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- [00:00]
Sean
All right, Sean, there's a documentary that Ari and I were texting about. Did you see it? It was called Martha. It was on Netflix. It was about Martha Stewart.
- [00:09]
Ari
I haven't seen it, but I actually don't know really anything about her.
- [00:12]
Sean
Great. This is so great because Martha Stewart was a beast. I feel like I could rule the world. I know I could be what I want to. I put my all in it. Like no days off on a road, let's travel.
- [00:26]
Ari
I really couldn't tell you five things about Martha Stewart. So like, was she kind of the first influencer, like in a celebr influencer who then started launching products or what's the story?
- [00:35]
Sean
Martha Stewart was a killer. She was a total shark. She was way sharkier. If you only know her as her put together image of like this like housewife who cooks. Everything I'm going to say is going to blow your mind because she was a total shark. So I'm going to give you a little bit of her background. So basically she's born and raised up in the east coast. She goes to Columbia University. While she's going to school, she becomes a model because she was a cute woman when she was young.
- [01:03]
Ari
Yeah, yeah. Wow. She was fantastic.
- [01:07]
Sean
Yeah, good. Very, very pretty woman. Yeah, go Martha. She gets married at a young age, like 19 or 20 years old, but graduates Columbia and her father in law helps her get a job as a stockbroker. And by the way, she studied architectural like history or something like that at Columbia. Nothing to do with stocks. And so at the age of like 24, 25, she gets this job. And you're probably wondering how on earth did Martha Stewart become a stockbroker? Well, I am wondering when her father in law first met her, he was like, you have this like it factor. Like you are so charming, you are so put together because she had this vibe at a very young age in her 20s, like she dressed it fantastically. She was very charismatic. She was clearly driven and hardworking and this small like 10 person operation that was a stockbroking company, brokerage. They needed a sales woman, a salesperson and it was all men. At the time, I think this was in the 60s, it was all dudes. It was a very male dominated industry. But she comes into this interview and eventually works there and they comment on how her. She's dressed like perfectly, like so perfectly that you're sort of intimidated when you first meet her because she's like perfectly put together. But then she's like really charming and warm and you're like, oh, I like you. And so she starts as a salesperson, basically, at the stock company, basically working at, with, with, with clients and getting them to, like, trust them and things like that. And she kills it. And so listen to this. At the age of 26, according to this documentary, she said she was making $135,000 a year, which equivalent today is a million dollars a year. At the age of 26 as a stockbroker. Pretty crazy that she went from being a model to a stockbroker in that short amount of time. And she kills it. And she does it for, like, six or seven years. Like, it's like a legitimate career for her. And she suggests that one of her clients buy this stock that was like a dollar, and it went to, like, 10 bucks. So it killed it. Then they bought a little bit more, and it goes something huge, like, to 50. It was, like, this massive stock, and it made these clients all this money, but then the $50 stock goes right back down to, like, eight or ten bucks. And so technically, her client had still made a bunch of money, but that roller coaster ride of, like, making a little bit of money, then making a ton of money, then losing a ton of money, it, like, left her kind of distraught. And so she bailed because of that, like, journey, and so she quit. And so in the. When she's, like, 30 years old or late 20s, she moves out to, actually where I'm living now, Westport, Connecticut. She's like, you know, I want to have a kid. I want to, like, try this housewife life, whatever, and do this thing. And she moves out here, and she sits around for a very short amount of time, and she's like, all right, I gotta do something. Like, I can't just sit here. And so they buy this, like, kind of shitty house, and she, like, totally turns around and redoes the whole thing all by herself. She paints it, she builds this beautiful garden. She learns how to raise goats and chickens and, like, plant her own garden and, like, creates this amazing, like, estate out in Westport, Connecticut, which now it's fancy. Back then, it wasn't particularly fancy. And so eventually she gets really into this, and she's like, you know, I kind of like this housewife life. What if I start hosting some dinner parties? And she creates these lavish, amazing dinner parties, and eventually all these rich guys who come are like, hey, do you want to, like, cater my party? And so that's what she starts doing. And so she builds a business as a caterer that she said made her a millionaire.
- [04:24]
Ari
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- [04:48]
Sean
And her whole shtick back then for this catering business was she goes, I'm going to make everything by scratch. And so Westport, Connecticut, we're about an hour and ten minutes from New York City at this time. People start realizing that she could actually operate on like three or four hours of sleep. And so she would go to, like, catering. The catering business, by the way, it's like, that's like the hardest thing on earth. Like, you know, it's brutal. It's a really hard business to pull off. And so she was famous for going to the farmers markets in New York at 4am, getting all of her produce, and then going in the morning and baking all of her food. And so her famous saying as her catering business was basically, I make everything from scratch. And not only does she just make stuff from scratch, one time she saw this brochure that, like, was doing a recreation of like, the Pilgrims Thanksgiving, and there was like a basket of fruit that was like, overflowing. And she was like, that's what I'm going to do. And so she was famous for creating these, like, charcuterie boards of, like, overflowing meats and fruits. And she says something that was actually really inspiring. She was like, I wanted to turn this into experience and, like, I wanted to make this, like, fruit board. She was like, it sounds trivial, but that was my art. And I was going to make like, these baskets of fruit overflow with strawberries to show that this table is where, like, generosity, like, like, you know, like, and abundance and all this stuff. And it's a massive hit. She builds us into a big business to the point where a few years in she goes and she caters a. I think it was like Penguin Publishing or something like that. Like one of these publishers parties. She caters it and it's a really big deal. You know, she's doing like the Met, all these museum and art museums in New York. And this is a big deal that she's doing this catering company or this publishing company, and they start talking to her and they're like, dude, you are amazing. Do you Want to write a cookbook for us. And so she does. And it takes her like a few years, like three or four years, because she's super hands on, on writing this book. And they were like, hey, so what you do? This cookbook just put in a bunch of recipes. It's a black and white photos, and she was a nobody. And she goes, not a chance. We're doing colored photos and we're actually going to do like 500 photos. And just give me the budget, I'll go ahead and I'm going to like hire a photographer friend and we're going to go and like organize all these photos and take all these lavish photos at my house that I made. Because we're going to make this like the Martha Stewart cookbook, where at the time typically it had just been recipes. She was like, no, we're going to add in about like my lifestyle. We're going to have these photos. One of the photos. This is like her kitchen. Look how lavish that is. Like, what do you see?
- [07:13]
Ari
The most full kitchen I've ever seen. There's literally 9,000 pots and pans hanging above her. And then she's surrounded. She's like, her kitchen looks like a charcuterie board. It looks like an overflowing charcuterie board. But she's one of. She's like a piece of salami in the middle.
- [07:27]
Sean
And that's like the whole, her whole shtick. Basically. She, she says this. She's like, I'm gonna sell perfection. Because she was, she was a perfectionist. She was actually a pain in the ass to work for.
- [07:41]
Ari
And the first book was called Entertaining. And it was about like, entertaining guests, basically.
- [07:45]
Sean
Yeah. And like creating an atmosphere of like, warmth and things like that. And it was a massive hit. It sold 650,000 copies. What, what do you think?
- [07:54]
Ari
I feel like Nick Gray is the new Martha Stewart. I'm just gonna put that out there. What Nick Gray is doing with the two hour cocktail party, I think he's just a, he's just a young Martha Stewart right now.
