to get editing out um you know you want somebody who actually understands the topic.
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So that's you know that's important.
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And then >> um you know distribution you know getting Amazon taken care of and stock stocking books and doing all that you know requires some work.
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And then the trickiest thing of all is book publishing is such a word industry is the big big titles.
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Um they don't have a list of all their customers, >> right?
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>> They have a list of all the bookstores.
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>> Y >> but they have a list of all the customers.
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So direct marketing is possible.
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So the first question they ask you is well what's your book about?
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And the second most important question is what's who's your community?
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How are you going to market this book?
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What's your marketing plan?
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You know it's it's on you.
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And so the way I look at it is you're a publisher.
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So let's talk about this for a minute.
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Every one of your authors is starting a business. >> Yep. >> Right.
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He's starting a little book or she is starting a book publishing business and they have to understand how to market it, how to make it cost effective, how to create, you know, virality, what formats to use.
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And so they have a little business and just that is a lot of work building that community, keeping the community up, finding the channels to reach people, all those things.
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And so you're a publisher.
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So let's talk about this.
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So you're someone comes to you and says, "Well, I got this idea for a book.
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Do you require a proposal?
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How do you how do you evaluate them?
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What are your what are your standards?"
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>> Uh so our standards are we're looking for books that can like Morgans's withstand the test of time, right?
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Uh so we we are shying away currently from like s supercurrent topics uh and looking more for books like Morgans's as a as an example.
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But on the marketing side, what we're trying to do at Infinite Books is really sort of supercharge the author's marketing.
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uh a lot of the big five publishers, you know, you get a two-eek window, gets a lot of push and then they move on to the next project.
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We're trying with continuous marketing to all of those uh portals that you mentioned, right?
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So, book talk, threads, Instagram, you all of these social media, Twitter, um but consistently, right?
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And we're trying a bunch of different things like we have everything we do is sort of AI first.
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And by that I mean we have fact checkers for example that blow my mind.
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I mean literally we have our own stack, right?
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So we have our own hardware software stack and I'm I'm currently writing a book uh a fiction book actually first for me.
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Um, but I was running one of my chapters through a fact checker, uh, our AI fact checker, and it blew me away.
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It was like, "Yeah, Jim, no, that tram doesn't come in on track seven.
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It comes in on track nine.
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Here is the schedule in Polish because this is a generational thriller and this happens to be happening in Poland."
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And I'm like, "Holy shit."
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And then I looked I have a library over here and I'm just thought all of my books that I own are filled with errors.
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So we try to uh help the author not only from marketing but from everything from factchecking to introductions to people who might be writing about his or her topic.
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Uh we found that that sort of lead generation is very interesting, but you have to do it just straight up.
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Here's a book we thought you might be interested in and that's it.
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You don't ask them for anything.
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You just send them the book.
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And we've gotten a lot of good coverage that way as well.
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Um but it allows us to continually search blogs, other books, podcasts, etc. and then say, "Oh, wow.
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Trend's book, this guy is writing about something just like Trend published in his book."
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Because we have that ability to find those people, that has made a huge difference from the publishers end.
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What's interesting about you are many things, but one of the things that I sort of sometimes when I see your face or you have a post or something is that I say, "Well, that's Jim Mediche, you know, he's he's he's he's taking his his some of his winnings and he's he's creating a Medici style p not patronish uh not right, but you're you're trying to to generate a lot of other good things with your capital.
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Well, thank you and yes, I am.
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Uh I'm uh you know, we talked about that last time we were together.
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Uh we we both believe that being generous, paying back is something that is incumbent upon us.
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Uh if you look, I I was lucky enough to be born into a pro, you know, prominent prosperous family. Okay, man.
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And I was born on third base and I was then even crazier lucky to be born in America where you know the right to free speech, the rule of law, all of these things.
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So I owe a lot in my estimation and and because I wouldn't have been able to achieve any of this had I not been born in this country, had I not, you know, had the opportunities that I had. And like I love reading.
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I love books, non-fiction, fiction.
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Uh and I I passionately believe that they are what allow us to advance as a species, right?
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And so yeah, in addition to just loving it, uh we also want to get good at it.
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So you mentioned uh the uh split with the publisher.
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We actually have one that goes all the way to 70% goes to the author.
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30% is retained by Infinite Books.
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Now, we can only do that because of all of the technological workflows that we have built into the process.
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Um, and it's just super exciting for me, uh, because I, not only do I find many authors incredibly fascinating people, um, it it really gives me joy to be able to bring their their works and their ideas into into the public.
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So the the conversation is lovely, you know, with a great editor and then the conversation with your audience is even lovelier, although sometimes it's not.
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And I've talked this about this before in your post.
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When you create something that's art, and a book is a form of art, literatur, >> of course, >> and you put it out in the public, you're saying, "Here's my heart.
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I put my everything into it. Go ahead and attack me."
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And there are prof and there are professionals.
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A publisher said to me once, you know, there's a there's a category of people who when the book comes out, they want to be the first one on Amazon and they're going to give you a negative review and and that's their whole purpose in life.
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And if you did a search from them, you'd find they're doing it book after book after book.
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Some people just want to be uh seen or have attention or whatever.
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But if you have a thin ego, writing a book is not a is not a place to go.
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Oh, and I know some authors do not read their reviews at all because it's just what's the point, you know, for me like if I don't like a book, I'm not going to review it.
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If but I would never write a a negative book review because these people are my brothers and sisters. >> Yep.
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>> And I feel like they're comrades in arms and I would, you know, I know what they put into it. >> Yep. >> Yeah.
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and they and they tried and you know maybe it's not popular but but you know the meaning the meaning of writing the reason you should write is for yourself like the book I'm writing right now is about a series of topics that um I wanted to get better at explaining to other people myself and Buffett says writing is thinking and I agree but also in order to write for a broad audience you have to find out a way to simplify >> Yep.
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and to create narrative and tell stories, not just, well, you should do this and this and this and here's the formula for this.
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You know, people people, we're storytelling creatures way before the written word. >> Oh, totally.
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>> So, we loves we love stories.
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And so, you know, that's go back to psychology of money.
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Morgan's got great stories.
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Fact that that thing was op option for a movie is like unbelievable.
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But because it isn't believable, it is believable if you know that he's a good storyteller. >> Yeah.
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>> Yeah. It's also one of my saddest uh memories is I tried to hire Morgan before anyone knew who he was and he was a young guy and I'd been reading all of the stuff he'd been writing and I'm like man this guy can not only write but his
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storytelling ability is incredible and uh he was very kind to me if you know Morgan he's always quite polite and kind and and he was like yeah thanks for the offer Jim but I've got a really good thing going here and I I'm just going to stay the course. >> Let's talk about
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>> Let's talk about uh the economics of publishing.
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>> Um, you know, there's a lot of competition and there's a lot of uh you got all the bad titles that you got to deal with. >> Yep.
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>> You got self-published books, you got more books coming out, you have all the fondal slab style content.
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you know, when they're designing book covers now, they want it to look good on a phone.
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>> You know, they have, you know, very specific things because that's where a lot of people buy books.
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>> Um, and so, uh, you know, a lot of consolidation has gone on and it's sort of sort of like be be big and and have scale or small and be specialized.
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Is that the way you see it? >> Um, sort of.
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Uh for example, you mentioned book covers.
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Uh one thing that we do with book covers is we have artists who create them.
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We have AI artists who create them.
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We have a a whole host of cover creators, but then we AB test them. >> Yeah.
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And one of the things that we've found is uh our own judgment is often not that great because you know everyone on the team and sometimes even the author will say oo I love this particular cover and then it comes in last place on the AB testing and then we have to go back to the author and say look it's our job to help get your book in as many hands as possible.
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this particular cover, you know, scored off the charts.
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This one that we all love really didn't.
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And, you know, the authors, as you mentioned earlier, we're finding that the authors are more willing to be partners in the marketing, the getting the book into hands, etc.
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Uh, but I, you know, I'm an empiricist from way back, right?
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And, and like it was how I invested. it. It's how I do things.
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And so, uh, we we had one cover, uh, for a book on grief that ended up being a picture of the author and her deceased do daughter.
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Um and ultimately the it wasn't the first choice but the feedback that we got not only from the author but from readers you know we we would get emails saying when I saw that cover I knew I had to have this book because it gets back to your idea.
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People want to see people's stories.
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They want to hear how did she get through that grief?
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And then when you look at a picture of her and her beautiful daughter, it's just like I have to own this book.
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Right now, it helps that it's a great book as well, but we try to cover every aspect um on the marketing side in a continuous ongoing way.
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Now, as far as economics, your question on economics, we couldn't offer this 7030 split if we did not have the technology underlying the book company, Infinite Books, right?
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So, uh you one of the first questions you asked that I didn't answer is, yeah, if you're writing a non-fiction book, we'd like to see the proposal.
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And then what happens to the proposal is it goes through all of our evaluators uh some of whom are human, some of whom are AI.
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We segment it to the audience.
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We have pretty deeply segmented by audience uh data sets that are very very helpful and it wouldn't surprise you I don't think that many of them are based on the big five personality profile.
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Um, lots of really interesting tidbits as to who like who's most likely to read your book uh that is coming out.
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We could tell you with a fairly high degree of accuracy what the profile of that reader looks like.
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Um, so being able to take advantage of all these innovations really really a keeps our our structured costs down, right?
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uh but also invites all sorts of marketing opportunities that like even five years ago you couldn't do I I mentioned earlier right we are continually scanning for other authors people doing blogs people making comments etc and if we find one that is really very adjacent to what you're talking about in your book if we were publishing it we'd send them a copy copy of your book without an ask. That's very important.
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You It's just we think you might enjoy this.
