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The Breakfast Club
INTERVIEW: Isaac Hayes III On The Rise Of Fanbase, Microdramas, Owning Our Content + More
00:32:40
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- [00:00]
Charlamagne Tha God
This is an iHeart podcast. Guaranteed Human.
- [00:04]
Ben (Shopify Host)
You know I love a fresh start, and I'll be doing that with my own Shopify store, reviewing what worked this year and mapping out how I'm leveling up in 2026. Shopify is the best place to start and grow your business. Which is exactly why I chose it for mine. Whether you're running a side hustle or building an empire, selling locally or globally, Shopify takes the guesswork out of all of it. Shopify has thousands of templates ready to go. Just pick one that matches your vibe and you're off. Plus Shopify Sidekick. With their AI tools, those two are total game changers. It's like having your own personal assistant giving you direction, helping with reports, content, ideas, everything. Whether you're just wanting to test an idea out or you're getting serious about launching your own brand, it's never been easier to get started on shopify.com Ben it's time to see what you can do with Shopify by your side.
- [01:05]
Coca-Cola Announcer
What a matchup we got, y'.
- [01:07]
AT&T Announcer
All.
- [01:07]
Coca-Cola Announcer
This is that classic HBCU vibe. Non stop action. The band is rocking and the crowd lit. Chance echo drum beat everybody showing that school pride game like this. Yeah, it calls for an ice cold Coca Cola. Ah, crisp and refreshing. That's a game changer right there. Yeah, that taste always hits the right note. Just like the band at halftime. And just like that, we're back at it. Passionate fans, school colors everywhere and an ice cold Coca Cola. That's a winning combo. No matter the sport, no matter the yard. Everybody knows fan work is thirsty work. So grab a Coca Cola and keep that HBCU pride going.
- [01:52]
DJ Envy
Hey, what up, y'? All? It's DJ Envy and the holidays are here. The time of year that's all about connecting with loved ones in person or over the phone. In fact, hearing someone's voice can evoke a similar emotional response as a hug. And while most of us can hop on a video chat to really bring that connection to life, using tech isn't easy for everyone, especially some of the older folk in our lives. And AT&T has been doing something special here to help. They offer digital literacy workshops that help older adults learn how to use technology to do things most of us take for granted, like video conferencing and sharing photos. Take Nancy Shand. She joined one of AT&T's workshops to learn how to video chat. For the first time this holiday season, Nancy won't just be hearing about family gatherings. She'll be a part of them sharing stories, opening presents and making memories all through a screen. Nobody should have to go through the holiday season alone. So be sure to connect and stay connected to your loved ones this holiday season.
- [02:48]
AT&T Announcer
Connecting changes everything.
- [02:50]
Sophie Cunningham
AT&T I'm Carolyn.
- [02:52]
Carolyn (Cascali Patient)
I have metastatic breast cancer. I was concerned after my diagnosis. Cascali gives me more life for living. Since I've been prescribed, I've seen a daughter get married. I now have a grandchild and another one on the way.
- [03:03]
Cascali Medication Announcer
Gaskale ribociclib 200 milligram tablets with hormone therapy is for adults with HR positive HER2 negative metastatic breast cancer do not take with tamoxifen in the clinical study study at 80 months, women taking cascali plus letrozole lived over a year longer versus letrozole alone. Individual results may vary. Cascali may cause serious skin reactions, liver problems and low white blood cell counts that may result in serious infections. Life threatening lung problems and abnormal heartbeats can occur. Your doctor should test your heart and blood before and during treatment. Tell your doctor if you have new or worsening cough, chest pain or dizziness before taking Cascali. Tell your doctor all your medical conditions, medicines you take and if you're breastfeeding, pregnant or planning to be as it can harm an unborn baby. Common side effects include nausea, headache and tiredness. Real patient compensated for her time.
- [03:50]
DJ Envy
Learn more@cascali.com on eBay every find has a story. Like if you're looking for a vintage band tee. Not just a tee. The band tee you wore everywhere until your ex girl stole it. Now you're on ebay. And there it is. Same tee from the same tour. The things you love have a way of finding their way back to you. Especially on eBay. You where else can you find that mint sign baseball card you've been searching everywhere for? Or your first car, the one you wish you never sold? Shop ebay for millions of fines, each with a story. EBay Things people love.
- [04:25]
Isaac Hayes III
Wake you up.
- [04:26]
DJ Envy
Wake that ass up.
- [04:27]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
Program your alarm to power 105.1 on iheartradio.
- [04:31]
DJ Envy
Morning everybody. It's DJ Envy. Just hilarious. Charlemagne the guy. We are the Breakfast Club.
- [04:36]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
Lauren.
- [04:37]
DJ Envy
Lauren Larose is here. And we got a special guest in the building. We have Isaac Hayes iii. Good morning brother.
- [04:44]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
What's up guys? How you doing?
- [04:46]
Isaac Hayes III
Good, black and highly favored. How are you my brother?
- [04:48]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
I am excellent. I am highly favored and blessed as well.
- [04:51]
Isaac Hayes III
So what are we doing today, Isaac? What we doing? What we doing?
