Latest / The Scene Projects / Wes Towers on AI's Impact, Human Connection, and Balancing Technology in Business

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Wes Towers on AI's Impact, Human Connection, and Balancing Technology in Business · The Scene Projects

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  Today's guest is Wes Towers, founder of Uplift three sixty and specialist in conversion
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  focused websites for trades and construction.
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  He blends smart UX, SEO, and AI to turn sites into lead machines.
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  Let's get into the show.
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  This program is part of the Scene Projects podcast network.
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  Scene Project features interviews with independent musicians, comedians, and artists
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  from across the Midwest.
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  Become part of our community and support local art wherever you are.
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  Welcome in to another exciting episode of the scene.
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  I'm your host Bubba Starts, and with me today is Wes Towers.
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  Welcome to the show, Wes.
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  Hey, Bubba.
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  Fantastic to be here.
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  It's an honor to be speaking with you today.
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  It's, my morning over here in Australia.
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  You can see the sunrise probably in the background there, and, must be your evening, is
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  it?
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  Not quite evening, but into the afternoon for sure.
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  That's beautiful.
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  Not a backdrop.
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  It's blurred, but that is, absolutely gorgeous coming up right now.
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  Yeah.
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  That's it.
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  Nice.
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  Very cool, man.
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  Well, I know we're gonna get into a lot of talk about how AI is changing the world around us,
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  but I wanted to give you the floor here at the beginning of the show and give us a little bit
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  of your backstory.
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  Sure.
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  So I run a digital agency, so I'm a creative by heart.
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  I studied oh, have I lost you there?
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  No.
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  I studied graphic design multimedia.
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  I think I've lost you.
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  I'm here.
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  Alright.
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  Cool.
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  Cool.
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  Sorry.
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  I, yeah, I studied graphic design multimedia at uni, so I became a graphic designer but moved
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  into the digital industry more and more and became a web focused more so on on website
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  designs and and started my own business, Uplift three sixty.
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  But the the interesting part potentially for your audience happened a few years ago now,
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  probably three just over three years ago.
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  And, I got a business valuation and the valuers suggested my business wasn't valued very much
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  at all simply because, AI was a massive threat and people don't buy unpredictability, as you
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  can understand.
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  So, AI is a disruption in every creative industry as is certainly a creative industry in
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  every industry, really, but I think it was recognized, really early days that it could
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  disrupt my business.
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  And so doubling down on that technology, AI, learning how it could be implemented into the
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  business, we've done that.
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  But also to really focus, deeply on what is important to me as a as a as a founder of the
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  business, and that's the human connections and to build, those relationships more so than ever
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  in this digital age where there's the lack of authenticity.
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  I think those that can bring something authentic and real and genuine are going to be
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  the big winners.
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  So that's the journey I'm on, and it's been an exciting and terrifying journey right now with
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  everything changing so fast.
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  No.
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  You you nailed it.
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  And and while AI is disrupting everything, and it indeed does threaten, you know, some people
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  that are working in different industries, it also opens so many doors for creatives like
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  ourselves to get a lot more done at a much lower price point and much faster than any
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  human could ever do as well.
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  So, I mean, you take the good with the bad.
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  People who are very rigid in their thinking and very, you know, very, I don't wanna say simple,
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  but they only have one thing that they learn how to do in their lives.
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  And they just went and did that one thing.
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  They're going to struggle now.
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  And if you can't learn and adapt quickly in this day and age, life is going to be a
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  struggle.
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  I would say more so in the next decade than maybe ever in human history.
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  I think you're right.
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  Absolutely.
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  And so the the goal is it was really a wake up call for me, the business value of saying what
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  I did.
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  It was something I knew sort of intuitively that there was gonna gonna be major disruption
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  in my industry.
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  But it was a real a bit of a kick in the teeth and a a wake up call to say, hey.
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  Better get started, thinking about how you adapt to the changes, in business.
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  And and it it was a great, blessing in disguise, really, to have that wake up call
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  fairly early on in in, AI, I suppose, when people started introducing it to their
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  businesses.
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  So we streamlined a whole bunch of things.