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Here is a complimentary copy. Boom. We're done.
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Um and when you do it that way, it's amazing how often you not only hear back from that uh person, but they're like, "Yeah, I think I'm going to actually write a a blog post and thank you so much for in other words, it's got to be organic.
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You can't do it the old way as far as we're concerned in terms of, you know, we'd love it if you would give, you know, this particular blurb, blah, blah, blah.
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People get turned off by that. >> Yeah.
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I think that's blurbs are less and less important, I think.
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And the the power of word of mouth is is is bigger than ever. >> Huge.
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And then the whole the Jeff Bezos quote about, you know, shouting doesn't do much good anymore. >> Nope.
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>> You know, but it's interesting in that a lot of my career has been about the economics of a business.
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And one of the key variables is always customer acquisition cost. >> Yep.
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>> And um one of the reasons why publishers like celebrity books is because they have a a cult already.
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They have a group of people.
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So when Michael Douglas writes his book, tell all book, he's going to sell a lot because he's already got a big fan group.
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He's got already got a community.
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He's going to get a lot of free press.
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And so it reminds me of I wrote this blog post on um uh Sammy Hagar and how he, you know, made a lot of money on Cabo Wabo.
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You know, it's just he brought a community to this this product in this case >> and uh and and and that was valuable.
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enough that I forget who bought it.
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One of the big big houses bought it.
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But the point here is getting a customer is hard.
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>> Whether you're whether you're opening up a shoe repair store in a mall or whether you're have a a frontier model and you're trying to get people to pay you.
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I mean, it's it's wild that 97% of people who use AI pay nothing. >> I know, right?
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and and and what what they don't understand at least in many that I've spoken with, right, is the paying nothing gets you the free models, which as you well know, are not the frontier models and the difference between the models you pay for or have inhouse where your own engineers have built them to your specifications.
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It's it's literally not even in the same country.
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I used to say they're not in the same zip code.
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They're not in the same country.
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I me I I mentioned earlier the factchecking that we do.
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That's a very sophisticated model which has tons of access to data and literally we'll pull again in my case uh I'm writing a generational thriller right and so it starts in n in World War II and it ends sometime in the future.
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Um, and it's a story about families that are kind of combating one another, the the villains family and and the good guy family.
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Anyway, um the the ability to have access to the actual documents, right?
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So, for example, um there's another thing that I got wrong when I was writing the book, and it was having to do with a blackout in a particular town.
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And our fact checker came back saying, "This works, but you might also be interested to know that the family that electrified that town actually has a house on the hill overlooking it, and they have their own internal generators running their electricity.
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So when the town goes into blackout, the house will still be lit up.
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And so the ability to have this kind of access to not only the fact check but also hey that's a good idea.
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I'm I'm going to have that house light up in that particular chapter.
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Um but I I also think you know back to basics in non-fiction in fiction you are absolutely right.
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My friend Rory Sutherland says, you know, your average human runs on stories the way, you know, cars run on gasoline.
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Horses don't run on petrol.
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And if you're not getting the story right, it doesn't it just really doesn't matter unless you're writing a technical book like say what works on Wall Street, which I intentionally wrote in a very consistent way so that you know I would say here's what we're going to test.
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Here are the here are the results.
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Here are the implications of those results. Moving on. Right?
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And at one point when the book uh first came out, I would give speeches, right?
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And in my speeches, it was all stories, right?
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And a guy came up to me at the end of one of my talks and he goes, "You can't be the same James P.
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Shaughnessy who wrote wall works on Wall Street because the book itself is so you know cut and dried.
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>> So um in terms of your production what what's really big I've written books for a long time is uh is people are doing indexes now with AI.
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They have their own internal tools usually but >> Yep.
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>> You know in the old days it was like three grand to get some professional firm to create your index.
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I don't know what your first book was like, but >> Oh, yeah.
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My uh my Yes, I remember that headache.
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And of course, this is back in the dark ages of the 1990s, right?
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But it it things were obviously, and I'm sure you experienced the same, lot slower.
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But then when you got to the index and the bibliography, I remember spending literally days going line by line in both and then you kind of lose your mind.
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Have you had the same experience in trying to do the indexing? >> Yes.
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And it's a phenomenon that I find even in writing which is after you've looked at a text long enough and you've rewritten it, it's hard to look at it again. >> That's right.
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>> Because you've read it so many times.
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So you need to go for a swim or, you know, go catch some fish and come back or something and clear your mind so you can look at it, you know, with a with a with a new mind with a, you know, with a fresh mind.
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>> And and that is one of the huge advantages of having AI do the indexing.
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It's not that humans aren't looking at it.
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Of course, we're looking at it.
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But when the AI doesn't get that text blindness that we get, right?
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We're big collectors of photography as you know and we would go to Perry Photo and they have this huge ex exhibit right with thousand literally thousands of photographs and both my wife and I realize she's a professional street photographer and so her eye is much better than mine.
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Uh but even she an hour and a half into us being in that uh huge uh exhibit, we look at each other and say, "We got to go walk around.
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We got to go have a coffee.
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We got to go do something."
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Because literally, you stop seeing. You really stop seeing.
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And it's worse with text.
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I remember when I was going through the line edits uh for my book, How to Retire Rich, and we both just looked at each other and just sort of at the same time shuddered and said, "I can't read this sentence one more time." >> Yeah.
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>> With AI, what we find is we have it do the line edits and then present them to the author.
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And it's a lot easier if you chunk it.
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So we don't if the author prefers to not have them all at the same time, we're accommodative.
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Uh but it's enormously helpful because the AI catches things that because of the what happens with our brains and we get that pros bl or the text blindness, it doesn't suffer from that same problem that we humans do.
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Well, I always the phrase I always use is is none of us have perspective on ourselves.
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And that's why the importance of a community of friends is so important.
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So over the years, people like Michael Mason or others who I've interacted with, they have a way of sort of shaking you loose and making you think about things in different ways. >> Yes.
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>> And looking at things fresh.
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And then um you know some people just it's just hard to see sometimes when we're not being clear.
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And you know one of the hardest things about writing is um because there's really I always love the line that um if you write for money you you're you're a fool. one, >> right?
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If we write if you write to teach and share and tell stories, you're unlikely to make much money, but you might get rich like Morgan. >> Yeah.
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>> The point is, you know, it's a is a it's a very very severe uh power law.
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Um, you know, uh 20% of the authors make 97% of the money and, you know, the top people make even more.
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>> And so, it's unlikely you're going to achieve that, but you might.
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But you'll never do it if you're in it for the money because you there won't be any soul in your writing.
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There won't be any passion in your writing and you probably won't say anything interesting.
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I mean, you know, it's it's it's some people write really well, but they're not interesting, >> right?
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>> Well, they're interesting and can't write, >> right?
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Some people can can do both, you know, and we are all a mix of of of those categories, you know, they're all dressed and then as you get older, maybe you you're more uh interesting in some way in terms of you can tell more real stories. >> Yep.
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>> But some people tell good stories and some people don't.
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Some people tell a joke, you want to sit down and, you know, sit there for the afternoon while they tell a joke.
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Good shaggy dog stories are fabulous.
30:53
Sometimes it's not even very good joke, but the way they tell it is hysterical. >> Yeah.
30:58
A good book is that way, too. Like, this is great. What's going on here?
31:01
I can't believe this coffin. >> Yeah. Yeah.
31:04
>> Uh and but it's real, you know, it's it's realistic and and uh I always love that phrase that um you know, if this was real life sometimes, if they said if this was fiction, you wouldn't believe it. >> Exa Exactly. >> Right. But good storytellers.
31:16
And so anyway, so I encourage people to write books. I love books.
31:20
I worry about the future of books.
31:23
future of books. you know pe what I think you know your mission is really good with infinite books and that the industry needs help >> you know authors need help most authors are are you know start you know working on some side job and you know they're
31:40
trying to put this thing together um they're passionate about what they're doing so having it having it more economical having them channels teaching them I think is is is a mission and and I think it's fabulous if If books have given enough to you, then you should try and give I use giving back. The phrase
31:58
The phrase I've talked to people about recently is you and I are probably the same because when we were born, um we had analog childhoods. >> Mhm.
32:09
>> And we had digital adulthoods like 1971 the chip came out, you know. >> Yep. Yep.
32:13
Um and um and so because our um our childhoods were analog, there was just a lot more books and a lot more paper. >> Yep.
32:25
>> And I think books are still very advanced.
32:26
You know, they're searchable, they're portable, you know, they don't run out of batteries, you know, all these things are great. Um I love paper books.
32:34
>> Um and I I just hope they continue.
32:34
Um and I hope uh that video becomes more booklike.
32:43
I don't, you know, blogs are a problem because nobody really reads the web anymore. >> Yeah.
32:48
>> But social media is picking up on some long form is kind of possible on on on X now. >> Yep.
32:55
>> Um anyway, it's all evolving, but people like you with infinite books are trying to put a shoulder into make it a better world. >> Well, thank you.
33:03
And uh you know that is intentionally right.
33:06
So, my editor-inchief, Jimmy Sony, is a wonderful author.
33:13
He's had great success writing.
33:16
And our editors, same deal.
33:19
They're all published authors.
33:19
So, they know, they have that passion, they have that love, they have everything that you and I love about books, you know, in their blood.
33:31
And also it was very helpful for us when we were thinking about starting Infinite Books.
33:38
I put the group together and I'm like, "Okay, we're all authors.
33:42
What did each of us hate about the publishing process that we went through?"
33:49
And one of the things that really surprised me was a lot of the stuff that I went through back in the 90s, right, when I was writing my books, um, still happens today to these younger people, right? It not much has changed.
34:07
And so we took as one of our north stars, we are we are the we we are fellow authors.
