Latest / Beat The Odds with Dre, Rodney, & Brylan / Blood Work, Travis is Back & The Autonomous Future is Already Here
Transcript
- Rodney: What's up everybody? Happy Monday. Beat the OZ Podcast. How's everybody doing? Dre: Man, I'm doing well, man. Braylon got on and said it's been a crazy day. I was anticipating a crazy day, but it was actually smooth for me, man. It was pretty light heading into my vacation tomorrow. So it's been a good Monday for me. Brylan Donaldson: And yeah, I, I, I wish I was on vacation, bro, but yeah, I just, I just got to Atlanta this morning, man. ⁓ cause we're getting ready to launch Atlanta next month. And so, yeah, we in zero to one mode. Like, it. Yeah. Got it. Got it. Got to get it up. I got, I got, I got a week to get it into a place. So in a month, we good to go. Dre: ⁓ you boost on the ground. You boost on the ground, man. Rodney: Yeah. Brylan Donaldson: ⁓ so yeah. Rodney: But you've done this before, right? In different cities. Brylan Donaldson: Yeah, yeah. I've done it in different cities, man. And so ⁓ say I'm 60 % confident. I think part of it is like different markets ⁓ have like different kind of like dynamics, right? Yeah. And so part of it is that. And then, you know, when you're bringing something new, there's always kind of like that hesitation. And so I'm just in the mindset of getting some points on the board because I'm like, Rodney: Right. Yeah. Yeah. Brylan Donaldson: eventually you'll come around. Dre: How do you go about launching a new market for like our listeners? Cause I'm sure we got some founders who listen to the pod. know we've obviously been founders. what, what are you learning anything new about how to launch things on the ground and how to physically be there? Cause I'm sure you're not, I'm sure you're not there for no reason, right? You, you there because obviously your presence, you have some, some success, right? So ⁓ what are you doing tactically to kind of get this new market off the ground? Brylan Donaldson: Yeah. Yeah. So, so, so before I kind of get into the tactics, right? I would say the frame to kind of understand our business is through the lens of like a marketplace, right? There's multiple sides to it. obviously on the demand side of things, we have the members. So folks who are new to a city, look into attend experiences and they're, what we're doing is we're matching them up with, you know, restaurants, bars, you know, different experiences, et cetera, that they can discover as well. I would say. ⁓ There's a really good, there's a really good sub stack posts from Lenny. I'm forgetting his last name, but if you just look up Lenny's newsletter, he has a really good sub stack pro posts on marketplace dynamics. Do most marketplaces kick get kickstarted by constraining demand or by constraining supply? And what that like for us is like just being super hyper focused. on supply, right? I think we've reached a stage now where the brand is strong enough to where it does end up, demand ends up kind of taking care of itself. So that's why we're strategically here in Atlanta next, because we already see like the number of subscribers we have in Atlanta and we haven't even like launched. But I think, you know, to really make that work, you do have to have quality, quality supply. And so in terms of the tactics, I think the first one is really from like a bar and restaurant standpoint, it's not rocket science. I'm not going to see her act like it, but it's a little bit tricky in terms of really figuring out like who has the power of the dollar, because it's not like we're walking in there and saying like, Hey, we want to just like partner with you and send you people. No, I am going in there and saying, Hey, I want to send you people. I, and usually it's a number where they're the first thing that comes out of their mouth is like, Oh, you're a promotional group. like, There's a food and beverage minimum to this. No, we don't pay anything. Like, so I want the space for free. And then on top of that, I want you to pay me five to $10 per person that I send your way. And it's, it, once again, it's not, I wouldn't say that by itself is not innovative, but the paradigm is just different. Right. And I think, you know, before, like when we were first launching markets, like, I think there was some anxiety because I'm like, if I was in their shoes and you came at me like that, no. Why would I take on all the risk? ⁓ still pay you. But what I've, what, what, what, what, what has been shown is if you are able to kind of get a few on board, eventually, you know, think the ball gets, gets rolling and it does work. And so one of the things I, Dre: Thank you. Brylan Donaldson: quickly try to do is map the city in terms of understanding the hospitality groups. Just because oftentimes, just because I can go talk to a bar manager, they don't control the pin. I need to talk to the hospitality group. ⁓ then oftentimes from that is like, I think it's a business of trust, right? Like, no offense, I'm not dealing with engineers, like I'm dealing with everyday people, right? ⁓ Who, you know, are trying to make a living off their business. So think one, it's like really, ⁓ Dre: Hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Brylan Donaldson: building that trust and understanding like, that's what we're selling. Right. And so I think early on when we were launching markets, it was a lot of like over-promising versus like now that we've launched, well, we're in 16 markets now. So we have really good data to like really speak to like how demand will drop, like grow over time. So the sales pitch is a lot, a lot easier, I would say. And then the other thing too, it's like, once you kind of get the relationship with the hospitality group, I think before I used to try to go after all of Dre: Mm. Brylan Donaldson: like their properties under, under their brand versus like now I take a crawl, walk, run approach where I know if I get it right with one bet, they got the trust to get it, you know, for everyone else. so yeah, literally bro, literally bro. It's, I think what we've been doing now is before it used to be like, we would set a launch date and the launch date would be in like two weeks. It'd be like, Hey, we're trying to launch body end of the month. Dre: Mm. Brylan Donaldson: Don't get me wrong. That was good at that stage of the company because it really did like push you to be like, can you really make that shit happen? and we made it happen, but now we're giving ourselves a lot more time to like go in there, almost like similar to Waymo, I would say go in there, build relationships. That way it's a solid foundation when we do launch and you know, things kind of like maintain itself. But yeah, those are some of the things we're doing, Dre: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah, that's dope. I'm always interested in how these in real life businesses kind of are formed and how they kind of really look on the inside. Because I've been seeing more and more about your company being talked about in different social circles here in Houston, is really interesting. So you guys are definitely hitting the. ⁓ Brylan Donaldson: Yeah. We launch in two weeks in Houston. Dre: Yeah, okay. Okay. I'm about to say y'all must be seeing the market because I'm like, I've been hearing the chatter here and there and I'm like, ⁓ shit, okay. Something must be happening. So that's what's up, man. That's dope to hear, Brylan Donaldson: Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Nah, it's definitely a learning experience, but I think, know, yeah, like I would say, I mean, I do think some of the things we're able to do now, we weren't capable of doing them or they might not have ⁓ as well. Like when we were still at that stage of a company, I would even say like eight months ago, where now I think, yeah, we can really lean into the data. And so like when we have the data plus the brand, literally almost sells itself over time. ⁓ Dre: Yeah. Dope, dope. Okay, okay. All right, well, we want to take it to you guys. We got a plate full of stuff. Rodney: Yeah, we got a handful of stuff. Brylan Donaldson: Well, Start with the plate. Start with the plate. mean, mean, the fact that, you know, your health, you, you, you a young cat, you a young cat. Rodney: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, we seen that. You seen that. It was unbelievable. I couldn't believe that. was