This week we’re joined by Emily Sundberg and celebrate our 100th episode, talking about classic topics like X vs Threads and is Silence the best product.

• Troy Young's People vs Algorithms newsletter
• Brian Morrissey's The Rebooting newsletter
• Alex Schleifer's Universal Entities
• Follow Alex, Brian and Troy on Twitter

When did you join a rockabilly band?

Oh,

No, Alex.

why?

because he's wearing flannel?

Well, it's his hair, he's got it all greased back.

Ha

did you, join a single lesbians book club?

Sorry about the cat,

gotcha.

welcome to People vs.

Algorithms.

this is a very special 100th video.

I think it's a 100th episode.

as always, I'm joined by Troy Young, Alex Schleifer.

are we doing video for this?

This is our first video?

Yes.

Okay.

so apologies to everyone if you're watching this on video.

I'm just kidding.

We're, we're fine.

but yo, it's been a hundred, it's been a hundred episodes.

Who would've, who would've thought?

Who would've thought?

what's been your favorite part of it, Troy?

Hm.

That's a good question.

Nothing, really.

Okay, Alex.

Thanks.

Thanks.

It's this type of great content and banter that has made this last 400 years, 100 episodes.

It feels like 100 years.

Well, I've enjoyed, I've enjoyed thinking through a lot of things with you guys and like having the different perspectives and particularly the organic nature of, of Alex joining the podcast when he was like sort of on the periphery of

Well, it, is a lesson.

If there's a lesson, it's a lesson in tolerance, for sure.

Yes, we're all learning tolerance, very imperfectly.

learning, we're learning that other people have needs.

We're learning tolerance.

We're learning that there's, there's a, for every X, there's a threads.

For every, center right person, there's a mad liberal.

And, and everything in between.

And we try to be tolerant of, of one another.

And sometimes it heats up in the threads.

Okay.

yeah, so I want to, I want to talk about threads.

I want to talk about X.

We are going to be joined, by, by Emily Sundberg, from feed me.

And, we're, I want to also talk about something I wrote about today, which kind of relates a little bit, I think with, with Emily, which was using, I, I stole this from a conversation we had very briefly yesterday, Troy.

So thank you for that.

about.

at least you're consistent.

Yeah, the All In Summit.

I mean, look, this is what, this is what, journalism trains you to do is, to be psychopathic and to steal things from other people, is to talk a little bit about, the All In Summit and then also Acquired.

We didn't talk about that.

That was my original edition because Acquired just had 6, 000 people turned out at the, whatever, the Chase Center in San Francisco to watch a podcast recording with Mark Zuckerberg, Who continues, by the way, to be completely dripped out.

It's just a remarkable, remarkable turnaround, as far as his fashion goes.

and I think that it really speaks to a lot of the changes going on in media, but we have to start with the debate, right?

and not in the politics stuff, but I was, so I was watching the debate.

We were, We were, I guess, texting about it a little bit and I was like, yeah, this is like actually pretty good.

I was kind of tame.

And then, Kamala Harris, baited, Donald Trump and next we were talking about pet executions and I was thinking to myself, most people sitting at home, I believe are like, what the hell is this all about?

And I unfortunately knew exactly.

What was going on because, I unfortunately still use Twitter slash X too much and, all these stories about supposedly Haitian immigrants eating pets in Springfield, Ohio, have been bouncing around there.

And then all of a sudden it broke through the wall into the sort of regular world.

when that happened, like, Most

it, it it had escaped X before,

I think so, I

think so.

It's like one of the,

had never heard of that.

I

it's like one of those things like the NyQuil chicken, Like, it, it makes it into the daily, the curiosity section of the daily

Okay, but 75 plus percent of people watching that debate

had to have zero idea what the hell

think you guys, you guys forget what, like, people that don't use Twitter, like think about every day and it's none of the, none of the shit that happens on Twitter, honestly.

Like I, I think nobody I talked to had ever heard of that.

Would you rather eat a cat, a cat or a dog?

it.

I, I'm not getting into that.

I'm just, I, it's whatever is available.

I think

No, but Alex, you've eaten, you've eaten like hardcore cat food.

Game before,

Yeah.

I'm not, I, I,

You've been, no, but he's in, you've been like, like Island stuff, like donkey,

matter

Oh my god, this is, this is more anti immigrant,

yeah, no, like, Troy oh, that's how it bleeds out of Twitter, Troy, via you, bringing, like, that trash into a reputable podcast like ours.

We're never gonna be, like, at the Chase Center talking to Zuckerberg if you keep going.

no, I don't think I actually feel, I feel like, if it weren't for politicians, I would lose.

And the media types being completely addicted to Twitter, nobody would hear about it.

Like, so I'm, I'm nearly want to tell all of you all, because I know we have lots of media types here, but just stop, like, nobody cares.

Okay.

It's like, it's like, you know, talking to some kids, about, when 4chan was out and there were always kids that would bring up all the stuff that they would discover on 4chan.

and, they wouldn't.

Shut up about it.

Back in my day, it was like whatever was on the latest thing on IRC chat or whatever, and it feels like that's what's happened.

That's the new media landscape.

It's just a bunch of people addicted to Twitter, wanting to talk about the, about it all the time.

But I think that it's, it's, it's, It's a little bit indicative of we have so many of these different little pockets and niches now that there isn't like, there isn't a thing that everyone is talking about at the same time anyway.

but the Twitter noise feels like pretty like Twitter ish.

Like it's like, it's as if everybody's tapped into a news source, and they say, well, I actually stayed there for the straight news, but it does mean I have to listen to whatever Alex Jones has to say.

Like, that's what Twitter feels like.

Just turn it off.

Everyone,

should not, you

turn it you heard about people

Oh,

I would have Alex Jones on

I think if people want to turn it off, that's fine.

I, but I think that you should probably at the same time, turn off threads and because it's, it's more

grading.

I think it's.

I know because you put a stupid port on a telephone and a bunch of losers talk like liked it.

so well, to catch the, the listeners up, dear listeners, Alex has become a threads fluencer on the side, which is a twist that none of us saw coming.

but Alex, tell us your experience as our, our, our

I I just want to say for the record.

I'm really happy that it's it's releasing alex's endorphins or dopamines rather It's great.

I'm very happy for you

you seem jealous.

You seem jealous, Troy.

Go on there brian.

You won't be jealous

Well, let me, I think maybe you get the algorithm that you kind of, nurture, my, my doubling down on threads was to test out, we're going to start releasing a game and, and, and, and video games have a long tail of like marketing, I don't know what, you know, the opposite of a long tail is, but there's a lot of pre marketing that you need to do, and we were looking at Twitter.

And I have a, substantial like 7, 000 following on Twitter.

And even when I post about design now, you'll get people engaging with it, but you'll have a lot of trolls in the comment, not a lot of engaging conversations.

The feed seems to be kind of a mess.

so I thought, okay, let's, let's see what happens on threads.

Let's just, let me just post things that I want to post.

And I think their algorithm is just very good.

And at times you'll get a lot of comments that feel like conversations.

So threads to me feels a lot more like Reddit in a way that like the best side of Reddit in a way that you'll get into a conversation with people, whether it's like asking questions or.

having fun.

And yes, I did a, a post.

I have like, over 500, 000 views on that thing.

It's doing well.

But the main thing that I'm finding out is that the ROIs, if you have, if you're running a business where you have to be.

on social, like people say, I think like threads and Instagram.

but you know, but comparing threads to Twitter, it's much more, you get much more ROI.

