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I'm Nick Richmeyer, and this is Dam's Given, a podcast where we explore how to free your venture from the extraction economy, realigning it to the timeless ways that humans build, collaborate, and buy.
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Dams Given, a podcast this week about the future of craft, of creative thinking, and what it means to build something people want to buy.
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There's a conversation happening right now between tech people and craft people, and it isn't really going very well.
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The tech site says craft is quaint and that's cute and so nice, and go have your art and opera.
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You know, people still listen to opera, the 12 people that listen, and for everything else, there's AI.
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And AI can approximate that, put its best in place, and replace the mass middle of the market.
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And that is true at a variety of craft levels.
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I've had this conversation with consultants and others who engage the middle market and our sell services into the B2B environment.
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And there's increasing frustration about the perception that what these folks do, what they make, can be replaced by AI when they know it can't be.
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And part of what AI does, right, is it shrinks the value stack.
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It says, oh, well, we thought value went from way down here to way up here, and there's a price range all the way through that from very low commoditized to very high elite.
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What it does, it says, no, actually, the value stack isn't that really tall thing.
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It's really short.
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And the bottom half of the value stack should be free.
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And all the other part of the commercial enterprise around whatever it is that you're selling should fit in this much smaller space.
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And that argument from the AI movement has taken hold in the marketplace.
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People believe that to be true.
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And the crap people say, well, gosh, this is technology is ruining everything and destroying everything.
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Nothing's good anymore.
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You can't make good stuff.
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No one appreciates anything.
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No one has any taste.
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And the reality is, as was almost always the case when we're on the horns of a dilemma, is that both those sides are wrong.
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Or at least they represent a shared set of assumptions that aren't serving us.
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Today, I bring on Chris McAdoo, who's a really unique voice.
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He spent his entire career living in the space between these two camps as a musician, a visual artist, a brand strategist, and as an advisor to startups, tech startups, trying to figure out who they're actually for.
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He's working with scientists at national labs, sending things to space, and artists introducing their work to for the first time.
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And because of that interesting Venn diagram and intersection, he's noticing these similar things from both rooms, this same flawed set of assumptions that the problem is almost never the quality of the work.
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The problem is what happens between the work and the world.
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What I tell our clients is every venture is a negotiated thing.
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Once you decide to hang up a shingle and put it out in the world, it's not you.
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It's not them.
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It's not even your customers.
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It's not even your team.
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It is this negotiated thing.
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Something I go into deep detail on how to actually do that negotiation in my book, The Damn Rules.
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But today we're going to talk about it specifically around this area of craft, people who make things and why it matters more than ever and why it just isn't enough to make a thing.
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You have to negotiate the thing.
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We're going to talk about this brief window in internet history when showing up was enough.
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Boy, that was a really fun time.
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And what that window kind of socialized into us, into an entire generation of builders and creators that is not useful.
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We're going to talk about how in the music industry today a house concert probably makes more than a venue tour, or certainly more than putting up your records on Spotify.
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And we're going to talk about, and we're going to end up somewhere which is a home base for me and a place that I invite everybody we work to, and a place that I invite everybody we work with and talk to to move toward.
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And that is the point in which we stop seeking attention and start paying it.
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Just would love it if you would join me in welcoming Chris McAdoo to Dam's Given.
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All right, well, Chris, welcome.
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Um, as I mentioned in the intro, Chris is like, you know, one of these multi-hyphenates joining us.
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Uh he's a musician, a brand guy, a strategist for startups.
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But really, you and I started talking, and the reason why I want to talk to you today has a lot to do with this kind of false collision that we're having between like the tech people and the craft people, and they can't get along.
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And you know, I don't mean to minimize that in some ways for good reason.
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But I think we've got to have really structured and thoughtful conversation around some of our really tough sacred cows, like craft.
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And it's not that there is no room for craft, it's not that it doesn't matter anymore.
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In fact, maybe it matters more than ever, but we have to think really well about what to do about it.
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Uh, Chris is gonna help us with that.
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Um, thanks for joining us, Chris.
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Um, starting, what got you thinking about sort of this relationship between sort of craft and business and how all these things meet together?
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I know you've got a lot of inputs that is your creativity, but give us a sense of that.
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Yeah, so all of these different things.
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Nick, when we started talking about this concept of craft isn't enough, I would actually say, to your point, it's more important than ever.
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And so it's more important that we take it seriously.
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And I've kind of done my own thing, both as a as an artist, as a person who's owned business and everything, since I was like 13 years old.
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And so it has always occurred to me, there's never a lack of ideas, but there's always a lack of execution.
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And so, you know, you've now you've probably had those conversations like, oh man, I've got this great idea.
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I just need somebody to do it.
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And you're like, you're like, well, no, that's the hard part, like that is the actual hard part.
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And so I've had the opportunity to sort of be all of these different things, but then also had the opportunity to work with people across the spectrum.
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And so one interesting thing that I have seen is if I'm talking to a the smartest person in the room, a national lab-ranked scientist sending stuff to space, or an artist introducing their work, their passion to the world, same conversation.
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I love this.
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Why don't people understand it?
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Man, why don't people love the thing that I'm doing in the same way that I do?
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And then you sort of work back from there.
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It's like you can't take for granted that people are going to hear what you're saying, see what you're doing, or understand what you're trying to accomplish without you being able to communicate.
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Like, guys, this is this is why this is valuable.
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This is why you understand your audience, you know, understanding your audience and understanding what it means to them.
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Let's let's start there.
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Let's break that down a little bit because I think there's so many layers going on there.
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And I think what's really fascinating and why I wanted you in this conversation is because it's easy to see how this might affect the entrepreneur, or it's easy to see how this might affect the designer who makes logos for a living, or it's easy to see how this might affect some of these more narrow segments.
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But when you start to see it thematically across all of these different areas, for me, that start, you know, triggers my systems thinking brain of like, oh, something really funky is going on here, right?
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And it seems like one of the early layers of this is this embedded idea that because I love a thing, people should like it.
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Right.
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So whether that's the entrepreneur, you know, whether that's the entrepreneur who invented some, you know, piece of tech or whatever, you know.
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But that whole concept is so pervasive, and I think is really running against some, you know, rough-shod ground these days.
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But speak to that layer of it first.
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It's this like, I made a thing, why don't people love it?
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Oh, dude, okay.
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So, yeah, personal examples, right?
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Like, I love Tom Waits.
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And if anybody out there listening is familiar with Tom Waits, you either love him or you hate him.
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Either way, totally cool.
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Right?
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Like you, you in everybody develops their personal taste and their personal cultures.
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And we all have our particular lived experiences that bring us to everything that we step into.
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And so I think one of the things that I've had to come to terms with about that side of it is that how I guess like how presumptive of me to think that you know, you would like the same books, experiences, things I make, or things that we're gonna share in the same way that I do, because it presumes that what I am saying is right.
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And while it may be in some in some ways, like everyone is coming at everything from their own point of view.
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That's right.
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That's right.
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I I do think I want you to react to this because we're seeing this a lot.
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I I see this a lot more in people who are like 30 to 50, right?
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There there is some younger generation thing, but people who grew up on the internet, right?
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Like so, particularly those of us who grew up when the internet still worked.
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Um, we lived before it has been inshitified.
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Right, exactly.
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I mean, quite literally, right?
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There's that early stage in the insidification cycle where everything is built for the user.
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And the user, right?
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So we all had that lived experience that for a very brief amount of time, you could like, you know, the blogger area, why you just stand up a blog and all of a sudden people are reading it, you know, or you show up on YouTube and you put out a few videos and all of a sudden people are watching.
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So there's this lived experience for a very brief window of time under a very specific set of constraints that I think socialized this idea that, hey, if you just show up and you use the magical powers of the internet, people will find you and love you.
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And it just ain't true, right?
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I mean, how does that gel with your experience?
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Dude, Soylent Green is made out of people.
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And as it turns, also, for anybody who gets that reference, you know, it certainly shows that you were in the gifted and talented programs in middle school.
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Well, we'll put we'll put the hint in the show notes if that's not a familiar.
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I think that what you have, and maybe you maybe you have seen this as well, is you have folks that are now building these platforms.
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These are second, third, fourth, fifth generation platforms.
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And when I say platforms, I am talking about now social media or whatever you want to Google, YouTube, all of it.
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Yeah.
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All that stuff, all of this has been bought, sold, and turned over so many times that the motives are different.
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What is the intention?
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What is the incentive for those platforms to exist?
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And I think we need to be very clear about like the incentive is profit for the companies that own them.
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And I'm not even saying that in a negative way because companies need to make money.
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But when you take that into account, that the people that are building a lot of these quote unquote connective tissues in that in the olden times, there was this there was this actual sense of curiosity, of this surprised connection.
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But we have now, I think, people that are building extractive machines to connect us, and they don't like people.
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And so they're building things built upon assumptions that may not align with the actual experience of people that like to go to the grocery store.
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I they like to go to shows, they like to make their own music, they like to learn to play guitar because it's a skill you want to master.
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And I think when you when you speak about those, a lot of those surprises and the things that I think we may have experienced in that first wave of what this internet is, we're real.
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But our but these next generation have never lived with that excitement and experience of like, wait a second, I can just send a message to my friend?
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Because of course you can.
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You know, yeah.
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Oh, yeah, I I I think what you raise is really important.
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And I think again, we've talked about this on this show before.
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Talking with folks offline, I can tell that we we can never talk about it enough.
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Yeah, there was a very brief window where we weren't the product, and we were actually people using an innovation, and that innovation was doing a thing.
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But the the subtext of that is that we had very, very patient capital for 10 or 15 years.
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Those early stages, these businesses didn't make any money.
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They were burning money on the hopes that someday they could figure out how to turn it into revenue.
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And and guess what?
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They figured it out, right?
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It took them a while, but they figured out how to turn all of our, hey, look at me doing a thing, whether that's hey, look at my business or look at my song I wrote or whatever it is.
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They figured out a way to turn all of our look at me doing a thing into their own form of revenue.
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And that changes the dynamic entirely.
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You just introduced a phrase that I think is really important, patient capital.
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Right.
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So, and these are conversations that also, and this is more towards the younger audience.
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Like, if you would have told 20-year-old art major Chris McAdoo that he would ever say the words or understand what patient capital meant, he'd be like, I don't know if he would believe you.
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But what what what that is, is you're right.
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The technologies that are being developed now are filled with patient capital.
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And so what you saw there is when there is money to the money that has the ability to wait, it has the ability to lock in on a here's where we here's where we go.
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Here's where we start to extract, here's where we start to exclude, here's where, and this is like you know, a common example, and we'll just go ahead and get hot on it, right?
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You look at some of the platforms out there that allow for, you know, hey, you upload an image and you can all of a sudden make that image, you know, sexually exploitative or this.
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And when that company, XAI, got a lot of blowback, I'm like, hey, we don't want this.
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Instead of saying, oh, we messed up and we should probably be in trouble for this and we should cancel all this, that company said, you know what, guys, you're right.
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We're just gonna put this in the paid version.
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Because they under, I mean, again, they understood the basic economic forces, is that there was demand for this.
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They just needed to be able to provide some sense of, you know, protecting the children, so to speak.
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And and I've talked about this, is that I really believe that a lot of this discussion that we're having about, oh, we need to get kids off of tech, we need to get kids off of social media, we need to get teenagers off these platforms.
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I'm not saying it's necessarily bad, although the data is pretty mixed on whether it's actually working.
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What I what my visibility into it, and I have teenagers, is that this is like a socially acceptable way to deal with our own guilt about what we've built.
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So we're not willing to protect ourselves.
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We're not willing to, we're not willing to protect the economy, we're not willing to protect our peers, business peers.
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So we we'll we'll leverage it in the only thing we'll allow ourselves to do, which is to protect the children.
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And the reality is we've allowed for really a platform economy that doesn't serve hardly anybody, to be honest.
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Like really serves only a very small number of people.
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Because what's interesting, you said there's patient capital right now, and I agree with that.
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But what's really fascinating is the patient capital of 15 years ago was hey, let's try banking, let's try design, let's try that.
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Like it's it's money that was trying a bunch of different things.
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And now we're at a level of the iteration where the only thing that matters is platforms.
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So there is patient capital, but the but almost all of it.
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In fact, I just saw a recent statistic that last year, 80% of venture capital went to AI platforms.
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So yeah, that that I that capital is proving to be somewhat patient, like we're gonna build out massive data centers and we're gonna do all this stuff, but it's now in a very, very narrow space.
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And what's gonna be interesting around that, because I help I I a lot of times I'm working with companies that are raising, you know, capital, all this kind of stuff, is the thing that I have sort of shouted from the rooftops for a couple of years is like saying you are AI powered or this or that.
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We used the dirty word now, but it's like saying you're that is kind of like saying you and I are using computers to do this.
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And here is definitely one thing I would say to those folks that you know, back to the craft isn't enough, right?
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Like back to that.
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Like, what can we we see what's happened, but what can we do about it is starting to become smarter and paying attention to like what are these incentives?
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What are they trying to build?
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Why are they trying to build it?
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And and I think there's these bets being made, and some of them are going to fail in a dramatic, dramatic fashion.
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And so the things that I like to think about about that uh is what is what are the things that we can do, or we can focus on the things that aren't going to change.
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And that means like if you are an artist, if you are a trying to build a business, if you are a leader, people do not want to feel unappreciated, people don't want worse service, people don't want all of those things.
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And I am looking forward to once the sort of froth settles down, and I think it's gonna be like 12, maybe 24 months around this.