like, Dre's not been doing nothing that I've been doing, but he's about five years biologically younger than I am. And I thought I was the youngest. I definitely thought that, but I was wrong. Dre: ⁓ that's I feel younger every day, That's funny. Man. Brylan Donaldson: ⁓ no! Dre: It's crazy. That's funny. That's funny. So yeah, so to catch everybody up, I actually, I heard about, like I mentioned on the last part, I heard about Function Health a long, a long time ago and I had meant to like sign up, but just recently it came back onto my radar again, probably Like a week ago, maybe like a week and a half ago. I immediately moved on and I'm like, you know what? I'm not even gonna think about this again. Let me go ahead and sign up, become a member. And for those who didn't listen to the last part, essentially Function Health is a blood testing company that allows you to essentially schedule an appointment. You can go give a bunch of blood. It's actually interesting, because when I went through the process, I started thinking about Theranos and I was like, fuck, has she been right? I was like, has she been right? It would have been, I mean, this would have been like the most transformative idea because Rodney: ⁓ it'd be crazy. That'd be insane. Brylan Donaldson: Mm. Dre: had to give a lot of blood. Now, normally I'm a person who does blood panels annually. So I go to my primary care doctor and normally annually I do a set of blood tests, but I've never done anything this in depth. So Function Health at a baseline, I believe they check about 160 different biomarkers. And so they have to take a lot and you can do additional add-ons. And I think I did do some add-on tests in addition to just what they provide on a basic level, they take a lot of blood. And at one point I was like, damn, you still going? Rodney: Yes. Yeah. Dre: Like it was just bow at the bow at the I'm like damn like and you feel it too because obviously you literally give him blood. So after a while you like fuck I started feeling a little tired. I'm like damn and I'm like man if Brylan Donaldson: What was the process leading up to it? did you have to, how did you prepare for that? Dre: was it was super simple and I like the way to function health handled it from a product standpoint So you go in you kind of answer some questions on onboarding. I think you can upload some of your Previous medical history and results and stuff like that as well And then basically you can schedule they use quest diagnostics, which I believe is like one of the largest Diagnostic companies ⁓ in at least Like if you had to do any, you know ⁓ blood work a job or anything like that most likely double quest diagnostic So I just immediately went in and had a bunch of availability and leading up to the appointment, they sent me a text and an email kind of just telling me like, know, fast, this many hours before, drink this much water. It was pretty straightforward, very simple steps to follow. Nothing, nothing crazy. sure that varies by ⁓ tests that you may be doing, but for me, was pretty simple. And then I just went straight in. I didn't even have a wait, put my information into a tablet. went in the back and then started the blood work. she, again, like, I'm not even, I'm not lying. Like it was a shit ton of blood. ⁓ and then immediately, I think maybe like an hour or two after doing it, I started seeing results in the function portal. So if you log into the function portal, they said normally takes about four weeks to get all your results back. But I guess as tests are coming back, they immediately started giving you some insight into the tests that are actually coming. And then maybe like three days after getting the results, I still haven't gotten all of my results yet. I'm still waiting for all of them before I kind of go through, peel through it and review with my primary care doctor. But one of the things that you kind of get is a biological age. And I was shocked when my shit came back. My shit came back at 22, 22 years old. So basically I'm nine, it said I'm nine years younger than my calendar age, which I was pretty shocked by. but there was also some other things on there too, that was out of range that I had no idea there was even a thing specifically around heart. Right. And if you know, you know, I'm not, I'm not incredibly versed on the true stats, but I do understand that black men struggle deeply with heart disease and heart attacks. Right. And we struggle a lot with just heart ⁓ complications and cardiovascular issues. And so I'm glad that I was able to find some of these out of range biomarkers, because you know what the hell I'm about to do? I'm about to go through every single one with a level of intensity and scrutiny looking at what can I do? Brylan Donaldson: Yeah. Rodney: Yeah. Dre: To move the needle in the other direction and so then now when I go and I do this this these series of tests again Because part of the membership is I think you could do twice a year I'll be able to see if there's actual any improvements alongside recommendations from my doctor So I'm really excited to just have access to all this information. I was so excited I got my wife on it as well And I'm even thinking about like gifting this to like some folks in my family like my sister and my mom and some other people in my family Because I know not like keeping up with it with their blood work at the level that they should. So I highly recommend anybody out there definitely look at Function Health. And if it's not Function Health, just get in control of your health, starting with your blood work and making sure you understand like what's really going on there. So yeah, that's been my experience so far. So still waiting for the rest of it, but so far so good. Brylan Donaldson: I got a question for you, Rodney. I mean, yeah, you're kind of the expert or becoming the expert in this space. How does one, after getting blood drawn, the tests are taken, how does it come up with your biological age? How does all that work? How does it go from blood to signal? Rodney: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Typically, it's on, so ⁓ company might do it differently. We actually, at LoopWay, that's not something that we do, probably because we're like really, really, we try to be as close as possible to evidence-based. Although I do think the biological age is a really good ⁓ feature. There's some type of calculation based on some core biomarkers. ⁓ Brylan Donaldson: What's a biomarker? Rodney: Well, biomarkers are just levels and these metrics inside of your ⁓ like your hormones, your cholesterol, your insulin ranges, all different things, ⁓ your they track, put a to ⁓ the health of organs basically. And these things affect every single day. And so, you know, and... My hope for Dre is that his biological age continues to stay the same as more of the results come in, hopefully it stays at that low age as more of your results come in, because the calculation is based on your results. But that's what is based on, it's just based on all your different results. And either though, ⁓ the thing that I love just hearing is just that, and this is typically what happens when people start investing in this type of ⁓ this type of testing because, know, function and, and, know, superpower, et cetera. They've made blood working, sorry, blood work more, popular and they're driving marketing around it. And it's getting people into this. ⁓ ⁓ know, blueprint. Yeah, we have biomarkers and that is the product that, you know, I work on product that we're, putting out general to the general public. but that's not Blueprint's main ⁓ product. It's a part of our whole suite, like the apple of health and wellness. So that's a part of our piece. We're like Apple Notes. And maybe we're not Notion, but we're Apple Notes in that category. But. What I see with people is that it's just amazing. I love seeing this because even people who are brand new, even work on these type of products and some of these people who work on function, super power, blueprint, you name it, they've never done blunt work. And then when they do it, they have a similar reaction to drag where you have this whole list of biomarkers. over 100. Actually, in fact, ⁓ was a lawsuit. where a function sued super power recently, was a couple within the last couple of days around March 15, March 16, where they sued super power for claiming they tested more biomarkers