- [08:05]
Sean
Yeah, well, and she was like one of the early influencers because this was in the 80s. This is when like mass media is really becoming a thing. And it's a massive hit. And so like these women buy these books because it's not just about cooking. It's about like being better, being aspirational, like perfecting a craft. And she sold the shit out of this lifestyle. And it was her lifestyle. And she basically said in the documentary, she was like, I had visions early on. Of creating this Martha Stewart media company all about me. Because I'm great. Like, I am. What? She like, she's like, she was very.
- [08:41]
Ari
Confident about that opening up the business plan. Like, all right, Martha Stewart's media company. It's about me. Next page. Because I'm great. Next page.
- [08:51]
Sean
But she was, I mean, she was so like, there's a lot of bad stuff that has gone on. Like basically her husband cheats on her. She cheats on her husband. Her daughter's like, dude, she was a cold mom. People complain working for her. They're like, dude, she's just a. And she was like, throughout the documentary, they get her on camera being rude to her employees. And so, yeah, she's like a perfectionist. And she, she, she was like, I'm not, I'm not sorry for that. I'm a perfectionist.
- [09:16]
Ari
Wait, so fast forward through the business side. So she does the cookbook. Cookbooks.
- [09:20]
Sean
A hit, massive hit. And eventually one thing leads to another where Kmart, which was just like Kmart today back then, it was like, you know, lower, lower status store. She partners with them to create like a line of betting. And people are like, shocked. They're like, why would this upscale woman do this? And it turned out to be a great move. It was really cool. And then she partners with Time and she creates a series of magazines and she's the editor of the magazine. It goes really well. But she's like, I want to own this son bitch. And so she raises $85 million and she buys the magazine and three or four years later takes it public. And I showed the financials of her business. It was based, I think it was called Martha Stewart Omnimedia. Basically the. She buys the business and like something like three years later, takes it public. In year three, it's doing $130 million a year. In 1997, $130 million in revenue. And it's a behemoth of a business. So basically they've got the TV show, they have tons and tons of magazines, they have merchandising, like the Kmart deal, it just crushes it. And it goes public and she becomes the first ever self made women's billionaire in, in America and just annihilates it. But then something really bad happens. So basically she's worth like 400, 500, 600 million at this point because the stock was going up and down. Apparently. She calls her stock broker, she's like, hey, I want you to sell this one stock. So she sells this one stock and it. She made like 30 grand off of it. Turns out a lot of people think that it was insider trading. And so the doj, like interviews her and figures out this whole thing and does this massive investigation. Turns out the charges of insert trading are dropped. They're like, you did not insert or trade, however.
- [11:13]
Ari
So sorry. She sold her own stock or she sold.
- [11:16]
Sean
Sorry, just a different, Just a stock and only 30k.
- [11:19]
Ari
So why was it a big deal anyway?
- [11:20]
Sean
It was. So it was a big deal because we're just, we're, we're basically. There was like Enron and a bunch of things like this were happening at the time. And the DOJ was like, any insider trading, any like, corruption, we're gonna go, we're going like really hard against all of this. And so she like, sells some stock. It's suspicious. Turns out that this, the CEO of this, of the company whose stock she sold, he was in fact corrupt. And they're like, but you knew him what was going on. You knew that this drug wasn't going to pass. You sold the stock, whatever. The DOJ investigates her and they're like, you actually, that looks clean. It looks like you didn't know anything. However, when we interviewed you, you told us some small fact about how you were on a schedule to sell this stock. Turns out you weren't on a schedule. And so you lied to us. And so we are going to put you in federal penitentiary for five months for lying. Not for insider trading, but for lying about this, like somewhat not that big of a deal fact. And so kind of bullshit. Kind of not like she did lie, but like she got five months in the federal penitentiary and she's like 50 years old. And at the time when all this trial happened, that's when we realized that Martha Stewart, she's, she's kind of bad. She's, she's, she's, she's, she's bad because there's all these stories where the, it comes out, she's a little rude. And so for example, her stockbroker has this assistant who would talk to Martha mostly. And like, there's examples of like, of the stockbroker's assistant being like, dude, she was the meanest person ever. For example, one time she called and I had to put her on hold. And I go back to talk to her, she goes, hey, if you don't change that waiting music, that tacky waiting music, by the next time I call, I'm going to have you fired. And just hung up. Just like hung up. Like there's like repeatedly, like a bunch of stories where she just did. She was not, like, very kind to people and that kind of swayed public opinion of her. She goes to jail for five months and it sucked. It sucked for her. It was not good. She gets out of jail and she ends up doing Justin Bieber's roast, which again, changed public perception of her because at this point, everyone was like, man, it's kind of fun seeing Martha Stewart kind of downfall because she was a perfect woman. Like, effort. It's kind of nice. Like, it brings. Brings me up to see this.
- [13:31]
Ari
Yeah, I knew she was so perfect. Yeah.
- [13:34]
Sean
But she roasts Justin Bieber and she's just like, hilarious. She talks about how she, like, shanked bitches in prison and how she like, made this shank with just like a piece of pencil and some bubble gum. And you could do one too at home. I'll show you how. Like, it, like, kind of humanized there was pretty cool, but her getting arrested, it decimated the stock. So she was like, on the documentary, she was like, I think I would have been worth $10 billion. But when I got arrested, my stock went way down. We ended up selling the company for like $300 million. And it was kind of like the. It could have been like a great company, but it kind of wasn't. However, throughout this whole thing, this whole documentary, Martha, like, has shown time and time again she's a bad, bad woman. Like in, in in all sense of the word. As in, like, she's brutal, she's smart, she's conniving, and her stock is only.
- [14:26]
Ari
Going up in your books. That's all I'm hearing. All I'm hearing is like, let's just summarize. Good looking lady already off to a good start. Then goes from model to sales slash stockbroker.
- [14:42]
Sean
All right, amazing.
- [14:43]
Ari
One interesting thing. That's cool. Two interesting things, you have my attention. Third interesting thing. Self made first kind of major trad wife influencer. Does the cookbooks, does it. Her way is ruthless with the details. Is a. Has, is. Has a no nonsense attitude. She's a stickler. These are all, I mean, these are your safe words, dude. Like, these are all the things that you enjoy. So this is really up your alley. Like, I mean, like, how do you feel about Martha Stewart right now? Because it sounds like even when she's bad, it just made her more good.
- [15:16]
Sean
In your books, sort of. I mean, she paid the price. So basically, like, her husband left her her kids. Like, she's got a bad relationship with her children because of the way she behaved. And she basically. She's 83 now, by the way. I didn't realize how old she was. And, like, she hasn't had a relationship since her husband and her broke up. So she paid the price. She. There's a cost to be the boss, you know, and she paid it, but she is, in fact, the boss. So I do have a lot of respect for her. And I also think that there's downsides to achieve what she achieved, but I'm shocked you didn't know that. Did you know any of this? Like, how she's like, not really.
- [15:50]
Ari
I knew she had, like, a cookbook or was on TV and that she sold, like, stuff to women. That's kind of the extent of what I knew about Martha Stewart.
- [15:59]
Sean
Dude, she's great. And so another big takeaway, and I'll wrap up here, is how big of a company you could start and have just off the back of one person. Like, it was the Martha Stewart brand, and she was, like, into that. Like, a lot of people would be fearful of, like, having that burden, having that on your back of, like, literally a thousand plus employees and billions of dollars of value. And she was totally into it and she loved it. And I love those types of personalities.
- [16:30]
Ari
Right. But it sounds like this company wasn't that good. And your numbers table here, you know, by 2001, it says total revenue, 295 million, net income, 21 million, which is obviously, that's good. That's not nothing. But that's not a $10 billion company to make, you know, 21 million a year of net income. And then it says from 2003 to 2015, which is, like, three presidents. It says consecutive annual losses every year except for one year. So was this really a good business or was this actually just a lot of work for nothing?
