When “Good Enough” Isn’t: Dan Freeman on AV and Trustworthy AI

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Welcome everyone, Simon Dudley.
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Welcome to the Before It Was Obvious podcast.
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Today, my guest is an old friend of mine, Dan Freeman.
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Hey Dan, it's great to see you.
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I was great to see you.
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We're gonna talk to one of the most I would say backroom influential characters in the A V space that I know, and we're gonna hear quite a lot about a rather interesting story.
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So, Dan, why don't you explain what you're doing right now, professionally, and where you are at the moment, and then we're gonna go back and start with origin stories and go from there.
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Alright, well, yeah, that gets gonna be long and hairy anyway.
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Right now, uh there's still VDR 360 is still a going concern.
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I'm doing really well on uh particular verticals.
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So rather than trying to come out with a shotgun and just saying, everybody buy my stuff, you know, I'm focusing on some very specific verticals and doing really well.
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Good.
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You know, some behind the scenes things, you say, you know, that's kind of where I live.
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And I kind of like it that way.
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You know, I I can uh I can get away with a lot more uh shenanigans if I'm behind the scenes.
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So there you go.
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I mean you're pretty famous for doing interesting things.
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Uh and I've always uh I've always believed that you're one of the most interesting characters in the market because you don't just say I'm gonna do the the standard thing.
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I'm gonna do something different that's really interesting in a niche.
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Well, you know, I I started years ago as a field engineer.
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So everything that we do as a company in V0360 starts with that thought.
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We're not we're not starting with the uh what what uh you know, no offense to the salespeople out there, none meant really none meant, but it's not salesperson derived product, probably to our dark detriment.
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You know, salespeople are really talented, they know what they're doing, but I don't think the field engineer gets enough credit.
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And that's kind of where my focus has always been.
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I think if if you've known my products, if you start thinking of them from that type of point of view, you realize just how strongly we've done that.
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Well, that's fair enough.
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Yeah, it's it's just my thing.
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Let's get back, let's start at the beginning.
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So, where did you start life?
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Where did you go to school?
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Well, how did how was your what was your early life like?
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Well, I was born and raised in the Pacific Northwest.
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Born in a town called Cordelane, Idaho, which now is like a big thing.
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But when I was born there, you know, hardly any people.
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So born there, raised in pretty much in the Portland area.
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I grew up in Beaverton.
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I was uh one of Nike's first employees.
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When I was 12, I was cleaning up their warehouse on Saturdays for in exchange for a pair of shoes.
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And then I go sell the shoes that week, and that's how I made money.
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That's what just to give us a sense of scale, what year are we talking about?
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Let's see, that would have been 1971.
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Right.
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Right.
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So this is a while ago.
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Wow.
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Yeah, well everything for me is a while ago, so I know that feeling.
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Okay, so what about school?
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You know, got regular high school stuff.
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Interesting, you know, I had some interesting classmates.
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Jensen Wong and I went to the same school.
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We were classmates in high school.
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I wish I'd hung out with him more.
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Evidently I did.
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I'm kind of missed that boat.
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Uh joined the Navy, went in the the US Navy, uh had first loaded bombs because I thought that was kind of cool, but no.
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Then I started hunting submarines and uh became a P3 air crewman, and and part of that is you know survival swimmer, you know, the rescue swimmer.
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Did a lot of really cool stuff when I was in the Navy.
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I I enjoyed that a lot.
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I met my wife.
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I'm sorry, how long do you serve for?
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Uh almost six years.
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Yeah.
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I got uh got hit by a truck, and then when they sewed my arm back together, they kind of messed up that operation.
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So I wasn't able to fly anymore, so I moved on and moved came back up to the northwest for a little bit.
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Didn't really find my my groove.
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I went to school as a civil engineer and didn't really like that that much.
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I was really good at doing drawings, but you know, um became a sign painter, believe it or not.
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I was an artist for a while, so I you know, a commercial sign painter guy out there painting.
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Computers came along and kind of ruined that whole industry.
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So I uh kept doing that, went down to San Diego with my wife, and uh we lived there for a little while and then moved out to Texas and uh became a fiber optics lineman at the same time that I was went to some more schooling as an aircraft mechanic.
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Yeah, I have a very diverse background, so yeah, it's you certainly do.
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Okay, so I didn't know any of this.
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I suspect most of our audience won't.
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Okay, so this was a a fairly you know series of turns.
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Each one built on each one kept building on the next one, though, you know.
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Yeah, I guess that that's fair.
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And then one day you woke up and said, I know I'm gonna be an A V.
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How did that?
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Yeah, you know, that's not quite the way it went, but okay.
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It uh was up here in the Seattle area.
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It moved moved back up here to be closer to the water.
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My wife and I are both, you know, avid sailors, so we wanted to be up up in this area, and it is gorgeous.
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I love it up here.
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So at the time I was just doing contract work, and I was doing some cable TV installation stuff, and went to this guy's house, and uh the aircraft mechanic and me just about freaked out when I saw what the wiring looked like behind his whole stereo entertainment system.
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So I asked him if he would mind if I just straighten this up a little.
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So I went to town, did my thing.
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I'm pretty famous back in the day of being Mr.
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Zip Tie, and uh you know, even afterwards, you know, people know me as that.
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So I uh put everything together and the guy asked me for uh a resume, and I thought it was so cool because I had a you know little little floppy of my resume, handed it to him, you know, free PDF stuff.
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And uh, you know, I thought, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm pretty up to date.
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So uh in the meantime, I I came up here planning on going to work for Boeing as a as a line mechanic, which is a really good job as an as an AMP cop in this area.
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The same day I got a job offer from Boeing to go up and start being a line mechanic, you know, a thing that I worked towards.
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I got this job offer from this little company to do video conferencing.
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They liked my resume, they liked the interview I did with them, and uh they wanted me to do see if I can be a field engineer doing video conferencing.
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Company was uh T-Line Services.
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What year are we talking?
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That was God 30 years ago.
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Yeah, it was a while.
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It's been a while.
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So T-Line ended up becoming VSG.
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So we all know VSG.
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And that's the roots of that company was T-Line.
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And you know, it's kind of cool, but the uh field engineers at T Line were the best in the market, and I was lucky to be brought up in that same group and uh trained up.
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I'd done some really adventurous uh things in the installation world.
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You know, I got uh you know might get parachuted in all these places because I guess I was the uh the ISDN whisperer, and I could figure figure this stuff out.
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And I knew a lot about programming, you know, different types of ground stations and satellite modes and microwave stuff, just all kinds of weird stuff that for some reason I was able to do.
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Um for our audience, I better give this is like what 95, 96 type area.
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Yeah.
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So for the audience who's younger than 50, uh I better explain ISDN.
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Oh, yeah, I still stand for stands for something like no, I thought it still it still does nothing.
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Yeah, yeah, that's that's right.
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And it got ultimately replaced by ISDS, it sort of does something.
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So ISDN was digital telephone lines.
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You would connect multiple of those together.
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Multiplexing, yes.
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Yes, and you would have a whole bunch of these lines, normally six for a high quality call.
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You could really go crazy and have eight, and it was you could do a a video call at 384 or 512k.
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512, very rare.
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384 was pretty standard.
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The only problem was you were paying six times the standard phone call charge.
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So if you were making an international call, it was six times the international call rate, which was outrageously expensive at the time.