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What happens when people start you know what what happens when we're back in person?
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What happens when trust becomes hard to verify, right?
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Without looking somebody in the eye.
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Yeah.
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Yeah.
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I mean, what I you're more optimistic than I am.
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I think we're I think we're in like a I mean, it depends on what froth we mean.
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This sort of like chewing through the supposed bubble and all of that, I think, yeah, 12 to 24 cycle, we'll know where we are with that.
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The sense of kind of permanent unknown, permanent insecurity, by virtue of the word permanent, I think we're in this for a while.
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And maybe for those of us who are early to you know, mid to late mid-career, we might be in it for our entire career.
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And so then I think which gets us back to your point, which is we're gonna have to learn how to make these kind of first principles, core behavioral decisions that are a little bit era agnostic because we actually can't even figure out what era we're in.
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Every new substack that comes out renames the era, right?
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Is it the AI era?
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Is it the deep fake era?
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Is it the attention era?
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Is it the right the era's been renamed 87 times?
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We can't decide what era we're in.
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And that I think further validates that we have to get back to these first principles.
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And I think that's really coming full circle.
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What you and I were talking about when we were talking about craft not being enough.
00:19:50.240 --> 00:20:11.200
It's not that craft doesn't matter, it's that you're gonna have to figure out how to bring that thing that you made into a network of relationships, into a way of going to market, into a way of engaging with other people that may not be dependent on yesterday's favorite algorithm.
00:20:11.920 --> 00:20:19.279
Well, and what may actually to what you're I I love that because what you're really talking about is context.
00:20:20.319 --> 00:20:23.519
What context are you operating in?
00:20:24.160 --> 00:20:38.400
To a lot of folks, I think that depending on it depends on how you for a lot of people, it depends on how you were brought up and how you relate to what is it?
00:20:38.480 --> 00:20:42.000
Uh what's the say he's like how you relate to being uncomfortable.
00:20:42.960 --> 00:20:49.440
And I've had, I think, the good fortune of like even growing up, both my father and mother were entrepreneurial.
00:20:49.759 --> 00:21:01.759
And so I've never lived in a situation and or understood it as a familial thing, like where you know, mom and dad go to work and come home and get a pay and turkeys, you know, at Thanksgiving.
00:21:01.839 --> 00:21:10.400
Like, we've I've always operated under this, like, all right, sort of constantly learning, constantly evolving, and constantly pivoting.
00:21:10.640 --> 00:21:13.759
And I think that's gonna be even more important.
00:21:14.640 --> 00:21:23.200
I mean, for not just to your point, yeah, not just for a certain few of us, but for I mean, almost everybody.
00:21:23.440 --> 00:21:28.880
Uh but here's the thing, I would argue that that's always been the case.
00:21:29.680 --> 00:21:41.359
Because when people are saying things about a certain technology and it's gonna it could it it's gonna replace us or whatever, people will argue, no, it can't because blank blank blank.
00:21:41.519 --> 00:21:42.640
No, it can't.
00:21:42.960 --> 00:21:48.240
It doesn't have to be good at its job, it doesn't have to be all those things, but you do.
00:21:48.799 --> 00:21:56.960
Like all of us being able to show up in that way, like what should have we and what could have we been doing all along?
00:21:58.319 --> 00:21:59.759
You know, does this become a time?
00:22:00.319 --> 00:22:03.920
Point in in history where people are like, wait a second.
00:22:04.480 --> 00:22:11.200
Like, we should have been teaching, teaching and learning with these navigable skills this whole time.
00:22:11.599 --> 00:22:14.319
Yeah, I mean, I think I think we're seeing a resurgence of that, right?
00:22:14.400 --> 00:22:23.039
One of the one of the themes of the news in the last two or three weeks, it's graduation time and you know, CEOs are getting booed off graduation stages and stuff like that.
00:22:23.200 --> 00:22:32.880
Like, one of the big themes that is, and and there was the big Canvas blackout, if I don't know if the year, you know, of the ed tech platform is massive pushback on ed tech.
00:22:33.680 --> 00:22:44.880
And that maybe it wasn't the best idea in the world with declining, you know, reading scores everywhere to have computers be the primary source by which, you know, our children learn, right?
00:22:45.359 --> 00:22:48.240
These things of like, we we had to try some things.
00:22:48.400 --> 00:22:50.480
And it's not about like a stupid us 10 years ago.
00:22:50.559 --> 00:22:53.039
It's just we had to try some things, we've learned some things.
00:22:53.279 --> 00:22:56.400
And now what do we want to do with what we've learned, right?
00:22:56.559 --> 00:23:01.200
You know, you see, and it isn't necessarily about, oh, it was better back then.
00:23:01.359 --> 00:23:02.720
I mean, I was there back then.
00:23:02.799 --> 00:23:10.079
I'm not sure how much better it was, but have as with all change, we've lost some things in the change.
00:23:10.319 --> 00:23:13.599
And what can we do to do this work of recovery?
00:23:13.680 --> 00:23:16.960
And I want to come back to your idea, which I think a lot of this is about context.
00:23:17.119 --> 00:23:24.160
So I want you to speak to this as a musician because I'm gonna say something I know almost nothing about, and then you can correct it and make us all smarter.
00:23:24.559 --> 00:23:33.839
So, to me, like an example of context is if I'm a songwriter and I want to get seen in the world and you know, but you know, have people listen to my music and et cetera.
00:23:34.240 --> 00:23:41.839
There was a stretch of time where it was like, okay, well, then you go put some videos on TikTok, you put some stuff on YouTube, et cetera.
00:23:42.079 --> 00:23:42.720
No context.
00:23:42.799 --> 00:23:44.640
That the way to be found is to have no context.
00:23:44.720 --> 00:23:50.480
Just go on these global platforms that just sort of hopefully use the algorithm to ship you to magically the right people.
00:23:50.720 --> 00:24:09.519
Now you're seeing this artist-owned, smaller scale, you know, platforms where, hey, you're not gonna get shipped to a hundred thousand people by way of an algorithm, but 3,000 people are gonna find you by way of natural networks and they're gonna love you.
00:24:09.680 --> 00:24:09.920
Right.
00:24:10.079 --> 00:24:13.200
This really small, long tail kind of stuff.
00:24:13.359 --> 00:24:18.400
I think the music industry sorting this out in interesting ways, and I'd love for you to speak to that.
00:24:18.640 --> 00:24:29.279
Well, I I'll I'll speak on I can speak to it, and I'll sort of do a dual path here, both as a from the music industry as well as the fine arts as artists.
00:24:29.440 --> 00:24:30.960
Yeah, even better.
00:24:31.279 --> 00:24:34.799
Because that that's where I spend more of my time or in that world too.
00:24:35.039 --> 00:24:49.519
But what you have are everyone knows that um that interview with the guy, the cre the creator of Suno that said, like, well, people don't really like to make music because it's hard to learn an instrument, it's hard to do that, it's hard to do that.
00:24:49.759 --> 00:24:54.720
And then there's the same thing over here on these generative platforms who are like, well, it's hard to learn to paint.
00:24:54.880 --> 00:24:57.279
It's hard to learn to do these things.
00:24:57.599 --> 00:25:06.559
And I think one, eventually that artifice that artifice breaks down because people have to care about it.
00:25:07.039 --> 00:25:16.160
And what I've learned both as a professional artist and and a creator and all of these kind of things is people buy into you as much as they do the art.
00:25:16.880 --> 00:25:27.119
And so they're conf, I think, I think it's really easy to confuse the finished product with the whole, with the whole process.
00:25:27.279 --> 00:25:33.519
Like the fact that someone may like a thing and they're gonna do an AI version of it and put it on their wall.
00:25:33.599 --> 00:25:35.039
Hey, we're gonna do that anyway.
00:25:35.440 --> 00:25:39.839
They're not your fan, they're not your client, they're not your partner.
00:25:40.640 --> 00:25:45.200
And so your point, man, you're talking about, you know, you're finding those 3,000 people.
00:25:45.279 --> 00:25:50.240
There is a technologist guy named Kevin Kenny, and he talks about 1,000 true fans.
00:25:50.880 --> 00:26:04.079
And so I think the nature of what success, I think the nature of fame, I think the nature of what it feels like to quote unquote make it are going to look very different.
00:26:04.400 --> 00:26:17.359
Because to your point, I I've seen actually literally just last week, there was a great artist that came through my town here, Knoxville, Tennessee, and played like two house concerts and probably made more money, right?
00:26:17.759 --> 00:26:21.839
Because they didn't have to book a venue, they didn't have to do all of these kind of things.
00:26:23.200 --> 00:26:24.559
And they were very successful.
00:26:24.720 --> 00:26:31.200
And so I think we have to be able, in the same way that I was also, it's like Gandalf style.
00:26:31.279 --> 00:26:42.079
I was there in the beginning, you know, for our kids generation, and really even for us, but but what was isn't anymore.
00:26:42.799 --> 00:26:46.160
And so what opportunities does that open up?
00:26:46.319 --> 00:26:52.799
And even if it looks different than it did even five years ago, 10, but especially 20, that's okay.
00:26:53.039 --> 00:26:54.799
But that's a new business model.
00:26:55.119 --> 00:27:11.920
And I think the ability to be creative in that craft is like if you really love your thing, if you really love the thing that you are doing and building, or the people that you work with, or the experiences that you create, like figure out, you got it.
00:27:12.000 --> 00:27:26.960
There's part of it that you figure out like, what does that sustainable model look like moving forward rather than sort of trying to wind the tape back, you know, to a to a time uh that wasn't working all that well either.
00:27:27.359 --> 00:27:30.480
Yeah, there's so much of it that's that that's fantasy, right?
00:27:30.720 --> 00:27:46.079
That you know it like it's it's funny to, I don't know, like watch an a 10-year-old American Idol episode or a 10-year-old survivor episode, these these things, and you you see like how we thought about the world at the time.
00:27:46.240 --> 00:27:52.640
You know, and it would be like, well, this kid got a million views on YouTube, and now he's gonna be the next big, you know.
00:27:52.799 --> 00:27:58.079
I remember that era, you go, oh my gosh, all you got to do is go on YouTube and you get a million, right?
00:27:58.160 --> 00:27:58.240
Yeah.
00:27:58.559 --> 00:28:07.920
Instead of realizing the arbitrage of it, that there's a million kids who went on YouTube and got zero, so that this kid could be the one that got a million.
00:28:08.000 --> 00:28:13.839
And of course it plays into the sort of American fantasy of, well, but maybe I'm the one and I just have to believe in myself and whatever.
00:28:14.000 --> 00:28:25.039
And I think part of what we're cultivating, and I think part of what you're cultivating with your clients, and we certainly cultivate here in this conversation, is a different kind of vision for the future.
00:28:25.440 --> 00:28:49.119
That instead of rolling the dice on somebody's, you know, sort of vagus algorithm, that it'll hopefully grab us and shoot us to our 15 minutes of fame, is well, wouldn't it be great to work with a small number of people, whatever that size is for what the venture you're doing and the work that you do, to work with a small number of people who totally believe in what we do, and that I could get to control my future in the process.
00:28:49.440 --> 00:28:51.200
That sounds fun, right?
00:28:52.160 --> 00:28:52.720
Yeah.
00:28:52.960 --> 00:29:00.720
And that actually is a thing that is available to us, like in a lot of different than it was, you know.
00:29:01.839 --> 00:29:06.480
I I love, I I think that is that's a big one.
00:29:06.960 --> 00:29:10.960
I there's another, there's an author, a guy named Eric Reese.
00:29:11.279 --> 00:29:13.039
Yeah, Eric Reese is doing great work right now.
00:29:13.279 --> 00:29:19.839
And right now, yeah, he's got a great, he's got a new book out, but uh now, and his last book was all about human flourishing.
00:29:20.079 --> 00:29:39.039
And he happens to be talking about, he's a venture capital guy, but he happened to be talking about technology companies, but you could apply it to just about anything, in that if we are developing something solely because we are like, you don't develop the tech for the tech.
00:29:39.440 --> 00:29:45.039
You don't develop the like we develop it so that we as people live better lives.
00:29:45.920 --> 00:30:10.079
And whatever we are doing, I think from if we're trying to, you know, if we're trying to make art, if we're trying to make music, or if we're trying to lead a team, or if we're trying to build a business, or all of those kind of things, there is this, yeah, it's like if we're not doing it for each other and we're not building something that matters for people that keeps us moving forward, like what are we doing?
00:30:10.319 --> 00:30:11.200
Yeah, and it's interesting.
00:30:11.359 --> 00:30:21.440
I mean, it's interesting to treat Reese as a as a text case here because it shows a little bit of how our our brains get a little mucked up and how we have to really be generous with each other.
00:30:21.599 --> 00:30:31.680
You know, like his original idea, lean startup, the idea of having an MVP and failing fast and iterating through and all of this stuff.
00:30:32.000 --> 00:30:42.640
What I think no one understood at the time is all of that methodology was based on the assumption that you were building a thing that was gonna help people, that was gonna be that was gonna do good and be beneficial.
00:30:42.799 --> 00:30:56.240
And now you're seeing Eric Reese, not it's not fair to say that he's on like an apology tour, but a little bit of a like a repositioning and going, hey, people took my ideas and took them to places that I never imagined them going.
00:30:56.720 --> 00:31:04.880
And now I want to recenter this into something much more human, and that it really isn't just about building something fast, right?
00:31:05.039 --> 00:31:07.039
His new book is about you know resilience.