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  The sound same outcome is achieved with designing websites, and every design is unique
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  and all that kind of stuff.
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  But the process in which we get it done, it's faster.
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  The the blessing in that is it's freed up a lot of time for me to focus on what I really love
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  to do, that's build relationships with the clients so I can really understand what they're
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  trying to achieve and make sure that they're on the right path for the success from a marketing
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  standpoint online.
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  So I've really been loving it, the the human building human connections and doing anything
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  that's, real and tangible.
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  That's why I'm guesting on podcasts.
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  I'm kinda new to this and finding my way and trying to figure out how to communicate, in
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  this platform.
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  And by no means am I a professional speaker and lots of ums and ahs and but I am getting
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  better.
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  So you can probably imagine how I started out pretty rough.
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  I don't I the first couple of podcasts, I I'm not even sure why they publish, and they're
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  pretty rugged.
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  But you get better at these things, and I think those people who are brave enough to take risks
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  and step out and try new things in this brave new world are going to be the big winners.
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  No doubt.
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  And I think I'm living proof of that in a lot of ways, Wes.
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  A year and a half ago, I was a welder.
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  I was working in a factory, and we were bringing in a lot of robots.
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  And I saw my own worth and value shrinking in that space, and I thought I was quitting my job
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  to be a rock star.
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  I'm a songwriter and a performer myself.
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  So I had a bunch of gigs booked, and I was like, oh, this is it.
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  We have some momentum and things are happening.
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  And I had actually recorded a new song and was releasing it in the way that, you know, the
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  music industry has kinda told us now you have to singles and everything has to be in this way
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  and you have to make content.
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  And and it was in that time that I I had gone on and guessed it on a few podcasts, and I
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  started to share my story.
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  And I realized how that was changing me.
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  Right?
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  Sharing my story and getting some of these things out and archiving them so that I didn't
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  have to tell the same story over and over again.
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  I could kinda point to something and say, no.
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  There's that piece of me.
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  If you wanna see that, you can go to that so that I could start writing a new story.
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  And it was in that where I was like, you know, other artists need this.
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  And there's not a lot of people that are taking time out of their day, even if they are
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  creatives themselves, to shine a light on someone else.
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  So I I just started calling all my friends, obviously, twenty plus years in the music
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  industry.
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  I know a lot of musicians and artists, and I just started having conversations.
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  And we got to a 100 episodes on our audio only feed, in nine months.
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  Now we have over 300 episodes out on our YouTube channel.
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  We've passed over 280,000 views in the last six months, and it's inexorably changed my life.
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  And I know that over the course of time as fans or, you know, just other people start to hear
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  some of these conversations that I've had, that it's going to change their lives.
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  And I think that's the really interesting thing.
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  And truly, none of it is possible without AI assisting me along every bit of the path.
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  And, it it's it's a give and take.
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  Right?
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  Is there people that maybe, lost money like yourself?
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  I I in the past, I would need graphic designers or I would need web developers to help me to
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  get to where I am.
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  But I didn't have the money to pay them anyway.
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  And in some ways, these web developers that held on to that knowledge and took forever to
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  get to somebody because they thought that they were irreplaceable, that they kinda brought on
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  their own demise because what they did was they caused a problem.
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  People couldn't get their websites developed affordably or quick enough.
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  You you I think, you know, ten years ago, to get someone to design a website for you was a
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  couple thousand dollars, and these people were gonna sit there and take their sweet time to do
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  it.
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  And it created the need for the AI or for at least a faster version of what they were doing,
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  and now a lot of these guys are out of work.
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  Yeah.
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  Yeah.
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  A 100%.
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  I mean, we're we're on the on the opposite side of the spectrum.
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  So we've had our most profitable year ever, from a business standpoint.
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  Just we report, midyear.
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  I think your your financial years just run to the regular year, but we report at the June,
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  and we had a most, most success this last financial year in in June.
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  So, and that came as a result of using AI to streamline process to get jobs done faster.
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  And, also, that freed me up to to build a greater connection so I can bring a new level
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  of, of value to the to the businesses that we serve.