- [04:54]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
What do you mean what we doing? We're closing this round for fan base. We're closing this equity crowdfund for fan base. It closes today. I feel like this is a great opportunity for everybody to give an investment as a gift for people. You know, I've been here before, talked about the importance of investing, but especially with social media, I think we really need to, to galvanize right now at this time because the world is shifting. And so I'm telling Everybody, go to startengine.com fanbase and invest to own equity in the company. 399 is the minimum investment, but it's a bigger story than just investing in fan base.
- [05:32]
Isaac Hayes III
So, so when people ask the question, they say, okay, you know, you raised, you've raised millions of dollars for fan base. You know, they may want to invest. Walk us through, line by line, how that capital gets deployed.
- [05:43]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
So number one, infrastructure. So we just built a brand new algorithm. You know, we spent almost half the year working on that. We have some new key hires. All this capital gets deployed in hiring better people. Like really people that used to work at Meta, that used to work at TikTok, they used to work at Snapchat. And those salaries aren't cheap. We also have to hire engineers to build what we're building and develop those products. And it takes time. Honestly, the amount of capital that I've raised over a five year period, some people get deployed five times that capital in one year and they burn it all and they go out of business. And so we've had to really stretch. You know how they say, you know, mama say you make, make the, make the money stretch, make the food stretch. Yeah, we've had to really make this capital stretch with this company. But it, it's a testament to our ability to spend wisely, hire effectively, and continue to build the best product.
- [06:46]
Isaac Hayes III
No, I agree with you. Because, you know, we see these tech companies, they get, you know, crazy donations all the time, raise a lot of capital, a lot more capital than you have. How much have you raised over the last, what, five years?
- [06:57]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
20. $23 million.
- [06:59]
Isaac Hayes III
$23 million? Yeah, that's, I mean, I'm not gonna say that's nothing because it is something, right? But compared to the other tech companies, you know, they get $100 million in a, in a month, man.
- [07:11]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
Listen, some of these, Charlemagne, some of these companies have raised like 150, $300 million and have not built but one feature and they're not even around anymore. And that's because they blow the money. It's really, it's really Tough for black founders. People understand, like black founders get less than half of 1% of all capital raised. They don't want DEI, they're not trying to give us money. And especially someone like myself that is disrupting the tech space in building something that we can own. And then, you know, black people are on the side of ownership. Like, you know, we, we don't own nothing. I know we talk about a lot of this, you know, a lot about building generational wealth and, you know, those types of things. But we don't own the sports teams, we don't own the record labels, and we don't own, you know, Hollywood. And we help build up all of these infrastructures and we don't own them. And social media, we help build up social media and they tell us to kiss their behind and they don't want DEI and all that kind of stuff. And so for me, this is a mission. This has been my mission, will continue to be my purpose and my calling, to continue to build this company, allow us to finally have the infrastructure of something that can be worth hundreds of billions of dollars and pull us all up and give us opportunity.
- [08:21]
Isaac Hayes III
We do have to acknowledge the black people who do own things, though. Isaac, I think we, I've heard you say that before, but, you know, I think, okay, you know, the urban ones of the world, you know, Kathy Hughes, you know, worldwide technology, you know, like there, there's, you know, things like uncle Nearest, like there's a lot of things that black people do own.
- [08:39]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
Yeah, but, but look what's happening, look what's happening in a lot of these spaces. A lot of these companies either don't get the capital that they need. They're tried to, they're, you know, handcuffed in what they're able to do. And you really just name like three businesses out of like, you know, half a million.
- [08:55]
Isaac Hayes III
Oh, I got, yeah, I can keep going. I mean there's, there's, there's hundreds of black owned businesses. I'm just saying, like we, I think sometimes we put that narrative out there and I think we gotta be more specific. Like black people can own more in the tech space. For sure. We do own things.
- [09:08]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
Yeah.
- [09:09]
DJ Envy
But the biggest problem about it, Isaac and Charlemagne, I feel, is sometimes we talk to people like they should know, right? A lot of these businesses that are getting these millions and 20 million and 50 million and raising $150 million are investors that have the money and know why they're investing and hopefully know where their money's going. But for like somebody like You, Isaac, who, you know, who's been on the Breakfast Club numerous times and, and asking for money for crowdfunding. I think people want to know where that money is going and why. Break it down on a level where people will understand. And what's next for fan base. No, no, but the reason I'm asking and break it down for what fan base is and how much money is needed to make sure this gets to the place of a meta or a Twitter or Facebook or you know, Instagram. Because you have to tell people like, like what's the overall goal and what's needed to this to fan base is self sufficient. So we don't have that or will it always be a thing like that for people that don't understand it? Don't know.
- [10:06]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
No, I think to explain how capital is deployed is, you know, it's kind of what I said earlier. Tech companies are not social media platforms are not cheap. Right?
- [10:18]
DJ Envy
Correct.
