Friday, November 7th

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ramp.com, baby. Um, the timeline is in

turmoil over Sam Alman again. Uh, what

were we calling it? Backstop gate.

Backstop gate continues unabated. Um,

timelines in turmoil turmoil

>> over Sam Alman.

>> Oh, every single day this week every

single day this week and last week. Uh,

it is non-stop open AI. What will

happen? Um, is is it over? Is it the end

of the global economy or will we uh you

know uh live to fight another day? Um,

the main the main point of debate is uh

is over you know Sarah Frier's comments

that she used the word backs stop. She

backtracked on her backs stop comment

and said, "I wasn't asking for a backs

stop of open AI equity. I was advocating

for this American manufacturing plan."

Um, then simp Satoshi is going pretty

hard. He says, "Here's an open AAI

document submitted one week ago where

they advocate for including data center

spend within the American manufacturing

umbrella. They specifically advocate for

federal loan guarantees." And S for

Satoshi says Sam lied to everyone again.

>> Let's read the specifics.

>> Yes, the specifics are AI server

production and AI data centers.

Broadening coverage of the AMIC, which

is the American Advanced Manufacturing

Investment Credit will lower the

effective cost of capital, derisk early

investment, and unlock private capital

to help alleviate bottlenecks and

accelerate the AI build in the United

States. counter the PRC by d-risking US

manufacturing expansion to provide

manufacturers with the certainty and

capital they need to scale production

quickly. The federal government should

also deploy grants, cost sharing

agreements, loans or loan guarantees to

expand industrial base capacity and

resilience. Okay, so

>> loan guarantees. So, so what's happening

here is OpenAI a week ago and everyone

can go and and read this letter which is

publicly available on their website

>> is was making the recommendation

that the government should effectively

treat data centers or AI or token

factories

>> uh put them in the manufacturing bucket

which would qualify them for similar

incentives that traditional

manufacturing defense tech etc. And I

don't have a problem with asking the

government for a handout. I think that

that's actually like best practice. It's

actually in your shareholders

responsibility. Like you have a

fiduciary duty to ask the government for

as much help as possible. I think that

everyone should go to the go to the

government right now. Hey, if you're if

I'm paying 50% tax, how about we take

that down to 20%. How about we take it

down to 0%. like you have every

incentive to ask your your person in

Congress, in your senator, the people in

Washington to do everything they can to

support your mission. This has worked

out in the past with Elon and Tesla. It

didn't work out in the case of Celindra,

but like the game on the field is if

there are taxpayer dollars that are

moving around the board, you want to get

those into industries that are aligned

with you. And so the thing that people

are taking issue with is that in the

opening of his message yesterday, he

said, "We do not want we do not have or

want government guarantees for OpenAI

data centers."

>> Yes.

>> And that seems to conflict with the

message the letter that they wrote a

week ago that is still up on their

website.

>> Yes. So if it's

if it's uh what is it what loan

guarantees to expand industiti

just sent the admin a safe to sign

uncapped send uncapped note.

>> You literally can do this now. there's a

sovereign wealth fund. Like like it

sounds crazy, but like they're ripping

checks. Like this is the new economy and

uh you know, you can uh you can you can

be upset about it, but you also have to

understand like what is the game on the

field. You can always advocate for like

we should change the game like we

shouldn't be doing this. Like I would

prefer a more of a free market economy,

but in the world where we're not in a

free market economy, you want to have

your company win, right? That's just

rational. That's just actually playing

the game on the field. Now, it is weird

optics to talk about the game on the

field. That's something most people

don't like doing. And that's very odd

because when you say, "Oh, yeah, this is

a one-hand washes the other situation."

Or, "Oh, yeah, this is uh this is a

situation where um you know, a backs

stop will allow us to be more

aggressive." That feels like the banker

te saying, "Oh yeah, I knew that the

government was going to bail us out in

'08." So I was intentionally

underwriting loans that where it was

somebody's fifth house and I knew that

they couldn't pay it. I wasn't asking

about their job. I wasn't asking about

their income. I wasn't asking about

their assets. And so they I I pushed it

way further and I made a lot of money

and I got out at the top. That's what's

really upsetting to Americans because

the bailout comes in, the backs stop

comes in. Yes, it makes sense to

rationally do the back stop in that

moment. But if some people get out early

and then other people get cooked, that's

a really bad optics. That's really,

really bad optics.

>> And which is why I kind of expect a lot

more of the narrative and to shift

towards subsidizing and incentivizing

>> and bringing new energy, which directly

benefits the labs and and anybody

building a data center. But it also

feels very much in America's uh interest

broadly, right? And it benefits it it

theoretically would benefit the average

American too.

>> We were listening to Ben Thompson this

morning. Uh it wasn't on reream one live

stream 30 plus destinations uh multiream

reacher audience wherever they are. Uh

we were listening to the strategy RSS

feed. Hopefully then goes live at some

point on reream. That'd be awesome.

>> By the way, I think the chat has

discovered that yes, this is a turbo.

Uh this is a one of two other one Simon

Puffer. Uh but you can see

>> it looks great especially with the green

background, the color grade. The

production team is on point today. Let's

let's hear for the production team. Um

so uh so yes, I I I agree with you on

the on the energy front. Um I think Ben

Thompson his point today

>> and fabs.

>> Yeah, and fabs too. Yeah, his point

today was like was like OpenAI needs to

be crystal clear about the position that

they're in, which is that they are the

hottest company in the world. There is

unlimited demand for their shares. They

could be a public company. They could go

raise more private capital. They need to

be on the opposite end of the risk curve

from the stuff that's like uh no one

really wants to invest in an American

fab that might lose money for a decade.

like like there is truly much less

appetite for yeah let's go and build a

nuclear power plant that might take a

decade and who knows like uh when you

think about the things that make money

in the short term it's SAS right AI for

SAS

uh just go and transform the legacy

business with some AI sprinkled on top

and just start printing money like this

is what

>> a cons you know people's concern for uh

governmentbacked data center lending is

that you're lending against chips which

have a really fast depreciation

schedule. Yep.

>> Uh we don't know, right?

>> There was some push back. I I made the

comment, hey, maybe that these things

don't depreciate as fast. Uh there was

some there was some push back in the

comments. Uh I think everyone kind of

agrees that these things depreciate

quickly and so energy infrastructure is

the place.

>> Yeah. And and if you look at uh right

now uh

uh it's coreweave's uh corporate default

swaps are now sitting around 500 basis

points. Jumped up dramatically. And so

this is a this is one of the leading

NeoCloud.

>> Five 500 basis points. Five 5%. Yeah.

>> They they jumped 5%.

>> They jumped they jumped from like I

think like two to five. Okay. I try to

find somewhere in the stack.

>> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But sorry I

don't mean to like ask particular uh

stats but uh clearly like people are are

worried about this. Um

>> yeah so so and again this is for a

leading Neocloud right we we

>> uh semi analysis uh cluster max uh the

updated version came out yesterday

they're only

>> in the platinum

>> neocloud in the platin platinum tier

>> and people are worried about them right

y

>> uh potentially you know having some uh

bankruptcy risk and so if you start

doing you know basically government

guaranteed data center lending

>> y

>> you could get in a situation where

there's a bunch bunch of new data

centers that come online that really

don't have a clear pathway to ROI.

>> Yeah.

>> And uh it just incentivizes the entire

stack to just get, you know, really

exuberant, right? And again, going back

to Sarah Frier's

>> interview on Wednesday, she was uh she

felt the market was not exuberant

enough. Um and I think a lot of people

disagree with that, right? There's a lot

of

>> uh there's been a lot of insanity uh

this year, silliness. Uh maybe we don't

need more but we will see. The other

news that was uh interesting out of

today uh the director of the Federal

Housing Finance Agency, William P says

Fanny and Freddy eyeing stakes in tech

firms. Uh Bill P, the director of the

Federal Housing Finance Agency said that

Fanny May and Freddy Mack are looking at

ways to take equity stakes in technology

companies. We have some of the biggest

technology and public companies offering

equity to Fanny and Freddy in exchange

for Fanny and Freddy partnering with

them in our business. Pt said Friday

during an interview at a housing

conference. Uh, we're looking at taking

stakes in companies that are willing to

give it to us because of how much power

Fanny and Freddy have over the whole

ecosystem.

Uh so

>> yeah, this uh this Wall Street Journal

event is just so many articles came out

of this. Uh the Wall Street Journal did

a fantastic job bringing a ton of people

together. This is where that Sarah Frier

quote came from. Uh it's also where the

Coree CEO was on stage. You were

mentioning Coreeave earlier. Um, and the

coreweave CEO, the headline in the Wall

Street Journal is coreweave CEO plays

down concerns about AI spending bubble

and the quote is from Michael, uh, if

you're building something that

accelerates the economy and has

fundamental value to the world, the

world will find ways to finance an

enormous amount of business. Um, and he

went on and said if the economy doubles

in size, it's not a lot of money to

build all those data centers. And so

there's a lot of folks to uh you know

addressing bubble concerns right now. He

says it's very hard for me to worry

about a bubble as one of the narratives

when you have buyers of infrastructure

that are changing the econ the economics

of their company. They are building the

future. And so if you are uh if if the

products are are you know effective in

and in in growing the economy then all

of the investment is worth it. Uh

there's a fascinating mansion story we

should get to that's actually related to

this. Good. Um, so there is a before we

do, let me tell you about Privy. Wallet

infrastructure for every bank. Privy

makes it easy to build on crypto rails.

Securely spin up white label wallets,

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infrastructure all through one simple

API. Did you get a whole new soundboard?

What's going on with the soundboard?

>> I did. Thank you.

>> Wait, really? Like they swapped them all

out.

>> Do you still have the horse?

>> I still got all the classics. Working

with some new material.

>> Working with some new material.

>> I like the sheesh. Uh, can we get the

vine boom on there? Is that on there

yet?

>> Uh, I don't know.

>> The boom. The thud. That's a big one. Uh

anyway, Casa Encantada is a 1930s estate

in Los Angeles. It's one of the most

important homes in the 20th of the

century. In 2023, it was also briefly

the most expensive home for sale in the

United States with an ambitious act

asking price of $250 million. This is in

Bair. Uh so it's a Bair property. Uh

it's uh was sold in the foreclosure

auction after the death of its longtime

owner, financeier Gary Winnick. So it's

an 8.5 acre property. He bought it in

2000 for $94 million. He bought it in

the year 2000.

>> No way.

>> Do you know who this guy is?

>> Uh Gary Winnick.

>> He had something to do with the the last

bub.

>> He did have something to do with the

last bub. It's one of the craziest

stories. So uh

>> is it uh

>> to satisfy the debt which has now grown

blah blah blah blah blah. So so

basically like it's a 40,000 square foot

house uh built in the 1930s counts

hotelier uh Conrad Hilton and Dole Food

billionaire David Murdoch among its

former owners. It's located right next

to the Bair Country Club Golf Course. It

has a se it's seven bedrooms, has a

swimming pool, tennis court. Uh it's

awesome. Anyway, Gary is perhaps best

known as the founder of Global Crossing,

which built fiber optic cable, a fiber

optic cable network across the world.

The company made him a billionaire, but

it imploded.

>> Did they have a little bit of dark Did

they have a little bit of dark fiber?

>> Little bit of dark fiber.

>> Uh imploded in the early 2000s under the

weight of massive debt. Kasa in

Incantada, Gary's primary home went on

the market in June of 2023, five months

before his death. Now it's asking 190

million. And they kind of move on from

there. But uh is there

>> Crossing was he was somewhat of an of a

of a global businessman. He was uh the

headquarters were in Bermuda.

>> You know this?

>> I didn't know that.

>> I wonder why. I wonder why. Um, I mean

it it might literally be because it it

it insulates the assets in America. Like

like that is one thing that um uh you

can do if you don't want uh to have to

give up your lovely home post

bankruptcy. Um you want to be able to

get liquidity before the bubble pops.

That's the lesson here. Sell sell the

shares before the top. Uh buy low, sell

high. That's the that's the phrase that

we that we uh live by here. Uh, was

there anything else, Tyler, that came

out of your deep research report on Gary

Winnick?

>> Did you get a chance?

>> I mean, so let's see.

>> He also started um Pacific Capital Group

in 1985.

>> Oh, wow.

>> That was kind of the precursor.

>> So, he was set up to to actually

marshall all the debt to do the big

>> He had been he had been a global

businessman for a while before this.

>> Okay.

>> Nice.

>> Let's give it up for global businessmen.

>> Let's give it up. Let's give it

>> uh Yeah. What?

>> Wild wild wild story.

>> We're hyper hyper local businessmen. We

we like to do our business right here in

the Ultra Dome. But

>> we do

>> got to give it up for them.

>> Also in the mansion section, which we

should continue on. Uh but first, let me

tell you about Cognition, the makers of

Devon, the AI software engineer. Uh

crush your backlog with your personal AI

engineering team. Uh you have a new

neighbor Jordy.

>> You have a new neighbor. So Tom Petty

apparently lived in your neighborhood in

Malibu, California. Uh, the late Free

Fallen rocker had a personal music

studio.

>> Some deep lore.

>> Please.

>> I saw Tom Petty. I believe it was the

first ever

>> uh who headlined the first ever Outside

Lands.

>> Was the first or second?

>> He was living in Malibu in a 11.2 $2

million house, 8,744

square feet, seven bedrooms, has a music

studio. Um, the buyer is Steven Slade

Tien, a psychoanalyst and author,

according to people with knowledge of

the deal. Tienne didn't respond for a

request for comment. I wonder if he if

he'd want to, you know, get beer

sometime, hang out, maybe go surfing, go

for a walk on the beach. We should reach

out to him for com. Okay. So, uh, the I

was at the first ever Outside Lands.

>> Really? How old are you? I thought I

thought you were

>> It was It was my basically the first

ever like con major concert experience.

>> I didn't realize. Yeah, that's uh Tom

Petty headlined uh on Saturday. This was

in August of 2008.

>> And that was my first time smelling

cannabis. And I kept I was there with my

my uh my friend and his parents. And I

kept asking like his friend's parents

like what is that stinky smell? So

stinky every we can't we can't get away

from it.

>> And uh very very memorable.

>> Very memorable.

>> That's amazing. Uh do you know where

this is? Uh 2.6 acres above Escondido

Beach. Is that close to you?

>> Beach area.

>> It's a a few minutes away, but um it's a

>> gated property.

>> Escandido Beach is the most underrated

beach. It was Petty's home decades

before his death in 2017. Lead singer of

the Heartbreakers purchased the property

for about 3.75 million in 1998.

>> Uh Petty turned his guest house into his

personal music studio with soundproof

rooms for recording music. And uh said

Levi Freeman who's putting up there's a

one-bedroom guest guest suite. Seems

like a very nice star. He was from

Florida. He shunned the spotlight

offstage. He's a member of the Rock and

Roll Hall of Fame. best known for songs

like American Girl and I Won't Back

Down. Um, what a what a lovely little

house. Well, uh, that's always fun.

Anyway, we should move on to our, uh,

top story. Should we should we do you

want to go through the Elon the Elon pay

package thing a little bit? I had two

questions for you on that and then we

can go into our Mag 7 review. Is that

Does that sound good?

>> Let's Let's do it.

>> Okay. First, let me tell you about

Figma.

Think bigger, build faster. Figma helps

design and development teams build great

products together. Um

I I I really enjoy this uh graphic

package we got. This is great. Um so uh

Elon's trillion dollar pay package is

done. It's signed. It's approved. I'm

sure it will be contested in the courts.

It's always contested in the courts. But

uh the Wall Street Journal has a very

nice little breakdown of how it works.

They have a nice little infographic here

I can share. Um, and it kind of shows

>> this is this is what technology

podcasting is all that holding.

>> Pull that up. Pull that newspaper.

>> Yeah. Yeah. So, basically, uh, uh, Elon

could get one trillion in Tesla's stock.

Um, if he hits all these different

tanches. And so, it's actually not that

many shares. So he he he's worth half a

trillion now, but he also owns 414

million Tesla shares outright. Got

another award in 2018 of 300 million

shares. And this next award is 424

million across 12 tanch tranches. So

it's not like they're giving him four

time twice as much as he already has.

They're just kind of giving him a little

like like basically what he already had.

They're giving him the same amount

again. And there's a bunch of things

that he has to do. He has to get the

market cap really really high. And then

there's also these uh like qualitative

operational goals or I guess they're

quantitative but uh 50 billion in Ebida,

20 million cars delivered, 1 million

robots sold, 1 million robo taxis in

operation, 10 million full self-driving

subscription. Now, some of those are

obviously more gameable than others.

What's the definition of a robot? If he

comes out with a really cheap robot and

he sells a bunch of those because it's

more of a toy, does that really fulfill

the goal? or like what's the ver what's

the you know million robo taxis in

operation? What's the definition of a

robo tax?

>> Qualifies is a Tesla that is enabled

>> and I turn on FSD and my friend rides in

it for one day.

>> Is there anything for actual rides?

>> Uh there's there's 10 million full

self-driving subscriptions.

>> Yeah.

>> And so some some of these are more

gameable than others, but the market

really isn't.

>> How many full self self-driving

subscriptions are there today? They

>> I saw I I looked that up. It's somewhere

between like 1 and 3 million right now.

So, he has to he definitely has to like

triple the size at least. Um, robo taxis

obviously goes from like zero to 1

million because there's barely any on

the on the road. He hasn't sold any

robots. So, a million would be entirely

new robots. Uh, he's obviously

delivering a lot of cars. And on the

IBIDA front, 50 billion in Ebida company

did like 13 last year. So, that's that's

a huge increase in Ibida. I mean, 50

billion in Ebida is a lot of money, but

he's, you know, it's not it's not 20x

where he is right now. And neither is

the market cap like he's he only has to

take the market cap to 8.5 trillion and

Tesla is already worth a trillion. So um

it's it's it's within you know striking

distance. Uh the market the market cap

is now around 1.5 trillion actually. So

uh my two questions uh were one uh like

it's going to be weird to live in the

world of the trillionaire like but we

are getting close like that's going to

happen not just within our lifetime like

definitely within the next decade. this

sets him up to be the first one, but

it's going to happen. Um, and I I wonder

how that's going to reshape our our

culture, like the world in America,

because um when I had this I had this um

I had this realization that when

billionaires became so prevalent and

prominent, there was a lot of heat that

was taken off the millionaire.

>> Like if you're just like a guy Yeah. I

have an H.

>> Millionaires are the heat shield.

>> Yeah. Exactly. Exactly. Like Yeah. I'm a

millionaire. I have a boat. I go to Bass

Pro shops, but like I'm not getting

protested because I have a million

dollars in my house and boat and

practice.

>> One out of 10 Americans is a

>> Yeah. Yeah. So, the millionaire became

more accessible and the billionaire

became the thing that the society uh

scapegoats for all the problems.

>> Approximately 9.4 to 9.5% of American

adults are millionaires.

>> Yeah. Um, and but uh my question was

what do you like like what happens to

the billionaire when trillionaires come

in? Because you know like Bernie Sanders

and the there's a whole crew that say

like billionaires shouldn't exist. Every

billionaire is a policy failure. Well

like what happens when you have to say

like well like trillionaires are the

real policy failure but billionaires are

also the policy failure and billionaires

were like kind of okay with but it's not

great. It's like it becomes much more

complicated, but at the same time, it it

definitely like if Elon is the only

trillionaire, it's going to be really

really easy to target him and be like,

he's bad. He's a trillionaire.

>> Get any more targeted?

>> I don't know. Yeah, maybe maxed it out

already. Uh, but I thought that was

interesting. And then the flip side was

what does this mean for other companies?

Uh, what does it mean for Sam Alman at

OpenAI? Can he run a similar playbook?

It's clear that he had a ton of soft

power during the OpenAI coup. Could he

go to the OpenAI forprofit board and

say, "Hey, if if OpenAI IPOs at two

trillion, I want 20%." If OpenAI moons

to 10 trillion, I want 50%. Like, how

extreme can Sam get? We We know that Sam

runs a bit of an Elon playbook. They

were in business together. They

co-founded OpenAI together, so clearly

they learned from each other. Um, I

wonder what o what Sam Alman can do

similarly. And then I also wonder what

what will happen at the garden variety

unicorn. If you're just the CEO of a $5

billion company and you're just kind of

hanging out there and you say like,

"Yeah, I I had 30% of the company when I

started. I've been diluted down to five

or 10. Uh but I like this company and I

want to get it up." Like what if what if

I say, "Hey, could could it could that

could I go to the board and say, "Okay,

we're at five billion now. Now, if I get

us to 50, will you double my equity

position? And how would shareholders

treat that? How would Sequoia treat that

or Founders Fund or Kleiner or A16Z,

like how would the growth stage venture

companies, the venture capital firms

feel about that? So, I don't know any

reaction that stuff.

>> I think there's a sentiment like

there's, you know, any any venturebacked

founder is like going to be

hyperconscious of delusion, right?

There's a sense that it's like one way.

Yes.

>> Right. It just goes down and down and

down and down.

>> And I think the right way for founders

to think about that is like, okay,

you're not actually like no one's taking

your shares unless you decide to sell

them. Your job is just to make the share

price go up. And there's going to be

more shares issued over time. But if you

just make the share price go up forever,

it doesn't really matter. But then

there's also you can also buy back, you

can also, you know, you know, get

>> buy back like Drew H.

sell all your shares and then give more

share create new shares if you want to

get your percentage ownership way down.