34:15
We want our authors to succeed.
34:18
We want to get that book in as many hands as possible.
34:21
Um, and so we built a lot of our practices around that.
34:27
But I also want to come back to something you mentioned earlier about the passion.
34:30
Um, the same is true in so many different um, uh, genre genres or careers, right?
34:38
Like I'm an old asset manager and I can count on both hands.
34:45
used to be one hand but then one guy screwed it up.
34:47
I can count on both hands the number of clients and we serviced high netw worth individuals as their asset manager.
34:57
I can count on that many and I'm holding up my hands for our listeners and I'm holding six who literally said I did what I did because I wanted to get rich.
35:13
everybody else getting rich was a side event to their passion, what they did, what they loved.
35:22
So, it's not just like people loving to read that in books. I I find it everywhere.
35:31
One of the great books that I that I recommended to people recently is Bill Gurley's book about running down a dream which was he has this whole formula around look if you structure this right if you follow your passions if you do these if you take these steps maybe you
35:48
can have uh activities that generate money someday want to call them work that aren't work like I never worked a day in my life you know because it was fun I would have done it for nothing they didn't want to do like don't tell anybody that, you know, >> and so >> it's true. It's absolutely true. I would It's absolutely true.
36:04
I would have done what I did for nothing just because I wanted it.
36:11
>> There are people who fell into it accidentally, you know, like I just happen to love this.
36:14
I followed it and I got rich. >> Yeah.
36:17
>> Andy Warhol or somebody, you know, whatever it was.
36:19
Um, but some people are much more purposeful about it.
36:21
You know, the girly book is about find the best mentors in the world, physically go where they are, interact with them, learn from them.
36:30
The Charlie Munger idea of of you know, you don't have to figure out everything by yourself.
36:34
Like learn from the greats, right?
36:36
And then find, you know, find your own passion, all these things.
36:40
But the important thing is um is like don't leave a life that's completely determined by chance, >> right?
36:47
>> Like be active in terms of like figuring out this is the right path. This will help me.
36:51
I should write a book now.
36:51
I shouldn't write a book now. I should focus on this.
36:54
Um and so some purposefulness and and you know learning from others is just so much more efficient. >> Yeah.
37:03
>> That's another Monger quote which is you know it's just like it's just so efficient to to read the great to understand the great and then also I had this analogy.
37:13
I've talked to you about it before which is life is like going to a grocery store Trader Joe's or Whole Foods or someplace.
37:18
You walk in down the aisles and when you're young, you say, "Well, I want to be this way and this is the way I want to deal with work and this is the way I want to deal with romantic partners.
37:26
This is the way I want to deal with physical exercise.
37:30
This is the way I want to eating."
37:30
And then as life goes on, you're still walking around these aisles and you can say, "Well, I kind of like the changing for this one because I'm not as interested in this anymore or this is bigger.
37:39
I can maybe even get a couple more of these."
37:40
And so you're constantly doing this opportunity cost analysis and saying, "Okay, well, this person's cool.
37:47
I love everything they do except only about four-fifths of it.
37:50
The other fifth like I don't want to be that way at all.
37:53
They're antimodel, >> right?
37:55
>> But you can be whoever you want and you can always you can change if you're if you're that kind of if you're that kind of person.
38:01
I've always wanted to be someone who could change. >> As have I.
38:05
And you know the thing that shocked me especially when I was younger, right?
38:10
um was the number of people who don't want to change, right?
38:18
And and like I just I I there there's no part of me that gross that like you you have >> some of that I think is inherent is genetic.
38:28
You just you come out of the the womb, they they talk about little baby in a crib and you go up to baby and go and some babies go, "Oh, that's cool. What's going on?"
38:37
Some of them go, "Ah, no."
38:40
And so some of it is is genetic, but some of it is pattern matching, which is if you're around people who are like Fineman or somebody like that who are super interesting and polymath and interested in multiple disciplines and play the bongos, whatever it is, you say, "Well, that sounds fun."
38:54
Like, why wouldn't I want to be like that, >> you know?
38:58
Why would I want to be like the guy sitting in the c the Barker lounger, you know, watching the latest NFL highlights? you know, it's just not.
39:06
>> But again, some of it's genetic, some of it's innate.
39:09
>> Yeah, >> you can you can train yourself. >> I agree.
39:12
You absolutely can train yourself.
39:14
Uh, and I want to ask you about the Monger book because you started out writing that just for yourself, which I thought was super cool.
39:23
Yeah, it was also it was a tribute in that during the internet boom things were crazy and I was worth a lot of money on paper and I had to make a decision about uh secondary sales. >> Yeah.
39:39
>> And how much of my existing portfolio I was going to keep in in Qualcomm and a couple of other names.
39:44
And um I went up to the San Juans in a boat had a skipper.
39:49
My family was downstairs. I was upstairs.
39:51
I just thought and paced.
39:51
Then I' been walking back and forth.
39:54
Eventually I used his principles because I most of what I read was was uh leading to his ideas and I realized that you only have to get rich once. This this is a key idea. >> Yep. >> Second of ideas. You have to survive.
40:09
You know, you don't want to you want to get in a situation where you have you're all on red, right?
40:12
And then, you know, you've got the whole uh Kelly optimization and all of that and he doesn't really use Kelly, but he's talked about the fact that he's kind of what he does. Yeah.
40:24
>> And then talking about, you know, markets can correct 50%.
40:25
Um, you know, this happened to me three times, he says in a BBC interview.
40:29
So, anyway, as a result of that, >> I sold half of of my internet and telecom stuff and it went to cash and I was able to get more out after after that.
40:41
But um that changed my life. >> Yeah.
40:45
>> It just your you you you you relax your sphincter relaxes.
40:50
>> And and but what did you have to change when you decided you were going to publish the book for other people to read it?
41:01
>> Um nothing really because I wrote the book for me and as a tribute, >> you know, like this is what you gave to me which is another way of thinking.
41:07
By the way, we don't agree on everything.
41:10
People say, "Oh, you wrote this manga book.
41:12
You must think he's, you know, walks on water." No.
41:13
Didn't agree with him in China on China.
41:15
There's a bunch of things I don't agree with him about. >> Yep.
41:19
>> But I like the way the man thinks and and and so that to me is the important thing.
41:24
So So really I didn't to I tried to make it maybe a little simpler.
41:30
I guess that's that's the thing I did do.
41:32
The hardest thing is to simplify.
41:33
Let's take the the Kelly criterion.
41:36
Writing about that simply is not easy. >> No. >> Right.
41:42
And and you know the difference between log and and and geometric wealth and and getting all that but making it simple and in a story that's not an easy thing, right?
41:52
But if you can teach it easily, you'll reach a lot more people and you'll help them because they'll say, "Okay, I kind of get that. I want to learn more."
42:00
You know, and then they go dig in someplace else or whatever.
42:03
simplifying complex things is the one thing that I did.
42:07
But he does that anyway and he does it in a funny way.
42:09
And you know, one thing about writing writing a book is write about something interesting.
42:14
Like I picked a pretty good topic.
42:17
You know, I knew a lot of people who who knew him, who interact with him.
42:22
And so you pick a good topic, you're gonna do a lot better if you're gonna pick about uh the nemode worm in Gambia, you know, in the 1500s.
42:35
You're not going to get quite as many.
42:37
Somebody's and then and then the thing, you know, comedy is truth, right?
42:40
And he's was funny because he'd always say things out loud that everybody knew was true, but he said he's saying it out loud like I can't believe Monger said that on the Daily Journal meeting.
42:48
Like that was unbelievable.
42:50
But, you know, he doesn't care. >> Yeah.
42:55
>> I always remember Billy Wilder saying, "If you're gonna tell the truth, you better be funny or they'll kill you." >> Yes. Exactly.
43:01
And and don't be and and be somewhat humble about it, you know, because if you're arrogant, people think, "Oh, what an asshole." Whatever. Sorry.
43:09
Whereas >> No, no, swearing is allowed on this podcast.
43:13
Remember, >> you know what I'm saying?
43:14
that that um you is like you have to be interesting or people will you there's a lot there's a lot of competing things for your attention >> totally >> and you have to you have to be interesting and it's got to be understandable it's got to be simple but you should have passion for it and you should be writing it for you >> because the more you write it for yourself the more likely it is to be a success in my view. >> Yeah.
43:37
because it'll be true to you and and the reader will pick up and say, "Wow, that's that's that's that that's something this person really believes."
43:46
And I don't care if they agree with me.
43:50
I want them to think about the issue. >> Exactly.
43:52
Um and and I want to go a little deeper on the curse of knowledge and simplifying because I suffered with that.
44:02
Um trying to make what are very complex topics simple enough, right?
44:08
So that everybody could grasp, okay, this is the way it works. That ain't easy.
44:19
It's really, really hard.
44:19
But it also gets back to writing teaches you whether you know something or not. Right?
44:29
I'm an inveterate journal keeper and I've been doing it for 45 plus years and the amount that it has helped me understand like when I'm writing about something then I look up and I realize oh I don't know about this and but then it spurs you on right because okay I need to learn better I need to be able to synthesize get this easier to understand you are really really good at that with like the profiles you do at 25 IQ etc.
45:05
Tell us your secret h how do others who want to get that good what could they do to improve their ability to synthesize information?
45:16
Well, first of all, you have to read everything that the person has said and written and, you know, try try and sort of set yourself in their shoes.
45:25
And then it helps to understand their history.
45:27
You know, somebody uh Ken Griffin, for example, um had a rough period and he learned a lot.
45:33
Um and um it wasn't rough by many people's standards, but you know, it was a period of underperformance and you you sort of learn and then um you if you to your point, you if you can't write it down, you haven't thought it through. >> That's right.
