Diet TBPN: October 23rd, 2025

Summary

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Podcast Summary: TBPN – “Diet TBPN: October 23rd, 2025”

Hosts: John Coogan & Jordi Hays
Date: October 24, 2025
Main Theme: A rapid-fire rundown on the latest in tech, branding, data center energy, AI bubble speculation, pop culture crossovers, and the evolving world of autonomous vehicles. The hosts satirically dissect news, offer opinions on trends, and riff about tech culture—all with characteristic humor and insight.

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1. The Evolution and Impact of Company Naming Conventions

Timestamps: 00:17 – 03:11

• Context: The Browser Company of New York’s acquisition by Atlassian prompts a discussion on naming trends.
  • John reflects on traditional naming conventions, emphasizing clarity and originality:
    • “Roughly 150 years ago, Standard practice to name a company like they did... The Prudential Insurance Company of America.” (00:17)
    • “The Browser Company of New York was a perfect name... juxtaposing 150-year-old naming with a modern tool like the web browser.” (00:49)
  • Copycat Branding: They highlight how copycats dilute original branding.
    • “The 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th...company to use this convention basically does the exact opposite.” (01:30)
    • Jordi references Instagram’s influence on other brands like Instacart (01:37).
  • On Inspiration vs. Copying:
    • John: “Copying great design signals that you don’t value design in my view.” (02:33)
    • Hosts admit borrowing inspiration, e.g., TVPN is inspired by ESPN/SportsCenter but applied to tech:
      • “But the key is that we took that inspiration and applied it to an area tack [tech] that none of those groups had ever played in.” (02:53)

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2. Data Centers, Energy, and the AGI Race

Timestamps: 03:21 – 04:58

• Nvidia Comparison:
  • “A single year of Nvidia’s revenue almost matched the past 25 years of R&D and Capex from the five largest semiconductor equipment companies combined. This is honestly a compelling ode to capitalism.” (03:26)
• US vs. China in AGI:
  • “If AGI is coming soon, America’s good because we have a head start… China has a slow start, but they’re running faster... if AGI comes in 2035, China has a higher probability.” (04:01)
  • Discussion of energy constraints sparks speculation on discovering new sources:
    • “Willing to bet that we will discover new sources of energy.” (04:18)
• Data Center Environmental Concerns:
  • “Let’s not give each other cancer.” (04:41)
  • Hosts joke about protesting data centers and propose a “wood-fired data center” as satire:
    • “A wood fired data center generating tokens old fashioned way.” (05:11)

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3. The Future of Human Content Creation & AI Platforms

Timestamps: 05:19 – 06:35

• Human vs. AI-Generated Content:
  • “People refuse to believe that there is... probability in 50 years people are still watching humans create content.” (05:19)
  • Meta Vibes app as moral panic versus actual product realities. Short form video isn’t the existential threat some claim.
• Sora and API Strategies:
  • “If you really wanted to give Sora the chance to become a consumption platform, you wouldn’t have made Sora available via API...” (06:04)
• AI in Business:
  • They have trouble outlining compelling enterprise use-cases for video AI like Sora, focusing rather on marketing and social ads.

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4. Thoughts on Age, Marriage, and Children (Personal Asides)

Timestamps: 06:35 – 07:16

• Discussion transitions to societal norms:
  • “It says something... the most controversial thing I have said in recent history is that I wish I would have married my wife sooner.” (06:48)
  • On parenting in your 30s: “Having children in your 30s at any point is exhausting. Basically, the younger you are, potentially in some ways it will be easier.” (06:59)

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5. Are We in an AI Bubble? Market Reflections

Timestamps: 07:16 – 08:30

• Analysis in Four Charts:
  • “Multiples are nowhere near dot com level. We got room to run. Capex is growing, but funded by cash flow. Largest tech company valuations lower than 1999. Concentration in the market isn’t necessarily negative.” (07:21)
  • Macro headwinds (trade wars, weak labor market, global conflicts, high interest rates) are said to be dampening even greater tech exuberance.
    • “If we didn’t have those factors, I think it could be a lot crazier.” (08:09)

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6. Media & M&A Drama: Skydance, Warner Brothers, and Conglomerates