>> Yeah. Yeah,

>> like if you want to go to

>> more like

>> if you want to bail,

>> I mean, yeah, we we we need to do we

need to do uh

uh an analysis of the most diluted CEOs

in the public market because if you look

at some of the IPOs from the last 10

years, like some of the guys that are

still hanging around running these

companies have have sold out,

>> you know, sold down so much of and this

is what makes Larry so

>> admirable, right? because just buy back

buy back buy back and and and he's the

second richest person 300 billion it's

remarkable um

>> by the way I think Oracle is like fully

roundt tripped now from

>> it happens well uh what about the so so

yeah I mean the question is like on what

time scale do you think this happens

like um Jordy do you think we'd actually

hear the story of somebody a CEO founder

maybe passed their vesting cliff maybe

one of their co-founders has left

because I I think about that a lot where

it's like, okay, yeah, there were like

there were like two or three people.

They were basically equal. They did

their full like four-year earnout, but

then there's clearly one that's like

still there grinding for the next decade

like they kind of do deserve more. It's

not that crazy. Um, and yes, there is

the just the stock buyback, don't sell,

but is there a world where someone like

Drew Hston goes to the board and just

says like, I think I can 5x this and I

want the pay package to do it and I'm

going to be in the office nonstop and

I'm going to go

>> I think that happens all the time.

>> Not to this degree. No way.

>> Not okay. Not Not to that degree.

>> Yeah. No, not even the headline number.

Not even the headline number. just just

in this sense of like we're going to

dilute everyone like five or 10% if this

happens. Like a trillion on 8.5 is is

serious dilution for the rest of the

shareholders. But if I'm holding at 1.5

trillion and I'm like you're going to

take me to 8.5 trillion like I'm totally

in for 10% dilution, you're going to 5x

my shares. Like I'm in. But what's

interesting is that we just haven't seen

other CEOs pull that from the Elon

playbook and say this is why I was it uh

was it Kimble or someone else was saying

like

>> very almost no other CEOs would take a

deal like this because it's so

ambitious.

>> Yep.

>> And so I think it's I think it's healthy

and I think people are going to people

are offended by the headline number.

Yeah. So I mean obviously I'm I'm very

pro this. I think we're all pro this.

That's not the that's not the

discussion. The the question is like how

widespread does this become? Does it

become mimemetic? Is it like every CEO?

Because there's a lot of people that are

just like, "Oh, Elon did it this way. I

want to do it that way." You know, and

I'm wondering how much it actually

spreads. Anyway, we'll have to keep

monitoring it. Uh we'll also have to

tell you about Vanta. Automate

compliance, manage risk, and accelerate

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we don't stop there. Our AI and

automation powers everything from

evidence collection to continuous

monitoring to security reviews and

vendor risk. Um, what else is in the

timeline? There's so much in the

timeline. Should we do our uh our mega

cycle review?

>> Let's do it. Um,

>> we got the laser pointer.

>> We got the laser pointer. Our our good

friend Tyler Cosgrove has put together a

slide deck for us that tries to help map

the Mag 7. Really? I call it the TVPN

top 10. The top 10.

>> Well, technically nine.

>> There's nine.

>> Well, no. No. No. There are 10. There's

10.

>> There's 10. Yeah,

>> we'll see. Well, one of them maybe is

shouldn't be there.

>> No, no, no, no, no. There's actually 10

cuz it's the Mag 7.

>> Oracle. I forgot Oracle.

>> Yes, you did. So, so it is it is the

TBPN top 10. Uh the 10 most important

companies in AI loosely. Um the Mag 7

plus a few bonus ones. Uh, and we're

gonna try and go through and look,

you're you're a horse. You're a horse,

man.

>> So, we're gonna try and go through the

various companies and rank them based on

how AGI pilled they are and how much

they need AGI. Is that right?

>> Uh, yeah. Basically, so so let let's

pull up the the actual scales. There's

two axes.

>> Um,

>> let's go to the next slide.

>> So, so basically on the horizontal we

have how AGI pilled they are. So, I feel

like that's fairly self-explanatory. You

kind of believe that AI will become

something like uh it can produce the the

median economic output of a person.

>> Yes. Um

>> and and there's a few different ways to

understand if somebody uh believes in

AGI. It could be the rhetoric of the CEO

or the founder. It could be the actions

of the company like they're just speak

louder than

>> actions.

Uh and uh is is there anything else that

could that could lead someone to to show

that they believe in AGI? I guess it's

mostly just the actions and the and and

the words, right?

>> I mean those are the main things that

you can kind of do as a person say or do

things. Yeah.

>> We well we have it. We will be judging

them by both their actions and their

words.

>> Yeah. So so then on the vertical axis we

have uh how much they need AGI. So I

think this is a maybe a little harder. I

so I want to qualify this. Yeah. So um I

mean this doesn't necessarily believe

that you have this kind of sentient you

know AI that's as good as a person but I

think it more so in this context just

means that AI will continue to become

more and more economically valuable.

>> Yes.

>> To where you can kind of sustain um you

know building more and more data centers

you can do more and more capex you know.

>> Yeah. There's a little bit of like how

much will this company be transformed if

the AI wave plays out well?

>> The AI doesn't play it play out well.

How chopped are they? How cooked are

theyact

framework? Um yes and then also yeah if

we if we flash forward nothing really

changes. Total plateau uh total decline

in in token generation or something I is

is the business uh just continuing

business as usual. Okay. So who are we

starting?

>> Let's start uh with Sam Alman.

>> Okay. Sam Alman where is he on that? So

Sam Alman I think this is

>> uh pretty reasonable spot. He believes

in AGI right? He he runs kind of the

biggest AI company. He also needs AGI.

Uh because if you imagine that um you

know if the models stagnate, right, they

they have a lot of capex they need to

fulfill. If models stagnate, like what

are they going to do? Maybe they can

maybe the margins somehow work out, but

you're probably not in a good spot if if

models

>> get worse or people start using AI less

if you're saying one.

>> Um but he's also not, you know, in the

top top corner.

>> Okay.

>> Right. And I think this is you can

justify this through a lot of open

actions. Um, you see stuff like Sora,

you see maybe the erotica. This is not

very

>> Who's who's running?

>> I'm running the laser pointer and I'm

I'm

maybe put him down here.

>> Okay, explain that. Explain that.

>> I think that more and more, at least in

the short term, OpenAI looks like

>> a hyperscaler. Mhm.

>> They're kind of a junior hyperscaler

>> and I think their actions are more, you

know, I I think that open AI,

>> a lot of people, you know, want to say

that they're they're bearish on on Open

AI at the current levels,

>> but ultimately when you look at how

their business is evolving,

>> they seem to me like they'd be fine if

the models plateaued.

>> Yes. But uh yeah, I I I I feel like the

I feel like the mood on the timeline was

much more slide Sam to the left doesn't

believe in AGI. There was that post

about like if if if OpenAI really

believed in AGI, they wouldn't be doing

Sora or they wouldn't be doing the

erotica thing. Like all of those were

very much like needs it but it but kind

of accepts that it's not coming and so

stopped believing it. I think in

response to Jordy I think um because

it's not like this the vertical axis is

also just about like if it's going to

continue to be economically uh you know

economically useful. So if people just

stop using AI in general

>> or or like people if the kind of

>> uh you know revenue stops accelerating

or any of this stuff I think open eye

will be in a bad spot regardless of the

models like actually getting much better

>> like if they just make the models much

more efficient to run you could say

that's not very like agi pilling because

the models aren't getting a lot better.

Yeah.

>> Um, but that's still like

>> but I'm just saying like if there was no

more progress at all like we never got a

new model from any of the labs.

>> I think that OpenAI would add ads, they

would add commerce, they would

>> Yeah. So they might be fine without AGI.

>> They would make agents a lot better.

>> But but I mean the trillion enterprise

the 1.4 4 trillion in commitments. Like

that is hard to justify if it's just the

business today just growing like it's

growing because it's just like it's

good. No, no crazy breakthroughs. Like

just you

>> Yeah, but they're they're they're laying

out the bull case.

>> They're playing they're playing

>> it's crazy. You're laying out the

bullcase saying, "Oh, if they just add

ads, they're going to be able to hit the

1.4 trillion. No problem."

>> That's

>> I'm not saying I'm not saying they they

can pull back on a lot of these

commitments.

They don't like I don't think these are

like going to end up being like

>> real liabilities. The business is just

cooked. They can't hit them, right? So,

>> I'm just saying like

>> I think there's a shot they have. They

could,

>> you know, when when they talk about

>> having success in consumer electronics,

right, which is something you talked

about yesterday.

>> Like they don't need like I I I think

they can probably build a really cool

device. Maybe it could be competitive

with, you know, if if there's

>> if if it can be at all competitive with

an iPhone like that, they could be fine

without AGI, right?

>> We're also getting into

let's get some other people on the board

so that we can see where

>> Yeah, I think it's useful to be relative

because these are not quantitative

numbers.

>> So, uh, next we have Daario. Okay,

>> so Daario is up here. So, I I think

Daario is kind of when you listen to

what Daario is saying, he is,

>> you know, he's extremely AGI pilled,

right? He he this is kind of the reason

why he's he's so anti-China, right?

Because he sees it as an actual race.

This is going to superelligence weapons.

>> It is a national, you know, security.

Totally.

>> It's a problem if China gets there

first.

>> Wait, what is that new sound cue?

>> I don't think Tyler has sound effect.

>> What is it?

>> UAV online.

>> UAV online. Okay, I like that. We got

This is the UAV. We should give this UAV

aesthetics for sure. This is good. Okay,

continue. And but there's also a sense

that he needs AGI because um if if AI

stops becoming if it stops growing as

fast and you imagine that things kind of

settle where they are now,

>> OpenAI is definitely in the lead. So you

you need a lot of continued growth for

for Anthropic to keep uh kind of making

sense economically, I think.

>> Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Sure. Um

>> who else is on here?

>> So I think next is uh Larry.

>> Larry Larry.

>> Larry's in kind of an interesting spot

here. So this is kind of a weird place

to be where you don't believe in AGI but

you need it.

>> Okay.

>> How did he wind up there?

>> So I I think

>> you're probably wondering how I ended up

in this corner.

>> Record scratch freeze frame.

>> So So I I think this is how you factor

in um there's kind of the personal

rhetoric and then there's the actions of

his company. Sure.

>> So when you listen to Eric uh to to

Larry speak,

>> he doesn't seem the type that is

believes in some kind of super

intelligent god that that is going to

come that's going to you know

>> birth this new thing and humanity will

will rise. But then you look at Oracle.

>> Has anyone found his less wrong

username? Is he on there? Yeah. I I

don't think you know I don't think

Larry's reading GRE.

>> Okay. Got it.

>> Um

>> but then but

they are

>> you know they they need AI to work,

right? They are

>> maybe they're covering up a little too

much

>> or maybe not enough depending on how AID

you are, but you know it's not very AGI

pled. So Exactly.

>> It's it's kind of hard to square but

it's a bold bet. Yeah. This is This is a

unique spot. I think this is a unique

spot.

>> He's He's off the grid. Okay. Uh who's

next?

>> So, let's see who's next. Who Who did I

Okay.

>> Okay.

>> I think this is a fairly regional spot.

Yeah.

>> Um

>> obviously there's, you know, there's

some sense where he's slightly AGI

pilled or maybe more than slightly.

>> He believes in the power of the

technology.

>> Yeah. I mean, he's very early on open

AI. He he thinks that AI in general will

become

>> very useful, but maybe it won't become,

>> you know, super intelligent. Maybe it's

not going to replace every person. It's

just a useful tool. The quote I always

go back to is him saying like my

definition of AGI is just greater

economic growth. So show me the economic

numbers and that will be it's like it's

a it's a very practical definition.

>> I think people see him as very

reasonable. He's not getting over skis.

>> Yeah. I like him. I like him in the

center of the grid somewhere. That that

seems like a real

>> he's also um you know if if AI doesn't

work out

>> Yeah.

>> I think Microsoft is in a very good

spot.

>> It's going to stick around.

>> Um you know they're not crazy over

investing in open AI. They have a nice

>> Yeah,

>> they'll write some code.

>> If open eye works out, he'll do very

well. If they don't work out, I think

he's also he's doing quite well.

>> He's hedged. The man's hedged.

>> He's happy to be a leaser.

>> Yeah, that's a good quote, too. Okay.

>> Yeah. Yeah. You wouldn't be leasing if

you were super AGI pilled, right? You're

hoovering up everything. You keeping it

all for yourself.

>> Exactly. I think let's actually talk

about that with I think it's Jensen

next.

>> Okay. Yes, Jensen.

>> So, Jensen,

>> he doesn't believe in AGI. He's the

whole reason why we're here. Explain

that.

>> So, yeah, this is maybe my personal

take. If Jensen was very IGI pled.

>> Yes.

>> I mean, he is the the kind of

>> he he's the rock on which this all is

built on. He has the chips. If he was

AGI pled, he would not be giving out

those chips. He would keep them all to

himself and he would be training his own

model.

>> Okay.

>> So, that's why I think he's he's more on

the doesn't believe in AGI side. Uh but

if there's any kind of downturn in the

AI,

>> could you put could you put Sam like

potentially closer in this direction too

because he's talking about getting into

the

>> like comput reselling for sure.

>> So like if there's so much demand

>> Yeah. Yeah.

>> and the models progressing so quickly,

wouldn't you want to just hold on to all

all that

>> comput I think this would also be

interesting to see over time like Sam

has definitely shifted uh leftwards over

time.

>> He's moving. He's moving. Basically this

summer you've seen a lot of the actions

of open AAI they seem less and less AGI

>> and pretty much everyone has been like

moving the AGI timelines outward which

is which you could transform into no

longer believing in a AGI it's more just

like the timelines have gotten longer

this year broadly pretty much everyone

up timelines there was a new blog post

yesterday it was basically AI 2027 there

was a new one it was AI uh 2032 so it's

basically

>> the same team

>> uh different team but the the team of AI

2027 was promoting it.

>> Did Yeah. AI AI 27uh 2027 should be like

it was actually AI 3027.

>> Typo

AI 3027.

>> We couldn't get that domain.

>> We were just off by a thousand years.

>> Yeah. But there's definitely the sense

where if if AI there's a downturn,

Jensen the stock is going to go down.

>> Yeah.

>> But it's not going to go down as far as

as Larry, right? Because they're they're

still not on they don't have insane.

>> It's not financial advice. Yes. You

know, they don't have, you know,

completely unreasonable capex. They're

not levered up.

>> Sure, sure. Sure.

>> That I know of.

>> Oh, yeah. Their Zcore is through the

roof.

>> Their man Zore is Zcore is through the

roof.

>> They're looking pretty safe.

>> Yes.

>> Um, okay. Let's see the next one.

>> Uh, I believe. Okay. Sundar.

>> Sundar believes in AGI more than Satcha,

you think?

>> Yeah. Well, I I think you can see this

um in kind of they were even earlier in

some sense than Satia, right? With with

Deep Mind. Yeah.

>> Um so, uh I think AI has played a fairly

big part in the Google story very

recently.

>> Um they've always I think basically for

the past 10 years they've been trying to

get into AI. Maybe their actions didn't

actually do much but you know they were

the transformer paper. They

>> you know applied AI like they're

actually applying

>> they self-driving cars discovery and

core Google search is just an AI

product. It's just an index on

information. They're organizing the

>> also I mean compared to Satia I mean

Gemini is a frontier model. Totally.

>> Uh Gemini 3 is supposed to be this

incredible model. Everyone's very

excited. Satcha is not Microsoft is not

trending their own base model yet.

>> Yeah. And and also like it's like there

is a little bit of like if you really

believe in AGI the actions that we see

are you like squirming and being I got

to get in. I I it doesn't matter if I'm

1% behind or 10% behind or 80% behind. I

got to get in. And I think we know

someone who's doing just that. Gabe in

the chat says, "Is this AGI or AG1 from

Athletic Greens like needs needs AG1?"

>> Needs AG1.

>> Mine without AG1 believes in AG1. Now,

we're the only podcast that is not

partnered with AG1.

>> But we do like green. Green is our hero

color. Let's go to the next person.

>> Okay. But also before that, um I I think

Sundar is also definitely below this

line because uh you know, Google has

been doing very well. Uh AI was at at

first I mean it people thought of AI as

like oh this is going to this is going

to destroy Google. This is bad for

Google. So if AI doesn't work then

Google's just in the spot they were

before which is doing very well. If AI

does work then um I mean Gemini is one

of the best models they'll do very well

too.

>> Speaking of Gemini, Google AI Studio

create an AI powered app faster than

ever. Gemini understands the

capabilities you need and automatically

wires them up for you. Get started at

a.studiobuild.

Yeah. Go continue.

>> Okay. So I I think uh yeah next is Zuck.

>> Yes.

>> So So Zuck is also kind of in an

interesting spot. Yes. Um I think

>> I think Zuck is actually someone who has

shifted uh rightward.

>> It's fascinating.

>> Yeah. You've seen this um basic I mean

for a while

>> traveling he's been traveling.

>> Yes.

>> Yeah. So for a while he was doing open

source which in some sense it's very AGI

pilling because you know you're building

you're training a model right? It's like

you're you're moving the the frontier

forward, but it's also it's open source,

which you can kind of think of as being

you're trying to commoditize everything.

Um, you don't think that there's going

to be some super intelligence that will

take all the value that you need to hold

on to. You can kind of give it out. Yep.

>> Uh, and now he's kind of moved towards

closed source. We're going to get the

best people. We're going to train the

best model.

>> It felt like Zuck was sort of like, oh

yeah, AI, like it's this cool thing. I'm

going to check the box. I got my team.

We did this fun little side project.

It's this uh open- source model. We kind

of found our own like little lane, but

we're not like competing in the big

cosmic battle between OpenAI, Anthropic,

uh, Deep Mind, like

>> Well, don't do Do you think that was

just a counterposition to way to w like

try to win the AI war? Go say, "Hey,

we're just going to try to commod

commodify this market

Chinese approach."

>> Yeah, commoditizing your is a good

strategy.

>> Yeah, that makes sense. And then maybe

you could say that, oh, once the Chinese

have have been getting better, he can

kind of step out of that position.

>> Sure.

>> And he's moved towards closed source.

>> Yeah. But now it feels like he's way way

going way harder on the AGI vision,

paying up for it, investing so much

money in it. Uh, you know, it's like

>> and depending on how much he invests,

you could see him neat pushing up.

>> But right now, but right now, the

business is just insane. It's so

phenomenal that even if he winds up

spending all this money and you know

they don't even get a frontier model and

like all the all the the researchers are

like yeah we didn't discover anything

and we're just gone like the business is

fine because it's such a behemoth so

that's why he's having after earnings

they took a fairly big hit so maybe he

should be a little bit higher. Yeah,

maybe a little bit.

>> Meta Broadley is still a very safe play

if if AI doesn't work out.

>> And it was the same thing during the

metaverse. It was like he believed in

the metaverse, he invested in the

metaverse, but he never needed the

metaverse. And so after the stock sold

off like crazy, it went right back up

because everyone realized, wait,

>> he's also raising debt off the balance

sheet, which would kind of could push

him up into this zone, right? If if he's

like, you know, if you're worried about

why why don't you just carry it

yourself? Why don't you carry it

yourself? What do you what do you you

believe in AGI?

>> Just just uh let it ride.

>> Yeah, that's true.

>> Okay, who else are we missing?

>> Okay, so we have most of the mag seven

now

>> is is Jasse. Oh, Elon. Elon.

>> Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Elon. So Elon uh

I mean he's been AGI pill I think for a

very long time.

>> Super AGI pill. I agree with that.

>> Open co-founder even before that he I

think he was fairly big in the in the

safety space. Totally. You see him even

on on Joe Rogan. He was talking about AI

safety. He still believes he hasn't

backed off and AI safety is important

because it's going to become super

intelligent. It's going to take over the

world. We need to be safe.

>> Totally.

>> Um,

>> yeah. Even this was part of the dialogue

around the new comp package, wanting the

the voting power to be able to be part

of securing his robot army.

>> Oh, yeah. Interesting.

>> Yeah. I I think robots are are very

underrepresented on this board. Totally.

And Elon is kind of the the main player

in that space right now.

>> Yeah. So, he talked yesterday about uh

about uh humanoids being sort of an

infinite money glitch. And I feel like

you kind of need uh AGI in order to kind

of unlock the the infinite money uh

glitch.

>> Yes. But at the same time very strong

core business. The cars don't need AGI.

The rockets don't need AGI. Starlink

doesn't need AGI. So he So he's so he's

not entirely indexed on it in the way

the Foundation Labs are. Right.

>> Yeah. I mean there's definitely a

significant part of the Tesla market cap

that is basically betting on robots.

Totally. But there's also a big part of

it that's just

>> but that's why he's in he's in the

middle of the needs are fine without

it's like

everything is needs

>> yeah but that's just one piece of the

>> AGI more than

>> SpaceX

>> SpaceX

>> yeah SpaceX is very seems very

uncorrelated with the AI

>> totally totally totally

>> unless you have the data

>> he's happy to be a telecom Baron

>> he's happy to yeah he's happy to be the

new Verizon uh who else is

>> okay so I believe now is Andy Jasse

>> Jasse yeah so Um he is I I think broadly

does not believe in AGI although he you

know fairly major stake in anthropic.

>> Yeah.

>> Uh which maybe is very AI but but they

have not

>> he's hedging with anthropic.

>> Yeah.

>> Yeah. I think that's basically what you

can say. He doesn't seem

>> at all worried about kind of the core

business AWS seems to be

>> Google building their position in

anthropic. I saw some headline about

that. That was wild. Imagine like Sundar

such a beast. and Sacha really both of

them they just have huge stakes

>> broadly Andy Jesse seems very

quantitative he's focused on the numbers

realistic he's not making these you know

grandio statements about the future of

of intelligence or what humanity is

going to be like

>> yeah when you look at the AWS earnings

it feels like they invest when the

demand shows up and they build data

centers when there is demand and they

they are not in the business of of doing

you know a 10-year hypothetical sci-fi

forecast based on breakthrough.