- [17:02]
Sean
No, it was good. I mean, you have to think of a few things. One, you know, it was making $300 million a year in revenue, and a lot of it came from publishing, and publishing means subscription magazines. So, like, that's, like, pretty good. But then the Internet came and just completely, like, obliterated that industry. I mean, that was like, magazines are probably, like, the worst industry to be in. So, like, yeah, there's a lot of what ifs. And the timing was such that she got arrested. And also, like, you know, Amazon was created and the Internet was created. So, yeah, there's a lot of, like, what ifs.
- [17:34]
Ari
But I feel like if she was. I think she was, like, 30 years too early. Like, I think if she had the Internet she could have become a juggernaut because it sounds like her talent and her ruthlessness, that combination was going to serve her well. And it just, she needed the, she needed a better medium. If she could have just owned her own Instagram and TikTok channels and built everything off the back of that, you know, she, I think she would have been the number one, sort of like women's or mom influencer. She arguably was that anyways of her era. But the market 100x.
- [18:09]
Sean
Yeah, yeah. I mean and like, I think a lot of these like big celebrities, I think it was a little bit easier to be a big celebrity in the 80s 90s and early 2000s because there was less of them. Now anyone with a cell phone can become a celebrity in like six or 12 months. So it's hard to say. But, but by the way, her businesses, her businesses still do like a billion a year in sales.
- [18:32]
Ari
Okay, gotcha. You have something in your notes here. Typical day of 60 year old Martha Stewart.
- [18:37]
Sean
Yeah, read that.
- [18:38]
Ari
It says she's 60, but she looks a decade younger. She's, she's been up since 4:30am she answers her email at 5, takes a 3 mile walk with her trainer. At 6, she tours her garden. At 7, as when she tours her garden, she's thrilled to discover a duck and 13 ducklings in the swimming pool. By 7:30 she's whipping up corn gr for a visiting waterfowl. I don't even know what any of these words are.
- [18:58]
Sean
An animal. An animal.
- [18:59]
Ari
Building a wooden ramp to help them get in and out of the pool.
- [19:02]
Sean
A duck.
- [19:02]
Ari
Okay, she's doing all this stuff for a duck. Her TV crew arrives at 8. Hair and makeup, 8:30. And then she's shooting her TV segment by 9:00am yeah, dude, she's crazy. Dude. I literally woke up like 19 minutes ago and I rolled out of bed, I put on this hat and then I started, I clicked play. I don't think, I don't think I'm built for this.
- [19:21]
Sean
She's a machine. You know how like people say stories of like how Trump can only operate on three hours of sleep? That's like a real thing, by the way. There's like a, it's like, I forget what the name of it. It's like a thing. She's another person. She's famous for only sleeping like three hours a night. All right, my friends, I have a new podcast for you guys to check out. It's called Content is Profit and it's hosted by Law, Luis and Fonzie. Cameo and it's brought to you by the HubSpot Podcast Network. After years of building content teams and frameworks for companies like Red Bull and Orange Theory Fitness, Louise and Fonzie are on a mission to bridge the gap between content and revenue. In each episode, you're going to hear from top entrepreneurs and creators and you're going to hear them share their secrets and strategies to turn their content into profit. You can check out a recent episode called the Secret to content that converts and they break down. Our buddy Alex Hermos blueprint for effective video production. So you can check out content is profit wherever you get your podcasts.
- [20:26]
Ari
Perfect segue. Can I tell you what my best topic was that I wanted to talk to you about?
- [20:29]
Sean
Yeah.
- [20:31]
Ari
Ozempic for sleep. So there's a guy, his blog is isaac.net and he wrote this post about sleeplessness. And he basically says that there is a set of people that are famous who have the short sleeper jeans, a set of jeans for where, you know, about four to five hours a night is a full night's rest for them. And he says that, you know, Mozart, Thomas Edison, Sigmund Freud, Margaret Thatcher, Obama. And he's like, even my, my lab, lab mate, this guy's a researcher, he's like, have this thing called short sleeper syndrome. And people thought that short sleeper syndrome would be, you sleep less and maybe you're able to operate that way, but you know, it's gotta be bad for you. Sleep, we know, is sort of the best thing for you. It restores the brain and the body and all your function. And so these people must be dying younger and have more disease, right? And it's like, no, actually they don't. These people just simply have the benefit without the cost. They sleep, you know, they need about 3 hours less sleep than the rest of us, but they, they don't pay the price in terms of, you know, the health consequences of that. And so he goes on this post and he basically outlines that.
- [21:40]
Sean
Who are these people, by the way, in this photo?
- [21:43]
Ari
So he says, you know, my favorite family is this family called the Johnsons from Utah. And the Johnsons from Utah are a set of researchers. And I think a bunch of them have this short sleeper genetic makeup. And so they've been researching this for a while. And it's about, you know, 1% of people have this thing where you're, you don't need as much sleep and it does not seem detrimental to your health or your productivity. And they've studied why is this, what is it? Is it one gene Is it not? And they've basically like, there's four kind of like protein changes that they've noticed, you know, V variations in the glutamate receptor, GRM1, blah, blah, blah. So there's these four things and then they've done some tests in mice and others where they do like knockouts. So they'll, they'll knock out one of the genes and they'll, they'll see if it, you know, makes the mouse sleep less or sleep more. And they try to understand.
- [22:35]
Sean
Can you do that to a, like when you say knockout, does that mean like you're a living being or when they reproduce, a living being? You could, that's how the body works. You could just like I actually, I.
- [22:46]
Ari
Said that with so much confidence for somebody who has no idea. But I think that you could do that. I'm a bio major. You could check that. That's a fact, Jack. But I don't know if you could do. I don't know if this is done at the embryo or in the living thing, but point is, they've tested this in mouse models. Mouse models don't always apply to human models. So there's some question there. But the, the researcher sort of points out actually, you know, usually when mouse model, when, when things that work in mice don't work in humans, it's cuz they tried it and it worked for the first time in mice and then it takes a long time to even try it in humans and maybe it won't work. He's like, in this case, we're observing it actually in humans and then we went back to mice and tried to recreate that those genetic mutations or those genetic, genetic changes. And so this is really exciting. So what he's talking about is like in the same way that we found drugs like Ozempic, which could modify your appetite, it could change your, your need for food in a way that had all these downstream health benefits, right? You change your need for food, you reduce your need for food now you eat less, obesity goes down. They've seen that it, you know, helps with things like addiction to alcohol. There's like all these other like things that people are noticing with these. That's the Ozempic case. This guy's saying you could do the same with sleep, like if.
- [24:01]
Sean
And is this guy Isaac, is he the researcher or is he just blogging on this?
- [24:06]
Ari
He's a researcher who is blogging about this.
- [24:07]
Sean
Wow. Got it.
- [24:08]
Ari
And he's basically saying that like potentially we could create something that does the same thing. That how Ozempic reduced your need for food, that we could reduce your need for sleep in and make you mirror these people who have this already where they don't suffer the consequences of less sleep. And he's like, you know, you do the math and you're like, if you're saving three or four hours a night of sleep, you basically, it's like the world's best longevity trade. So what most people are trying to do with longevity is like, oh, if I'm living till 80, can I live till 90? If I'm living 90, can I live till 100, 100, 110. And they're trying to push off the, like that last marginal decade of poor health where you can't walk as much, you can't see as well. You know, if you're in pain, all that stuff, you're trying to push that back as far as you can. This would make it so that you actually just live better. Like the days where you're healthy, you have more days, you're awake for more of the time and it's the equivalent of an extra 10 years. But you get the 10 years, not at the end. You get it sort of all along the way while you're in your best health of your life. And that would be the promise of this. And so how exciting is that? I feel like that it's possible that somebody's going to make an ozempic for sleep and it's going to allow us to. Instead of needing eight hours, I can sleep for five and feel just as good as I would on eight.