Timestamps: 08:23 – 08:33

• Inside Scoop:
  • “People inside Paramount Skydance say David Ellison, advised by his father Larry Ellison, are reluctant to pay more than $25 a share for Warner Brothers...” (08:23)
  • Hosts frame Ellison’s moves as an experiment in building a “new conglomerate.” (08:30)

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7. Tech Product Reactions & Pop Culture Crossovers

iPhone Air Launch Flops

Timestamps: 08:33 – 09:10
- “There’s virtually no demand for the iPhone Air... He just said it was not. The thinness of the phone was not worth the battery trade offs.” (08:33)

Palmer Luckey and Nicotine

Timestamps: 09:10 – 09:38
- “Nicotine increases focus, also is very habit forming. Duh. I know that it’s habit forming. I’ve quit nicotine five or six times.” (09:10) - “Is not carcinogenic unless smoked, vaped, dipped, or snuffed. And...simultaneously focuses and relaxes you. Also raises blood pressure. Again, do your own research.” (09:14-09:32)

Travis Kelce buys into Six Flags

Timestamps: 09:38 – 10:08
- “Travis Kelce...invest in and revive Six Flags...$200 million deal. He bought 9% of the theme park operator.” (09:38) - Satirical aside: “Did Travis Kelce get three wishes when he was 11?” (09:38)

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8. Robotics, Safety Jokes, and AI Sentience Fears

Timestamps: 10:08 – 11:07

• Robot Security Satire:
  • “If we get one of these we also have to get a couple Desert Eagles, because if it starts acting up, we have to be able to take it out.” (10:17)
  • “Strapping a suicide vest onto the robot is the last thing I would do.” (11:01)
• Fire extinguisher gags and “be ready to take this thing out” refrains.

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9. ChatGPT Retention & Tech in Everyday Life

Timestamps: 11:07 – 11:32

• Adoption:
  • “People try ChatGPT, they love it. They stick around. It becomes a part of their life... let’s ask chat type of thing.” (11:18)

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10. Viral Photo Analysis: Fact-Checking and Visual Oddities

Timestamps: 11:33 – 12:30

• French Detective Meme:
  • Joke about “the detective with a fedora” in a viral photo, but community notes clarify he’s a bystander.
    • “This is a photo is real... But the man in the fedora is a passerby, not a detective on the case.” (12:04)
  • “Her face is, like, perfectly lit—this is a remarkable photograph.” (12:21)

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11. Investment Vehicles: Tertiary and Quaternary Funds

Timestamps: 12:31 – 12:58

• Satirical breaking news segment on increasingly esoteric fund structures:
  • “We’ve now got tertiary funds.” (12:31)
  • “Quaternary funds.” (12:57)

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12. Autonomous Ridesharing: Waymo’s Explosive Growth, The Uber Question

Timestamps: 12:58 – 14:25

• Waymo’s Volume:
  • “Waymo is now doing 876,000 rides per month in California. 6x increase over the past year and a 69x increase since August of 2023.” (12:58)
• Market Structure Debate:
  • “Ben Thompson was talking about... needs more data. Because even at Uber and Waymo… they don’t necessarily know what the consumer behavior will be like.” (13:14)
  • “Waymo is quite a bit more expensive per trip basis than Uber, so it’s possible... Waymo ends up becoming like more of a luxury good.” (14:01)

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Notable Quotes

• On originality: “Copying great design signals that you don’t value design in my view.” – John, 02:33
• On AGI race: “If AGI comes in 2035, China has a higher probability of it emerging.” – Jordi, 04:01
• On ChatGPT: “People try ChatGPT, they love it. They stick around. It becomes a part of their life.” – John, 11:18
• Market perspective: “Multiples are nowhere near dot com level. We got room to run.” – John, 07:21

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Conclusion

This episode blends insightful tech news with the hosts’ signature mix of hot takes, humor, and skepticism. From branding trends and the AGI energy race to quirky product releases, AI content paranoia, and robot-safety comedy—all angles of tech culture get a witty but substantive once-over. The episode closes with data on Waymo’s growth and musings on the future shape of the rideshare market, keeping listeners both informed and entertained.