- [10:19]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
And so there's two things. It's how fast you can build, how well you can build. You know what I'm saying? And so if you don't have capital to build the right product, then it's not going to, it's not going to happen. So we have salaries, we have infrastructure, we have all the tech stack, you know, all the things that we do. Like we employ about 40 people, we have a lot of C suite executives that are, that are working and all this stuff is, is built enrolled into a company that is trying to fight the fight against major tech corporation. Now to explain what fan base is and understand why that it, that it costs what it costs. Fan base is basically social media through the lens of black ownership. But the functionality is the same. Right. We do have posts, we have stories, we have live, we have short form, we have long form, we have audio chat, we have an algorithm, we have dms, we have subscriptions, we have tipping. All of those parts are put together in one platform. Right. And, and integrated so that people can have the ability to monetize their content from the moment that they sign up. Build community. And when you think and when you compare fan base like and I'll tell anybody to do this, compare fan base to your experience that you get on a TikTok or experience that you get on an Instagram and just grade us based off that. But remember that Those companies have 30,000 engineers and have, you know, billions of dollars of capital. And here we are, you know, building up from the ground, up from scratch with a small team and we're still here. And I think that's really the most important part. And then the things that we're, things that we're actually breaking, we're actually breaking the opportunity for black people to get into the micro drama space for users to actually monetize their, their data and have it trained by AI if they want to. But on Instagram, Tick Tock, Facebook, they're training off your data right now, not paying you anything. And so this is a real challenge. But it's a lot of moving pieces and parts that come together to make this machine run.
- [12:14]
Isaac Hayes III
How many months of Runway does fan base currently have?
- [12:17]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
We have about 18 months of Runway, a little bit longer than that. So you know, that gives it, and, and you understand like even in that amount of time, there's so much that, that you have to accomplish in that, in that period of time because you're always going to be raising capital. I think the difference between what I do and what everybody else is you publicly hear that I'm raising all the time. But startups are raising all the time. 50 million, 100 million, 200 million, 300 million. But it usually comes from VCs and private equity. And those deals are always made public. This is made public because the people that are investing are not the rich guys and the billionaires and the oligarchs. It's you, it's me, it's the people that we know that are putting their money into the business. And so that's why it's so public. And you see everything all the time.
- [13:02]
DJ Envy
So when you say people are investing, so you say the minimum investment is 399. So if somebody invests at 399, what percentage are of the company or how, how much of an investment are they getting? What's the ROI on that? For somebody who, you know, because it's tough out there, but so if somebody wants to give 399, they want to know what they're getting back.
- [13:20]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
Yeah. So every investment that you make, especially in an early stage company, you ride the life of the investment.
- [13:26]
DJ Envy
Correct.
- [13:27]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
So you're here from the beginning all the way to we either IPO or somebody acquires the company. So you see like, like if, if Warner Brothers is about to get acquired and they, and that's a different scenario. But when that company is acquired, the shareholders in that company will all be bought out. Right. And then Netflix or whoever will acquire that company. So when you do early stage investing like that in seed startups, that's what you get. And so for 399, you're getting a Small, small, small piece of the company. But the upside of what I tell people is that the value in which these tech companies get to is where you see a return on your investment. So we're valued at $160 million right now. I want to put that in perspective of what Met is valued at. Meta is a $1.9 trillion company. So you think about 1.6 billion, 16 billion, 160 billion. That's a thousand X return. So someone that invests 399. Even if we get to something that is 10 times less valuable than Meta, 5 times less valuable than TikTok and Instagram, that's still a thousand X return on the type of investment that you're putting in there. And that's the, that's the part that people don't understand. When you invest in any business, they tell you like, 15% is an amazing return on investment. And I didn't, I didn't raise capital this way to give somebody 15% back. I didn't want somebody to put in $400, right, and get $440 back. I'm not doing it for that or $445 back. That's not what I'm doing. I'm investing. It's. I built a tech company so that people could put 400 in, 250 in. And together we build something that can be worth hundreds of billions of dollars, that's still far below what other tech companies have, and exit that company. And then at that time, you know, we're distributing generational wealth to our people because it's tech. The fastest way to grow wealth right now currently is in the tech space. And you can't save your way to wealth. You have to invest. We don't think a lot about investing nowadays. We're not really thinking about, you know, putting our money into things that we can see a long return. They will tell us to go do prize picks and gamble and, and play the lottery and go to Vegas. Like that's all that. All of that is the stuff that they push on people of color. No one in these other rooms, people are getting together quietly and saying, hey, put your money in this startup. Put your money in that startup. And they're not telling the average person to do this kind of thing because that's the lockout. They want the access to the best deals. All the vcs and investors want the access to the best opportunity to invest. And so that's why this is important. This is breaking a whole system down that a lot of people don't I've seen more people now use equity crowdfunding, especially people of color, since I started. And I was one of the first people to really start doing this, to have major success at it. Now everybody does equity crowdfunding. I've seen startups and I've introduced multiple people to equity crowdfunding because it's a way to circumvent the racism, the discrimination and all the things that exist. And so that's why it's important.
- [16:18]
Isaac Hayes III
So when should, when should investors reasonably expect the return? And in what form would that ROI look like?