00:31:07.200 --> 00:31:09.920
How do you build something that's worth having for a really long time?
00:31:10.160 --> 00:31:13.119
You know, I think there are people in the world who'd be like, well, screw that guy.
00:31:13.200 --> 00:31:15.200
He basically created Silicon Valley.
00:31:15.359 --> 00:31:20.640
And I think, again, this is like, come on, folks, like we all are learning and growing.
00:31:20.799 --> 00:31:25.839
We're all getting there, we're all waking up to these this reality as the levels that we are.
00:31:26.079 --> 00:31:29.359
And now we can figure out our next steps together.
00:31:30.079 --> 00:31:49.440
Well, that like a thing that I like to say and a point of view that I'll start a lot of sort of set the tone for facilitations as well as just when I'm talking with anybody, is an absolute repudiation of break of move fast and break things.
00:31:49.920 --> 00:31:52.000
Hate it with every ounce of my body.
00:31:52.079 --> 00:31:55.440
And I say move fast and build things.
00:31:56.319 --> 00:32:08.640
And because what a lot of people have now sort of experienced from that first wave of breaking things is like when you break something, somebody has to pick it up, somebody has to clean it up.
00:32:08.880 --> 00:32:14.160
And so you're not necessarily thinking about the downstream effects of what you are doing.
00:32:14.400 --> 00:32:23.279
But when you come like you to your point, when you're building together, and I'm actually sometimes very literally like, hey, how's my neighbor?
00:32:23.519 --> 00:32:35.599
Hey, like I am going, as maybe a creative professional or somebody or whatever, it's like I'm going to go and be involved with this thing that I care about that takes time out of my day because I care about it.
00:32:36.400 --> 00:32:40.079
There is no forward motion in a positive way without cost.
00:32:40.160 --> 00:32:46.160
And sometimes that cost is is literal money, but sometimes it's time, sometimes it's attention.
00:32:46.480 --> 00:33:00.799
But I think that we are at this opportunity, this point in time where working together to move fast, yes, but to build rather than to break things is something we can all come together, um, I think in a really powerful way around.
00:33:01.119 --> 00:33:02.240
Well, we have to, right?
00:33:02.400 --> 00:33:06.720
We we've we we spent a generation disrupting and deconstructing.
00:33:06.880 --> 00:33:08.799
And you and I were a part of that generation.
00:33:09.119 --> 00:33:12.720
Me, I'm a little bit older than you, me, a little, my, my group a little bit more so.
00:33:12.960 --> 00:33:16.480
And I stood on stages and let's said, let's Uberize everything.
00:33:16.640 --> 00:33:22.319
And then last week I'm in New York and I'm begging for a taxi because if I have to deal with Uber one more time, I'm gonna free and scream.
00:33:22.559 --> 00:33:26.640
Because we didn't think about we, I uh, you know, here's my public mayaculpa.
00:33:26.720 --> 00:33:34.640
We didn't think about the second and third and fourth degree consequences of dismantling what we dismantled and how much they were load-bearing.
00:33:34.880 --> 00:33:38.079
And and and this stuff matters.
00:33:38.160 --> 00:33:47.200
And now we get to go back and go, okay, well, we we kind of have an economy and a society that needs some support structure again because we tore out all of the load-bearing columns.
00:33:47.359 --> 00:33:49.119
So, what do we want to build?
00:33:49.359 --> 00:33:50.799
What do we want to build in our neighborhood?
00:33:50.960 --> 00:33:52.319
What do we want to build in our industry?
00:33:52.400 --> 00:33:55.680
What do we want to, and and that we is so important.
00:33:56.960 --> 00:34:02.960
We and you uh the load-bearing, the inefficiencies were load-bearing.
00:34:04.240 --> 00:34:11.280
Like that is the thing, is we continue to sort of want to incentivize, like, this is inefficient, let's do this.
00:34:11.679 --> 00:34:26.239
But no, like, I think the things that we can do now, again, to be craft first, but to also be like positional around each other is like, wait a second, wait a second.
00:34:26.559 --> 00:34:29.679
Why would we want to stop doing X, Y, Z?
00:34:30.559 --> 00:34:31.840
What are we not looking at?
00:34:32.000 --> 00:34:33.519
What are we not thinking about?
00:34:33.599 --> 00:34:39.039
And who is it going to affect if we take away, like to your point, like what is load bearing?
00:34:39.119 --> 00:34:47.679
Because if we just start taking sledgehammers to things, which we have seen the effects of, incredible harm can be done.
00:34:48.000 --> 00:34:57.280
And so if you know, you know, if you really think about it, if you know the people that live in the uh that house, you're not gonna take a sledgehammer to it.
00:34:57.679 --> 00:34:58.239
That's right.
00:34:58.480 --> 00:35:06.639
I mean, you there's no way that, you know, when they were building Uber, they were having focus groups with taxi drivers.
00:35:06.800 --> 00:35:08.159
They just weren't, right?
00:35:08.480 --> 00:35:13.920
That that this is this is every everything was worthwhile collateral damage and it'll all work out in the end.
00:35:14.159 --> 00:35:15.840
And and we've learned, right?
00:35:15.920 --> 00:35:19.039
But now we have to, now we have to do make different choices.
00:35:19.280 --> 00:35:28.320
Well, and if you remember too, or if anybody else was, you know, paying attention when Uber first came out, we can use that as an example because it came out as the best version of itself.
00:35:28.559 --> 00:35:32.960
Do you remember when you would get in an Uber and the guy, you know, the guy's like, oh, would you like a mint?
00:35:33.280 --> 00:35:35.599
Here's a here's a freshly squeezed lemon.
00:35:35.679 --> 00:35:36.079
I don't know.
00:35:36.320 --> 00:35:40.800
It felt new and you're like, wow, they really, this is nice.
00:35:41.599 --> 00:35:49.280
The last, you know, traveling, and like you said, like I I would give anything not to get in the back of one of those cars.
00:35:49.599 --> 00:35:56.079
And it's because when it started out, they were still like, here's the best version of ourselves.
00:35:56.320 --> 00:36:01.599
And then piece by piece, it gets inshidified to use that term.
00:36:01.920 --> 00:36:04.639
But it's like, what if we just stop paying attention to this?
00:36:05.280 --> 00:36:06.639
What if we stopped doing this?
00:36:06.719 --> 00:36:08.000
What if we stopped doing that?
00:36:08.159 --> 00:36:12.639
And it extracts the most margin out of every ride.
00:36:12.880 --> 00:36:20.159
But take Uber and apply that to uh, you know, so many different, you know, situations.
00:36:20.719 --> 00:36:26.880
And I think too, people underestimate, again, because the the people building these systems don't like people.
00:36:27.199 --> 00:36:33.199
People underestimate, for instance, even self-checkout lines at the grocery store.
00:36:34.159 --> 00:36:39.119
I changed the grocery store I went to for like two years because my buddy's kid worked there.
00:36:40.960 --> 00:36:43.119
And I like to see, I like to see James.
00:36:43.199 --> 00:36:45.039
I was like, oh, hey James, how's how's school going?
00:36:46.079 --> 00:36:51.840
Not because I cared about one brand over another, but it was like, oh, cool, cool.
00:36:52.079 --> 00:36:54.400
That's neat that he's got a first person job.
00:36:54.639 --> 00:36:56.159
And that's a very human thing.
00:36:56.800 --> 00:36:57.440
Yeah.
00:36:58.400 --> 00:37:03.519
Let's I wanna I wanna in some ways like the place that we've landed.
00:37:03.599 --> 00:37:18.320
I'm I'm imagining all of our listeners are like, yeah, yeah, you guys, screw Uber, we hate those guys, you know, like you sort of imagine everybody's, you know, and and I don't, I never want us to just sort of play the hits, you know, like right.
00:37:18.480 --> 00:37:34.960
Because I think part of why we started this and and really where we are right here is okay, if I'm listening and I'm a person who makes a thing that's human first and value for and is crafty and cool, and maybe it's code-based, maybe it's in the real world, maybe it's a piece of art, it doesn't matter.
00:37:35.039 --> 00:37:37.280
It's my thing that I'm making, right?
00:37:38.239 --> 00:37:44.239
I think the hardest bridge to cross, though, is I'm still sitting here wishing somebody would care about it.
00:37:45.039 --> 00:37:54.719
And what I have to pivot to is how do I take this thing that I have and find some people that I can use it to care about them?
00:37:54.880 --> 00:38:06.639
And I have so many agency owners, solos, people who in my network who are like, are we, you know, in the age of AR, are we going to find people who love what we do?
00:38:07.199 --> 00:38:12.400
And my honest response to them is, well, who does what you do love?
00:38:12.480 --> 00:38:13.840
And how would they know?
00:38:14.400 --> 00:38:15.440
How would they know?
00:38:15.599 --> 00:38:18.639
Is there a group of people that you're like, this is for you?
00:38:18.880 --> 00:38:32.400
And I'm talking to you, and I'm embedded with in your community, and I'm at your industry event, and I'm getting to know you, and people like you, and I'm I've become an expert on whatever libraries, because I really want to work with libraries.
00:38:32.559 --> 00:38:46.639
I've become an expert on, you know, that behavior of taking attention and pushing it outward and going, I'm gonna pay attention, not seek attention, I think is what we're both advocating for, but it's a hard turn.
00:38:46.960 --> 00:38:49.679
It is a you just nailed it though.
00:38:49.840 --> 00:38:58.480
I mean, that is if you are in the marketplace, in which we all are, and again, back to you could be making music, you could be making code, you could be building a business.
00:38:58.880 --> 00:39:02.320
I don't want to hear about you, I want to hear about me.
00:39:02.880 --> 00:39:12.719
In every customer profile you've ever heard, in every hero's journey, you in this case, I like the chance to make a Lord of the Rings reference when I can.
00:39:13.360 --> 00:39:14.079
Whenever you can.
00:39:14.400 --> 00:39:18.480
Everybody thinks of Frodo as the hero of that story.
00:39:18.639 --> 00:39:20.079
And that makes sense.
00:39:20.400 --> 00:39:26.159
But when you think about Sam Wise Gamge, at the end, Frodo's ready to give up.
00:39:26.239 --> 00:39:28.559
He's the one that carries him up the mountain.
00:39:28.880 --> 00:39:30.400
That is our role.
00:39:30.719 --> 00:39:42.079
So when we're trying to, when we are engaging with an audience, when we have a potential client, when we have a potential collector, whatever that means, how can we help them?
00:39:42.800 --> 00:39:44.320
What are their pain points?
00:39:44.400 --> 00:39:45.280
What are they going through?
00:39:45.360 --> 00:39:45.920
What do they love?
00:39:46.079 --> 00:39:47.519
Like you said, what do they love?
00:39:47.599 --> 00:39:48.880
What do they care about?
00:39:49.679 --> 00:39:54.480
And we re I think it's too easy, and we've been doing this for years and years.
00:39:54.639 --> 00:40:00.079
It's too easy for us to reduce people to sock puppet personas.
00:40:01.920 --> 00:40:15.280
And so I always I always advocate when I'm talking with well artists or a lot of our companies, I don't want you to tell me that Susie is definitely a 42-year-old mother of two and like blah, blah, blah.
00:40:15.360 --> 00:40:16.239
Like, no, no, no.
00:40:16.400 --> 00:40:21.039
Talk to Deborah, the lady that is actually your customer.
00:40:21.360 --> 00:40:24.000
Talk to the person that actually came to your show.
00:40:24.159 --> 00:40:36.079
Talk to the person that actually wants to see more of your work and ask them questions, not about how much they like your work, but like, what what made you show up tonight?
00:40:37.920 --> 00:40:39.679
What it's about them.
00:40:39.760 --> 00:40:40.719
It's not about you.
00:40:41.760 --> 00:40:44.239
What made you what made you come out on a Thursday?
00:40:45.119 --> 00:40:49.039
What made you show up in this way at work rather than another way?
00:40:49.920 --> 00:40:56.719
And you start to learn about them in a way that I think it comes back to that things that never change.
00:40:57.920 --> 00:40:58.880
People want to feel heard.
00:41:00.079 --> 00:41:04.559
People want to feel that the decisions they make have an influence on others.
00:41:04.639 --> 00:41:08.480
And I hope that they I hope that they want that influence to be positive.
00:41:09.599 --> 00:41:10.400
I think that's true.
00:41:10.559 --> 00:41:23.760
I mean, I think there that by and large, you know, one of the things that's been said ad nauseum in this sort of hyper-growth, hyper-acceleration of technology is, you know, code is fast, but evolution is slow.
00:41:24.480 --> 00:41:27.119
And so we are who we are.
00:41:27.280 --> 00:41:31.679
We are who we were in 1800, we are who we were in 1450.
00:41:31.840 --> 00:41:35.039
Like human beings just don't evolve that fast.
00:41:35.519 --> 00:41:45.280
And so our instinctual nature of how we make decisions, what gives us comfort, what gives us joy, what gives us meaning is really not that inventive.
00:41:45.360 --> 00:41:49.199
It's not that new, it's not that creative, it's pretty pretty baked in.
00:41:49.840 --> 00:41:59.440
And so ventures and leaders who are willing to do the hard thing of going, well, I'm just gonna do the human thing.
00:41:59.679 --> 00:42:05.760
You know, like I hear a lot of people being like, gosh, I wish the economy wasn't as extractive and this extraction, this, and extraction that.
00:42:05.840 --> 00:42:08.480
And I write a lot about extraction for this reason.