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For more lively tech commentary, catch the next episode of TBPN, streaming weekdays on X and YouTube.

Transcript

[A]

You're watching TVPN.

[B]

Today is Thursday, October 23rd, 2025. We are live from the TVPN Ultradome.

[A]

The Temple of technology, the fortress of finance, the capital of capital.

[B]

But first, I want to tell you about ramp.com Time is money. Save both easy use corporate cards, bill pay a whole lot more all in one place.

[A]

Six years ago, the Browser Company of New York was born. This week, its acquisition by Atlassian closed. The name, the brand, design, et cetera, were all incredibly thoughtful, but they weren't new. Roughly 150 years ago, Standard practice to name a company like they did the Prudential Insurance Company of America.

[B]

Found in standard practice sounds like a good name for a company.

[A]

The way that you named a company. You weren't Warner Brothers back then. You were trying to think of like a cute dot com. Why don't we just name it what it is? And so what I'd like to name.

[B]

It what it is or name it who we are. Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley.

[A]

So what was, what was amazing about this naming convention? This isn't an essay is just like how explicitly clear it is what the company does. The Edison Electric Company, Illuminating Co. Of New York. I can imagine what they do. So the Browser Company of New York was a perfect name for a specific reason. Juxtaposing a 150-year-old naming convention with a modern tool such as the web browser was an incredible way to stand out and signal to the world exactly what their mission was and that they would be bringing inspired thinking to the category Naming a web browser company. The Browser Company of New York signaled this sort of original thinking. And the problem is that the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, et cetera, company to use this sort of convention basically does the exact opposite. Right. It signals like, okay, I saw somebody do something cool in my industry, I'm gonna do the cool thing as well.

[B]

There are people that probably found out about it after they found out about five copycats. This is what Instagram did. Instagram was bourbon originally. And then once Instagram hit, they were like, we have a new brand. We have a cool thing. And then of course, everyone copied Instagram. Instacart copied Instagram's name and it worked.

[A]

Yeah. Yep.

[B]

So, yeah, not always a total anti signal.

[A]

In defense of copycat branding, naming startups really hard. Every founder's gone through this. There's only so many domain names, there's only so many English words that mean something. And there's just so many companies being created. It's quite challenging. Good artists copy great artists Steal linear launched in 2019. The product design, the website was so good that people were just like, I'll take one, please. One Linear brand. I even talked to a founder earlier this year and he was like, yeah, our website and product is going to look exactly like Linear.

[B]

Admittedly, I was just like, insane.

[A]

There's probably something better if you just really thought hard and like, spent the time to think through, like, what? What could this be? Copying great design signals that you don't value design in my view. Today, every AI company wants to be the Apple of AI, but sometimes they feel like, okay, you guys went to an ad agency and said, Give me one 90s Apple ad, please. Perfectly respectable and even fair to take inspiration from obvious sources and industries. We at TVPN have been vocal about being inspired by ESPN, SportsCenter Complex and others. But the key is that we took that inspiration and applied it to an area tack that none of those groups had ever played in. I feel lucky to love the hunt for a great domain for sure.

[B]

Yeah, that feels like OpenAI and Anthropic's most recent campaigns to me. The AlphaGo documentary, you've seen it, right, Tyler? Yeah, yeah, yeah, many times.

[A]

He didn't just watch, he studied. Did you smoke a heater while you watch?

[B]

Further up the supply chain, a single year of Nvidia's revenue almost matched the past 25 years of total R and D and Capex from the five largest semiconductor equipment companies combined. This is honestly a compelling ode to capitalism. Let's hear it for compelling odes to capitalism. Not only are hyperscalers building new data centers at a much bigger scale than before, they are building them from scratch and competing for the same inputs with each other.

[A]

They should rebrand as the semiconductor company of Taiwan.

[B]

And the conclusion is basically like, if AGI is coming soon, America's good because we have a head start in the race, but we're running slower. China has a slow start, but they're running faster. And so if AGI comes in 2035, China has a higher probability of it emerging. There's. You better be advocating for some American electricity.

[A]

The big question is like, where's the energy going to come from for all these new data centers willing to bet that we will discover new sources of energy.