I think you guys are still stuck in this like loop of just having to be there in the dirt.

And it's not particularly useful.

It's not particularly, I

I

anyone say, I haven't heard anyone say, Hey, Twitter is still a substantial part of my business or that it's, that it's growing in any way.

Twitter.

It's going down.

The only reason we see a tweet is because the media is addicted to it and the politicians are addicted to it.

Once that addiction is broken, that thing is no longer useful.

Yeah, but that that that tells me that that Twitter is going to be here forever, right?

I mean, because that look when Joe Biden dropped out of the presidential race, what, where did he go?

Did he go to the New York Times?

Did he send out a press release?

When Taylor Swift endorsed Kamala Harris, who did, where did she go?

She went to Instagram.

She didn't go to fucking Twitter.

Yeah, but that's, you know, that's, yeah, that's true.

But,

Like, it doesn't, here's the thing, like, just, like, I never talk about media bias because, I find that, but there's a media biases if Most of these people will post something to Twitter, Threads, X, all at the same time using a tool that just blasts it out everywhere.

But people will use the tweet because that's just it.

It's just like a reflex and they think like, oh my friends, oh my media friends are in it.

I am in it constantly, therefore the rest of the world's got to be in it.

And that's why nobody else heard about the cats and dogs being eaten, guys.

That's how I broke through.

Anyway, I'll stop now.

I like Threads.

It's a good product.

this is point counterpoint.

I think a lot more people knew about the dogs and cats than you think and I think that Alex has a hard time separating his disdain for Elon Musk from the platform.

Um,

him once.

That's not true.

but you can't, it doesn't matter whether you mentioned him or

Really?

Because if I post something with 7, 000 followers on Twitter,

the point already.

I got

no, but I mean, that is not, that has nothing to do with Elon Musk that has to do with my

apparently people in that environment don't like what you're saying and it's not, it's not resonating.

So

maybe you should change your

But wait, is this an algorithmic thing?

Because, like, I find, I, I used to post to Twitter all the time.

I mean, I got a lot of followers from original Twitter, and I rarely ever post.

I mean, I never found

It's not true.

You posted yesterday.

I know, but I'm just saying, like, I, I used to, like, post, like, probably, like, ten times a day, like, back in the day, but I don't, it's not, like, a big traffic driver.

I'm not getting a lot of,

but your, your relationship is not, it's exactly, it's consumption.

It's not

but, but what are you complaining about?

Like, I think I have like my own data to prove to myself that Twitter is not a great product where I should be spending my time.

And also I believe after.

seeing his behavior, that Elon Musk is a despicable human being.

These two things overlapping

Of course it is.

His hate for Twitter is

that is, that is, that is ridiculous.

That is ridiculous.

That is ridiculous.

That is ridiculous.

As a lot of things I hate more, there's a lot of things I hate using more than Twitter that have nothing to do with Elon Musk.

Let me remind everyone.

I use like Starlink right now to have this call.

I drive a Tesla and I have the batteries.

It's like.

Give me a break.

That is,

those are harder to get rid

but that is like, that is like a light kind of argument, like where everything, Oh, well, you, you just saying this because you're woke or you hate Elon Musk or whatever.

Elon Musk is despicable.

I don't like him.

I also think the product of Twitter is terrible now.

It looks uglier.

It doesn't work for me and Any time I spend of it doesn't bring me anything, and I think everybody else that's stuck to it is addicted or, held captive by the huge audience that they might have gathered over time.

But if they actually look into the numbers, I'm pretty sure it doesn't really pay off.

I do think it has become more addictive, weirdly.

I find that I like it less, but I find that I'm compelled more, because the algorithm has gotten a lot better, I believe.

And not in a good way.

Like, in my view.

Like, it's not going in a positive direction.

It's like, I, maybe I clicked once on a fight video.

I have no idea.

Maybe it was an accident, but I really don't need all these, like, videos of people, like, beating each other up.

Oh, I don't see those.

That's wild.

They're not on threads.

They're on Twitter.

Someone, someone who gets into a fight in an

mean, I'm sure you can, Troy, I'm sure you can find all the trash you like on threads too.

It's just, You

I don't, I don't, I don't think I'm getting, I don't think we're getting the same thing, but I, you know what?

I'm not, I don't have a super strong opinion about this, but I go to threat.

I go to Twitter.

Occasionally, I think what irks me though is, yeah, it's the, it's the statement about what threads means.

And, and, that, that's, I think what, what grates me a bit,

But is that what I came with?

Like, I, I just,

oh, well, there's what you're come with

after using it for two months and you're saying, well, you just hate Elon and really should still be using X.

I'm like, no, there's

no I, I don't care what you use, but you do hate Elon, for sure.

But is that a problem that I hate Elon?

it's not my problem.

No, it's,

it's,

mean, hate is a strong word.

I don't find him particularly.

I thought he did really well on the all in, uh, summit.

Interview really well.

Yeah.

it was actually kind of endearing.

do we just gauge people from whatever they did last?

Because that sounds really great.

Well, I want to actually use that, it's a great segue, Troy, to talk a little bit about All in.

Something I wrote about, today, which is, you know, this All in Summit that went on.

I don't know how many people, I, I haven't seen anything that they, they released.

But, if it wasn't sold out, it was close.

I just looked at the, the photos posted.

and they were charging 7, 500.

And, One of the things that I thought of, I was talking with someone who had, I wouldn't have expected, but she, she had been like going to, to this, to the summit, that was in Los Angeles is, they had an amazing.

Like lineup, right?

I mean, they had J.

D.

Vance was there.

Look,

Oh, wow.

I missed that.

they had Elon Musk, Sergey Brin.

Is he good enough, Alex?

He's pretty good, right?

The Waymo CEO, Kirsten Sinema.

anyway, it was, to me, what it said to me was that this is something Noteworthy, like, because this is like, this is an event that is more influential than probably any event that any of the legacy technology or business publications are putting on.

This is, this felt to me like it would be like the new, say, code conference or something from a previous era.

And that's a real shift.

I think.

Troy?

I think that you're, the notion that media companies and brands are still being built is right.

I think that.

I don't know what the attendance, how big the, the, the attendance was, but it's 7, 500 tickets.

So it's not cheap.

It's hard to, I mean, obviously they've built a brand that people want to be part of.

And, so I'm sure the pod numbers are, are, are enormous.

Their numbers are enormous on, on YouTube and, clearly it's activating an audience.

So, it's a very valuable media brand and it's what, a couple of years old.

and, and so the path, I just think that what's different now is we used to think of a, a series of steps to build a media, a media brand in the digital age.

it typically started with a website and I'm, and I'm publishing to a page or.

I guess publishing a video or something to, to YouTube, but more likely publishing a page.

And that's irrelevant.

I don't even know.

Does all even have a website?

it, it, it's a, it's a brand that was built on podcasting and there's, there's a handful of those now.

these companies find different ways or these, people and companies find different ways of, monetizing them and they're, and they're different rules.

You wrote about those rules in your newsletter today, Brian, I subscribed today, by the way,

Oh, good.

Thank you.

I saw that.

20 bucks.

Wait, so you're not going all in on the

I can't, I can't commit.

Cause I,

Okay.

Well, that's good.

I'd like

That'll get me out of bed.

I mean, it's a recurring 20.

No, I know.

I plan on making more off of you in the first year than if you had taken the annual.

So I appreciate that.

what does it say about media?

Emily's going to come on the podcast, Emily Sundberg, and She's pursuing a, a, a, like a, a kind of new path as well.