- [16:26]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
So that ROI would be probably eight years. I always say, like, you know, six to eight years is when you invest, right? And you see return. Like prime example, again, like Uber had seed investment in 2010 and 2019, they went public. So it took nine years. But the people that invested in that nine year period saw 5000x return right? On those, on, on that investment. And that's, those are people that put $5,000 in. And so $24 million come back, right? And so any early stage company, you would think between, you know, six to nine years, you would get a return on your investment. And then how that happens is through a liquidity event. And the liquidity event is somebody either buys the company, like somebody says, okay, we're going to buy fan base at a higher valuation than it was before, or we go public, which is still selling the company. And that's when we, you know, you ring the bell on the stock market and, and everybody can sell their shares that day. Oh, and that's what money comes in and people and buy shares. And so that's how it works.
- [17:20]
Isaac Hayes III
Hold on now. You said five to six years. So you know, people are going to be looking like, wait a minute, I, I put money in back in 2019, 2020. So you show.
- [17:30]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
We, we didn't raise, yeah, we didn't, we didn't really raise capital. We didn't close our first round till 2021. Okay, okay, so that's what I'm saying. We didn't close our first round till 2021. And again. But again. And also those are people that get like VC dollars, Charlamagne. That's what I'm saying. Like this is, people don't understand how incredibly hard this is, but it, I love it because it's the, it's the biggest challenge of my life. And it's, and we're being successful at it and we'll continue to be successful. But man, like, this is like, you know, this is, this is this is an amazing. A journey and process for me. But yeah, this is also.
- [18:04]
DJ Envy
It's also teaching. It's also teaching because we talk about generational wealth, and it talks about some of the times where people don't understand because we've never been taught. It's not like we've had millions and millions of dollars passed down from generations like, you know, other backgrounds have. So it's also a teaching method, right? So you're teaching people what it means to crowdsource and to get money and to put money down and how much money you can get back. So it's also a matter of teaching. So answering the question shouldn't be really a problem because you're teaching a generation that might not know.
- [18:31]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
No, absolutely. That's why. That's why I consistently have, you know, told other people to actually invest. Right. And I mean, other people to use equity crowdfunding. I've helped like, five or six other companies raise through equity crowdfunding and told them about equity crowdfunding. And that's a really good thing because it's an alternative to black people going to banks, an alternative for black people trying to get loans and trying to ask venture. You know, go for venture dollars or angel investing, where those deals can be predatory. A lot of what I do is disruptive because of what I knew coming from the music business, right? So I knew that I had to create two classes of stock and. And made sure that no one else has voting shares because that's when people try to force you out of your company, right? And. And I. And I knew that the. The deals that you get from angel investors are sometimes predatory. So somebody gives me $200,000 to invest in fan base. When I first had the idea, they get 20 of the company, and I put my own $200,000 in it. So I saved that 20%, right? So those are the things that most people don't know, because a lot of my friends that are founders got forced out of their companies. They got taken advantage of. They got in bad deals that. That don't allow them to raise capital from other people. So it's real. It's a dirty game. It's not as dirty as the music business, but for me, it's something that I was very, very familiar with, because I know, you know, a lot of founders just come in with a great idea, and then they get some guys and they're like, yeah, here's half a million dollars, but I want a board seat and XYZ and all that kind of stuff. You get Voted out of the company. Ask as Stacy Sparks. I don't know if you've ever seen Movie Pass, but the guys that invented Movie Pass were two black guys. They took in capital, they had board seats, they got voted out of their own company. The guys ran up a huge bill.
- [20:10]
Isaac Hayes III
On Movie Piece of the planet Charlemagne, the God here. Now, you know the end of the year is when, like a lot of business owners are really locking. All right, this is the time to set the foundation for next year. You got new ideas, new product drops, new goals. And when I'm building anything meaningful, I need the right tools. That's why I always tell folks, especially black entrepreneurs and small black owned businesses, shopify is the move, okay? We use it at the Black Effect Podcast network and I've seen firsthand how it helps creators and business owners grow with confidence. Entrepreneurship is very important to me, okay? There's nothing wrong with working for people. There's nothing wrong with partnering people. But you should strive to own your own as well. And Shopify can help others grow into entrepreneurs. It's like having a whole team behind you. Your chief of staff, your personal assistant, your co founder, all in one platform. Whether you're running a side hustle or a full storefront selling locally or worldwide, Shopify takes all the guesswork out. Shopify brings everything into one place. You can sell on your website, on social media, and even in the real world, like some of our partners at our Black Effect Festival coming up in April, wherever your people are. So Shopify makes sure your business can meet them where they're at. Plus, you got Shopify, Sidekick and their AI tools. Total game changers. I love how it's like having an assistant giving you insights, content, ideas, edits. Shopify's got your next move covered. So let me ask you this. If you're ready to take the next step in your life, whether it's merch, products or anything in between, get on shopify.com BEN. That's shopify.com BEN and make it happen. It is time to stop putting off your future and start your new role as your own boss today.
- [21:45]
DJ Envy
Hey, what up, y'?
- [21:45]
Coca-Cola Announcer
All?