[B]

Elon has been publicly saying, like, this is the biggest data center with the most energy.

[A]

Yeah, it was. It was framed as a guy bombshell. Yeah, it was framed as a.

[B]

We pointed a camera at it and it's big, it's big. It's the big it's bigger than everything else. Not to be like a total decelerating like tree hugger. It's just like let's not give each other cancer.

[A]

Surprised we haven't seen somebody like protesting on top of a data center yet. Yeah, you'd think somebody would have scaled one. And also people used to do this with trees, right? They would just climb to the top of a tree and get cut down.

[B]

This happened at anthropic. Right, but for doom reasons, not for environmental reasons. What about just a good old fashioned wood fire data center? Tyler, can we figure out what it would take?

[A]

A wood fired data center generating tokens old fashioned way.

[B]

Exactly.

[A]

Can you imagine late nights with the fellas just tossing wood?

[B]

The hearth timeline was in turmoil a little bit yesterday. People refuse to believe that there is at least a probability that in 50 years people are still watching humans create content. I think many, many people in like traditional media just in not AGI pilled crazy world. And so is there a possibility that the Meta Vibes app becomes so addictive you can't turn it off and it destroys your life? Maybe. I've read the sc. I would put a probability on it. Everyone was like, Meta Vibes will kill everyone. Run was reacting to that saying, there's a moral panic about short form video. It's not actually that bad. And so near says, do you actually believe this? Like, do you realize the product is the API, not the app as containment isn't possible.

[A]

If you really wanted to give Sora the chance to become a consumption platform, you wouldn't have made Sora to available via API for anybody to generate the tam of people that today only want to watch AI video is basically zero.

[B]

If I'm a OpenAI customer as a business and then they come out with Sora and I'm like, I really would like to use that in my business. Like I have an actual business use case. I'm trying to think of what that would be.

[A]

I don't really know the business, the business use cases. I mean, think about how many platforms are trying to help people generate ads for social ads. Yeah, right. Generate, you know, content for various videos. It says something about society that the most controversial thing I have said in recent history is that I wish I would have married my wife sooner. He even said, easy for me to say. I met my wife when we were teenagers.

[B]

Yes, yes, yes.

[A]

And the broader conversation of how having children in your 30s at any point is exhausting. Basically the younger you are, potentially in some ways it will be easier. Why we are not in an AI bubble. In four charts, you gotta, you gotta.

[B]

Summarize these and I'll hit the gong for every positive bull signal out there.

[A]

Multiples are nowhere near dot com level. We got room to run. Capex is growing, but funded by cash flow. Largest tech company valuations lower than 1999. Concentration in the market isn't necessarily negative. I think a lot of what's holding us back from even more craziness is the overall state of the economy. You have trade wars, tariffs, you have a weak labor market, you have an unpredictable admin, you have war in the Middle east, war in Europe and you have a higher rate environment than we've been used to. If we didn't have those factors, I think it could be a lot crazier. Scoop alert. People inside Paramount Skydance say David Ellison, advised by his father Larry Ellison, are reluctant to pay more than $25 a share for Warner Brothers as the buyout drama continues. Company still weighing a public AKA hostile offer for Warner Brothers. I think he's running the experiment of like just, you know, basically going to the world and saying one, one media industry, please.

[B]

Basically it feels like he's trying to build some sort of new conglomerate.

[A]

There's virtually no demand for the iPhone air. I have a friend who used to work at Apple, he bought the iPhone air, used it for I think like 24, 48 hours and returned it. He just said it was not. The thinness of the phone was not worth the battery trade offs. And he also said the phone is so actively trying to conserve energy that it renders things like, poorly. Palmer Luckey's comments about nicotine on tvpn. Your reminder that yes, nicotine increases focus also is very habit forming. Duh. I know that it's habit forming. I've quit nicotine five or six times.

[B]

Yes. I typically quit it like every night before I go to bed.

[A]

Yeah. And then pick it back up. Is not carcinogenic unless smoked, vape dipped or snuffed. And is an. Is an unusual stimulant because it simultaneously focuses and relax you. Also raises blood pressure. Again, do your own research.