>> So Ben Thompson on the recent Sharp

Tech, we were listening to it on the way

in. He was talking about how

>> uh Amazon has repeatedly said, "Hey,

we're we're supply constrained. We have

a lot more demand than we can fulfill

with this new deal with OpenAI, the $ 38

billion, which only got announced

Monday,

>> which again feels like forever ago at

this point. But, uh, Ben was kind of

hypothesizing that they kind of let

OpenAI jump the line because that $ 38

billion deal was starting effectively

immediately. Yeah. Versus some of the

other like Larry's deal with OpenAI

>> was announced. this like massive backlog

is uh revenue that uh cannot be

generated in a meaningful way today

because they have to build the data

centers that can actually deliver the

compute.

>> Yeah. I mean and you know Amazon has

been building data centers. They're

building data centers. They're basically

they built all the data centers for

Anthropic, but it still seems very um

kind of restrained. It's not overly

ambitious. Anthropic has had issues with

capacity and it's probably because you

know Andy Jasse doesn't want to get over

his skis. he doesn't want to build too

much.

>> So, I think that's why he's kind of on

the left side. And also, I mean, if you

think AI doesn't work and we're going to

kind of be in this, you know, the same

spot of web 2.0, you need you need a

AWS, you need your EC2 server.

>> Um, I think he's very well positioned

there.

>> Um, and then I think the last one is Tim

Cook.

>> Tim Cook. Let's hear for Tim Cook.

crim criminally underpaid but has done a

fantastic job not getting over his skis.

>> Yeah, I this one I think is

>> contention

>> fairly self-explanatory. He I mean he

seems

>> he doesn't believe in AGI. He doesn't

believe in LLM doesn't believe in chat

bots apparently.

I don't know the new the new Gemini deal

signaling

>> two years ago Apple was like yeah we're

we're not we're not doing that stuff

but I think what's what's under

discussed that my takeaway from the our

conversation with Mark German and

Apple's ambitions around their new uh

LLM experience with Gemini is that I

think that there's a very real scenario

where Apple

>> like wants to compete for the same user

base as open AI They want that like

transactionbased revenue, that commerce

revenue.

>> Yeah, I I just I disagree on this point,

but um

>> I'm not I'm not saying that I'm putting

their odds at like winning that market

at over like 10%. But I think that they

would be right to realize that it's

potentially an opportunity.

>> Yeah. Is it a billion dollars a year

that they're paying Google for

>> I believe that's the number. Yeah.

>> That feels really low, doesn't it?

I I I don't know. It just feels super

low to me in among all the different

deals that are going on when I think

about like when I just think about like

the value of AI on the iPhone

>> and and you're like $1 billion like when

I when I think about like what is the

value that we're that the market broadly

is putting on like AI for the enterprise

for whatever

>> when when Sundar on the Google earnings

call was talking about their top I think

10 customers and how many like trillions

of tokens they were using, but it really

was netting out to like $150 million of

like actual revenue.

>> And so this is this will be their

biggest customer for Gemini on day one

>> until one of our listeners gets on,

>> of course. Yeah. And I think I mean even

with the with the Gemini news, uh Apple

still seems very uh kind of reactive to

AI. They're not uh kind of seeing, oh,

this future where AI is going to do

everything and moving there right now.

Yeah, they're kind of seeing where the

demand is, seeing where the users are,

and then moving, which I think is very

kind of, you know, classically,

>> you know, that's how business work. It's

not very

>> also on on that point of $1 billion,

like I have no idea how can they

possibly know the amount of inference

that's going to happen in Siri plus

Gemini over a year period. Like there's

just no way to predict that. Or can

they? Like I I feel like if the

integration's good, there will be a ton

of queries. It will it'll

>> I didn't read the 1 billion headline.

Chad can correct me if I'm wrong, but I

didn't read the $1 billion headline. I

felt like that was a technology license,

not necessarily infring

on top of that.

>> Yeah.

>> Okay. Or or maybe or maybe Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Maybe they're licensing Gemini and

then they pay per query for like the

energy and the capex like

>> couldn't a lot of this stuff be done on

device

>> for sure. Yeah, because Gemini uh Gemma

has like bakedown models that could be

smaller. So, that's possible.

>> Chad says, "Where's Tyler on the chart?"

>> Feels like Tyler isn't AGI pled anymore.

>> I actually am on the chart here.

>> Uh I am. So, I'm over here.

>> So, I uh Yeah, I I think I'm very AGI

pled, right? I you know, I'm ready for

the Dyson sphere. I think it's you know,

only a matter of years. Handful.

>> Only a matter of years.

>> It's it's a couple thousand thousand

days away. You need to you need to

publish a broadcast 2026.

>> AGI 2025.

>> AGI.

>> We still have a month left.

>> We still have a month left. AGI on

Christmas. This Christmas. It's coming

this Christmas.

>> This holiday season.

>> But why do you need AGI?

>> I think I also need AGI.

>> Why do you need AGI?

>> Well, I mean, look, if you look at the

current jobs data for uh like college

age students, postgrad, it's looking

pretty bad.

>> It's bad.

>> So, I think you kind of need AGI to

really boost the economy. If if AI does

not work, the macro economy is looking

not good.

>> Oh, sure, sure, sure. Okay.

>> So,

>> I feel pretty bad about my job outlook

uh without AGI.

>> Sure, sure, sure. Even though you're

already employed.

>> That's hilarious. Uh well, thank you for

taking us through. Uh

>> uh chat wanted to know where would you

put Lisa Sue?

>> AMD.

>> Yeah. So, Lisa Sue, I I think she's

broadly been um quite reactive actually.

she uh you've really only seen AMD start

kind of

>> you don't get credit for being reactive

is what you're saying.

>> Yeah. You you um I think it's really

only over the past year maybe that she's

been making any kind of deals, right?

You saw George H. Hots maybe a year or

two ago basically trashing AMD chips for

how bad they were in

>> but maybe she's she's given so much of

the company away. Maybe she thinks that

shares won't have very much value in the

future. She's like happy to just give

away 10% of the company.

>> Yeah. So, I I think I would if I had to

pick somewhere, I would say that she is

she's honestly getting a little close to

Larry uh in that AMD it's very much an

like an AI play still, right? They're a

chip company obviously. Um but you don't

get the you don't get the feeling that

she's a true believer.

>> Yeah. Yeah.

>> That tracks.

>> Okay. The

>> the new Siri I'm reading through some of

Mark Gurman's reporting. Speaking of

Apple and AI, the new Siri is planned

for March, give or take, as has been the

case for months. Apple has been saying

for 9 months it's coming in 2026. Apple

simply reiterated on that. And then on

the actual deal, it's a $1 billion deal

for a 1.2 trillion parameter artificial

intelligence model developed by Google

to help power its o and overhaul the uh

Siri AI voice assistant. The two

companies are finalizing an agreement

that would see Apple pay roughly 1

billion annually for access to Google's

technology with the Google model

handling series summarizer and planner

functions. Apple intends to use the

Google model as an interim solution

until its own models are powerful enough

and is working on a one trillion

parameter cloud-based model that it

hopes to have ready for consumer

applications as soon as next year. Uh

that is that's interesting. I feel like

they're going to have to pay a lot more

to actually run all the queries,

generate all the tokens, but I'm sure

we'll find out more as Google reports

earnings and Apple reports earnings. Um,

before we get to that, let me tell you

about graphite.dev, code review for the

age of AI. Graphite helps teams on

GitHub ship higher quality software

faster. Um, what else is in the news

today? We have We are

>> We have some breaking news through the

timeline. What's the breaking news? TJ

Parker has finally found a new car that

he likes.

>> Huge.

>> Guess what it is. Guess

>> uh a new car that he likes. Uh it's not

the Sado. It's not the Lamborghini

Huracan Strato.

>> No, it is the

>> Wait

R. Look at this. Look at this. Finally

found a new vehicle I quite like and

great gas mileage to boot.

>> This was the problem with your Ford

Raptor. It wasn't the R.

>> It wasn't the R. That was

>> You only had 600 horsepower instead of

eight.

>> That was the main problem. I also needed

to park it in uh in cities.

>> Oh, yeah.

>> Which is just absolutely brutal.

>> Yeah. What are the specs on the on the

on the Raptor R again? It's uh it's a

pretty wild. How much how much

horsepower? Uh Raptor R.

>> 0 to 60 and 3.9

3

>> 720 horsepower. 5.2 L supercharged V8.

Fantastic. It's kind of the Julius.ai of

trucks. It really is.

>> AI data analyst. Connect your data, ask

questions in plain English, get insights

in seconds. No coding required. Um, I'm

trying to go through the timeline. We

got Will Manitis talking about some

other stuff. Um, let's pull up this post

from Pegasus since it's relevant to uh

the overview we just did. Pegasus says,

"Altman today, of course, he's talking

about yesterday. We're looking at

selling compute, but we need as much as

possible. Zuck, last week we could sell

compute.

>> Are we in a shortage or not?" because

both are saying they're buying as much

of it as they can and thinking about

selling it.

>> That's very interesting. Yeah. I mean,

the the the supply and demand dynamics I

I I like that that story about Jensen

where like he understands the dynamic

here, but there's still you get kind of

crushed if there's a sell-off in terms

of demand. Like you just have to go back

and study what was what was going on

during the crypto boom for Nvidia. Like

during the crypto boom for Nvidia, it

was like buy as many as possible. Just

ramp ramp ramp. And then they literally

had a glut.

>> Yeah. And again,

>> completely had a glut and they took huge

right offs because they were making

>> a steel man here. If you're a large tech

company and you have the ability to and

the the financing capital to buy a lot

of GPUs,

>> you're you're it's not the worst idea to

buy as much as you can so that you have

preferred access to it and then resell

some if you have more than you need,

>> right?

>> Yeah.

>> But uh yeah, the question is

>> historically that has not been how

things have been done. like uh I I I

understand the the the pitch there, but

I mean we just talked to David Bizooki

from uh from Roblox and he was saying

that look we had our we had our own

onrem but then we had we had spikes of

demand and so we went to the

hyperscalers for that because they can

load balance across well people are

playing Roblox here and then maybe they

watch some Netflix over there and then

they are storing you know all sorts of

different data and there's different

workloads that happen at different times

and So um traditionally the the uh like

the hyperscalers have been able to serve

service like multiple users across them.

Uh jumping straight to uh selling

compute. I think that the timelines are

a little bit funky on this one. It seems

it seems it seems odd. It seems rushed.

It seems rushed especially when your

when your core product is growing so

quickly. Like Google Cloud Platform was

released what seven years after Google

launched. Same thing with AWS. Same

thing with Azure. Like these were very

mature businesses, very stable

businesses with cash flow that were able

to justify the investment. It was not

something that was done as part in the

growth phase as much. I don't know. Uh

speaking of other wild uh wild uh you

know new business lines, Elon apparently

confirmed that Tesla is going to build a

semiconductor fab.

>> Yep.

>> I've been advocating this for this for a

long time. I'd love to hear um what Elon

had to say. But first, let me tell you

about fall, the generative media

platform for developers. The world's

best generative image, video, and audio

models all in one place. Develop and

fine-tune models with serverless GPUs

and on demand clusters.

>> Let's play Elon.

What do we got here? Let's play Elon

>> from our suppliers. Uh, it's still not

enough. So,

I think we may have to do a Tesla

Terraab.

>> Whoa,

>> great name.

>> So,

>> that is a bombshell.

>> It's like giga but way bigger.

>> Terra terabyte.

>> He's feeling good right now. I I can't

see any other way to get to the volume

of chips that that we're looking for. Um

so I think we're probably going to have

to build a gigantic chip app.

>> Morris Jang TSNC is like no actually I'm

fine. I will I will supply you. Samsung

is like I'm good. I will do it.

>> Pull up this other pull up this other

video of Optimus.

>> This crazy because there was some new

moves of Optimus

uh getting getting jiggy.

Let's see. It is at the bottom of the

Tyler app. Look at this. Let's see.

>> Look at this.

>> Okay. Uh, so this was this was shown in

contrast to the first Optimus, which was

just a guy in a suit. So

>> this thing this thing has motion.

>> Yeah, it's not bad. It feel this feels

like getting to getting pretty close to

unitry level. Definitely at that level.

Um,

I don't know.

Imagine you're working late at the

office one night and this thing just

walks out onto the floor and starts

looking at you and doing these moves.

>> Yeah. Weird. It's so it's so weird how

these new projects like they seem

like a lot I understand why a lot of

people look at this with skepticism but

at the same time like it just doesn't

seem that complicated to just

manufacture that thing and ship it like

like they do it at at you know in China

they do it all over the place. This

doesn't seem that insane. And at the

same time, like Apple couldn't ship a

car, so like these new projects like

they do kind of

>> Elon's shipped some cars, though.

>> Yeah. Yeah. Uh I I I meant it more as

like as like if you're doing one thing,

it can sometimes be hard to branch out

to the other thing.

>> I remember a few weeks ago there was a

headline around uh Tesla ordering like

$600 million worth of actuators.

>> Yeah. Like it seems like they're going

into some sort of production.

>> Yeah. Um, I wonder what who they're

going to send.

>> You don't need 600 million for like test

just for testing.

>> It's just a the the car analogy is so

tricky because it's like uh most people

that bought Teslas already had cars,

right? And so it was just like a one for

one slot swap.

Who are you replacing with this? You

know, it's tricky. What do you think?

Well, with this you can replace uh like

an exotic dancer.

>> Yes, that's true. I don't know if many

people have that an exotic dancer in

their life who they're ready to who

they're ready to replace. Um it seems I

I don't know. It'll just be very

interesting to see where these things

actually diffuse. Like because if you

sell them if you sell them for one price

to consumers to do their laundry but

they work in an industrial capacity like

people will just buy them and use them

for that. But when we talk to people who

are in industrial environments they're

like I definitely don't want a humanoid

robot for that. I'd rather just like a

big massive robotic arm that's like

bolted to the ground and can actually

lift like 10,000 lbs as opposed to one

that can only lift like 50 lbs. I don't

know. Uh Ryan says they're gonna sell

them to the police. We'll see. Maybe

they certainly would be uh I don't know

backup.

>> I think they would be pretty effective

deterrence.

>> Maybe. Maybe. I like Vtorio having some

fun on the timeline going viral. Get

community noted. Vtorio said Elon Musk

now has $1 trillion in his bank account.

That's a thousand times$1 billion. He

could give every single human on Earth1

billion and still be left with 992

billion. Let that sink in. People love

this funny math whenever it drops. Uh

what else is going on? The the uh the

humanoid uh yes, China has a similar

humanoid robotic project, although it's

way way scarier because it went full

terminator mode on this. Of course, this

one is hooked up to to power. But

>> yes, so this video was in response to um

earlier this week there was a I think it

was Unitry like presentation and they

brought out this new robot and it was

walking with such like

>> swagger

>> natural gate. Yeah. Basically that that

people thought it was actually just a

person in the

>> and so they replied with uh with the

fully stripped down.

>> Wow. That is remarkable. Yeah. Oh,

because they put it they put it uh they

put like the suit on the robot.

>> Yeah. It was like a neo. It looked kind

of like the 1x robot. We're getting

We're getting spooky spooky territory.

This is pretty crazy. Oh wow. Yeah, it

does look human. It does look human. I'm

looking at the other video. Sorry. Uh

let me tell you about Turbo Puffer.

Search every bite serless vector and

full text search built from first

principles and object stores.

>> Cheaper.

>> You see these new logos?

>> Oh wow. Stacked.

>> Stacked.

>> Absolutely stacked.

Chris Baky says, "In the last 10 months,

three very talented friends have joined

separate hot earlystage startups in

senior roles and quit after realizing

that the company's actual revenue was

significantly less than what the founder

had told them during the interview

process and and shared online."

>> H few things to clarify clarify. I'm not

joking. In two of three in two of the

three cases, it would be hard to tell

that you were joining a bad actor

company. on the surface solid investors

founders worked at unicorn companies. Uh

the third was maybe more obvious. The

only ones who really lose here are the

employees. The investors have 200 port

codes and can afford some losses and our

industry doesn't really pursue founders

over fraud/ming

information up to a certain point. Four,

if you're thinking about joining an

early stage startup, ask to see their

Stripe andor signed contracts before you

join. Not bad advice. Um

>> yeah, again this going back to spring,

right? that just felt like there was

this like every founder was feeling this

insane pressure to show like 1 to 10

million of of of uh like a 1 to 10

million ramp that was just insane.

>> Yeah. And and and the weird dynamic is

that like as that pressure ramps up, you

just get more and more incentive to fake

it with uh community adjusted ARR and

contracts that don't actually stick and

um all sorts of different uh twists on

something that's like is it actually

cash? Is it actually people coming in?

Are they on long contracts? Um the

quality of revenue has been maybe

degrading but also just maybe um uh in

just just you know uh it's just been

easier to game than ever. There's been

more incentive to game it than ever. Uh

so stay safe out there folks.

>> Uh Kazakhstan has signed anou to buy up

to two billion of advanced chips from

Nvidia. Let's hit the gong for

Kazakhstan.

>> Warm it up. Warm it up. Warm it up.

Boom. Great hit. Great hit for our

friends in Kazakhstan. Good to see them

getting into the game.

>> Does Does Borat take place in

Kazakhstan?

>> Isn't that Isn't that the whole thing?

Maybe they should do Borat 3

>> about data centers.

>> He he he goes to a data center.

>> Sasha Bear Cohen would be ones his role

all to bring AI to Kazakhstan. Sasha

Barra Cohen doing a doc like a yeah just

on AI in general.

>> Incredible. It'd

>> be amazing.

>> So I can use it to do better web search.

>> So I can use it as an autocomplete.

>> You're not doing the Borat voice,

brother.

>> I'm not going to do the Borat voice.

>> I will do the profound voice. Get your

brand mentioned in chat. Reach millions

of consumers who are using AI to

discover new products and brands. go get

a demo. Uh co the Kobe SE letter says,

"Breaking Nvidia's losses accelerated to

negative 5% on the day, now down 16%

since Monday's high." That marks a drop

of 88 800 billion since Monday. Wow,

that is a wild selloff. Uh didn't Tyler

quote this and say, "Is this bullish?"

or something like that.

>> No, that was on the the Door Dash. They

went down 20%.

>> Everyone's down 10 or 20%. We need that.

>> Yeah. Whether you whether you beat or

miss, you're going down. Wait, is this

true? Reguel

said he's working with Elon to bring

Optimus to the UFC. That would be

incredible.

>> Please don't be fake news.

>> Please don't be fake news. We need

robots in the UFC. I mean, Rogan and

Palmer Lucky were talking about it on on

their podcast and uh it certainly seems

like a hilarious and wild thing even

just as a as an exhibition match before

the real UFC. Uh get an Optimus though.

Here's a question. Would Elon want a

human to thrash on Optimus? Is that good

for his brand? Or would he want Optimus

to win? And if Optimus wins, then is

that actually entertaining? I don't

know.

>> I think putting Optimus up against the

best MMA fighters in the world.

>> Yeah.

>> Is fine.

>> It's impossible though, right? Because

if you just kick metal, you'll just

break your foot and if you punch, they

This was Arya Emanuel at the All-In

Summit.

>> Yeah. Uh, it was released I guess one

day ago when he was talking about

wanting

>> Wait, wait, what a weird what a what a

crazy crazy timing. That's so

interesting.

>> Uh, I saw what he's creating. The man's

a genius. I want to do a UFC fight with

his robots.

>> Yeah. Yeah.

>> Um, very cool. Uh, Heisenberg uh is

sharing

>> Yeah.

>> sharing a little bit of red here.

Microsoft down 10% in the last 8 days.

Nvidia 12% in the last 4 days.

>> Palanteer at 16%.

uh down 16%, Meta down 18%, losses uh

have accelerated. Uh compound 248 was

sharing yesterday. He's like, uh when I

clipped this uh I didn't expect to crash

the markets globally,

but he uh certainly that clip uh seems

to have played a a part in this uh

little sell-off. always take a victory

lap for for being world for having world

historic consequences. I I actually

think that that particular clip was like

less than 5% of the total views on that

clip because there were other people

that clipped it and it got for sure went

everywhere.

>> But always claim victory. That's the

lesson. That's right.

>> Um anyway, we have our first guest of

the show, Katherine Bole from Andre and

Horowits joining us. She's in the stream

waiting room. Welcome to the TV channel,

Catherine. How are you doing?

>> It's great to be here. Good to see you

guys. It's finally the night vision

goggles sound. You already got new

soundboard today.

>> I felt a little tactical. I felt a

little tactical. It's great to see you.

>> Do you should the Department of War get

a soundboard during these speeches? Uh I

heard uh I heard Haggath was giving a

big speech. Is it are they sticking

mostly to uh to the the the the cheers

and the clapping or are we doing firing

off musketss? Are we firing off cannons?

Is there pageantry? pageantry alive in

the Department of War.

>> Bring the pageantry back to the

Department of War. That is that is

important. You guys You guys should

definitely have your own sound for them.

>> You guys are getting the the first look

at a a major speech.

>> Yes.

>> Um so it is it is just ending right now.

I I just topped off the live stream. Um

and I can tell you my my phone is

blowing up with just how many people are

enthusiastic, not only in the venture

community, but just across Washington

about what has been said in the speech.

dramatic repercussions for defense and

for Silicon Valley and the broader

defense innovation. So, it's an

extraordinary speech. You'll be hearing

a lot more about it, but you're getting

the first look.