45:53
>> So starting to write it down, you sort of say, okay, well, I really don't understand this as well as I as as I could have going back to Kelly Criterion or explaining something like that.
46:02
And it's just uh you try and be empathetic and then eventually some other people are gonna read this book.
46:11
Nobody's gonna read it till I tell send it to the publisher and I'll get some feedback and that'll be good.
46:15
Um and there are people who who think about these issues harder than I do. But I have my own style.
46:20
I'm not going to adopt their style.
46:23
But you know, I sort of want to be interesting and amusing.
46:27
Um I've got in the manga book. I've got six jokes.
46:30
I've got four four jokes in my current uh book and I'll they'll probably get cut out by the editors, but at least there's some jokes in there.
46:38
You know, you you sort of have to you have to mix it up.
46:41
Um and you don't want to be boring. Like don't be boring. It's deadly.
46:45
And plus being boring is not fun, right?
46:47
It's much more interesting.
46:51
And and you're going to take some arrows.
46:52
Some there's going to be incoming.
46:54
You know, any artist, you know, someone create some lovely painting like the one behind you and someone will say, "Oh, I don't like that.
47:00
you know, it's too much like so and so or look at this brush work or whatever the hell that is, you know.
47:05
Yeah, you're just negative and you're going to have that. That's fine.
47:07
It's and it's in some sense it could be good publicity. >> Yeah. >> But don't be boring. >> Yeah, I I agree.
47:13
Um, and one of the things that I got very good at was when when I read the first review of my first book that was negative.
47:24
I I will admit to you I was 30 whatever years old. I was crushed. I was literally crushed.
47:35
And then I I read it again and I read it again and then I realized he he actually doesn't understand this topic at all and that's why maybe I frustrated him or whatever and and so I I became not immune to getting attacked but I my thin uh my skin thickened up considerably.
48:01
Now have you found that there are some very very critical reviews that have actually improved the way you think about something the way you write about it the next time you write about it because I have had that experience as well.
48:18
experience as well. So what I what I like is a dialogue and so someone will say well I read your manga book and you talked about this you know my interpreter is interpretation is different you know and then we have this conversation and that dialogue tends to
48:34
be good uh it can be even great um because it forces you to explain things simply like I was had this conversation with this person and I was trying to explain them about wealth increasing geometrically >> as opposed arithmetically >> and >> it's not intuitive. >> No,
48:54
>> No, >> people say well you know and so and so getting that across simply um requires some work.
48:59
So having having the dialogue is best and then also the the reviews of people who I trust who read the book before it's published that I get the most out of that and that because in that situation they'll they're not afraid to say well this is messed up. >> Yeah.
49:19
you need to fix this or do this or whatever.
49:21
And sometimes it's good and sometimes it isn't.
49:23
you know, I know uh some people like Morgan probably don't need to get a lot of external advice, but you know, I like I like that phase where I'm getting, you know, push back, >> but then also sometimes there's no there's no great answer >> and and and so you complex adaptive systems and you know, a whole range of things um that mean well, you know, that might have been a good answer a long time ago, but it isn't true right now.
49:48
time ago, but it isn't true right now. M >> and you know it's like this whole debate about uh is is passive share changing active you know everybody everybody has an opinion on that just like they have a belly button you know they're all different they're all slightly different some are very different you know but the point is you know some things are opinions and and you know you can you
50:13
can agree to disagree because it's opinion you can't prove it and also it's early you know things some things are nonlinear some things aren't you know some things come out of nowhere, you know, it's like they were working on AI, you know, machine learning then and they created this thing that could make translation better, you know, and and they scaled it up and it started to do more than that. It started to be capable
50:36
It started to be capable of producing things.
50:38
It kind of seemed like it understood reasoning >> and it got better and it but it came out of nowhere.
50:45
I mean, this whole AI thing is not long.
50:50
And so, you know, that's that to me, this is this feels to me like when the internet first arrived, like it feels like 1993 commercial internet before that, but the US said finally, okay, you can sell things on the internet. That's when it changed.
51:07
>> And you and I are entirely sympotico on that.
51:10
I think that the AI revolution, I've been interested in it since it was called machine learning and uh I've always been fascinated by it. But I agree with you.
51:22
I think that this is a sea change in not only society but in the way businesses are organized, in the way people do publishing and the way people do media and the way people do investing.
51:39
All of that I think are literally I I my version is what a time to be alive.
51:49
I am so lucky that I am around for this innovation, right?
51:53
Because we are at such early stages of where this might take us.
52:00
And to me, I just like literally I get giddy because the ability to use the leverage that these tools allow is just like extraordinary.
52:15
If if if I fell through a time tunnel back to, you know, when I got married, 1982, and somebody like had an iPhone and said, I first off, I'd be freaked out about the iPhone, right?
52:30
But then imagine them running a large language model on it. I mean, can you imagine?
52:37
It would just seem like what did Arthur C.
52:39
Clark say any s sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. >> Yeah.
52:47
>> And and and to me it's just intoxicating all of the new things that we can do and make better right with these new tools.
53:00
Now I'm not naive right all tech in my opinion is dual use.
53:03
And like fire, great example, great tech, you know, first uh when we started cooking our food, that helped us develop our executive function, our prefrontal cortex.
53:17
Very nice for us as humans to have, right?
53:20
But fire is also incredibly dangerous. And so we didn't ban it.
53:22
We we had fire alarms, fire departments, fire exits, fire extinguishers.
53:31
and and I think that we're going to have to do the same thing with this new technology.
53:35
Um but I I definitely think that we we are looking at what is going to be just an extraordinary tumultuous decade or two going forward because I mean just the the innovations and the ability to to do things that would have been inconceivable just you know 10 years ago to me it's just like okay we've got to rethink all of our business models We got to rethink our playbooks.
54:08
You know, I don't know if you're a fan of Ken Stanley's Greatness Can't Be Planned, but like I love that book because and you you alluded to it earlier, right?
54:18
You've got to be Nothing is binary, right?
54:23
I either love Charlie Munger or I hate Charlie Mer. That's right?
54:28
There's a lot of things about Charlie Munger. I love the guy.
54:30
I think he was just such an amazing human being.
54:35
But does like you, does that mean that I think he was right about China?
54:40
No, I think he was totally wrong.
54:40
That doesn't reduce my admiration for him as a human being.
54:47
It's just that like, okay, you're you're not going to always agree with everything, but the ability to pivot back to Ken Stanley, right? it.
54:57
A lot of things come completely unexpectedly and if you want to increase the surface area of your luck, you better take those things seriously, right?
55:07
When you notice like, oh, look at what I can do with this new factchecking workflow.
55:12
Wow, that that's going to be very helpful.
55:18
Plagiarism, for example, let's hope we never have to face that again because it's literally trivial for us to run a manuscript through our AI and comp contrast and compare it with hundreds of thousands of other ones to see if because there's a thing, you know, in back testing for quants, right?
55:40
There's a thing called honestminded minded data mining, right?
55:46
You're not intentionally trying to mine the data, but you know, we had the old uh quote that when you torture the data long enough, it will confess to anything.
55:55
Uh and so they're not doing it intentionally to data mind.
56:02
The same thing happens a lot in writing, right?
56:05
People who are really good writers, guess what?
56:07
They're also really big readers and they might take notes about books that they've read.
56:13
they might just have great memories and you know when they're writing about a subject they could completely unconsciously channel something that they read you know from uh long ago.
56:25
So with the new tools when we find that like they're like oh my god I that isn't what I meant and obviously it gets changed but there's just so much that I think that this is going to bring to us as a culture that is I just find super super exciting.
56:48
>> One of the things is interesting related to that is um if you look at SpaceX they're really vers vertically integrated.
56:55
They make a lot of things themselves.
56:58
the Ben Steel, you know, cast things.
57:01
Um, I think writing is that way, too, in that people that are doing self-publishing, and some of people do really well at it, make a living at it, they're doing the whole stack. >> Yeah.
57:12
>> And all these new tools allow them to do the whole stack.
57:14
And so, you get ability for people to get noticed maybe with their first book, people to have a niche indie hit, people to make a a living doing what they love.
57:24
It's not a great living, but it's a living. >> Yeah.
57:28
>> Um but the vertical tools um enable you to sort of un unbundle this whole stack and if you can't get to a big five publisher, you know, maybe your first book will be self-published and and you know, the next one will be will be a small press and then maybe you'll be a big press or maybe you're you're just happy with a small press.
57:45
I mean c certainly you want somebody who cares about your book as your publisher. >> Yes.
57:51
And the bigger your your publisher, the more likely you are to be, well, we've got six celebrity books on for fall, you know, 2027 and and you know, yours is well, you know, yours is in the mix, you know, whereas whereas it's nice to be the big dog.
58:06
Um, and have I had the success with the book and be big dog and I've sold some books and and you know, success reinforces itself.
58:17
Unfortunately, there's a feedback loop and success breeds more success. Yep.
58:22
>> And you know the sort of one of the questions is why is there a power law?
58:25
You know why do books have a power law?
58:27
And Duncan W has this great uh essay but basically he points out that humans don't make decisions independently.
58:35
The books we buy are the books that we see that other people have.
58:36
You know what's on his books? Oh, he's got that book.
58:40
Oh, she's got reading this.
58:40
Oh, oh, she's doing this.
58:41
And then you and so you tend to buy that book and that and that whole thing cascades until it stops and then it can stop pretty quickly.
58:52
But the point is how do you get that started?
58:53
How do you bootstrap that?
58:54
Um you know it's tricky but but you there are ways to do it and lowcost ways to do it >> and and you're absolutely right about momentum.