- [21:45]
DJ Envy
It's DJ Envy. And the holidays are here. The time of year that's all about connecting with loved ones in person or over the phone. In fact, hearing someone's voice can evoke a similar emotional response as a hug. And while most of us can hop on a video chat to really bring that connection to life, using tech isn't easy for everyone, especially some of the older folk in our lives. AT&T has been doing something special here to help. They offer digital literacy workshops that help older adults learn how to use technology to do things most of us take for granted, like video conferencing and sharing photos. Take Nancy Shand. She joined one of AT&T's workshops to learn how to video chat for the first time this holiday season, Nancy won't just be hearing about family gatherings, she'll be a part of them, sharing stories, opening presents, and making memories all through a screen. Nobody should have to go through the holiday season alone, so be sure to connect and stay connected to your loved ones this holiday season.
- [22:40]
AT&T Announcer
Connecting changes everything. AT&T. You ever notice how wild life gets when you don't slow down? From meetings to errands to your phone buzzing nonstop, it can feel like the day never ends. Sometimes you gotta stop and reset. That's when it's time to grab a Diet Coke. That crisp, refreshing taste, crispy as some would call it, allows you to make time for you time. Maybe you're wrapping up a workout, finishing that last email, or sitting on the couch scrolling. Or maybe you're catching up with friends, cruising through your neighborhood, or enjoying a quiet moment nobody else can touch. Whatever your break looks like, Diet Coke can make it so much better. It's not only a drink, it's a signal to take a breather, reset and remind yourself the moment belongs to you. Because when you choose to pause, you're choosing you. So next time white feels non stop. Hit pause, crack open the Diet Coke, take a sip, let the bold taste cut through the noise and remember, your break is yours. Make time for a Diet Coke break. Diet Coke this is my taste.
- [23:47]
Carolyn (Cascali Patient)
I'm Carolyn. I have metastatic breast cancer. I was concerned after my diagnosis. Cascali gives me more life for living. Since I've been prescribed, I've seen a daughter get married. I now have a grandchild and another one on the way.
- [23:58]
Cascali Medication Announcer
Gascali ribociclib 200 milligram table with hormone therapy is for adults with HR positive HER2 negative metastatic breast cancer do not take with tamoxifen In a clinical study at 80 months, women taking Cascali plus letrozole lived over a year longer versus letrozole alone. Individual results may vary. Cascali may cause serious skin reactions, liver problems and low white blood cell counts that may result in serious infections. Life threatening lung problems and abnormal heartbeats can occur. Your doctor should test your heart and blood before and during treatment. Tell your doctor if you have new or worsening cough, chest pain or dizziness. Before taking Cascali, tell your doctor all your medical conditions, medicines you take, and if you're breastfeeding, pregnant or planning to be sick and harm an unborn baby. Common side effects include nausea, headache and tiredness. Real patient compensated for her time.
- [24:45]
Sophie Cunningham
Learn more@cascali.com this is Sophie Cunningham from Show Me Something. Do you know the symptoms of moderate to severe obstructive sleep apnea or OSA in adults with obesity? They may be happening to you without you knowing. If anyone has ever said you snored loudly, or if you spend your days fighting off excessive tiredness, irritability and concentration issues, it may be due to osa. OSA is a serious condition where your airway partially or completely collapses during sleep, which may cause breathing interruptions and oxygen deprivation. Learn more at. Don't sleep on osa.com this information is provided by Lilly A medicine company pass.
- [25:26]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
And destroyed the whole company. Some white dudes. And that's what I'm saying is like that's what happens when, when we try to build our businesses. It's very, very predatory. But it's going to take, it's going to be harder, it's going to take longer, but it's going to be well worth it because people can follow my blueprint and do exactly what I did. And I'm paving that way so that you know, you can own your company, not get voted out. Have as much equity as you possibly can to give yourself more the ability to raise more capital. All that stuff is important with the.
- [25:51]
Charlamagne Tha God
So you're because you're not doing it the VC way, right? You have everyday people giving like smaller amounts of money. When you do scale, right? So after you hit that profit margin and people, maybe some VCs or whatever come in, how do you stay connected to the everyday people? Like people that are listening to the Breakfast Club who might not understand what it means when a company goes public or when they're acquired. Like anything that you plan to do once you hit certain points of, you.
- [26:12]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
Know, return, well, you're connected. We're connected to our investors all the time. We have like, you know, over 29,000 investors and fan baseball. We have communications that are updated all the time. We send out newsletters, we, we talk on the app, we send out updates through the Start Engine page where when you invest in fan base, that's where you can always find your shares. So we're in constant communication with our investors. They see the progress of the company. They see new hires, they see New releases, they see everything that's going on. But what we're doing, we have to be extremely transparent about all this stuff because this is an SEC regulator raise. All these things, you know, are above board so they follow the journey. And then a lot of them use the app. A lot of them are on fan base. And that's the really cool part about it too is a lot of them are using the platform and a lot of them have used fan base for what it's intended to do, which is to passively make money by using social media and have actually made the money back from the money, made the money back by using fan base that they invested in the company. So people have made thousands of dollars, you know, just getting loves and getting subscriptions on fan base and they've already invested in the company for free because, I mean, that's the future of social media. Social media is the new tv. Right. And we are all our own channels in these communities. And that will be able to monetize without disruption, without middlemen, and be able to scale our businesses or scale our pages or scale our talent or our platform or our, our ideas without people interrupting. And that's the disruptive part about social media and fan base right now.