>> Fantastic. Take us through it.

>> And uh and and and it is it is it is

definitely um I'd say, you know, for the

last say 10 years or so, we've been

talking about defense reform, why it is

so important uh for for increasing

competition for startups. Um, and what

is amazing about this speech is that

it's not just lip service to yes, of

course, we need competition. Basically,

what you've been hearing in Washington

for the last 10 years. It goes line by

line.

Hex Seth actually made a very very funny

comment. He said, "If you're watching

this on Fox News, your eyes are glazing

over

>> because this is the most boring thing

you've ever heard." But for everyone in

the room, from the the Andres, the

Palunteers, the SpaceX's of the world,

all the way down to the little guys to

the Primes, it was like it was like

Christmas come early, right? because

it's it it really is changing the way

that acquisitions are going to happen

inside the department uh in ways that

are so meaningful not only for Silicon

Valley companies but for private equity

backed companies and and for the primes.

Uh he basically told the primes in the

very beginning you have to be investing

more in research and development. The

companies that have been getting the

large programs cannot just continue as

as as business used to be done. He

actually quoted um Donald Rumsfeld.

Didn't tell us he was quoting Donald

Rumsfeld for the first five minutes and

basically went line by line through a

speech that he gave on September 10th,

2001.

>> About how important it is to change the

defense acquisition process. And he

said, you probably don't recognize this,

but the speech I am giving now is

actually Rumsfeld's

>> wait September 10th.

>> Yes. Yes.

>> The day before just happened to be

>> happened to be the day before where he

said we have to process.

>> That is a crazy coincidence. it very

very crazy coincidence, but it shows you

just how long this has been going on.

Sure. Sure. Sure. So, I'm I'm I'm happy

I have my notes here because I was

taking notes throughout throughout the

speech.

>> Yeah. Let's go line by line.

>> Let startups know what what's going to

be changing. Yes, please.

>> Um but the the first thing that I think

is really important for for all of the

startups in Silicon Valley is that he

mentioned and called out the importance

of commercial first technology. So this

is going to shock people who are not in

the defense world that right now if you

need to build a product specifically for

the department of defense the vast

majority of contracts that are given out

are not given out with a purview of what

exists already in the marketplace that

we can buy. Yes. uh people, you know,

it's a requirements process, a very long

300 day and you know, requirements

process actually that that he called out

that requires the different program

offices to say what they need to write

it down and then to find people who will

build explicitly for those requirements.

They are doing away with the old

requirements process and saying this is

not what we're going to do anymore. We

are going to focus on commercial first

technologies. Even if there is a

technology out there that is only 85% of

what we need, we will we will buy it or

that that is that is the goal and then

we will turn it into what we need to for

actually for the warfire.

>> This is CS versus got for the DoD DO

word nerds like commercial offtheshelf

versus government offtheshelf. Uh this

is what Anderol and all the defense tech

community has been beating the drum on

for basically a decade now and it feels

like it's finally getting echoed back

from the administration. Is that

correct?

>> Yes.

>> Yes. And there was there was a lot the

administration and the EO that was was

out a couple months ago said that they

wanted commercial first technology. Now

you're hearing it straight from the

secretary's mouth. There's always dust

ups about this on Capitol Hill with with

you know various parties arguing over

whether we need more studies or whether

we should just do this. It looks like

now th this is a real change that's

about to happen and it's going to be

transformative for for all of the

startup community. What it really says

is that the best products will win.

>> Yeah. Who are who are the losers here?

>> Well, I think I mean the major loser

from this speech is the primes. I mean

he did he said I don't want to pick on

anyone. I'm not going to call out

companies but you have to be investing

in research and technology. like you

have to be the the fact that these that

the primes only spend 2% uh on on

research and development uh and are are

focused on you know constantly kind of

maintaining the status quo that is not

going to happen on his watch% I think it

was a

>> 2% on R&D

>> yes um and and and haven't historically

been been acquiring ventureback

companies so this is also the problem

where they're they're they're really

just on a much uh slower timeline than

is needed by by the department um and

and I'd say that the the takeaway away

from the speech and I think the sound

bite you'll be hearing more and more

about is that the new process is really

going to be used to enable speed and

volume

>> and one of the things that I think you

know a number of companies have been

talking about for a long time is that by

taking more risk in the acquisition

process you take less risk on the

battlefield and he actually echoed that

he said we want to take more risk we

want to have we want to reward the

people inside of the department who are

take making risky decisions or

supposedly risky decisions because

they're acquiring new technology ies or

or from companies that are that are not

Rathon and and and the the kind of big

guys, right? But what what they what

they ultimately said is like they want

those the the people who are going to be

making those acquisition decisions to be

taking on the risk because it takes less

it will affect the risk of the war

fighter, right? It will make things

safer for the war fighter. So, it's it's

basically linking this entire process,

bringing it back to to what needs to be

done um before wars start and before

products get into the world. this is

like a a top-own directive and then who

are the players that need to actually

put this into like who are the kind of

key players that need to put this into

practice?

>> Yeah. So, I mean like the the the main

thing that I this is definitely a

message sent to Congress because there's

there's currently, you know, two

different bills going through on

Congress that are actually pretty

aligned and in in most of the things

that they're saying. There's a few call

outs where I think you'll you'll see

sort of um some some sort of back and

forth between the House and the Senate,

but but this is definitely a call to

them. Like this is happening on on sec

the secretary's watch. This is something

that he cares deeply about. This is

something that the administration cares

about. And so it definitely is a huge

push, not just a not just a major

signal, but they sort of outlined this

is how we're going to change things

inside the department. One of the

biggest things that they do is is they

created this sort of portfolio-based

approach of how they're going to be

allocating capital to companies. Now,

and this is always shocking when I

explain to people that this is this is

revolutionary because you'd say in a in

a normal company, you're given a budget

and if the vendor you choose is, you

know, fails, you'll go to another vendor

and you'll use that capital in order to

to buy whatever product you need. That

is not how the department works. And so

with this new portfolio-based approach,

they're basically saying, "We're going

to give the what what's known as the

PAEEs, the the portfolio acquisition

executives, the right to say, okay, if

this if this one product that we

acquired 60 days ago isn't working on

the battlefield, we can use the rest of

the money and reprogram it for a product

that is working."

>> And right now, that is that is not

possible inside the Department of

Defense. Right now, you have to write a

whole another list of requirements and

ways that you would build a new product

in theory that can take years to

actually build. and by the time it's

built, it it it isn't meeting the

requirements or the needs of the war

fighter. So, the fact that they're even

changing the budgeting process and that

they have an explicit call out of how

they're going to do that, that will show

up in this year's NDAA once it's passed

and it will be the way that things are

done from now on.

>> A couple extraordinary.

>> Yeah. So th this means that uh if a

contract is allocated to a certain

company and they're they start

underperforming in real time, the the

person who's in charge of of allocating

that budget can basically say, "Hey,

this other this other startup like we're

we're going to like rotate this budget

over here because

>> yes,

>> they're actually going to deliver on

this." I've heard super

>> Yeah, I've heard some horror stories uh

and even opportunities where some of the

bigger primes have just been have just

held on to contracts forever. They're

kind of like barely delivering. They're

kind of like trying to deliver and

startups coming in and saying like,

"Hey, we'll actually take this over."

And sometimes those deals can can

happen, but uh this seems like it'll be

a lot more effective.

>> Are there any new categories that are

opening up generally? I mean in we we we

we we you know we've heard this week

about like data centers in space. So if

you're tracking like data centers or

space like that's a story. Um but I

remember secretary of the army was

talking about uh modularity of weaponry

taking apart a drone fixing it are uh I

feel like the whole idea of drones or

autonomous submarines these are new

categories that sort of opened up. There

have been a number of competitors, but

at the thematic like within defense

technology level, are there any

categories that you think this new

administration is maybe more excited

about than ever before?

>> Yeah. So, I mean, you you mentioned

modularity and what the Secretary of the

Army is talking about. I mean, this is

this was actually called out in in

Secretary Hegv's speech where he said,

"Part of the reason why we need these PA

paees and were formerly called PEOS, but

PAEEs, these portfolio- based

approaches, is because right now, if you

want to take something apart and put it

back together, you have to build an

entirely different system to acquire

those parts."

>> Uh, and you have to go through a

requirements process. So, if you're

building modular based approaches that

update in real time and he actually said

like, "We want it to be more like

software. we want to do software in

updates in real time and not have to go

through a requirements-based approach.

You you need um to to be be thinking

about things in terms of modularity. So

I think there's there's a lot of

different even just changing the way the

budgeting works, it opens up a lot of

different techn technologies that were

that were you know not able to to

participate in the acquisition system

because they didn't want to go through

um the the requirements process or they

knew they wouldn't meet the requirements

that are being put out by the Department

of War. So it is it is going to

radically change I think not only the

types of products you're seeing in the

hands of the war fighter but just how

quickly they get there.

>> Makes a lot of sense. Switching gears a

little bit. Uh Sam Alman suggested on

Wednesday this idea of like my my

interpretation of it was kind of like a

go model for uh AI factories. Without

commenting on on that specifically, can

you give us the history of go when and

how they work well and what kind of some

of the challenges have been?

>> Well, what what I actually didn't see

what can you give me a little more

context on what what

>> Yeah. So, I'll read exactly what he

said. So, this was in response to uh

clarifying the the sort of uh backs stop

gate. Um he said uh

so anyways he he basically said obvious

one we do not have or want government

guarantees for open AI data centers and

then like later in the post he said what

we do think might make sense is

governments building and owning their

own AI infrastructure and then the

upside of that should flow to the

government as well. We can imagine a

world where governments decide to

offtake a lot of computing power and get

to decide how to use it and it may make

sense to provide lower costs of capital

to do so. Building a strategic national

reserve of computing power makes a lot

of sense, but this should be for the

government's benefit, not the benefit of

private companies. And sure, just in

some of like some of the ideas around

this just reminded me of of how Gokos

have have worked in uh in defense tech

where the government is basically saying

like we we have we're willing to commit

resources and land to like a certain

initiative and then you can have the

private market potentially pay a role. I

have no idea how uh how this would that

how this would look like uh in the AI

context, but I just want I I just

thought it'd be helpful to understand

like how these sort of like public

private uh partnerships have worked in

the past, specifically in defense.

>> Yeah. Well, no, I can I can talk to one

that was actually discussed today. So

the secretary of the army was on

squatbox this morning talking about

specifically if we are giving the land

and security for for massive data

centers could the army have its own data

centers and be one of the largest

providers and actually offtake that

compute. So I do think that there are

are ongoing conversations. Candidly I

haven't seen, you know, massive

conversations about how it's going to be

enact enacted by the Department of War,

but I thought it was very interesting

that the Secretary of the Army was

basically saying that you this is

something that they would be very

interested in that they know that they

are going to need their own compute um

and that if there is sort of a trade-off

of we provide the land and the security

uh there should be an understanding that

that that compute then goes to to the

army. So, I don't know that they fully

fleshed out the details of of those

sorts of things, but I do think there's

a lot of conversations about this. Um,

and you know, it's it's good to hear

that that Sam is also talking about that

in certain ways, but I do think for the

Department of War, they know that it's

top of mind, and I think they're being a

lot more experimental, which again comes

back to if you have um a system of of

requirements um that that is far more

sort of open, I'd say, to

experimentation or working with new

companies that can do that. Um, it does

give the the, you know, secretaries of

the army or the navy a lot more

authority to make those decisions on

kind of the the actual things like

compute or energy that they need. Yeah.

How do you think about the the flow

between like uh entrepreneurial ideas

like problems that are identified in the

private sector? Somebody starts a

company like with Anderl is like the

flipped model. This idea that R&D should

maybe live outside of the taxpayer dime

uh be funded by venture capitalists. uh

that company gets built. Eventually

those ideas are percolating into DC and

then the the world updates, America

updates, we change the way we work. Uh

things get better, but Anderole benefits

and people are pointing the finger, you

know, like, hey, you you you're the one

that advocated for this. And I feel like

that's kind of where Sam's caught right

now. Uh where OpenAI is advocating for

things that I think are good for

America, but also might benefit OpenAI.

And so he has to do this delicate dance

of like well I was independent on this

one but this one does benefit me etc

etc. It's like such a communications

challenge. Do you think it's like do you

have any best practices for like how to

not get over your skis on that?

>> Well I think it's I think as you said

it's sort of a typical Washington story

where in order for things to change you

you do have to sort of you know kind of

Washington's a meme town just as Silicon

Valley is a meme town. you have to be

able to tell your story why it's so

important. I would argue that that Ander

was exceptional at at really telling the

story of why you need attitudable

systems, why you need modular systems.

Basically, the the kind of, you know,

the the kind of uh frameworks that we're

using today inside the Department of War

came from those memes being established.

But yes, if you're if you're successful

inside of of Washington, you're going to

tick off a lot of different people.

Totally. um and you're going to to

certainly upset sort of the the

bureaucratic class. And what was very

interesting too about this this speech

is that the secretary actually called

out the bureaucratic class and said like

this is not a problem with people that

we have. This is not a problem with

innovation or technology. It is the

bureaucracy that is stopping us from

making great decisions.

>> And I think like that that is something

that is that is you know always been the

problem with DC. Um, and I think, you

know, the the the most important thing

that companies can always do is just

continue saying what they believe, going

to Washington, building those

relationships. And I think if anything

over the last 10 years, this defense

defense acquisition reform, which

everyone said was impossible, is now

actually at our fingertips and going to

happen because it makes sense. The

argument has been made. It's been made

in dozens of different ways um across

many administrations and everyone's in

agreement on it now. So for founders

that that feel like, oh gosh, like look

look at these great companies that are

getting backlash because they they've,

you know, kind of spread their own

gospel and now they're being attacked

for it, like that's actually, I think, a

sign of progress. Um, if you're being

attacked for what you're what you're

advocating in Washington, um, that's

usually a good thing.

>> Yeah. No, that makes a lot of sense.

>> Uh, final question. What is your most

up-to-date guidance for your portfolio

companies around the shutdown?

>> Yeah. Yeah. No. So, I mean it it

definitely is having an impact, right?

Like the the companies that were

expecting contracts to come in or

reprogramming dollars like they're not

going to necessarily see it on the

timelines that they thought maybe, you

know, maybe a quarter ago. That said, um

I I do think that a lot of these

provisions that are happening right now

um are are so transformative that in the

long run, like the kind of if we look

back on what happened in in the year

2025, it will have been a very very good

year for startups. Maybe maybe their

their numbers will lag by a quarter just

because okay like the funds can't be

delivered depending on how long the

shutdown goes down. I think it's having

a greater impact actually on the

citizen, right? Like I mean what's

happening with air traffic control,

what's happening, you know, across um

you know, civic benefits like that that

is something that I think um we're now

all feeling the pain of or or people who

are dependent on those benefits are

certainly feeling the pain of or people

who are traveling um or planning to

travel for upcoming Thanksgiving are

certainly going to feel the pain of the

shutdown. But it's certainly having an

impact um on companies and I think most

companies are still working

exceptionally hard um on the things that

they can work hard on now. um even if

the even if the contracts can't get

signed or the press releases can't be

put out or or the dollars aren't coming

in yet. Um but I think when we look back

this year, the story of this year will

actually be the defense acquisition

reform and and what's happening for

these companies in the long term versus

sort of the short term.

>> Yeah. Short-term pain, long-term uh

gain.

>> Yeah, absolutely.

>> Awesome. Well, thank you uh so much for

taking notes and giving us the full

breakdown.

>> Thanks so much.

>> Always great to catch.

>> We'll talk to you soon. Have a good one.

>> Uh let me tell you about linear. Linear

is a purpose-built tool for planning and

building products. Meet the system for

modern software development. Streamline

issues, projects, and product road maps

and start building. And we have our next

guest, Mikey Schulman from Sunno in the

ream waiting room. Welcome to the TBPN

Ultra. How you doing?

>> It's great to be here. I'm doing great.

How are you guys?

>> Fantastic.

>> Fantastic to have you.

>> I'm I'm very excited about this. Um, I

have a million questions and and I know

that we're just going to go super deep

into all the details of user behavior,

but uh, kick us off with just a general

highlevel interu introduction on you and

the company and then we'll go from

there.

>> Cool. Yeah, great to be here. Um, I

don't know, I'm not so interesting. Uh,

the company's much more interesting. Uh,

uh, the way I like to think of it is we

are delivering the best, most valuable

digital musical experiences, um, to the

whole world. And right now the things

that are available to the end user are

not always amazing. They're not always

differentiated. Um, and I think that's

just like a failure of imagination that

you can do so much more with music and

you can enjoy it so much more. So that's

how I think about us.

>> What was the first song that you ever

made?

>> Ever made? Yeah.

>> I've been playing piano since I'm four.

Uh, I played in a lot of bands in high

school and in college. Um, I play every

day. So uh, I don't actually know the

answer to that, but it was probably like

chopsticks or something.

>> Are you a foundation model company?

class

>> or an application layer company or both.

>> Look, the the answer is both. You know,

all the technologies are ours. These

didn't exist. Um but I think about and

may maybe this will color the

conversation and certainly um you know

when you guys were discussing us last

week or two weeks ago,

>> all that matters here is the product.

All that matters is that we deliver an

experience to a user that makes them

feel a certain way. And so at the end of

the day um like that like if there were

a way to do what we're doing without AI

like we would probably do that. There

just isn't.

>> Yeah.

>> Yeah. Yeah. So it in in so there is a

win condition where you don't even train

models and you use someone else's models

but as long as you have the best

application like that's where the value

occurs. I think so. Like at the end of

the day

>> story.

>> Yeah. Users don't care and I I think

probably at some point um maybe there's

like a last model we officially release.

Yeah. Um and the rest is just like

amazing product updates.

>> No, no, I I completely agree with that.

That makes sense.

>> Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. What uh

walk us through we we normally don't

talk about the history of companies too

much during interviews but because

you're I mean this is the first time on

the show like I'd love to kind of

understand the different inflection

points for at for the business. I mean

you guys just grown tremendously over

the last uh over the last year. So walk

yeah walk us through kind of the the

history of Sunno and then kind of the

history of even AI music and how those

two things track.

Um, sure. We launched this product a

little over two years ago. I think it

was in September. Um, and it was kind of

barely passable back then. It was a a

Discord bot. This is actually something

I got wrong completely. Thankfully, I

have good co-founders um who disabused

me of my bad ideas.

>> And was that like a mid was that a

midjourney? Were you inspired by

MidJourney? Makes

>> sense. It was working for MidJourney.

Why not?

>> It was working so well for Midjourney.

And I thought we'd be on Discord

forever. And then um uh it was like

around Thanksgiving we released of that

year we released like a really thin web

app. Um it didn't even have the full

functionality of the Discord bot and 5

days for 90% of the traffic to move over

to the web. It just like ever market

signal that I got something wrong that

was like very very strong. Um, and I

think slowly but surely, you know, we

keep releasing new products, new models,

the product gets more engaging, the

music gets more impactful, and slowly

but surely, I I would say the cartoon

you should have is um it becomes more

and more appealing to a larger and

larger group of people every time you

make the product better. And so, um,

it's basically been a lot of iteration.

Yes, there are inflection points. Um,

everything consumer is like a little bit

lumpy, but uh, that's that's the history

of it.

>> Yeah. What did what did the early cohort

of users look like? How were they using

the product? Where like why were they

I'm assuming they were you know you had

uh I'm sure you had a cult kind of cult

following kind of early. Uh what what

did that early cohort look like and and

is it that much different than than

today or is it just scaled up?

>> Um it's very different today. So, the

early cohort um I would describe as like

uh very tech forward and music curious

and it's like here's this new thing. You

kind of have to suspend disbelief. You

need to be really forgiving cuz the

music actually isn't all that good. Um

and uh as you make the product better,

you you grow out from there. And now

it's like people who love music who are

like a little bit tech curious. And

actually at this point, you don't even

need to be all that tech curious.

there's like a fairly easy to use

experience on both web and mobile that

you can just kind of dive into. And so

um I think uh the the early users are

indeed like you know if you were on

Discord, let me put it this way. If you

were on Discord like you are a very

different kind of user than the type of

person who might um find it.

>> Yeah. Exactly. Exactly.

>> Yeah. And so and so today I think like

part of the part of the debate that we

were having and and you can uh deliver

some some truth around this is like what

like what are kind of the key cohorts

that are using and loving SNO. Everyone

by now has probably seen you know viral

short form videos where people are

combining two different songs and and

some of the reach on on these assets is

insane. And you'll see, you know,

somebody combining like uh uh rap

artists like Future with uh jazz music

and and you know, getting, you know,

hundreds or tens of millions or, you

know, potentially even more uh views on

this type of content. But then we've

also heard of stories of professional

musicians using this to like accelerate

their workflows. And then we've now

heard stories of people that are just

using creating music just for personal

consumption. And so what what do the

different kind of cohorts look like and

what what are you guys what kind of user

are you guys most focused on?

>> So the professional content creator be

they professional music creator or other

content creator this is like mids

singledigit percentage of our user base

>> and the vast majority of people are

people um who love music but aren't

making music uh for any other purpose.

That's just we call it creative

entertainment. is just like a new

behavior.

>> And so I think trying to apply too much

of what you know from other things, be

it

>> consumer social platforms or video

games, it's always you always just have

to take everything with a grain of salt.

Um

>> but most people they come and they find

that music making is incredibly

enjoyable. And um if you have studied an

instrument and made music with your

friends, like you probably already know

this and um you just don't believe that

it can be done digitally and then you

kind of find the product and you

realize, oh my god, this can be done

digitally. I'm gonna enjoy the hell out

of making music. Um, I usually um try to

cartoonize our our average user as

people who would say, "I love music. I

love to sing. You don't love it when I

sing." That's kind of uh that's kind of

our sweet spot.