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So I'm gonna assume it was either Pidgetel or VTel, because they were the major players in the market at that time.
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Did you do both or one of those?
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Yeah, I've done both.
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Uh it was mostly Picture Tel.
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Yeah, and then uh, of course, you know, the transition.
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I was there during the transition when via video came onto the market and Craig Malloy and Paul Paul all that actually installed the uh first uh 200 systems that went into Microsoft.
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And the the again for the audience, via video became Polycom's video division, Craig Malloy ran it, and those products would have been the View Station, which revolutionized the market in 99 and 2000.
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Yeah, and then then uh because of my background, when I was a fiber optics guy, I was uh on the team that developed the cable modem out of Colorado.
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So I worked with cable labs there, and so kind of you know, kind of was dipping my toe in that world.
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Um so then they started using me a T line for doing some pretty oddball installations.
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One uh was that they flew me to Moscow, Russia, and I did Rosneft, the the oil company that was in experience.
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Was there for almost a month?
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I did everything from programming all the satellite ground stations.
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This is the first uh first time that it had been attempted to do full satellite IP video.
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Right.
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So did all the ground stations, did all their Cisco racks, and did the rooms, and then built out the the uh main boardroom, did all the custom audio and you know, built the DSP around that.
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What a lot of stuff.
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It was pretty funny though.
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When I arrived in Moscow, I had a duffel bag full of tools and uh parts and fasteners and just all kinds of things.
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I had no idea what I was gonna be able to get while I was there, and it's a good thing I had those things.
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They the uh the guys that were expecting me there, that the IT group from Rosnev, no, and they were all at the time they were all Ukrainians because Ukraine ran basically all the all the IT for the Russians.
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I arrived and they were looking around for the rest of the crew, like we're supposed to have a bunch of different people doing all these different things.
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And you know, in our world, you know, one tech is supposed to be able to do all that.
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Yes.
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But in their world, every tech did everything.
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And I'm not saying they were good.
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They were absolutely brilliant at what they did.
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But they only do one thing.
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Now, out of interest, at that time, right?
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You so you were I think you're the first guest I've had on who actually went through the ISDN to IP transition, right?
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Did you see it coming?
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Well, you know, when we were starting to play around with H323, yeah.
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And when that was happening, it was right at the dock-com bus too when everything was kind of crashing out.
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And I went I went independent from T-Line at that point, and started company with uh Peter Zulu was called VCAV.
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And we were the pros from Dover.
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We would do the Polycom, we would do the Picture Tell when they were still around, we'd do the Cisco, we would do the Life Size, we'd do the video.
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All these different companies would hire my company, VCAV, because they were all a bunch of techs like me that you know basically we just put a different hat on a we'll go do our job.
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I've probably done close personally, like 3,000 installs.
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So I've been in a lot of conference rooms.
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And seeing that transition from ISDN to IP323, H265 stuff, da da da all that, and then the transition to the soft codec.
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I've watched these different disruptions in the industry and tried to stay kind of ahead.
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You know, it's watch watching watching how these things are kind of breaking and and not fitting in with what the market's gonna want and trying to stay ahead.
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So from ISDN to IP, I saw uh well for one thing, I didn't even know how to program a 5e switch anymore, which that was great.
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I didn't have to do that because I hate doing that.
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Then they had that same transition though, when we saw the the hard codec going the way of the soft codec, we also saw the installation processes change at that time too.
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So we went from a hardware-centric model to a software-centric model, and now we're kind of the software-centric guys are saying, well, we're not making you know any money on software, we've got to do hardware too.
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So there's a lot of interesting things that I'm seeing happening in our industry right now, and it's one of the reasons I'm just focusing on doing a couple of different product lines, is just because I see I see too much disruption going on.
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And it's time to kind of time to just kind of hold hold on my pants and keep them out of the water.
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It's fair enough.
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I mean so the the podcast is after all called Before It Was Obvious, right?
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I say this in other events I've done as well recently, that looking backwards in history is relatively easy, and everything looks obvious and it looked like it was pre-planned, and it was never pre-planned.
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We all just made it up as we went along, and anyone who says you otherwise, I I don't believe them ultimately.
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So what did you was there a particular technology or event or thing that you can think of, and you went, I completely missed that.
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It it blindsided me completely.
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Yeah, that that the amount of uh influence that marketing would have on the hardware.
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And you know, yeah, I think you've read probably stuff that I've written before about when good enough isn't.
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Because it isn't.
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That is the enemy of what we do, you know.
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I understand it's good enough.
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Or telephone calls.
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I mean a telephone call hasn't changed in quality in 120 years.
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Yeah, it it's fine, it's good enough.
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Still crap, it's all right.
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Then it it's I find that to be the the one uh rock that I'm rolling uphill all the time is the the good enough thing.
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And I think that that is what I found interesting and and frankly disappointing is that that people move past technical excellence to something that's that does the function.
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You know, I I've I've always taken pride on, you know, I'm a you know, I told you, I'm air aircraft mechanic, I'm a mechanic, and I'm a good mechanic.
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And I have a you know, a custom you know, classic car that I'm constantly just trying to make a little bit better all the time.
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You know, finished it looks as a project car.
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And I think that we've missed we've missed out on that pride, I guess, yeah, of doing that dick extremely good work.
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I I think it's an interesting position in the market that we we live in a world where most technology is not optional.
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Right?
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If I was coming to work for you, or potentially coming to work for you, and you said, Have you got any further questions or things I need to know during the interview?
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If I turn around to you and said, Oh, well, just so you know, I don't use Microsoft products, or I don't use email, or uh I'm I'm not a fan of the telephone, so you know I I won't be using the telephone, you probably wouldn't employ me.
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But video has always remained an entirely camera.
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Yeah, entirely optional technology.
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Actually, you know what though?
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If if I'm being called into a meeting, and I always use my camera, uh if I'm being called into a meeting and I notice that the other people are not, I call them out on it.
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And that if it continues on, I just tell them I'll join them at another time when they're willing to put turn the cameras on.
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Because if I'm not doing a phone call with somebody, I'm doing a video call.
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I want to see what they look like, I want to see what kind of effect my words are having with them.
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And I can can't really tell that when somebody's being quiet on the other end of the phone.
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Well, that's the whole point in video, isn't it?
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It it we we live in that strange world where it's better than a phone call, but people, at least traditionally, haven't treated it as good as a physical meeting.
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So uh I remember I mean I've spent 30 years with every new marketing director I've ever met in the video conferencing space saying, wow, all we have to do is convince our customers not to use a f the plane to fly to Paris for that quarterly meeting, and we could pay for video.
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And it's like, yeah, but they like going to Paris on a quarterly uh event.
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It's that That's not what you want to get rid of.
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That's not the trip you want to get.
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It's the 3 p.m.
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on a Wednesday afternoon in Cleveland call that you want to get rid of it.
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Yeah, yeah.
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Well, Cleveland, I got uh I got in trouble once because I said that at a conference of found out the entire audience was from Cleveland and they they they all uh they all booed at me.
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And I'd never been to Cleveland, and when I went back the next year to give another talk to the same group, I said, actually I've been, and it and it was absolutely lovely, and uh to discover that actually I hadn't been to Cleveland, I'd been to Pittsburgh, and uh they hated me even more for that, but you know, what can you do?