than they actually did. So this is actually getting kind of serious because they don't want people to be misled about the amount of things that are being tracked for the price point, essentially. And But anyways, the response that people have when they go in, yeah, number one, like the blood, right? People are shocked by how much blood it is. Really what it is is that it's a lot of vials. It's in reality, it's like a small cup of blood, but it will feel, especially when you're watching it, when you're watching it and each time... ⁓ Dre: Yeah. Yeah. And I heard that shit too. was like, it's like an oil well and that shit was gushing on like, shit. Yeah. Rodney: Ahahaha! Right and and Hopefully everybody and I know we tried to do this at Blueprint is be really upfront about how much blood is going to be Because people are usually not used to doing that because when a doctor typically takes your blood test, they're not really Trying to test as much biomarkers as function or blueprint etc. So that's interesting But what I see happening is like this natural inclination to focus on the things that are out of range. Unless you are in your early 20s, if you're in your 30s, I guarantee you, you have at least one thing that's out of range. At least one. Now, if you don't, then more power to you. That's an awesome place to be. But most people are going to have one, two, maybe three, one to three things that are out of range. that triggers something in people. Dre: Mm-hmm. Rodney: The next thing they're starting doing is they start looking up that specific biomarker. Let's say it's cholesterol, which is related to your health. could be HDL or LDL. It could be below range or above range. And so then you, usually in these platforms, they'll tell you what that means, what it's connected to. And then people start going in the rabbit hole. start researching and then people start saying, okay, you know, do I need to do exercise? Do I need to eat less of this food? Do I need to buy this supplement? And it just creates this like this, it pulls people into this, this, this health and wellness world in this longevity world. And that's what I love to see. And I just love to see it. I honestly can't believe it. It's coming from somebody who I always ⁓ interested this stuff. I did my first blood test well before function blueprint or anybody existed, maybe 10 years ago. It just out of curiosity, just to understand what was going on in my body. And Dre: Mm-hmm. Rodney: And I never really spoke on it because nobody was ever interested in it. And I just didn't see, and it was was kind of weird. It was kind of like, I couldn't really explain why I wanted to do it. was ⁓ years ago, ⁓ like, ⁓ yeah, guys, I just got all my blood drawn and trying to explain it. I just didn't have a good reason to explain that. ⁓ Dre: Yeah. think what's interesting about Function Health is for me, because similar to you, I normally get my blood work every year. And I was shocked to hear, like, with Nia, my wife, she wasn't getting her blood work every year, which was crazy to me. like, wait a minute. I'm like, wait, that. That's what's just why I'm like, no, you got to get this. I'm like, you got to check your shit at least once a year. Now, I'm about to start doing mine twice a year, but I'm like, at least once a year. But the problem is, I think, yes, you get your blood work for me, but the problem is how that information was presented. Rodney: Yes. ⁓ wow. Yes. Dre: And then like what actual tests were being done. And then I think where function takes it to another level ⁓ these things called protocols, right? Which I think is quite interesting, right? Which is taking your data, right? And then building a set of steps for you to actually figure out, okay, what action should I take to improve these things in the first place, right? What are actual dietary steps that I should take? Because a lot of times, unfortunately, a lot of doctors, they don't really have the specialties to really even offer that advice. Rodney: Mm-hmm. Dre: Sometimes you got to get referrals to a dietician or a nutritionist, somebody else to give it to you. And then it's like, OK, well, then what fitness work, what can I do fitness wise? And then you might have to go to a trainer. You might have to go to these different people. And what I think was interesting, what functioned, least in my early experience, is they try to consolidate a lot of that information. First of all, making it easy for you to interpret what your actual results are and what are you even actually testing for. Because a lot of times when you go to a doc and you're like, I just need blood work. It's really up to the discretion of the doctor to even order the blood work to be done. You can say, I want to check for cancer. I want to check for this, but that's a really broad thing, right? You don't know, oh, I want to check this particular biomarker in the kidney. And maybe some people do who are really involved in that, but I feel like the average person is not going into the doctor to doing it. At least I had never done that before. so function at least have given me a framework to how to even think about my biomarkers, how to even think about my blood work. So that from this day forward, when I even talked to a doctor concerning my blood work, Rodney: Yeah. Dre: the conversation is about to be totally different. We're not even about to talk generically anymore. We're going to get real specific now because now I got the framework. Now I got the framework and the protocols to even back into it. So I think it changes how you even see it. So again, I'm just highlighting the beauty of the product of Function. Is it like, yes, the tests have been around for a long time, hundreds of years for people to test blood work. But I think the way that information is presented to people has been through a very opaque way of thinking about it. Rodney: Yes. Hahaha Yeah. Dre: You just get a notification, did your blood work was good? And they're like, yep, you're good. You ain't got no cancer. And you just kind of keep it pushing. And I think function pushes you to ask another level of questioning. At least I wasn't asking before. So yeah. Rodney: Yeah. It's streamline, it's streamlines, it streamsline the experience. Like for me personally, I've never, no doctor was ever able to give me a blood work that I was satisfied with. So anytime in the past that I ever had blood work that I was satisfied with, I had to go through private channels. And some of these channels still exist. Like, there's requestatest.com, private MD labs, et cetera, and those things, but you have to know how to build the test. You have to. Dre: Mm-hmm. Rodney: or you have to, they're like, they have all these different panels. So you have to kind of like, you know, for example, you could just select like mail panel and you just assume, know, and it gives you a lot of stuff, but it's not like these new companies where what we're doing is not just like private MD labs. We're not like your doctor. We're not like requestatest.com where see those sites were better than the doctors. Cause I think the doctors are always trying to manage. So they're either trying to gatekeep. So, okay, do you need this or do you not need this? And they're thinking about a bunch of different things. could be insurance. could be maybe they just don't want you to, they don't want you to be like, why do you need so much blood? And they don't want to deal with that and all things. then ⁓ like said, they're kind of just, you ask them a question. They're just like, ⁓ yeah, you're good. ⁓ Nothing But you didn't, and you know what's actually interesting though? Dre: Mm. Rodney: A lot of doctors are not trained to really actually interpret these biomarkers. So it's actually interesting when you think about it that ⁓ people that you kind of trust to kind of hear this information ⁓ not ⁓ informed in all this stuff, especially even like the general doctors. And so I think what ⁓ market has done well with function, superpower, and blueprint. Dre: Right. Rodney: is basically simplified this to where you go the blood, you get drawn. then because I used to have this thing where I would, okay, I had the more advanced panels and I had the PDFs and had all the values I had to buy, my biomarkers, but then I had to do all this extra research. And it was just a bunch of numbers, know, out of range, in range, whatever, below