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  So it's really important these days to think about how you bring value in an AI driven age
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  where things do become easier.
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  So as you said, our industry so people can potentially jump in and and do their websites
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  themselves quickly, and it that's going to get even easier and easier and better as technology
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  changes.
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  It's it's obviously in its infancy realistically of where we are with all this
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  kind of stuff.
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  So I've got to step up my game and bring a new level of value.
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  It's kind of and well done, by the way, stepping out from the the welding industry and
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  and doing what you're doing and following your creative passion.
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  That's a massive leap leap of faith, but it's obviously, as you mentioned, paid off, really
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  substantially and and and Yeah.
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  Maybe not financially yet.
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  I'm not reporting any, you know, huge gains, but I I've covered some events this year.
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  I'll I'll be covering the Josie music awards at Nashville.
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  So my first time going to Nashville, I'm going to be working in Media Village at the Grand Ole
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  Opry.
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  Right?
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  And that's not possible without that leap of faith.
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  Right?
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  So I think that, know, obviously, our best days financially are still ahead of us, and we're
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  really on the precipice of that right now.
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  And by the time this episode release, we'll probably already be way past that that point.
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  Yeah.
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  But it it's in exactly what you said.
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  Where is the value that you can bring to someone else's life?
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  And that's what it's really about.
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  And, the human element is still so important.
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  People, yes, we have machines and we have this AI that can do a lot of these things, But at
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  the end of the day, it's still about serving other human beings.
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  So you have to have that personal element, and you use the the machine learning and all of
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  these things to allow you more time with the people that you're serving to really get to
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  know them and their problems, to be able to bring that value to them.
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  Our business is predicated on artists want to be more famous.
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  Right?
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  They want people to buy their albums or to support them with ticket sales.
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  Well, we had to learn how do you do that, how in this age is it changing.
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  We know we're not making any money from streaming.
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  And literally, all the music industry has been telling you for the last ten years is you gotta
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  get on all streaming platforms and drive streaming.
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  Well, why would the music business want that?
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  Oh, because they own the streaming platforms that you are helping them to go out and market.
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  You are their marketing plan as an artist.
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  And now ten years hence, the artists are waking up to that and going, yeah.
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  I'm done being your your free marketing to bring people to your platform so that you can
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  serve them the artist that you want to, and they don't get to even hear my stuff.
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  So what we've done is built an Internet radio station, our whole list of podcasts that we
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  have.
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  We now have 10 shows plus on the network, four different networks that we're running, and and
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  to be that promotion engine for the artists themselves.
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  And what we do is community.
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  Build communities of artists or podcasters or whatever it is to teach them for free how to do
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  it and then give them the tools to advance those things and maybe some premium
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  distribution services, TV and radio things that we can provide for them that help them to to
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  achieve their goals while still having room for sponsors and those things that help us to keep
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  the machine on the road.
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  And we're looking at longevity.
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  Right?
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  We're not some flash in the pan.
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  Everything that I've built is to build a wide platform.
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  I kind of equated it to you know, I'm not planting a a a annual plant.
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  Right?
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  I'm not putting a plant in a pot.
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  I'm planting a forest.
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  Right?
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  And that takes time to realize the full scope of it.
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  Right?
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  You may see one or two, but over the course of ten or twenty years, eventually, you're going
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  to be able to come back.
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  And when we get that moment in the sun, whether it's a viral moment or Joe Rogan invites me on
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  his podcast, then we get the the huge bump that it's not just going to grow my own platform.
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  It's going to grow the platform of these, you know, now thousands of people that we've been
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  associated with over the last eighteen months and now extrapolate that over decades.
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  We're going to change the world that just just by doing exactly what we're doing.
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  It's already happening.
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  Yeah.
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  That's so so brilliant.
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  And it sounds as though you've got a really great balance of the the tech, but also the
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  human, the creative element.
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  Obviously, you need that in in what in the field you're you're working in and the the
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  disruption you can bring.
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  So it's the way I look at it for creatives and artists, and I'm one of them, is to it's it's
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  kind of like the light and shade.