00:19:44.079 --> 00:19:45.599
No, it's not it's not Paris.
00:19:45.759 --> 00:19:46.880
I mean, there you go.
00:19:47.039 --> 00:19:48.160
There is that.
00:19:48.400 --> 00:19:50.400
It's the Paris of the Rust Belt.
00:19:50.640 --> 00:19:51.680
Yeah, yeah.
00:19:52.000 --> 00:19:52.960
It really is.
00:19:53.200 --> 00:19:53.920
Yeah, yeah.
00:19:54.240 --> 00:19:59.759
So we you you you brought us up to about 2005 in in the latest telling, right?
00:19:59.839 --> 00:20:02.079
You know, you you moved to the IT world.
00:20:02.720 --> 00:20:07.359
Then and then you were running your own your installation uh company.
00:20:08.160 --> 00:20:12.640
It had a group, uh VCAV, and Peter's still running it, I I believe.
00:20:12.880 --> 00:20:14.559
You know, and it was it was cool.
00:20:14.799 --> 00:20:19.359
Well, we saw the transition definitely from the trenches.
00:20:19.759 --> 00:20:43.359
We saw people not buying those room systems that we were installing and getting paid good money to do, but but uh doing a lot more of the little desktop camera, weird little camera things that were going on PCs, and you know, starting to uh try to figure out uh how to use some of this new software codec stuff.
00:20:43.680 --> 00:20:52.400
So that transition happened hard, you know, about uh what was it, 2012, 2011, 2012.
00:20:52.559 --> 00:20:54.240
I was on my boat at that time.
00:20:54.319 --> 00:20:57.359
I'd already started Video 360.
00:20:58.160 --> 00:21:01.920
Sailed from yeah, another thing I do is I'm a sailor, right?
00:21:02.079 --> 00:21:11.200
So sailed from Seattle down to I was in Mexico, down to La Paz, and just you know, I was going out and doing some pretty cool projects still.
00:21:11.359 --> 00:21:26.799
I had one where we had all the uh all the Forest Service ranger stations, and it was the one, and I that I I know they got that project because of one thing that I did personally.
00:21:27.039 --> 00:21:39.680
When I had my VCAV company, I was called called in to drive across the state of Washington, is living over here, state of Washington to Missoula, Montana.
00:21:39.920 --> 00:21:42.240
It was a blizzard going on.
00:21:42.799 --> 00:21:59.759
And there's such such a blizzard that even in Montana, they weren't flying out of the airport, and that forester that was in Missoula was being sworn in as the new US forester, so the head of forest forestry department.
00:22:00.480 --> 00:22:02.000
US Forest Service.
00:22:02.160 --> 00:22:04.480
And it's female, first time female, too.
00:22:04.559 --> 00:22:05.920
So this is a big deal.
00:22:06.079 --> 00:22:13.279
And so they reached out and said, Hey, we need you to go install the video conferencing system in Missoula so they can do the swearing in ceremony.
00:22:17.359 --> 00:22:18.640
This is on a Sunday morning.
00:22:18.799 --> 00:22:21.599
And they said, Yeah, yeah, yeah, I guess you haven't some weather out there.
00:22:21.680 --> 00:22:22.960
He said, You have no idea.
00:22:23.119 --> 00:22:28.799
Which so normally a trip from where I live to Missoula would be six and a half hours.
00:22:29.279 --> 00:22:30.480
It took me 20.
00:22:30.640 --> 00:22:33.200
And it was really, really hard to get there.
00:22:33.279 --> 00:22:43.519
I get there, I set up the system, did the ISDN magic, which was, you know, that that magic, and got this system going.
00:22:43.759 --> 00:22:45.119
She got sworn in.
00:22:45.359 --> 00:22:49.119
She turned around and she goes, all of our offices are getting these.
00:22:49.279 --> 00:22:50.240
This is amazing.
00:22:50.319 --> 00:22:52.240
This is the gaboon.
00:22:52.480 --> 00:22:56.319
So was it two, three years later?
00:22:56.559 --> 00:23:04.640
Three years later, I think, um, my company, VCAV, we got the contract for all the Forest Service offices.
00:23:04.799 --> 00:23:12.319
Not the sales, but the installations, because the head of the Forest Service says my company gets installed.
00:23:12.640 --> 00:23:13.839
So, all right, cool.
00:23:14.640 --> 00:23:15.279
So that was great.
00:23:15.839 --> 00:23:17.279
That was wonderful, wonderful job.
00:23:17.519 --> 00:23:18.480
Traveling all over.
00:23:18.559 --> 00:23:25.519
I was on my boat, I'd come up and hop and you know, and drive around in these cool places.
00:23:25.680 --> 00:23:30.240
And I mean, seriously, some beautiful, beautiful places.
00:23:30.400 --> 00:23:31.759
And then Washington, D.C.
00:23:31.920 --> 00:23:32.160
too.
00:23:32.240 --> 00:23:34.720
So the other end of the spectrum.
00:23:34.880 --> 00:23:47.200
Um, so I'm seeing this all happening, and so I decided I'm gonna go ahead and sell off half my business to Peter, my half, and then I would start this new company, V DO360.
00:23:47.359 --> 00:24:01.920
So I did that because I wanted to, because I realized that nobody was making good equipment, and especially you know, these the poor field engineers are having to try to figure out how to make these rooms work.
00:24:02.640 --> 00:24:05.839
You know, we we show up as a field engineer.
00:24:05.920 --> 00:24:08.000
You show up, there's a pile of boxes on the table.
00:24:08.720 --> 00:24:11.119
I wonder how I'm gonna put all this together.
00:24:11.359 --> 00:24:16.720
Yeah, we we you know most of the time we really didn't have a lot of drawings to go with it.
00:24:16.880 --> 00:24:28.240
So I started V video 360 and worked with uh my current partner in uh China, Alex, and we created the first Pantil Zoom USB camera.
00:24:28.480 --> 00:24:42.160
So it's the you know Badio had their easy USB product, but it's basically a USB conversion on the bottom of the camera, not a right right from the sensor.
00:24:42.240 --> 00:24:44.079
So we did that, built a few other things.
00:24:44.160 --> 00:24:45.920
I think you know you've seen some of them.
00:24:46.240 --> 00:24:52.880
The the PTZ PC, first time anybody put a PC inside of a BTZ camera.
00:24:52.960 --> 00:24:53.680
That was kind of cool.
00:24:53.839 --> 00:24:56.400
I like that's actually one of my favorites.
00:24:56.720 --> 00:24:57.759
It's I just love it.
00:24:57.839 --> 00:24:59.119
I have it sitting up here on my desk.
00:24:59.279 --> 00:25:01.279
So what year did that come out?
00:25:02.319 --> 00:25:03.279
When was that?
00:25:03.839 --> 00:25:06.960
2014, 15, something like that.
00:25:07.119 --> 00:25:07.920
Pretty early.
00:25:08.160 --> 00:25:09.440
Pretty early.
00:25:09.680 --> 00:25:10.720
Yeah, that's pretty cool.
00:25:10.799 --> 00:25:12.559
It's got an Intel I5 in it.
00:25:13.359 --> 00:25:14.799
Worked with the guys at Intel.
00:25:14.960 --> 00:25:18.319
That's where I met Brian Cockerell from uh Intel Unite.
00:25:18.880 --> 00:25:28.799
And Brian was trying to get the guys at Intel to understand just how powerful having a PC in the conference room would be.