And I think has, lots of influence and subscribers and, we'll see what she does next.

But there's, I guess the good news, if you, if you love media and you want to build a media businesses, there's ways to, there's ways to do it.

It's there's, it's a vital industry and it's not going anywhere.

Yeah.

And I acquired is the other one that this week, I think it was just yesterday.

They, they had 6, 000 people at Chase Center to, to watch that Zuckerberg interview.

they really exploded, which is interesting because it's like the, it's kind of like in, in some ways, like Lex Friedman reminds me of this and that, like, think about the least viral type of content, right.

these super long podcast interviews, and they do case studies.

And they've only released, I think, six or seven episodes this year.

I mean, they put a ton of work into the research behind this.

I'm, my personal favorite is this.

If anyone hasn't listened to it, I really recommend it.

The one they did on Starbucks with Howard Schultz was, was fascinating.

A lot of people love the Costco one, but,

yeah.

but what are some of the characteristics?

I mean, these people, the conversations are very different.

They're not, quote unquote, journalistic and in their spirit, the practitioners tend not to be journalists.

I think, they're more, people have accomplished something else in their lives and are now, Applying or, using the, availability of tools to have to make content for people, but they're not of the sort of journalistic tradition.

They're the monetization is different.

The path to getting maybe the, the, potential for a, a, a media brand that's disconnected from a personality is, is, I think, one of the complexities of these businesses because they're sort of deeply deeply connected to the people underneath of them.

Right.

They're not, institutional brands.

but it's just a different, it's a really different time.

Yeah.

Alex, what is your take?

look, because I live in Silicon Valley.

My consumption of these types of interviews is pretty low because I've heard a lot of this stuff before and I find more and more that these, Especially these founder stories are kind of.

they're so embellished, and, and they've been told so many times,

What do you mean these founders stories?

well, you know, these founding stories have come.

I mean, a lot

box one

is, is a lot of this, a

I could stand to not hear that one more.

a lot of this is like, you know, people trying to, Sell insight into how these people got rich and there's a big appetite for that.

you know when we interviewed chris chris kimball, he said You know like When you make a magazine, you're kind of, you have to build it on the promise of improving something about people.

People want to improve themselves.

And how, what a better way to improve themselves to see how Zuckerberg or Brian Chesky or whatever got luck, got rich.

When in fact, you know, luck and perseverance and kind of abilities and all these types of things like got into play and life is way more complicated and there were ups and downs, etc.

So when you hear these stories.

the acquired guys are really compelling and the interviews are compelling.

but that stuff works because I think people are being sold that, you know, it's the new version of the kind of self help, self help book, these podcasts.

They're just much easier to consume.

Like you used to have, you know, every year you used to have like a dozen self help

books that would teach you, how to relate with people or

what are you talking about right now?

I don't know what you're talking

I'm talking about like kind of this ecosystem.

I'm

Are you talking about All in?

Are you

In, I'm talking about the Lex Freedman podcast.

I'm talking about all this kind of ecosystem of long form.

Let's sit down and discuss these things, which people who are usually quite wealthy and powerful.

and, and for me, this is like, I've been thinking about, I think these podcasts are kind of just a new version of the self help book.

Like you don't really hear, you remember when, there were like, self help gurus that were coming out with like one Three books every year.

and that would make the new cycles now that's been replaced with, let's just get somebody that, that got rich, in front of a mic and talk to them for two hours, and I think that that's, that's absolutely fine.

I just, don't consume that stuff all that much.

but that's why you see these events also bringing in these audiences.

People are hungry to find out, how to make money.

Emily's here.

We were just talking about, the all in summit and

the, what was the other one?

The acquired.

Did you see acquired?

They had like 6, 000 people show up.

Zuck's big, big t shirt.

Yeah,

he made it himself.

What do you think of Zack's look lately?

It's hard, I can't, I'm not

I think it.

was really intentional to rebrand.

I think it's working also.

Like, there's value to people thinking you're cool.

wait, someone thinks he's cool?

yeah,

I

That's

shocking.

It's really shocking

000 people went to see him, this thing looked like it was a, a Taylor Swift concert.

I

liked him better when he had the Roman emperor haircut.

Yeah, I feel like guys can kind of oscillate in like the weeks between haircuts.

That can like come in and out.

But, The big t shirts are like a look right now.

So he's kind of like playing into trends I liked the chain

You like the chain?

I did.

Yeah

mean he also got, he

Who is his stylist?

Is it known who his stylist is?

I think that he got a whole new pr team at like for meta

do you actually think that someone came in and said, we got to get rid of the hoodie

oh my god,

need, we need to update the look and maybe you could wear a chain outside of your

t shirt?

I don't think anybody told him that I think that he probably was like I want to switch things up and I think that Founders are more and more Outward facing at a lot of these brands, right?

Like we saw that for a while with like the girl bosses in the early 2010s that they were these public facing Evangelists of their their own products, but I think it's happening more and more with companies that you wouldn't necessarily expect it.

Yeah,

I think that's that shift from institutions to individuals.

It's like happening all through different levels.

It's not just media.

I mean, that's part of

Yeah, yeah, I agree with you I

agree with you and it's an interesting strategy because it can work really well to just be The

I think it's different with him.

I think he said, what the fuck am I doing?

I've literally overcome all of these challenges.

I'm one of the richest people in the world.

I own the most influential kind of modern forms of media.

And why am I sitting back again?

Like, why am I hiding from people in a hoodie?

Like, fuck that.

I'm going to come out, and I'm going to be bold, and I'm going to like, I'm going to like, surf behind boats, and hold up an American flag, and I'm going to be like, baller.

So you think he felt like he was hiding?

oh, I think there was a time when he definitely felt under siege.

For sure.

that's different to hiding though.

I don't think he was, I mean, he,

he, he, he always put himself at the full, I mean, maybe it's because I live here.

Zuckerberg was always at the front of Facebook.

It was always known he would be the one doing the interviews, et cetera.

mean, his original business card said, I'm the CEO, bitch.

yeah, yeah.

Yeah,

Yeah,

I think it was more just like, he's like,

I think it had something to do with the MMA stuff, and just being ripped, and being kind of,

he probably had more time to focus on himself and his, his coolness.

And there's something about the tone of the internet has changed a bit and maybe his interaction with the memes and everything.

He was like, you know what, people can handle this.

And then he hired incredible people to

Yeah.

Yeah.

Oh,

You

how would you rank his makeover to say, Jeff Bezos?

are you asking

You're

Emily.

you wanna take, you wanna take that one?

Which one, which one is, uh, preferable?

man, like, I say like, I'd rather, I'd rather like, go on an upward slope than do a 180.

Do you think Bezos met with his PR team and he says, I want the, I want to look like a divorced dad.

I know what a midlife crisis looks

Yeah, that's not a PR team, that's a doctor.

Yeah.

that, that

physically.

I

think that Bezos, again, like I finished doing all that.

I'm wildly rich.

It's time to get jacked.

They put a couple needles in him.

I think he's having a time of his life.

I watched this great Jeff Bezos video yesterday.

there's a great, YouTube series called everyday astronaut where they, this guy who's like nerdy kind of fan boy guy goes out and like hangs out with Elon and he tours him through SpaceX.

And he did it with.

In two episodes with Jeff Bezos in the last couple of weeks.

And, they just walk around this incredible mind blowing bananas facility that was financed entirely by Jeff Bezos.

There's no, there's no outside capital in it.

It's like Blue Origin is his thing.