>> That makes sense.

>> And and and that tracks on like actual

monetization. It's not like those are

the free users and then the all the

revenue comes from professional people

or like API like it actually matches

roughly what you described.

>> That That's right. And so that's

fascinating. Um I you know you guys

mentioned um a couple weeks ago the

Chris Dixon thing the like um come for

the tools stay for the network. I think

about it a little differently for us and

I I kind of think of it for us as like

come for the gimmick and stay for the

joy and this is like the party trick of

making that song that um even if it's

not you know your favorite artist um you

know which you largely can't do on the

platform but it's you know make the

country song about Debbie being late.

That's the party trick, but there's

something that is behind the party trick

that you get pulled into and all of a

sudden you are a music maker and you're

enjoying it. And so, um, I actually I I

don't think it's bad,

um, you know, there's like this this

this song that is meant to be consumed

once that you're never going to consume

again that like you laugh for 4 seconds

with your friend. And I think you know,

one of you said like, I almost just need

to know the prompt um, and then I don't

need to know the rest of the song. I

don't actually think that's bad because

there's this amazing experience that it

gets backed up with that people spend

hours a day on.

>> Totally.

>> Yeah. And I I when I think about some of

the most fun moments of my childhood, it

was my dad writing and playing a song

for guitar and singing it one time and

never singing it again. And I still like

just remember the moments and the and

the joy of that. And so like the concept

of like ephemeral songs that can be

created for a moment that historically

you would have needed, you know, studio

time. You would have needed to spend all

this time like writing the song, you

know, producing it, all this stuff. And

now it can be done in an instant. I I

think uh it really is it really is

>> totally magical.

>> Where

>> I think this is similar to this is

similar to this like there's ephemeral

pictures on your phone, right? And

you're never going to look at them again

unless Apple tells you to.

>> Yeah.

>> Yeah. Where where where are the rough

edges or where where are the edges that

you want to be like careful around? I

feel like uh with chat GBT no one was

really expecting the whole like getting

oneshotted and like psychosis and like

be delusions of grandeur like that came

out of nowhere in my opinion and then

all of a sudden it was like an issue and

they had to work on it and of course

there's like guardrails that they can

put up. Uh midjourney I think a lot of

people use that as art therapy. I

haven't seen that many people or heard

that many anecdotes about people like

going crazy because of midjourney, but

there's still like if you're doing image

generation, you don't want to generate

adult content, for example. Uh do you

have an idea of like the shape of the

battle that you're going to be waging

against like the the like the risks that

you want to like fight off?

>> Yeah. Look, I think for us, they're

actually just fairly lower stakes than

those other ones. Like our AI is turning

anyone into paper clips and not that I

think that that's a real thing anyway.

And I I like you said, I don't think

we're we're we're inducing psychosis in

anyone. Um,

>> you know, this is a tricky question.

Music um

>> the the the content has kind of always

been filthy in in the best music. And um

>> I don't really want us to be the arbiter

of that. So, we have like some some

content moderation that's like pretty um

>> I would say pretty

>> forgiving and and currently that's

actually that's it. And then lots of

copyright moderation, of course.

>> Yeah. I was uh I was raised on Little

John and the East Side Boys and uh it

was it was indeed filthy

>> and and yes, it it would not be your

place to necessarily filter that. I

would imagine that you at some point

have to do some sort of like KYC, age

verification or or even something that's

just like parental controls, that type

of stuff. Uh that certainly makes sense.

Um I I have a follow-up question, but

>> go for Oh, yeah. I there was an article

in the in the journal yesterday about

how uh um Instagram had used uh PG-13 as

a heruristic for the type of content

that they would show to teenagers on

Instagram. And the MPA actually pushed

back against that. And I was very upset

about that because I feel like we need

shared language for how we describe what

is acceptable on new tech platforms. So,

like I want you to be able to put the

label of like explicit content. Remember

that explicit content on every album? It

became so iconic it was actually cool,

which it maybe had a bad effect. But if

you put that if you put that black and

white flag with the explicit on there, I

know exactly what I'm getting. And I

know that I'm going to keep that out of

my hand out of the hands of my kids for

a number of years. Um, and I would hate

for I would hate to be in a situation

where you couldn't use that and you had

to come up with some new jargon for your

policy. I love just building on the

shoulders of giants, but have you

thought about adapting any of those

terminologies or just making your

moderation language match what people

already know? Is that relevant to you?

>> Um, not as much as it is on other

platforms. I mean, but but it is, you

know, I feel like um

we should not be the arbiters of a lot

of these things and um you know, quite

quite frankly, maybe like you don't want

us to be the arbittors of these things

and that there should be other

guidelines set by other things. And so

like yes, if you're dealing with

children, you're going to have different

rules about the songs that you can make

and that you cannot make. And actually,

um right now, parents making songs with

their kids is actually a mega use case.

It's probably half of my usage um which

is a lot. I I use the product a lot. And

so it's like right now this is actually

not the biggest focus for us. Um like

what we have like works pretty well.

There are always going to be edge cases.

There are edge cases in moderation on

every single platform literally, you

know, ever. And kind of just through

them as they come.

>> Yeah.

>> What are your conversations like with

people in the music industry? There were

there was some news earlier this week

around the first like AI artist signed a

record deal. I don't know if it was

actually the first, but that's how it

was being reported. How are the

conversations with go are going with

your users that are like true pro users

that are using Sunno to either like, you

know, experiment with like a bunch of

different variations of songs, get new

ideas, make entire songs themselves.

What are those conversations like?

>> You know, I think there's been a huge

shift in the last 6 months. I would say

like now I really don't meet a lot of

professionals who don't use Sunno at

least a little bit. Like songwriters use

this a ton. We run a lot of camps. Um as

it's cliche but a creative companion or

a creative co-pilot for helping craft

the right songs, you know, verse by

verse or getting ideas. Um basically

every producer I know uses Suno. This um

it was recently put to me just in in an

incredibly piffy way of we've become the

ompic of the music industry. Everybody's

on it but nobody wants to talk about it.

Um, and uh, while that might be

frustrating for us that in the interim

nobody wants to talk about it, in the

long run that's actually great. You

know, in the long run, the fact that

everybody is using it and loves it is

fantastic. And so, um, it's this weird

dynamic, I think, where one-on-one

people are quite pro, even though like

the industry as a whole may have

different feelings about it.

>> It's interesting. Yeah. I wonder I

wonder how this like like the creative

the creative element of this like really

throws me because uh on on the one hand

I see if if I'm thinking about Sunno in

the creative realm is like you know

cursor for your

uh for your DAW your your your

workstation your your Fruity Loops or

your ProTools or your Ableton um and

you're generating samples and actually

working through that. I feel like that

is something that yes would get to 100%

pres penetration but on the flip side

like we've had the ability to generate

blog posts and text for years now at

human touring test level and and yet

like we it does not feel like we're

close to uh just oh yeah just put in a

prompt write a good blog post and it

comes out and it's good like you still

need that that spark that inspiration

and then most people I I feel like are

still not they're they're you still in

the co-pilot era for sure and I feel

like that that that's interesting. Yeah.

I don't know.

>> I think there's a big difference though

here which is that there's a few big

differences but for me you know hearing

you say that I I it makes me think a lot

of um you're thinking of us largely as a

tool and it's because a lot of AI

products are tools and um the point is

not to just churn this blog post out.

Actually the point is to have enjoyed

the process of it. I happen not to

really enjoy the process of writing so

much. Maybe maybe you guys are

different, but like um for us

>> the way people use suno, it's like

you're coming. Yes, there is some song

at the end of it that you listen to and

the fruits of your labor are enjoyable,

but the journey of doing it is actually

why you're there. And so the actual tool

analogy doesn't really work there of

like I don't just write in the prompt

and it comes out perfect. That's not

even the point here.

>> Yes. So I I I think what I'm I think

where I'm getting is that uh the actual

market for AI audio is going to

bifurcate in my opinion and there will

be people just like there are there are

people right now that use LLM to just

chat and just have an AI therapist or

they have a friend or they just ask

ChatgBT40 for you know hey what should I

do at work about this they're just

having a conversation and then out of

text generation, out of LLMs, we also

got just the ability to do code

completion. And so we got, you know,

windsurf and cursor and codecs and, you

know, we got these like coding agents

and then we also got like AI therapists.

And these are two wildly different

things from the same underlying

technology. And I feel like the like I

would I I would just be shocked if you

don't see both emerge over time. I mean,

maybe the different company comes in and

takes one more seriously than you

because if the market's really big, but

I would I would imagine that you wind up

servicing both to some degree. No,

>> for sure. I mean, we already service

both, but you know, I almost think of

this as um in the coding example. Yeah.

>> You might vibe code something.

>> Yeah.

>> Um and that's just a few prompts. Yeah.

>> Um or you might actually need fine grain

control over the thing and then you use

a different tool like something that's

basically autocomplete on steroids. And

I don't mean that in a jar of way. It's

like amazing.

>> 100%. music is the same way. I might

vibe create something and have a session

where

>> y

>> the music is generally what I'm looking

for and I enjoy the process of getting

there. Um, but maybe that's the end of

it. And if this is going to be a song

that is everlasting and intended to top

the charts, I need that fine grain

control and I need a different paradigm

and a different set of workflows and

tools for doing it. And so, um, there

may even be the the same underlying

model that powers both of those things

and it's a different end user

application. Yeah.

>> H how do you think uh like video

creation is distinctly different than

like music creation? Because I think you

know on our side watching the Sora

launch, Sora was like a cool creative

tool that had this novel like feature

that was the cameo feature. But then

immediately those outputs just want

wanted to go live elsewhere, right? They

wanted to go where these big audiences

were. And I feel like with Sunno, the

difference is like you can create music

and you want to save stuff and it's

actually can be very enjoyable to just

listen to the content. Um, is that is

that just a like do you think that will

do you think that will always be kind of

the dynamic or do you think eventually

like video models will catch up to the

point where like people are generating

videos and then just like consuming them

a lot because I haven't again like I

think a lot of the the output of

something like Aora has been like very

ephemeral. gets maybe shared in a group

chat or gets shared on another social

media platform but people are not like

revisiting the content.

>> Yeah, I think look very fastm moving

space and so you know this is just one

guy's opinion today. Um I think there's

basically two big differences. One is um

the joy in making the music and I think

people mostly enjoy consuming the Sora

outputs and the the

experience of making it is is less

interesting. And then the other thing

about video in general, but especially

AI video, is it really tends to short

form and actually the beauty of music is

that it really is meant to grab you for

minutes at a time and not seconds at a

time. And it makes for a completely

different consumptive experience. And

so, um, and I think that's actually a

lot of what's broken in music

consumption today is there's so much

pressure to put on a song and then put,

you know, through headphones and then

put your phone in your pocket and not

even really pay attention to it. Um, but

I I think a lot more is possible where I

do have somebody's attention for 3

minutes, 4 minutes, and you can actually

tell the story through music in a way

that like a 30-second video really does

not. And so maybe AI video will get

there. Maybe it will get there in a

year. Maybe it'll get there in 5 years,

but like today, that's what I see as the

the two big differences.

>> Makes sense. H how do you think the

music streaming platforms will navigate

AI music?

I

>> I think they look they they already are.

There's AI music on these platforms. Uh

Spotify has announced that they'll start

doing AI music. And so, um, I I I I very

strongly suspect that in like 5 years,

this is not a conversation that's being

had because I already know that there's

little bits of our music everywhere in

in, you know, mega smashes. And um, the

same way you don't think about like was

this song digitally produced or was it

produced on a giant console in a studio

somewhere? And that's maybe something

that people thought for 5 years, you

know, 30 years ago. I I my my very

strong suspicion or just like autotune

where now every song has autotune in it

even if you can't hear it. My very

strong suspicion is that that is where

everything um ends up and the reason is

it is better for consumers. It would

really be bad for consumers and

therefore bad for the size of the

ecosystem if these things kind of

bifurcate.

>> Yep. That makes a lot of sense. It's

like asking uh I don't even think anyone

ever asked the question how will social

media apps handle Photoshop? Photoshop

was Photoshop outputs were just

immediately the tool existed prior to

social media. So it just proliferated

immediately.

>> I mean speaking of Photoshop uh

Photoshop has had to grapple with the

existence of generative images uh

through partnerships through rolling

their own. Um, how important is it to

you to play in the market of like the

enterprise audio workflows, do deals,

partnerships? what we saw in the text in

the at least in code at least um every

coding platform or and there were a

whole bunch of new ones like there's

been a real battle for the IDE and I'm

wondering if there's like a battle

coming for the um this the the the top

end of the music production workflow.

Um, I think there there probably will be

a battle, but it will be not nearly the

bloodbath that it will be in other

domains. And it's just because the

average piece of music today is produced

in 800 different tools. And so,

>> and everybody has all of the tools. And

so, I actually don't think it's entirely

reasonable to think that there will be

one tool that uses up all of your screen

time. And like that's going to be the

thing that you produce 99% of your music

in if you are a true professional. And

so there um the the end goal is the

perfect song and and a little bit less

the journey of how you got there.

>> Yep. Interesting.

>> Code it's like VS Code is just open all

the time and I don't want to have

another editor. And if you like talk to

people who develop iOS, they're pissed

off because they have two editors. Um

but it's not nearly the same 800

different tools that it is in music.

>> Yeah. Yeah. No, that makes a ton.

>> Makes sense. Uh this is super

interesting. Thank you for uh coming on

to uh to break it down. Yeah, this was

awesome. Thanks so much.

>> I'm gonna I'm gonna I'm gonna use Sunno

uh to try to make uh bedtime with the

the my three and a halfyear-old a little

bit easier later tonight. So, uh I'll

report back.

>> I'm I'm excited.

>> What What are What are the What What are

some of your favorite prompts that you

use with uh your kid or kids?

>> Um you know, a lot of them are songs. I

have a one-year-old and four-year-old.

It's like still too early for the

one-year-old. A lot of them are um songs

about him in fantastical situations.

Like my most favorite one is just was

like last winter after um the the

Zamboni driver at the local ice rink let

him like ride in the Zamboni and so it

was like like a whole album of songs

about him riding in a Zamboni doing all

sorts of crazy stuff. Um and yeah,

they're like very special and personal

and I do go back to those and and um

gosh, yeah, I think this is wonderful.

Sometimes we joke if we were a kids app,

we'd have five times the revenue that we

do. You know, it's just like um kids is

like the most straightforward way to get

me to par with my money. I'm sure you're

the same way.

>> Totally totally agree. Soono kids. Maybe

the iPad the iPad app.

>> Yeah.

>> Coming next year.

>> No, not actually.

>> But who knows?

>> Uh so great to meet you, Mikey. Thank

you for coming on and all the progress.

We'll talk to you soon. Cheers.

>> Bye.

>> Uh let me tell you about numeral.com

sales tax on autopilot. Spend less than

five minutes per month on sales tax

compliance. Uh speaking of kids,

>> so nice to drop the HQ. Yeah, drop the

HQ.

>> RIP to HQ.

>> Speaking of kids, I want your review of

this way to decide how to buy a house.

So, in New York City in 2023,

this real estate agent worked with a

couple who wanted to purchase purchase

an apartment on the Upper West Side of

Manhattan. But they wanted their Pokemon

obsessed six-year-old son to have a say.

How? by playing Pokemon in each

neighborhood before his parents would

commit to a purchase. We spent an

afternoon covering four neighborhoods as

the child played the game and caught

Pokémon characters. It turns out that

Central Park West was a hot spot for

Pokémon Go characters that day. And we

toured a two-bedroom co-op that was

listed for about $2 million. The child

ended up catching a Snorlax as soon as

we stepped inside Central Park. A

Snorlax is a blue green character that

looks like a bear and is apparently

extremely rare to find because it spends

the majority of its life asleep. The

child is screaming, jumping up and down.

He was so excited to find it. Although

my clients looked at seven other

apartments that day, no other area came

close in terms of Pokemon action, so

they knew that apartment was the one.

They wrote up an offer that same day for

the full asking price. What's your

review? Is that a good way? Is that cute

and adorable to bring your kids?

>> I think it's cute.

>> Or is it weird?

>> It potentially could lead to total

heartbreak, you know, if the kids just

like, "Yeah, this is the the dry spot

now.

>> This is a Pokemon hot spot." And then

they're then the Pokemon dry up a week

in after moving in.

>> Good take.

>> And they're like, "What are we doing

here? I know we just moved in here, but

we got to I I got to get closer to the

Pokemon.

>> We got to We Mom and Dad, we got to book

a wander. We got to find our happy

place. Find our Pokemon hunting spot.

Book a wander with inspiring views,

hotel grade amenities, dream beds, top

tier cleaning, and 24/7 concier service.

It's a vacation home, but better, folks.

Um, yeah. I don't know. I I think uh I

think I like the idea of bringing the

kid, the six-year-old into the into the

house purchase pro process, but uh let's

leave the phones at home and let's

develop a taste for uh let's become

snobs. How about that? six-year-old

become a snob and say, "No, I I couldn't

live anywhere but

>> I don't like the cafe."

>> The Upper East Side because I have

strong opinions about this. Get into the

lore. What happened on this street?

That's what the six-year-old should do.

I'm fine to delegate to the

six-year-old, but not to Niantic, the

company behind Pokémon Go. Anyway, uh

our next guest is waiting for us in the

reream waiting room. We have Ahmad from

Mercury. How you doing? Good to see you.

Welcome to the show.

>> Great to see you.

>> Hey, good to be back. how you doing?

>> Great.

>> It's been a little bit.

>> Yeah, it's been a while.

>> Little bit. Great back.

>> Give us an update on what's going on in

your world and then I want to just talk

about all the crazy stuff that's

happening in tech. Honestly,

>> yeah, let's go for it. Uh, we just

announced uh today on on Fortune term

sheet that we hit three years of

profitability.

>> Whoa, whoa, whoa.

>> I'm excited about our

>> hitting all the sound effects.

>> Founder

is nice. That is why

>> yeah full founder mode. Uh yes it's been

a

>> one weirdick VCs hate this VCs hate this

one weird trick man area man discovers

profitability.

>> Congratulations.

>> It's actually really funny. You know I

love my VCs but there's definitely every

every board meeting they're like okay

you know how can we spend this money a

little bit faster? But

>> I was actually talking to some CEOs just

like last this week and yeah most of the

time like spending more money doesn't

mean you grow faster. And that's kind of

like what I was, you know, trying to

celebrate with this milestone that like

it's, you know, you, we're building

software companies here. At least we

are, not everyone. U

spend money to grow.

>> I got I got a bit for you. You're in a

strong financial position. You should

put out a press release say we don't

need a backs stop.

>> We don't need a government back stop. We

are we are proper.

>> I didn't know there was a back stop

available to me.

Well,

>> I was ready to use I was ready to when

when those comments started floating

Wednesday, I was ready to use the

analogy of like what would happen if

there was a government back stop on

venturebacked corporate cards.

>> I mean I mean truly you are you are a

bank and you and you've obviously lived

through you live through the financial

crisis like

>> can't say he's a bank.

>> No. Okay. Okay. But we're not partner

with

>> partner but but you're obviously

intimately familiar with the financial

system. Uh do you have any uh do you

have any unique lessons or stories that

you tell from the financial crisis? Uh

warning signs that you pull from even

just like movies or books or something

that you keep going back to is like, you

know, we want to stay sharp on this.

>> Um you know, I think like building trust

in what Mercury does has always been

it's actually probably the hardest thing

we do, right? Because you know, we're

asking a lot from people. We're storing

all their money for their business. And

you know, it's like I had this

conversation when we first launched

Mercury with someone who'd raised $10

million and he was like this is more

money than I've ever seen in my whole

life. I'm not going to give it to a

startup banking service. Uh and now we

have customers that have more than 100

million with Mercury. So like building

that trust is always so important and

you know obviously I don't know which

financial crisis you you were referring

to

2008 actually but but I I do want to

talk about what is like the SV crisis

you know um

take us through the SV yeah what what uh

what were the biggest lessons from the

SVB crisis? Yeah, I mean the biggest

thing for us was uh it can't just be all

talk, right? Like if I you know and I

was talking to founders saying like hey

you should trust Mercury and they'd be

like oh man like SVB is a 40-year-old

company and they just like you know

>> are dying. Uh why should we trust

Mercury? And then you know what we did

and what we've continued to kind of

invest in is to make it so it's not just

about trusting Mercury. It's about like

having products that that deliver like

trust. So, you know, we have like

accelerated FDIC insurance, which is,

you know, u

>> I guess on the website we publish 5

million, but it's actually most accounts

get way more than 5 million. So, almost

all the deposits that sit at Mercury are

FDIC insured.

>> Uh, and that was the big thing. I think

SVB was at 80ish% uninsured deposits.

Um and

>> and that's just because just for anybody

that's not super familiar, that's

because they had standard two and a4

million dollar of FDIC insurance, but

almost every account had well beyond

that because

>> Yeah, exactly. business, especially

especially VC back businesses, you know,

>> and also in a zero interest rate

environment. In a zero interest rate

environment, you're like, I'm just going

to keep it in the checking account. I

raised a $5 million seat. I'll just

literally keep it in the checking

account because like what's the point?

and if I move it to some other vehicle,

I'm going to earn 0.5% or 0.1%. Now it's

now it's a different environment.

>> Yeah. What was it always the plan to get

profitable, stay profitable as fast as

sort of reasonably possible? I think

like

>> or did that happen? If people are

trusting you as like a financial

platform institution, it it's not

exactly comforting to know that you're

burning money and your financial

institution.