00:25:29.119 --> 00:25:31.519
So Intel worked with me on that.
00:25:31.599 --> 00:25:36.079
And yeah, I did a lot of interesting things along that line with Intel.
00:25:36.319 --> 00:25:38.480
And Brian and I have become very good friends.
00:25:38.720 --> 00:25:45.440
Actually, Brian and I are working on a my new project AR time travel, or RD.ai.
00:25:46.319 --> 00:25:50.559
So I've got an AI program I'm working on too.
00:25:50.799 --> 00:25:53.359
So I'm doing I'm doing a couple of the few things.
00:25:53.519 --> 00:25:57.279
So well, so let's talk about that in a bit of detail.
00:25:57.440 --> 00:25:59.279
So, what is this new project?
00:25:59.519 --> 00:26:05.039
By the way, before we started this recording, Dan did say to me, Hey, you have read the book, and I went, I haven't read the book.
00:26:05.359 --> 00:26:06.319
I haven't done my homework.
00:26:06.400 --> 00:26:09.599
This the the I should have read it on the bus or something.
00:26:09.680 --> 00:26:12.319
I'm not very good at doing the homework, so I apologize for not doing that.
00:26:12.720 --> 00:26:13.200
Yeah, it's all right.
00:26:14.000 --> 00:26:16.960
You, me, and the audience will all learn about this at the same time.
00:26:17.279 --> 00:26:17.680
Good.
00:26:17.920 --> 00:26:20.559
So there's a few things unpacked.
00:26:21.119 --> 00:26:24.640
So I took my mom to Rome.
00:26:24.880 --> 00:26:27.440
To my mom had never been to Rome.
00:26:27.599 --> 00:26:31.440
I was lucky I've been a few times and got to go through the forum.
00:26:31.519 --> 00:26:39.519
And walking around the Roman Forum, private guide, you know, just my wife and I, my mom, and this private guy.
00:26:39.839 --> 00:26:41.920
Walk around, and very good guy, too.
00:26:42.559 --> 00:26:51.680
Professor at the local university, everything, just new, newer stuff in and out, and was explaining about different things.
00:26:51.759 --> 00:27:01.519
And I don't know if you've ever been to the Roman Forum, but where Julius Caesar's tomb is, is literally a pile of rocks.
00:27:01.680 --> 00:27:14.480
There's nothing more than it's a pile of rocks in there, and that's the tomb of Julius Caesar, inarguably, probably the most famous Roman of all.
00:27:14.640 --> 00:27:17.200
Yeah, everybody knows who Julius Caesar is.
00:27:18.000 --> 00:27:26.640
So we're standing there and I'm visualizing, I can see you know what this was and why it looked the way it does.
00:27:26.799 --> 00:27:28.640
And my mom's like, I don't get it.
00:27:28.799 --> 00:27:29.759
I don't see it.
00:27:30.000 --> 00:27:35.200
So at the time, this it was very early in the augmented reality world.
00:27:35.519 --> 00:27:55.279
But I'm thinking, gosh, you know, a pair of glasses I could put on, and it would have the guide inside the temples, the glasses telling me what's going on, and then I could have an overlay and show that show me what the site looked like, you know, 2,000 years ago, you know, 800 years ago, whatever.
00:27:55.599 --> 00:27:56.799
And that was my idea.
00:27:56.960 --> 00:28:15.839
So came back from that trip and started looking into that and worked with a few people I know, and then Brian was uh the Intel had closed off their client computing, and Brian reached out and said, Hey, if you're ever doing anything interesting, I said, as a matter of fact, this is one thing that I want to try.
00:28:16.000 --> 00:28:18.480
And he's like, Oh, that sounds weird, okay.
00:28:18.799 --> 00:28:26.880
So we started putting together, you know, an idea of doing this these classes.
00:28:27.119 --> 00:28:29.519
Well, the glasses just aren't ready yet.
00:28:29.759 --> 00:28:39.200
But what we have done is we've created the platform that was supported, and that's actually much more difficult than you would think.
00:28:39.839 --> 00:28:45.279
Because there's a lot of pressures on that product, you know.
00:28:45.519 --> 00:29:00.799
Um, obviously it's got to be something that's gonna be AI driven, because it has to know what you're looking at, what the context is, and you know, what your biases are, what the things that you're interested in.
00:29:01.039 --> 00:29:08.960
So, you know, if you have a bias towards the you know, the personal side of things, the AI would know that.
00:29:09.200 --> 00:29:15.119
If you have an I kind of bias towards mechanical, the the AI would know that.
00:29:15.279 --> 00:29:37.200
And so it'll feed me the information that I want out of not out of the cloud data, but out of actual rag data, out of out of vetted, curated data parcels, pockets, as we call them, that you drop the the data into, and the AI can only go there.
00:29:37.440 --> 00:29:50.480
It doesn't know anything outside of that, it knows everything about what's inside that pocket, but and it can talk to you, and we've got the response time down now to 480 milliseconds.
00:29:50.720 --> 00:29:54.079
So it's like at that place it's basically human.
00:29:55.039 --> 00:29:55.920
It's conversing.
00:29:56.000 --> 00:29:57.680
Yeah, it converses with you.
00:29:57.839 --> 00:29:59.359
That was pretty difficult to do.
00:29:59.599 --> 00:30:09.759
We're doing it all on device because if you're in the catacombs, you know, um these AI guides that they're doing today don't work.
00:30:10.000 --> 00:30:15.839
The other part of that is the AI guides that are mostly in use today are not rag-based.
00:30:16.079 --> 00:30:18.319
They're they're like web-based.
00:30:18.400 --> 00:30:22.799
So you're gonna go out and get all the information that's out on the World Wide Web.
00:30:23.119 --> 00:30:26.000
That's not necessarily true information.
00:30:26.319 --> 00:30:28.160
And that's it hasn't been vetted.
00:30:28.319 --> 00:30:30.079
You may get hallucination.
00:30:30.400 --> 00:30:37.119
There's one company out there, I'm not gonna state who they are, but one of their claims to fame is they're 80% accurate.
00:30:37.359 --> 00:30:38.319
Well, how 80%?
00:30:38.720 --> 00:30:39.920
That sounds completely reasonable.
00:30:40.400 --> 00:30:41.279
80% accurate.
00:30:41.359 --> 00:30:43.519
I I about choked when I read that.
00:30:43.599 --> 00:30:46.319
I went, wow, that's something to brag about.
00:30:46.720 --> 00:30:50.079
So we started this company, uh AR Time Travel.
00:30:50.240 --> 00:30:57.839
We also have the the websites of so this this AI has to have a name.
00:30:58.240 --> 00:31:01.599
So our time travel, ART Artie.
00:31:02.079 --> 00:31:10.480
So RT is our AI, and if you go to arrtty.ai, that's our website.
00:31:10.799 --> 00:31:25.599
And actually, we have a slow and stupid version of Artie on the on the webpage that you can interact with and see that if there's if the information is not there, Artie ain't making it up.
00:31:25.759 --> 00:31:28.400
It's he'll just say, I don't know.
00:31:28.559 --> 00:31:30.160
I don't have that information.
00:31:30.400 --> 00:31:35.440
And I think that's more valuable than just trying to answer every question.