59:06
I I I think that you you know the whole Gerardian idea of mimetic desire absolutely plays in where and by the way it's not just books it's like everything it's art it's movies it's >> any form of media >> any form of media and that's why that word of mouth is so important >> in our opinion >> yeah because I as you have rightly pointed out like attention now is truly the most precious commodity, right?
59:41
And people have so many options that they can elect to either ignore, right?
59:49
Or they can read every particular book uh etc.
59:56
So getting that getting that finding those readers is like really really important.
1:00:03
Um you your your publisher uh urged you and encouraged you to develop the book in public.
1:00:10
Tell me tell me exactly what that entails.
1:00:17
>> Well, so usually they don't want you revealing the title or any of the content until like eight months before. >> Right.
1:00:24
>> And the way it works is in the spring they said, "Let's go give it to us at the end of November and it'll be out the following November."
1:00:29
Like, you know, they're like baseball managers. They got a lineup.
1:00:33
you got to get in a lineup, you're gonna be a Christmas book and all that and so you have to phase it.
1:00:37
But building your book in public is super important because um even before you announce the title or whatever, you're building the community. >> Yeah.
1:00:46
And you can do that in social media.
1:00:48
You can do that with with with with other kinds of speaking you know thing doing doing events.
1:00:54
But you know pre-sale is really important >> and uh early word of mouth is really important and the more they see early sales the more they're going to lean into it and the more distributors are going to want to move it and things like that.
1:01:10
So, um you know, you you really um you really have every incentive um to build the community way out like even before you reveal the title and all that because you want to Kevin Kelly's got this idea of everybody needs a thousand fans.
1:01:27
I don't think a thousand is enough but if there are super fans maybe >> you know I know that you on your only fans you probably have what couple 10,000 But they're very passionate about you, Jim.
1:01:43
And they have, you know, you you fit their you fit their profile.
1:01:48
And so, you know, my hats off to you.
1:01:51
Although, and that one that lastly fans, you weren't even wearing a hat. Come on.
1:01:55
Anyway, >> now now I'm going to have to start promoting my Only Fans channel, >> which is completely, as you well know, non-existent. >> Yes.
1:02:10
>> Um, but but but seriously, how would you suggest like let's say you and I had to uh put our heads together, we found a a a really bright young non-fiction author, right? You and I both agree.
1:02:27
Wow, this is an amazing book, right?
1:02:27
How would we go about other than the obvious, right?
1:02:37
Obviously, I'd have him on the podcast.
1:02:39
I'd suggest him to other podcasters.
1:02:39
I would send his book around to people that I know are interested in that particular topic. All of that.
1:02:46
But what what advice do you think that you and I could craft together to tell this young man or woman, here's what we really think you need to do?
1:02:58
Because your book is amazing.
1:03:01
We Let's take that as a given.
1:03:04
Even amazing books that don't get marketed right to the public die.
1:03:12
So the key thing is is the cost of of creating a book is high but the cost of making it and distributing it and publicizing it has never been lower. It's almost zero. >> Exactly. Right.
1:03:25
>> And so what the publisher is saying when they tell their authors to do this is you need to get out in these channels where is essentially a premium model which we call in the in in the SAS business which is you've got to find channels where you're giving your stuff away.
1:03:39
>> You're not giving it all away.
1:03:39
So Substack is actually, you know, sort of a great example of that where so many authors have, I don't know, nine paragraphs or eight paragraphs and they're leaving you into into a conclusion and then oh beyond this point you have to but that's you know that's good marketing. >> Yeah.
1:03:57
>> And so because it's zero cost to you not zero cost but very very low marginal cost. >> Yeah.
1:04:02
And so you have to sort of build this passionate group of of fans who hopefully are going to say to their friends, you know, hey, you should buy this book, too.
1:04:10
One of the funny things stories I tell is they'll go to someone's house and uh I'll see their bookshelf and I'll say, wow, cool bookshelf.
1:04:18
So, I always want to read that book and I'll pull it out and I'll open it up and it's got that crackling sound of a book that's never been opened before. >> Yeah.
1:04:26
>> And unfortunately, there's a modern phenomenon which is people buy books to make a statement. Um, no.
1:04:32
>> And um, to some extent I swear some of them think like if they bought it that's good enough.
1:04:41
>> South money cuz I got it on the shelf.
1:04:43
>> Do you Do you remember the meme with the little Chinese boy going like this on the book and then going like this on his face?
1:04:52
It doesn't work that way.
1:04:54
>> No, it doesn't work that way.
1:04:54
But some people think that way or some people would like to think they read that much.
1:04:59
I mean, look, it requires effort and time.
1:05:02
You have to set aside time to do it. It's like writing.
1:05:03
I s I believe that if you're going to write, really, you should have a period of time where you set aside a couple of hours, completely block everything out, and you go at it and you think and you go at it.
1:05:14
Not not like, I'm got 10 minutes here.
1:05:16
I'll try and do something.
1:05:16
You can do a little research that way. >> Yeah.
1:05:20
>> Like, oh, I'm waiting for my pills at the pharmacy or whatever the heck it is. Um, I got a cold and Dr. this. I got 10 minutes. Oh, what?
1:05:28
You know, I always I wondered about that. >> Yeah.
1:05:33
>> You know, there's all these little little moments like like I always wondered why do the mustard packets in Chinese takeout food taste so good versus the jarred mustard.
1:05:41
And actually, so yeah, it's so fabulous.
1:05:44
You can go in and then they'll tell you why it is.
1:05:47
Well, there's a reaction and it won't last and you can't replicate that in a jar.
1:05:50
Once it hits it, it gets ruined.
1:05:52
So, you should buy some powder, make your own, and I make my own.
1:05:53
But the point is if you got 10 minutes you can go research some point on your book and then you can go deeper and deeper and deeper and you got five engines you can talk to.
1:06:04
You know most of the engines now are focused on coding because it's what pays but you know for purposes of just like who said this and when or I remember you know Michael all of a sudden said this you know in an essay called this you know find it for me give me a link. Um, I don't use Google.
1:06:19
I don't use the search engine anymore for that. >> Same with me.
1:06:25
Everything I find now is through our AI system and because it finds exactly what I'm looking for.
1:06:32
And th this is one of the things that I'm now questioning my own statements about.
1:06:42
I I I used to say that I I was lucky when I came up, right?
1:06:45
Because I have an unusual memory in that if I read something, I kind of can remember it pretty well, but only if I read it, right?
1:07:00
Um if I see it in a movie or I hear it, I don't my memory is not that great.
1:07:06
But if I do read it, I mean, it's maybe one of the reasons why I read so voraciously.
1:07:13
But I started to think that my memory back then was a huge advantage for me because people didn't have that similar recall.
1:07:23
And then I thought, well, you know what?
1:07:25
In the age of AI and large language models, my memory advantage is going to plummet because they're they're just going to be able to go to their phone and say, you know, tell me about fill in the blank, right, Rosepierre?
1:07:41
Um, and and get a pretty good biography or their specific question answered.
1:07:45
But then I started thinking about the fact of the memory still gives me access to things that other people have never experienced. Right.
1:07:58
And >> your prompts are better. >> Exactly. Yeah. Exactly.
1:08:05
>> You really have to know a lot to be good at prompting.
1:08:06
And so it's really leverage. >> Yes.
1:08:11
um you know because you if you don't know what to ask you know and and you have to find out now it's it's not always right the answer's got hallucination in it and so you have to be able to smell you know smell something that I'm going to ask another
1:08:27
engine or I'm going to read source material or I still have a huge paper library I mean I have thousands of books I going to them all the time but um but you have to be able to you know to tell when it's you know it's when it's But also to ask the key thing is you're a better prompter. >> Yeah. And and I think that that will >> Yeah.
1:08:45
And and I think that that will continue to persist.
1:08:47
And one of my worries is, you know, everyone's decrying, oh, reading is plummeting.
1:08:55
No one's reading long form anymore.
1:09:00
And I I just I wonder if I buy that.
1:09:00
And by that I mean, listen, I think that 50 years ago, right, probably a similar amount of what I would call very serious book readers, okay?
1:09:21
And I'm being very specific about that, right?
1:09:23
Because back 50 years ago, most people read the newspaper, most people read, you know, uh, magazines, etc.
1:09:32
But if we focus in on the group of what I would call serious book readers, do you think that that has literally changed all that much from then to now?
1:09:44
>> I I think something has changed in that like in 1993 um I got introduced to Bill Gurley and and uh Michael Mson on the same day by a guy named Michael Larson who's a big fund manager. >> Yeah. >> One of the biggest.
1:09:57
And um and they got me interested in in what they were doing down there. And I said, "Oh."
1:10:02
And then I said, "I got to know more."
1:10:04
And I figured out Mandelro.
1:10:05
And then and then Michael Larson said, "Well, you should read Alchemy of Finance by Soros, which is a very hard book to read." >> Oh, no kidding. >> You really? >> Yeah.
1:10:17
But um but if you if you come a layer up, it you you it becomes an important book which leads you other places.
1:10:26
And so those two books, Medbots uh has a book that's particularly good in and alchemy of finance, they just lead you to other places.
1:10:34
And so I probably have more time to sort of focus on that book when I was reading Alchemy of Finance.
1:10:39
I wonder what I'd do reading it today, whether I'd be patient to work all the way through it and then think about it hard >> because there's so many other competing things. >> Yeah.
1:10:49
But it but it was pretty seinal for me in terms of thinking about feedback loops and increasing returns and Brian Arthur and you know network effects and and it it just sort of leads you on a path.
1:11:04
Anyway, so probably I seldom put as much effort as I did in the 90s and 80s into that one book and really you really digging into Mandarin or really digging in to Ital's books or really digging into you know whatever it was but uh because there are more distractions but I think I'm reading more and I think most of it is is supplementary.