00:42:08.719 --> 00:42:11.199
And then, but what am I supposed to do?
00:42:11.519 --> 00:42:17.599
Well, what is the least extractive thing you could do to solve the problem that you're in?
00:42:17.840 --> 00:42:19.440
I said this to a client of mine the other day.
00:42:19.519 --> 00:42:22.079
I said, okay, we have this giant goal we're trying to reach.
00:42:22.400 --> 00:42:26.639
What's the most human, natural, joy-filled way we could solve it?
00:42:28.400 --> 00:42:30.239
What a great way to say that.
00:42:30.480 --> 00:42:41.440
And that doesn't necessarily mean we're gonna get the one right answer, but man, it points us in such a completely different direction, and we get really, really different ideas.
00:42:42.079 --> 00:42:50.000
Well, I think too, with that approach, you are also being mindful of everybody else in the room.
00:42:50.239 --> 00:43:00.719
And who's when you're trying to make things better, you're actually who's in the room and also who's not in the room, and who are we making these decisions for?
00:43:00.960 --> 00:43:07.039
And I also think people wildly underestimate small things.
00:43:07.440 --> 00:43:08.480
Absolutely.
00:43:08.719 --> 00:43:20.719
Like do you underestimate that in you know, I making something up, like in the office every morning, you come and make the coffee, or you're kind to the parking valet, or you make sure that whatever that is.
00:43:21.440 --> 00:43:28.639
And if you had everybody doing just one little thing that helped, man, that made me feel better.
00:43:29.599 --> 00:43:34.800
With no necessary, it's not a quid pro quo, it's not an oh, I'll do a nice thing, and then you'll do a nice thing.
00:43:34.880 --> 00:43:39.280
You're like, no, I'm just gonna do a nice thing because it's joyful.
00:43:39.920 --> 00:43:42.079
Because it makes life better.
00:43:42.880 --> 00:43:44.559
You know, be selfish about it.
00:43:44.719 --> 00:43:46.320
It makes life better for me.
00:43:47.599 --> 00:43:56.800
And it's those small steps, those things that we can do that make um over time make a huge difference.
00:43:57.119 --> 00:43:58.320
I a hundred percent agree.
00:43:58.400 --> 00:44:02.800
I mean, I think We over-index to the big flashy moves.
00:44:02.880 --> 00:44:06.719
I think that's part of this the one of the consequences of our digital era.
00:44:06.800 --> 00:44:08.159
Um, see, that's one of the eras we were in.
00:44:08.239 --> 00:44:18.320
It's changed several times since then, but one of the consequences of our digital era is we over-index to the flashy and we under-index to the simple because it'll never show up on a dashboard.
00:44:18.480 --> 00:44:23.039
And the stuff that'll never show up on a dashboard is where the magic is right now.
00:44:23.360 --> 00:44:26.400
So we're near the end of our time, Chris, and this has been super fun.
00:44:26.559 --> 00:44:27.760
So let's do two things.
00:44:28.000 --> 00:44:30.000
One is where can people find you?
00:44:30.159 --> 00:44:38.639
Obviously, you want to let people know where they can find you and learn more about what you're doing because you're doing incubating, you're doing training, you're you're in like nine different things.
00:44:38.800 --> 00:44:40.239
So where can people find you?
00:44:40.480 --> 00:44:45.280
Yeah, like most folks in this new age economy era.
00:44:46.480 --> 00:44:51.440
Um, you know, yeah, you can find for art is uh ChrisMacado.com.
00:44:51.599 --> 00:45:01.119
I do a lot of speaking at ChrisMackadoospeaks.com, but then my main company uh is called Fighting Shape, uh, Fighting Shape Impact Company, and that's fightingshapeimpact.com.
00:45:02.320 --> 00:45:08.239
And then lastly, we ask everybody this when they swing by and hang out, is um what's giving you hope right now?
00:45:09.360 --> 00:45:12.800
Uh I can be very specific about that.
00:45:12.960 --> 00:45:25.280
Um, some of the work that I do both with you know with my kids and with some um students at uh the university level, 18 to 23 year olds.
00:45:26.719 --> 00:45:32.320
I have had some of the most meaningful experiences with some of the most curious people in the world.
00:45:34.239 --> 00:45:48.960
As a as a advisor to the a college here, um to the college of business, it gives me hope that there are people that are out, you know, sort of one generation below us that are asking great questions.
00:45:49.599 --> 00:46:08.159
That regardless of what we hear on the news uh and see uh you know on our feeds and everything, I believe that there is a vast majority of folks that when given the right, when given the right outlet, are curious and they care a lot.
00:46:08.239 --> 00:46:10.559
And I see it over and over again.
00:46:10.719 --> 00:46:15.280
So I'm gonna go with like the next generation's uh curiosity.
00:46:16.159 --> 00:46:24.960
And so it's up to us as sort of those next generations to protect that curiosity at all costs.
00:46:25.280 --> 00:46:25.840
That's right.
00:46:26.000 --> 00:46:26.719
That's right.
00:46:26.960 --> 00:46:27.679
It's funny.
00:46:27.840 --> 00:46:31.039
I I I maybe this might be true without exception.
00:46:31.119 --> 00:46:33.679
And I'm sure there's somewhere there's an exception, but I can't think of it.
00:46:33.840 --> 00:46:43.679
Whenever I talk to somebody with proximity to teenagers and early adults, you know, people like 16 to 25, they're like, these guys are gonna be all right.
00:46:43.840 --> 00:46:46.960
These kids are gonna like there, there's just there's so much optimism there.
00:46:47.039 --> 00:46:47.920
It's really exciting.
00:46:48.159 --> 00:46:48.880
All right, Chris.
00:46:49.039 --> 00:46:51.519
Well, thank you so much for hanging out with us.
00:46:52.079 --> 00:46:52.719
Thank you, man.
00:46:53.679 --> 00:46:58.639
We will uh hear more from you when they follow your links, which we'll have in the show notes.
00:46:58.800 --> 00:46:59.920
All right, much appreciated.
00:47:00.719 --> 00:47:04.719
And uh thanks to everybody for, you know, for the thanks to you and everybody for this opportunity.
00:47:04.960 --> 00:47:11.679
If this conversation put language to something you've been feeling but couldn't quite name, that's the show doing what it's supposed to do.
00:47:12.000 --> 00:47:22.719
The job of Damskiven is to surface our questions, surface our ambiguities, even dangerously surface our vulnerabilities, and ask, what if we lived inside of this in a different way?
00:47:22.880 --> 00:47:28.960
One of the things I was having a conversation with a colleague of mine actually on LinkedIn, which is never where good conversations happen.
00:47:29.119 --> 00:47:34.880
And he was talking about he kindly put the word out about my book coming out and introduced that to his community.
00:47:35.039 --> 00:47:39.440
And we stumbled into this phrase, you're already uncomfortable, you might as well grow.
00:47:39.679 --> 00:47:51.840
This economy, this environment, this uncertainty, this you know, K-shaped discrepancy between the haves and the haves not, it creates an enormous amount of discomfort and cognitive dissonance for people.
00:47:52.000 --> 00:47:56.639
So the reality is whether you're acknowledging it or not, you're already uncomfortable.
00:47:56.960 --> 00:47:59.840
So moving toward discomfort isn't going to make things worse.
00:47:59.920 --> 00:48:01.199
It actually is going to make things better.
00:48:01.360 --> 00:48:04.559
And if we can move toward discomfort, we might as well grow.
00:48:04.800 --> 00:48:17.440
We might as well actually tap into the energy in our vulnerability, tap into the energy and the questions that would that don't have answers because there's so much pent-up energy in there, and then use it to solve real problems and negotiate our ventures out into the world.
00:48:17.599 --> 00:48:25.039
As far as Chris, you can find him at chrismcadoo.com for his art, Chris McAdooSpeaks.com for him in front of an audience or your team.
00:48:25.280 --> 00:48:30.800
And then Fighting Shape Impact for his kind of main company and advisory work.
00:48:30.880 --> 00:48:32.159
All of those links are in the show notes.
00:48:32.480 --> 00:48:36.639
For everything happening in my world, the easiest place to always find me is nickrichmeier.com.
00:48:36.719 --> 00:48:41.920
And you can always subscribe at damnsgiven.com to the newsletter and everything that we're publishing.
00:48:42.079 --> 00:48:53.360
Uh, if you're watching on YouTube or if you're on Apple and this connected with you again, we ask that you provide a review and subscribe because we really want to help everybody off the algorithm recommendation machine.
00:48:53.679 --> 00:48:57.440
Algorithmic recommendations are keeping all of our brains frozen.
00:48:57.519 --> 00:49:04.880
And so the more you can use the tools and use the platform to tell it what you want and only engage with what you want, the better off you're gonna be.
00:49:05.039 --> 00:49:10.320
And so, for better or worse, like and subscribe and uh is a key way of doing that.
00:49:10.480 --> 00:49:14.960
As I try to say as often as possible, um, the future is coming at us, whether we like it or not.
00:49:15.119 --> 00:49:16.239
So forward forward.
00:49:16.400 --> 00:49:17.519
Let's get there together.
00:00:00.080 --> 00:00:10.240
I'm Nick Richmeyer, and this is Dam's Given, a podcast where we explore how to free your venture from the extraction economy, realigning it to the timeless ways that humans build, collaborate, and buy.
00:00:12.240 --> 00:00:20.079
Dams Given, a podcast this week about the future of craft, of creative thinking, and what it means to build something people want to buy.
00:00:20.320 --> 00:00:25.839
There's a conversation happening right now between tech people and craft people, and it isn't really going very well.
00:00:26.079 --> 00:00:31.280
The tech site says craft is quaint and that's cute and so nice, and go have your art and opera.
00:00:31.600 --> 00:00:36.000
You know, people still listen to opera, the 12 people that listen, and for everything else, there's AI.
00:00:36.159 --> 00:00:42.079
And AI can approximate that, put its best in place, and replace the mass middle of the market.
00:00:42.320 --> 00:00:45.119
And that is true at a variety of craft levels.
00:00:45.280 --> 00:00:52.640
I've had this conversation with consultants and others who engage the middle market and our sell services into the B2B environment.
00:00:52.799 --> 00:01:00.560
And there's increasing frustration about the perception that what these folks do, what they make, can be replaced by AI when they know it can't be.
00:01:00.799 --> 00:01:04.319
And part of what AI does, right, is it shrinks the value stack.
00:01:04.400 --> 00:01:12.799
It says, oh, well, we thought value went from way down here to way up here, and there's a price range all the way through that from very low commoditized to very high elite.
00:01:12.959 --> 00:01:16.400
What it does, it says, no, actually, the value stack isn't that really tall thing.
00:01:16.480 --> 00:01:17.280
It's really short.
00:01:17.439 --> 00:01:19.840
And the bottom half of the value stack should be free.
00:01:19.920 --> 00:01:28.239
And all the other part of the commercial enterprise around whatever it is that you're selling should fit in this much smaller space.
00:01:28.719 --> 00:01:34.400
And that argument from the AI movement has taken hold in the marketplace.
00:01:34.560 --> 00:01:36.079
People believe that to be true.
00:01:36.239 --> 00:01:40.159
And the crap people say, well, gosh, this is technology is ruining everything and destroying everything.
00:01:40.239 --> 00:01:41.040
Nothing's good anymore.
00:01:41.120 --> 00:01:41.920
You can't make good stuff.
00:01:42.000 --> 00:01:42.879
No one appreciates anything.
00:01:42.959 --> 00:01:44.319
No one has any taste.
00:01:44.640 --> 00:01:50.319
And the reality is, as was almost always the case when we're on the horns of a dilemma, is that both those sides are wrong.
00:01:50.560 --> 00:01:55.040
Or at least they represent a shared set of assumptions that aren't serving us.
00:01:55.280 --> 00:01:59.599
Today, I bring on Chris McAdoo, who's a really unique voice.
00:01:59.760 --> 00:02:11.039
He spent his entire career living in the space between these two camps as a musician, a visual artist, a brand strategist, and as an advisor to startups, tech startups, trying to figure out who they're actually for.
00:02:11.360 --> 00:02:17.520
He's working with scientists at national labs, sending things to space, and artists introducing their work to for the first time.
00:02:17.680 --> 00:02:29.680
And because of that interesting Venn diagram and intersection, he's noticing these similar things from both rooms, this same flawed set of assumptions that the problem is almost never the quality of the work.
00:02:29.840 --> 00:02:32.879
The problem is what happens between the work and the world.
00:02:33.120 --> 00:02:36.719
What I tell our clients is every venture is a negotiated thing.
00:02:36.879 --> 00:02:40.479
Once you decide to hang up a shingle and put it out in the world, it's not you.
00:02:40.719 --> 00:02:41.599
It's not them.
00:02:41.759 --> 00:02:43.520
It's not even your customers.
00:02:43.680 --> 00:02:44.879
It's not even your team.
00:02:44.960 --> 00:02:46.479
It is this negotiated thing.
00:02:46.560 --> 00:02:52.159
Something I go into deep detail on how to actually do that negotiation in my book, The Damn Rules.
00:02:52.400 --> 00:03:02.240
But today we're going to talk about it specifically around this area of craft, people who make things and why it matters more than ever and why it just isn't enough to make a thing.
00:03:02.400 --> 00:03:04.479
You have to negotiate the thing.
00:03:04.719 --> 00:03:08.479
We're going to talk about this brief window in internet history when showing up was enough.
00:03:08.560 --> 00:03:10.000
Boy, that was a really fun time.