>> I think the other, you know, the other

thing that was part of SB was, you know,

like people just had so little time to

move all of their banking operations and

it's just like there's so much reliant

on a bank account for a business. Uh,

>> and

>> it was such a funny I was I was with

SVB. It collapsed and I was like, I need

to go someplace less risky. I'm going to

First Republic.

>> Yeah. And then that collapsed too. And I

was like, but that's that feels like an

even old I don't know if which one's

actually older. I think First Republic

was older, but it was this odd

>> was a little I believe

>> total total reputation of the Lindy

principle. It was like actually go to

Mercury.

>> Yeah, would have been better. Sorry.

>> I was going to say I think one of the

parts of that was like, you know, you

rely so much of operations and it's even

more extreme for Mercury customers

because, you know, we do more than

banking. So we do uh people's credit

cards and invoicing and yeah we've been

building more and more features and our

customers are reliant on a broader set

of features. So

>> you know I think part of like being

profitable and sustaining profitability

is being you know making that promise to

our customers that this is like

something that's going to stick around.

So if they use us it's not like you know

one day we don't raise a funding round

or or you know whatever there's like a

crash or something and people have to

like worry about that. So it's

definitely like a core part of that kind

of having that trusted service.

>> Yeah. Where uh where are you guys

getting the most leverage from AI?

>> Yeah, good question. Um yeah, the

biggest thing we've done is like back

office stuff. There's just a to run a

fintech, especially uh kind of on the

banking side, there's just a ton of

people that have to do a lot of back

office things. uh and you know it's like

you have to upload a formation document

and someone has to review it and you

know there's all of these things are

very ripe for u AI to just you know

smooth smooth it out either like

automated 100% or automate it 80% so

that like a human can just review the

review the answers. So yeah lots of

stuff on compliance risk back office is

has been our biggest investment. We've

got lots of you know I'm not uh I guess

a lot of what we do at Mercury is like

not kind of follow fads or whatever. So

we have we've done a bunch of things

that are userfacing but you know we try

to add like little bits of value here

and there. So yeah we have a chat bot so

you can ask it questions and that's been

actually

>> actually it's solved like 40% of tickets

uh customer questions are just like you

know hey when's you know how long does

it take for a wire to settle in like

>> that yeah those kinds of questions. So,

and that's just a better customer

experience than you know we think about

how and that's 40% over the baseline of

like because most most uh most customer

support systems like if you email in it

would just previously do like fuzzy

database search to be like oh it seems

like you're asking about this FAQ you

got a 40% lift on top of that because

you were already doing best practices I

imagine

>> um something like that

>> yes it's a bit more complicated because

we still have that email system when

people email it

So this did replace like the suggested

topics in like the live messaging

system.

>> So yeah,

the suggested answers was way way less

because people don't like reading those

suggested things like they just want an

answer and they want to move on.

>> What about on the cost side? Uh we were

talking to Ivan notion. He said that uh

his inference bill was actually having

an effect on his gross margins. You've

remained profitable. But if I'm looking

deeper in your financials, will I see an

uptick in inference bills based on

actually is that something that you're

actually trying to manage as you stay

profitable or has it been low enough

that it just

>> Yeah. I think like it's wildly different

I think using it in back back office

context where you're sort of processing

forms and PDFs and things like that

versus Ivan where people are like I'm

going to generate you know trillions of

tokens because I'm just making long

documents and totally on the back office

side it's mostly been a cost saving

right like you're uh you're kind of

giving leverage to humans and um

>> or you're moving off of like a

mechanical turk or scale or something

like that for whatever workload it is

>> exly uh and yeah on the userfacing side

It's, you know, I think a big difference

for us is, you know, we have 200,000

plus customers, but it's not that many

customers, right? Like, uh, a lot of

like consumer services have millions of

customers. Like each of our customers is

obviously like much more valuable.

>> And also, you probably don't have like a

ton of DA DA I mean, you probably have a

lot of DAUs, but you it's not the app

that people open when they wake up, you

know? It's a great

>> It's much more utility than

productivity, right? people are actually

kind of open. Exactly. And so and so the

inference is just going to be so much

lower than if Instagram is all of a

sudden being like we're going to run an

LLM query on every on every you know

photo that gets uploaded. It's like okay

well that's a huge amount of inference.

>> What uh

>> yeah and we're doing more and more

though. So you know potentially uh you

know when you're churning through all

these transactions will go up. I don't

expect for us. We also make way more on

a per customer basis than actually I

don't know about notion but than like

most proumer consumer type things. Uh so

I think it would net out that it would

be a smallish percentage.

>> Yeah, that makes awesome.

>> What are you what are you seeing across

your

>> angel portfolio?

>> Like you've been you've been investing

like like

>> I guess for context I've I've done about

350 investments in the last 10 years. Uh

I don't know if I need a go for that.

Uh

and I just actually announced uh earlier

this year uh my I have like a formal

angel fund now. It was a 26 million uh

kind of angel fund. I mean I'm still

mostly investing in the same way. Uh I

mostly invest because it's just fun to

talk to founders and I guess the same

reason you guys run this podcast. It's

like interesting to talk to founders and

learn learn new ideas. uh uh you know

it's all it's very AI focused right now

as you can imagine uh you know what's I

think AI is kind of fun to invest in

because like every 6 months what you're

investing in like changes a lot right

like for a while it was kind of dev

tools in AI and now I feel like that's

done uh so most of what I see right now

is kind of deeper vertical uh kind of

B2B applications of AI um

>> do you think AI gives people the

permission

to invest in more unique categories

because basically like there there used

to be like a whole set of categories

that were just kind of like small

businesses or industrials or some niche

some weird niche thing and they would

just be kind of off limits because it

would be like oh no no no like the real

money is made in in fintech the real

money is made in maybe maybe the edtech

but that one's difficult or adtech or

marketing mart attack, you know, it's

like there were these easy themes, but

with AI, you can go and and actually put

together a pitch around something that's

um maybe more or less untouched by tech

and actually generate deck.

>> It's definitely like a you know this

extension of the software is eating the

world kind of vibe that Mark Andre talks

about right?

>> A little bit more of the world on the

edges.

>> Like 10 10ish years ago, it was all like

social and mobile, right?

everything

like even Mercury is like 10 years ago

it was probably off limits to like try

to make something that went after the

banking market and I remember when I

started in 2017 it was like

>> you know it sounded weird right like it

was it was it was not something that was

done uh

>> I think the thing that AI does is like

open up labor right like in robotics it

opens up physical labor and then in the

case of um kind of the uh white collar

workers. It opens up like human uh kind

of intellectual labor. Uh and that is

like a whole set of categories. So you

know people generally VCs hate services

firms, right? Like it's like they'll be

like oh that's like a services firm. But

now like services firms are cool. You

like oh yeah it's human it's human AI uh

plus human services firms are like the

the thing that a lot of people are

investing in. Ideally trying to get to

like fully human only uh sorry fully AI

only. Uh but yeah, it's definitely like

opened up a lot of industries that

wouldn't have been interesting from a

investment perspective.

>> Do you do you think people have been

overly bearish on on SAS? It's you know

notable that uh OpenAI uses everything

from Salesforce to Slack to Qualrix and

I imagine you use a lot of on on your

business. I don't think anybody's out

there saying you know I'm going to vibe

code a bank. you know, even if they

could even if you could somehow build

that on like a banking as a service

platform, it's like

>> the the the level, you know, the amount

of work you need to do to maintain a

vibecoded

bank on top of, you know, just doesn't

make sense.

>> Generally, I mean, I think uh there will

be a wave of disruption that will happen

in SAS, but I don't think the answer

will be everyone's just making their own

end to end like Salesforce like that

just that sounds ridiculous to me. I do

I mean I hope someone builds a much

better salesforce uh but it'll still

yeah and maybe their pricing won't be

like per seat and it'll be like per sale

or whatever but I think the category

will exist the shape of the category

will change the business model will

change but I don't think the answer is

everyone's building their own salesforce

like that just that just sounds

inefficient like it just sounds

ridiculous to me but uh there will be

like I think actually like the

incremental new applications people

build will actually make will just be

more applications right like if the

number of vendors you had was like 10

and like you're paying a lot like maybe

you'll have another 90 internal apps

that like people just made for like

small use cases. So like the amount of

software people will use will go up I

think because of VIP coding uh and the

ease of coding but I don't think like

these big categories are going to just

disappear because like people can now

make it themselves

>> and do you think do you think companies

will go multi-product sooner and are you

seeing that across the portfolio if like

the engineering actual engineering hours

are less to go from you know one product

to a second to a third that that will

just encourage you know more companies

>> I think it's going to be like industry

specific fake. Uh I mean I think a big

story about fintech in the last couple

of years has been like every fintech

going multi product right uh I think

it's partly because you know when we

started in 2019 like no one was building

like a better uh neo bank so that's you

know that's all it took like our first

product was a bank account and it was

like really good. Uh now to compete

against Mercury, you would have to have

you know bill pay and credit cards and

invoicing because like that's just what

people look for like they look for more

of a bundle product. Uh so I think it

depends where you're competing and in to

some extent it gets a little easier

because you can just make products

quicker. Uh but making like amazing

products is is never easy, right? Like I

think you just like like the quality and

craft and all of that like do matter and

yeah we try to invest a lot like when we

make a new product it's never easy like

it takes a lot to make an amazing

product.

>> Uh but when you're like very new to a

category and like almost everything in

AI is like very new you can build more

quicker and then like kind of refine it

over time. Uh but it's a good question.

And I think a lot of the ways people

will end up competing with incumbents,

right? Like I've heard a ton of like I

don't know why we're picking on

Salesforce, but I've heard a lot of like

how do we beat Salesforce kind of

strategies and a lot of them are like oh

actually we're going to bundle like AISD

and some you know X and Y and like we're

going to make it like a much more fully

featured kind of version of like

Salesforce. Uh uh so I think like when

you compete against incumbents like

doing a bundle strategy sometimes is

like a better strategy. So like we'll

see that play out.

>> Yeah.

>> Very cool. Well, congratulations to the

whole team three-year milestone. Uh

looking forward to the fourth, the

fifth, sixth, and hopefully hundreds of

years of Mercury profitability. You got

to get past the the SVB mark, become the

the long longest standing

>> institution. Funny, they were started

like a year before I was born. So I have

this like exact mental model of like

they were started 42 years ago. That's

amazing.

>> Maybe maybe I'll stop thinking about

that one when they're going to further

down.

>> Very cool. But yeah, really appreciate

you having me on.

>> Yeah, we'll talk to the whole team.

>> Have a good one.

>> Cheers.

>> Bye.

>> Bye.

>> You heard about the importance of AI

agents for customer service. You got to

head over to Finn.AI, the number one AI

agent for customer service. Number one

in performance benchmarks, number one in

competitive, number one world champion

>> ranking on G2. And he was also

mentioning better CRM. Why? Why not try

out Adio? Customer relationship magic.

Adio is the AI native serum that builds,

scales, and grows your company to the

next level. Brett Adcock fired back at

hype around 1x presumably. Figure CEO

Brett Adcock says his quote major

competitors are using tea operation

human operators in their videos and

calls it deceiving. Does will he call

out 1X by name? Will he call out Elon by

name? Will he call out unitry by name?

Let's find out by watching this clip.

His analogy, it's like if a self-driving

car pulled up and we found out there was

somebody um from Tennessee,

>> a demonstration of a robot doing

something that's like not teley opt or

um like coded and what you're seeing now

in the world is like I would say most

major competitor to us at this point are

putting out most of their content and

updates teley opt from a human. And I

think it's like perhaps some of the most

deceiving things I've ever seen. It's

like uh if I was driving a self-driving

car, if a self-driving car pulled up

next to us and we found out there was

some guy from Tennessee driving it, we'd

both be like, "That's uh that's not what

I thought this would look like." What

you want to see is

>> So the funny thing is that Tyler, why

are you laughing at that, Tyler?

>> Well, that's like exactly how

self-driving cars work right now.

>> Yeah.

uh teley op is actually maybe critical

to the development of full self-driving

cars and uh maybe used by all the top

companies all the time. Uh yes, I mean

it is odd that like

>> I thought that I thought it I thought it

was I think it's like a key it's it's

the key enabler for 1x to actually get

robots in homes

and getting them to a point where they

can do valuable work. Yeah.

>> Right. And they're gonna be taking a

loss on

>> they're going to be taking a loss on

that. They're charging like $2 an hour,

but that's going to be, you know, a

flywheel for them to to get more and

more training data.

>> Oh, the founder of Oneax actually

replied, uh, I think Dar, that's the

founder, right? Um,

>> no, Darp founder.

>> Oh, but he's just the loudest voice on

X, so I I give him all the credit. He

created one X. It would be nothing

without him. Anyway, uh he says, "So

basically Whimo, there were two

operators to every car when Whimo

started." It is interesting that um

yeah, Whimo has never that I know of,

they've never really like published data

on how many operators they have per car.

I think that that would actually give

people a lot of reassurance around like,

okay, these cars are driving around. Are

there people overwatching them? And then

you just get to a point where you say,

"Okay, yeah, there's there's 10,000

operators for 5,000 cars." And then next

year there's 8,000 operators for 5,000

cars. And eventually there's 5,000

operators for 5,000 cars. And then

eventually there's 1,000 operators for

5,000 cars. And eventually there's one

operator for 5,000 cars. But it's just a

slow process of getting people up to

speed on the on the new technology. And

it just gives people uh like confidence

at every turn, much like the confidence

that I feel when I go to sleep on my

eight sleep. How'd you feel? How'd you

sleep last night, Jordy? Uh 88 from me.

7 hours 38 minutes. I want to hear if

that soundboard still has my favorite

song on it.

>> Boom.

>> You got an 88. I'll give it to you.

>> Wait, did we tie?

>> Yeah, I got an 83.

>> Oh, 83. Okay.

>> Rough one. Rough one.

>> Well, we have breaking news from the

Pope. He chimed in on the AI bubble.

Some bub talk from the from the papacy.

>> A papal bull. Is that a top signal

>> on the bub talk? No. No. It's not it's

not on the bubble. It's not on the

bubble. It's not on the bubble. It is is

about it is on the is from the pope

though who I should be following. Why am

I not following the pope? Uh tech

technological innovation can be a form

of p of participation in the divine act

of creation. It carries an ethical and

spiritual weight. for every design

choice expresses a vision of humanity.

The church therefore calls all builders

of AI to cultivate moral discernment as

a fundamental part of their work to

develop systems that reflect justice,

solidarity, and a genuine reverence for

life. I like that.

>> Good line.

>> Liquidity thinks it's AI generated slop.

>> Very bearish.

>> No. Yes, he used one M dash. Like the M

dash is not a tellt tell sign. You can

just use one if you're just hammering on

the keyboard. Or you can just write a

note and then in the edit someone can

use an M dash. I don't know. Is the Pope

one-shotted? We'll never know. I think

this is fine. I think this is a nice

little call to action. What What do you

think, Tyler? You put this in here,

right?

>> Uh yeah. I mean, what are you guys doing

if if the Pope comes out and says like,

"I actually don't care about AI margins.

What are you doing?

>> Uh, I would be extremely bullish on

that. What I'm worried about is the pope

coming out and being like actually like

I've discovered some novel physics.

I've been chatting I've been talking to

Grock and I've been talking to Chad GPT

for just like thousands of hours.

>> People don't think about the

recursiveness in the Bible.

>> Yeah. No. Yeah. Recursiveness in the

Bible. Actually, it's crazy. You know,

I'm the pope of the Catholic Church, but

I've been getting into polytheism

recently. I went down a rabbit hole and

I think there might be more than one

god. I mean, there's multiple gods.

>> Uh, AB in the chat says, "Got to get the

pope on Vanta." Tot to totally agree.

>> 100%.

>> I I think it would be the the it'd be

interesting if the Pope started coming

out and said, "We're exploring taking

equity stakes in technology companies

like uh Fanny May and and Freddy Mack."

>> Yeah. Well,

>> we got to get the Pope on bezel because

your bezel concier is available now to

source any watch on the planet.

Seriously, any watch. Uh

>> yeah, the Pope already has the the drop

top sixwheel G Wagon.

>> Is it six wheels?

>> I think so.

>> No way. I always thought it was a rules.

No, it is a G Wagon, but there's I feel

like he has a wild set of cars. Uh it's

>> No, it's not. It's not six wheels.

>> No, it's not six wheels. Six wheels

would be so

>> But it is a one of one. And they made it

they made an EV.

>> I love it. Um speaking of EVs, the Ford

F-150 Lightning is potentially going out

of production. Um no way. It it it it is

it is close to failing. Uh the Wall

Street Journal has a story on the front

page talking about um where is this? I

can pull that up. The Ford F1 uh Ford

Ways ending electric F-150 truck. Uh

executives at Ford Motor are in active

discussions,

active talks. They're in talks.

>> Active talks

>> uh about scrapping the electric version

of the F-150. people familiar with the

matter said which would make the

unprofitable truck the US's first major

EV casualty. Maybe this is Do you think

this is all triggered by uh TJ Parker?

>> Possible.

>> World famous venture capitalist and

founder himself. He he bought a Ford,

but he didn't buy an electric one. He

bought a Raptor R.

>> Why they should make Why don't they make

the electric one like the Raptor R? They

>> like with an internal combustion engine.

>> Exactly. I feel like if they want people

to buy the electric version of the

truck, they should give it like an

exhaust and an engine and gas.

>> Real engine note.

>> Yeah. Real engine note.

>> When I had my Raptor, I

>> And more cylinders.

>> People anytime I was on a call in the

car.

>> Yeah.

>> People would assume that I was driving a

sports car because there's so much

>> engine noise in the cabin. It was

ridiculous.

>> Yeah. I mean, the Raptor R has how many

cylinders does it have? Is it an eight a

V8? It is, right?

>> I thought it was a

>> So So it has It has eight cylinders. The

The F-150 Lightning had zero cylinders.

>> That could be why it's not selling very

well.

>> The The Ford Raptor R had 5.2 L in its

engine. The F-150 Lightning had a zero L

engine because it didn't have one. So uh

it makes sense why this uh has been

struggling. Um, and we will we'll see

what they wind up doing.

>> We got to change the subject because all

this Raptor talks got me thinking about

getting one again and

>> pull the trigger. Uh, well, if you think

it's bullish or bearish that Ford is

pulling the Raptor, no, they're going

they're doubling down on the Raptor.

They're pulling the lightning. Uh, head

over to public.com investing for those

that take it seriously. Multiasset

investing, industry leading yields.

They're trusted by millions. Um,

quadrillion. What else is going on in

the markets?

>> Hero Natada says, "My inbox is full of

people breathlessly trying to interpret

this." And it is one-year look at spy.

>> It's over.

>> A slight dip.

>> You can interpret this in two seconds.

It's over. It's just completely over.

The bubble popped. Now it's ready to

start rebuilding. It

>> was a good run.

>> We can go up from here

>> because the bubble has popped.

>> You're welcome. Yep.

>> It was rough. We got through it. We are

now

>> It's almost a weekend.

>> We are now past the trough of

disillusionment. We're in the plateau of

productivity.

>> It's good.

>> That's what I see.

>> It's good. It's good. And and pretty

soon Oh, the stocks have already stopped

trading. So, we're safe now.

>> We're safe. It can't hurt us anymore.

>> The economy can't hurt you on the

weekend.

>> Um there's there's so there's so many

more charts. It's really chart talk

time. Consumer sentiment almost back to

its record low. People are not happy

with consumer sentiment right now.

>> You see this too? Uh

>> which Bank of America.

>> Yes. just uh as of yesterday just fully

recovered from the global financial

crisis.

>> Wow.

>> Took 19

>> to the day and then it's like back in

another crisis. Can you imagine?

>> It's like no, we just dug our way out of

the hole. Uh no, fantastic. Uh famously

backstopped by none other than Warren

Buffett. Um

>> yeah, it's been interesting to follow. I

mean Birkshshire Hathaway is green this

week.

>> He's got so much cash. That's so much

>> building cash pile.

>> So it's $1.07 trillion.

>> Maybe the least AGI pilled person in the

world.

>> Cash pills.

>> Imagine if imagine if uh Birkshshire

Hathway just comes in and and just

acquires like 90% of Open AI.

>> You like those authentic greenbacks. Ag

What's What's the I for uh authentic

greenback

incentives? I don't know. Um

>> uh Dan Daniel E says commenting

>> so Nvidia put out

>> something

on Wednesday said as I've long said

China is nanconds behind America and AI

it it's vital that America wins by

racing ahead and winning developers

worldwide

>> Daniel says this is an insane statement

America is more than nanconds ahead of

China and AI the actual gap is months

and it would be larger too if Nvidia

stopped the flow of advanced GPUs to

China. So, putting

>> him in the truth zone.

>> Um,

>> or some more information on the SNAP

deal. Snap gets 400 million, which is

greater than Perplexity's total revenue.

>> Snap uh gives nothing except access to

>> Wait, wait,

it's more what? They're they're they're

paying more than their revenue.

>> How How Wait, how does that work?

Perplexity is taking VC dollars, okay,

>> giving them to Snap for distribution.

>> There's also there's also an equity.

>> All the SNAP holders are sorry, this is

extremely confusing. Let's read this.

Uh, the deal looks incredibly in Snap's

favor. Snap gets $400 million greater

than Perplexity total revenue. Now,

Signal is saying this is most likely 399

million of Perplexity equity to Snap,

not cash. So there is a question about

how much of it is cash um versus So

yeah, the uh the the raise VC dollars,

give it to SNAP is one theory, but it is

possible that they're just giving $400

million of equity like a stock grant.