1:11:29
I'm still reading as many books. >> Yep.
1:11:31
I'm just reading also more stuff.
1:11:35
No, I'm reading >> the how-to stuff is amazing, you know, for fishing, you know, flies to choose, where to fish, what time to fish, you know, all things like that.
1:11:43
Now, AI is fabulous on that.
1:11:45
And it could be very local, you know, like, but where are the chump salmon going to be hottest, you know, in a week in in Hood Canal? It'll tell you. It's great.
1:11:53
Um, but so I'm reading more than ever.
1:11:56
I'm reading more than ever. I I but I like thinking.
1:11:58
Like not everybody likes to think.
1:12:00
Some people want to get home and not think.
1:12:04
Like I don't want to think anymore.
1:12:04
I've been thinking all day.
1:12:05
But to me, like it's just it's it's it's better than sex. No, it isn't. But it's darn good. >> It's darn good.
1:12:17
>> It's not as good as your only fans, Jim.
1:12:19
But you know >> now you know as a result of this people are going to go look for my only fans account which does not exist.
1:12:30
>> You got maybe you got a doppel what do you call doppelganger out there. >> Ganganger. Yeah. >> Yes. Exactly. Yeah.
1:12:35
Maybe maybe they'll maybe they'll find something.
1:12:37
Maybe they'll find purpose. >> Yeah.
1:12:40
Finally, finally I will find my true purpose in life and that is to have an an only fans account.
1:12:46
Um I I think though that you're exactly right about the idea that a lot of us who were serious readers to begin with are reading a lot more.
1:13:00
I am uh now granted that's because I'm a publisher and I want to give the manuscripts that are submitted their proper uh attention but I my idea is a little different in that I think that the percentage of people who were what I call very serious readers was very similar back in 1950 as it is today.
1:13:26
By this I mean we there we're back to power laws, right?
1:13:36
There is always going to be that group that they're different people but there's still very very serious readers and I think that that has not changed.
1:13:47
I think when we look at varying marketing surveys etc.
1:13:54
And the the percentage of people who read the most books is a power law.
1:14:03
Like literally there are I I don't have the graph right in front of me, but you know there's the big majority that don't read any books at all, right?
1:14:14
And it's not a big majority actually. Let me rephrase that.
1:14:17
Uh but then it it steps up to the top of that heap reads something some ridiculous amount of the books every year.
1:14:28
And I just think what's happening is the group of people that belongs to that category is just changed, right?
1:14:37
I mean, you and I are still around, but there's a bunch of young people in that category who weren't even born when we were started our reading adventures and and they have taken to reading in much the same way we did.
1:14:53
Now, do they do it exactly the same?
1:14:55
And do they have the same paper book that we had or the way we took notes or did they do they have to go to the library like you and I had to? No.
1:15:06
But they're still reading.
1:15:06
And so I'm very optimistic that with a lot of the new innovations, a lot of people who for whatever reason, you mentioned people don't like to think, right?
1:15:21
I I can't remember who >> I said some people don't like to think.
1:15:26
They get >> some people a game and not think. >> Yeah.
1:15:30
There's that great philosopher who said that people would rather rearrange their prejudices and call it thinking.
1:15:37
And and I think that there's some truth to that.
1:15:39
But I definitely think I think of a a person who let's take a crazy book, right?
1:15:45
Like go to Leherbach, kind of like Soros's book. Oh my god.
1:15:48
I don't know if you've read it. I've read it.
1:15:53
But it was unbelievably hard to read that book.
1:15:57
It and and a lot of people avoid that book.
1:16:02
And same with Metal Bro's misbehavior of markets, right?
1:16:06
I thought that was an incredibly brilliant book.
1:16:08
It unlocked a lot of insights for me about the way I actually built the models that I built to select securities.
1:16:16
But I think that there is a chance that the technology could actually allow a path into God that wasn't present before.
1:16:29
that wasn't present before. By that I mean how cool would it be to have an AI right there as you're reading Gold Leerbach that you could immediately ask hey what's this threebody problem hey I I never heard about a a grippa's trillemma can you give me a you know
1:16:51
explain it to me like I'm five and I don't mean to belittle that I I often use that prompt explain it to me like I'm like one of my grandchildren I think that that could bring a lot of people who are right on the edge of, you know, maybe I should really read that book. I
1:17:06
I think it could I could really benefit from it. >> Prompts.
1:17:13
One thing I like is to say to a complicated answer, okay, >> I've just read that. Uh, thanks.
1:17:19
Give it to me as a nar as a simple narrative.
1:17:25
Um, and include a story if you can. >> Yep.
1:17:28
Um and so reducing it down to its essential components um oftenimes helps but it's also it's much more interesting to read about something where you've already done something where it's applicable. >> Yeah.
1:17:45
>> And so you start to invest and you say wow you know Mandra's ideas are are are like I read about those and they're interesting.
1:17:52
I'm going to go deeper into that.
1:17:53
And then you know that leads you to Talib and that leads you to to Ed Thorp and that you know a whole range of things and it becomes a you know a treasure hunt. >> Yeah.
1:18:03
>> To get to the truth and then everybody has slightly different views uh and uh you know it's like uh Zack Hower and Gallb don't agree on these issues but they agree on this issues and then you have to form your own opinion.
1:18:16
and you have to dig into it and what are the what are the various arguments on either sides and is there someplace where they meet in the middle but the ability to do self-exploration is amazing when I was in the second grade I used to ask so many questions of my teachers they'd say Tren you should go down and help Mrs.
1:18:34
uh Silverson in the library, you know, because there's books down there and you can help her put them away and read for a while.
1:18:40
It's like stop, you know, stop asking me so many questions, you know, but some of us, you know, you can't stop asking questions like why, you know, catch a strange fish, what kind of fish is this? What do they eat? Where do they swim? Does it taste good?
1:18:56
Does it have mercury in it?
1:18:57
You know, does it migrate?
1:18:57
You know, is it is it sustainable?
1:19:00
You know, and some people don't want to know. Is it trend? It's just a fish. >> Well, no. I want to know. I want to know.
1:19:08
Like, I want to know more. I want to know more. >> There's no end to it.
1:19:12
>> This is just not so much fun.
1:19:14
>> It's It's uh Dorothy Parker's great quip that um uh reading is a uh cure for curiosity.
1:19:24
There is no cure for curiosity.
1:19:28
>> And and but here's what I'd like your advice on.
1:19:30
How would you inspire somebody to to be curious?
1:19:35
Because I think like the fellow you mentioned who just wants to go home and watch the game for whatever reason, right?
1:19:44
Like what if you were going to run a course on how to increase your curiosity, what would the syllabus look like?
1:19:54
I think the first thing is you sort of have to identify the passion first because everything flows from that. >> Yeah.
1:20:03
>> You know the reason why the person is coming home and watching the game is they haven't discovered that they have a passion for fly fishing or fixing their car or reading books or appreciating art or you know appreciating nature or being a bird watcher or you know being a fly fisher whatever whatever it is is like you can't fake passion.
1:20:18
So you got to try a bunch of things and then once you find it then you have to dig in.
1:20:22
And the great thing is um the more you know, the more you know that you don't know very much yet. >> Oh, no kidding.
1:20:32
>> And and there's no end to it.
1:20:32
And then eventually you get this question of of you go all the way down to it root and you get why is there something instead of nothing?
1:20:38
You know, and then you get into quantum physics and then you're like, how did I get here?
1:20:42
Well, it's because you you're you're following the string, you know, but you'll follow a string if it's interesting, if it's relevant, if you have some passion about it.
1:20:53
And some people just haven't found their passion.
1:20:56
>> Um, and that's why I like Gurley's idea of, you know, finding your passion early in life. Yeah.
1:21:00
>> Because you you you tell the story about writing your book.
1:21:02
I think you were 27 or something for your first book.
1:21:03
Um, >> you know, you have nothing to lose when you have nothing to lose. >> Right. >> Right.
1:21:11
It's like a venture capitalist.
1:21:13
All you can lose is what you put into it.
1:21:15
Well, if you write a book, all you can lose is is the energy you put into it and the time you put into it.
1:21:18
And you've learned during the process.
1:21:20
But as you get older, it becomes harder because your opportunity cost gets harder, right?
1:21:25
And so that's why I consciously say, I'm going to do these things that are consulting because it keeps me around interesting people and it's it generates some revenue and it's nice.
1:21:35
I'll do these things which are paying it forward and and I'm I'm I'm going to, you know, I'm going to cordon those off and I'll always give it the time it deserves.
1:21:44
And that can happen in a lot of ways include one-on-one mentoring with people.
1:21:48
mentoring with people. um you know um you know just learning about things just to learn about them that I never never be able to use or monetize just I want to know you know I want to learn I want to know and so you know anyway it all starts with passion is is my answer and then you go from there
1:22:07
>> you can't fake passion >> yeah I >> you don't find it sitting on the couch you going out trying all kinds of you know like oh you like bird watching come with me one time >> you might get hooked You might not, >> you know, and then you might say, well, I don't like bird watching, but I sure like looking at sunsets and scenery and all that. Maybe I'll be a photographer.
1:22:25
Maybe I'll be a photographer.
1:22:27
>> And it one thing, one thing leads to another.
1:22:29
You know, I like to read obituaries.
1:22:32
And one of the reasons I like it is because he had these great stories of well he was went to college at MIT and then he met this guy and he was selling rugs and he moved to Afghanistan and he sold rugs for a while and then he shipped them and then he became a
1:22:44
wholesaler and then now he moved to Thailand and then he you know did this and then he bought a bank and sort of like wow you know like that's that's a leg like my my my goal in life is to be able to tell great stories that I'm in that I'm a character in Because that's a test. Like it's it's
1:23:00
Like it's it's gonna be interesting. Shit's gonna go on. >> It's crazy, you know?
