Melkey and Dax on Routine, SST, Startup Relationships, and Goal Setting
Your emotions are just tied to whatever metrics that you are trying trying to pull. There's a chart and my, like, mental state just correlates a 100% exactly to that.
Speaker 2:Is that the Dunning Kruger chart?
Speaker 1:No. No. I meant, like, just a chart of our, like, downloads. Like, that's the thing that we focus
Speaker 2:on. God. Yeah. You literally meant, like, a metrics chart. No.
Speaker 2:No.
Speaker 1:No. No. Like, just literally that that's a good chart of my emotions. Like, if you wanna know how I'm doing, just go check her NPM downloads. How's it going?
Speaker 2:What's up? You went right into the recording. Was about to say how much I missed you. It's good to finally get to talk to you. You're like, shut up.
Speaker 2:Shut the hell up. Pause. Let me give everything. I'm gonna record. I'm like, okay.
Speaker 1:Well, here's the thing. We used to, like, do, like, an intro and then start recording, but then some of the best stuff was always just in the warm up. So now I just record right away. Like, I don't give a shit.
Speaker 2:Nice.
Speaker 1:So how are you doing? How have things been?
Speaker 2:Dude, things have been pretty rough. I'm not even gonna lie.
Speaker 1:Really? Tell me more.
Speaker 2:Yeah. I know I know it's good to you get people like, oh, look this everything's so great. But, man, like, I've been I've been in it right now. It's definitely been difficult for me.
Speaker 1:Yeah. What's going on?
Speaker 2:I got COVID. I have COVID Really? Right So that's been tough. Yeah. Bad cough.
Speaker 2:It's hard to like talk for a long time because I have to take a deep breath. And my cardio is pretty good. Like, don't smoke, don't do anything bad, train a lot. So So it's hard. It's like weird when I'm like out of breath.
Speaker 2:So Yeah. That's been pretty, you know, rough. Work has been like extremely like my work, my team is shifting to really make me like a senior senior.
Speaker 1:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:And like the point of contact tech lead, and that's just been a lot of responsibility, like a significant step. It's been like, typically, you know, ideally want to be a gradual, like kind of here and there while you have like an like a a real senior or like the former tech lead to kind of still look over stuff, but they've, like, really flipped the switch where it's like now no one's gonna look over your stuff. You are responsible. And that's been a hard transition. And then obviously with, like, content and
Speaker 1:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:Side projects, you know, when that's not in, you know, the best spot, obviously, that eats at you a little bit more.
Speaker 1:So Damn, dude. That's a lie. I didn't even know people were still getting COVID. Is that still a thing?
Speaker 2:Dude, it I I never I had COVID once and it lasted, three days. And it wasn't bad. Like, I didn't even think I had COVID, but I just came down with a cold. I took a COVID test because those were like, you you can get them easily. And I got, and I popped for positive.
Speaker 2:I'm like, okay, three days I'm good. This time it's been lasted for over a week and it's been terrible. It's been bad, man. Like I was bedridden once for a couple of hours, but yeah, like, it's like some days I feel great. Like this morning, I feel phenomenal.
Speaker 2:Sometimes I cough. And then sometimes randomly in the evening, I just get hit with a wave of like achiness, weakness that I'm just like, I can't do anything.
Speaker 1:Dude, I hate that too because then it just because you're saying you train a lot. Like, it just messes up your routine too. Then when you go back, you're like off and you gotta like work back up again. Just a bummer. And
Speaker 2:the other factors, even when I feel great, I don't wanna put everyone else at risk of COVID. Right? So I'm not going, like even though I think I can train right now, like at this moment, I'm not going to because I can still probably spread COVID. So I have to be locked down. And that's like no training, no weight lifting, no sauna.
Speaker 2:And like that is just killer. Just so bad.
Speaker 1:Yeah. I always realize like how brittle my life is because I I'll think I'm in like a really good routine. Like I wake up at a certain time. Have I my responsibilities, I do them, I get a lot of work done, I go to the gym, I do it all. And then one little thing will change, like Yeah.
Speaker 1:Like I'll get sick. Or right now, like Liz has been gone, so she just went to visit her friend in DC. It's only been two days and literally this morning, I fucking flooded my kitchen. Like, just everything is going wrong. Just one little change and then I'm just like off my routine.
Speaker 1:I slept at like 3AM yesterday. I've been I, like, slept four hours yesterday. Yeah. Like, those little things just knock you entirely out of a good pattern.
Speaker 2:Dude, routine is so key. Like, so key. Especially for, like, certain types of people. Like, I feel like the Primogen, he's very routine based. Right?
Speaker 2:Yeah. Like, extreme. Like, his time is, like, allocated to the smallest second, right? And I'm not to that extreme, but I need my routine. Like I need to wake up at this time, walk honeydew, and then do all my stuff.
Speaker 2:And like whatever throws me off that I'm just not in it. And it snowballs, you know? Because then you don't do one thing in time and then it bleeds over to the next item and you're like, this sucks.
Speaker 1:Yeah. It's funny because when I was younger, I had no routine at all and I was like, oh, I'm really productive. Like, look how much work I'm getting done. Look how many hours I'm putting into it. Happened and I kind of switched to be like, okay, let me actually like try to wake up consistently, let me go to bed consistently, let like have like slotted time for different things.
Speaker 1:And I was like, damn, holy shit. Like, I'm getting the same amount of work done in like half the time because when you just have a consistent day every day, it just adds up every every single time. So it's hard to know that because when you're not doing it, it feels like, yeah, this is this is fine. But when you're when you actually have that habit of having a routine, you realize huge difference.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Definitely. So, yeah, that's been like my update a little bit, you know, quick one. I've been asking you for a ton of CDK help on the side there behind the scenes, getting real, really deep into CDK more so than ever. Yeah.
Speaker 2:But yeah, how's how's life with you, man?
Speaker 1:Yeah. It's funny you were saying when when people ask how are things, everyone's always like, it's great. I always think about this with founders, like whenever you ask a founder like, oh, how's it going with your company? They're like, it's going great, man. Like, we're signing deals like, you know, whatever.