[B]

Also 21 plus, don't get in the game unless you're 21 plus. Tyler.

[A]

Travis Kelce is teaming up with an activist group to invest in and revive Six Flags. Did Travis Kelce like get three wishes when, when he was like 11 and he's like, I want to be a football player. I want to date the biggest pop star in the world and I want to take over.

[B]

It's, it's a $200 million deal. He bought 9% of the theme park operator. Do you like theme parks?

[A]

No, I kind of grew out of theme parks.

[B]

We might have.

[A]

I mean, there's something beautifully dark about a humanoid that's walking, and then it suddenly turns into this crawl policy.

[B]

Yeah, that is very spooky. If we get one of these, we also have to get a couple Desert Eagles, because if it starts acting up, we have to be able to take it out.

[A]

Yeah, and the AI Becomes sentient and then tries to kill us. Right, that's why we need the fire extinguisher.

[B]

Well, that's what. No, no, we just need the fire extinguisher because it's good safety policy. You got to be ready to take this thing out. You have to be ready to take this thing out. Jordi, what do you think? How are you taking this thing out?

[A]

I think you strap charges to it, a vest that.

[B]

And then we have explosives. We release it. At any moment, it explodes.

[A]

Basically. It has a kevlar suit over it, explosives on the inside.

[B]

Oh, so it explodes inwards.

[A]

Inward, yes. I feel like strapping a suicide vest onto the robot. It's the last thing I would do.

[B]

ChatGPT's customer retention. What do you think about this? How do you square this with the earlier data that we saw that showed that, hey, there might be some slowing adoption?

[A]

I think this is what you would expect, right? People try ChatGpt, they love it. They stick around. It becomes a part of their life. It becomes like, you know, a kind of muscle memory. Quick, quickly. It's become a, you know, let's ask chat type of thing. Actual shot, not AI Of a French detective working the case of the French crown jewels that were stolen from the Louvre in a brazen daylight robbery. To solve it, we need an unshaven, overweight, washed out detective who's in the middle of a divorce. A functioning alcoholic who the rest of the department hates. Never going to crack it with. A detective who wears an actual fedora unironically. I mean, this guy, really?

[B]

There are so many weird things about this photo.

[A]

Okay, okay, okay. Yep. I knew this was too good to be. Too good to be true. The. The community note says this is. This is a photo is real. Taken outside the Louvre after the jewel theft. But the man in the fedora is a passerby, not a detective on the case. Didn't stop it from getting 42.

[B]

But look. Look at the. Look at the woman in the back, all the way on the right. Her face is, like, perfectly lit like this is a remarkable photograph.

[A]

We have some breaking news. You've heard about funds that directly buy equity in companies. You've heard about secondaries, funds that buy stakes in other funds. And we've got something new. We got some breaking news. We've now got tertiary funds.

[B]

Quaternary funds.

[A]

Next, more interesting news. Self driving taxi company Waymo is now doing 876,000 rides per month in California. 6x increase over the past year and a 69x increase since August of 2023.

[B]

Do you think they wind up working with Uber long term or not? Ben Thompson was talking about like he hasn't been writing a lot about the Uber Waymo, the self driving taxi stuff. Mostly because he thinks like he needs more data. Because even at Uber and Waymo, like they don't necessarily know what the consumer behavior will be like. Will the consumers stay with Uber? And they'll order an. They'll order a Waymo when one's available, but then when they'll want one app that can get them anywhere. And so if you say, well, I need you to drive me into the snow to go to Big Bear today, like you want to do all that in one app or will people say I use the Waymo app for most things and then when I want to go into the snow and use a human driver for some specific route, then I'm happy to open up the Uber app.

[A]

Right now Waymo is quite a bit more expensive per trip basis than Uber, so it's possible. The rideshare market, you know, it used to be bifurcated a little bit between Uber and Lyft. Lyft was always, you know, I remember when I was in college I was using Lift more because it was like slightly cheaper.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And it's possible that Wayo ends up becoming like more of a luxury good and people just have the Waymo app. Thanks for hanging out with us.

[B]

Thank you so much for tuning in today. We will be back tomorrow at 11am sharp.

[A]

Can't wait.