range, whatever. And I had to do extra research, but these platforms, the... what things mean are right next to each, each one. So this is going to change everything. And doctors are going to have a lot to deal with. They already have to deal with this AI wave where people are coming in with AI, you know, informed with AI. And now they have to kind of deal with that. But then they're going to have to now they're also having to deal with, know, so I like it because that's making doctors actually have to work for the money that they're charging, you know, us for, and the insurance companies for smart. Dre: 100%. Rodney: you know what, if if a patient comes in informed, and my guess is this, this idea of user healthcare going increase. This is something that was talked about on this week in startups by Jason Calacanis himself, but this ⁓ idea of user driven is going to be something that's going to ⁓ really, really And it's basically just putting the power of people's health their own hands as opposed to being managed by somebody else. Dre: 100 % bro. bro, one of the first things I'm gonna do bro, like shit I get a big ⁓ of bread and I want a private doctor like I want I want to lean fully into private medicine because to your point bro, the industry has been managed by insurance companies I used to work at I remember I interned at Blue Cross and Blue Shield and so I had a little bit of insight into this back, you a decade ago when I was interning there like it's all about risk management inside it's not about patient care. That's not what it's about. Rodney: Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Dre: It's a business that is purely built on managing risk. mean, that is the business. The business is to underwrite risk and to push and pull certain levers to minimize business impact and loss. I mean, that's the nature of the business, right? And the effects of that is patient health. so, yeah, I 100 % look forward to the future where it is more patient driven because today it's not that way. Insurance companies literally will deny Rodney: ⁓ you saw it. Yeah, you saw that. Dre: some of the blood work that function health provides, they'll literally deny it because they just don't want to cover it. Because they're like, well, why do you need to know that? You know what I'm saying? Why do you need that test? Why do need that? Rodney: ⁓ that's all that kills that kills me so much I'll play this To some extent give insurance a little bit of a pass not really because I think that they should be covering these baseline tests They be covering baseline I'll give them a pass but one thing I know one thing that really boils like this really bothers me a lot is when doctors say that if I have the money Just order Like, if I have the money, just order it. Don't worry about why I need to see what's going on in my body. Like, that's the craziest thing. Like, don't worry about trying to manage why I need to know what's going on inside of my body. I have the right to know what's going on inside of my body. Regardless, I don't need to provide a reason to know what's going on inside of my own body. Brylan Donaldson: You Rodney: That's insane. whether or not it's covered by insurance, that's another topic. But there is a lot of customers that we've had, other people have had that have spoken to this where doctors will outright reject. You know what? don't know. No, you don't need that. No, there's... Dre: 100%. I've had a doctor tell me that before. I wanted to get, which I'm actually gonna do it through Function Health, because they provide scans. We talked a lot about blood work, but they also provide scans. So if you wanna get a scan of your brain, if you wanna get a lung scan, a heart scan, you can go through a different company, you can get these different scans. I remember asking my doctor if I can get a scan of my heart, and he was like, well, ⁓ normally don't. He gave me all these reasons, and I'm just like. Rodney: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Hahaha Dre: bro, I don't want to go through hoops and hurdles. I want the fucking scan. It's that simple. I want the scan. I feel like I need to scan and I just want the scan. You know, like, why do I got to jump through all these hurdles to get a scan? You know, like it shouldn't even be like that. But unfortunately, that's just the way that it is. And, you know, the medical system wants people to come after they already have a problem. It's too fucking late at that point. I'm already dying. I'm already dying. Now you want me to actually help? Rodney: Yeah, I had the bread. Yeah. It's the worst. That's the worst. That's the worst. Yeah. Well, it's profitable at that point. It's profitable to have at that point. Yeah. They do want you to ask. They do want you to ask at that point because now you need them. Brylan Donaldson: What? Dre: Like, it sucks, but like we, but we all know that it's like that. Exactly. It's horrible. Brylan Donaldson: So let me ask this question to y'all. Cause if I'm just being transparent, I have not got a blood test done. I am very compelled based off of this information, but I'm not going to sit here and act like not, ⁓ it's actually weird because it's not necessarily the blood piece that I think is giving me anxiety. It's one of those things of like, What might I figure out? Am I ready to figure that out? Dre: ⁓ yeah, ⁓ yeah. ⁓ Rodney: It's empowering though. It's actually empowering though. It's actually empowering. You'd be surprised. It's more empowering. Brylan Donaldson: You know you- Yeah. It's so, it's, it's so the question I want to throw at y'all is like, mean, Is this, is this something, yeah. Is this, is this kind of frame of mind ⁓ relation to like having this type of like insight and control over your health, something you saw in your household kind of like growing up or was there a switch for you that then led to kind of like this lens you now kind of have like on your health and you know, and you're saying straight like. Dre: for sure. Brylan Donaldson: You already said it. You got your wife on it. You about to get the whole family on it. Like, yeah. What's been that kind of journey? Rodney: Yeah. Dre: Bro, honestly, what it comes down to is, the reality of just life. Like we're not getting younger. You know what I'm saying? And so it's more important today to get some of these things in check than ⁓ look up 20 years from now and now you're trying to work your way backwards to figure out what could you have done. Right? So we're at that point where it's just like, it's just more important than it's ever been. It's always been important. But I would argue, at least for me, it's more important. And then the second thing too, bro, is just like thinking about longevity for me. Like I'm really, to tackle some super ambitious stuff, in terms of my career. I'm doing some, you know, I'm trying to have children. I want to be around as long as I possibly can for them. ⁓ and so for me, I'm just, I'm focused on longevity. You know what I'm saying? So, ⁓ and the other thing too, I'm like, my mindset is like, if you have the money, which I do have the money to invest in my health, to do these things, why not? What else am I going to spend the money on? You know I'm saying? Like if I'm not going to spend it on my health, if I'm not going to spend it on my family and bettering my family, then what's the point in me working so hard? What's the point in me earning this money? What's the point in me building this wealth and doing all this stuff if I'm not going to actually put it back into myself? And so I kind of feel like I just owe it to myself and I owe it to my household. I owe it to my family to invest what I can into making sure we live the best, healthiest lives that we possibly can. And so that's just kind of where I'm at with it. Rodney: And that's an incredible mindset and that will ultimately will improve the quality of life of yourself and everybody around you. And a huge, that's thing that we at Blueprint to be like, almost like the default of how people feel. Because right now not the status quo. the status quo is a little bit more reactive. The status quo is a little bit more, you know, wait and see. The status quo is like, you know, I kind of, just more lackadaisical. And think we want people to want to live to 100. We want people ⁓ and to think, and when they hear that, not to think that they're going to be walking around. crippled