00:03:10.159 --> 00:03:17.280
And what that window kind of socialized into us, into an entire generation of builders and creators that is not useful.
00:03:17.439 --> 00:03:26.159
We're going to talk about how in the music industry today a house concert probably makes more than a venue tour, or certainly more than putting up your records on Spotify.
00:03:26.319 --> 00:03:40.000
And we're going to talk about, and we're going to end up somewhere which is a home base for me and a place that I invite everybody we work to, and a place that I invite everybody we work with and talk to to move toward.
00:03:40.080 --> 00:03:43.520
And that is the point in which we stop seeking attention and start paying it.
00:03:43.680 --> 00:03:48.080
Just would love it if you would join me in welcoming Chris McAdoo to Dam's Given.
00:03:48.240 --> 00:03:49.439
All right, well, Chris, welcome.
00:03:49.599 --> 00:03:54.159
Um, as I mentioned in the intro, Chris is like, you know, one of these multi-hyphenates joining us.
00:03:54.240 --> 00:03:59.599
Uh he's a musician, a brand guy, a strategist for startups.
00:03:59.840 --> 00:04:13.280
But really, you and I started talking, and the reason why I want to talk to you today has a lot to do with this kind of false collision that we're having between like the tech people and the craft people, and they can't get along.
00:04:13.439 --> 00:04:16.800
And you know, I don't mean to minimize that in some ways for good reason.
00:04:16.959 --> 00:04:24.560
But I think we've got to have really structured and thoughtful conversation around some of our really tough sacred cows, like craft.
00:04:24.639 --> 00:04:28.720
And it's not that there is no room for craft, it's not that it doesn't matter anymore.
00:04:28.800 --> 00:04:33.759
In fact, maybe it matters more than ever, but we have to think really well about what to do about it.
00:04:33.839 --> 00:04:35.519
Uh, Chris is gonna help us with that.
00:04:35.600 --> 00:04:37.360
Um, thanks for joining us, Chris.
00:04:37.600 --> 00:04:45.519
Um, starting, what got you thinking about sort of this relationship between sort of craft and business and how all these things meet together?
00:04:45.680 --> 00:04:49.920
I know you've got a lot of inputs that is your creativity, but give us a sense of that.
00:04:50.160 --> 00:04:52.879
Yeah, so all of these different things.
00:04:53.279 --> 00:05:02.639
Nick, when we started talking about this concept of craft isn't enough, I would actually say, to your point, it's more important than ever.
00:05:03.040 --> 00:05:06.959
And so it's more important that we take it seriously.
00:05:07.519 --> 00:05:16.480
And I've kind of done my own thing, both as a as an artist, as a person who's owned business and everything, since I was like 13 years old.
00:05:16.720 --> 00:05:25.360
And so it has always occurred to me, there's never a lack of ideas, but there's always a lack of execution.
00:05:25.920 --> 00:05:31.839
And so, you know, you've now you've probably had those conversations like, oh man, I've got this great idea.
00:05:31.920 --> 00:05:33.519
I just need somebody to do it.
00:05:33.680 --> 00:05:38.959
And you're like, you're like, well, no, that's the hard part, like that is the actual hard part.
00:05:39.199 --> 00:05:49.040
And so I've had the opportunity to sort of be all of these different things, but then also had the opportunity to work with people across the spectrum.
00:05:49.680 --> 00:06:08.240
And so one interesting thing that I have seen is if I'm talking to a the smartest person in the room, a national lab-ranked scientist sending stuff to space, or an artist introducing their work, their passion to the world, same conversation.
00:06:09.040 --> 00:06:09.839
I love this.
00:06:09.920 --> 00:06:11.519
Why don't people understand it?
00:06:12.240 --> 00:06:19.199
Man, why don't people love the thing that I'm doing in the same way that I do?
00:06:19.759 --> 00:06:21.759
And then you sort of work back from there.
00:06:21.920 --> 00:06:32.000
It's like you can't take for granted that people are going to hear what you're saying, see what you're doing, or understand what you're trying to accomplish without you being able to communicate.
00:06:32.079 --> 00:06:35.519
Like, guys, this is this is why this is valuable.
00:06:35.680 --> 00:06:41.839
This is why you understand your audience, you know, understanding your audience and understanding what it means to them.
00:06:42.319 --> 00:06:43.279
Let's let's start there.
00:06:43.360 --> 00:06:47.839
Let's break that down a little bit because I think there's so many layers going on there.
00:06:48.000 --> 00:07:04.079
And I think what's really fascinating and why I wanted you in this conversation is because it's easy to see how this might affect the entrepreneur, or it's easy to see how this might affect the designer who makes logos for a living, or it's easy to see how this might affect some of these more narrow segments.
00:07:04.160 --> 00:07:15.360
But when you start to see it thematically across all of these different areas, for me, that start, you know, triggers my systems thinking brain of like, oh, something really funky is going on here, right?
00:07:15.519 --> 00:07:24.879
And it seems like one of the early layers of this is this embedded idea that because I love a thing, people should like it.
00:07:25.360 --> 00:07:25.759
Right.
00:07:25.920 --> 00:07:34.079
So whether that's the entrepreneur, you know, whether that's the entrepreneur who invented some, you know, piece of tech or whatever, you know.
00:07:34.800 --> 00:07:42.240
But that whole concept is so pervasive, and I think is really running against some, you know, rough-shod ground these days.
00:07:42.319 --> 00:07:43.759
But speak to that layer of it first.
00:07:43.839 --> 00:07:47.519
It's this like, I made a thing, why don't people love it?
00:07:48.160 --> 00:07:49.279
Oh, dude, okay.
00:07:49.439 --> 00:07:51.600
So, yeah, personal examples, right?
00:07:51.680 --> 00:07:52.959
Like, I love Tom Waits.
00:07:53.120 --> 00:07:58.879
And if anybody out there listening is familiar with Tom Waits, you either love him or you hate him.
00:07:59.040 --> 00:08:01.120
Either way, totally cool.
00:08:01.360 --> 00:08:01.680
Right?
00:08:01.759 --> 00:08:07.439
Like you, you in everybody develops their personal taste and their personal cultures.
00:08:07.600 --> 00:08:13.360
And we all have our particular lived experiences that bring us to everything that we step into.
00:08:13.759 --> 00:08:40.799
And so I think one of the things that I've had to come to terms with about that side of it is that how I guess like how presumptive of me to think that you know, you would like the same books, experiences, things I make, or things that we're gonna share in the same way that I do, because it presumes that what I am saying is right.
00:08:42.080 --> 00:08:49.279
And while it may be in some in some ways, like everyone is coming at everything from their own point of view.
00:08:49.519 --> 00:08:49.759
That's right.
00:08:50.399 --> 00:08:51.039
That's right.
00:08:51.279 --> 00:08:55.279
I I do think I want you to react to this because we're seeing this a lot.
00:08:55.360 --> 00:09:00.159
I I see this a lot more in people who are like 30 to 50, right?
00:09:00.240 --> 00:09:04.879
There there is some younger generation thing, but people who grew up on the internet, right?
00:09:04.960 --> 00:09:08.399
Like so, particularly those of us who grew up when the internet still worked.
00:09:08.639 --> 00:09:13.679
Um, we lived before it has been inshitified.
00:09:13.919 --> 00:09:14.720
Right, exactly.
00:09:14.879 --> 00:09:16.320
I mean, quite literally, right?
00:09:16.399 --> 00:09:22.399
There's that early stage in the insidification cycle where everything is built for the user.
00:09:22.480 --> 00:09:23.759
And the user, right?
00:09:23.840 --> 00:09:36.480
So we all had that lived experience that for a very brief amount of time, you could like, you know, the blogger area, why you just stand up a blog and all of a sudden people are reading it, you know, or you show up on YouTube and you put out a few videos and all of a sudden people are watching.
00:09:36.799 --> 00:09:51.919
So there's this lived experience for a very brief window of time under a very specific set of constraints that I think socialized this idea that, hey, if you just show up and you use the magical powers of the internet, people will find you and love you.
00:09:52.080 --> 00:09:53.600
And it just ain't true, right?
00:09:53.759 --> 00:09:55.840
I mean, how does that gel with your experience?
00:09:56.320 --> 00:09:59.120
Dude, Soylent Green is made out of people.
00:10:00.559 --> 00:10:09.919
And as it turns, also, for anybody who gets that reference, you know, it certainly shows that you were in the gifted and talented programs in middle school.
00:10:10.159 --> 00:10:13.279
Well, we'll put we'll put the hint in the show notes if that's not a familiar.
00:10:14.159 --> 00:10:23.919
I think that what you have, and maybe you maybe you have seen this as well, is you have folks that are now building these platforms.
00:10:24.159 --> 00:10:27.600
These are second, third, fourth, fifth generation platforms.
00:10:27.679 --> 00:10:36.320
And when I say platforms, I am talking about now social media or whatever you want to Google, YouTube, all of it.
00:10:36.399 --> 00:10:36.720
Yeah.
00:10:37.039 --> 00:10:46.639
All that stuff, all of this has been bought, sold, and turned over so many times that the motives are different.
00:10:46.879 --> 00:10:48.159
What is the intention?
00:10:48.240 --> 00:10:51.440
What is the incentive for those platforms to exist?
00:10:51.759 --> 00:10:58.399
And I think we need to be very clear about like the incentive is profit for the companies that own them.
00:10:58.480 --> 00:11:03.200
And I'm not even saying that in a negative way because companies need to make money.
00:11:03.519 --> 00:11:21.120
But when you take that into account, that the people that are building a lot of these quote unquote connective tissues in that in the olden times, there was this there was this actual sense of curiosity, of this surprised connection.
00:11:21.360 --> 00:11:29.279
But we have now, I think, people that are building extractive machines to connect us, and they don't like people.
00:11:29.519 --> 00:11:41.440
And so they're building things built upon assumptions that may not align with the actual experience of people that like to go to the grocery store.
00:11:41.519 --> 00:11:52.799
I they like to go to shows, they like to make their own music, they like to learn to play guitar because it's a skill you want to master.
00:11:53.279 --> 00:12:05.840
And I think when you when you speak about those, a lot of those surprises and the things that I think we may have experienced in that first wave of what this internet is, we're real.
00:12:06.639 --> 00:12:16.159
But our but these next generation have never lived with that excitement and experience of like, wait a second, I can just send a message to my friend?
00:12:16.480 --> 00:12:18.559
Because of course you can.
00:12:19.360 --> 00:12:20.799
You know, yeah.
00:12:21.120 --> 00:12:24.799
Oh, yeah, I I I think what you raise is really important.
00:12:24.879 --> 00:12:27.679
And I think again, we've talked about this on this show before.
00:12:27.840 --> 00:12:31.039
Talking with folks offline, I can tell that we we can never talk about it enough.
00:12:31.200 --> 00:12:42.720
Yeah, there was a very brief window where we weren't the product, and we were actually people using an innovation, and that innovation was doing a thing.
00:12:42.879 --> 00:12:50.559
But the the subtext of that is that we had very, very patient capital for 10 or 15 years.
00:12:50.720 --> 00:12:54.399
Those early stages, these businesses didn't make any money.
00:12:54.480 --> 00:13:00.559
They were burning money on the hopes that someday they could figure out how to turn it into revenue.
00:13:00.799 --> 00:13:01.840
And and guess what?
00:13:02.000 --> 00:13:03.679
They figured it out, right?
00:13:04.000 --> 00:13:14.720
It took them a while, but they figured out how to turn all of our, hey, look at me doing a thing, whether that's hey, look at my business or look at my song I wrote or whatever it is.
00:13:14.879 --> 00:13:21.519
They figured out a way to turn all of our look at me doing a thing into their own form of revenue.
00:13:21.840 --> 00:13:24.639
And that changes the dynamic entirely.
00:13:25.679 --> 00:13:31.279
You just introduced a phrase that I think is really important, patient capital.
00:13:31.519 --> 00:13:31.840
Right.
00:13:32.000 --> 00:13:37.200
So, and these are conversations that also, and this is more towards the younger audience.
00:13:37.279 --> 00:13:48.879
Like, if you would have told 20-year-old art major Chris McAdoo that he would ever say the words or understand what patient capital meant, he'd be like, I don't know if he would believe you.
00:13:49.200 --> 00:13:51.759
But what what what that is, is you're right.
00:13:53.360 --> 00:14:00.639
The technologies that are being developed now are filled with patient capital.
00:14:01.039 --> 00:14:15.519
And so what you saw there is when there is money to the money that has the ability to wait, it has the ability to lock in on a here's where we here's where we go.
00:14:15.759 --> 00:14:26.559
Here's where we start to extract, here's where we start to exclude, here's where, and this is like you know, a common example, and we'll just go ahead and get hot on it, right?
00:14:26.960 --> 00:14:38.879
You look at some of the platforms out there that allow for, you know, hey, you upload an image and you can all of a sudden make that image, you know, sexually exploitative or this.
00:14:39.120 --> 00:14:45.039
And when that company, XAI, got a lot of blowback, I'm like, hey, we don't want this.
00:14:45.279 --> 00:14:53.919
Instead of saying, oh, we messed up and we should probably be in trouble for this and we should cancel all this, that company said, you know what, guys, you're right.
00:14:54.080 --> 00:14:56.159
We're just gonna put this in the paid version.
00:14:56.399 --> 00:15:01.440
Because they under, I mean, again, they understood the basic economic forces, is that there was demand for this.