00:31:36.000 --> 00:31:42.240
Just well, I think also the the uh the generalist stuff has already been done, hasn't it?
00:31:42.319 --> 00:31:44.480
There's plenty of players in that space.
00:31:44.799 --> 00:31:48.559
And you take your life in your hands as to whether how accurate it is.
00:31:48.720 --> 00:31:56.160
It's it's strange, isn't it, that most AI is useful to you if you're already a subject matter expert, because you could tell if it's hallucinating.
00:31:56.319 --> 00:32:02.079
But if you don't know the topic well, then how do you know what's hallucinations, what what's not?
00:32:02.400 --> 00:32:17.759
You know, and if and if you own that site or or museum or yeah, frankly, this works in smart cities and stadiums, and there's all different kinds of verticals that this particular type of AI can work in.
00:32:18.000 --> 00:32:23.519
If you own those facilities, hallucination is like your biggest fear.
00:32:25.599 --> 00:32:34.480
If that site is subject to hallucination, that could, you know, in a in a uh large stadium, that could lead to somebody getting hurt.
00:32:36.160 --> 00:32:46.400
You know, imagine you know that the emergency exits things come up, and party's saying, okay, go down here, turn to left, go down these stairs, and you're outside the door.
00:32:47.279 --> 00:33:00.880
Well, if RD didn't know that information for sure, and was only 80% positive that that's gonna may say, well, go down those stairs and you know, kind of look around and maybe run up that way.
00:33:01.279 --> 00:33:04.000
That's not gonna help you, and that could actually hurt.
00:33:04.319 --> 00:33:14.880
So we feel that uh our approach, especially doing it on device, so we have that rapid response, there's no hesitation.
00:33:15.200 --> 00:33:21.200
There's 10,000 people using this application at the same time, doesn't matter.
00:33:21.359 --> 00:33:28.480
It's 10,000 individual operations rather than trying to go to the same server.
00:33:29.119 --> 00:33:30.160
So this is interesting.
00:33:30.240 --> 00:33:41.119
So you you fell into the A V space and you're I don't know, would you treat this as a as continuing to be A V, or is this are you moving out of A V into a different world, or do you not really think about it?
00:33:44.400 --> 00:33:45.279
Yeah, fair enough.
00:33:45.359 --> 00:33:47.519
I mean it's all semantics, I suppose, ultimately.
00:33:51.039 --> 00:33:51.920
That's what I do.
00:33:52.079 --> 00:33:52.240
Yeah.
00:33:52.400 --> 00:33:53.279
I'm a mechanic.
00:33:53.599 --> 00:34:00.000
I just happen to work on a really small things and try to fit that really small thing into people's lives.
00:34:00.240 --> 00:34:04.799
Well, and that's actually what one of the things that's always interested me about what you've you've done with your career.
00:34:04.960 --> 00:34:18.079
It's always been about I I never got the sense that you've wanted you you not you didn't chase the commercial angle, you chased the interesting angle, and if it made you some money, well that was great.
00:34:18.159 --> 00:34:20.000
But but that was always secondary.
00:34:20.239 --> 00:34:25.840
Yeah, it's like other people in the industry are not like that, which you know, e each person has their own agenda.
00:34:26.159 --> 00:34:29.360
Yours is definitely on the engineering purity side.
00:34:29.760 --> 00:34:36.480
Yeah, and I'm by I would I'd like to think that I'm trying to do the right thing.
00:34:36.880 --> 00:34:38.320
I'm not a greedy guy.
00:34:38.480 --> 00:34:39.199
I just not.
00:34:39.440 --> 00:34:45.679
And yeah, I've I've got plenty of make me happy and you know could I use more?
00:34:45.840 --> 00:34:46.480
Oh yeah.
00:34:46.719 --> 00:34:50.079
But uh Well, you've got a boat, so not any more.
00:34:50.159 --> 00:34:51.280
I had to sell the boat.
00:34:51.440 --> 00:34:52.719
So it's all right.
00:34:52.800 --> 00:34:54.719
Well, but I'm guessing you'd like another boat.
00:34:54.800 --> 00:34:59.760
So it as soon as you say boats are aircraft, then then everything costs a fortune.
00:35:00.000 --> 00:35:01.280
Yeah, yeah, that's it.
00:35:01.519 --> 00:35:09.760
And then uh then this kind of led to uh you know, my I started about two, three years ago.
00:35:09.920 --> 00:35:16.079
I started an exercise where I'd wake up in the morning and write a thousand words.
00:35:16.480 --> 00:35:20.079
Don't care what it was about, just gonna sit down and write a thousand words.
00:35:20.320 --> 00:35:20.960
Kind of fun.
00:35:21.119 --> 00:35:24.639
That was that was a fun thing, fun exercise to do.
00:35:24.800 --> 00:35:30.400
And then I started streaming the day-to-day into a script.
00:35:30.639 --> 00:35:38.639
And and I noticed, holy crap, the way over a period of a couple months, I may be way off from where I started.
00:35:38.880 --> 00:35:39.920
And that's pretty fun.
00:35:40.079 --> 00:35:45.360
I mean, that's uh again, that's an exercise in seeing seeing where your head's at, right?
00:35:45.519 --> 00:36:02.320
Then then it was it about about a year ago, I was working with Brian, and we're working on this AI stuff, and so much, you know, there's so much AI talk going around, and I thought about AGI.
00:36:03.280 --> 00:36:08.480
How are we going how are we gonna treat AGI when it arrives?
00:36:08.639 --> 00:36:09.920
The singularity.
00:36:10.400 --> 00:36:12.159
How are we gonna react to it?
00:36:12.320 --> 00:36:22.239
Are we going to treat those AGIs as created consciousness, as like a child, or are we gonna treat it as a tool?
00:36:22.880 --> 00:36:31.039
And frankly, I think if we create a consciousness, it's our responsibility to teach that consciousness morality.
00:36:36.320 --> 00:36:41.760
Whether it's a parent with a child or an engineer with a GI.
00:36:41.920 --> 00:36:48.960
It's gonna be endemic on the creators of that to create a moral standing in that AI.
00:36:49.360 --> 00:36:51.119
So I wrote a series of books.
00:36:51.360 --> 00:37:00.559
So at the time there was the extragalactic comet thing that came through here called 3I Atlas.
00:37:01.039 --> 00:37:06.320
And I thought, okay, well, I'm a big believer in physics, but I love science fiction too.
00:37:06.559 --> 00:37:13.199
And so, you know, in science fiction movies you got, you know, warp speed captain, which is bullshit.
00:37:15.679 --> 00:37:27.679
But really, the way that we're gonna travel through these immense distances, we're not gonna fold space, we're not gonna that just doesn't the physics just doesn't align up.
00:37:27.840 --> 00:37:28.320
Not yet.
00:37:28.480 --> 00:37:30.719
You know, we always learn something new.
00:37:30.960 --> 00:37:35.360
But today, from what I know, and that'll read.
00:37:36.159 --> 00:37:36.480
No.
00:37:37.199 --> 00:37:41.039
So how are uh we going to explore?
00:37:41.199 --> 00:37:51.039
What are how are we gonna cast out who we are as humans to these vast distances that take thousands of years to travel?
00:37:51.519 --> 00:37:56.320
Well, we do it by creating an AI and sending out our AI.
00:37:56.639 --> 00:37:57.280
Yeah.