and with their back, you know, know fucked up and like no not like that but more so healthy and biologically healthy, you know, and they've done what they could There's all these different things and we're at a time and we're at a time right now where Where AI and whatnot is going to take the scientific advancements to a whole other level. So people will be surprised, even Jamie Dimon himself from a JP Morgan was like, a lot of the people our age don't realize like, a lot of you guys, or to all these scientific advancements, if you're 20 years old right now, you might live to 120. Like this is not gonna be like your and your parents that you see right now, they're getting like. Dre: Mm-hmm. Rodney: It's not going to be that. It's not going to be that. that's not obvious to everybody. And so when you realize that, you might think, let me take care of myself now so I can have a longer, better... So this a great topic. ⁓ I love continue to always tie into this. But speaking of AI, speaking of real world, let's talk about atoms. Brylan Donaldson: Yeah. ⁓ Rodney: Travis Kalanick is back in the game. And let me just read his story real quick, real quick. Cause I think this is a master class in painting a vision. He's used some tricks that I've used in the past. So here it goes. He has a vision statement on the Adams site, adams.co. I left Uber in 2017, heartbroken. Dre: ⁓ yeah. Rodney: I had been torn away from an idea and a movement that I poured my life into. I had lost my bearings as I found the world increasingly operating by the rules of perception, not reality. It was only days after the death of my mother and the near death of my father in a bony accident when an investor decided to come out from the shadows and exploit this vulnerable moment to wrestle control of this idea away. I bled, but I did not perish. I got back up fought my way back into the arena, back to my calling, back to building. Digitizing the physical world is my life's work. After Uber, I started building city storage systems. The obscure name was a nod to ⁓ computation with a focus on real estate. Our first computer was a food computer. Digitized manufacturing. Real estate. and logistics for food. Today we expand our physical computation portfolio to the mining and transport industries and rename the company Adams. Brylan Donaldson: Hold up, hold up, hold up, hold up, up, hold up, hold up, because people really, you, for the listeners, if you have not went and read the full site, is genuinely genius. I'm not going to lie. Like he ain't losing this one. He ain't losing this one for sure. But I think the thing that really resonated with me was down here at the beginning, the last paragraph. Rodney: Yeah. Brylan Donaldson: My dude said, I'm back. I often get the question from entrepreneurs or executives, what should I do next? My answer has always been become deeply self-aware and when the right thing comes, you will know it. If you know yourself, your next thing, your new idea, your work soulmate will reveal itself. When I told my friends, family and colleagues about my plans for what was next, they were really excited that I was coming back. The thing is I never left. You talk about a fucking mic drop? Rodney: Yeah, yeah. Yes. Yeah. Dre: He even operating in the shadows for a while. Brylan Donaldson: He's been in the shadows for real. Dre: No, for real, for real, real. super excited to see what he does, man. He's one of my favorite founders that I think personally just embodies the core essence of what it really takes to be a successful startup founder, but also just a successful entrepreneur. The ability to to persist through pain. And I think oftentimes, like Elon has often looked at Brylan Donaldson: Yeah. Dre: is a gold standard of that, which I do think Elon certainly exemplifies ⁓ ⁓ better than anyone. But I do think Travis Kalanick is another founder who most people may not be as familiar with because he hasn't really been in the shadows, but really been in the light the last couple of years. And at one point he was and then he kind of went away. And if you're not really in the tech, then you probably really don't know who he is. But I just think about like as an entrepreneur, just what it takes to succeed, what it takes to win, whatever winning is defined by for yourself. I think Travis Kalanick embodies every single attribute of that on 10. So I get inspired with his story. I get inspired listening to him. And I'm just excited about what he does again, because it seemed like everything he's worked on has been somewhat transformable. So I'm excited to see what he does with this next chapter. Brylan Donaldson: Yeah. I honestly, man, like, I mean, we were, were talking about this in the group chat, around like Waymo, but I don't like if, if, a listener, if you do know the early days of Uber and how they went about literally wielding world to take shape around the vision that they had. Rodney: Yeah. Brylan Donaldson: Like they didn't ask that you talk about ask for permission later. This was like the true definition of asking permission later. And like, I think one of the things I really like respect about him is, you know, now being in a space where, you know, it is physical things in the world that, you know, I'm engaging with like on a daily basis. It is one of the most interesting things because it's so humans are so variable. Like We're predictable in some ways, but humans are so variable. And I think about like this Uber challenge man. I mean, to get to the scale that which he did, bruh. Dre: Go read the book for those who out there who really want to get a good sense of it. And honestly, there's a lot of books out there, but I think one book that kind of really gives a really good insight into how Uber was built is a book by Mike Isaac called Pumped. I highly it. I've read it like two or three times, honestly. It's just a good listen. It's a good audio book listen. Really, really fascinating the tactics that Uber had to do overcoming city regulation. Rodney: Yeah, that was crazy. That's crazy. Dre: Overcoming the taxi commissions overcoming investors the story of his his mom passing his dad almost dying I mean like literally it goes through the incredible timeline just building uber to rise fall again and hopefully there's a chapter ⁓ chapter two of traveling a Travis's journey with Adams because I think he did certainly deserves it But yeah super pumped by Michael Isaac ⁓ recommend it. I think it's an incredible book Rodney: I read nine or nine years ago, I read super pumped while we were living in Berkeley, California. And it was, it inspired me. It changed how I approach things. It changed how I looked at startups. And it gave me a backend to how things kind of unfolded with Uber and For me to work at Bird later, it wasn't Uber, but because so many people were from Uber, ⁓ kind of felt like ⁓ felt Travis's influence in lot of ways. I just saw how those people worked and how they came in. ⁓ it definitely changed how I looked at work as well. And in general, yeah, I think Travis is a great founder. And it sounds like he has, you know, something to, not necessarily something to prove, maybe a little bit, but just to point out some of the couple of things that stood out to me as far as ⁓ storytelling things is that I think just to point out real quick is when somebody starts with a date, they know how to tell a story. Stories are really good when you start out with a date. One of the reasons why is because they anchor a timeline in people's mind. So that's one thing. Another thing that he did really good, which I didn't, which I always thought was genius was he started off with vulnerability immediately. So it was like, I was heartbroken. So he didn't try to dance around it. He didn't try to say like, you know, I was like, I left the company and kind of like with no, with no heart in it. He started off saying, no, I was heartbroken. No, I was broken. You know, like, you know, I was taken advantage of, I was exploited. I was in a vulnerable place. talking about hard stuff like that and, know, things that we know, but it's just being, putting it out there like that. I think it pulls people into the vision that he's, you know, ultimately, you know, I could tell he spent a lot of time because you can see how even in the vision state is ⁓ only, very So he reduced things now. And I just wanted to bring that up to anybody who Definitely founders, but even if