- [27:38]
Isaac Hayes III
Let me ask you a question, Isaac. If no clear liquidity event is on the horizon, why should investors, you know, stay in?
- [27:46]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
Well, I mean, I'll say this. A lot of platforms don't have liquidity events. They can't guarantee when they will go public. Right. But that's what an investment is. It's limited risk though, when in these other instances, when people are putting their money into these companies and they're investing, especially credit investors, they have to put 10,000, 25,000, $50,000 to just to be allowed to sit on the cap table. And they don't get any guarantee on when that liquidity event is going to happen. They don't know if those businesses are going to be successful. And they still put that money in because the upside is that's the risk. Now if you want to put your money into the stock market and let it sit and maybe double and triple over the next 25 years. Yes. But if we want to escape the generational wealth gap that exists for people of color and black people in this country, we have to aggressively invest in, in tech startups that can scale to hundreds of billions of dollars. We're not getting out if we don't do that. I'm just, I'm being 100. You can't, you can't retail Invest your way about it, about a lot of stuff. The people that put their money into Nvidia 15, 20 years ago are the people that are sitting on hundreds of millions of dollars. And people never saw Nvidia coming, but somebody believed. And those are the people that are just believers in fan base. The same way anybody that you see that exits a company like this and that makes millions and millions of dollars, they're the people that were like, man, that's a dumb idea. You shouldn't invest in that. Every, every corporation that you can think of, every Uber, every Instagram, every Nvidia, all of them, where people were like, man, that's not gonna work. That's stupid. But that, that small group of people that believe that actually had the opportunity to invest are the ones that wind up winning in the long term. And so that's what it is. There is no, no platform, no, no, no startup will ever guarantee, guarantee you a liquidity event. Like to this day, the ByteDance, the parent company of TikTok, is still a privately held company. They've never gone public and they're worth $400 billion now. That means people probably found a way out somehow to exit. But I don't plan on keeping fan base, a privately held company in perpetuity because of the fact that we have investors that can see a return. So the company at some point will go public or will get acquired and that's the energy behind it. It's taking our, it's taking our capital and our culture and then scaling it to a point that we can exit.
- [29:56]
Isaac Hayes III
That's so, so if it does not reach profitability or the liquidity event within whatever amount of years, what is the plan B for the investor capital?
- [30:06]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
It's still, it's, it's to continue to raise capital until you into your clips that. The unfortunate part about that is, is that other, other businesses will get funded infinitely until they raise that capital. Right? They'll get, they'll keep putting money into it. Even like, you got to think about this, even something like Netflix. I'll be, I'll be. Netflix is about to acquire Warner Brothers, right, for $80 billion. They took out a 63 billion dollar loan just to acquire that. A lot of these companies aren't necessarily proper when you dig into what it is. That's why for me, it's harder because I'm doing it the right way. I'm, I'm doing it the way that's actually harder. And we're not playing games with investors. It's like you really you really have an opportunity to sit and scale the business, right, by being part of the company. So for, for us, every person that's actually using fan base and on fan base has the ability to scale the company too. It's. If it doesn't, if it doesn't happen, you raise more money, you raise capital, you continue to do that. That's why I say for me coming on here and having public conversations about raising capital, there are, there are people that are in round J, right? Series A, series B, series C, series D, series E, right? And it just continues to raise and raise and raise and raise, right? And so this is really our first, this is still our seed round. We haven't even raised a series. When I, when I do a series A, a series A is when I raise 50 million or 100 million at one time, right? Someone cuts a check for 50 million, 100 million or group of people, that's a series A. Now that now we're, now we're talking, now we, now we got engineers working around the sun and building. And I'm really competitive especially with agentic AI and agents and being able to code AI is really helping us actually stay competitive. Without it, it would be a lot harder because now we can use AI to code AI to do qa, AI to develop all those things. And so it's a lot. It gives us, this is the time for us right now to actually be involved in, in scaling the business because we have AI to help us scale. I'm not big on AI content creation, but scaling is, is important.
- [31:59]
Isaac Hayes III
And what do those micro dramas look like? That's going to start on Q1 in February.