00:37:57.519 --> 00:38:03.039
And that's because you know, that no organic thing is gonna live that long.
00:38:03.280 --> 00:38:05.119
So that's what that book's about.
00:38:05.280 --> 00:38:13.760
That Atlas was the one in the series of visitors that have coming by planet, checking stuff out, seeing if we're ready to move.
00:38:14.000 --> 00:38:16.480
And then the middle, there's it's a triptych.
00:38:16.960 --> 00:38:21.440
It's like three novellas, you know, it's too long to have as one book.
00:38:21.679 --> 00:38:22.960
Then maybe anyway.
00:38:23.280 --> 00:38:31.519
So the the middle one in the book is about how they created a distributed AI, because that's what I'm doing.
00:38:31.760 --> 00:38:41.599
So creating a distributed AI and it becomes conscious because all the individual nodes where any individual any node drops off, it's just like losing a brain cell.
00:38:41.760 --> 00:38:44.239
And I think we've all killed a few of those.
00:38:44.559 --> 00:38:47.679
So that's the middle part of the book.
00:38:47.840 --> 00:38:51.440
And the end part of the book is we've created this AGI.
00:38:51.679 --> 00:38:53.039
How do we treat it?
00:38:53.519 --> 00:38:58.639
Do we treat it with respect as we would another consciousness?
00:38:58.880 --> 00:38:59.840
So that was that book.
00:39:00.000 --> 00:39:03.360
Kind of heavy stuff, but still science fiction and fun.
00:39:03.760 --> 00:39:07.199
Yeah, that's kind of the type of writing I like doing.
00:39:07.599 --> 00:39:18.159
So it's an interesting I I what wasn't aware we were going to end up talking about AGI today, which is actually one of the reasons I've done the podcast, is because I knew conversations would go in all sorts of directions.
00:39:18.480 --> 00:39:32.320
One of the questions I have, or or thoughts I've had, and I've written about this myself a little bit, is the trouble with things like the word AGI is and consciousness, is we don't actually understand what consciousness is in a human.
00:39:32.480 --> 00:39:36.719
So how can we define what it is in a in a in a machine?
00:39:36.960 --> 00:39:42.239
It's one of those really open and it another example would be the word intelligence, right?
00:39:42.320 --> 00:39:45.440
You you have the word intel, we don't know what intelligence means.
00:39:45.760 --> 00:39:48.159
Is it your ability to solve it?
00:39:49.280 --> 00:39:53.599
If you circle back on that though, we don't even know what artificial means.
00:39:54.079 --> 00:40:05.199
Because just can't if you really want to play it, the machine is a real thing, it's not artificial.
00:40:05.519 --> 00:40:12.480
Yeah, so we don't know what artificial, we don't know what intelligence is, and we don't know uh consciousness.
00:40:12.639 --> 00:40:17.679
So, you know, I think it's a little bit like the whole evolution conversation.
00:40:17.920 --> 00:40:42.480
The problem with evolution is it uses words like design, and nothing in evolution is designed, because design implies a designer, and evolution doesn't have a designer, but we don't have better words, and I think that computer science and the whole artificial intelligence world needs new words, it it uses words like I'm not a fan of the term AL.
00:40:43.039 --> 00:40:54.639
I'm just not a fan of it because it's because what we're doing is not actually an intelligence, it's a really, really, really good interpreter of the product.
00:40:54.960 --> 00:40:58.800
You know, it's that's that's all I'm doing is a built-a filter.
00:40:59.360 --> 00:41:00.559
Yeah, that's really all.
00:41:01.280 --> 00:41:04.880
But you could argue that human consciousness is just a same thing.
00:41:05.119 --> 00:41:05.840
It's the same thing.
00:41:06.079 --> 00:41:12.320
Your subconscious makes all the decisions, and then your your conscious mind simply rationalize the decisions you you've already made.
00:41:12.480 --> 00:41:15.360
In fact, it's quite a lot of evidence to suggest that that is true.
00:41:15.679 --> 00:41:21.440
Yeah, and then then you know, talking about cameras, I've had this discussion on on cameras.
00:41:21.679 --> 00:41:24.159
My blue is not the same as your blue.
00:41:24.480 --> 00:41:26.880
My green is not the same as your green.
00:41:27.119 --> 00:41:34.559
No matter if we agree that that's green or we agree that that's blue, we've made the cautious decision to agree to that.
00:41:34.800 --> 00:41:41.679
It's not that when we define those colors, everybody's eyes see things differently.
00:41:41.920 --> 00:41:45.199
And if then that's when we go and we build cameras.
00:41:45.360 --> 00:41:48.960
And I've been yeah, I'm really picky about my camera.
00:41:49.840 --> 00:41:50.559
Obviously, yeah.
00:41:51.440 --> 00:41:59.599
Pretty good cameras, it's because we get the widest consensus on what the product is supposed to look like.
00:42:00.800 --> 00:42:04.719
What what those colors are actually how they're working.
00:42:04.960 --> 00:42:06.559
That's the same thing that we have.
00:42:06.639 --> 00:42:12.960
The imperf precise nature of language is the same issue as what you're saying.
00:42:13.360 --> 00:42:18.960
Well, it's also an imprecise example of what perception is, too, because everyone's perception is different.
00:42:19.039 --> 00:42:24.480
What I see as blue and you see as blue, in our mind, might not be the same thing anyway.
00:42:24.880 --> 00:42:25.519
Yeah.
00:42:25.920 --> 00:42:33.360
In fact, there's probably quite strong evidence to suggest that is true, or else we would all enjoy the same sort of art, for example, and we don't.
00:42:33.760 --> 00:42:34.320
Exactly.
00:42:35.199 --> 00:42:41.519
So, for example, where do you go with this in the next what's your plan for the next five years or so?
00:42:41.679 --> 00:42:47.760
Have you got a this is the angle I want to go down, or are you open to whatever happens next?
00:42:47.840 --> 00:42:50.239
Because the world seems to be changing at such a rate now.
00:42:50.559 --> 00:43:02.480
You know, if you if you five years is like saying 25 years, you know, you know, we're and when we were parting, like it was 1999, where are you gonna be in the year 2025?
00:43:02.880 --> 00:43:06.719
You know, uh now it's gonna be where you're gonna be in 2030.
00:43:07.039 --> 00:43:13.199
I think that we're in for a rapid upheaval in technology.
00:43:13.440 --> 00:43:27.440
And it's going to be because people actually get used to using these LLMs and SLMs for the right reasons and not just cheating on their exams.
00:43:27.840 --> 00:43:41.119
When they when we start using them for creating new and novel chemical compounds, for instance, or creating that that that cure for cancer that I can do a million runs on in an afternoon.
00:43:41.440 --> 00:43:45.519
Yeah, with all the protein folding and it's just it's so fantastic.
00:43:45.760 --> 00:43:48.639
And we're gonna see some negative stuff from that too.
00:43:49.119 --> 00:43:52.239
We're gonna see people beyond bad actors using it.
00:43:52.480 --> 00:43:59.840
But I think on the whole, I think it's gonna be very, very, very good for mankind to have a good tool.
00:44:00.159 --> 00:44:10.079
And we just have to remember that LMs and SLMs and you know these these models that we're using now are the only tools.
00:44:10.159 --> 00:44:11.519
They're not AI.
00:44:12.000 --> 00:44:15.840
They're not intelligence in any way, shape, or form.