you're not a founder listening, those are some of stories that I found in my own personal journey that helped me as far as, especially with raising money, just being able to anchor timeline, being able to set a date, being able to be very, very concise were all things that helped me raise millions dollars basically. that, ⁓ I saw do that. was like, that's a nod to that. So guess there's so many things we could talk about with his Adams company. So things, I guess. ⁓ Dre: Do we have a sense of exactly what he's doing? So know before he announced his day, the company was called City Storage Systems, I believe. And they were essentially building ghost kitchens, right, and building the robots, essentially building a fleet of robots to produce food inside these kitchens. They might have expanded beyond that, but I know that was at least my understanding of it. I don't know if you share more about like exactly what they're going to be building or is it still to be determined yet? Rodney: Yes, did. He did. So there's two things. Adams mining, which is helping ⁓ mining, know, probably Rare Earths, if I had to guess, that's probably him saying, okay, I see AI, I see this demand for Rare Earths, I see that we have a dependency on China, I see all that, well, we've already built a, you know, a robot, food computer, we can build one for the Earth. So I think that's what he's saying with that one. And then the second one is Adam's transport, which is basically a nod to Uber, which is basically probably his way of getting back into that autonomous, you know, vehicle, you know, potentially right. It's not just ride sharing and thinking this, he's saying transport. So he's giving himself room there. So it could be ride sharing, but it could also just be all the other forms of transport as well. ⁓ Dre: What if he buys uber back? What if he does a reverse a reverse merger and like takes uber private? That'd be crazy Rodney: You transport? He flasks, he flasks too. He probably flasks too. I think he plays too. I think he plays too. Brylan Donaldson: Well, I want to, I want to add a very important piece here because, you know, earlier, you know, when we were just talking about him in general, uh, as an entrepreneur, you know, we alluded to like, you know, him genuinely being on the caliber of like an Elon Musk, if we're going to keep it a stack when it comes to the physical world. But I think, um, you know, if you think about what Elon is seeking to do in that robotic space, he's going for the general purpose humanoid. approach. And I think the thing you have to call out with Travis's bet is he's on the other end of the spectrum and going specialized like robotics in general. And for someone who, how long has he been operating like the cloud kitchens? It's been a minute. Yeah. So he's, he's had eight years of real world experience, like real world experience. Dre: Mm-hmm. Rodney: I think eight years. Brylan Donaldson: Operating these kitchens. I think it's very telling that he's choosing not to build a humanoid robot I think the fact that he is doubling down Like the fact that environments require very specific type of you know, like physical robotic to be able to achieve that is Probably worth like paying attention to across many adjacent spaces Dre: Yeah, I think one of the, mean, that's a good point to highlight. I will suspect that one of the reasons beyond just like the technical limitations, I mean, let's just be honest, there's just a significant amount of money there, right? At least in the food space, right? A lot of the costs associated to the food industry. mean, food restaurants alone in this country is almost a trillion dollar market, just restaurants. If you look at groceries, groceries is another almost trillion dollars in spend. So you're talking about almost $2 trillion just there. But if we're just talking about restaurants, about a trillion dollars, a good chunk of the capex for a restaurant is labor, right? So I think the opportunity that he sees, again, beyond the technical side of it, is, I mean, that's a lot of margin to capture, right? It's like, if you can automate that, if you can get things more efficient, then there's significant cost economics, like there's just an economic advantage there, right? And I think he sees the same thing on the transport side. And I think he sees the same thing on the mining side as well. while there probably is some decisions at a technical level, probably him to maybe dive into some of these niches. I think really zooming out, there's a business case for why these things make sense. And I think he knows that. And I think in order to really compete, you've got to have a business case to make sense. Whereas in case of Tesla, not to say they don't have that, they have the to experiment in a different way. So I don't know, I'm just speculating here, have no idea, but I would just say he's choosing these pockets that these are high profit pools, right? If you're able to automate and get these things right, right? Brylan Donaldson: I think other thing that I would add too, because I do ⁓ I mean, yeah, there's the technical aspect. You just hit on the economics aspect. The thing that I would be curious about is like the operational aspect of these, right? So if we think about, you know, is, know, being done with food, what's being done, you know, with mining, what is even being done with like transport. If we're going to be honest, many of those are like, they're very process oriented. Like, and so the thing that I'm almost kind of curious about is like, operational advantages does that create? Right? What learnings ⁓ he take from one part of the business and now be able to apply operationally to another? Cause even the fact that like he intentionally said in terms of the transport business, he's going after robotics, like fleet management for robotics and autonomous vehicles. Like that is, that is, that is very interesting, especially given like, yes, Waymo is at a certain scale, which I think it still blows people's minds, but where we know all of that will be probably here within, shoot the next, you know, three to five years. Rodney: Yeah. Yeah. Brylan Donaldson: is very intriguing. And so, yeah, I think you bring up a really good point, because I hadn't even really thought about the margin opportunity there. Rodney: I'm loving all this. I'm loving the celebration. In fact, it's making me celebrate in my own life much, much faster. I'm just trying to run into the future, embrace the future. I already see that almost every city, almost every major city by this time next year will have in them. ⁓ every major city will have them. Some even, they might even have, do some suburbs. Brylan Donaldson: Yeah. Rodney: by this time next year. Bradley even mentioned that Zuc is, Zuc's the, there's another competitor that they're in Atlanta testing. Waymo's testing right now in downtown Detroit. It's, this is not, this is not some five, this is not no five year thing. This is, the future is here. It's here today. Brylan Donaldson: Hold up, hold up, hold up, hold up. Yeah, bro, like, man, like, mind you. So I got into Atlanta today. I've taken, I've done the Waymo experience in San Francisco. And I remember when I was there, you literally could not go a block without seeing probably like four or five Waymos all at the intersection at once. That is how it is here in Atlanta. Rodney: Yeah, yeah. Jeez. Dre: Well. Brylan Donaldson: Like genuinely bro, like I was in multiple, I was in Midtown, West Midtown, Buckhead. Kid you not bro. Each, each time there were multiple, it was either Zooks or Waymo. And so like that actually surprised me with. Rodney: Cheers. This is gonna transform everything. Like, it's not clicking. I don't think it's clicking. I don't think it's clicking. Dre: It's going to click soon because Uber just announced, I just saw a video on Bloomberg actually. Uber was just, they just did a joint interview with the Zucs CEO, which is a woman of color by the way. So shout out to her. and Uber, just formed a partnership where essentially Zucs is going to be using the Uber platform as well as they're going to have their own direct to consumer platform. Rodney: I Brylan Donaldson: you Dre: Probably a business platform as well where companies can ship like door-dash could probably use them to ship Orders and forth between restaurants and customers, but they will be adding this to uber and so folks to