- [25:22]
Sean
He says this is like adding 10 more years to your life. An 80 year lifespan, eight hours a days of sleep compared to 80. 80 years with four hours of sleep, that's 10 years. This is amazing.
- [25:34]
Ari
And on top of that, by the way, there's people who suffer from insomnia and narcolepsy and there's all these actual sleep apnea. There's all these things that affect people's sleep. Maybe you could alleviate those along the way. Right? Like if, you know, there's, there's thousands of Americans who have those problems, could you also improve those?
- [25:51]
Sean
Okay, first of all, this is amazing. This is a great find. I'm reading his blog, his writing's really great. It doesn't write like this is why I was shocked that he's the researcher because he's, I think like there's like a quote where he goes, this is crazy.
- [26:05]
Ari
Like he doesn't, they don't, they don't normally say things like that.
- [26:08]
Sean
Yeah, they don't have personalities usually.
- [26:10]
Ari
This has profound implications, by the way. He's 22 years old. He's a PhD student at MIT exploring brain simulations as an alternative path to beneficial AI. And in the past he skipped out of high school in rural Austria to graduate early in his gap year. He created a $1 million nonprofit and ran the most viral tech conference of the year that had Sam Altman and others come. He's self taught Mandarin last year and did his undergrad at Berkeley in two years. Guy's a winner, doing well.
- [26:44]
Sean
And he owns isaac.net like great domain name.
- [26:49]
Ari
Isaac with a K.
- [26:53]
Sean
This guy's great, man. Well, what I was going to say was, is this, I've never, I've heard of, you know that gene a little bit that you're discussing. But it's just funny that there's just some kid with a 22 year old with a personal blog and this is the first time that I've ever heard about this. Is this.
- [27:12]
Ari
That's what I'm saying. It's fascinating.
- [27:13]
Sean
But if he, if he's just talking about his blog, is this like something that actually has like why is there not more press or press releases on this topic? Is it actually legitimate?
- [27:25]
Ari
We just broke it, dude. This was the tipping point. You're going to see other people working on this, you're going to see people talking about this. There's going to be misinformation everywhere. It's going to be great.
- [27:35]
Sean
This story is awesome. Just because I like Isaac and also I would like to do, I would like to not sleep. Would you rather be skinny like ozempic and not and eat less or be like chubbier or whatever you.
- [27:49]
Ari
I could sleep only five hours instead of eight. I don't give a shit. I would be the fattest man on earth to do that. No, just joking. But like that is a, that is a way better superpower to need less sleep to get back three hours of time every day.
- [28:02]
Sean
That's debatable. I think that people will always prefer to be skinny over sleep. Less sleep.
- [28:07]
Ari
People are dumb. That's so dumb. If they, if they prefer to be skinny over, like have an extra three hours of life every day.
- [28:14]
Sean
If the average 25 year old, if you're like look hot or live to 90 versus 80, they're going to choose hot over sleep any day of the week.
- [28:22]
Ari
Well, this is why we don't ask 25 year olds questions. The brain is not fully formed yet.
- [28:27]
Sean
This is a great find. His blog, according to SimilarWeb just shot up to 125,000 visitors in October. What did he like before it was.
- [28:37]
Ari
He published this in November, so that's kind of cool. So Ben found this, and he sent it to our friend. So our friend invested in a company that made a GLP1 drug and, like, sold for billions of dollars. And so he sent this to him because he's like, oh, you, like, you did that early OIC thing before. OIC was like a known thing, like seven years before. He invested in this company that was going to work on. On that, and it paid off in a big way. So he sent it to him, and that guy was like, I don't know how you found this. This is the best thing I've read all year. Like, I'm so excited about what you just sent me. And it was such a great example of Ben being Ben, where Ben has on one side a really curated feed where he'll find interesting things like this. He'll be fought. He doesn't follow many people, but he'll be following a guy like this Isaac guy. And then he knows who to route the information to. And it's. He's like a. He's like FedEx. Like, he doesn't touch the package. Like, when I. When I get this, I immediately start doing research. I write notes, I go talk about it. I'm not passing it to somebody smarter. Ben's like. He's like a FedEx guy. The package comes off the conveyor belt. He grabs the box, tosses in the truck, drives it to the address, drops it off, and doesn't ask any questions about what's inside. He just knows that's useful for you. I think this is useful for you. And he just does that all day. I had him like, add me to all these group chats. Like, he was always texting people. But I said, yo, just add me. I just want to be a part of these. So now I'm in probably like 60 group chats where it's me, Ben, and a mutual, like, acquaintance or friend. And he's just doing this all day. He's just routing packets to each. To different people about, yeah, I think you're into this kind of thing.
- [30:11]
Sean
That's ridiculous. How is he going to monetize it? Can he ever monetize this?
- [30:15]
Ari
Yeah, dude, we monetize this phenomenally. This is the secret of Ben. He just tries to be useful, and then he'll be like, hey, yeah, remember that guy like, you met a year ago who you then didn't talk to ever again. I'm like, yeah, I think so. I think I remember that guy. He was cool. He's like, yeah. So I've been texting him. You know, we text daily. And he's got this new thing and it's taking off and he wants us to invest. He's not letting anyone else in. And then we invest in it. It's like, it's incredible how this karma just comes back tenfold for Ben. And he never asks for anything. He never asks. It's amazing.
- [30:48]
Sean
He texts me, like, a fair bit. Like, just, like, saw this thing. You might like it. Like, you know, I saw. I'm the recipient of some of these things. And I. I hate texting. Like, I hate, like, being at my computer and, like, constantly having to go back and forth with 10 different people, which is how a lot of people's computers look right now, where you're like, it's between Slack and messages. You're just, like, going back and forth with 15 or 20 people at all times. And you're like, what did I do all day today? I just, like, I just shit chatted. It takes it. So I don't like doing it. Do you fall into that trap, like, throughout the day where you're like, dude, I just, like, texted people all day?
- [31:25]
Ari
Yeah, I like Slack because I like my projects that I'm working on, but I don't text much. I'm a very bad texter. And if anyone's out there who's texting me, I really apologize. I probably have not texted you back. So I'm. I'm prolifically bad at it. Ben is prolifically great at it. And that combination has really helped. The combination has really helped. And now people don't. They just bypass me altogether. They go to him, and it hurts my feelings sometimes. I'm like, wait, I thought I was friends with this person, but now I understand why. Because he's just a better person. He's a better texture. In fact, he. He was like, I need to make a shirt called. I reply. He goes, because that's my thing, dude. I reply. And it's like, it's. It's pretty easy. And I was like, you should write, like, the Modern day How to Win Friends and Influence People. Because that's what he does. He wins friends and influences people with the most basic. The most basic of things. And I was like, you couldn't sell a. Like, the thing you do creates, like, tons of value, like tens of millions of dollars in value for us. You couldn't even teach People this because you, you would say what you do out loud and they'd be like, that was it. I showed up for the seminar for that. That's basic. It's basic as hell. And. But that's what he does and it works.