It's, it's, it's, it's sort of of a class of YouTube videos that are like boys and their toys.

And, he's got the biggest toys.

He built a rocket factory.

And he's.

He can't believe how cool his life is right now.

And, and he looks pretty, The boat.

school.

Yeah.

I would rank them, from best to worst, sort of, morphine is Zuckerberg.

It's not ridiculous.

Like you said, Emily, then I would go to Bezos cause he is having, yeah, he is having a good time and he did move to Miami.

and then

a distant third is Elon.

I think

but Elon's let it like physically he's let he's slid a bit, right?

Like he,

think everywhere else.

He's really on the up and up.

Yeah.

so Emily, on that note, I feel like since the last time you came on here, like Feed Me has like hit like a new level.

Yeah, that was, I think it was February.

Yeah.

It's

maybe it was because we need to chart it with like when you came on the

That's the PVA

I owe you guys a lot.

Let's get some advisory shares.

Yeah.

yeah, it's grown a lot.

It, I think it has been for the past year, like last fall, my numbers started really

Do you think people know, know what it is?

What is it, first of all?

Feed me.

Okay.

So if you're, if you're listening to this and you don't know who I am, I write, a daily newsletter on Substack and it has.

Become quite big.

It's sort of like a cross section between, your group chat and Gawker and, the wall street journal.

it's like one of the top business newsletters on sub stack and it's, it's been really, really fun.

It's the best job I've ever had, but it's a one person machine right now.

It, by the way, it's the number seven I see on the business

Yeah, it's the number seven, top grossing one in the business category, which is fun.

but like who?

Who's the, who's the audience who really

everybody from like the bartender down the block to Marc Andreessen, subscribe.

it's, it's fun.

It's like a really wide range.

So I would say LPs at At VCs, like who want their portfolio companies to be in it, but also girls who work on marketing teams in Chicago, who want to walk into their weekly meetings, a little bit more prepared about what's going on in New York.

Specifically.

I'd say it's a lot of consumer news.

there's some cool interviews.

I've kind of broken down the benefits of my paid readers that they get to.

Help me do the interviews with these interesting people that I bring in.

I've interviewed, like David Ulovich from Andreessen.

I've interviewed, like a friend of mine who got into Harvard business school this year and like those get the same amount of engagement, which is really interesting.

So I think what people are really paying for is.

The way that I specifically curate the letter but also the access that I have so if something breaks at 7 a.

m By 8 a.

m.

I can probably get in touch with somebody that I know Who was part of whatever that news item is?

and I would say I owe that to the amount of jobs I've had and the amount of work that I've done like since I was in college I've just had a lot of like I worked at meta But I also worked at new york magazine and I was at both those places for a decent amount of time And I had pretty scrappy roles where I had to talk to a lot of people so this is like a cool Outcome of how I spent my 20s.

did you start out targeting a specific audience, or were you always

No, basically what happened was I was working at Metta and I heard that they were going to do layoffs.

And I said, I'm not going to live off of severance.

I need to have something to do.

And I saw that Substack was sort of becoming popular.

I knew a few friends who had newsletters, but they weren't really doing it as a business.

And before, they announced what the layoffs were going to be, I started a newsletter.

I knew that I wanted to monetize it.

I saw an opportunity there.

And the opportunity was based off of how a lot of my.

Different group chats.

We're discussing gossipy workplace news in like the wake of COVID.

So when you think of it almost like a group chat, cause I think of like,

hate that term because it's being

used as a marketing thing by millennials really strongly, but I think it has, it's like super, it's super community driven news, like from it's feed me as kind of taken on a new term because a lot of the tips I get are from my readers and it's like this.

thing, which is fun.

but to answer

but it's more than that, Emily.

I love it because it's more than that.

You know this.

else is it?

Well, it's, it's you.

And I like you.

So that's what's cool about it is it's, it's a little spicy.

It's a weird, unconventional intersection of like Wall Street, bro stuff.

And like, it's provocative.

And, kind of definitely a New York view on the world from someone who's fighting to not be a Long Islander.

I'm not fighting to not be a Long Islander, but I think where I grew up definitely

For sure it does.

quite a bit.

like my dad's a teacher.

My mom's an artist.

I went to school in New York city when I was 17.

And, um, I love shelter Island love going out East for sure.

But.

Yeah, to answer your question, did I know what I wanted to write about?

I was writing for New York Magazine a bit at the time that I started the newsletter about like cultural phenomenons and the, and the business behind them or like the, the business implications of them.

So this sort of just allowed me to, write about it every day.

But you put yourself out there from the first

issue,

right?

You put yourself out there in the like, this is your newsletter, your voice, your face.

And so it was, it was really personal from the get go.

which I want to talk about because like, how do you, we, we talked about this the last time and I want to know if your thinking has changed or it's progressed at all, because ultimately you have to figure out.

Anyone has to figure out in these things is, is it feed me Emily or is it feed me like with Emily?

You know what I mean?

Like, I mean, is this a creator?

the goal is to be like feed me edited by Emily and have different voices come in.

I don't think I'm an expert at everything.

and I'm kind of, at the point where I have enough experts who are really great writers, like in my friend, friend group, network group.

Like, I can't even say office.

I don't have a fucking office.

Like this is my office.

Nobody's here.

but I have people who I want to bring on to be regular contributors.

Which I'm excited about I think I described it recently to Troy as like baby puck and he was like fuck that it's just pucks competitor so I think that's exciting

but do you want to grow?

Do you know what you want it to do?

I mean, do you want to, I mean, cause it's, it's, you've like succeeded, you've broken through, right?

So like, it's like a great dilemma to have of which direction you go,

Yeah, I want to be a great little I'm gonna stop saying little it just feels small compared to so many of the legacy media companies that I have worked for I wanted to be a media company and then hopefully eventually I can have time to make another movie or do like an audio project and sort of treat it as this studio to do other things.

That's probably what's going to end up happening.

yeah.

Yeah, it's interesting how it resonates.

I was doing a call earlier with a guy who's in total b2b media.

he's in Chicago and he brought it up like randomly.

Like, I was like, Oh, my God,

in what context?

a little bit.

about like about, the sort of media properties that he's really into.

I'm always asking, what are you, what are you into right now?

What do you see out there?

That's like really interesting.

So like, I think that's, I don't know.

It's, it's, it's a,

Brian, it made me think about the discussion we were having before Emily came on, because It's maybe to look at the modern phenomenon of media brand creation or media business creation.

I've watched you.

It hasn't been that long.

and I think quite early, people thought this product in its mix of community news, long form, short form curation and the sort of Venn diagrams that your content approach, people liked it right away and it grew really quickly.

And now.

Without any concern for, monetization, although you did have subs, like paid subs from, from early on and something like Substack could make that really easy.

But now like the world's your oyster, right?

Like you can, you can do an audio project and get big audience to it.

you have the credibility to have different types of conversations with people that want to give you money to make a documentary or do it yourself.

so the, the idea that it's a kind of modern media studio is, is like a really cool thing.

And the reason that we bring this up is because there's been so much talk in the last few years about media dying.

And it's, it's just like, not, that's just not the case.

Like

I think some media is dying.

I think, you know, and

But that always happens, right?

definitely.

I think people Need to not think that you can turn everything that's dying, like you can't bring everything that's dying back to life, but you can do something else with it.

So I was talking to a friend of mine who's an editor at a big women's magazine earlier this week.

And I don't think you can save those but what I would do if I was there and the lights were still on Would be to go back and mine some eight like some ip from old issues And sell that and make some money off of it and like try to do something while you're there.