00:15:01.840 --> 00:15:08.480
They just needed to be able to provide some sense of, you know, protecting the children, so to speak.
00:15:08.720 --> 00:15:20.399
And and I've talked about this, is that I really believe that a lot of this discussion that we're having about, oh, we need to get kids off of tech, we need to get kids off of social media, we need to get teenagers off these platforms.
00:15:20.559 --> 00:15:24.159
I'm not saying it's necessarily bad, although the data is pretty mixed on whether it's actually working.
00:15:24.320 --> 00:15:34.000
What I what my visibility into it, and I have teenagers, is that this is like a socially acceptable way to deal with our own guilt about what we've built.
00:15:34.159 --> 00:15:36.080
So we're not willing to protect ourselves.
00:15:36.399 --> 00:15:42.080
We're not willing to, we're not willing to protect the economy, we're not willing to protect our peers, business peers.
00:15:42.320 --> 00:15:47.759
So we we'll we'll leverage it in the only thing we'll allow ourselves to do, which is to protect the children.
00:15:48.000 --> 00:15:56.960
And the reality is we've allowed for really a platform economy that doesn't serve hardly anybody, to be honest.
00:15:57.120 --> 00:15:59.840
Like really serves only a very small number of people.
00:16:00.080 --> 00:16:04.320
Because what's interesting, you said there's patient capital right now, and I agree with that.
00:16:04.480 --> 00:16:12.480
But what's really fascinating is the patient capital of 15 years ago was hey, let's try banking, let's try design, let's try that.
00:16:12.559 --> 00:16:15.679
Like it's it's money that was trying a bunch of different things.
00:16:15.759 --> 00:16:20.000
And now we're at a level of the iteration where the only thing that matters is platforms.
00:16:20.240 --> 00:16:24.399
So there is patient capital, but the but almost all of it.
00:16:24.559 --> 00:16:31.759
In fact, I just saw a recent statistic that last year, 80% of venture capital went to AI platforms.
00:16:31.919 --> 00:16:41.519
So yeah, that that I that capital is proving to be somewhat patient, like we're gonna build out massive data centers and we're gonna do all this stuff, but it's now in a very, very narrow space.
00:16:41.919 --> 00:17:00.399
And what's gonna be interesting around that, because I help I I a lot of times I'm working with companies that are raising, you know, capital, all this kind of stuff, is the thing that I have sort of shouted from the rooftops for a couple of years is like saying you are AI powered or this or that.
00:17:00.480 --> 00:17:07.359
We used the dirty word now, but it's like saying you're that is kind of like saying you and I are using computers to do this.
00:17:08.480 --> 00:17:19.119
And here is definitely one thing I would say to those folks that you know, back to the craft isn't enough, right?
00:17:19.200 --> 00:17:19.839
Like back to that.
00:17:19.920 --> 00:17:30.240
Like, what can we we see what's happened, but what can we do about it is starting to become smarter and paying attention to like what are these incentives?
00:17:30.319 --> 00:17:31.599
What are they trying to build?
00:17:31.759 --> 00:17:33.519
Why are they trying to build it?
00:17:33.920 --> 00:17:44.240
And and I think there's these bets being made, and some of them are going to fail in a dramatic, dramatic fashion.
00:17:44.640 --> 00:17:56.400
And so the things that I like to think about about that uh is what is what are the things that we can do, or we can focus on the things that aren't going to change.
00:17:57.279 --> 00:18:13.359
And that means like if you are an artist, if you are a trying to build a business, if you are a leader, people do not want to feel unappreciated, people don't want worse service, people don't want all of those things.
00:18:13.599 --> 00:18:22.319
And I am looking forward to once the sort of froth settles down, and I think it's gonna be like 12, maybe 24 months around this.
00:18:22.720 --> 00:18:30.480
What happens when people start you know what what happens when we're back in person?
00:18:30.880 --> 00:18:37.200
What happens when trust becomes hard to verify, right?
00:18:37.359 --> 00:18:38.880
Without looking somebody in the eye.
00:18:39.920 --> 00:18:40.240
Yeah.
00:18:40.400 --> 00:18:40.640
Yeah.
00:18:40.720 --> 00:18:42.720
I mean, what I you're more optimistic than I am.
00:18:42.880 --> 00:18:46.160
I think we're I think we're in like a I mean, it depends on what froth we mean.
00:18:46.240 --> 00:18:53.680
This sort of like chewing through the supposed bubble and all of that, I think, yeah, 12 to 24 cycle, we'll know where we are with that.
00:18:54.000 --> 00:19:01.200
The sense of kind of permanent unknown, permanent insecurity, by virtue of the word permanent, I think we're in this for a while.
00:19:01.359 --> 00:19:10.160
And maybe for those of us who are early to you know, mid to late mid-career, we might be in it for our entire career.
00:19:11.200 --> 00:19:27.279
And so then I think which gets us back to your point, which is we're gonna have to learn how to make these kind of first principles, core behavioral decisions that are a little bit era agnostic because we actually can't even figure out what era we're in.
00:19:27.359 --> 00:19:30.400
Every new substack that comes out renames the era, right?
00:19:30.559 --> 00:19:31.839
Is it the AI era?
00:19:32.000 --> 00:19:33.279
Is it the deep fake era?
00:19:33.519 --> 00:19:34.480
Is it the attention era?
00:19:34.640 --> 00:19:37.440
Is it the right the era's been renamed 87 times?
00:19:37.519 --> 00:19:39.519
We can't decide what era we're in.
00:19:39.839 --> 00:19:44.319
And that I think further validates that we have to get back to these first principles.
00:19:44.400 --> 00:19:46.880
And I think that's really coming full circle.
00:19:47.279 --> 00:19:50.160
What you and I were talking about when we were talking about craft not being enough.
00:19:50.240 --> 00:20:11.200
It's not that craft doesn't matter, it's that you're gonna have to figure out how to bring that thing that you made into a network of relationships, into a way of going to market, into a way of engaging with other people that may not be dependent on yesterday's favorite algorithm.
00:20:11.920 --> 00:20:19.279
Well, and what may actually to what you're I I love that because what you're really talking about is context.
00:20:20.319 --> 00:20:23.519
What context are you operating in?
00:20:24.160 --> 00:20:38.400
To a lot of folks, I think that depending on it depends on how you for a lot of people, it depends on how you were brought up and how you relate to what is it?
00:20:38.480 --> 00:20:42.000
Uh what's the say he's like how you relate to being uncomfortable.
00:20:42.960 --> 00:20:49.440
And I've had, I think, the good fortune of like even growing up, both my father and mother were entrepreneurial.
00:20:49.759 --> 00:21:01.759
And so I've never lived in a situation and or understood it as a familial thing, like where you know, mom and dad go to work and come home and get a pay and turkeys, you know, at Thanksgiving.
00:21:01.839 --> 00:21:10.400
Like, we've I've always operated under this, like, all right, sort of constantly learning, constantly evolving, and constantly pivoting.
00:21:10.640 --> 00:21:13.759
And I think that's gonna be even more important.
00:21:14.640 --> 00:21:23.200
I mean, for not just to your point, yeah, not just for a certain few of us, but for I mean, almost everybody.
00:21:23.440 --> 00:21:28.880
Uh but here's the thing, I would argue that that's always been the case.
00:21:29.680 --> 00:21:41.359
Because when people are saying things about a certain technology and it's gonna it could it it's gonna replace us or whatever, people will argue, no, it can't because blank blank blank.
00:21:41.519 --> 00:21:42.640
No, it can't.
00:21:42.960 --> 00:21:48.240
It doesn't have to be good at its job, it doesn't have to be all those things, but you do.
00:21:48.799 --> 00:21:56.960
Like all of us being able to show up in that way, like what should have we and what could have we been doing all along?
00:21:58.319 --> 00:21:59.759
You know, does this become a time?
00:22:00.319 --> 00:22:03.920
Point in in history where people are like, wait a second.
00:22:04.480 --> 00:22:11.200
Like, we should have been teaching, teaching and learning with these navigable skills this whole time.
00:22:11.599 --> 00:22:14.319
Yeah, I mean, I think I think we're seeing a resurgence of that, right?
00:22:14.400 --> 00:22:23.039
One of the one of the themes of the news in the last two or three weeks, it's graduation time and you know, CEOs are getting booed off graduation stages and stuff like that.
00:22:23.200 --> 00:22:32.880
Like, one of the big themes that is, and and there was the big Canvas blackout, if I don't know if the year, you know, of the ed tech platform is massive pushback on ed tech.
00:22:33.680 --> 00:22:44.880
And that maybe it wasn't the best idea in the world with declining, you know, reading scores everywhere to have computers be the primary source by which, you know, our children learn, right?
00:22:45.359 --> 00:22:48.240
These things of like, we we had to try some things.
00:22:48.400 --> 00:22:50.480
And it's not about like a stupid us 10 years ago.
00:22:50.559 --> 00:22:53.039
It's just we had to try some things, we've learned some things.
00:22:53.279 --> 00:22:56.400
And now what do we want to do with what we've learned, right?
00:22:56.559 --> 00:23:01.200
You know, you see, and it isn't necessarily about, oh, it was better back then.
00:23:01.359 --> 00:23:02.720
I mean, I was there back then.
00:23:02.799 --> 00:23:10.079
I'm not sure how much better it was, but have as with all change, we've lost some things in the change.
00:23:10.319 --> 00:23:13.599
And what can we do to do this work of recovery?
00:23:13.680 --> 00:23:16.960
And I want to come back to your idea, which I think a lot of this is about context.
00:23:17.119 --> 00:23:24.160
So I want you to speak to this as a musician because I'm gonna say something I know almost nothing about, and then you can correct it and make us all smarter.
00:23:24.559 --> 00:23:33.839
So, to me, like an example of context is if I'm a songwriter and I want to get seen in the world and you know, but you know, have people listen to my music and et cetera.
00:23:34.240 --> 00:23:41.839
There was a stretch of time where it was like, okay, well, then you go put some videos on TikTok, you put some stuff on YouTube, et cetera.
00:23:42.079 --> 00:23:42.720
No context.
00:23:42.799 --> 00:23:44.640
That the way to be found is to have no context.
00:23:44.720 --> 00:23:50.480
Just go on these global platforms that just sort of hopefully use the algorithm to ship you to magically the right people.
00:23:50.720 --> 00:24:09.519
Now you're seeing this artist-owned, smaller scale, you know, platforms where, hey, you're not gonna get shipped to a hundred thousand people by way of an algorithm, but 3,000 people are gonna find you by way of natural networks and they're gonna love you.
00:24:09.680 --> 00:24:09.920
Right.
00:24:10.079 --> 00:24:13.200
This really small, long tail kind of stuff.
00:24:13.359 --> 00:24:18.400
I think the music industry sorting this out in interesting ways, and I'd love for you to speak to that.
00:24:18.640 --> 00:24:29.279
Well, I I'll I'll speak on I can speak to it, and I'll sort of do a dual path here, both as a from the music industry as well as the fine arts as artists.
00:24:29.440 --> 00:24:30.960
Yeah, even better.
00:24:31.279 --> 00:24:34.799
Because that that's where I spend more of my time or in that world too.
00:24:35.039 --> 00:24:49.519
But what you have are everyone knows that um that interview with the guy, the cre the creator of Suno that said, like, well, people don't really like to make music because it's hard to learn an instrument, it's hard to do that, it's hard to do that.
00:24:49.759 --> 00:24:54.720
And then there's the same thing over here on these generative platforms who are like, well, it's hard to learn to paint.
00:24:54.880 --> 00:24:57.279
It's hard to learn to do these things.
00:24:57.599 --> 00:25:06.559
And I think one, eventually that artifice that artifice breaks down because people have to care about it.
00:25:07.039 --> 00:25:16.160
And what I've learned both as a professional artist and and a creator and all of these kind of things is people buy into you as much as they do the art.
00:25:16.880 --> 00:25:27.119
And so they're conf, I think, I think it's really easy to confuse the finished product with the whole, with the whole process.
00:25:27.279 --> 00:25:33.519
Like the fact that someone may like a thing and they're gonna do an AI version of it and put it on their wall.
00:25:33.599 --> 00:25:35.039
Hey, we're gonna do that anyway.
00:25:35.440 --> 00:25:39.839
They're not your fan, they're not your client, they're not your partner.
00:25:40.640 --> 00:25:45.200
And so your point, man, you're talking about, you know, you're finding those 3,000 people.
00:25:45.279 --> 00:25:50.240
There is a technologist guy named Kevin Kenny, and he talks about 1,000 true fans.
00:25:50.880 --> 00:26:04.079
And so I think the nature of what success, I think the nature of fame, I think the nature of what it feels like to quote unquote make it are going to look very different.
00:26:04.400 --> 00:26:17.359
Because to your point, I I've seen actually literally just last week, there was a great artist that came through my town here, Knoxville, Tennessee, and played like two house concerts and probably made more money, right?
00:26:17.759 --> 00:26:21.839
Because they didn't have to book a venue, they didn't have to do all of these kind of things.
00:26:23.200 --> 00:26:24.559
And they were very successful.
00:26:24.720 --> 00:26:31.200
And so I think we have to be able, in the same way that I was also, it's like Gandalf style.
00:26:31.279 --> 00:26:42.079
I was there in the beginning, you know, for our kids generation, and really even for us, but but what was isn't anymore.
00:26:42.799 --> 00:26:46.160
And so what opportunities does that open up?
00:26:46.319 --> 00:26:52.799
And even if it looks different than it did even five years ago, 10, but especially 20, that's okay.