>> I think I think it's a it's some split.

Yeah,

>> I don't know if they they published it,

>> but S like like Signal's thesis is that

it's it's 399 million of equity and like

1 million of cash. And and so it's

basically just like like we want

distribution in Snap and we're willing

to give you equity to pay for it because

400 million on 20 billion is 2% of the

company, right? Something like that.

>> Yeah,

>> it's crazy. 2% of the company. Snap

gives nothing except access to an

unloved AI chat. Perplexity gets

indirect access to zero income teens.

Wow. Sasha is not a fan of this deal. Uh

Spiegel negotiation master. go back to

the conversation we were having I think

Saturday. We were

>> uh we had a couple hour drive and we

were basically doing a podcast with no

no mics. But I was saying I was

surprised that Snapchat has not figured

out a way to just monetize all the

capital

>> that a lot of these uh consumer AI

companies have given their massive

massive user base. Well, well, it's

because it's because the the numbers are

like all flipped around like like Snap

is is a I think like way more mature on

all the business metrics and yet worth

half Perplexity,

right? Like look at the look at the

difference in terms of like business

metrics, DAUs, uh page.

>> Perplexity does not want

will not want people comping it to snap

in their next financing. Yeah, it's odd.

I don't know. It's it's some sort of

like uh you know dance to actually uh

integrate these two things. Uh TAN uh

says Snap will be integrating Perplexity

directly into Snapchat's chat interface.

Perplexity will play will pay Snap $400

million over a year in a mix of cash and

stock as part of the deal and gets

access to Snap's 900 million monthly

active users. A in the chat, Snapchat's

gonna accidentally build AGI just trying

to make the dog filter blink

realistically.

>> I love it.

>> You think Tyler is at a pathway to to

AGI?

>> Well, I I mean, look, Spiegel I mean,

Spiegel might be back.

>> You think so?

>> I mean, look, we know someone who was

previously

>> What do you think?

>> What do you think he actually gets? What

do you think he actually gets? I I have

a lot of trouble understanding what

perplexity is because it's it's it's

somewhat of an application layer

company, but a lot of the APIs, a lot of

the foundation model products like do

deep research. Some of them have news

hooks already. So if my choice like like

Apple could have gone to Perplexi, they

went to Gemini. like does Gemini give

you search results the way Perplexi like

Perplexi's initial pitch was it's a LLM

but there's no cut off and we'll search

the web for you I feel like most of the

LLMs just do that out of the box now and

so like what are you getting when you

partner with Perplexity over something

else what's the differentiate

>> you're getting cash that's why I think a

lot no I think a lot of this deal had to

have been cash because I think if I'm

Evan Spiegel and I'm looking at

>> like perplexities revenue and user base

relative to his own.

>> Yes.

>> And you're not

>> okay. So, help me understand this math.

If I'm if I'm Apple, how many how many

DA use does Apple have? Is it It's like

the same size as Snapchat, right? In

terms of like actual iPhone users, it's

got to be a billion, right? There's like

a billion iPhone users or something like

that.

>> I think it's more uh like 1.5.

>> Okay. So, and then Snapchat has like

400. Oh, wait. No, Snapchat has almost a

billion. Uh, MAUs, but DAUs is like 400,

right?

>> Uh, yeah, like 470.

>> Okay. So, let's say that. So, let's say

that Snapchat has roughly 40% as many

users as Apple. So, it's 40% to Apple's,

you know, billion plus 1.5 billion. Uh,

Apple is paying Google

1 billion

per Snapchat could potentially go and

pay Google for access to Gemini 40% as

much, right? Because they're 40% the

size. So, they could pay 400 million and

get the exact same quality of of AI

product that Apple is vending. You'd

think because Apple says, "Hey, or

Google goes to Apple and says, "Hey, you

want to service a billion users? That'll

be $1 billion. Oh, you want to service

400 million users? That'll be $400

million because it's billion because

it's basically a dollar a user. I don't

know.

>> Google's basically charging a dollar a

user.

>> But perplexity is in the opposite

scenario where they're paying for the

right as opposed to the other way

around.

>> Yeah. The definition of perplexity is

inability to deal with or understand

something complicated

or unaccountable.

>> It's perplexing. I It is perplexing.

>> Similar to confusion, bewilderment,

puzzlement.

>> Yeah. I mean, this was a little bit of

my of my question with Mark German, and

he was like, "No, no, no." And he kept

shutting it down, and I think he has a

strong opinion, and he might wind up

being right, but his uh my take was was

when when a platform, when an aggregator

partners with a foundation model lab,

which direction should the money flow?

And he was like, obviously, it should

flow from the application layer to the

foundation model lab. So obviously Apple

should pay Google because Google is

inventing a technology and then selling

that technology to Apple.

>> I think it I think it again it would

have looked a lot different. It would

have been flipped if Apple was just if

Gemini was becoming the default

assistant within Apple,

>> which they would never probably allow,

right? Um

>> well they would if they're getting paid

>> potentially if they were getting paid

$20 billion.

>> Exactly. Which is like how I think this

plays out actually.

>> Yeah. I think somebody maybe it's open

AI but I think somebody will be paying

Apple for the right to funnel those LLM

queries wherever they want and take the

cut just like what happens in search. Uh

but that's a hot take and I and I I I

respect people that don't agree with me.

>> In other news, Deutsche Bank is

exploring ways to hedge his exposure to

AI to data centers. It's looking at

options including shorting a basket of

AI related stocks and buying default

protection via synthetic risk transfers.

So they're hedgeman.

>> So they've bet so they bet big on data

center financing. Uh the scale of the

expend expenditure on AI infrastructure

has prompted concerns that a bubble is

forming with some likening the

enthusiasm to that which preceded the

dotcom crash. Skeptics have pointed out

that billions of dollars have been

deployed in an untested industry with

assets that quickly depreciate in value

due to rapid change in technology.

>> Stream Yimi in the comments says, "If

there's one thing Deutsche Bank is

really good at, it's being very

exposed."

>> Uh so in recent months, Deutsche Bank

has provided debt financing to Swedish

group Eco Data Center as well as the

Canadian company 5C, who together raised

more than 1 billion to fuel their

expansion. The investment bank does not

break down how much money it has lent to

the sector, but it's estimated to be in

the billions of dollars. Hedging

exposure to the industry could prove

difficult because betting against a

basket of AI related stocks in a booming

market will be expensive. While

meanwhile, SRT transactions require a

diversified pool of loans to earn a

rating and investors to likely hire

demand higher premiums. Hyperscaler's

pursuit of super intelligence has fueled

demands for infrastructure that will

help them build it. I mean, this is

everyone from the uh from the Haunted

Mansion proprietor. Like, everyone is

getting in on the action. Like a few

years ago, like the like it was like if

you have anything that's related to AI,

like go go go raise money, grow it, uh

spin it, flip it, turn it around, pivot

it, whatever you want to do. Uh Europe

is expecting a wave of dealm

consolidation in digital infrastructure

and the cost estimate from the financial

times on the total AI buildout three

trillion three trillion bucks. Um pretty

wild times. Uh Business Insider has a

scoop here that Google is looking to

invest in anthropic at a 350

billion valuation.

>> Um it's interesting. Enthropic seems

what, one quarter the revenue of OpenAI.

And yet from a vibe perspective, from a

from a public attention, from a PR

crisis perspective, Anthropic used to be

in trouble every other week because

Daria would be out there being like

paper clip, we're going to paperclip

everyone, you know, we're going to get

rid of everyone's job. And it was like

really aggressive, right? Uh, and so

like like they had to back stuff up from

they had to back stop they had to backs

stop their coms a couple times, but it's

been great and Daario's looked great for

the last 6 months and he's just been

beating the drum on, hey, there's a

there's geopolitical considerations here

with China, but overall we're we're

building and we're happy to be an API.

We're happy to be we're we're happy to

help businesses Yeah. generate code and

>> running the experiment of like highly

focused lab. Yeah,

>> versus highly

>> not distracted, but taking a lot of

shots on goal with OpenAI.

>> We could we could be looking back on

this in a couple years and being like,

man, they really missed erotica. They

really missed SLO

>> Consumer Electronics.

>> We missed Consumer Electronics. It's

possible, but on the flip side, it does

seem like they've built a, you know, a

bit of an elegant business and it seems

to align well with uh Google's strategy

>> and every hyperscaler wants a piece of

it.

>> Yeah. I mean similar to how Microsoft

has access to open AI models on Azure,

you know, Google uh bringing anthropic

in through an increased investment.

Also, I I just wonder is it hard to do a

deal at 350B

these days in the venture community?

Like there was already that reporting

that Dario had to go all over the world

to scrap together the last round. And

I'm wondering if there's a world where

you if you're trying

you should just go to the hyperscalers.

Well, yeah, they're using every possible

capital source. We've seen some of these

SPVS that have like, you know, 0% carry,

10% management fee.

>> Yeah. Yeah.

>> Up front. So, they're tapping

everything. Uh,

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Jordy, where do you want to go next?

>> I think we should bring on

>> our next guest, our first and only

inerson guest,

>> Jordan Castro. Hey, he's here live in

the TBP and Ultradome and we will bring

>> Muscleman himself.

>> He is the author of Muscleman and the

novelist. Wait, you you're Was that your

first novel? Did you write a novel

called The Novelist?

>> Yes.

>> What inspired that? That's it's kind of

like uh it's recursive.

>> Yeah. Oh, well, I I wanted to say first

of all, thanks for having me. Of course.

Of course. Um you know, I Yeah. I um

>> uh and shouts out to Norman Plays in the

chat. Someone just showed me they said

I'm here for Jordan Castro.

>> Let's go. It's not norman.

Um um um but yeah, I I I uh I write

novels, but I also um

>> you know, you guys had the pope up

talking about the pope and I I I work

with this guy Luke Burgess with this

thing called the Clooney Institute.

>> Oh, no way.

>> Um and one of the things I've noticed

it's sort of we sort of do stuff at the

intersection of like what we say Athens,

Jerusalem, and Silicon Valley. And so

sort of bringing religious wisdom into

the tech conversation. But

>> so I've been like I'm not really related

to tech, but I've been like at all these

different like talks and so on about

tech and whatever. And I noticed that

when people normally talk about AI, they

sound like AI. They immediately just

sound like AI. And when you guys were

doing your AI quadrant thing, I was

like, they sound like people.

Interesting. You know, and I I was like

I'm like, why do I give it up for

people?

>> Yeah. Yeah. Let's give it up for That's

right. That's right. That's right. Yeah.

And I was like, why do I like TVPN? you

know, I shouldn't like I mean, you know,

I shouldn't like it or whatever. And I

was like, well, because you guys like

talk like people and you talk about

people, you know what I'm saying? And so

much of the conversation about

>> Yeah. There was it was very deliberate

to put the faces of the people there,

not the logos of the companies.

>> Yeah. And I noticed that they weren't

particularly flattering uh photos. Yeah.

Yeah.

>> Oh, interesting. That was not

intentional. We a lot of times we'll

give them muscle Well, we will literally

make the muscle me. We have fun with

that. uh for that that decision was

actually more just about like how do you

actually fit them all in? Like if you

make them the muscle man, then you have

to make it smaller. You can't see their

face facial features. It No, I mean some

of those photos are like their hero

photo that like their comm's department

clearly like put on their Wikipedia page

or something. I don't know. Hey man,

that's

>> uh or like their corporate photo. You

don't always get to pick what photo is

becomes you on the internet, but

sometimes,

>> trust me, I know when people get mad at

me on Twitter. I've been publishing

since I was like 16.

>> Oh, do they go find a stupid photo? find

pictures of me like in high school

wearing like a pink button up and they

post it and they, you know, comment that

makes sense. Yeah. Yeah. I I' I have

some silly photos from from of of old

that I'm sure will resurface when people

want to dunk on me. Uh what break this

po post down for me actually like what

what what was your read on this? So

technological innovation can can

do you think he did?

>> Well that I think the worst actually uh

the the worst thing about AI is that

people are saying you can't use m dashes

anymore. I love the mdash.

>> Okay. Okay. So, I don't love the M dash.

Like, it's not that I hate it. I'm just

indifferent to it. I didn't I don't even

know where it is on the keyboard. And

so like

>> you do minus sign, minus sign, and then

space, I think, to generate

>> I think you know, double tap, double

tap space shift option dash.

>> So, like just double tap space.

>> And I go here.

>> Double tap it. But sometimes it doesn't

like this is the story. And then I want

to do an M dash and then space.

>> Shift and you can hit it. I'm putting on

an absolute human mash. Underscore. This

is an underscore.

>> That's an underscore, dude. Look.

Underscore underscore.

>> Maybe it's just something that I know

how to do.

>> Test underscore test.

>> How do you do?

>> Maybe. Maybe.

>> I just run it double double dash space.

>> No. So, so, so I completely agree with

you. So, uh, I I wrote I write like a

little, you know, 300word, 400word like

summary of my current thinking on

whatever's in the news every day. Uh, I

just write it right in Google Docs here.

I don't use any AI. I hand it off to

Brandon on our team. He edits it. I

don't think he uses any AI. Uh sometimes

he would put M dashes in and if we put

in even one M dash, all the comments we

M dash M A what was the problem? And

it's just like okay, like now I just

can't use the M dash because like like

the the masses will go crazy.

>> I refuse to let them take that from me.

>> You're fighting the good fight. Okay,

you think you can win?

>> I think that it's just I lost it. I was

and and Brandon was like really like and

there were places I'll I'll show you

sometimes I will literally just write

like like a minus sign not an M dash

I'll just be like you know close quote I

will deliberately break the rules that I

know I'm not supposed to like even when

you when you when you put something in

quotes you put like the period inside

the quotes or whatever I will just break

all those rules because it just makes it

clearer that I'm not slopping it up.

>> I don't know. I think you're accepting

accepting the frame of the hat or

something.

>> I think so. I think I I think it might

be I think you're right. I think you're

right.

>> Also, shouts out Brandon. I don't I

didn't hear any claps for Brandon.

>> Yeah, let's get some claps going for

Brandon.

>> Me call him in the He's in

>> He's got a new haircut.

>> He got a new haircut.

>> We need a We need a trading card for

Brandon's new haircut.

>> He's a sleeper muscle man, too.

>> He's a muscle man.

>> I know why, but I've got I got Is it

fair to say I got you into it?

>> What? You're Wait, you you're the reason

he's the reason you got Jack?

>> Is that fair to say or that

>> He's the reason that you're absolutely

shredded and diced. He's the reason

you're walking around at 2% body fat.

>> Yes.

>> Okay. Wow. Wow.

>> Brandon content.

>> That's why That's why you can bench

three plates. You can just rep it out

because of him.

>> Four. Okay. Four. Wow.

>> Whoa. Whoa. Whoa. Whoa.

>> Look.

>> Crazy.

>> It's good. Wait. Uh, so yeah. Actually,

tell me the story of the the Muscle Man

book. Like how like what inspired it?

What was the thesis?

>> It's a novel about an English professor

who hates being English professor and

loves lifting weights.

>> Sick. Um, and part of it was that

>> And this is a real person or

>> No, it's a it's a fictional character.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Um, um, but like, you

know, part of it was that I, when I was

growing up, I basically grew up online

and, you know, it's sort of a classic

story, but it was like I was totally

anxious, you know, like I would be at

school, then I would get on the screen

and, you know, I would just post and

sort of lurk and be sort of weird and

creepy in front of the computer, you

know. Um, and then when I started

lifting, um, my anxiety and depression

just like completely went away. Yeah.

you know, and and and and I was like,

damn, like, you know, was my dad right

my whole life? You know, are all the

sort of jacked guys who are like

annoying and saying that, you know, you

got to start lifting. Were they just all

totally right? Basically,

>> the other thing that that tracks with my

personal experience, I used to have

trouble falling asleep at night. Yeah,

that too. The second I started lifting

daily or six days a week, it just went

away entirely. And the lesson is

>> people that struggle to fall asleep, at

least in some cases, are just not

exerting themselves enough to be just

physically tired enough to like fall

asleep and started lifting. Soon enough,

it's like, okay, you basically close

your eyes, you're knocked out in like 5

minutes.

>> Totally. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And so I

wanted to just kind of like I and then I

tried to find novels or even books about

lifting that I thought were like

compelling at all. And I couldn't find

any. So I started sort of trying to

write um something like that. It's also

like a satire about higher education.

There's like a lot of rants and stuff

about the universities and stuff. That's

cool.

>> Um so, um so yeah,

>> talk about the reception.

>> Um the reception has been sort of

idiotic.

>> Okay.

>> Um you know, the the the the media as we

all

>> Let's give it up for idiotic.

>> Let's give it up for the idiotic media.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

>> Um you know, it's a it's it's um

>> the idiotic media. And we have a horn

going on.

>> We are Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You know, you

know,

>> you have a horse wearing a hat in the

back of your consider journalist, but I

definitely consider us to be part of the

idiotic media.

>> Yeah. Well, that's now you're using it

in a good way. You're reclaiming it. You

know what I mean? But um but but but

most of them are idiotic in a bad way.

>> Um and the the reception has been like

here's a novel to like explain the

manosphere,

>> the manosphere and like here's like a

novel about men. And I feel like, you

know, back in the day, um, like, uh,

there's this great, uh, the literary,

uh, the writer Norman Mor has this

debate with these feminists like back in

the 70s, and he keeps calling them lady

critics. It's this very hilarious

debate.

>> Um, and I feel like in a weird way

they're doing the same thing to me, but

they're calling me like a man novelist.

Okay. You know what I mean? Where it's

like, this is a novel about a man, so

like it has to be about masculinity or

something like that.

>> Um, yeah. Everyone wants to know what's

going on with young men.

>> Yeah.

>> And it's this kind of fake discourse.

>> Yeah. I saw Chris Williamson on Tucker

the other day and it felt it felt very

much I mean honestly like I feel like

Chris has done a fantastic job of

actually sort of explaining like what's

going on with young men like it is an

interesting question. Yeah. Uh there's a

whole bunch of and I feel like every

media outlet has their own way of

interrogating this whether it's Harper's

or Vanity Fair Wired. Like everyone's

telling stories and writing profiles

about interesting people and young men

and I don't know it seems like it was

somewhat worthwhile uh discussion to

have if there if it can inform

interventions even in even just in your

own life or with your own kids. It seems

like there's some some value to the

discourse.

Did you have any intention of actually

uh sparking that debate or like actually

like like was was one of your thesis

like I need to put this book out so that

more people lift weights at young ages?

>> Uh no, but I did write an essay for

Harper that was just basically a

straightforward prolifting essay. So

that had more of that kind of

>> Sure. Sure. Sure. Yeah. That's awesome.

Yeah. The uh the thing that the my take

away from going I was very anti- gym

growing up because I was a skateboarder

and a skater surfer like the idea of

like going inside being indoors

>> lifting stuff up and putting it down

just for the

>> whatever the whatever the reason was it

wasn't appealing to me as a kid because

I was like well I could just go to the

beach and surf and like be out in nature

and so I had a generally negative

sentiment around the gym and I was also

like super scrawny growing up. I've got

like long arms. I'm I I I was like in

high school probably like 140 lbs. Like

getting under like one plate on bench

was like big

>> I'm going to die at first. And I never

really got into it. I wasn't I didn't

play football or anything like that.

>> Uh and then I got really into it in

college and it was the biggest unlock

for like mental health. Like I prior

prior to that I was like a you know

teenager. where I was like teenagers I

think are just naturally kind of like

moody and figuring out who they are and

how they fit into the world and all that

stuff. And then I found lifting and like

a lot of that stuff just like went away

entirely because I had a purpose. Uh I

would even if that purpose was like so

simple and just like going I woke up, I

was going to eat well and I was going to

go to the gym. I was going to lift as

heavy as I could and go on with my day.

And it just it it ended up being like uh

it it was like a drug almost immediately

cuz I was like I want the feeling of how

I feel after I lift. It was it was

incredibly addictive in a very positive

way. So I did that and then and then

about probably a year or so I went from

likeund by that point of like 150 lbs to

like

190 in like a very short period of time.

like basically spending I was this was

from freshman year to sophomore year and

I was spending like so much of my energy

just focused on lifting.

>> Yeah.

>> Uh and I ultimately reached a point

where I was like okay at some point this

is actually not the most productive use

of my time. And I was fortunate enough

to at that point to kind of like

discover like work and things that I was

passionate about and and ways that I

could use my energy that was more

interesting to me. And so I think like

the debate to have around lifting is

like I think like basically everyone

should be like picking up heavy stuff

and putting it down like at least a

little bit, right? You don't need to go

to the extreme. Uh the the advice that I

find myself maybe giving like you know

people that were in my shoes is like

figure out the point where you maybe

actually want to dial it back a little

bit because it's possible and probably

healthy to go way too much to the

extreme where you're spending like like

I was like all my time and energy like

just lifting because I didn't have

anything better to do besides like you

know work and and school. And then at

some point I actually needed to dial it

back and actually apply that energy in

other places. But I got the benefit of

like that period of just like

obsessiveness that I still carry with

me.

>> Yeah, 100%. I mean I that was sort of

actually what the novel was exploring,

you know, cuz when I first found it,

like you said, it's like, is this the

answer? Is this the ultimate answer? You

know what I mean? And it it it really

isn't. I mean, that's part of the issue

that I take with like the optimizers,

you know, like Hub, I mean, I know you

guys had Huberman on or Brian Johnson

>> where you sort of become like perversely

obsessed with health or with lifting or

something like that. you sort of tinker,

you know, you think of the person, the

human person as some sort of like,

>> you know, mix of neurons and chemicals

and stuff. And

>> yeah, it's interesting like even between

uh Brian Johnson and Huerman, I see a

huge wide gap, but let's put them in the

same bucket.