You can't turn around certain you you can like bring in a sexy new editor and throw some parties and like have some fun advertising, but Magazines have just changed.

So what can you do while you're there to make the most of it is like Make a docuseries sell it to netflix for whatever fifty thousand a hundred thousand bucks publish a book with like some old issues.

Like I don't think anybody's gonna save bon appetit I don't think anybody's gonna save like teen vogue Like I think that that's really hard to do but you can make the most of it while you're there and then on on like the other You The other side of what we're talking about, it's like media is not dead.

Look at what Alex Cooper just did.

That was like an insane media deal.

It doesn't look the same way as some massive New York times, Google partnership or something, but that's still a media deal.

And she's, she was under 30 when she did that.

What was it?

120 million.

Who knows if it will work, but she got the deal.

She got the headline.

She was talking all year in these interviews about how she was trying to do a deal that big people doubted her.

And then she did it.

So

deals.

Amazing.

Can you run me through that deal?

I don't know what

Well, it's just someone buying your podcast, like a platform

Yeah.

She doesn't, for those who don't know, I don't know if anyone does, But she does call her daddy.

How would you describe that podcast?

I mean, it started as part of

started as started at barstool as like the hot sorority girl podcast about like, Blow jobs and getting drunk and dating.

And then now she's kind of shifting it into more of like a Barbara Walters interview situation.

But what she did was she created a media company called Unwell, and then she's a bunch of other people under that media company and what some of them do really well, and some of them are clearly not doing well, but her media company, Unwell got a deal with Sirius.

Okay.

So she has different properties.

They're almost like endorsed brands.

He built Like, a mini barstool and what they will eventually do is like spin out live shows from there, make money from that, create probably like a canned alcohol drink, make money from that merch, make money from that.

And it's, there's a ton of these deals happening right now.

I spoke to somebody this week who's doing a version of that with a really.

I'm sure it's going to be announced soon, but like with a really big consumer brand We all know they're basically creating like a new platform for Wellness podcasts.

I spoke to somebody else this week trying to do like barstool for girls It's like a lot of it's it's like there's a gold rush happening in these content studios where they're trying to incubate a bunch of talent to eventually Sell a bunch of stuff.

Kind of like what Disney did in the late nineties with like the Disney channel.

Like you create all these superstars to sell you a bunch of stuff.

podcasts are just so good.

And

the economics of these modern kind of streamlined personally anchored media brands is truly like, Brian, it's just worth pointing out that like big publications fight to sell monthly subs at 10 bucks, but you can write two sub stacks a week and charge me 20.

the, the creator economics are so good, particularly in things like podcasts outside of

yeah.

There is a power law.

Let's be real.

Like for, for every feed me, there's, there's like 10, 000, like ones

yeah,

Sure.

But there's always power laws in talent based,

But it's also like both podcasts and newsletters are actually, it's hard to predict the growth and it's hard to build a plan around it.

Right.

Let's say it's a, it's they're not businesses that, you can invest X amount into and then gain that much audience, right.

They're actually hard

Especially ifou're starting from scratch and you're

not like bringing an existing audience over.

I also think that we don't necessarily always address the implications for the creators, which is like.

If they become stars really quickly, there's like privacy things.

If they don't make it, then they have to deal with the fact that they have like this failed audio video, whatever project, like there's a talent management piece that's somehow missing with a lot of these things.

Like with Alex Cooper's portfolio, for example, some are doing really well, and you can tell some are really, really struggling.

And then, yeah, something I'm fascinated by with a lot of her talent is like, once you get boyfriend, a boyfriend and like sober up, you're not as interesting.

And then you kind of like plateau also, which is the same thing as like housewives.

Right?

Like,

That's why I'm trying to get drunk and get a boyfriend.

yeah, do it, do it.

I'm sure you could create some incredible content.

but, but, but but you asked Chris, Chris Black from how, how long gone about, Brian knows Chris, I think, about the line between, or the difference between influencer and celebrity, or famous person in your interview today.

How do you think about that?

think everybody has a little bit of celebrity, like loading bar.

If you have an Instagram account.

Or Twitter, then you have some amount of influence.

so I, I think it's like a spectrum, like everyone's on it a little bit.

The second that you create a job where you are somehow public facing.

How do you think about, I don't want to use the word personal brand, but I don't know what else to use it.

Like, how do you think about the leverage that your own personal brand.

gives to, to feed me with the reality is when these things become bigger, they become more complicated and they get like, if you're like well known, like at a certain level when you get to some level and it be, there's more unpleasant aspects

I'm struggling with that right now.

I was at dinner with, my boyfriend a few weeks ago and I was like getting upset about something.

And there was a woman sitting next to us the whole dinner.

And at the end, she said.

I love feed me so much and I wanted to be like you don't pay for that like you don't pay for what all that stuff you just

heard.

awful.

Yeah or like the other day I told somebody in the bathroom at a restaurant that I really liked her bag and then in the morning she dm'd me and was like I meant to say I read your letter so it's like somebody knows you but they're not and even just now on the subway somebody was like I love feed me and I like So I'm struggling with that a little bit.

because,

put your face on every issue though.

but I've stopped recently.

Like I'm pulling back a little bit.

Yeah.

I do put my face on every issue and I forget that like, just

cause I don't.

of people are reading.

Well, yeah, yeah.

I don't really talk about my life though.

So it's like this funny thing.

Cause I do think that that strategy helped me get to where I am, but just because they got me my first, whatever number of.

of.

readers doesn't mean that I need to use the same strategy to get double that number.

I think Like as I hire more people and I I build out the team then I can pull back from it a little bit.

How much time do you spend on like the business?

Cause I mean, I think one of the great things about Substack is it allows, individuals to focus fully on, I mean, you write every day, right.

And you, you're, you're spending, I would guess the majority, overwhelming majority of your time on the actual content and the difficulty of a lot, if you're going to have a different model, and I know it myself, is you're spending majority of your time on, on other stuff.

but how do you think about, first of all, like how much you want to do to build the business?

Because I mean, I think a lot of people would, would, probably a lot of people offer you advice, or like bring in an operator or something of that nature.

How do you

That's the number one piece of advice I get I mean i'm constantly thinking about the business of it Is the first time i've had something so precious that is working so well based purely off of 90 percent off of instinct.

but as far as like, when you, when you guys say operator, cause you and Troy both say that, like, what do you mean?

Well, people use this vague term, and I think they usually use it to people who come from the journalistic or content side, like they're like sounding out the word.

So I don't like, like it personally, because I find it, I find it off putting because it's like, oh, no, no, don't worry.

You're a words person.

This involves numbers

and all this thing.

It's like, wait a second.

I've gotten this far.

Why are you telling me just because you used to like sling ads

Well, Brian, I would say that you probably need an operator.

We've had scheduling issues,

so

that's, different.

That's, oh, is that an operator?

I mean, an

Oh, okay.

Then that, that's the

Sure.

Sure.

Operator operator is meant to take everything that they kind of creative, force behind the business doesn't want to do honestly.

Like, so it's up to you to define an operator, but it's like, It could be

Yeah, I mean, I think in the ideal, like, defining operator is exactly this.

What are the areas that you're doing where you bring no particular, like, leverage to and that, like, you get no, you get no joy out of whatsoever.

You're always going to do shit that you don't want to do.

I mean, nobody loves to go into QuickBooks, but you, you got to,

Not if you're in founder mode.

Founder mode.

Yeah.