00:26:53.039 --> 00:26:54.799
But that's a new business model.
00:26:55.119 --> 00:27:11.920
And I think the ability to be creative in that craft is like if you really love your thing, if you really love the thing that you are doing and building, or the people that you work with, or the experiences that you create, like figure out, you got it.
00:27:12.000 --> 00:27:26.960
There's part of it that you figure out like, what does that sustainable model look like moving forward rather than sort of trying to wind the tape back, you know, to a to a time uh that wasn't working all that well either.
00:27:27.359 --> 00:27:30.480
Yeah, there's so much of it that's that that's fantasy, right?
00:27:30.720 --> 00:27:46.079
That you know it like it's it's funny to, I don't know, like watch an a 10-year-old American Idol episode or a 10-year-old survivor episode, these these things, and you you see like how we thought about the world at the time.
00:27:46.240 --> 00:27:52.640
You know, and it would be like, well, this kid got a million views on YouTube, and now he's gonna be the next big, you know.
00:27:52.799 --> 00:27:58.079
I remember that era, you go, oh my gosh, all you got to do is go on YouTube and you get a million, right?
00:27:58.160 --> 00:27:58.240
Yeah.
00:27:58.559 --> 00:28:07.920
Instead of realizing the arbitrage of it, that there's a million kids who went on YouTube and got zero, so that this kid could be the one that got a million.
00:28:08.000 --> 00:28:13.839
And of course it plays into the sort of American fantasy of, well, but maybe I'm the one and I just have to believe in myself and whatever.
00:28:14.000 --> 00:28:25.039
And I think part of what we're cultivating, and I think part of what you're cultivating with your clients, and we certainly cultivate here in this conversation, is a different kind of vision for the future.
00:28:25.440 --> 00:28:49.119
That instead of rolling the dice on somebody's, you know, sort of vagus algorithm, that it'll hopefully grab us and shoot us to our 15 minutes of fame, is well, wouldn't it be great to work with a small number of people, whatever that size is for what the venture you're doing and the work that you do, to work with a small number of people who totally believe in what we do, and that I could get to control my future in the process.
00:28:49.440 --> 00:28:51.200
That sounds fun, right?
00:28:52.160 --> 00:28:52.720
Yeah.
00:28:52.960 --> 00:29:00.720
And that actually is a thing that is available to us, like in a lot of different than it was, you know.
00:29:01.839 --> 00:29:06.480
I I love, I I think that is that's a big one.
00:29:06.960 --> 00:29:10.960
I there's another, there's an author, a guy named Eric Reese.
00:29:11.279 --> 00:29:13.039
Yeah, Eric Reese is doing great work right now.
00:29:13.279 --> 00:29:19.839
And right now, yeah, he's got a great, he's got a new book out, but uh now, and his last book was all about human flourishing.
00:29:20.079 --> 00:29:39.039
And he happens to be talking about, he's a venture capital guy, but he happened to be talking about technology companies, but you could apply it to just about anything, in that if we are developing something solely because we are like, you don't develop the tech for the tech.
00:29:39.440 --> 00:29:45.039
You don't develop the like we develop it so that we as people live better lives.
00:29:45.920 --> 00:30:10.079
And whatever we are doing, I think from if we're trying to, you know, if we're trying to make art, if we're trying to make music, or if we're trying to lead a team, or if we're trying to build a business, or all of those kind of things, there is this, yeah, it's like if we're not doing it for each other and we're not building something that matters for people that keeps us moving forward, like what are we doing?
00:30:10.319 --> 00:30:11.200
Yeah, and it's interesting.
00:30:11.359 --> 00:30:21.440
I mean, it's interesting to treat Reese as a as a text case here because it shows a little bit of how our our brains get a little mucked up and how we have to really be generous with each other.
00:30:21.599 --> 00:30:31.680
You know, like his original idea, lean startup, the idea of having an MVP and failing fast and iterating through and all of this stuff.
00:30:32.000 --> 00:30:42.640
What I think no one understood at the time is all of that methodology was based on the assumption that you were building a thing that was gonna help people, that was gonna be that was gonna do good and be beneficial.
00:30:42.799 --> 00:30:56.240
And now you're seeing Eric Reese, not it's not fair to say that he's on like an apology tour, but a little bit of a like a repositioning and going, hey, people took my ideas and took them to places that I never imagined them going.
00:30:56.720 --> 00:31:04.880
And now I want to recenter this into something much more human, and that it really isn't just about building something fast, right?
00:31:05.039 --> 00:31:07.039
His new book is about you know resilience.
00:31:07.200 --> 00:31:09.920
How do you build something that's worth having for a really long time?
00:31:10.160 --> 00:31:13.119
You know, I think there are people in the world who'd be like, well, screw that guy.
00:31:13.200 --> 00:31:15.200
He basically created Silicon Valley.
00:31:15.359 --> 00:31:20.640
And I think, again, this is like, come on, folks, like we all are learning and growing.
00:31:20.799 --> 00:31:25.839
We're all getting there, we're all waking up to these this reality as the levels that we are.
00:31:26.079 --> 00:31:29.359
And now we can figure out our next steps together.
00:31:30.079 --> 00:31:49.440
Well, that like a thing that I like to say and a point of view that I'll start a lot of sort of set the tone for facilitations as well as just when I'm talking with anybody, is an absolute repudiation of break of move fast and break things.
00:31:49.920 --> 00:31:52.000
Hate it with every ounce of my body.
00:31:52.079 --> 00:31:55.440
And I say move fast and build things.
00:31:56.319 --> 00:32:08.640
And because what a lot of people have now sort of experienced from that first wave of breaking things is like when you break something, somebody has to pick it up, somebody has to clean it up.
00:32:08.880 --> 00:32:14.160
And so you're not necessarily thinking about the downstream effects of what you are doing.
00:32:14.400 --> 00:32:23.279
But when you come like you to your point, when you're building together, and I'm actually sometimes very literally like, hey, how's my neighbor?
00:32:23.519 --> 00:32:35.599
Hey, like I am going, as maybe a creative professional or somebody or whatever, it's like I'm going to go and be involved with this thing that I care about that takes time out of my day because I care about it.
00:32:36.400 --> 00:32:40.079
There is no forward motion in a positive way without cost.
00:32:40.160 --> 00:32:46.160
And sometimes that cost is is literal money, but sometimes it's time, sometimes it's attention.
00:32:46.480 --> 00:33:00.799
But I think that we are at this opportunity, this point in time where working together to move fast, yes, but to build rather than to break things is something we can all come together, um, I think in a really powerful way around.
00:33:01.119 --> 00:33:02.240
Well, we have to, right?
00:33:02.400 --> 00:33:06.720
We we've we we spent a generation disrupting and deconstructing.
00:33:06.880 --> 00:33:08.799
And you and I were a part of that generation.
00:33:09.119 --> 00:33:12.720
Me, I'm a little bit older than you, me, a little, my, my group a little bit more so.
00:33:12.960 --> 00:33:16.480
And I stood on stages and let's said, let's Uberize everything.
00:33:16.640 --> 00:33:22.319
And then last week I'm in New York and I'm begging for a taxi because if I have to deal with Uber one more time, I'm gonna free and scream.
00:33:22.559 --> 00:33:26.640
Because we didn't think about we, I uh, you know, here's my public mayaculpa.
00:33:26.720 --> 00:33:34.640
We didn't think about the second and third and fourth degree consequences of dismantling what we dismantled and how much they were load-bearing.
00:33:34.880 --> 00:33:38.079
And and and this stuff matters.
00:33:38.160 --> 00:33:47.200
And now we get to go back and go, okay, well, we we kind of have an economy and a society that needs some support structure again because we tore out all of the load-bearing columns.
00:33:47.359 --> 00:33:49.119
So, what do we want to build?
00:33:49.359 --> 00:33:50.799
What do we want to build in our neighborhood?
00:33:50.960 --> 00:33:52.319
What do we want to build in our industry?
00:33:52.400 --> 00:33:55.680
What do we want to, and and that we is so important.
00:33:56.960 --> 00:34:02.960
We and you uh the load-bearing, the inefficiencies were load-bearing.
00:34:04.240 --> 00:34:11.280
Like that is the thing, is we continue to sort of want to incentivize, like, this is inefficient, let's do this.
00:34:11.679 --> 00:34:26.239
But no, like, I think the things that we can do now, again, to be craft first, but to also be like positional around each other is like, wait a second, wait a second.
00:34:26.559 --> 00:34:29.679
Why would we want to stop doing X, Y, Z?
00:34:30.559 --> 00:34:31.840
What are we not looking at?
00:34:32.000 --> 00:34:33.519
What are we not thinking about?
00:34:33.599 --> 00:34:39.039
And who is it going to affect if we take away, like to your point, like what is load bearing?
00:34:39.119 --> 00:34:47.679
Because if we just start taking sledgehammers to things, which we have seen the effects of, incredible harm can be done.
00:34:48.000 --> 00:34:57.280
And so if you know, you know, if you really think about it, if you know the people that live in the uh that house, you're not gonna take a sledgehammer to it.
00:34:57.679 --> 00:34:58.239
That's right.
00:34:58.480 --> 00:35:06.639
I mean, you there's no way that, you know, when they were building Uber, they were having focus groups with taxi drivers.
00:35:06.800 --> 00:35:08.159
They just weren't, right?
00:35:08.480 --> 00:35:13.920
That that this is this is every everything was worthwhile collateral damage and it'll all work out in the end.
00:35:14.159 --> 00:35:15.840
And and we've learned, right?
00:35:15.920 --> 00:35:19.039
But now we have to, now we have to do make different choices.
00:35:19.280 --> 00:35:28.320
Well, and if you remember too, or if anybody else was, you know, paying attention when Uber first came out, we can use that as an example because it came out as the best version of itself.
00:35:28.559 --> 00:35:32.960
Do you remember when you would get in an Uber and the guy, you know, the guy's like, oh, would you like a mint?
00:35:33.280 --> 00:35:35.599
Here's a here's a freshly squeezed lemon.
00:35:35.679 --> 00:35:36.079
I don't know.
00:35:36.320 --> 00:35:40.800
It felt new and you're like, wow, they really, this is nice.
00:35:41.599 --> 00:35:49.280
The last, you know, traveling, and like you said, like I I would give anything not to get in the back of one of those cars.
00:35:49.599 --> 00:35:56.079
And it's because when it started out, they were still like, here's the best version of ourselves.
00:35:56.320 --> 00:36:01.599
And then piece by piece, it gets inshidified to use that term.
00:36:01.920 --> 00:36:04.639
But it's like, what if we just stop paying attention to this?
00:36:05.280 --> 00:36:06.639
What if we stopped doing this?
00:36:06.719 --> 00:36:08.000
What if we stopped doing that?
00:36:08.159 --> 00:36:12.639
And it extracts the most margin out of every ride.
00:36:12.880 --> 00:36:20.159
But take Uber and apply that to uh, you know, so many different, you know, situations.
00:36:20.719 --> 00:36:26.880
And I think too, people underestimate, again, because the the people building these systems don't like people.
00:36:27.199 --> 00:36:33.199
People underestimate, for instance, even self-checkout lines at the grocery store.
00:36:34.159 --> 00:36:39.119
I changed the grocery store I went to for like two years because my buddy's kid worked there.
00:36:40.960 --> 00:36:43.119
And I like to see, I like to see James.
00:36:43.199 --> 00:36:45.039
I was like, oh, hey James, how's how's school going?
00:36:46.079 --> 00:36:51.840
Not because I cared about one brand over another, but it was like, oh, cool, cool.
00:36:52.079 --> 00:36:54.400
That's neat that he's got a first person job.
00:36:54.639 --> 00:36:56.159
And that's a very human thing.
00:36:56.800 --> 00:36:57.440
Yeah.
00:36:58.400 --> 00:37:03.519
Let's I wanna I wanna in some ways like the place that we've landed.
00:37:03.599 --> 00:37:18.320
I'm I'm imagining all of our listeners are like, yeah, yeah, you guys, screw Uber, we hate those guys, you know, like you sort of imagine everybody's, you know, and and I don't, I never want us to just sort of play the hits, you know, like right.
00:37:18.480 --> 00:37:34.960
Because I think part of why we started this and and really where we are right here is okay, if I'm listening and I'm a person who makes a thing that's human first and value for and is crafty and cool, and maybe it's code-based, maybe it's in the real world, maybe it's a piece of art, it doesn't matter.
00:37:35.039 --> 00:37:37.280
It's my thing that I'm making, right?
00:37:38.239 --> 00:37:44.239
I think the hardest bridge to cross, though, is I'm still sitting here wishing somebody would care about it.
00:37:45.039 --> 00:37:54.719
And what I have to pivot to is how do I take this thing that I have and find some people that I can use it to care about them?
00:37:54.880 --> 00:38:06.639
And I have so many agency owners, solos, people who in my network who are like, are we, you know, in the age of AR, are we going to find people who love what we do?
00:38:07.199 --> 00:38:12.400
And my honest response to them is, well, who does what you do love?
00:38:12.480 --> 00:38:13.840
And how would they know?
00:38:14.400 --> 00:38:15.440
How would they know?
00:38:15.599 --> 00:38:18.639
Is there a group of people that you're like, this is for you?
00:38:18.880 --> 00:38:32.400
And I'm talking to you, and I'm embedded with in your community, and I'm at your industry event, and I'm getting to know you, and people like you, and I'm I've become an expert on whatever libraries, because I really want to work with libraries.