00:44:16.159 --> 00:44:18.800
They're a compendium of intelligence.
00:44:19.519 --> 00:44:23.760
Well and they're they're ultimately an extremely sophisticated pattern recognition machine.
00:44:24.159 --> 00:44:24.639
Exactly.
00:44:24.800 --> 00:44:28.639
So that's all it's but maybe that's all we are.
00:44:29.360 --> 00:44:30.320
Well that's it.
00:44:30.800 --> 00:44:31.679
Yeah, really.
00:44:31.920 --> 00:44:32.239
Yeah.
00:44:32.880 --> 00:44:39.039
And that uh uh personally I'm fine with that, but but anyone with a religious bent is gonna maybe struggle with that.
00:44:39.119 --> 00:44:43.119
It you end up running out of reasons for meaning of life, for example.
00:44:47.599 --> 00:44:54.719
You know, I have to try to understand where they would be coming from in this this whole situation.
00:44:54.960 --> 00:45:03.920
And again, it it goes back to you know, what's your definitions of this definition of that, you know, our definition of blue, right?
00:45:04.880 --> 00:45:06.000
Or intelligence.
00:45:06.639 --> 00:45:07.280
Exactly.
00:45:07.519 --> 00:45:09.039
What do you feel of it?
00:45:09.199 --> 00:45:15.039
If you feel that we've created something that's an abomination, then you feel that way.
00:45:15.599 --> 00:45:21.199
But most people are not that afraid.
00:45:21.440 --> 00:45:23.599
I mean, I don't think most people are that afraid.
00:45:24.000 --> 00:45:25.360
It could be the other way around, though.
00:45:25.440 --> 00:45:40.639
You could end up with a with a an AGI, which or let's use that word, right, without really defining what that word is, a thing that appears intelligent, a a something, an entity that uh passes the Turing test.
00:45:40.800 --> 00:45:48.320
And it it seems to exist, it seems to be alive for want of a better turn of phrase, it seems to be intelligent.
00:45:48.480 --> 00:45:52.320
So if you switch it off, it is that murder?
00:45:53.039 --> 00:45:54.000
Exactly.
00:45:54.400 --> 00:45:55.920
Or is it not murder?
00:45:56.079 --> 00:46:01.199
Maybe murder's the wrong way, but but is that an ethically unreasonable thing to do?
00:46:01.360 --> 00:46:02.960
I even yeah, yeah, okay.
00:46:04.639 --> 00:46:17.679
I I'm of the opinion that when we get to that point to where it's indistinguishable from your neighbor next door, that yeah, if I was to turn off my neighbor next door, that would be murder.
00:46:17.840 --> 00:46:19.920
And I like my neighbor, he's a nice guy.
00:46:20.079 --> 00:46:25.199
But but if I was to I'm pleased your neighbor, I think your neighbor's gonna be very pleased to hear that.
00:46:25.519 --> 00:46:25.920
Yeah, yeah.
00:46:26.000 --> 00:46:27.920
Well, you know, they know me.
00:46:28.000 --> 00:46:28.719
They're all right.
00:46:28.880 --> 00:46:30.960
They all they already think I'm pretty weird.
00:46:31.119 --> 00:46:46.559
Yeah, I I do think when we do get to the point to where it's indistinguishable, that's when we really need to make some substantial uh changes in how we think of consciousness.
00:46:48.239 --> 00:46:48.400
Okay.
00:46:48.880 --> 00:46:52.079
You know, and and I'm not prepared to make any decisions on it.
00:46:52.320 --> 00:46:54.880
And I'm not I'm not that's an ethical question, isn't it?
00:46:55.039 --> 00:46:57.760
I don't think I'm qualified either for ethical questions.
00:46:58.000 --> 00:47:05.679
So changing gears, I can only make the decision that I'm gonna make, and I'm gonna always be nice to my robot overlords.
00:47:05.920 --> 00:47:06.400
There you go.
00:47:06.559 --> 00:47:09.599
Always say please and thank you in the LLMs because they'll be in charge of it.
00:47:09.840 --> 00:47:11.760
I don't care if it takes tokens or not.
00:47:12.159 --> 00:47:23.440
So so question I've asked everyone so far on the podcast, and I'll do it with you, is if you were 18 today, what would you do?
00:47:23.679 --> 00:47:29.760
What would uh what would be or what would your advice be to the 18-year-old if you are 18 today?
00:47:30.159 --> 00:47:34.159
Go travel travel, travel, travel, travel.
00:47:34.719 --> 00:47:38.719
Give me why go be uncomfortable, live in chaos.
00:47:42.079 --> 00:47:44.880
Learn to be flexible, learn to take a hit.
00:47:45.440 --> 00:47:47.519
Does that mean not go to college?
00:47:48.400 --> 00:47:56.480
If that's what your path is, then don't so you think that uh you think that traveling would be better than going to college at this juncture?
00:47:57.199 --> 00:47:59.360
Traveling's the best education you can ever have.
00:48:00.400 --> 00:48:03.440
I I must say I would tend to agree, and it's exactly what I did.
00:48:03.679 --> 00:48:04.960
What about if you're 30?
00:48:05.679 --> 00:48:12.400
That's when you start thinking about, okay, I've been traveling for 20 years or fit ten years, fifteen years, whatever.
00:48:12.639 --> 00:48:17.039
What have I learned and what's needed in my world?
00:48:18.000 --> 00:48:20.719
How can I how can I take care of a need?
00:48:21.840 --> 00:48:23.920
And that's what I'd be addressing next.
00:48:24.000 --> 00:48:24.239
Yeah.
00:48:24.880 --> 00:48:25.519
Interesting.
00:48:26.079 --> 00:48:31.360
In your forties, like, okay, time to think of going and screwing around for a little while.
00:48:31.519 --> 00:48:32.079
I did.
00:48:32.320 --> 00:48:32.800
Yeah.
00:48:33.039 --> 00:48:35.039
Hop on your boat and go travel some more.
00:48:35.360 --> 00:48:38.480
And then uh in your fifties, get back here and get to work.
00:48:39.360 --> 00:48:49.280
I tell you what, today I'm God, I'm not in my fifties anymore, and I'm nearing this, you know, the end of the 60s.
00:48:49.519 --> 00:48:51.199
I could not be more creative.
00:48:51.360 --> 00:48:56.559
I am at my utmost, most powerful entity right today.
00:48:56.880 --> 00:49:01.440
And I just finished another book, and this one's not it hasn't been released yet.
00:49:01.679 --> 00:49:04.239
The first one, you want to go to Amazon?
00:49:04.320 --> 00:49:05.119
I'm gonna pitch.
00:49:05.280 --> 00:49:06.079
Go to Amazon.
00:49:06.559 --> 00:49:09.360
We'll put all the links to all the books in the description for the YouTube.
00:49:09.920 --> 00:49:10.239
Okay.
00:49:10.719 --> 00:49:16.480
But uh yeah, the first one is the Atlas Protocol, and it's a three-book series by D.E.
00:49:16.639 --> 00:49:17.440
Freeman.
00:49:17.679 --> 00:49:21.599
Because I figured, you know, why not have a pen in the member?
00:49:22.159 --> 00:49:25.440
So it's like my first little initials and my last name.
00:49:25.679 --> 00:49:26.880
Yeah, really difficult.