- [32:04]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
So if you don't know what micro dramas are, Micro dramas are movies that are chopped into two minute segments with cliffhangers at the end of each of these. They are very popular platforms in China. It's the micro drama industry has eclipse the film and television industry. And when I started looking at this about eight, nine months ago, I went on these micro drama platforms and I noticed they were owned by Chinese corporations and all the content was white content. And I said, if we don't come in and distribute micro dramas and make it so that multicultural people can distribute micro drama. So we have black micro dramas, Latin micro dramas, African micro dramas, somebody's going to corner that market. That doesn't look like us, make billions of dollars. And these are the same people that said they didn't want DEI and they didn't want black people and they didn't want diversity and they didn't want equity and they didn't want inclusion. So for me, I said it's easier for us to distribute micro dramas on fan base because we already have the components of what a micro drama is. A micro drama is just vertical short form video currency that unlocks episodes, subscriptions and an algorithm. We already have all four of those. And so it made perfect sense to partner with Ty Walker and Keisha Perry Walker to, with Wild Peach Studios to produce. They're going to produce micro dramas and fan base will distribute those micro dramas. And when I tell you my phone has been ringing. I went to Tyler Perry's Christmas party this weekend. Everybody that I talked to that was black there was like, yo, what's up with these micro dramas? Because the micro drama industry is going to be multi, multi billion dollar industry. But the question is, who's going to own it and who's going to own the infrastructure of the platforms that actually produce and distribute those micro dramas. And fan base is going to be one of those in 2026. And so it's a, it's just, just don't, don't even listen to me research micro dramas. I just got like Kim Kardashian, all these. Everybody's getting into micro dramas. But there's one thing that's different is that they're building micro drama apps and all those micro drama apps have a retention problem. Once you see a micro drama, you leave. What gets people to stay? So when micro dramas are built into an app that's already built to hold all media, then the retention is a lot higher. Right? And there's more things to do. You don't want to watch a micro drama then leave. Right? You can watch a micro drama and then get right back over to your feedback and see news or see your friends or see all, you know, the content that you see or create content yourself. And that's what we're doing. Make it, make it, you know, be very, very clear that social media is the new television. If you do not think that all media will be distributed through large social networks in the future, which is almost now, you're sadly mistaken. And so that's why I built Fanbase. I built fan base to contain all media. I built this platform so they can hold podcasts, it can hold music, it can hold audiobooks, audio rooms. Short form, long form, that's the long game because that's where everything is going. Like a TV on a wall is, is done for these days, right? You know, I'm saying it's either your phone, your tablet, or Your laptop, because the screen is mobile and you can watch the content when you want. Not at 8 o' clock in front of my living room. That changes everything because now your content could get billions of views as opposed to millions of views because you have to be somewhere at a certain time in front of a certain device.
- [35:11]
Isaac Hayes III
Do you think Quibi was too early when they launched?
- [35:15]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
Well, Quibi wasn't micro dramas.
- [35:17]
Isaac Hayes III
It wasn't.
- [35:17]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
That's the thing about it. That was vertical series, right? Quibi was not micro dramas. And, and be clear, micro dramas are an art form. Anybody out there that's interested in doing micro dramas don't think that just taking a movie and chopping it up into segments and is what a micro drama is. You have to study the art form. They're written, right? They're produced, written and directed. A very, very specific way that keeps the audience engaged. It is not just taking a movie up and chopping it up.
- [35:41]
Isaac Hayes III
So it's not just short form content. Quibi was just short form content, okay?
- [35:45]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
That's just short form content. And there are other platforms that have been doing that.
- [35:48]
DJ Envy
But Michael, dramas are good and they've been popping up. I've been seeing them on different fees and they're very interesting, right? Very entertaining. The only problem I have with him and this will be good is they usually just pop up on your feed, right? And they're very entertaining, but you never know how to get back to it, right? So you'll watch two minutes and it'll be something very stupid or very simple, but it'll be entertaining. But then you just never know how to get back to it. You know what I mean? So the fact that you can get back to it and understand it is dope.
- [36:14]
Charlamagne Tha God
How do you.
- [36:15]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
You just said something key, right? You just said something really, really key. You have to leave wherever they advertise at. So let's say you're on Instagram or TikTok. You have to leave TikTok or Instagram, go download the microdrama app and then find finish watching the rest of what you're watching. You're not going to have to do that on fan base. It's going to be in the feed. So if you see it, if you see a micro drum in your feed, you can watch it and you're already inside the app. That's what I mean by these apps have a retention problem. That's why I was like, okay, good. I want everybody to go out there and make another 40, 40 micro drama apps and, and split the audience. In a million different directions, while we have micro dramas built inside a community of people that are already there.
- [36:50]
Charlamagne Tha God
But how do you compete with. Because, like, I can't think of her name right now. I was trying to text my friend to get her name. I follow a girl. She's been doing it for almost like six, six years, and it like skyrocketed her. Now she's working with Issa Rae. She's been doing micro dramas just on Instagram, like before rules were even a thing. It's just literally about how you cut your content and make the episode the next one. The next one. How do you compete where people already are with making them come over to fan base to do it? They're already on platforms doing it. Like, a lot of creators do it.
- [37:15]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
No, because. Because again, specifically the micro drama industry, they're next to no black micro dramas. Like, I'll give you. I'll give you.
- [37:22]
DJ Envy
I've never seen a black micro drama girl.
- [37:25]
Charlamagne Tha God
She's fire. I know Issa works with her now. I just don't know her Instagram name. But she was early. She has a micro drama. It's about. It's kind of like Devil Wears Prada, but it's like the young black girl moves to LA version of it and she. It's like episodic and every. Like. But.
- [37:40]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
Yeah, that's a. But again, that's a vertical series. Again, that's different. That's like taking a TV show and making it vertical. When I mean, micro dramas are an art form. I promise you, it is not. It is like very, very specific. They're shot in these two minute. Every two minutes is a cliffhanger. Every two minutes, some. Something dramatic happens and it. And it. And it escalates over the course of the hour, hour and a half. That. That happens. And so the micro dramas are. These micro dramas are getting 200 million views, right? Like, the most watched movie on Netflix this year was. Was the. The K Pop Demon Hunters, the anime movie.