Speaker 1:And I know fucking it's not. It's not going great. I know you might feel good one day and the next day you feel like, it's a disaster. But every founder is like, we're doing really well. And then then like a week later, their company shuts down.
Speaker 2:Oh my god.
Speaker 1:But yeah, I've been in like a period of just intense work, I think for it's been it's been lasting a while. That's probably gonna continue to last till the end of this year. Like, basically with SST, we are we shifted into a phase of like, hey, let's get to a break even point where, we're making enough money to cover how much we're spending. Okay. And that's like a key phase of the business because you know that's like the shift from being like, oh, yeah, we're just like a start up fucking around to see if we can do something to then knowing, oh, yeah, like, we can work on this for the next ten years if we want So like, I'm like really eager to get to that milestone.
Speaker 1:We have like, I would say like twelve to twelve months or so to figure it out and we'll see like there's it's not clear, like I feel like there's a fifty fifty shot, we'll we'll do it or we won't. There's like a million fallback things that we can we can go to. But yeah, right now it's like we're so focused on the metrics and the numbers and it's like it's like very clear. But that just for me, when I'm in this mode, I just, like, can't enjoy other things. I'm like, this is what my life is about right now.
Speaker 1:I'm like, not really gonna I'm gonna kinda deprioritize some of the other stuff, even, like, just the fun stuff because Mhmm. I feel like if I don't have certain things figured out, I just, like, can't enjoy, like, much else. But I also can't stay in this mode for for that long, so we'll see.
Speaker 2:Dude, I have two things I wanna talk about, and each of them can go into separate paths. Yeah. One of the topics is, like, startups and what you said about how we make money, especially a company like SST, which I wanna get into after. But my first, like, question or, like, thing I wanna bring up is I saw a recent podcast. I was just scrolling through, like, social media.
Speaker 2:I don't even know what podcast this is. Right? There's some people didn't know. And this guy was like, you know, a person's always struggling between three things. And one of them is supplying for your family in terms of, like, you know, you wanna make sure that your family's taken care of, you're making enough money, you have a they have a house or they're you know, all that stuff.
Speaker 2:Right? The essentials. The second one is being the best version of yourself for your family. So that's where like you self improve, where you go to the gym, you're reading, you're building, all that stuff. Right?
Speaker 2:And the third one that everyone's always torn between these three is actually spending quality time with your family that you're doing all these things for. And it's so hard to find that balance. And I don't know how that's even done at this point. And, like, I have a really small like, my my direct family is obviously, like, my partner and my dog. Right?
Speaker 2:But it's like, I'm trying to be the best for them. I'm trying to give them, like, everything they want. Like, money is never an issue or whatever. But then it's like to do though, to really excel those two fields, you're gonna have to take away from spending quality time with them. But then at the end of the day, the thing that really matters, if we strip away everything and we're super old, 80 year old, We're gonna be wishing we spent more quality time with these with these folks.
Speaker 2:Right? So that's something that's so hard. Like, I'm so torn between those. I'm trying to find the balance is like radical.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Yeah. It's really hard. And I think I think for me it's a little bit different because there's a little bit more harmony between those three things for me. Because me and my wife worked together on, like, our business together.
Speaker 1:So, we really enjoy doing that together when we're out. We can when we're taking walks, that's kind of we can talk about that. It counts as both quality time and work. Mhmm. There's a little bit of harmony there but yeah, I think overall, there's just for me, the conflict is really, like, maximizing my income today, which would mean I have I would have like a really great, like, work life balance.
Speaker 1:I wouldn't be working too much. I'd be making a good amount of money. We'd be able to, move our family forward with the things that we wanna do. That that would kind of be like that's like always there, it's like a temptation. But there's like a ceiling to that, like I know in terms of what like me and Liz want for our future, if I just did that and that's all I did today, like we don't really get the life that we want one day.
Speaker 1:So there is this trade off of like, yeah, we need to kind of try to set ourselves up for the next ten, twenty years of our life. But it's painful now and then simultaneously, you can't just wait forever, like nothing's guaranteed. So if we like, you know, we wanna have kids soon, we can't just wait for, like, our businesses to be in order, which might take ten years before we have kids. So you just kinda have to, like, do everything at the same time. It's not really ideal.
Speaker 1:Yeah, man. It's it's a it's really hard.
Speaker 2:Yeah. It is. It really is, man. So that's why, like, the older I think the older I got and the more I've been into, like, the the the content space and, like, really looking up to people. Like, Primogen, I think is one of the best examples and and trash as well, actually.
Speaker 2:Because and Tiege too. Like, there's so many people I'm gonna miss. Right? So I don't wanna, like, every single person, but these individuals have families, they have full time jobs and especially Prime, his content output is at the same caliber, if not more than a person doing this full time. He's streaming multiple times a day.
Speaker 2:He's uploading multiple times to his second YouTube channel while working on a more polished one on his main channel and doing extra stuff, which would be like front end masters and all that stuff. And it's just mind blowing that he's able to fit everything in his day and balance it. And it's like really admirable. And that's the thing I look up to Prime the most. Like people always say like, when they come up to me and talk to Prime, right?
Speaker 2:Because I think Prime is so massive that he can't dedicate like one to one time. But a channel like me, you come in, you pop in, you ask a question, I can add actually dedicate more questions for you. Right? And they're like, oh, like, Prime is such a good developer, such a good programmer. And like to me, I don't think of Prime as like this excellent programmer developer.
Speaker 2:He's good. He's really knowledgeable. But to me, what makes Prime stand out and what people should be asking is like, how is he so good at managing his time?
Speaker 1:Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. That's key. And I think like for me, it's always been about building leverage.
Speaker 1:So if I spend an hour today versus an hour I spent ten year ten years ago, like what what is the output? And I've always tried to choose things that would, kind of build my leverage in that way. And oftentimes it's not the thing that seems like it makes sense in the short term, right? In the short term, you like try to be like, okay, where can I make the most money or like what's the best job that I can get? But oftentimes, the things that build leverage are things that, like don't seem to make sense in the moment but they kind of compound over time.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Yeah. So I I think I mean, the older you get, like, you don't want to have this, like, very linear career or life where you're just kind of linearly improving what you can do. You want it, you know, like ten years from now, you should be outputting like a 100 x like what what you could do before. You know, exaggeration, but like, it's kinda how I how I think about it.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. So then the second thing, the more like, I think less philosophical, more like actual business implemented question I had. So obviously, when BUN came out, I was That was the huge ripple in the tech sphere.