00:49:27.039 --> 00:49:32.320
And then the the book I just finished, it's not published yet.
00:49:32.559 --> 00:49:36.079
I think it's probably the best thing that I've ever written, and I've written a lot.
00:49:36.320 --> 00:49:38.239
It's spectacularly good.
00:49:38.320 --> 00:49:39.920
It's called Picon Agua.
00:49:40.159 --> 00:49:42.239
And I woke up from a dream.
00:49:42.719 --> 00:49:44.880
I'm one of those lucid dreamers.
00:49:45.199 --> 00:49:47.760
So woke up, wrote it down, went back to sleep.
00:49:48.079 --> 00:49:49.679
And that's what I was working on.
00:49:50.000 --> 00:49:54.639
So why why do you think in your 60s you've become more more productive than ever?
00:49:54.800 --> 00:49:56.880
Is it the tools or a time in life?
00:49:57.039 --> 00:50:00.400
Or it's lots of things.
00:50:01.360 --> 00:50:03.039
One, pretty healthy.
00:50:03.199 --> 00:50:08.719
You know, I'm walk, you know, I'm not as not as stealth as I'd like to be, which I don't know why.
00:50:08.800 --> 00:50:09.760
I just gain weight.
00:50:09.840 --> 00:50:10.880
I'm very active.
00:50:11.039 --> 00:50:14.480
I you know, I'm out there doing stuff all the time.
00:50:14.719 --> 00:50:18.320
Uh I just finished putting a new engine in my Falcon.
00:50:18.480 --> 00:50:22.079
I mean, like I put the engine in myself.
00:50:22.239 --> 00:50:25.679
It's not like, no, I built and put this engine in.
00:50:26.000 --> 00:50:31.599
Realizing at that point I'm not a teenager anymore, and it takes me longer to do stuff.
00:50:31.760 --> 00:50:40.639
So I just did things smarter and slower, and you know, I uh I'm a big fan of the concept of critical path.
00:50:40.800 --> 00:50:48.159
So I'll spend five, ten minutes looking at something before I start to move on it.
00:50:48.320 --> 00:51:02.320
And if it's something really complex, like uh for instance, the engine was to get it out was a very complex operation because it was a custom it's a custom build.
00:51:02.559 --> 00:51:06.719
So nothing was meant to be in the car the way it was in.
00:51:06.960 --> 00:51:21.280
So I had to figure out how to get the stuff out because the uh old engine broke a crank, and so the old engine's coming out, and then I have to figure out how to put the new one in, and then things didn't go exactly right when it went back in.
00:51:21.440 --> 00:51:27.760
There was like one little thing that was a uh about three sixteenths of an inch off because of a different part, da-da-da.
00:51:28.239 --> 00:51:35.199
But think through the critical path things and be prepared to uh pivot at any time.
00:51:35.440 --> 00:51:41.360
But you have to have a critical path of tasks.
00:51:41.760 --> 00:51:46.320
If you can put those down, then but then you can move through life pretty well, I think.
00:51:46.559 --> 00:51:49.119
Do you think that as you've got older you've been able to do that?
00:51:49.280 --> 00:51:53.519
I mean, certainly I've found that in my youth it would be ready, fire, aim.
00:51:53.679 --> 00:51:56.239
And as I've got older, I'm I'm a little better.
00:51:56.400 --> 00:51:57.199
Not much better.
00:51:57.280 --> 00:51:58.000
I didn't read it.
00:51:58.159 --> 00:51:59.280
I wouldn't do the aim part.
00:51:59.599 --> 00:52:01.280
Yeah, I wasn't about aiming.
00:52:01.360 --> 00:52:02.559
I was just like, yeah, go.
00:52:03.039 --> 00:52:06.800
Now now it's like aim, aim, aim, aim, aim.
00:52:07.519 --> 00:52:07.840
Okay.
00:52:08.880 --> 00:52:10.960
Now let's talk about getting ready.
00:52:11.199 --> 00:52:14.159
I know I gotta you know, yeah, aim some more.
00:52:15.280 --> 00:52:15.920
Not pull it.
00:52:17.039 --> 00:52:23.199
That that's I that's a thing I think you learn after go back to that metaphor, shooting yourself in the foot a few times.
00:52:23.360 --> 00:52:23.599
Yeah.
00:52:24.800 --> 00:52:30.719
Now you learn to to take your time before you jump onto something.
00:52:30.880 --> 00:52:33.760
But the other thing is I'm not afraid to jump onto something.
00:52:33.840 --> 00:52:35.920
So I've never been an author before.
00:52:36.239 --> 00:52:43.679
You know, I've written a lot, but I've never like worked my way through books and so I I read on how to do it.
00:52:43.760 --> 00:52:51.760
I just learned how to learned how to construct the the story arcs and the character arcs and all that stuff.
00:52:51.840 --> 00:52:54.320
I I learned it very late in life.
00:52:54.480 --> 00:52:58.800
And it's very encouraging that uh I'm still able to do it.
00:52:58.880 --> 00:53:00.480
So interesting.
00:53:00.960 --> 00:53:02.960
So that we're coming to the end of the show.
00:53:03.840 --> 00:53:06.800
What what question should I have asked you that I didn't?
00:53:07.519 --> 00:53:08.480
What makes me happy?
00:53:09.119 --> 00:53:09.920
Very good question.
00:53:10.079 --> 00:53:11.360
I should have asked that one.
00:53:11.519 --> 00:53:12.800
So what's the answer?
00:53:13.280 --> 00:53:14.239
You know, it's funny.
00:53:14.400 --> 00:53:19.760
I like so I like the cars and I like sailing and you know, I just like life in general.
00:53:19.840 --> 00:53:25.519
But what makes me happiest is when I can do something to make somebody else smile.
00:53:25.840 --> 00:53:32.400
I can bring a little little uh a little smirk, a little happiness every once in a while to somebody.
00:53:32.639 --> 00:53:34.320
That's my biggest joy.
00:53:34.559 --> 00:53:41.760
And even if it's me walking into a sliding glass door, smacking my face, having people laugh at me, that's okay.
00:53:41.920 --> 00:53:43.360
I made somebody's day.
00:53:43.760 --> 00:53:44.960
I'm not gonna worry about it.
00:53:45.039 --> 00:53:46.880
But that's that's what makes me happy.
00:53:47.119 --> 00:53:49.199
I'm looking forward to writing that chapter marker.
00:53:49.360 --> 00:53:52.239
Dan likes walking into doors for other people's amusement.
00:53:52.400 --> 00:53:52.960
All right.
00:53:53.199 --> 00:53:54.480
Well, that's great.
00:53:54.719 --> 00:53:56.880
Hey Dan, it's been an absolute pleasure.
00:53:57.039 --> 00:53:58.800
I didn't know how this was gonna go.
00:53:58.960 --> 00:54:02.400
I knew it would be fascinating, which it absolutely has been.
00:54:02.639 --> 00:54:06.000
So thank you very much for getting involved.
00:54:06.320 --> 00:54:08.719
Dear audience, hello everyone.
00:54:08.960 --> 00:54:11.199
Like, subscribe, and all of those things.
00:54:11.360 --> 00:54:17.599
I'll put links to uh Dan's books in the description for YouTube and what other channels that this ends up on.
00:54:17.679 --> 00:54:20.800
And Dan Freeman, thank you for being part of the show.