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  So you need the both so that the, you need the darkness so the light can can shine.
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  I'm a visual kind of guy, so I my creative, Ben is the the visual element.
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  That's what I studied graphic design.
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  But it it's true in in in sound and music as well so that the lightness and the dark.
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  You need the the contrast, and I think that's true in business as well.
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  You need the technical capability.
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  So that's the really, data driven side of things, but then you need the creative beauty
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  and the mystery and the art and the that's less science and it's more, it's out there in
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  another dimension, really.
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  It feels like sometimes it's when you I don't know about you, but sometimes when you're
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  designing something, maybe when you when you're working on a song, it feels like it comes from
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  somewhere else because you're in that creative flow.
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  So getting that creative flow right with the with the, enhancement.
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  I think AI is a massive amplifier.
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  So if you get the foundations of who you are and what you're trying to your messages and
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  what you're trying to bring to the world, if you're really solid in that, you can use AI as
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  an amplifier.
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  The problem is people come about it the other way.
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  So they they start with AI.
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  So no longer is it their ideas, their thoughts, their world their view of the world, but it's
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  coming from AI.
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  So, therefore, it's just the average sum total of what everyone else has already done.
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  Say, for example, if you're writing content, and this is in our world.
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  So people might jump on ChatGPT and say, I I wanna blog post about blah blah blah, their
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  industry, and the intention is so they can show up in Google and the like.
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  Well, it's just really, really average because all it all it can give them is something other
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  people have already said.
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  So it's a collation of other people's thoughts.
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  So when you flip it around the other side and you bring the ideas and you just use AI to
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  help, structure it maybe or to reword it a little bit so it's in a better format, more
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  articulate, but it's your thoughts, that's when it's a powerful tool to amplify your message.
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  So I think it's true in every creative field.
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  I think another really interesting thing I believe, the future is for the artists.
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  So what I mean by that is to think about the value of a piece of art.
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  Again, I'm a visual guy, so a painting.
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  If if we know the artist and the painter and we wanna know that it was their hand that picked
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  up the paintbrush and touched the canvas and made that beautiful artwork, We don't want a a
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  rip off.
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  Once it once we it's identified that it wasn't truly created by the artist, then it doesn't
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  hold the same value.
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  So I think there's going to be value in in what has been touched by human hands.
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  And I think music will be a definitely a massive part of that too.
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  I I can see, like, live music becoming a bigger and bigger thing.
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  Anything live and human those human connections, we're kinda craving for it because
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  we live behind our screens in this, digital age.
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  Anything that anything that can break through that is, our human hearts and connections in in
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  live in in person is really great.
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  I often just visit the, downstairs.
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  We've got a a local music, a bar that brings local music, and it it's wonderful just to
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  connect in in that in that, in that room.
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  Yeah.
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  And as, as we record this, I I will be, headed out, tomorrow morning early to head to a
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  songwriter festival.
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  There's gonna be probably close to a 100 songwriters performing in the town of Deadwood,
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  South Dakota, my hometown actually, and I get to be a part of that.
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  And to and I say it's my favorite weekend in this town that does events every weekend
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  essentially of the year because of that fact, because the creative juices are just flowing
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  everywhere and you're watching people performing their art.
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  I think for for visual artists, I think live painting and and not just like going to a
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  gallery and seeing someone's work of art, but actually going and watching them make it is
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  going to be more valuable.
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  And that's great content as well that you can create it in a digital space or you can create
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  it and and to broadcast it in the digital space, but then it becomes more valuable
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  because now you have the real thing.
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  And I think there is a huge resurgence of that coming back.
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  And we're I think we're ahead of the curve, Wes.
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  I think guys like us are are thinking, you know, maybe a year or two down the line.
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  But that's ultimately when a lot of people are going to maybe discover this conversation is
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  not tomorrow or not the day after it's released, but into the archives as we both
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  continue to be active in our spaces that, that people are googling than our name if Google's
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  even a thing anymore, right, especially in two years because you're just going to chat and
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  asking them.
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  I mean, that's how I I found out about you.
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  I just simply type in chat.
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  Who is West Towers?