But you know, I think that is the best that I think sometimes it's used by saying, particularly to creative people or content people, however you want to call it, that, Oh, this business stuff is very complicated.

You need to bring in someone.

So you can focus on just

just

See, luckily the people close to me are like, this business stuff isn't that complicated.

You

can figure this out, like keep this thing lean.

Yeah.

Like take go see your accountant.

Sorry It takes like an hour to go uptown see your account go see your accountant show up like know what's happening with your money

You see

your accountant in person.

i've started to

Wow.

it's kind of fun going

uptown and like going into the big park avenue office and

Her business is doing better than

Yeah.

Mine's in Las Vegas.

We just do zoom.

probably should have somebody in las vegas, but i have bob on I'm park avenue.

but like I sell my own ads.

I negotiate my own ad deals.

I take meetings with brands all the time I host events I have calls with the subset.

I'm really close with the sub stack team So like if there's an issue with anything like there was something with my stripe account yesterday.

They're on it like that like It's I have a good Understanding of my business.

I don't want to do this forever.

I don't want to have to be like running around You Doing everything in and out all the time.

I don't, I I've had to do, there's been a strong learning curve to this whole thing, even like learning that a subscription business files taxes differently, that was a cool thing to learn.

I don't know if a standard accountant would have clocked that.

Like, I've been like, wait, wait, wait, can we pause this for a second?

Like you need to be doing things differently.

This is great that we have, have realized that.

But I need help.

Like I, I do need help.

Well, you need to stop doing a lot of that shit in my opinion, but we've already had that discussion.

I want to do something.

Let's give back to Emily you guys because you know, and I think it would be fun if we could all just manifest what feed me could become.

You

Oh yeah.

Unsolicited advice.

Men are great at this.

yeah, and we could do it.

We could do it and just think about how great her business could be in like five years.

So we could just kind of channel that in a, in a, in a little monologue.

already great.

Can I like, I disagree with the premise.

It doesn't have to, you can keep a great business as it is if you want.

I need to get rid of typos.

I

Do you

though?

stay away.

Yeah.

I need to get rid of

typos because I've started getting

No, that's authentic.

That's,

unsolicited advice.

Do you need an editor?

I need to do more original reporting.

I think I need to raise my prices.

Cause I have the lowest cost of subscription in the top 20 letters in my category.

Which is crazy.

It's 30 cents a newsletter.

That's a good one.

Is that going to be retroactive?

Cause I'm a subscriber

or

You guys will be locked in at your current

what will be grandfathered in?

Okay, good.

yeah, I don't know.

I think it's interesting.

I like to think of feed me as something really amazing in five years.

I like to think about it as being more visual, as being like a kind of media, like a media brand that's seen, that's admired for its broad ranging creative output.

And meaning like, beyond, the newsletter just kind of is the foundation, but it's a place that is commenting on this great intersection of business and culture from a very new vantage point.

But it's doing that with, not just words, but with all the mediums.

Well, how do you think of in person because I, what I noticed is like, cause I, to me, the, the test of, of a lot of these media brands is, can you attract like

these, these high value, hard to reach area, segments, but then can you get them to take some kind of action and, you're behind a paywall, just like everything is behind a paywall, just about, and I just see like, the amount of interaction that you can get online is, is really impressive, honestly.

Yeah.

And how do you, or do you want to, because I think it's a major opportunity, to translate that into, an in person.

Will people, I would suspect a lot of people, will show up to Feed Me,

Yeah, so I have a few different parts of that.

few different answers to that.

I've thrown parties with like 200, 300 people, which is really fun.

I had like, I've done everything from 10 person dinners to 30 person book clubs that are sponsored.

By Warby Parker to like 300 person free parties at my friend's nightclub in the city all under the feed me umbrella, which is really fun.

And I think part of the reason that it works because my audience is almost 5050 men.

Women.

I have a decent amount of demographic or yeah, demographics on them just based off of manual.

Surveys that I've done because Substack doesn't offer that much information about that stuff so I can sort of take the temperature of like who will be where I knew that I had Maybe around 100 readers that spent time out east on Long Island So I threw a party in Montauk a few weekends ago and maybe 50 people showed up and it was great It was awesome, but I knew that because i'm constantly polling people in my chats and then as far as like taking action, I have a lot of data about that from ads.

I have a lot of data about like what people will buy from surveys that I've done with them.

I can track affiliate links that I've posted before for different items.

So I know that if I suggest a 5 item or a 500 item, like people take my suggestions.

you get a thousand people to show up somewhere, do you think?

would you ever consider creating a dating service?

Thank you.

I can't do that.

You guys don't like my ideas today.

Dating

well, like the dating thing, it's like, I've thrown parties and people have

gone home and hooked up.

that's like,

well, what else do you want?

I

Young people are off dating apps.

I read this somewhere.

I saw it on

Yeah, but

Yeah, just make, uh

I think a new one.

running

something wrong with dating right now, but I think it's more of a communication issue.

People are really scared to talk.

And There's something wrong with like the young men, I think.

too many video games.

something, scared, like a lot of scared energy.

but I think people in New York City are the luckiest people in the world when it comes to dating, so I don't know what's going on exactly.

Yeah,

men have been like particularly impacted by a lot of the content that, you know, that that's that's coming out made specifically for men.

I don't know.

It's not all very good.

I think it, I think there's a lot of advice for young men from like on one spectrum to Scott Galloway's, which is, you know One side of it all the way to kind of the, the, the darkest side of that whole

thing and I

yeah, there's like the Andrew Tate of it all, and like,

there's something a little broken there.

One more question.

Do you, do you think of this as like a brand or a media brand?

You know what I mean?

Like, I mean, because you mentioned like, being able to, cause there's a lot of different paths you

What what tell me an example of a brand that would maybe also be second guessing if their brand or media brand.

I think going back like a while, like something like Goop, right?

Like, I mean, Goop was originally like, was, was a newsletter, right?

And it's more of It's more of a brand now.

I think of like, and so you can go in a lot of different directions and it can be part of like a media brand, but how do you think about like making products or using the brand for things that are not just ads and subs and events?

Physical product is so hard.

It's such a big investment like.

The group stuff isn't working.

I don't think that they had experts in the room and I don't think I think Gwyneth probably should have brought in a CEO.

she tried, she tried that.

Yeah, it's sad because I actually think that there's a huge blank spot in wellness and like owning that space and it's probably like somebody on Substack is probably going to own it.

Like spinning out products is not, I don't, I've worked for like enough consumer brands to the magic of that has really been taken away for me.

Like, I think I can probably scale this thing without making physical products.

Like I'll make cool merch.

Maybe I'll make some money from it.

But,

But it's a media business that you look at it as,

yeah,

cause I mean, some people, the, the current thing is these like hold coast, you know, this kind of thing.

A lot of it, and it's like, okay, well, we're going to use one of these businesses that can produce nice cashflow, right?

But are, are, it's either an agency business or like a media business, but you want to, you want to use that cashflow then for different purposes that are in areas that are frankly better made better valuations

Are you still thinking of doing the rebooting Hart's Seltzer?

Yeah, that's basically what I'm getting at.

Summer 2025.

are you going to do that?

I'm just kidding.

I'm not doing that at all.

No, I'm just going to do webinars.

Yeah, I think like.

There's a problem with the consumer space where people who aren't actually, like most new brands aren't good.

So I, I'm not a specialist.

I have no problems that haven't been solved by like everything I need.

I have, there's nothing, I don't need to put out any other more stuff into the world.

Physical stuff.

Thank you.