Speaker 2:Everyone was talking about BUN. I actually got approached by investors and they're like, Hey, can we ask some question about BUN? And I'm like, what the hell? Why? And it's because I made a tweet about BUN that went like pseudo viral.
Speaker 2:Like it had like 2,000 likes. Yeah. And there's a picture of TJ. And you know, these investors are like, yeah, we wanna talk to you about BUN. And I'm like, are you sure?
Speaker 2:I'm not the right person to be talking about Bond. And they're like, yeah, yeah, let's talk. I'm like, okay. So we hop on this call. I thought the call was gonna be like, oh, look, what do you think of Bond?
Speaker 2:Do you think it's a good tool? Etcetera, etcetera. Which the questions were that, but then the questions spun where it's like, how do you think Bund can make money?
Speaker 1:How can
Speaker 2:Bund and I'm just like, what the like, I can't answer this.
Speaker 1:Are you
Speaker 2:kidding me? I have no idea how Bund can make money. I have no clue. And they're like, do you think they should compete against Vercel? And I'm like, this is not I'm not your guy.
Speaker 2:Like, I'm not the guy to be asking these questions at all. But the reason why I wanted to bring this up is like an interesting point because investors in BUN, the only reason why they want to invest majority of the time is because they want to make their money back. Any investment, want see your money come back x fold. In a company like SST or any open source company, how do you make money? How does a company like SST where, you know, I could spin up SST and use it for free and and you guys will never even know about it only be to only because of, like, some metrics maybe that would get download.
Speaker 2:But there's no subscription model. There's no, like, like, how do you guys make money with SST or any tool like that?
Speaker 1:Yeah. I mean, I love this topic because I just love thinking about, like business models in general. Every project is very different and it ranges from you can follow a very established business model that has like a ton of history or other things need to like be really creative and be really inventive. And there's like so much synergy with like the tech you're working on like needs to line up with that. So for SST, I think we are, I would say in the simpler range of things.
Speaker 1:So we have like the standard do as much for free as possible, then for the people that are in production, there's like add on services that aren't strictly necessary and there might even be other alternatives too, that we charge for. So right now, that's kind of saying like we're trying to think about like actually trying to make more money. So the laws that we've been working on the last couple of months has been in that category. So yeah, you can use this for free. You can deploy your application for free.
Speaker 1:But once you deploy, there's like a lot of things that you need to do in production, an infinite number of things actually. And you can actually think every single dev tool, in this space as an option of something we can build. So one thing is like basic things like logs, how do I go see what's happening? Issues, how do we get alerted when there's an exception? So typically, people might do something like, okay, I'm gonna go sign up for Datadog, set that up, set my logs in there.
Speaker 1:I'm gonna go sign up for Sentry, step integration, get alerted in Sentry. And you can still do that and that's that's fine and you'll get like a very good experience because those companies are very focused on those things. But for us, we basically took both of those things and said, whenever you deploy an app, this is like already set up for you. Like both of these things, you have a log experience, you have an issues experience. There's a free tier.
Speaker 1:If you don't want it, fine. Go use your own thing. For some people, they like the fact that, again, it's all integrated and like you don't have to set anything up and every time deploy all of your functions are monitored, there's like no accidental case of you forgetting to do something or setting something up right. Source maps, all that stuff is handled for you. So that's our approach where we like because then we get it has to reflect your team, right?
Speaker 1:The three of us, we like building really good products and really good web applications. Like, we're very motivated to build those experiences. But that's how we wanna make money. We wanna make money because you pay us for a really good product we built that is complementary to to the core thing. And the reason that this works is because there's a lot of benefit in being the default.
Speaker 1:If SST is big, our tooling is the default tooling to use with it. There's gonna be some percentage of people that don't use it, that's fine. But there's like a really nice nice channel there. And in general, when you're trying to build a business, especially a venture scale business, you wanna find something that you can become the default for. Most companies cannot pull this off, like even us, like it's very hard to become default for anything.
Speaker 1:In our case, we're trying to like be the default for AWS on the ST side and then, like, then our tooling is, like, the default for once you're in production. So yeah. But, like, it it it varies business to business. Like, Bund is very different. I have a bunch of thoughts on Bund too, but, does that make sense?
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Absolutely. And so that was like that that model, like, if I break it down, is like a very, like, generic model.
Speaker 1:Like, you
Speaker 2:get Yeah. Enjoy everything for free. Everything's great. You know? Like, hobby projects, we we got you.
Speaker 2:Enjoy the project, And then you benefit because it's word-of-mouth essentially. Or like, if you give a pleasant experience, people are gonna be like, this is awesome. Right? And so, and you can introduce that seamlessly with a free tier right off the bat. Right?
Speaker 2:And the more generous the free tier, the better that experience is typically. But then it's like, like you said, you're competing essentially with what I would classify as a group of companies that are the uncompetable, which is AWS. AWS CDK, and you and I have this, use CDK. Right? And the reason why I use CDK is because I've been exposed to that work.
Speaker 2:I'm more familiar with it. And so I use CDK, right? Even when I make my side projects right now, I'm using CDK and etcetera, etcetera. And CDK or AWS has a free tier. It's not the most generous, it's very limited, but whatever.
Speaker 2:So when it comes to the distinguishing factor of how SSD can make money, another question I have is like, okay, so for the hobbyist, the individual, the person's getting in getting into it, you use three two, you're good. But then you have like, you know, if we were going like black, like zero one, the other categories are the people that are gonna need that extra little oomph, the more production experience, that's where we make money. But then my kind of, I guess, question to that is if a company is big enough, an enterprise level company is big enough, why would they trust SST over AWS? And then the follow-up question is, is there maybe a middle ground between the hobbyist and the enterprise level for companies that aren't as big as an established enterprise that use AWS right now that SST actually aims for, like a niche in the middle, group of people, group of companies?