- [32:32]
Sean
That's insane. I think it's funny. I, by the, by the way, Google Isaac Freeman. Very good looking, young, stylish black dude. This guy's got it all. This guy's got it all. This guy's. If he just becomes an astronaut, he's basically the modern day James Bond.
- [32:50]
Ari
Oh, man, he's got like cool glasses and a jawline.
- [32:52]
Sean
Fuck yeah. Game over. You said you had a bunch of exciting things you want to do.
- [33:00]
Ari
By the way, you know, we don't judge a book by its cover. So like, you know, looks, looks do matter. Let's be clear. We try not to judge people by their looks first. But once we take a look at what you do, we then go take a look at how you look. And it either is like a plus a hundred or it's a minus 100. It's a huge multiplier on my opinion of you and how much I'm going to remember you afterwards. I will never forget this guy.
- [33:24]
Sean
Yeah, like if he were dorky looking, I'd be like, yeah, makes sense, checks out. And then I see what he looks like and I'm like, aw, right? It's tough to be like, looking at. By the way, most people, when they have an avatar as their Twitter profile, it's because they're goofy looking and the avatar is better looking than that.
- [33:45]
Ari
He's making me question everything. Like, there's a reason I have a cartoon profile picture. All right, look at me. If you're on YouTube, look at me. This is why I have a cartoon profile picture. Okay? That's the rule. It's like when someone quotes your revenue, they would have said profit if they had it, right? If somebody talks about users, they would have quoted revenue if they had it. Normally, if somebody's got the looks, they're going to put their face as the profile picture. This guy defies all convention.
- [34:10]
Sean
I asked someone what the revenue was recently and they were like eight figures if you include the dot, zero zero. And that's pretty funny. It was. That was pretty good. So here's the deal. I made most of my money from a newsletter business. It was called the Hustle, and it was a daily newsletter at scale to millions of subscribers. And it was the greatest business on earth. The problem with it was that I had close to 40 employees, and only three of them were actually doing any writing. The other employees were growing the newsletter, building out the tech for the platform, and selling ads. And honestly, it was a huge pain in the butt. Today's episode is brought to you by Beehive. They are a platform that is built exactly for this. If you want to grow your newsletter, if you want to monetize a newsletter, they do all of the stuff that I had to hire dozens of employees to do. So check it out. Beehive.com. that's B E E H I I V dot com. You want to do another thing? Yeah.
- [35:18]
Ari
All right. I got some cool stuff.
- [35:20]
Sean
Oh, you got to do this. Poly market whale.
- [35:23]
Ari
Okay. Yeah, this is.
- [35:24]
Sean
All right.
- [35:24]
Ari
So this is the Billy of the week. Cue the music. Million dollars isn't cool.
- [35:33]
Sean
You know what's cool? A billion dollars.
- [35:37]
Ari
So you've heard the story, I think, but can I just explain a little bit of the detail here?
- [35:42]
Sean
Amazing. I read. I read about it a little bit. Do. Do we even know who this person is?
- [35:46]
Ari
Yeah. So the election was happening, what, 10 days ago or so, and the big news was sort of, I guess, like, there's a battle going on. There's Republicans versus Democrats. Great. There's Trump and Kamala.
- [35:56]
Sean
Great.
- [35:57]
Ari
They were supposed to be headed, but there was. There was an undercard to the pay per view. And so who was the undercard? Okay. If Trump and Kamala are the main event, then I think the undercard, a lot of it was like mainstream media versus social media. Right? You had, like, Twitter and blogs versus MSNBC and whatever. And they were. They were giving you different narratives. Right. So, you know, Joe Trump and Vance go on, Joe Rogan, Kamala goes on Saturday night live and, you know, the View or 60 Minutes or like, you know, these, like, traditional media. So that was one battle that was going on, by the way.
- [36:30]
Sean
Who would have thought, like, you seen, like, steel von swing the election being, like, a needle mover. Insane. Right?
- [36:38]
Ari
I was saying this the other day. I think that going on Theovan needs to be part of the national standard for an election. Like, I need to know if my president's going to be a good hang or not. And I think Theo is the one who could save us there.
- [36:47]
Sean
Yeah, that was insane.
- [36:49]
Ari
So under that, then you have, like, the billionaire backers. You got Elon on one side, you got Mark Cuban on the other. And it's like they're going around, they're promoting. They're using their money and their voice to do what was the other Battles. One of the other battles was polls versus crypto prediction markets. So the polls were telling a story. At the time, pre election, the polls were saying, razor thin margin, toss up these swing states, too close to call. It's a 50, 50 election right now. Like we don't, it is too hard to tell who's going to win. And the prediction markets, which were people betting money, were saying something different. They were saying 65, 35 Trump going to win. And they're different things.
- [37:30]
Sean
Right?
- [37:30]
Ari
A poll is, you know, you go out and you ask people, who are you going to vote for? A prediction market is who's going to get the most votes. So they do tell different things, but the reality is still the same, which is that if the polls were accurate, that it was a 50, 50 toss up, it's going to be a razor thin margin. Then the betting market shouldn't have such a big spread. There shouldn't be a big favorite versus a big underdog.
- [37:51]
Sean
And what was the poly market spread? I think it was like 75, 25.
- [37:55]
Ari
No, a little less about, it was about 63, Trump, but then it got to 65. And then like as the election started, when the news was saying, you know, we're still too early, the, the odds were just jetting in Trump's direction. They were, they knew earlier than, than the exit polls or the news was willing to report about how much of a landslide this was going to be for Trump, which it was. Okay. So before it happened, there was a question of like, is the prediction market actually predictive? And there were some legitimate skepticism.
- [38:23]
Sean
So the pros, you mean, was the betting market versus the poll market, the.
- [38:28]
Ari
Betting just like even just alone, should we be, should we care what poly market says? And on one, poly market being the.
- [38:35]
Sean
Platform where you could take the betting market.
- [38:37]
Ari
Exactly. And so you, the plus side would be to say, well, these are people betting their own money. So skin in the game. And so if you see a lot more action coming in on one side, that means the sort of the wisdom of the crowds and the actual free market believes the odds are, are this. And that might be better than just the polls where people say they're just saying what they're going to vote for and it's a small sample, but who knows, maybe they're lying. Maybe it's just too small of a sample to know. Maybe it's not indicative of. There's no skin in the game there. So on one hand you said skin in the game, on the other hand you would say poly market never Heard of it banned in the US so all the betting action was from international. So three, over $3 billion was bet on the election. None of this was Americans because you can't use polymarket in America. Then it's also crypto holders. Right. Because polymarket is a crypto betting thing. So you're like, oh, maybe there's a bias. Crypto holders are more libertarian. Maybe they're going to go more, more Right, right, right leaning. And so it's what Trump wants. And Trump is pro crypto.
- [39:35]
Sean
Yeah.
- [39:36]
Ari
So it's like maybe they're voting on what they wish for and not what it actually is. Okay, so there was some, some question marks. Then there was one more. Then the news came out and said, you know, we can't trust Poly Market because it's manipulated. Manipulated how? It's manipulated because a couple of whales are betting heavily on Trump and that's swinging the odds. So it's actually, this is not what the crowds think. It's really a couple of whales that are influencing this. And they saw that.
- [40:02]
Sean
And you, you can see on polymarket the size, like, can I, oh, someone just put this million dollar bet in.
- [40:08]
Ari
I can go on Polymarket right now and look at the top 10 betters and what they are bet on how much volume they've bet this year and how much their P and L is, are they up or down?
- [40:17]
Sean
So Theo 4, I think, is the biggest one on the platform and he has made a profit of $22 million this year.