Yes.

Yeah.

yeah.

this is not advice, but I think that I've seen way too many businesses, especially in media, start out in media with a sense that, media wasn't a good enough space to exist in, so that was always just a starting point to build something bigger and better, right?

and this ability to focus on one thing, or, or just focus and, and, and just build a successful business without kind of having too many distractions.

Because the problem is like the way of working, the rhythm of a media business is different than the rhythm of a product business, right?

So you kind of have to start thinking.

It's not just like adding another newsletter or YouTube channel, all that stuff.

That's a

similar rhythm, right?

the second you start kind of veering too far away from your core business, the more your core business suffers, I think, especially if you want to keep it lean.

it was really a symptom of, vanishing monetization and media looking for a different way to, to capitalize on your influence.

That's where it all started.

So, you know, what is, what is

But it proved out not to be the right path, right?

I would say that it's, there's more cases of failure than there is success.

my hypothesis around that stuff is that.

And look, we, we've, even when I was at Airbnb, we tried to do things that didn't feel like they flowed with a natural rhythm of being a tech company.

and those were much harder than any startup than, than any focused startup would, would, would find, because I think like you, you got to kind of lean into your rhythm as much as possible.

And I even worry about live events for that because.

all of a sudden you're dealing with a whole lot of different things, like I, you know, if I, in those shoes, that sounds like really complicated, even, even though your webinar is Brian, you know,

They're not complicated.

Live events are,

just, it's essentially this, it's essentially this, but people, like, I'd be paying you for it, right?

broadly.

Yeah, I'd rather attach myself to a brand that exists that wants to give me money to activate something in a better way for them than they can do themselves or like guarantee that like

the right people are going to be in the room and push their products for them.

then

then get into the product game.

And listen, like there's a few celebrities that have spun out products that have done really well, like Clooney killed it.

There's like celebrity beauty brands that have done really well, right?

Like Skims, Kim Kardashian crushed it.

But, they've also created a lot of waste.

And you are dealing with like a totally different trend cycle.

And I don't know.

I just don't see myself doing that.

Which path are you most like partial to then, do you think?

We talked about a few.

I mean, listen, like the newsletter space is still growing, so I don't even think I need to be like, okay, done with this yet.

This is still such a, I have plenty of friends who have no idea what sub stack is still.

So, there's a big opportunity on that platform.

That's been so rewarding to me.

Extremely annoying.

I have my own problems with sub stack, but it's working really, really well.

I've made a movie before.

I can do that again.

I get more joy out of the creative process than fast cash or else I probably wouldn't be doing this or I'd be doing it in a really different way.

I like making things.

I like connecting with people.

I like telling stories more than anything.

so if I can make my dream podcast with a, a sponsor on it, that helps me make it happen.

That's probably going to make me happier than like, Selling a million pens that become like the it pen and having to like promote that like

Yeah.

it's landfill.

Do

you,

I'm

Because a lot of our listeners might be interested in this.

For anyone starting a new, a newsletter from the ground up today, did you have a playbook, any, anything that, any advice that you have?

Like, how do you, because it feels like a little bit of a black box of, of how you would promote that, right?

Today.

Well, let me ask you this, just like, how long did it take you to get like five, to, to get like a, say a thousand subscribers?

Did you start

with that or?

gonna tell you right now.

I'm gonna pull up my dashboard and

Nice.

We're looking at data.

I love the dashboard.

But I bet, and while you're doing that, that, your friends and ex colleagues, come to you all the time and ask you if they should be doing the same thing as

It took me a month to get my first thousand and then it's like total fucking hockey stick like it's crazy

See, I think that's unusual.

Was that a, was there

It is unusual.

That's why you're talking to me.

But like part of it is like I was born me And like, I had my work experiences and like, that's the funny thing.

Like everyone, the number one thing I get asked is how do I do this?

And it like starts with it with kind of like what Troy said.

It's like be born to my parents on long Island.

Go to my high school, go to my state school, work at the jobs that I did.

Like, it was a whole life that went into it.

I think there are things I could tell you, which are like.

Surround yourself with smart people, grow your contacts list, keep really great connections along the way, learn how to write, be out in public and list like eavesdrop, take in stories.

Like the biggest part of it was like being in New York city, being around different groups of people, have an innate interest in business, which meant growing up in proximity to people who had more than me, which made it an interesting topic to me, like, It's not formulaic in the same way as a, there was no business plan.

It was, I'm going to start talking and see who's interested, and then I'm going to keep doing that every single day and write to an audience of zero and hope that eventually people started sending this around,

this is why I find the first kind of two to four weeks really interesting and why I find these founder stories often not interesting because there's so many things stacked on top of each other that have been successful happen, right?

Some of them are luck, some of them are genetics.

Some of them are, like where you were, the amount of hard work, your passion, et cetera.

But, but just very, very tactically, those first two weeks, you decide that you're going to start writing this thing.

Did you decide on a frequency?

Did you say, I'm going to

I knew from day?

one, I wanted it to be daily.

And I knew from day one that I wanted to try to make money from it.

The one thing that I'll say to you is that I started it in October and then in January of 2022, I wrote a story for New York magazine about the idea of Shopee shops, which was like a big retail story that kind of exploded.

I don't know if you guys read it, but basically it was about this billion dollar software that is.

Replacing trade shows and it's a wholesale software that was causing all retail across the country to look the same immediately and why every store you went to from like a hotel lobby gift shop to your wine store to your local like whatever are selling the same tinned fish and olive oil and whatever so basically that story hit on a point of like Tech people loved it.

Consumers loved it.

People who worked in the CPG space loved it.

And I think that was the, that was like a big, Moment where my people wanted to read more of that kind of story and then they, they saw my newsletter after that.

So, I think that was another thing, like, writing a story that was number 1 on New York magazine for like, 3 or 4 days.

Yeah.

And I, and I think this type of, if, if you have access to it, it seems to me that like that newsletters and podcast require that type of audience capture that comes from appearing on somebody else's property, right?

You kind of hop around, you try to kind of get, get some of that reach in right.

put something out of consequence and then you can get people in.

Because it's really hard to, to promote either a podcast or a newsletter, it feels like.

are a lot easier than Pug.

Podcasts are a mess,

One final question, at least that I have.

Why do you stay on Substack?

Because it's working.

Yeah.

It's working.

The discovery feature's on it.

Aren't the same as as far as I know beehive and ghost and other stuff like I have a lot of frustrations with it.

I've written extensively about my frustrations with Substack and the way that it's changing but it continues to work and people just continue to discover me through it.

much of your growth do you kind of assign to their discovery systems?

I can tell you that it's like I think it's Half of my

readers are from

recommendations

But that's free.

How many of those convert to paid?

I mean, I, I think after

they don't show that and that's my whole thing with sub stack with the

recommendations and I, there's a reason they don't show that.

Yeah.

I also, for a while I, I was being told that writing for that, like using that most people read on app.

And then I looked the other day and I was like, no, 8 percent of my readers read on the app.

Like, so, but

those things drive me crazy too.

Those drive me crazy, but it's still just like,

it's working.

Yeah.

so they're being valuable as a platform for you, not outside of the

percent valuable because the money becomes pretty big once you start

I know, I know that I can't, I can't do too many life changes at once.

I'm

just one person.

Okay, fair enough.

Should we do good product you want to stay for

good product,

It's a bit of a weird one this week.

I think I'll do a weird one.

It's always weird.

is it a

is completely normal.

the way to good product.

I have to I found that the Apple event so cringy.