Speaker 1:Yeah. So, that is a really good question, and I don't even know if I have an answer to it, but I can I can, like, tell you about some of the situations? We weirdly have a crazy amount of, like, giant enterprise companies. Like, we have companies like BMW, Tesla, Samsung, Disney. So the question is, like, why do they bother to use as a it's a CDK directly?
Speaker 1:That's kinda where the opportunity is even though there is like you said, it's hard to compete I was saying earlier that being the default. Right? If you're gonna use AWS, CDK is a default. It's hard to compete with that in theory. But if the default is bad enough, you can actually compete with it.
Speaker 1:In this case, CDK has a weird constraint in that they need to support every possible architecture in every possible language. Our bet is that, if you look at AWS and you're building something new and you're gonna do you're gonna do it like the correct AWS specific way, that shrinks to like 5% of AWS. Like, not thinking about EC twos, you're not thinking about like like all these other services. So if we just focus on that smaller zone, can we build it can't be like a 20% better, gonna be like a 10 x better experience. And there was a gap, like, just for that exact zone of like serverless, what we focus on, there is a big enough gap where people see the benefit of using something that's not the default with which CDK is.
Speaker 1:And to be honest, CDK itself is that, like, it is the default in some way of looking at it, but, like, things like Terraform are still still massively big. So it's not like it's not a space that has been won, like, if you're gonna use AWS, you're gonna do you're gonna do this way. The thing we're really competing against is not really CDK, it's more that we're competing against Amplify. Because Amplify is that, it's like, okay, let's scope into like what 95% of companies need and build a nice framework and experience around that. Amplify just like really bad, it's just not a good tool.
Speaker 1:So that has been like that angle has been a lot easier for us. We do get that question. We used to get it a lot more early, earlier on, like, where people would say, like, well, why would I use this instead of just using CDK directly? Because early on, the differences weren't massive, but now there's just, like, huge gaps in capability and entities. So, yeah.
Speaker 1:The the gap is there. It's possible.
Speaker 2:I think SST, the way you guys built SST really exposed, like, the shortcomings of CDK that I think people were just, like, numb to. They're like, oh, well, this is just CDK. You know, that was kinda what people were saying. But then, like, SST is like, you you can do the exact same thing, but we can make your life a little bit easier. And I think we a lot of developers didn't know that path of least resistance until you guys built it.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So I think that's a huge thing you guys got got going for you.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And the other side of it is, there's also something really basic going on here, which is, if you use CDK, and you're using on a bigger code base with a bunch of people, you start to build your own abstractions for certain things for like the area of AWS you're you're focusing on. Those abstractions end up being shitty because they're really narrow they're like, you're not really testing them against a lot of situations. So when stuff changes, like your abstractions are brittle, our main advantage is we're doing the same thing. We're trying to build an abstraction over some of the infrastructure, but we get to test it against like thousands of companies that are using SSD.
Speaker 1:So we know Mhmm. When we pick a design when we make a design choice, we know that's gonna work for most people. So we just have a leg up on building the abstraction that you would have tried to build yourself.
Speaker 2:Yeah. A potential this might be getting too much into the business of SSD, so you can like just not answer this question.
Speaker 1:We're pretty transparent with everything. So yeah.
Speaker 2:Would another path of making that win being bought by AWS?
Speaker 1:Yeah. So people ask us this all the time, and there definitely is a possibility. But the reality is that, let's say they made us an offer today, we'd say no, because we'd have a better offer a year from now. Make us offer a year from now.
Speaker 2:Is that guaranteed? Like, so that that okay. Sorry. I didn't mean to interrupt you, but is that guaranteed?
Speaker 1:No. Because you do have level confidence and we're like very we're like, if we think about the vision of what we want to do, it's only three of us. We just need to fund ourselves for two to three years and we can probably realize the vision of what we want. It's like, well, where we are to where we wanna be is that gap is massive. So so if they approach us today, like we would say no because we see we wanna wait till we've like at least attempted it.
Speaker 1:The reason it doesn't really make sense is if you drop the three of us inside AWS, we would get nothing done. We would maybe build a product even worse than the type of products AWS builds. It's just a reality of being dropped into a certain environment. Like the reason we can do certain things is because we operate in a very specific way. We found we found each other.
Speaker 1:We like we click. If you introduce like even the smallest variables into that, like, it probably is not gonna make sense. But people do ask us all the time, like, would AWS require you guys? It it wouldn't make sense from their point of view. It just I don't know, like, I don't know.
Speaker 1:I just don't see it making sense for us.
Speaker 2:I remember you and I talked about this, about the whole chemistry and dynamics in between you three. Yeah. I think I remember remember you and I were talking about, oh, look, if you ever need, like, you know, asking, would you guys ever expand your team or whatever? And it's like, you treated that very carefully because it's like, you you really showcase, like, the sensitivity between the synergy between the three of you guys. Right?
Speaker 2:It's like, and I agree. If you guys bring in a fourth person or another person or x amount of people, that could throw off the entire jive of what you guys have built so far. I don't know. You probably wanna handle that like plutonium.
Speaker 1:Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2:You know?
Speaker 1:Yeah. Well, the three of us have been doing it's funny because like, the three of us have always like, pretty much like been founders, like been at early stage places, whatever. And so we're doing this company with a bunch of experience. But if you look at us on paper, we look way less of way less like a real company than anything else we've done before. And I think it's like this paradox of like, as you get more experience, you're just like you just shed all this other stuff that you know doesn't matter or like is actually negative.
Speaker 1:So, like, companies I founded, like, we had way more people working there by now. But yeah, it's exactly what you said. Like, the lesson I learned was literally one person that's like slightly off, permanent damage. Even if you like remove them, it's like done. Like it's you you like can't undo like culture things like that.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Yep.
Speaker 1:And that's really the only thing we have going for us right now.
Speaker 2:Remember? So there was a tweet between us where I said like, oh, before before Twitch, worked at a startup that got acquired. Yeah. And a lot of people are like, that that's bullshit. Like, that's I don't believe you.