- [40:25]
Ari
Exactly. So that's, that was one, that's one user, but you can go user by user and you can see, oh, this guy's just betting on everything or this guy's one huge bet or whatever. Right. So you can go look at anybody, any, any betters, P and L on, on Poly Market. So what they found was they were like, hey, there's a couple of bets here that were in the tens of millions on Trump. And actually it all came from the same guy. And what they were thinking was that there's four big accounts that bet 28 million. And actually it turns out now after the fact, the guy came out and said it, he had 11 accounts and he, he bet 40 something million and he 40 or 50 million and he had made about $80 million of profit. Actually, sorry, I don't know the exact bet amounts, but I know he made, he made $80 million of profit in the end.
- [41:08]
Sean
A French guy, I think, a French guy.
- [41:10]
Ari
So they were like, who is this French whale? And the story behind it's Pretty interesting, because this guy was a trader. He's like. He's like, in finance. He lived in the US at one point, but basically he's like. He's like, I'm trying to remain anonymous. I'm trying not.
- [41:24]
Sean
By the way, how would on earth would a journalist find this person? That seems really hard. That's a great scoop.
- [41:28]
Ari
So on polymarket, you could see the bets. So you can go see, wow, this is huge bet. Then you go look at the account, you try to figure out whose wallet is this. And because crypto is. There's a public ledger, you can actually trace back and try to find it. And there's a company called Chainalysis. Do you know Chainalysis?
- [41:42]
Sean
I've heard of it. Just like, as a headline.
- [41:44]
Ari
They're basically, the government goes to Chainalysis and says, we need to know who owns this wallet. And they can go and do the forensic analysis of every transaction that wallet's done and tries to figure out the root wallet and who owns that wallet. And so that's. And this is like a $10 billion company chain.
- [42:01]
Sean
We have to do a breakdown of this company. This sounds fun.
- [42:03]
Ari
Yeah, they're. They're a fascinating company. And so they came out and they did this analysis, and there's like, this web of the accounts, and, like, so take a look, dude.
- [42:11]
Sean
This is like, all the best stuff. Like, crime and crypto stories are the best stories. And so, like, working at this company would be super exciting. Oh, I know, but you know what I mean?
- [42:20]
Ari
Totally. So they come out and they say, all right, well, dude, how did you know? Why did you make such a massive bet on Trump? And this is where the story gets really interesting. He says, he. He's like, I didn't trust the polls, but I trust polling. What do you mean? He goes, I commissioned my own polls. There's a French guy who commissioned polls in America to inform his own bet. And what he did was he paid a polling company, and he said, I want you to go and I want you to ask them, but don't ask them who they vote, who they're going.
- [42:49]
Sean
To vote for, because that's what polls often ask is, what do traditional polls ask?
- [42:53]
Ari
Are you likely to vote? If you're going to vote, who are you likely to vote for? Are you certain of that? You know, whatever. Is there anything that's going to change your mind? Would you?
- [43:00]
Sean
Well, and I think they also ask who do. I think they ask it in a weird way as well. I think they also ask, who do you Think your friend is going to vote for?
- [43:10]
Ari
This guy did. Oh, so this guy did, was called the neighbor method. And what he says is, he says, don't ask them who they're going to vote for. I don't want to. They people are indirect. People don't want to reveal their own preferences. But if you ask them a specific question, which is, who do you expect your neighbor to vote for? They will indirectly reveal their own preferences and what they believe is going to happen. And he believed that the neighbor method is a more predictive method. And when he did this, he commissioned this poll, he paid a poll, paid a major US Pollster to go do these polls for him. Just like, you know, the DNC and the rnc, they'll pay pollsters to go run their independent polls that they're not reporting to the public. And he wanted him to measure this neighbor effect. And what he found was that the results were, quote, mind blowing to the favor of Trump. It showed a Trump landslide. And so he thought, now this is mispriced. The media is telling you that this is 50, 50 razor thin. But actually my polling is showing that actually this is going to be a major landslide for Trump. It's overwhelmingly in favor of Trump. So now the bet is mispriced. So he places this huge beta on Trump and it turns out he's correct. And his final quote was, you know, public opinion would have been better prepared if the latest polls had measured using the neighbor effect. And he specifically didn't just bet on the overall victory, he bet on specific swing states where he thought this people think the state is closer than it's actually going to be. It's going to be more in favor of Trump using this neighbor method, which is just insane. And now of course, the French guy.
- [44:41]
Sean
This guy nailed it. Like just two words.
- [44:45]
Ari
Bonjour.
- [44:46]
Sean
Yeah. A. First of all, what I respect about this is everything go. I don't respect everything about it. I don't love, I don't love gambling like this. But people who have conviction on, like they do their own analysis and they're like, no, this is the answer. Even though all the, quote, smart people or everyone's, the establishment is saying this. But I did my own research and then that he did the big part, which is he bet $30 million or whatever of his own money. I think that is like those types of people fascinate me because that takes so much conviction.
- [45:24]
Ari
Yeah, exactly. This is, I mean, the guts that it. The, the brains and the guts. Right. And that that's kind of I think the theme of the year is like, you see someone like Elon, who basically swings the election, who catches a rocket out of, you know, catches a rocket with some chopsticks, you know, is working on self driving cars, helped co found open AI, which is changing the world. The guy's just, you know, like firing on all cylinders. And it's like, why? What is it? What is different about this guy? And it's the combination of the brain and the balls, right? Like there are other people as smart as Elon Musk. There are other people who have, you know, the risk taking, you know, guts as Elon Musk, but the combination is rare. And then you add on top of that the willingness to, you know, absolutely work to the bone as well. Right. And then you add on top of.
- [46:13]
Sean
That, like, sacrifice your own life. Yeah.
- [46:16]
Ari
So he's, you know, top 0.1% in like five things. And then it's like, oh, if you just multiply 0.1% times, you know, five times over and over again, you end up with like 1 in 10 billion, which is like, oh, that's actually the ratio. We do have one Elon out of the entire human population.
- [46:31]
Sean
Dude, I thought it was impressive. I was like Justin Timberlake. You can sing, dance and act and you're funny. You know what I mean? Super bad. Eli just really stepped it up.
- [46:50]
Ari
That's a great call.
- [46:52]
Sean
Is Poly Market going to sustain after this? Of course not. Right?
- [46:56]
Ari
Okay, so I've been a big Poly Market fan. I was using Poly Market before they banned it like way back in the day.
- [47:02]
Sean
You're also a little bit of a degen.
- [47:04]
Ari
Yeah, but I think a lot of people are.
- [47:07]
Sean
How much money have you first, by the way?
- [47:10]
Ari
You call this gambling? I don't believe that this is gambling betting. Well, like, for example, you own stock. Do you believe that you're gambling, Gambling when you, when you buy a stock?
- [47:21]
Sean
I guess.
- [47:22]
Ari
What are you doing when you buy a stock? Right?
- [47:24]
Sean
Like, yeah, you are. I guess, I guess you would have to say that there's. It's not as binary, but there's levels or like it's a scale. So. But yeah, you are just like, if you buy cars, like you and I.
- [47:37]
Ari
It exists on a spectrum.
- [47:38]
Sean
Yes.