use uber as their prime dominant ride-share platform Eventually, it's just in way and I know in Austin Waymo has a partnership with ⁓ uber well So it seemed like from a distribution. We I mean we talk a lot about distribution here on this podcast my distribution standpoint it seemed like a lot of these self-driving car companies are starting to partner with existing platforms. They are already in the hands of consumers. And so if you don't know about these things that are coming, you soon will, because we know that Uber is ubiquitous in the US, always Lyft, but Uber is everywhere. And so as people start opening their Uber apps to go to the airport, like I'm about to do tomorrow, eventually you're going to start seeing some new ride options that you've never seen before. And so I think it's coming for sure. Rodney: Yes. Dre: you know, by the way, to get in these partnerships with Uber and some of the other partnerships that I know are going to be coming soon. Rodney: It's insane. And when people ride them, especially people who are in this industry who have built tech, even if you're not, but especially if you are in it, you will start seeing the future. You'll start seeing the future. And we can go so long on this, but we do have, I think we have time for one more. I think we have time for one more. Let's do one more. well, okay. Brylan Donaldson: Facts. Dre: Yeah, let's do it. Let's do it, let's do it. Rodney: I think that we'll table, we had a handful of topics for everybody, but we're gonna table one of the ones that Dre and Brian are really passionate about, because there's not enough time. We're gonna table that one. We're gonna table that one, because that was gonna be like, I wanna give y'all 40, 30, like 30 minutes to like. Brylan Donaldson: you Dre: ⁓ that was the one I really wanted to go into. was waiting on that one. Brylan Donaldson: You We're going to have new information by then. Dre: Oh, for sure. So that's all good. Rodney: Maybe we should start. Yeah, on the next podcast, we'll start with that topic. I won't tell everybody what it is. We'll start with that topic. Just so the knows, it's going to be about 40 minutes. And I'm not going to even say much. It's and Brylon that's ⁓ to speak on that. I'll to get a little bit of information to try to ⁓ chime Brylan Donaldson: Yeah. Dre: for sure. you Rodney: One that's a little bit for time that we have is ⁓ There's few things going on with meta, actually. One thing I just wanted to bring up that I didn't bring up to the guys is that one, the meta glasses concern, privacy concerns are starting to pop up, lawsuits, et cetera. So that's a very interesting one. And then another one is the super intelligence team or they call it, the AI team there is being restructured. There was a guy from Scale AI, Mr. Yang. He seems to ⁓ have position being changed. was the guy who replaced ⁓ top AI scientist called Jan. I think his last name is Lucian, ⁓ believe. And Lucian ⁓ actually and started a company called ⁓ AMI Advanced Machine Intelligence, in which case he's claiming the AI is based on real world and not LLMs. So essentially he's basically saying AGI or artificial general intelligence will not be achieved by predicting words. so ⁓ just laid out a couple of things, but the privacy, the AI changes, and then the X ⁓ because after he got demoted, he pretty much said, you know, fuck meta, I'm going to start my own thing. He raised almost, I think he raised a billion dollars to do it. so now he's working on that. And the guy that replaced him is getting seemingly demoted. So ⁓ that's frame there. Dre: BS on the privacy concern. mean, bro, everybody has a device in our pocket that has a camera and a microphone on it. It's like, we want to talk privacy, I feel like this conversation should have happened a decade ago, you know, or the upworn madness about this a decade ago. ⁓ get people's point, right? Like, you know, people can be recording you. ⁓ my argument to that is everybody already has a device that's capable of what meta glasses are doing. Rodney: Okay. Right. Mm-hmm. Dre: and have had this device in their pocket for a long time. You know what I'm saying? So if there's a privacy concern, I mean, I feel like we're past that point, in my opinion at least, in society. We've already accepted baseline of privacy by ⁓ these devices on us 24 seven that have GPS's, again, cameras, microphones, micro cameras on the front, on the back. I mean, you see people out in public like this with their phone all the time. You have no idea what the hell people doing on their screen. I got a privacy screen on my phone, so people can't even see my screen. Right? So like, know, and I'm just saying, so like, I don't know. I mean, I get it in theory what the concern is around the privacy, but my thing is like, we've already chosen to be okay with giving that right up. Otherwise, we have a phone in our. Rodney: Yeah, same, same. So there's that and there's also, so there's that, which I would lean with Dre. I think what people maybe just need to do is just pay more attention. There are glasses that exist that can record you. So just pay attention to your surroundings and they all have this light. Some of them, people are blocking that little light so they're recording in secret, but you can still obviously, I'm telling you these glasses, If you are a person that pays attention to your surroundings, you cannot miss them. Yeah, I'm sorry. You're going to see the camera in somebody's glasses. You know, you're going to see it. The second thing, though, in regards to the privacy was meta employees are being able to see some of the private videos that people are recording, which may have a little bit more validity there from what I'm seeing. Essentially, They're using some of this AI record, some of these recordings to like, guess, train AIs in some ways that Brylan Donaldson: We knew that was gonna happen. Dre: Yeah, yeah. Rodney: I mean, that's a meta move though. When say we, are you talking about us on the podcast or are you talking about the average consumer? Dre: think we've talked about this before, right? And we should be very clear. If you are using a third party software company, that is not your data, okay? When you sign up for a terms of service, it is clearly outlined that that data belongs to the company. Any data generated on that device, any data generated in that system belongs to the company. It is not your data. That is just baseline. So from that standpoint, people, it seemed like people just don't understand that. That's really what it is because if you understood that, then it's like, it's no upwork. It's like, okay, cool. If you use Apple products, even though they say, Hey, we don't use that. I guarantee you it's in the privacy policy or terms of service that they can use it. Now they may choose not to use it, but it's there, it is there to let you know that you don't own that data. And it's up to their discretion on how they want it to be used. Rodney: Ha ha ha. Dre: That's just baseline. And so anybody who thinks, this is my data, it's not your data. You're renting a device. You don't even own that shit. Rodney: Yes. Yeah. And to answer what Dre said, especially like, so one, 100%, if a company has not explicitly mentioned privacy, then you should just assume that all your information can be used. And then, but also to Dre's point about Apple, even if they have explicitly mentioned privacy, you want to be sure that you want to be sure that, ⁓ doesn't apply broadly. They like Apple doesn't, they may be privacy focused, but it's not broadly. For example, your iCloud may not be entirely protected. something happens in the case of, you know, case or whatever, et cetera, you ⁓ your is probably, but then for example, your iMessages, there's more of a technical standard, but that doesn't stop people from. getting your text messages, especially if maybe not from Apple, but would be able to get them from your phone carrier if it still went through your phone carrier. At the same time though, when a company explicitly states privacy, don't trust that either fully. you're technical, read the documents. Brylan Donaldson: facts. Rodney: If you're non-technical, ask somebody that you know that knows technology to read the documents and they will tell you if you enough. Now, or you could just also take the approach that I'm going to be watched, ⁓ I do. So whatever I do should be something that I do