Speaker 2:Which is like totally understandable, but, like, that acquisition was the company that acquired the startup was like a Fortune 500, and they were super old, like extremely old and they moved so slow. And the second that acquisition went through, like the majority of people left.
Speaker 1:Like more
Speaker 2:than eight, like a significant number. The CTO left, I left. Everybody left because it's like we knew without even experiencing the culture that that's not for us. Yeah. And we would not we would not enjoy ourselves working for this new environment.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's exactly I mean, the acquisitions are really hard, like, especially when you're trying to merge two different companies together and have it continue operating.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah. It's like you probably will lose the best people. Like, that's why like, I don't I don't understand acquisitions well yet, like, I just because I haven't done them. But most of the ones I see, I'm just like, I don't fully get this because this is just gonna the value here is gonna evaporate over x amount of years.
Speaker 2:Yep. Another interesting point is like, I was interviewed for a company, like a startup that just passed like like raising some capital. And they wanted to hire me as their founding engineer. So I went through the interview process, like two loops. I built them like a few system and they were like super impressed.
Speaker 2:They were just like, wow. And they gave me an offer and the offer was really good, especially for startup. Like I was kind of floored by the offers. Like this is like, I'm talking base salary was very high and everything looked good. And I was actually strongly concerned because these people really wanted me.
Speaker 2:That sense of knowing that they see your value and they appreciate it, not only in terms of financial, but we, like, we trust you to build this company is so awesome. But but I had to be very, very practical, and I knew just from my experience talking to the founders that we would not jive. Uh-huh. And it was because of how close I'd be working with them and what I was understanding from them, the way I like really look deeper into the way they operated. Great people, but to work with at that tight coupling would have been very, very bad.
Speaker 2:Especially for me. Like for me, I'm like, obviously from a content creating, like I'm fairly social, all that. But when it comes to like pro, like my programming life and content life is so drastically different. The only person truly knows, like my capability to program is like Theo. Because he is seeing like, when I like really put on the headphones, like dive in, like, I'm like, I don't talk on Slack.
Speaker 2:I don't message. I'm not When it comes to programming at work, I'm like a ghost. Yeah. Like all I do is like grunt code work and like, that's all I do. I don't join any of the happy hours.
Speaker 2:Yeah. None of that. But this company was a little bit opposite. So I knew like, they really valued that charisma factor that I guess I brought in terms of social and content, but into the programming, it was like what I was being hired to do, it was not gonna be right for me. I wasn't gonna excel at the field that I can kinda do behind the scenes.
Speaker 1:Yeah. No. That that's really wise. I think I have definitely seen opportunities like that and I've taken them even though I knew that something was off. Like, you know in your gut that we're gonna click or not.
Speaker 1:And when it's that early I mean, to be honest, like, you're joining a company that early, like, you should expect to become really good friends with the people that you're working with. This is gonna be a couple of people and you're spending hours and hours together every day. And if you can't see that happening, like, don't see myself really really driving with these people. It just isn't gonna work. It's just gonna be kind of awkward the whole time and eventually just gonna it's gonna end.
Speaker 1:It's gonna be like, you know, full of friction. So, yeah, that chem it's just like dating. It's like the tech chemistry needs to be there.
Speaker 2:Exactly. And and it's like, at a bigger company like Twitch or Amazon or wherever, there's more the there's a bigger, like, margin of error that you can take essentially. Let's say you don't really jive with the senior engineer on your team of, let's say, like eight people. Yeah, that's not great, but idealistically, you can manage because there's so many other teams. There's the manager, there's your teammates that like you can make it through a very healthy and good mental state career and position, even if you don't get along with one or two people on the team.
Speaker 2:But when it comes to a startup where you guys will be pinging each other on your phones, calling each other, talking 20 that is where you have to be very, very diligent and be like, are you sure this is people you're essentially gonna date? Yeah. Like you said, you're gonna be in a relationship with them. And the relationship is like, you know, creating someone that's gonna make money and deal with clients and shit's gonna break at 2AM. You better wake up and deal with it at 2AM.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Yeah. And like all kinds of emotional highs and lows and I all
Speaker 2:can't deal with that, man. The emotional stuff, I'm so bad. My feedback every year, like I'm such an asshole when it comes to interns or juniors. Like when they come on the team, like I'm always a mentor because I always have a good idea of like how to introduce people to our infrastructure and code and all that. But when they come like, you know, like, oh, it's too tough.
Speaker 2:Or like, oh man, this is like, I don't know how I feel. I turned off and I'm just like, yo, I don't care about that right now. And that's gonna make me sound so bad. But like I said, like there's such a clear Like if someone comes up to me on my Discord and they tell me about a bad day, I'll drop everything and I'll talk to them. Know, like I'm yours.
Speaker 2:But when it comes to like programming, doing work, and like, coding, literally, I'm just such a different person.
Speaker 1:Yeah. No. I mean, I'm the exact same way. Like, it's a I find it fun. I don't know.
Speaker 1:To me, like, I think it it all comes from, like because I played a good amount of sports.
Speaker 2:Same.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So, like, to me, it just is the same thing. Like, you're on a team, you're trying to accomplish something, like, you gotta push, you gotta try, like, the energy around sports is like, it's pretty like it's like that. It's like, it's like, shut the fuck up, stop complaining, let's get this done. So I bring that, like, same kind of mentality to work.
Speaker 1:It's not for everyone. I know, like, again, like everyone doesn't some people have, like, a negative reaction to that. For me, I find it motivating and I find that it gets I build, like, really strong relationships when everyone is, like, in in that zone. So yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 1:So it clicks for me.
Speaker 2:Yeah. 100%. So before, when I wasn't a tech leader of the team, our attitude was a little bit like, you know, so so, like, you know, we're very like friendly, all all that. Now that I'm a tech lead, like, I've like said very distinguishing lines where it's like, I don't want like junior L fours on our team right now. Like the state of our team as much would be a great experience for L four to join.
Speaker 2:Like, I do not think that is the best interest of the squad. And like, I had to kind of pitch that and it actually was approved. They're like, yeah, you know what? Like, we'll we'll we'll agree. Like, we'll only hire L fives.