- [47:40]
Ari
So, so like, you know, the, with a stock, the chair, the, you know, the. The old fashioned way of looking at it is I'm not buying, I'm not gambling. I'm buying a piece of ownership in a company that produces goods. And for account, it's like, yeah, all right, cool. Nobody really in practice treats it like that. Meaning you're not sitting there like, you know, you're, you're not sitting there waiting for dividends. You're not, you're not trying to, you know, own this piece of this company because you think it's going to, you know, exit at a later date when it's a public stock already. Right. Like you're basically saying, I believe that, you know, the future earnings of this company are going to be X and that that's why owning this is good. Because the share price is going to go up because their earnings are going to go up and they're maybe going to go up at a faster rate than the current price of the earning, current price of the stock indicates. That's what you're supposed to buy, right? You're supposed to buy, buy a stock that you think is going to, you know, appreciate over time. I think that Poly Market has the ability to do that in a bunch of interesting ways. So first there are the other speculation, slash betting, gambling type of use cases. So speculating on prices of things, speculating on sports game, you know, sports outcomes of games. Right. Like sports betting is obviously a huge deal. So there's those use cases. There is an interesting thing. So I'm guessing you didn't read Vitalik's blog recently about this.
- [49:02]
Sean
That's an accurate guess.
- [49:04]
Ari
Vitalik, who's the creator of Ethereum, wrote a great blog post. Vitalik's one of my favorite entrepreneurs and thinkers on the planet.
- [49:11]
Sean
So the blog post is called I guess From Prediction Markets into Finance, Info Finance.
- [49:17]
Ari
So he's like, I have written a lot and I've supported polymarket. And many of you who know me might be surprised by this because Vitalik is notoriously not into the like crypto casino side of life. Like he's not price based. He's not trying to get rich as like his primary motivation.
- [49:35]
Sean
He's kind of like a prude, he's a purist.
- [49:37]
Ari
And so like it'd be like why do you care so much about these like prediction markets? Just people gambling, who cares? And he's like, because I don't see it as that. I actually think that there's another category here that's overlooked and it's called Info Finance, Information Finance. And he gives some examples. So he's like Poly Market was two things at once. He goes on one hand it's a betting site for the few people that want to bet and gamble. But for the rest of us, we could look at how the gamblers are Betting, and that would it for them. It served as a news site. It was like, oh, wow, Trump is doing better. Trump is improving in the same way that the polls are supposed to be part of the news. The prediction markets were actually better news information. So it was information finance. He's like, that's the first level, which was even if you're not participating in the betting, trying to. Trying to make a buck, it is very useful that other people are doing that because it's a new. It's another source of information. He's like, it's not. It should not be the only source of information, but it should be another one. He talks about the elections in Venezuela, how, like, you know, basically he was watching how people were protesting how it was getting manipulated and blah, blah, blah, how polymarker was actually a very useful source of information for him in understanding what was going on in Venezuela from an informational point of view. All right, so that was one. Then he's like, okay, what's the other use case? He's like, so imagine a company so like, you know, I don't know if you saw like, Chipotle or Starbucks. Like, Starbucks just hired the Chipotle CEO. Did you see that?
- [51:00]
Sean
Yeah. And he's. The headline is that he's working from home even though he's making everyone else go back to work, right? Yeah.
- [51:07]
Ari
And he's like, private jetting in and out. But like, this guy's kind of famous for, like, he trims the menu, he cuts costs, and he, like, he basically improves margins. That's what this guy's known for. And so the amazing thing was he's that guy. He's that. He's that guy. And so, like, he's him when it comes to public markets, because when he switched teams, they paid him a bunch of money. And I was like, wow, what a huge stock package for CEO. It was like $100 million or whatever, whatever the number was. But the stock jumped like $20 billion or something. Like, it was like, I'm making up numbers here because I didn't plan to talk about this, but, like, the stock jumped in a disproportionate way based on just the news that this guy was coming over. And so, like, it was a great trade for them to overpay this guy, this talent, because it immediately improved the overall value of the company, just the news of him joining. And so Vitalik actually was like, just like, there's. Today we're looking at these as prediction markets. You could actually use this as a decision market. Meaning a company or a group of people could set, could basically, in the way that that guy Theo paid for a private poll to get information. You could actually set up a prediction market and say a decision market and say, should we hire this CEO or what will the, should we, what will the share price be in six months if we hire Brian Nichols? And if the share price expectation is really high, it tells you in advance without having to hire him yet what the market reaction is going to be to making this decision. Does that make sense? And so you can actually create decision markets and it would be worth basically paying to paying participants to go pick a side and make a bet in order to gather information that would help you make a better decision about what you're going to do. And so he's like, there's, you can actually improve judgment if you were to, if you were to make this decision. And so I thought that was pretty interesting. And he talks about, he goes through, you know, how this might affect, how info finance might affect all these other things. So for example, scientific peer review. So right now in science you submit a paper and there's something called the replication crisis, which is that famous results that end up being, you know, going to books and in the news or whatever, then they can't be reproduced. That study can't be reproduced. It's like, is it even like the definition of good science is that it's a reproducible experiment, but that's not happening. And in fact, there's not really a big incentive to go reproduce these because the incentive is come out with a new finding, you get published, you get the glory, you get the funding for your lab, spending your resources to reproduce somebody else's science, somebody else's big news. It's not really a good use of time. And he talks about how prediction markets could actually create incentives for people to go and try to reproduce these studies. Because you could have people betting on if this is reproducible or not. And so you, you'd be able to profit off of knowing that this, this is going to be reproduced or not. So it's pretty interesting to see how that might be applied in all these other ways.
- [54:00]
Sean
I haven't read this other than what you just told me and skimming it here. First of all, this is like an amazing blog post. I need to go read this. Second, if you go to his blog, if you go to like his other posts, he's publishes like a in depth posts like every three days. How amazing is this that we have access to a genius like this? Who just like shares his thoughts. And, and by the way, they're like, if you read just the headlines and then click the articles, they are not just like half assed blog. These are like in depth things that he's publishing a shit ton. How special of an era do we have where we can like go and just read his thoughts that you get access to this?
- [54:37]
Ari
Yeah. And the beautiful thing about his stuff, which is I think hard to. Because, you know, I was thinking about this with podcasts. It's amazing now that there's podcasts with, you know, like when we started this, I felt like there was a slight differentiator in the business podcast space because we were not just journalists, nor were we like never has been. We had like done it. We had started many companies or where in the process failed and we had, you know, sold companies. We had done real things. And so that was kind of like a interesting. Oh, what if you actually had a podcast from. From entrepreneurs who are actually like more successful than the average podcast, let's say.
- [55:13]
Sean
I think you're looking for the term for us, by us.
- [55:16]
Ari
We fubu ed it. Yeah, but now you have all in. You have, now you get to see billionaires, you know, doing this. Reid Hoffman has a podcast. You know, Zuck is going on podcasts. Like who doesn't have a podcast at this point? Right? And I think that's really cool. And the same thing's happening in sports. Athlete, current athletes, past athletes now have sports podcasts. Whereas before the only sports podcast you get was like, you know, hardcore fan in his. In his base mom's basement, you know, ranting about his team or, you know, a journalist. And now you have this like this third thing. And the third thing is like somebody who's actually been there and done that, who gives their perspective. Not to say it's always better, but like, it's interesting that that's now another good one accessible to us. But the problem with something like let's say all in or other podcasts like that is like you have to always parse the agenda. So it's like, wow, this guy's really bearish on nuclear and really pro solar, that you go look into Shema's profile and it's like, oh, wow, he's made like enormous bets on solar. And like that's just. He's talking his book in a way, right? And it's okay, it's okay to talk your book, but it's. You have to constantly do that, like underwriting yourself as a listener to be like, are they, you know, what's the bias here? Yeah, the beautiful thing about Vitalik is that the guy is such an uber nerd that like you can actually take him at face value. And it's so nice to have somebody you could take at face value. And other people might disagree. I don't care. I take him at face value. And I followed this guy for like, you know, eight years straight now and this guy's done nothing to make me think he's just trying to pump his bags. In fact, he actively does things against his bags. You know, not pumping Ethereum or talking about what, where it lacks or what's slow about it and you know, under promising what it's going to be. And I think that that is, that's great that we have access to this guy who is not trying to take something from us in the process.