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  And it says, hey.
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  Here here who there's who he is.
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  Right?
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  And it it works good enough for a fifteen second intro, but it doesn't tell me everything
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  about you.
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  It doesn't tell me about your years as a graphic designer studying and and your, you
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  know, the kick in the teeth as you put it that you got when starting out on your own business.
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  Right?
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  Like, it can't express that human side of it.
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  It can give you some bits of information, but it doesn't tell you the whole story.
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  And I think as we move along through time that, just like you said, that the human element of
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  things, seeing live performances, seeing live art, seeing and feeling and touching that
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  visceral experience is going to become super valuable again.
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  And it's why I've kind of set my hooks into a lot of coattails with live artists over the
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  last two years is we never know which one of these people are going to make it.
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  And now I have connections all over the country, all over the world that now I get to
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  go visit them and to get to perform in their towns and to connect with real human beings
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  other than seeking out the affirmation of a simple digital like or a a view or a follow.
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  That's not why I'm doing this.
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  I'm doing this to make friends, And I think that, that's kind of the beauty of the
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  Internet.
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  It always has been, right, going back to the old chat room days that you could connect with
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  another human or across the world.
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  And now it's just it's increasing in its value beyond any measure that I think we could have
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  foreseen fifteen to twenty years ago.
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  Yeah.
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  100%.
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  And you and you mentioned the the thing about Google, so less people potentially using
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  Google, and that makes sense.
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  I do the same.
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  I do all my research on ChatGPC.
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  I I chat to it all the time.
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  Even in the car driving around, I might have some thoughts and ideas and talk to my phone as
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  if it's a a real person.
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  It's like my counselor and my adviser and my strategist and all of these things.
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  But, realistically, it's my own thoughts that go through it, and it sort of helps me to
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  refine them and and think through logically and and bring bring other suggestions as well to
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  open open me up to other ideas.
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  It's part of what we're doing now is to help, our clients show up in, in the large language
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  models as well.
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  We had a massive success story just recently where we just started working for a client.
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  He'd only been with us maybe couple of months or so.
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  And, he met he won a massive contract simply because ChatJPT said he was the very best of,
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  his consulting type in Australia.
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  And so someone quite a distance away, geographically chose him because he he was he
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  was perceived to be the best according to ChatGPT.
• 21:50
  So that's, that's massive if you can shop in all the right places.
• 21:54
  That that's what we're trying to help clients do.
• 21:56
  So not only build the website, build the content that can be surfaced in the large
• 22:01
  language models and Google as well.
• 22:02
  Still paperly using Google currently to find a business if they're ready to buy something.
• 22:07
  If they're ready they they know they wanna buy a particular service or they need something, a
• 22:12
  plumber or electrician.
• 22:14
  We we work with mainly trades and construction related industries, building materials, those
• 22:18
  sorts of things.
• 22:19
  So all
• 22:19
  of those But in many ways, those those are the people that need your help the most because
• 22:24
  they're usually not tech savvy people, but they are the people that are doing the work that
• 22:29
  other humans need.
• 22:30
  And how are humans finding them?
• 22:32
  Well, then you need to be good at that.
• 22:34
  And for so many years, we have been kind of blocked out from that by the tech savvy
• 22:39
  individuals who have kind of been gatekeeping that in price or in just not being available
• 22:46
  all the time to do that, the SEO and all of these things that elevated some others or it
• 22:52
  became that, you know, if you're not paying Google to get this placement, then you're not
• 22:56
  going to to get any business.
• 22:58
  And it and it feels like AI is, in some ways, leveling the playing field a little bit and
• 23:04
  giving the little guys a chance to catch up to the people that just have all the money in the
• 23:09
  world to spend.
• 23:11
  Yeah.
• 23:12
  That's it.
• 23:13
  The way I look at it is the world is now a collaboration.
• 23:16
  So you collaborate with, people who can support your vision.
• 23:20
  So that's what precisely the way I look at, clients.
• 23:23
  So as you say, they they our typical client isn't all that tech savvy.
• 23:28
  Typically, they're I mean, they came up from the from the bottom.