Speaker 2:And the L fives that we hire are the same people like me. Like, I don't know, like what they do on the weekend, like they have a brief conversations, but you know, it's not like that. It's like, these people that I would trust with code anytime, you know, like, it's that kind of relationship. But when it comes to, like, know, what they do or, like, what the dogs are, like, doing at the dog park, like, I couldn't I I don't care. You know?
Speaker 1:Yeah. Yeah. And, again, like, at a big company like that, it it's it's pretty different because the fate of the company isn't resting on you having a good relationship, like the perfect relationship with these people. Whereas, yeah, at a small company, it's like, if you are not like in love with your co founders, like, the company's not gonna succeed. That's just kind of
Speaker 2:100%.
Speaker 1:The reality of that. So, yeah. And that's why so many people say, like, they, like, make or break relationships. Like, it's a very common thing. Like, friends that go into founding companies together, they end up not being friends anymore.
Speaker 1:And and the and the reverse also, but, like, yeah, it's a very intense relationship.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Two of my really good friends, they made a comp startup, and they've been doing it for, three years. But now, like, they come to real like, they pour, like, over a $100 into it. I thought it was a really clever idea. It's still a very clever idea, but it just doesn't like, the it's just too tough of an industry to break in.
Speaker 2:And, like, they've built it all right. They've improved it. And, like, now they're realizing and, like, these are two of my, like, homies, like, home like, good friends. Right?
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And they got into this and like, there were so many times where their friendship was like dangling by thread because of like the stress of their startup and putting in all that money into it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:And now they're like, you know what? Like, we've been doing this for three years. We've, you know, moved on from a few different things. And like, the love for the product is not there yet, but the love they have for each other is still there yet. Yeah.
Speaker 2:So they're like, you know what? We're still gonna be best friends. They are still, Thank God. But the company, they're like ramping it down. Like, looking at either just completely, you know, destroying it or or trying to sell it for some sort of recuperation.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that that's definitely there. Like, I I have a business with my wife. I'm not gonna pretend like we don't start work fights that spill over into, like, marriage fights that it just like kinda gets everywhere.
Speaker 1:I think to a lot of people that's like, that sounds like, they're like, that is terrible, like, would you ever do that? Like, I'm not gonna pretend like it's great but it's also fine. Like, it's it, like, you know, it happens every once in a while, but it's not it's not a big deal. And it's only I think long term, it's been strengthening for us. But, yeah, it's it's not it's not always like that.
Speaker 2:It's not for everyone. I can like, for sure, like, I I what you and Liz have is, like, very unique, and I'm sure, like, a lot of couples would just, like, falter, like, right off the bat if if they were put in that same position.
Speaker 1:Yeah. We met through work, so that, like, made it wasn't like, oh, we're gonna work together and we have no idea what to expect. Like, she knew how I get with work like I described earlier and I knew I knew all of her things as well. So it's not it's not like they bother us less but at least we we knew going in. Yeah.
Speaker 1:That's good. We do run into a lot of husband wife companies, like we see there's lot of companies that are founded by husband wife teams. Yeah. So it's like actually not that uncommon. And if you really think about it, if you zoom out, like, historically, you know, a lot of people had their own businesses like like you run your farm or, like, you run your little, like, whatever small business your family operates.
Speaker 1:And those are all technically husband wife founding founded companies. I know his parents have a construction business, it's a husband wife thing. So it is hard, but it also has, like, a lot of precedent.
Speaker 2:Mhmm. Mhmm. Yeah. It's weird, man. It's weird.
Speaker 2:I'm I'm thinking of like what my next step is going to be in life. And that's why I'm like, I started off wanting to ask you for like questions like your business models, like how you and Jay Frank work, all those, like, because I'm thinking, like, the next step for me is probably gonna be the most significant one. As much as I love the comfortability and, like, the paychecks I get from Amazon, which is nice. I don't wanna, like it's it's very nice. Right?
Speaker 2:Like, if I would just want to rest and invest, I wouldn't even think about my current thoughts. But like the the the unfortunate reality is like, at these companies, you know, without lingering layoffs, let's say, like, you get way too comfortable. Yep. And that comfort ability is like very poisonous for a person like me. And I'm sure like a person like you, whoever, it's like, I can't like, I'm not working at like my biggest capability.
Speaker 2:Mhmm. And I think like that sports analogy you made is reason for that. Like, you know, if you train in a room where you're the best guy, you can get comfortable smashing all these people. And like, essentially, maybe there's nothing wrong with that. Maybe you just enjoy smashing all these people that are just lesser than you and and whatever, and what, like, you move on.
Speaker 2:But like, I always want to like improve. And the same kind of thing is like, you know, I'm not the best engineer at my team, not even close, but like, I wanna be pushed to a limit where I can get to that. And due to the comfortability, I'm not being pushed to be the best. And I'm not under that pressure. Look, like I said earlier, I'm definitely under pressure of like being ramped up as a tech lead, and that that's been stressful.
Speaker 2:But like, I know if I tell my team, like, Hey, I'm too stressed. I need a mental day off. They're like, Yeah, no problem. Take it. We understand.
Speaker 2:And I kind of don't want that I in a almost want more like, Hey, no, you fucked up. You you need to, like we don't care. Stay up. Stay up late. Fix it.
Speaker 2:I want that more of, like, a pressure cooker situation.
Speaker 1:Yeah. It's funny because when you're at least in the situation that I'm in, you get that, but it's not from your coworkers. It's just from the market. There's, like, no bigger bully than the market that doesn't give a shit about you at all. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Like you're trying, they don't it doesn't give a shit. Like what you're doing is not good, nobody cares. So like, yeah, like it just that's the thing that's beating you up every single day. Just the just the ignorant just the world ignoring you, everything you're trying to do.
Speaker 2:Dude, on content. So you and I talked about the DMs. When we first started talking, and I told you, like, one of my goals with content creation. Yeah. And it's like, that what you just said about how no one cares does not like, it it it means so it could not be more true.
Speaker 2:Yeah. When you make a video that you pour, like, so many hours in, like, you're like, this topic is great. It's all this. I edit it. It's like the everything's perfect.