1:23:05
It it it it is boring to be boring. Let's put it that way.
1:23:12
Just >> lighten it lighten it up. Light it up.
1:23:17
>> Try some >> I I could not agree more.
1:23:18
I had a friend uh a while back say to me, he looked at me and he goes, "You know, I deeply suspect that everything you've done was just for the stories."
1:23:30
I'm like, "Well, what else is there?"
1:23:33
But it's also it's also a great test, which is someone says, "Well, you should come do this, right?"
1:23:41
And you think, "Wow, that's going to be great.
1:23:43
And now I have a great story out of it."
1:23:44
Because if if it doesn't m for a great story, it was boring. You didn't do it right. interesting.
1:23:49
You know, we're out and the weather got bad and you know, the ship was getting tossed and if not for the courage of the fearless crew, the widow would be lost. >> Be lost.
1:23:59
>> All these things, you know, there that's an adventure.
1:24:02
You know, you learned how did the professor make a radio out of a coconut?
1:24:06
All these things lead you to like maybe I should investigate. Just kidding.
1:24:11
that one used to live very close to me and I I I asked him that once in the grocery store like >> really >> couldn't fix the minnow but you made a radio out of a coconut.
1:24:21
>> How did how did that work?
1:24:22
>> He didn't think I was very funny. He's passed.
1:24:27
>> I think it's hysterical.
1:24:27
But both you and I had early experiences.
1:24:30
Yours was actually earlier than mine.
1:24:33
I was a teenager and I was listening to my uncles and aunts argue about an investment, right?
1:24:42
And as I was listening and it was one of the first times I got to sit with the adults, right, at at when they all had gathered.
1:24:51
And so I was trying to be on my best behavior and I was listening to my dad and my uncle argue about IBM, I think it was.
1:24:59
And I just remember thinking, I think that's the worst way to think about a stock, right?
1:25:06
And and I remember your story about when you were six years old on your grandfather's 45 foot crisscross uh boat, you were listening to them talking about business and about buying hotels and all of that.
1:25:24
What was what was something that when you were six you were like I have no idea what they're talking about but that stayed with you from that experience.
1:25:32
So in that era Seattle had a tolerance policy and um if you were south of the which is a street goes goes east to west there was gambling and prostitution and cops were being paid off and there's bingo and all kinds of crazy stuff. there's drugs.
1:25:50
Illegal gambling uh was probably the biggest thing.
1:25:53
But anyway, but they would talk about that and you know who was corrupt and the governor was corrupt and this was this guy was the bad man and it was a small smaller town and the thing I took away from it was was this is damn interesting, right?
1:26:08
But also the people are human and things aren't always what they appear, >> right?
1:26:13
And so that nice hotel right there is actually a brothel, you know, and and all these things and but it was different in that when I was six, I was very old and so I was paying attention.
1:26:24
And so we'd go on a trip someplace, Palm Springs or skiing or something and and I'd see Mr.
1:26:28
So and So kissing some 24y old and I'll say, "That's not his wife."
1:26:34
And my dad would say my dad would say, "Yes, that's you know, and but but most kids didn't pay attention to that."
1:26:39
But I said, "Okay, I want to know why that happened. Why would he do that?
1:26:42
You know what what what because I want to understand the motivation, you know, like that's I was I was observant uh to a fault early on.
1:26:51
And so listening to those things may be curious about how the world really worked and then how the work world appeared to work and and so and and once you learn about something then you want to know a little bit about more like okay well who's taken the who's taking the bribes and how did they get distributed and why did they choose yeser and you know which of these buildings has a casino and all these sort of things.
1:27:16
So anyway, but but I think we were both genetically curious and probably at an earlier age than most people, but everybody can get curious because it's fun. It's just fun to learn.
1:27:29
It's fun to discover like, you know, why does it you just why does this restaurant packet of mustard taste better than the stuff in the jar?
1:27:35
Well, stuff in the jar is vinegar and there's a chemical reaction that happens when you open this thing up.
1:27:40
And if you mix your own powder, you can have a chemical reaction. It tastes better. But knowing that is fun. learning that was fun.
1:27:45
But for some people, it's not fun.
1:27:48
Like, why would I want to know that?
1:27:49
I just want to focus on my >> Corvette.
1:27:51
I got in the garage and I work on that and it makes me happy and that's all I think about. >> Yeah.
1:27:55
>> When I go to bed, >> it's not me.
1:27:57
But if it makes them happy, if if it crank if it cranks their, you know, look, if if they want to get home and just turn on Jim's only fans, you know, I it's just it's okay.
1:28:07
You know, I'm not judgmental.
1:28:15
You know, you're doing such a good job of marketing my non-existent only finds. I'm my only fans.
1:28:20
I might actually have to open one.
1:28:23
>> I think it's it's a chance to diversify imprint in the imprint brand.
1:28:27
I mean, you know, a lot of these publishers are talking about being multimodal, you know, video, all that.
1:28:33
And um you know, you could you could publicize a lot of things there. You could advertise.
1:28:40
You could you could you could be, you know, you could you could get, you know, like Speedo would give you big money for wearing a tight, >> a tight a tight Speedo, you know.
1:28:51
>> I I admire I admire your optimism, but >> it's not a placement.
1:28:54
They'll give you a speedo.
1:28:56
>> But let let me correct your assessment.
1:28:59
Speedo would probably pay me a huge sum of money not to wear a Speedo and show it.
1:29:09
So, uh, whenever I'm talking to you, I glance at the time and it's just the the the time just disappears, which means a very good thing.
1:29:18
Um, what what are you doing right now?
1:29:21
Are are you agreeing with with Craig?
1:29:23
And and what are you doing specifically to do this book in public that you want our listeners and viewers to to know about?
1:29:35
>> Um I'm really not supposed to talk about what's in it yet, but but what I what I'm trying to do is take some key ideas and illustrate them with stories. >> Okay?
1:29:47
>> And um and to not make it too complex and but it's a book about investing. I can say that. >> Okay.
1:29:53
>> And you know, it's about book about investing principles. It's like my blog.
1:29:56
Someone said nicely the other day or yesterday or something on Twitter like I love 25 like you because it's timeless.
1:30:03
>> You know, there's no >> 300 posts there.
1:30:04
There's over a million words.
1:30:06
And I I didn't write it to say, well, this is what's going on today.
1:30:08
And you know I I think in one case I I went into uh uh one business deeply but you know I I I was trying to be be timeless and I was trying to do the same thing.
1:30:21
But you know the other thing is uh I'm trying to be happy uh and and enjoying the process of writing the book. >> Yeah.
1:30:32
>> You know you you can't torture yourself.
1:30:36
Um, and and being happy is tremendously underrated.
1:30:39
So, I'm trying to be happy.
1:30:41
I'm trying to be focused.
1:30:41
I'm trying to be passionate.
1:30:43
Um, I'm I'm trying to create something that I feel proud of that might help people that is paying it forward.
1:30:54
>> I think that's a wonderful motivating thing when you're writing your eighth book.
1:30:59
um the idea of I I've always like and I think you probably agree I I view happiness as a byproduct right I I and by that I mean uh you know there's so many books on how to be happy how you know etc etc how-to books and and I think that to take you know I if you if you if you make it conditional, right?
1:31:30
And you say, "When I get X, then I will be happy."
1:31:33
You're setting yourself up for failure. >> Absolutely. >> Like I don't know.
1:31:40
I know so many rich unhappy people. >> Oh, no kidding. No kidding. >> Right.
1:31:45
And I know many people who don't have anything or are super happy. Yeah.
1:31:49
>> And then I know rich people who are super happy.
1:31:50
And so you could go a matrix and and and draw the quadrants, but you know, a lot of it is is just it's up to you.
1:32:00
>> Like no one's going to make you happy, >> you know.
1:32:04
>> Oh, you truer words were never spoken.
1:32:07
>> That is absolutely correct.
1:32:09
>> And you're not going to It's very hard to make someone else happy and and it's even harder to make them to change in some way. >> Yeah. Right.
1:32:17
And so, you know, you get to acceptance, but then you get the fact that at least with your own behavior and your own happiness, you're in control. >> Yes. >> Right.
1:32:26
You don't, you know, it's sort of like I have this saying that I talk to people about which is some people, you're being going through your day and some guy comes up to you and says, "Hi, you know, um, uh, you've been really smart today.
1:32:38
Will you help me with this problem?"
1:32:39
And he said, "Here's this turd. Will you take it?"
1:32:44
And, you know, the answer, of course, is no.
1:32:45
no. I'm not I'm not you know it's a very nice very nice term but you keep holding that you should what do you think about and here's some resources and good luck with that but you know you you you should only take on things that you want to take on you take on things that make
1:33:00
you happy and productive but realize you're in control if if you're unhappy it's because you're letting yourself be happy no someone else isn't making you unhappy you are >> completely agree and you know that there there are so many simple things that are not easy, you know, like investing, right? A lot of pe you the way I look at
1:33:21
A lot of pe you the way I look at investing is there are a lot of simple ways you can do very well, but they're very hard to actually do.
1:33:29
Um, and I love the idea about about the turd, right? Yeah. No, thank you. You keep that turd. It's a very nice turd.
1:33:44
Good luck with that turd.
1:33:46
But it's not >> It's a lovely lovely turd.
1:33:51
>> And and I definitely agree that um you it is ultimately up to you, right? >> Because >> uniquely. >> Uniquely. Exactly. Right.
1:34:04
>> You don't need anybody's permission, >> right?
1:34:06
You don't need >> this frictionless. >> Yeah. Yeah.
1:34:09
>> As opposed to, well, if so and so doesn't like me, I won't be happy, >> right? >> That's a setup.