• 23:31
  They got their trade as an apprentice.
• 23:33
  They become fully fully qualified.
• 23:35
  They end up in some form of leadership role in the company, and then, they become a founder of
• 23:40
  their own business in the same field that they've always worked in.
• 23:43
  So they're really practical, pragmatic, hands on, really fantastic people.
• 23:48
  They don't necessarily like being behind a computer, but they set the vision and the tone
• 23:53
  of where the business is headed.
• 23:54
  And it's my job to come alongside and to support them in any way I can from a digital
• 23:59
  standpoint to help make sure their marketing is working for them and it's bringing the right
• 24:03
  kind of inquiries through the door.
• 24:08
  So how did your journey into AI start?
• 24:11
  Was it really that moment where it's like, hey.
• 24:13
  AI is gonna take your job, and you're like, well, then I better figure out who the enemy
• 24:18
  is.
• 24:18
  Right?
• 24:19
  And to get to know this thing, was that kind of the impetus for it at that point, or were you
• 24:23
  already starting to dabble?
• 24:25
  I'd I'd started looking at it a little bit.
• 24:29
  So but, yeah, nothing you know, I hadn't really, invested a lot of time into figuring
• 24:35
  out how I could apply it to my business really well.
• 24:38
  I was just on ChatTubit using it personally.
• 24:41
  That's pretty much how I think most people start out.
• 24:43
  Just, download it and and see how great it is and realize there's probably greater potential
• 24:49
  for the business.
• 24:49
  The business has been running twenty over twenty years now.
• 24:54
  So it's always felt like it's been a fast changing business, business industry because
• 25:00
  tech has always changed pretty fast.
• 25:01
  So you build a website, a few years back, and then it looks dated even in a couple of years
• 25:06
  time because things change so fast.
• 25:09
  But that's just escalated and increased dramatically over the last few years with AI.
• 25:14
  So the acceleration is phenomenal.
• 25:16
  It's it's going to definitely leave some people behind who are as you say, so the the the
• 25:23
  people who are holding on, just holding on to the old way and the the, the way they used to
• 25:28
  do proposals and, not allow clients in on on the secrets, I suppose.
• 25:35
  Those people are going to really struggle.
• 25:37
  I don't think they'll survive.
• 25:38
  I think you've got to adapt and adapt quickly before you're left behind.
• 25:45
  No doubt.
• 25:46
  And that's a beautiful piece of advice, I think, for anyone at any age is to not be rigid
• 25:53
  in your thinking and to to not think that it can't happen to you because it can happen, to
• 26:00
  really anyone in any industry.
• 26:02
  You don't know what's coming, in the future.
• 26:05
  Some of us have a little bit better idea than others, but it's always best to try and keep
• 26:11
  up, especially in the tech world, but also realizing how it applies to the value of the
• 26:17
  human experience and what that's bringing to it.
• 26:20
  You know, don't learn AI just so you can go make funny pictures of your dog or something.
• 26:25
  Right?
• 26:25
  Like, learn how it serves.
• 26:27
  You know, if you have a business or you work in an industry, learn how that can serve you and
• 26:32
  add value to what you bring to the world.
• 26:35
  And I think the people like like ourselves that that realize that, that we're going to be the
• 26:42
  ones that succeed and how we teach others how to do that, is how we have longevity and build
• 26:49
  that trust with people and maintain those human relationships because it is still a human
• 26:54
  experience.
• 26:56
  Yeah.
• 26:57
  Well, people like to buy from those that they know, like, and trust.
• 27:01
  So just that relationship building, that that's gonna be the secret to success for a lot of a
• 27:06
  lot of people and navigating the the tools and tech to support the what you're trying to
• 27:11
  achieve.
• 27:12
  It's there is going there's massive risks and dangers.
• 27:14
  I mean, even on our news here in Australia, I don't wanna butcher the story too much because
• 27:20
  I only was half listening, but there was, in some school, there was some people who made
• 27:26
  fake photos of one of the students in compromising, in a compromising manner.
• 27:34
  It wasn't as obviously, she was nothing to do with it, but that was circulated around the
• 27:38
  school.