Speaker 2:Right? But you put it out there and no one gives a shit. And like, that's the reality of it, man. Like, no one gives a shit about you. Content market, whatever, like, they don't care.
Speaker 2:You have to just kind of put out a quality content all the time. And like that eats at you sometimes. You know? Because you get a like I had a really good week on content like two weeks ago. All my stuff was popping off.
Speaker 2:I was like, yo, this is like this is it. You know, the exponential growth, it's happening. This week, like as fast it went up, the fast as fast it went down, you know? Yeah. And after that kind of swallow that realization again, it's like, okay, that was a blimp.
Speaker 2:I'm back to reality. Like, where the reality is like, no one's gonna care that I just made some random video on Go if it's not like what they resonate with. Right? I think, I don't know how close that is to the market we talked about.
Speaker 1:It's the exact same thing. It's the exact same thing. It's like the you get it like, when you're I mean, I think it's the same job. Like, when you found a company, you are nobody. You're trying to find some value you can create in the world that no one has tapped yet, And it's got to resonate with people.
Speaker 1:So it's yeah, content creation is the exact same thing. I think what sucks a little bit about content creation is for most people, it's a very solo solo effort. When you found a company, especially with other co founders, like, having everyone it's still stressful and hard but, like, it feeling like a team effort is very different. It's like, if you play a team sport versus, like, an individual sport, you know, it's I think content creation is the exact same thing, it's just you're kinda on your own in your own head.
Speaker 2:That's the thing. I've always played individual sports except, like, rugby. I played, like, high level rugby, like amateur rugby back in Canada, and that wasn't the only team sport. But before then, like, I swam competitively solo, tennis solo, like wrestling, jujitsu solo, right? Like you only blame yourself.
Speaker 2:And I think that's why like team sports, as much as I like team sports, for me, they're like very fun. Yeah. Because I can, maybe it's like a conscious thing, but I can always, know, subconscious like, Oh, if he did bad, like that's not me. It's other people. You know, when it's team sports, when you get smashed in jits or wrestling, there's no one to blame.
Speaker 2:Yeah. There is nobody to blame. You got smashed because you got smashed. And I think like, because of that way, because I grew up that way, like I'm just always a content, like, I have to do it by myself. And like, now, you know, this I have an editor.
Speaker 2:He's great. You know, obviously I pay him, but he's he feels like a little bit more like he's in he's more involved in my content. Right? Like he wants to get paid. He's making he's making sure that he gets a good wage hourly and everything.
Speaker 2:But he's also, like, looking after my content, which I think is super important, extremely important. But, yeah, like, at the end of the day, dude, like, it's it's all me. And it's like, it yeah. Eats at you sometimes. When you're not doing good, eats at you.
Speaker 1:Yeah. It's the same thing. Like, when you're a founder, like, your emotions are just tied to whatever metrics that you are trying trying to pull. Like, there's a chart and my, like, mental state just correlates a 100% exactly to that.
Speaker 2:It's like the Dunning Kruger chart?
Speaker 1:No. No. I meant, like, just a chart of our, like, downloads. Like, that's the thing that we focus Oh, Yeah.
Speaker 2:You literally meant like a metrics. No.
Speaker 1:No. Like just literally that that's like a chart of my emotions. Like if you wanna know how I'm doing, just go check your NPM downloads. And the thing and that the thing you bring up, the thing that's why it's the thing I say all the time is, the people that succeed doing this are the people that can just take that. Just take that hit for a very long time because it compounds very, very, very slowly.
Speaker 1:So the longer you can stay in it, like, that's that's just how you're gonna have success. Like, I think it's been a bit tough, think, for some people because in the last five years, there've just been so many crazy successful people really quickly, like seemingly successful people really quickly. So I think people kind of expect like, doing any kind of like, independent thing whether you're a creator or finding a company, you expect to be like those people that like, start something and raise like a $100,000,000 eight months later and then they get bought for like 500,000,000 a year later. Like those are stories that we see all the time but that that that was like a weird anomaly. Like a lot of it just did not make sense.
Speaker 1:Most of the people that have like built long lasting things have done it over ten years very slowly.
Speaker 2:Dude, what you're saying now hits so hard because so I'm gonna bring it back to the content thing because, like, obviously, you like, I'm super close, like, Theo and Prime and, like, all the like, everyone, you know, we're all very close. And like when Theo started making YouTube, like he popped almost instantly. Right? He just popped off. His content was good.
Speaker 2:People loved him, you know, etcetera. And it's so difficult because you see the success of Prime and Theo, and they put out a video and it's like their worst video is like your best video
Speaker 1:in terms of metric
Speaker 2:And you're just like, you're there seeing them like, not complain, but like, okay, how can I do better now? And you're like, man, if only I can even get to that level where you're like not happy about. And it's like being so close to these successful people is good and bad. It's it's mostly good because you can see what they're doing. You can learn from them.
Speaker 2:You know, it's a good way to like always look up, but it's bad for your mental state because then you're like, why, what am I doing wrong? Why can I not mimic that success? And there's been instances where like another content creator and they make really good videos, but they pop off like make like, you know, let's say 10 videos and they're already hitting metrics that you're not even close to hitting. And you're already on like video 100, let's say. Right?
Speaker 2:And you're just like that in that always comparison is so toxic, but I feel it's the hardest thing to not do.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. It's it's oh, yeah.
Speaker 1:It's really hard. I think it's a little as a founder, like, one of the key things is, like, stop watching your competitors. Like, stop like, just stop looking at them, stop doing all that. Because at least when you're building a business, if you start to pay them to your founders, you just start to mimic them for no reason. And especially, I mean, that might be different in the content space, but in and when you're building a business, like, that just guarantees that you're not gonna succeed.
Speaker 1:Like, you have to come up with a unique angle of attack and it's even if you're just looking at other companies, like, I'm just gonna, like, see what they're doing just so, like, get an idea of things. That, like, poisons your head, it kind of biases you. So you have to, like, really be able to handle that stuff, stuff well and it's super hard to think clearly of like what path makes sense for me because it probably is gonna be extremely unique and very different. Think it has to be. But yeah, like different companies go at different speeds.