00:38:32.559 --> 00:38:46.639
I've become an expert on, you know, that behavior of taking attention and pushing it outward and going, I'm gonna pay attention, not seek attention, I think is what we're both advocating for, but it's a hard turn.
00:38:46.960 --> 00:38:49.679
It is a you just nailed it though.
00:38:49.840 --> 00:38:58.480
I mean, that is if you are in the marketplace, in which we all are, and again, back to you could be making music, you could be making code, you could be building a business.
00:38:58.880 --> 00:39:02.320
I don't want to hear about you, I want to hear about me.
00:39:02.880 --> 00:39:12.719
In every customer profile you've ever heard, in every hero's journey, you in this case, I like the chance to make a Lord of the Rings reference when I can.
00:39:13.360 --> 00:39:14.079
Whenever you can.
00:39:14.400 --> 00:39:18.480
Everybody thinks of Frodo as the hero of that story.
00:39:18.639 --> 00:39:20.079
And that makes sense.
00:39:20.400 --> 00:39:26.159
But when you think about Sam Wise Gamge, at the end, Frodo's ready to give up.
00:39:26.239 --> 00:39:28.559
He's the one that carries him up the mountain.
00:39:28.880 --> 00:39:30.400
That is our role.
00:39:30.719 --> 00:39:42.079
So when we're trying to, when we are engaging with an audience, when we have a potential client, when we have a potential collector, whatever that means, how can we help them?
00:39:42.800 --> 00:39:44.320
What are their pain points?
00:39:44.400 --> 00:39:45.280
What are they going through?
00:39:45.360 --> 00:39:45.920
What do they love?
00:39:46.079 --> 00:39:47.519
Like you said, what do they love?
00:39:47.599 --> 00:39:48.880
What do they care about?
00:39:49.679 --> 00:39:54.480
And we re I think it's too easy, and we've been doing this for years and years.
00:39:54.639 --> 00:40:00.079
It's too easy for us to reduce people to sock puppet personas.
00:40:01.920 --> 00:40:15.280
And so I always I always advocate when I'm talking with well artists or a lot of our companies, I don't want you to tell me that Susie is definitely a 42-year-old mother of two and like blah, blah, blah.
00:40:15.360 --> 00:40:16.239
Like, no, no, no.
00:40:16.400 --> 00:40:21.039
Talk to Deborah, the lady that is actually your customer.
00:40:21.360 --> 00:40:24.000
Talk to the person that actually came to your show.
00:40:24.159 --> 00:40:36.079
Talk to the person that actually wants to see more of your work and ask them questions, not about how much they like your work, but like, what what made you show up tonight?
00:40:37.920 --> 00:40:39.679
What it's about them.
00:40:39.760 --> 00:40:40.719
It's not about you.
00:40:41.760 --> 00:40:44.239
What made you what made you come out on a Thursday?
00:40:45.119 --> 00:40:49.039
What made you show up in this way at work rather than another way?
00:40:49.920 --> 00:40:56.719
And you start to learn about them in a way that I think it comes back to that things that never change.
00:40:57.920 --> 00:40:58.880
People want to feel heard.
00:41:00.079 --> 00:41:04.559
People want to feel that the decisions they make have an influence on others.
00:41:04.639 --> 00:41:08.480
And I hope that they I hope that they want that influence to be positive.
00:41:09.599 --> 00:41:10.400
I think that's true.
00:41:10.559 --> 00:41:23.760
I mean, I think there that by and large, you know, one of the things that's been said ad nauseum in this sort of hyper-growth, hyper-acceleration of technology is, you know, code is fast, but evolution is slow.
00:41:24.480 --> 00:41:27.119
And so we are who we are.
00:41:27.280 --> 00:41:31.679
We are who we were in 1800, we are who we were in 1450.
00:41:31.840 --> 00:41:35.039
Like human beings just don't evolve that fast.
00:41:35.519 --> 00:41:45.280
And so our instinctual nature of how we make decisions, what gives us comfort, what gives us joy, what gives us meaning is really not that inventive.
00:41:45.360 --> 00:41:49.199
It's not that new, it's not that creative, it's pretty pretty baked in.
00:41:49.840 --> 00:41:59.440
And so ventures and leaders who are willing to do the hard thing of going, well, I'm just gonna do the human thing.
00:41:59.679 --> 00:42:05.760
You know, like I hear a lot of people being like, gosh, I wish the economy wasn't as extractive and this extraction, this, and extraction that.
00:42:05.840 --> 00:42:08.480
And I write a lot about extraction for this reason.
00:42:08.719 --> 00:42:11.199
And then, but what am I supposed to do?
00:42:11.519 --> 00:42:17.599
Well, what is the least extractive thing you could do to solve the problem that you're in?
00:42:17.840 --> 00:42:19.440
I said this to a client of mine the other day.
00:42:19.519 --> 00:42:22.079
I said, okay, we have this giant goal we're trying to reach.
00:42:22.400 --> 00:42:26.639
What's the most human, natural, joy-filled way we could solve it?
00:42:28.400 --> 00:42:30.239
What a great way to say that.
00:42:30.480 --> 00:42:41.440
And that doesn't necessarily mean we're gonna get the one right answer, but man, it points us in such a completely different direction, and we get really, really different ideas.
00:42:42.079 --> 00:42:50.000
Well, I think too, with that approach, you are also being mindful of everybody else in the room.
00:42:50.239 --> 00:43:00.719
And who's when you're trying to make things better, you're actually who's in the room and also who's not in the room, and who are we making these decisions for?
00:43:00.960 --> 00:43:07.039
And I also think people wildly underestimate small things.
00:43:07.440 --> 00:43:08.480
Absolutely.
00:43:08.719 --> 00:43:20.719
Like do you underestimate that in you know, I making something up, like in the office every morning, you come and make the coffee, or you're kind to the parking valet, or you make sure that whatever that is.
00:43:21.440 --> 00:43:28.639
And if you had everybody doing just one little thing that helped, man, that made me feel better.
00:43:29.599 --> 00:43:34.800
With no necessary, it's not a quid pro quo, it's not an oh, I'll do a nice thing, and then you'll do a nice thing.
00:43:34.880 --> 00:43:39.280
You're like, no, I'm just gonna do a nice thing because it's joyful.
00:43:39.920 --> 00:43:42.079
Because it makes life better.
00:43:42.880 --> 00:43:44.559
You know, be selfish about it.
00:43:44.719 --> 00:43:46.320
It makes life better for me.
00:43:47.599 --> 00:43:56.800
And it's those small steps, those things that we can do that make um over time make a huge difference.
00:43:57.119 --> 00:43:58.320
I a hundred percent agree.
00:43:58.400 --> 00:44:02.800
I mean, I think We over-index to the big flashy moves.
00:44:02.880 --> 00:44:06.719
I think that's part of this the one of the consequences of our digital era.
00:44:06.800 --> 00:44:08.159
Um, see, that's one of the eras we were in.
00:44:08.239 --> 00:44:18.320
It's changed several times since then, but one of the consequences of our digital era is we over-index to the flashy and we under-index to the simple because it'll never show up on a dashboard.
00:44:18.480 --> 00:44:23.039
And the stuff that'll never show up on a dashboard is where the magic is right now.
00:44:23.360 --> 00:44:26.400
So we're near the end of our time, Chris, and this has been super fun.
00:44:26.559 --> 00:44:27.760
So let's do two things.
00:44:28.000 --> 00:44:30.000
One is where can people find you?
00:44:30.159 --> 00:44:38.639
Obviously, you want to let people know where they can find you and learn more about what you're doing because you're doing incubating, you're doing training, you're you're in like nine different things.
00:44:38.800 --> 00:44:40.239
So where can people find you?
00:44:40.480 --> 00:44:45.280
Yeah, like most folks in this new age economy era.
00:44:46.480 --> 00:44:51.440
Um, you know, yeah, you can find for art is uh ChrisMacado.com.
00:44:51.599 --> 00:45:01.119
I do a lot of speaking at ChrisMackadoospeaks.com, but then my main company uh is called Fighting Shape, uh, Fighting Shape Impact Company, and that's fightingshapeimpact.com.
00:45:02.320 --> 00:45:08.239
And then lastly, we ask everybody this when they swing by and hang out, is um what's giving you hope right now?
00:45:09.360 --> 00:45:12.800
Uh I can be very specific about that.
00:45:12.960 --> 00:45:25.280
Um, some of the work that I do both with you know with my kids and with some um students at uh the university level, 18 to 23 year olds.
00:45:26.719 --> 00:45:32.320
I have had some of the most meaningful experiences with some of the most curious people in the world.
00:45:34.239 --> 00:45:48.960
As a as a advisor to the a college here, um to the college of business, it gives me hope that there are people that are out, you know, sort of one generation below us that are asking great questions.
00:45:49.599 --> 00:46:08.159
That regardless of what we hear on the news uh and see uh you know on our feeds and everything, I believe that there is a vast majority of folks that when given the right, when given the right outlet, are curious and they care a lot.
00:46:08.239 --> 00:46:10.559
And I see it over and over again.
00:46:10.719 --> 00:46:15.280
So I'm gonna go with like the next generation's uh curiosity.
00:46:16.159 --> 00:46:24.960
And so it's up to us as sort of those next generations to protect that curiosity at all costs.
00:46:25.280 --> 00:46:25.840
That's right.
00:46:26.000 --> 00:46:26.719
That's right.
00:46:26.960 --> 00:46:27.679
It's funny.
00:46:27.840 --> 00:46:31.039
I I I maybe this might be true without exception.
00:46:31.119 --> 00:46:33.679
And I'm sure there's somewhere there's an exception, but I can't think of it.
00:46:33.840 --> 00:46:43.679
Whenever I talk to somebody with proximity to teenagers and early adults, you know, people like 16 to 25, they're like, these guys are gonna be all right.
00:46:43.840 --> 00:46:46.960
These kids are gonna like there, there's just there's so much optimism there.
00:46:47.039 --> 00:46:47.920
It's really exciting.
00:46:48.159 --> 00:46:48.880
All right, Chris.
00:46:49.039 --> 00:46:51.519
Well, thank you so much for hanging out with us.
00:46:52.079 --> 00:46:52.719
Thank you, man.
00:46:53.679 --> 00:46:58.639
We will uh hear more from you when they follow your links, which we'll have in the show notes.
00:46:58.800 --> 00:46:59.920
All right, much appreciated.
00:47:00.719 --> 00:47:04.719
And uh thanks to everybody for, you know, for the thanks to you and everybody for this opportunity.
00:47:04.960 --> 00:47:11.679
If this conversation put language to something you've been feeling but couldn't quite name, that's the show doing what it's supposed to do.
00:47:12.000 --> 00:47:22.719
The job of Damskiven is to surface our questions, surface our ambiguities, even dangerously surface our vulnerabilities, and ask, what if we lived inside of this in a different way?
00:47:22.880 --> 00:47:28.960
One of the things I was having a conversation with a colleague of mine actually on LinkedIn, which is never where good conversations happen.
00:47:29.119 --> 00:47:34.880
And he was talking about he kindly put the word out about my book coming out and introduced that to his community.
00:47:35.039 --> 00:47:39.440
And we stumbled into this phrase, you're already uncomfortable, you might as well grow.
00:47:39.679 --> 00:47:51.840
This economy, this environment, this uncertainty, this you know, K-shaped discrepancy between the haves and the haves not, it creates an enormous amount of discomfort and cognitive dissonance for people.
00:47:52.000 --> 00:47:56.639
So the reality is whether you're acknowledging it or not, you're already uncomfortable.
00:47:56.960 --> 00:47:59.840
So moving toward discomfort isn't going to make things worse.
00:47:59.920 --> 00:48:01.199
It actually is going to make things better.
00:48:01.360 --> 00:48:04.559
And if we can move toward discomfort, we might as well grow.
00:48:04.800 --> 00:48:17.440
We might as well actually tap into the energy in our vulnerability, tap into the energy and the questions that would that don't have answers because there's so much pent-up energy in there, and then use it to solve real problems and negotiate our ventures out into the world.
00:48:17.599 --> 00:48:25.039
As far as Chris, you can find him at chrismcadoo.com for his art, Chris McAdooSpeaks.com for him in front of an audience or your team.
00:48:25.280 --> 00:48:30.800
And then Fighting Shape Impact for his kind of main company and advisory work.
00:48:30.880 --> 00:48:32.159
All of those links are in the show notes.
00:48:32.480 --> 00:48:36.639
For everything happening in my world, the easiest place to always find me is nickrichmeier.com.
00:48:36.719 --> 00:48:41.920
And you can always subscribe at damnsgiven.com to the newsletter and everything that we're publishing.
00:48:42.079 --> 00:48:53.360
Uh, if you're watching on YouTube or if you're on Apple and this connected with you again, we ask that you provide a review and subscribe because we really want to help everybody off the algorithm recommendation machine.
00:48:53.679 --> 00:48:57.440
Algorithmic recommendations are keeping all of our brains frozen.
00:48:57.519 --> 00:49:04.880
And so the more you can use the tools and use the platform to tell it what you want and only engage with what you want, the better off you're gonna be.
00:49:05.039 --> 00:49:10.320
And so, for better or worse, like and subscribe and uh is a key way of doing that.
00:49:10.480 --> 00:49:14.960
As I try to say as often as possible, um, the future is coming at us, whether we like it or not.
00:49:15.119 --> 00:49:16.239
So forward forward.
00:49:16.400 --> 00:49:17.519
Let's get there together.