• 27:38
  Now they're looking at the legal implications of what that all means, and the police are
• 27:42
  getting involved in a whole bunch of stuff.
• 27:44
  But there's massive threats and opportunities with any any changes.
• 27:49
  It feels like we've got these massive speed wobbles.
• 27:52
  So, you know, when you're riding down a hill on a bike and and you start to go so fast that you
• 27:57
  can
• 27:57
  Or a skateboard.
• 27:59
  Yeah.
• 28:00
  Yeah.
• 28:00
  I've come off, I've come off multiple, wheeled, items, over the years.
• 28:06
  Surprised I could still walk and function.
• 28:09
  Well, I think we all do, don't we, growing up?
• 28:11
  Hopefully, the kids still do that, by the way.
• 28:14
  I don't know.
• 28:14
  They're often on devices.
• 28:15
  But I think, well, that's that's another point too, isn't it, to to not be, trapped by the
• 28:23
  tech and get sucked into social media too much.
• 28:25
  Use them as amplifiers but to connect on a human level as well.
• 28:30
  There's so many risks and challenges and exciting opportunities that we need to learn to
• 28:36
  navigate.
• 28:38
  It's a hell of a time to be alive, Wes.
• 28:41
  To be I'm 39, so I say that I'm, you know, someone who still has you know, I grew up in an
• 28:48
  analog world, but I had tech, right, computers.
• 28:51
  And and I remember playing SimCity as a young lad and, you know, where where things have gone
• 28:57
  to now.
• 28:58
  And my children don't play any video games at all.
• 29:01
  I have a 10 and a nine year old.
• 29:03
  My 13 year old doesn't live at home with us.
• 29:06
  He lives with his mom, so his life and growing up is a little bit different.
• 29:09
  But my nine my nine year old, my 10 year old's reading The Hobbit right now.
• 29:13
  Right?
• 29:13
  And he's like, oh, he's in the goblin cave now.
• 29:16
  And they're like, I didn't read that book until I was well into my teens.
• 29:19
  Right?
• 29:20
  And how exciting it's going to be for him to maybe see the movies one day and to go, well,
• 29:25
  like, oh, but they cut out all the good parts.
• 29:27
  Right?
• 29:27
  And they kinda have that that generational shift that kinda skipped me where everything
• 29:32
  that I consumed as a young person was visual.
• 29:36
  It was TV, movies, and thank god I learned how to play guitar because that kinda took me away
• 29:42
  from a lot of that tech.
• 29:43
  And moving we moved into the middle of the woods when I was 10 years old.
• 29:47
  So moved out of the Chicago area into rural South Dakota out in the woods.
• 29:51
  So I got to have a visceral childhood still, but I could have gone completely the other way
• 29:56
  and been like a lot of the kids these days with the tablet and everything in the hands twenty
• 30:00
  four seven and to never put it down.
• 30:03
  But the damage that's doing to a a lot of these children's creativity.
• 30:08
  And I think that we're seeing the studies come out now, and I'm very happy to raise my kids
• 30:13
  the way that I am and giving them a a visceral human experience because the tech is only gonna
• 30:18
  get easier to use.
• 30:20
  Right?
• 30:20
  Like, you don't have to use it for ten years to figure it out, and they're using them at school
• 30:25
  and different things.
• 30:26
  So it's like they know how to use the things.
• 30:28
  I'm not putting them at all behind by not having them available to them all the time.
• 30:33
  And I think that my wife and I deal with a lot less behavioral issues from our children
• 30:38
  because of that as well.
• 30:41
  Yeah.
• 30:42
  Brilliant, what you're doing there.
• 30:43
  So my kids, well, a couple of them are older.
• 30:46
  So, 19 and 18, just 18, and, 13.
• 30:51
  So I've still got one one, who's young and influenced a fair bit by the social.
• 30:56
  So it's getting that balance right for her.
• 30:59
  But everyone that seems as though and it say it seems as though everyone's, attention span is a
• 31:05
  whole lot less since social came out, and we started using these, particularly TikTok as
• 31:10
  well.