not care about being watched. And if this ever got exposed any reason, if it ever got leaked, somebody stole my device, et cetera. You want to think about it like that. I do understand that we live in a time where our computers are very personal. Our computers are very personal it is tricky to provide a lot of the things that all us want while also protecting privacy. that's a tricky aspect there. But. That's not the only concern Mena is having outside of the privacy. like clearly there's something going on with the AI stuff. Brylan Donaldson: Yeah, I feel like, because I mean, there was, we were talking about this earlier, there were the comments that recently popped up around, you know, what they had to regal work in their AI, with their AI super intelligence team, if I remember correctly. And there were their whole rumors around like Alexander Wang, who, you know, came over from Scale AI and the Aqua Hire. you know, and is now the chief AI officer, there were some. Dre: Thank Rodney: Yeah. Dre: You think you think you think Zuck tried the byclock? Yeah, no. He made an offer. I know he did. Because, you know, he's not afraid to throw you a bag. I mean, he's done it before. He's not afraid to spend money on acquisitions. If there's anybody to understand the strategic value of a good asset. Rodney: Probably. Dre: Yeah. Same, same, Rodney: Yeah. start. Don't start. Don't start. almost... Look. I was with you with the Madness part. I was with you with the Madness part, but you had to tell me. I knew, I was like, is he gonna mention perplexity? Cause I knew what they came out with. just, ⁓ just, ⁓ you just kept, because you know what? ⁓ say this every time. Brian Lynn has strong product taste. He has strong product taste. Brian likes great products, right? And know, Dre: You Thank you. you you Rodney: Perplexity Computer is, Perplexity itself is a great and beautifully designed product. Craftsmanship is on another level. But even before our break on the podcast, we had a long break on the podcast, was a podcast where ⁓ ⁓ about the Perplexity CEO. And anybody goes back to those podcasts, you will see that I was claiming that that CEO was distracted and didn't know what he was doing. And he was not going to end up in the commerce in the top conversation of LLMS and everything else. And what do you know? We don't talk about this guy. Now he just recently released perplexity computer. Dre: you Rodney: because it's becoming relevant in the ages and whatnot. So he's trying to get a little bit of, you know, relevancy there and trying to speed there. And maybe there's a little bit of statistics that Bronley quoted about what they're doing over there. Well, at the end of the day, let's be honest with this. Let's be honest. still on his head. I'm sorry. sometimes, I, on podcast, sometimes, I'll let y'all know I'm gonna shoot at some founders. And it's not personal. It's not personal. fact, when I was a founder, there was nobody harder on than me. And I can tell you this. also sometimes my hope is maybe one day when my clips gets to one of these guys and they see it, they probably won't receive it because you know, my tone, but if they see it and they actually can look past the tone, they can see that I want to help them. Look, you have a great product, great craftsmanship, great concept, but you're not gonna do anything. Nobody cares. Nobody cares. Brightling cares. Dre: Thank Rodney: But Brian is not enough. But Brian is not enough. You know I'm saying? know, Brian is not enough. They should have done it sooner. They should have been... Right, right, right, right! We're gonna take over Google, did I age well? Dre: Thank Rodney: Yo! that's what it was. Desperation, it was desperation, bro. I hate, hate, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. How are they gonna ride the how are they gonna ride the cloud bot hype? How are they gonna ride the cloud bot hype? They bought into the cloud bot hype to get to so that they can sell the company. Dre: Wait, is that. Is that? Is that out yet? Or is that, is that coming? Rodney: Drake, come on now. I know you see him when I'm seeing. Drake, come on now. And you be quiet on this. You see what I'm So they seen Claude, but they seen all those, you know, those people. Dre: me. Honestly, thought perplexity was dead, to be honest. I didn't even know that he was still around. But I have been hearing about this computer thing. I don't know much about it. I really don't know much about it. I don't. I thought they were dead. Rodney: Draping even credit, see, Dra, Dra, Dra. Okay, all right. Dre: I don't know much about it. I do use, I do use cowork though. So I will, I will take a look at it. I'll take a look at it. I do like cowork though. I do find, I do find some, some value there. And I'm bull, I'm bullish. I'm bullish on agents. I am very bullish on these agents. Whether or not perplexity has something here. I don't know, but I am bullish on these agents. So it seemed like the founder, didn't, he know how to ride waves. ⁓ know what I'm saying? He know how to ride waves. He the waves. ⁓ Rodney: You know, dress friendly. Dre is founder friendly. actually is an investor, but Dre is actually founder friendly. will not call, I'm trying to get Dre to call this shit for what it is. This is no different than what I was saying before. How, you were gonna, ⁓ gonna kill Google, you're gonna replace Google. You're gonna be able to, you're gonna, first that's what you're gonna do. Now see the Claude bot way. Dre: Okay. you Rodney: which was a fake wave is not a real wave. Agents are not useful enough. And there's also too many security vulnerabilities. You hop in and you buy Mac minis like the average random person on Twitter that bought five Mac minis and set it up. And then they had no tasks. like, ⁓ do you need ⁓ these Macs? Like how many tasks do you guys have? Like, like, like after you clear your ⁓ after you do all this stuff, how many tasks do you have? Even like I heard what jayka was saying on on this week in startups caught up in the hype ⁓ you because you got the money to be The what you'll know it's useful When people who don't got money are starting to consider whether it's worth it or when people have less money And start to consider whether or not it's worth it if this stuff is like buying a come on now Come on guys. But you know what? Look, give him a, well, I won't, but we'll give him a pass, you know, ⁓ you know, let him slide and maybe he pulls off something, but Manus did the right thing. They sold to Metta and Metta is going to try to do something with that. Just how they're doing with Multbook. We don't time to hop into the Multbook thing. We could probably tap into that on the next podcast. But guys, guys, I just. Dre: you For sure. Rodney: Bradley, you just had to bring, I'm sorry guys. ⁓ It's kind of like with the cloud thing. It's like, telling you, Dario is not gonna be number one and just not gonna be number one. He doesn't have what it takes. He's too nice of a guy. He's not a true founder. He's just a guy who thought he was morally superior than Sam Altman and ultimately is playing the same game. he's, it's Dre: You Rodney: these guys I hate to break. Now if he changes, I will update. If any of these guys change, I will update. ⁓ not gonna ignore evidence. But come on, Claude bought, you chasing the Claude bought hype. You bought a bunch of Mac minis and then you wanna turn around and then repackage it and sell it to us like we idiots? Like on, come on, come come on, come on. Dre: Yeah. Yeah, my man says that he is the master of repackaging. He is good at that. He is good at that. He is good at that. He is good at that. Rodney: Right. He just repackages shit. He re- He sees some shit. He repackages it, makes it look a certain way. And it's like, here you guys go. Like, ⁓ Stop. Acquire. He needs to be, I don't know what company he needs to be at, but he would, maybe, ⁓ maybe should get those guys or something. He's a, he's good. Dre: Yeah. Rodney: And what he does, it's just that it's not kill Google. It's not even get, you can't even kill Yahoo. It's like, come on, come on. Come on, come on. Yahoo, Yahoo Bing. start there first. Dre: Yeah. Rodney: I hate to sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. But I think that might be our last one. But yeah, I'm just saying, guys. I'm just saying. Dre: All right, well that's it that's like that's a good point to wrap it up y'all