1:34:15
>> That's handing someone else control over your happiness.
1:34:17
It's It kind of reminds me of of the margin clerk.
1:34:19
Uh when you're when you're borrowing on the margin, you know, they can sell that stock when it gets low, you know?
1:34:25
So, you've you've basically said, "Here, you determine my fate, right?" Yeah.
1:34:30
>> This is like, well, unless you unless you help me, unless you do these things, I and you say you that I'm wonderful, I can't be happy. >> No.
1:34:40
Like, you don't want to do that.
1:34:42
>> Again, >> you strive to be you can strive to be like, you can strive to be helping someone like you.
1:34:46
You can strive to have them approve or, you know, not think you're an idiot or whatever, but you're in control.
1:34:53
And that's just this is beautiful.
1:34:57
I again could not agree with you more.
1:34:57
I think that one of the problems, you know, I'm sure you've read Chelini's influence, right? >> Yes.
1:35:07
>> And and one of his first principles is reciprocity, right?
1:35:10
And I I do think sometimes that people have that.
1:35:14
We talked about genetic curiosity, etc.
1:35:18
I do think that there is in many people uh a strong uh component to their personality where reciprocity can be a right?
1:35:32
Because like let's take the guy with the turd.
1:35:39
He he prior to asking you to take the turd from him, he does something really nice for you, right?
1:35:47
>> And then you're supposed to take the turd. >> Yeah.
1:35:49
That's That's like the woman who guy boot monk or whatever gives you the flower in the airport and then ask for the donation.
1:35:57
>> And and by the way that was based on that principle.
1:35:59
The Har Krishna studied that they actually had a pretty good marketing plan. >> Yeah.
1:36:05
>> Because and >> reciprocity is a powerful thing.
1:36:08
>> It really is until it gets ruined.
1:36:08
>> It really is until it gets ruined. Like if the example of the Hari Krishna's with the flowers in the airport for the first couple of years that worked really really well until people became ineared to it right
1:36:26
>> they won't take the flower >> they won't take the flower and and then you've got to move on but there there are so many I think the broader point that is worth people contemplating is unfortunately there are other people who are doing their very best to manipulate you as well. And you know with one of
1:36:45
And you know with one of the downsides of social media is that you know a lot of the things are posted there specifically to get you angry to get you nervous to get you worried etc.
1:37:03
And so I always say to people you know get in the habit of saying why am I reading this now?
1:37:08
What what what would happen if I actually believed this?
1:37:10
Who wants me to believe this?
1:37:13
Is it a guy who wants me to take his turn from him?
1:37:19
And yet those th those kind of simple questions elude a lot of people. >> Yeah.
1:37:25
You know, the the the truth is be true to yourself, be kind to yourself, um and don't take the turd.
1:37:36
Those are the three PR Those are the three principles, >> Trent. >> Yeah. >> My next book. My next book. Don't take the turd. >> Don't take the turd. >> Please.
1:37:46
If you do nothing else, send don't take the turd to us at a whole other book.
1:37:51
My cur book is not has nothing about that.
1:37:54
But, you know, that's the life advice thing.
1:37:55
that's the life advice thing. the mongeres stuff is is you know there's some things that are they're really pretty simple and there are some things that are complex and there's some things that um involve night and uncertainty some things that involve what Zeow calls
1:38:11
ignorance there's deep uncertainty there are black swans there you know there tale events uh you know life is complex but if it wasn't it'd be damn boring you know nothing like a little stirring things up a little soup you don't want to sit around not have anything going on. Like
1:38:26
Like a lot of people who were really smart had already checked out and then AI came along and said, "Oh, I'm in again." >> Yeah.
1:38:34
>> You know, this is fun. This is cool. Quantum, wow, let's go. Let's go.
1:38:35
You You don't want to be bored.
1:38:38
You don't want to have things stay the same because because life is short, you know.
1:38:45
It they Someone said to me the other day, life is like a toilet paper roll.
1:38:48
Towards the end, it goes really fast.
1:38:52
>> And that is very true.
1:38:52
And I also could not agree more completely about man, if you don't mix it up, life just gets really boring really really fast.
1:39:03
And we we get one time around on this baby hopefully.
1:39:12
uh that >> the other point is you know you you have a career and you have all these interesting people and you're getting challenged you learn things and all that and then just because you decide not to take a W2 anymore which I decid I was 71 I said okay it's time not to have a W2
1:39:27
time to focus on fishing time to focus on writing books time to focus on this consulting work that's super interesting >> um and I can order my own life when I want to and all those sorts of things but you still need this interesting people and so you need to find ways How am I going to be around interesting people? Who who's going to challenge me?
1:39:43
Who who's going to challenge me?
1:39:44
And it can be not real people.
1:39:44
It can be virtual people in terms of what I read, what I listen to, what podcast I listen to.
1:39:51
But you don't want to go, you know, into a state where, okay, well, I'm not don't have a W2 anymore.
1:39:57
What am I going to do now?
1:39:58
My mom told me about uh people she lived with and the wife had been on her own for 20 or 30 years and husband was suddenly retired.
1:40:06
He would start following her around and eventually she would turn around and say, "Go find something the hell to do. Get out of here. Go someplace. Get out of here."
1:40:14
You cuz she's used to have she's used to having her own life.
1:40:16
And you know, you don't want to be in that situation where you don't know what to do.
1:40:20
So, you're just following your wife around.
1:40:22
You or husband, you know, the other can be the other way.
1:40:23
Some guys are retiring before their wives.
1:40:26
But the point here is is seek out what interests you. Seek out your passions. Find new passions. Do new things. Try new things.
1:40:37
Um, you know, don't be worrying. >> Totally agree.
1:40:40
And uh, you know, I I took uh the advice from my grandfather when I was lucky enough to spend a lot of time with him when I was a kid and I asked him like uh and he ma he was born in 1885 and died in 1973 at age 88. He had a wonderful life.
1:41:00
And uh I said uh I remember one of the last things when I was a teenager and he was getting on.
1:41:10
I'm like so what what do you credit everything?
1:41:13
And he said never retire and always find something interested interesting that you hadn't done before.
1:41:22
Those are his two pieces of advice and boy you you seem to live them.
1:41:28
Trent, >> the key thing is is not having a W2 does not mean you retired. >> Of course not.
1:41:36
>> There's so many things to do. >> Of course not. Absolutely.
1:41:39
>> We're about to wrap up. I interrupted.
1:41:41
>> No, that's that's okay.
1:41:41
I I actually think you're absolutely right because a lot of people do equate the two, right?
1:41:48
Like, oh no, I don't now I don't have a W2 anymore. I guess I'm retired. No, you're not.
1:41:53
You you you can do a ton of different things like you're doing what?
1:41:58
like a ton of people are doing.
1:41:58
And you really want to do that because life will get boring very very quickly if you don't.
1:42:06
Uh I've been married nearly 45 years and uh I would have been divorced long ago had I hung around the house.
1:42:19
>> Give give the person you love some space can be can be excellent advice.
1:42:24
>> Yeah, it really really is.
1:42:24
Well, Tren, as always, I am always have a wonderful time chatting with you.
1:42:30
I think this has been a great uh conversation.
1:42:32
As you recall, uh you get to and now you're on your third time, so you get to really incept people.
1:42:41
Uh our our final thing is we're going to make you the emperor of the world. You can't kill anyone.
1:42:46
You can't incarcerate anyone, but you can.
1:42:52
We're gonna hand you a magical microphone and you can say two things into it.
1:42:55
I bet I can guess what one of them is going to be, but you can say two things into it and you're going to incept the entire population of the world.
1:43:04
Whenever their morning is, they're going to wake up and they're going to think, "I just had two of the greatest ideas."
1:43:10
And unlike all the other times, I'm going to actually take action against both of these ideas today.
1:43:19
What are you incepting in the world's population?
1:43:23
>> I think that probably the thing is um to find your passion, to find the thing that motivates you, to find the thing that wants you to learn more, do more, help people more.
1:43:34
Find that passion and you you the best way to do that is just with experiments.
1:43:39
You just do a lot of things.
1:43:41
and you do more of the things that really, you know, float your boat, that charge you.
1:43:45
And um, you know, once you find that passion, then um, you know, all these other great things flow from it.
1:43:56
>> And, you know, then the second thing is really um, listen, you know, where we all could, me particularly, I could do a better job listening.
1:44:07
I know I could do a better, I should listen more.
1:44:08
And um you really have to listen because you can get it into your own grooves.
1:44:16
You know the one of the things I'm talking about book I'm writing is path dependence.
1:44:19
Um you know you can be like a snowball rolling down the hill and the bigger you get you can't change you can't change the motion of this thing that's going down the hill but you really have to change and you really have to adapt.
1:44:29
AI right now is really that way, which was you maybe used to do X and that was your thing, but now you're expected to do the whole stack yourself and unless you can change, you're in trouble. >> Yeah.
1:44:42
>> And so and so the only, you know, thing that doesn't change is change.
1:44:48
It's it's always it's always going to be different. So you have to listen.
1:44:50
So be passionate and listen.
1:44:52
If they're only two things, that's what I'd say.
1:44:56
>> I love I love both of them.
1:44:56
Good old Heracitis for the win.
1:44:59
The same man cannot step in the same river because he is no longer the same man, nor is it the same river. >> River.
1:45:08
Yeah, >> Tren, I always have a wonderful time chatting with you.
1:45:11
We will put up all of the places that people can find you um when we post the podcast.
1:45:16
But thank you so much for giving me so much time. >> All right.
1:45:22
Good luck with the Only Fans.
1:45:27
You're going to carry that bit right to the bitter end, aren't you?
1:45:28
I admire the persistence.