• 31:10
  So the attention span on that is just crazy.
• 31:14
  So you know?
• 31:16
  Yeah.
• 31:17
  And it's so that from a marketing standpoint because that's what we support people in is to
• 31:21
  to you gotta make people where they're at.
• 31:24
  So if their attention isn't as strong as it used to be, we've we've got to adapt and and
• 31:28
  make the marketing, work in that field, but it's it's not necessarily great for the human
• 31:35
  species, where things are going in those in that regard.
• 31:39
  Well, I and I think podcasting is changing that as well, and I love having an archive of these
• 31:44
  conversations that I'm building just for myself, but a legacy for my children, for them
• 31:50
  to go back and to to know who their father was, you know, in in the time when I am gone from
• 31:56
  this world, that they will always have a record of me and who I was truly, not just as their
• 32:02
  dad, but as a human being.
• 32:04
  And I think that the more conversations we can have and the more we do this, that it's
• 32:09
  actually how god is healing the world or the universe or or whatever you wanna call it, that
• 32:14
  this is how we're getting back and having conversations again and then being able to
• 32:18
  bring it out of that digital space.
• 32:20
  And for me, I think of everything in a, you know, a tour capacity, right, as a musician
• 32:25
  that we get to go out and connect with these people and to bring them into that and to do,
• 32:30
  you know, visceral meet and greets and to give everyone that you've met online or has followed
• 32:35
  your career to have an opportunity to give them a hug and snap a photo with them.
• 32:40
  And I think people crave that, and we couldn't be in a more beautiful time even with all the
• 32:46
  craziness around us in my country and I'm sure in yours as well, that people just wanna be
• 32:52
  people.
• 32:53
  And they just want to connect with other human beings again, and they want to experience good
• 33:00
  music and to taste good food and good drink and and and see beautiful art.
• 33:06
  Like, I I think we're getting back to that, and I'm really looking forward to the next couple
• 33:11
  of decades and and being a part of that to use these digital spaces that we have to be more
• 33:17
  human again instead of less human.
• 33:21
  Yeah.
• 33:21
  I think it's so true.
• 33:23
  So even with all the tech changes in I don't know what it was.
• 33:26
  You you said something just then, but it reminded me of a bible a bible's verse, I think
• 33:31
  it's in Ecclesiastes or something like that, where it says there's nothing new under the
• 33:35
  sun.
• 33:36
  I think it's a a a repeated phrase.
• 33:39
  Well, there's certainly tech, but there's a lot of it is still the same.
• 33:44
  Behind the scenes, realistically, it's all the same stuff we need to connect with humans.
• 33:49
  I think, it also speaks of, to to the the most important things that they eat and drink and be
• 33:55
  merry, those sorts of things.
• 33:56
  So those human connections you mentioned, having food, enjoying nice food and,
• 34:00
  relationships, all these kind of things are core to our foundations of who who we are as
• 34:05
  people.
• 34:06
  That'll remain true all the time no matter what tools and tech do.
• 34:14
  Awesome, Wes.
• 34:15
  Well, before I let you get out of here and get on with your day, we see the sun is fully up
• 34:19
  there now in Australia.
• 34:21
  It's good.
• 34:21
  Go ahead and tell everybody how they can find you and where they can, you know, contract your
• 34:27
  services at.
• 34:29
  Sure.
• 34:30
  So our website is uplift360.com.au.
• 34:34
  Aussies have the a u.
• 34:35
  And, from there, you can if people want to, they can book meetings with me from the
• 34:39
  website, so that's cool.
• 34:40
  But there's all the social media that you would expect, someone like me to have, even personal,
• 34:45
  LinkedIn.
• 34:46
  I'll I'll accept any invites there too.
• 34:48
  Happy to connect with those out there listening.
• 34:52
  Awesome.
• 34:53
  Well, I've been happy to connect with you.
• 34:55
  I had a great conversation, and I'm looking forward to many more over the next several
• 35:00
  decades of being friends now.
• 35:02
  West Towers, thanks for being part of the scene.
• 35:06
  Thanks, Babette.
• 35:06
  It's been awesome.