- [38:15]
Charlamagne Tha God
People love that.
- [38:16]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
I got 140 million views, right? I got 140 million views. The. The number one micro drama in Asia, in China, 2025, got 500 million views, right? 500 millions. That means like a. Like half a billion people watched a micro drama in China, one show, right? And that's what I mean by the art form is it's a lot different. Like, if you go. If you go to any of the Michael Drama apps, just listen what I'm saying. Go download any of the apps. Real short drama box, all of them, right? Go on there, you'll see all white people or all Asian people. And my point is, is that nobody. You're not going to see a bunch of black micro dramas, right? And my, and the point that I'm making is that they're going to start producing micro dramas. But who owns the actual production company of the micro dramas? Like when you get on real short, real short looks like a white company. It's Crazy Maple Studio, Real short, that's owned by a Chinese company. It's the same thing they did with Tick Tock. It's like, who owns it on the back end? And we're at a point right now in, in society, the nutrition facts matter. Who owns the platforms that you use? We know that Fox owns to be. We don't really. We don't. We don't. World Star Hip hop is not owned by anybody black, but black people are on there every day. And so when we're creating content and entertaining the masses, right, who sits on the cap table and who owns it is also very, very important. That's why I say I'm making sure that black people own the infrastructure of micro drama distribution. Because if not, we're just going to be giving our content back to other platforms again. And then when they get big enough, they'll stop making our micro dramas and, and tell them. Tell us to kiss their behind like they did on Tubi, like they did on the wb, like they did on upn, the cw, like they did with black exploitation films, right? In the seventies. Black exploitation films save Hollywood, right? Shaft, the Mac, Superfly. They brought Hollywood back from the brink of bankruptcy and then when they got back on their feet, they didn't make those movies anymore. Thank you. Thank you for saving us. Boom. So I'm intentional about the fact that we have to own the infrastructure of the micro drama community of social media because we contribute so much.
- [40:16]
Charlamagne Tha God
I just wanted to mention her name because I didn't say earlier. Her name is Candace Banks and it's called thanks, Candace Banks. But I don't know if it's considered a micro drama or not, but I thought it was what you were talking.
- [40:25]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
About, but just no, like, even, even, like, even as successful as Country Wayne is, he's. That's like a, that's like a micro soap opera. Like, you know, to put. To put what he's doing in perspective. In the month of November, Country Wayne showed that he got a billion views in the month of November on all his content on Facebook. A billion views. Right. And so what I mean is the ability for large amounts of people to consume content, multiple different types of content, especially in the micro drama space in, in 2026, we have to own the market. You know, because Country Wayne doesn't own Facebook. He's making money off the ad revenue. But imagine he owns the actual productions and the infrastructure of what he's doing on those platforms. Again, I tell him to stay on Facebook because he's so successful, but there are a lot of people that have been reaching out that are saying, hey, look, a lot of people that we all know that are in TV and film, actors, producers, writers that are like, yo, I need to, we need to talk about this because we have to own these industries.
- [41:23]
Isaac Hayes III
So how do they invest?
- [41:25]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
They go to startengine.comfanbase to invest. That's, you know, startengine.comfanbase. the minimum is 399. Our raise closes today. Raise is over. And see, after the race close of the day, I've been here before and, and been able to raise a, a enormous amount of capital, especially on my first time here. And so I'm letting people know that the importance of investing and have platforms like this and thank you guys for allowing me to come on here and, and inform the community about the opportunity to do this is important. So startengine.com fanbase to invest. A minimum is 399. You get 60 shares of stock and fan base and you will own the infrastructure of social media and micro dramas in the future.
- [42:05]
DJ Envy
All right, well, thank you, eyes and case. The third week.
- [42:08]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
Appreciate you.
- [42:09]
DJ Envy
And it's the Breakfast Club. Good morning.
- [42:11]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
Hold up.
- [42:12]
Isaac Hayes III
Every day I wake up, wake your ass up. The Breakfast Club finished or y' all done?
- [42:20]
Coca-Cola Announcer
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- [42:21]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
All.
- [42:22]
Coca-Cola Announcer
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- [43:06]
Sophie Cunningham
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- [43:45]
DJ Envy
People, don't listen to radio ads while you're driving or making a sandwich. Your subconscious pays full attention, so relax.
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DJ Envy
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Isaac Hayes III
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- [44:31]
Coca-Cola Announcer
Only one movie answers the call.
- [44:33]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
Hello, it's me, SpongeBob. For the biggest comedy event of the.
- [44:38]
DJ Envy
Holiday season, do you know what the best part is?
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AT&T Announcer
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- [44:42]
Sophie Cunningham
Patrick?
- [44:42]
Coca-Cola Announcer
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- [44:43]
Isaac (Fanbase Founder)
The SpongeBob Movie rated DT Friday this.
- [44:46]
Charlamagne Tha God
Is an iHeart podcast. Guaranteed human.