- [57:01]
Sean
That's a very good speech on this guy. I'm going to like, I don't even think you could subscribe to his. Like, I don't. There's not even an email form. Dude, his blog, like so he publishes on. All right, so listen, October 29, October 26, October 23, October 20. He's been writing these posts a lot. And those posts that I just said, I just put them into a word counter. One of them was 6,000 words. Now I don't know, like, I don't know how Bitcoin.
- [57:32]
Ari
The dramatic look you just gave me when you said that, like I was supposed to like audibly gasp.
- [57:38]
Sean
Dude, that's so much work. I've written a lot of blog posts. A 6,000 word blog post would take me 40 hours probably. Right? It's so much work. When you are this guy and you create Ethereum, is it one of the things where like you've created it and you can now walk away? Or does it like, is it like a house and you got to like maintain it?
- [58:01]
Ari
No, he's actively working on it. Like, I don't know, is it like.
- [58:04]
Sean
A thing where you're like, I mean.
- [58:05]
Ari
It'S bigger than just him obviously, but like, yeah, he's, he's, you know, actively dedicated.
- [58:10]
Sean
You gotta like reroof it every once in a while. I, I don't know how these things work. Like Ethereum. I don't know. Like, did you.
- [58:16]
Ari
It was Ethereum was like a 10 year roadmap and so he's just, it's not even like reroofing it. It's like building a hotel one floor at a time and people are staying in the hotel, but you told them from the beginning, this is a 50 story hotel and I, I haven't even built all those other things that we're going to need in order for this to work. Like there's no elevators yet. I know we're going to make elevators. For now we take stairs. That's like transaction fees and all that.
- [58:38]
Sean
The reason I'm asking is how on earth is he writing this much stuff while doing like a full time job?
- [58:44]
Ari
Because Ethereum doesn't work like that. It's not like he's sitting there coding all day or managing people like it's not a company. It's like a non profit foundation, open source project of which he's like a steward and a champion, but he's not like he doesn't have like 25 direct reports. You know what I mean?
- [58:58]
Sean
Does he have a girlfriend or wife yet?
- [59:00]
Ari
I'm not sure. I've seen a bunch of pictures. But it's so hard with him to tell what's a meme and what's like reality because he's like so memeable that like when bitcoin, when Ethereum price goes down and then they posted him pictures of him, they're like, God damn it, it's because he has a girlfriend, by the way.
- [59:17]
Sean
Like, it's his girlfriend just going to be like, which way is it going to go?
- [59:20]
Ari
So it's November 13th, we're recording this exactly one month ago I came on this podcast and I said, tim, can I give you my one minute case for bitcoin? And you literally rolls your eyes and audibly groaned at me and said, haven't you already done that? Like you're talking about why you like bitcoin again? I just want to say the price is up 47% since I did that rant.
- [59:42]
Sean
All right, well, are you, are you like that? Are you like, I'm that guy? Dude, are you the French guy? Did you. You had you. Were you smart or just, or were you smart and ballsy or just go.
- [59:55]
Ari
Back and listen to it? It's in the episode called did the creator of bitcoin get unmasked at the 30 minute mark? 30 minutes?
- [60:00]
Sean
I'm not debating if you said that. I'm saying did you make go listen.
- [60:03]
Ari
To the case and say, did I get lucky or was I smart? Did I have a reason?
- [60:06]
Sean
I'm asking, what I'm asking is, did you make the bet? Oh, of course.
- [60:11]
Ari
What do you mean? Well, I didn't.
- [60:13]
Sean
What I'm saying is, did you just say it was going to be good or did you actually invest your own money into it?
- [60:18]
Ari
Dude, I'm Poly Market, bro. I was getting in the game.
- [60:21]
Sean
Does gambling on Poly Market mean you have bitcoin?
- [60:25]
Ari
Well, it's like Poly Market versus a poll. A poll is just saying what you're going to do. Poly Market is putting your money up, saying what you think is going to actually happen. I put my money up and said what I thought was going to happen.
- [60:34]
Sean
Yeah, I mean, it's had a hell of a run. Almost as good as Palantir. Everything's fucking crazy right now, though. Like, everything, when I look at.
- [60:41]
Ari
Everything's a little too crazy.
- [60:42]
Sean
Everything's too crazy. Like it wouldn't be. I don't know anything about anything, but it seems like it'd be a good time to make the opposite prediction. So, yeah, you were right. It's just like, how long are you going to be right for? Right now everything is just like insane.
- [60:56]
Ari
Yeah. Yeah. And of course these are like, you know, one month. Fluctuations are nothing. But I guess the, the thing I, the reason I thought it was bullish was because it was the same reason that the thing is pumping right now. Because there was a whole bunch of like, big things, like for example, that the government was going to be pro bitcoin, which was always the biggest risk of bitcoin was like, oh, even if it's, even if you're right about the technology being better, the government will never allow this. And I was like, dude, the guy who's going to become president is saying not only will he allow it, he's bought and sold by the crypto donors now. And both sides are. And I don't know if you saw the Congress and whatever, House, Representative, Senate, all that shit, there's like, there's like 140 Pro crypto people now. Like in, in active government, which is like, you know, that number was. Was zero, you know, seven years ago. And I just felt like these things were not priced in properly. Now they're talking about a bitcoin strategic reserve for the country itself. It's like these things, once you go in, it's almost impossible to unwind these things. And I just thought that when a top two or three risk gets de. Risked, that should change your. Your underwriting on the price. And I thought that that wasn't happening for some reason. The price was flat and people weren't paying attention to that one fact.
- [62:09]
Sean
What a world.
- [62:10]
Ari
So in summary, I was right. Thank you.
- [62:11]
Sean
You were right. You absolutely were right. Everything is insane at the moment. I hope your prediction will be true for many, many, many more months and many more years. But it's definitely making me nervous at the moment. Everything is insane. Is that where we end?
- [62:25]
Ari
That's where we end. It's been a fantastic podcast to Martha Stewart, to bitcoin, to the Poly Market whale. That's called thank you for your service.
- [62:33]
Sean
Hot, hot heat. The hot, hot heat was served. You're welcome. All right, that's it. That's the pod. I feel like I could rule the world I know I could be what I want to I put my all in it like no days off on a road let's travel never looking back.
- [62:58]
Ari
Hey, Sean, here. I want to take a minute to tell you a David Ogilvy story. One of the great admin, he said, remember, the consumer is not a moron. She's your wife. You wouldn't lie to your own wife, so don't lie to mine. And I love that. You guys, you're my family. You're like my wife. And I won't lie to you either. So I'll tell you the truth. For every company I own right now, six companies, I use Mercury for all of them. So I'm proud to partner with Mercury because I use it for all of my banking needs across my personal account, my business accounts, and anytime I start a new company, it's my first move. I go open up a Mercury account. I'm very confident in recommending it because I actually use it. I've used it for years. It is the best product on the market. So if you want to be like me and 200,000 other ambitious founders, go to mercury.com and apply in minutes. And remember, Mercury is a financial technology company, not a bank. Banking services provided by Choice Financial Group and Evolve bank and Trust members. Fdic. All right, back to the episode.