I can't even watch that crap anymore.

Alex.

I'm sorry.

It's like, it's so sanitized and the way the people present and, I mean, really big picture is they said all the same things about AI as they said last time.

And then they put a camera button

mean, it's definitely, it's definitely a big shift after, probably spending seven hours on Twitter.

No, it's the eye people.

It's the eye people presenting.

They bug me.

don't like them.

I don't like the way they do their little, this is

our perfect world.

I like the way they present California because I live here and it's a beautiful place and I like that they jumped around.

The one thing I will say about the Apple event, it was very telling.

There's three things if you want to take away from them.

One, people are totally bored and uninterested about these AI features which are not even coming out.

Like that's been, a general sense and, and it feels like a big bubble unless, unless there's massive adoption.

Two, they didn't raise the prices of the iPhones, even though inflation means that, these are probably the cheapest iPhones.

And that is probably because they're pivoting very heavily into, like, being primarily, funded by services.

and I think in their services, I think health is going to be a big deal.

I mean, We, we didn't talk about it, but like the fact that AirPods can now be professional grade hearing aids is just like a massive

Well, you know how much hearing aids are Alex?

They're 5, 000.

Yeah.

The, the Apple put a screen in front of our faces and now they want to take over your ears.

is Apple a cool brand anymore?

Emily, do you think, like, are they

cool?

it is very cool, Brian.

I

Yeah.

I think.

like for people who work in any tech or design adjacent field, it's still the North star.

Do you know the same way Twitter is really important because all the media people are addicted to it?

Apple is important because all the creative people create on Apple and therefore have that Apple bias.

So anything cool you see was built on an Apple device.

Hey, but what about, what do you guys think of me getting that new Pixel 9 foldable phone?

If I came out to Coffee M and I

The Chinese one, the like three panel,

very on brand.

That's what

I think it would be on brand.

I think in this stage you're going, like, kind of leaning slightly into conspiracy theories, spending a lot of time on social media and retreating.

it's your, it's

I'm also turning into a gay bear.

but

then your texts turn green and that sort of like,

So that's still uncool, the

that is a, that is worth, that green bubble is worth billions to Apple.

it is.

But, but I'm actually thinking that the green bubble's cool now.

No.

No.

I, you guys are,

Troy, Troy, you have to, like, understand.

You don't, your sense of culture.

I think You gotta

reset.

You gotta

Alex, Alex, I understand the sort of cultural significance of the blue bubble.

I'm on the, I'm on the other edge of cool culture, right?

Like this,

I'm not,

You're just not cool.

I'm not cool.

I'm going to ask another cool question.

It's a Malaysian guy asking someone younger I have this theory and I hope it's true.

that being extremely online is on its way to becoming extremely uncool.

Yeah, you're so right.

I mean that.

Okay.

I think that COVID was a tipping point and I live in New York.

So my perspective on this is super based on New York, but there's, I think like nightlife and being out and being off of your phone is like a, it's a status signal.

It's like to

be able to be like, I'm outside.

I haven't looked at my phone.

I'm sorry.

Like, I didn't get back to you.

Like I don't check it's, it shows like it's status as a signal for sure.

It's

not

do that and green bubbles, awesome.

yeah, I think you're totally, or at least pretending like you're not tethered to

it all, like the, the less tethered you can be, it shows a certain amount of luxury, honestly.

And restraint is kind of cool in some ways, because you don't like you're not drinking as much and or at all.

And I don't know, I just think that there's something that seems to be changing with technology, like rolling every single aspect of life where it's like, you're on like, like social media all day, like,

yeah, yeah,

no, I

think, I think that that's

That feels right.

That feels right.

I'm pretty sure

Nice.

Nice one, Brian.

Okay, well, well, I haven't done the product

yet

because,

and, and, I think it actually, it, it hasn't yet.

That's true.

Alex.

I think it fits with your, this concept.

the difference between us and ai, us as humans, flesh, right?

Is that we don't need inputs.

I mean, our bodies are input machines, right?

So

We're all input and output.

What are you talking about?

We put stuff into ourselves and it comes out.

Yeah, but we're

sentient, right?

We absorb things.

It goes

on around.

That's the act of living

Alex.

And one thing that I noticed lately.

So my good product this week is silence.

And.

Jesus.

You

weren't exaggerating

No,

not at all.

I'm not exaggerating

wait.

So you, it's funny that you would do that when you have a massive fan blowing over your head,

when I'm walking in Brooklyn or wherever I am, I, I always think I can use this time very effectively and I'll listen to podcasts and I'll like, be able to, use the time wisely and know what's going on and all that.

And then lately I've just not been doing anything.

I just walk and I find that I get way better.

Like it's way better.

Yeah.

Like

I'm just, I just have way more.

Insight and new ideas.

And I'm thinking about the things that I process all the time.

And so today is an ode to silence.

this is like raw dogging walks.

Basically

like

the, the, the

dogging walks.

I

at the moment it's

uncomfortable, but the effects are good.

yeah, you see, it's resonating

I, I actually, Troy.

I will, agree with that.

I lost my AirPods for a week and I have been less anxious.

much more like in the moment, and I've had better.

Kind of clear thoughts since then.

Yeah, I think that's why the AirPods announcement got me a little bit.

It's because when I have them, I use them a lot.

I find I walk into stores.

I turn on, I block out all the noise around me and I live in my little bubble and now the next generation of AirPods are going to help me when I'm elderly and they're going to, they're going to be an accessory that I never

Hey, I know.

I imagine how many hours of Elon Musk interviews going to be listening to them,

that's kind of

when I worked in an office, it drove me nuts.

The, the, when people would walk around the office with the, the, the AirPods in all day, but that was a long time ago.

it socially acceptable now to walk around with your AirPods and talk to someone, I'm asking Emily.

We, we have no idea.

100%.

I didn't have them until like two weeks ago.

I was always like wired, wired headphones.

but people walk around talking all the time.

It's super weird.

Yeah,

Yeah, so, so you guys are coming around to the silence as good product?

Yeah.

I mean, I think for once you're just like detour, has been useful.

This is your pivot to Buddhism.

I like it, Troy.

Right.

Alright, Emily, thank you so

thank you.

Sorry I was

it.

Really appreciate it.

Thank

you.

you.

Emily.

Bye

Okay, that was great.

great hundredth episode.

Alex has a hard stop.

It's gonna be our spin off podcast.

Hard stop.

We need a third podcast.

We can do this.

Also, we need to start making money.

This, this,

Oh, yeah, that'd be a next, a podcast that we can

Exactly.

You know what we should do?

We should try to make money and make it a segment on the show where we talk about making money.

I think Troy is reticent to do it because he's worried we're not gonna make money.

I have a lot of confidence that we're gonna

Well, Troy is scared to do it because he's afraid of failure.

But if we just, we do it, we turn it into content.

Right, Troy?

up with you guys

Let's make money.

Well, you just told me I didn't like Twitter because I liked Elon and I'm not, you know,

I said the opposite.

I said, cause you hate Elon.

Oh, because I hate

Yeah,

Do you want to make money on this?

Shall we start?

Shall

we start doing it?

No, I do.

I do.

We outnumber you,

I'm talking 20 25 deals with many of my valued partners, so.

I'll do ads.

I'll read ads.

I'll shill for this

Happy 100th episode, guys.

I am, I am very happy and very proud of us for getting it here.

This is a lot, this is an achievement.

this is

Yeah, and I do enjoy our chats.

Yes, I do

you both.

Thank you.

bye.