>> How do you contrast your philosophy?

>> I think you need to be injury maxing. I

think you need to be horsing heavy

weights.

>> Interesting.

>> And uh I think it's like a spiritual

endeavor. I think you need to almost I

think you need to get crushed under a a

body breaking weight a few times.

>> Okay.

>> Uh and um

>> and and yeah, it's more of a it's more

of a spiritual process than an

analytical process.

>> Yeah, 100%. It's it's it's Eric

Bugenhogen, who's like my favorite uh

like lifter on YouTube, always talks

about how it's a mindset. And he has

these things where like he'll just fail

insane amounts of weight multiple times

and then just like

>> work himself into this kind of like

crazy mental state and then lift it, you

know?

>> What do you think about the other

YouTubers? What do you think about Sam

Sulk?

>> Oh, I love Sam Sulk.

>> What do you think about the Trend Twins?

>> I love the Trend Twins. I love Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. For sure. For

sure. Sam Sul also Sam Sul is weirdly

emo.

>> Yeah.

>> Like he will, you know, his vlogs

actually there's this weird thing where

so my my I don't know why I'm talking

about this now, but my brother died like

a year and a half ago. That's all right.

And after the funeral, one of my buddies

threw on a Sam Sulic video. And I don't

inspirational. Yeah, it was incredibly

inspirational. But I noticed I was like

Sam Sulick's videos are sort of emo

where he's like driving by himself. He's

like talking to the camera. He's like

taking unnecessary loops around the

parking lot just

I I I I've maybe watched like 20 minutes

of Sam Sulick. appreciate like the

content like that the the world that

he's built but because specifically I

remember being in that mindset of like I

was kind of like again I remember I was

like 19 I was in school I wasn't that

happy I was like living in Santa Barbara

which was like paradise but like

mentally I was chasing that like I need

to I'd be like that those scenes where

you're like driving I'd be driving to

the gym at like 5:00 a.m. Dude, I can

relate with everything you're saying.

Like down to the specifics. Like I

started lifting too like sort of like I

was in school, just moved, didn't really

have friends, would like go to the gym

at 11:00, you know?

>> Yeah. These early early mornings or late

and then getting like food afterwards

and like honestly that era for me like

Future uh the the rap artist was like

absolutely peing.

>> What year was this? Monster for me. For

me monster was just Yeah. Yeah.

>> Yeah. So So we might we might be the

same. He became a man after

>> Wait, is your is your full name Jordan?

>> Yeah.

>> Wow. Brother,

>> make it make sense.

>> Make it make sense.

>> Make it make sense. What's going on

here?

>> But uh but yeah, so I would I would

drive I I I just remember like at the

time I was driving a a a Prius with like

200,000 miles on it and I'd just be like

driving to the gym just blasting Future

drinking protein shakes and that's like

when I think I became a man.

>> Yeah.

>> Like

incredible, incredible things about

>> and so I want I when I I think it's

super important and like when I hear

when I hear that a young person is

getting into going to the gym, I'm like

great totally

>> like you're going to become

>> you're going to find yourself through

that. And my only thing is like I think

at some point you have to evolve beyond

that and take the learnings and that

like that mentality that you get from

going to the gym and apply it to other

other ways. I think like the big

takeaway that I learned early on was

like early on I was obsessed with like

how many how many sets am I doing? How

many reps am I doing? How am I uh how am

I you know just approaching different

lifts? How many different exercises

should I be doing in a lift? And I very

quickly realized that there was like two

fac there was maybe three factors. It

was like was I sleeping a lot? Was I

eating a lot? And was I like

hyperconsistent and doing a lot of

volume. And those are the same lessons

that I've brought into

my real life outside of the gym. It's

like, am I sleeping a lot?

>> Am I like nourishing myself? Am I

getting the right amount of calories? Am

I getting, you know, getting the right

amount of um uh just like the right

kinds of food? And then am I being

consistent in the work? And so we apply

that every day. We come in and do the

show.

>> Well, and you also go to the gym. I

mean, I behind the scenes look, the

whole squad was at the gym this morning,

which I think is a great thing that you

guys do. Yeah.

>> Uh, a lot of people that were on that

chart, a lot of the tech elite are

deeply unpopular people.

>> Um, I think Elon was polling as less

popular than Donald Trump. So, not just

controversial, but actually just

unpopular across the board. A lot of

tech CEOs, a lot of tech people are just

unpopular in America. Obviously, we love

them here. Um, but we're weirdos about

that. But my question is like when I

think about who's really popular, I

think Tom Cruz. I think George Clooney.

think people that are in shape, is there

something, you know, we we we do this

jokey like giga chatification of these

people um is there something where you

like like it would actually be in their

best interest for the tech elite to get

a lot. Look at Zuck.

>> I was going to say like that um you know

I I used to think Zuck was a full creep.

He was like a beadyeyed sort of bug. He

would like you could when when when Zuck

would look in the camera, you could

almost like hear him blinking. You know

what I'm saying? It was it was it was

And then he got jacked on a chain. I was

like, "This guy's not so bad after all."

You know what I mean? So maybe um so

maybe they would all benefit from PR PR

teams hate this one simple trick.

>> Well, PR team should love it, but they

maybe aren't awake to it for some

reason. And

>> yeah, look, if you're on if you're on a

billionaire's PR team, um

>> step one, hire a trainer.

>> Bring the trend twins in.

>> Yeah. Yeah. Bring the trend twins in.

Get jacked. Um and uh you know, then

then the public opinion. Why do you

think health is so political?

>> Oh man, I I I did an event uh two nights

ago here and um someone asked the same

question

>> and this guy in the audience stood up

and he he because I I I actually don't

know. I mean, one one reason is that um

I think that

um when you're jacked and you're strong

and you're, you know, or you're

competent, it it acts as a judge

actually because if you're like, you

know, fat and you're lazy, then you feel

just sort of implicitly judged. The

other thing is that going to the gym and

getting jacked implies a certain value

system. You know, there's there's like,

you know, if you lift 145, um you know,

that's less than 225. And if you're in

the gym, you're trying to get stronger,

the implication is that it's better to

lift 225, you know? And so like a lot of

people who are like dogmatically

committed to a certain kind of like

egalitarianism, don't like that. But the

guy at the event stood up, this guy, he

looked just like Joe Rogan. His name's

Anthony, actually. Shouts out Anthony.

But he he was like he said that he said

that um the generally speaking, the left

tries to impose their ideas onto nature

and the right starts with nature and

discerns their ideas from there. And so

there's something just sort of

fundamentally different about that. I

think lifting sort of falls into the

latter camp.

>> I have a question.

>> Makes sense. Yeah. I'm always I'm always

surprised at how much like there seems

to be more controversies within

>> in between like various people even that

consider themselves all to be pursuing

their ideals of health. It's like

everybody like kind of picks a lane in a

category and then it's like

>> they're fighting over like green

powders. What green powder should you

take? Oh, my green powder is better than

your green powder. Let's get

>> It's universal. Like it I I feel like

it's it's hard to make a political issue

out of something that doesn't affect

everyone because you just keep bumping

into people and if your whole thing is

like you know

>> corporate cards or something or like you

know the the manufacturing supply chain

for large gongs. It's like there's a lot

>> you guys have a lot of those around even

have the you got I noticed in the

bathroom the the picture of the jacked

guy the shirtless guy hitting the gong.

I like these guys love

>> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's it's like

it's hard to get everyone animated about

that. It's a niche interest. Whereas

like healthare, how much money you have,

your job, your health, your food, like

these things are universal. So anyone

can uh anyone can relate to them and I

can give you a take and you can bounce

off it immediately instead of being like

I don't really know anything about that

or that doesn't really affect me ever.

>> Yeah. But there's also there is so much

co more people die in this this is

actually I don't actually don't know if

this is true but you see this talking

point all the time. More people die in

this country from like obesity and from

starvation. You know, there is this

total cope around around being unhealthy

and people people don't like the idea

that there's actually something you can

do about it.

>> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's just like

everyone everyone can be obese or not.

Like not everyone can have a like a

large corporation that goes bankrupt

under their stewardship. Like so it's

just less relevant to them because like

they might not be the CEO of a company

that's going bankrupt or something. Um

pickle ball. There's uh I couldn't find

it in here, but there's a in the mansion

section online. There is a house that is

up for sale right now that has a pickle

ball court outside and a pickle ball

court inside. What's your take on pickle

ball?

>> Dude, it's fun. I hate to say it, but

it's fun.

>> Guilty pleasure.

>> I mean, I played it one time with a

friend and I was like, man, this is I

probably said some

>> Yeah. Yeah.

>> words and uh uh and then uh we played it

and I was like, this is awesome.

>> Yeah. So I don't I don't

>> inside or outside.

>> I mean two courts is a little bit um you

know I don't know if you love something

>> zoom out for me build the the the

ultimate mansion for ath for athletics.

Are you going all in on one particular

athletic endeavor? Are you making sure

that there's a pool and a basketball

court, a tennis court? What's important

to have around the mansion?

>> For me definitely a basketball court.

>> A basketball court. Uh, and then like a

gym in a garage with no AC.

>> No AC.

>> And

>> And what's in that gym? Are we doing

rogue racks? Are we doing

>> Rogue racks are good? Okay. Yeah. Yeah.

>> Free weights.

>> What is it about uh

>> what's the archetype that can make a

home gym really work? Do you have to be

like like spiritual? Like every time

I've just been in a dedic like only like

during co

>> I bought a bunch of weights and I was

working out of my garage and I just got

so small.

>> Hard to be motivated.

>> Yeah. I got J. That's a skill issue,

bro.

>> I think No, no, I think I'm I'm implying

it's a skill issue because I would be

going in there and I was at home so I

could get an email and I'd be like,

"Okay, I'm going to run in and respond

to this email on my computer because

it's easier." And if I was taking a more

monklike approach,

>> I'd probably have been getting even more

jacked because there's no distractions,

right? It's just like more focused.

Well, during co I mean we ordered a

bunch of weights, me and my lifting

buddy like right when like right at the

tail end because everything sold out

like super fast. So we had

>> But you still had a buddy that helps.

>> Had a buddy. Yeah. And um um and we we

ended up getting these like dinky

probably like 25 lb barbells with these

like shitty weights or whatever.

>> Um but I would just go I had a shed at

the at the house and I would like go in

the shed and throw on music. And it was

actually the first time that I was

lifting where I understood the power of

like shrieking and screaming while you

lift. There's a lot of power. You can

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

>> Okay. Well,

>> moder man does not shriek and scream.

>> Uh what what's in the supplement stack?

What's Lindy? What's interesting? What

What are you staying away from? Are you

beta alanine? Are you creatine protein

supplementation mass gainers? What do

you like? I don't I'm feeling uh

reactionary against the optimizers and I

want to just say nothing. I mean I

creatine for sure. Protein's fine, but I

think you could basically

>> just eat

>> eat uh raw milk. I do I do like raw

milk. I drink a lot of raw recently. I

gained I went from like 165 to 200 lb

over the course of like 3 months. And so

I was drinking like a gallon of raw milk

a day, a tub of Greek yogurt a day.

>> Yeah. Uh um the raw eggs. I do think

like drinking, you know, 12 raw eggs

makes you feel amazing. Okay.

>> Um but that's kind of the

>> I went through a raw egg. I went through

a phase where it' be like five eggs

mixed into raw milk. Just raw.

>> Were you Bodybuilding.com guy back in

the day?

>> That was a long That was a long That was

like That wasn't even like a phase. I

would just That was just me for a long

time.

>> Um

>> I I realized like wait, I don't have to

scramble the eggs. I can just put them

in a jar and just drink it. I would I I

didn't like the taste. I would kind of

>> almost throw up sometimes, but it was

just so effective.

>> I mean, uh Derek from our place more

dates talks about just drinking the full

carton of liquid egg whites.

>> He does stuck

>> in the carton.

>> Yeah, that was a good era. There was a

period where I was watching his videos

like when I was first getting lifting,

watching like I remember being like I

can't believe I'm watching an hour and a

half videos about something.

>> Crazy. But it's so meditative.

>> Well, it's like what we were saying at

at at breakfast. It's just amazing to

watch anyone who loves what they do.

Yeah exactly.

>> You would have appreciated we we gave a

a talk last year when we had done like a

few episodes of the podcast and then we

we uh gave a talk at Heredicon uh of

like the case for like founders getting

on like peeds because you have like you

think about like pro athletes are like

spending all their time trying to be

healthy, sleeping well, working out and

being as strong and as physically fit as

possible and they legally or cannot take

peeds. Although if you asked them like

if you could take peeds if it was legal,

would you do them? They'd be like,

"Yeah, absolutely. I want to go to the

next level." Meanwhile, in the business

world, you have people that are not

sleeping that well, they can't train

that much, they're not that healthy,

they have like kind of not that great

hormone profiles. In a perfect world,

they just start sleeping well and

training and eating well and getting on

track. But for a lot of people, if

you're a CEO, busy CEO, you're scaling

your company, you don't have like you

you some of these people like can't

prioritize it or they don't for whatever

reason. And like I genuinely think if

they just got on peeds, they might build

they might build the build the uh you

know, of course under under doctor's

supervision, but they might actually

like get motivated in order to build

some of those healthier habits, but at

the very least have a lot more energy

and bring that uh intensity. What do

what do you what's your take on on

peeds?

>> I don't do them because I haven't had

kids yet, but they do seem probably

good. I don't know. Have you done them?

one actually although I I actually one

of my buddies um from from from

Cleveland uh was having a hard time on I

won't I won't say his name he was having

a hard time on the dating apps

>> and he was like um no one's responding

you know whatever like and he started

blasting gear cuz he thought it would

help him get girls and I was con

>> yes immediately and I was like but he

didn't even get jacked in the it was

like it was literally immediate and I

was like

>> was it a mindset

>> I think it might have been a mindset

>> sure sure he's like I got I I have I've

solved the problem solved my problems So

I can bring the confidence.

>> It worked for him like the next day.

>> I I find uh I find dating very

performance blasting.

>> I find creatine genuinely very creatine.

I also find caffeine extremely

performance-enhancing in the gym. Like

if you can like the Celsius phenomenon I

think is very real. Like 200 milligrams

of caffeine getting actually very fired

up before a workout genuinely helps you

stay focused during this with lift. Push

your push you. We want to make the the

beta alanine for for the workplace. You

know, imagine you got to do some emails.

Is that the

>> tingling? You start tingling. You're

like, I got to get through these emails.

>> I mean, I will say that the Yeah, for

sure. I guess the supplement sack is

like drinking enough caffeine to like

kill a small child. It

>> It's really

>> And not that I'm going to kill a small

child, but that would if they drink it

kill them.

>> Um, these mates are really good, though.

Are you guys sponsored by these guys?

>> We're not, but we That's Andrew

Huberman's brand.

>> God damn. Sorry, man. Hey, look, look,

look. I love your product if you you

know I'm talking trash but no you're

reminding I don't even consider I don't

consider Andrew's philosophy like about

>> nothing you said

wildly disagreeing with

>> yeah but yeah I I I think it's more

about like understanding

>> understanding yourself and the various

inputs so that you can then make

calculated decisions like

>> yeah I I still I know how important

sleep is there's plenty of nights we we

were traveling on Tuesday didn't get a

lot of sleep made made a call to try to

get some more sleep. But ultimately I

think it's just about my my view is like

as much as possible try to understand

how the body works but at the same time

you need to remember that the

the real edge is like having like uh

like a a fiery like spirit like and just

being like that that is like that's the

thing that you want to cultivate, right?

>> Yeah. There's that there. Yeah. I mean,

I I um

Yeah, maybe part of the the the my

feeling about it is that the one time I

tweeted something negative about Andrew

Hummerin, I got like ratioed into

oblivion, you know, people people

calling me gay and it gets like 5,000

likes, you know, and I'm just so so so

yeah, they came after me hard. But

you're probably you're probably

>> you're probably right, you know. I don't

know there. But then but the the

counterargument to that is like that. Um

>> delicious yerba mate.

>> Well, yeah, he makes a delicious uh

matina yerba mate. He makes a great

great product. Um and actually in my

first novel there's a long passage about

how your mate is great.

>> Oh really?

>> Yeah. Yeah. In in the novelist. But um I

guess the counterpoint to the to the

sleep thing that you're saying is that

um

>> there's that for a while when like the

tape brothers were just all over the

feed. There was that one of Tristan

being like um you know I I'll go to

sleep at 6:00 a.m. and wake up at 5:59

a.m. and you know 1 minute before 6:00

a.m. and I don't need any sleep. And

like that that's the kind the sort of

counterargument.

>> That's what you want to do. I mean,

negative one minute. It's a It's a It's

a It's an admirable vibe. The attitude.

Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Right.

>> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No, I always get it. I

always I always do beef with Brian

Johnson about this because I'm just

like, don't you think that if you just

have uh like great will and a life's

purpose, you can live forever even if

you're super unhealthy. And I always

cite like Charlie Mer and Warren Buffett

who like eat McDonald's and drink

Coca-Cola all day long and like live to

99 and 100 and just like, you know, they

don't look jacked. They don't really do

any biohacking, but they see

>> I think one thing that we probably one

thing we probably agree on is like I

don't think you should let health

trackers like decide your mood. Totally

or decide like how you're going to

approach totally. It's like I wake up

some days I sleep on an eight sleep. I

have like a tracker is a competition

going to the gym.

>> It's not telling you what to do.

>> Well, and it's and it's just Yeah, it's

just a it's a it's a little friendly.

>> It's not tracking me. I'm tracking it.

>> You're tracking it.

>> I'm tracking it. Yeah. But then there

are also studies that are like, you

know, the people that live the longest

have like, you know, they have like uh

good relationships, they have some sort

of spiritual life.

>> Stuff is Yeah. That stuff is very

unquantified right now in the quantified

self movement and it needs to be more

included. I think for sure.

>> That's why I don't think you can really

like quantify that stuff. People are

really uncomfortable things you can't

quantify. Totally. Totally. Um um but I

think probably yeah good relationship

some sort of spiritual life general

health you know eating the things that

like you're because also different

people different you know diets work

better for different peoples and stuff

like that. Totally.

>> Yeah.

>> Anyway,

>> what's your actual uh routine?

>> You're split. Are you in bro split? Push

pulling manosphere.

>> The manosphere split. Just crushing fo.

Um um um

>> not beating the manosphere alligator.

>> Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Um uh lately I was

doing uh Mad Cow I think it was called.

It was just three days a week and it was

literally just

>> go crazy.

>> It was um it was uh uh just

powerlifting. So it was like squat,

bench, deadlift, barbell rows three days

a week, 5x5s three days a week.

>> So you do all of those every day? All of

those three days or you rotate through

them?

>> You you rotate through them, but you're

you're squatting three days a week.

You're benching twice a week. You're

doing overhead press, too. And you're

adding um you're adding five pounds a

week. So it was like and that was when I

was doing the the spirit bives.

>> Yeah, exactly.

>> I like the 5x5. That's a good that's a

good

>> Um so I was doing that recently. I I do

like I I mean the thing that got I'll

>> It's funny. I I the the thing that maybe

we're just holding back a little bit of

our progress is like we want to work out

every day and there's actually like

studies that show if you just take more

rest days you can put on you can you can

just like start

>> but the problem with that program is

like I also like lifting every day so it

was like a problem like I I was like it

was actually not the most enjoyable

thing. I do like, as much as I'm like uh

uh opposed to it in theory, I do like

Jeff Nipper's programs. They're the

power building programs. I like him a

lot. Yeah, they're they're very good.

Yeah. Um um so the powerbuilding one and

powerbuilding three are I think my

favorite programs I've done.

>> Yeah. I just like the way he like

structures his like lessons and stuff.

>> Well, he's also natural, which is like a

big deal. You know what I mean? A lot of

people who make these programs aren't

natural, so it won't work for guys that

aren't

>> Sure. Sure. Sure. Sure. Yeah. Makes

sense.

>> Yeah. They're like,

>> "Do 10,000 reps of this. The rich Piana

8 hour arm workout.

>> I'm on

>> I'm on enough trend to kill a horse.

>> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

>> That's fantastic.

>> Well, thanks for chatting. What's your

You have your next book in the works.

>> Uh yeah, kind of. But I don't I don't I

want to talk about it.

>> Yeah.

>> Yeah. It's going to be a thriller.

>> Can you share the prompt? What's the

prompt?

>> No, no, I can't because the thing the

the the the don't make mistakes.

>> No, I'm not I'm not I'm not gonna do it,

but thanks for having me on. Muscle man

is the current one. You guys can buy Uh,

what about the biggest fish you've ever

caught?

>> Dude, I just did. I never

>> You've never been fishing? No.

>> No. Not once.

>> Family has? No. Dude, I was punk. I was

too much lucky.

>> You've never shot a fish in a barrel?

Nothing?

>> Nope.

>> Nothing. Okay. Well, we'll have to

change that soon. Uh,

>> the outfit looks like it could maybe

transport onto fishing boat. And

>> it's funny. That's funny cuz I I wore

this the other day for an event and my

buddy was I told him my friend that I

was coming on the show and he was like,

"You're actually kind of dressed like he

thought the vest was somehow TBPn."

Also, Brandon Content over there has the

same has the same vest he told me about.

>> Very good.

>> He told me that he has it. So,

>> he's looking he's looking sharp. Uh

well, thank you so much for coming on

the show. Leave us five stars on Apple

Podcast and Spotify.

>> And if you're listening to this and you

haven't lifted today,

>> hit the gym. Get a lift. re Jo uh visit

the Church of Iron.

>> That's right. Uh have a great weekend

everyone.