Speaker 1:The other thing, some of the stuff is like very invisible, right? So me and Liz were talking because I interviewed the the founder of Linear, a couple months ago. And it was funny because we're I was asking him like, kind of the early stages of the company and I was like, oh, like, was I asking about the standard challenges you have when you're a startup. And he was just like, I don't know, we didn't really have that. Like, we built the product, everyone loved it, we raised a shit ton of money and like now we're super successful and everyone loves us.
Speaker 1:They just had this like beautiful shot to the top and Liz was listening and she was like, oh, fuck him. Like, you're just like Yeah. That sucks. But then the thing that's invisible is that was like the third or fourth company by the three founders who are each individually extremely talented. I've put like twenty plus year career history and this is like what that's culminated in, like that coming together.
Speaker 1:So like there there's a lot that can be very visible. Like you talk about Prime, right? You know, he's he's like been doing this. By this, I mean, he's been like working on his career for a very long time and has built up a lot and that overnight success is a result of all that time that he put in before.
Speaker 2:Yeah. 100%. Yeah. There's yeah. The Invisible Fence is actually a really good, like, reminder that, like, you know, there isn't truly, like, a overnight success.
Speaker 2:There is maybe, like, in terms of the the company, but, like, behind the scenes.
Speaker 1:It happens occasionally. And, like, like, truly some people just truly have an overnight success and that happens, but that's like not in your control.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Post Malone is like the best example of literally overnight success. Like drop this on SoundCloud. Next thing you knows, like Wiz Khalifa, everyone is just retweeting it and bang, that's it.
Speaker 1:Do you think that it was overnight? So we have a friend that, he worked for some like German music startup and there's a story where he was like, because he would like see the users and whatever and he was like sending his friends like a photo. Was like, dude, look how crazy this guy looks. And he was just saying people a photo, like, what a weird dude. And that ended up being Post Malone.
Speaker 2:No way.
Speaker 1:That was before he was famous, just like, you know, like, happened like a year later. So I'm sure he was like grinding too, you know. Like he says, worked so hard he forgot how to vacation.
Speaker 2:Yeah. The The story I heard and the story that he comes tells, I don't if this is true or not, but like, he was kind of not happy going the same school path. One of his friends was making a big on streaming, streaming Minecraft. They moved to LA. And because he was just so, like Post was so unhappy doing the regular, like find a job, etcetera, etcetera, he was always into music.
Speaker 2:He just tagged along with his friend in LA. He was like bumming, basically, like a couch bum. And yeah, he just recorded a song, which was White Iverson. Because if you really look at Post Malone's SoundCloud, he had maybe like two or three, like less than five songs guaranteed before White Iverson. Right?
Speaker 2:And those are not like at a high level studio. They were a studio, but it was more like, yo, like a basement level studio where there's some nice equipment here and there. And he recorded White Iverson and literally post on SoundCloud with the art. And I'm sure there was a lot of invisible lines like I'm grinding it. He made the art himself, But like, the ratio
Speaker 1:Yeah, ratio.
Speaker 2:To 60. The ratio was like absurd. Yeah. Because post on SoundCloud somehow gets to the hands of Wiz Khalifa. Like you've in my opinion, you've won.
Speaker 2:Yeah. If Wiz Khalifa's retweeting, tweeting, and Mac Miller, all like you are getting hit up by people that want to do business with you after that.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Yeah. No. Of course. Yeah.
Speaker 1:So there are cases like that where it's just like, you know, they just hit it.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:But again, just like how do you you can't like recreate that. Right? There's like no way for you to do that. All you can do is keep trying and hope that one of your things hits in that same way. Yeah.
Speaker 1:But yeah, it's like when you see those stories, it's just like, god, goddamn it. But it's the same as literally someone winning the lottery, like that's no different than whoever won like $500,000,000 last month. Yep. Yeah. That comparison, it's tough.
Speaker 1:It grinds at you, especially when things aren't going well.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Exactly. So it's always like the mental state of things in terms of like founding or content creating. You have to always be like a step away from your emotions. And you and what I mean by that is you cannot this is gonna sound bad, and I and I hope you can correct me, but you can't celebrate the wins Mhmm.
Speaker 2:In a sense. Like, you can't celebrate if you're gonna post a video and it gets a 100,000 views while your average is like a thousand. Mhmm. Like you shouldn't celebrate that. Because then you set up yourself pretty much success, because if your next video gets a thousand, you'll be like, oh my god, what just happened?
Speaker 2:And then you're panicking, you're frantic, and you're just forgetting that, like, that was the anomaly. That one video hit the lottery in terms of, relation to other videos, but all the other videos are still, like, on that lower level.
Speaker 1:Yeah, exactly. It's I mean, it's funny because I've heard you guys talk about this stuff and, like, I've experienced it to to a small degree and I'm like, yeah, that is a that is a real thing. Like, you just obsess over the fact that your your next one is gonna be worse than your previous one, like that just Yeah, man. That just happens all the time. I think that that is a little bit unique with with doing stuff in like, I guess, a more creative space.
Speaker 1:Like every product I've ever built has been better than the previous one because I've gotten better And so I don't have to worry about that. Like there's other factors that determine whether it's gonna be successful or not but yeah, with content it's like, it's so simple. It's like there's like a number and this video was worse even though you thought you knew what you were doing and you thought you got better.
Speaker 2:This like, the only advice I'll give to anyone who's listening who can, like, who's relates to this and, like, I'm obviously, I'm still learning. I don't have the answers. To kind of, like, circle back, I guess, is, like, one there's a content creator who I saw at the beginning of the year, like, January said, they will post a video every single week, once a week. That was their goal. Right?
Speaker 2:And they did it very well for the first four weeks. They did like the first four weeks of January, there was a video every single week. Every video flop. Mhmm. And then they stopped because it was too much.
Speaker 2:And I don't blame them. I understand. It's like, you know, you set this goal, you set yourself up for success, you do it four times, and it's just like, what the hell? My biggest advice to anyone is if you are setting yourself a goal, and I think a goal of releasing one video a week or setting yourself to that is a very, very good goal. Right?
Speaker 2:And a lot of people may disagree, but I truly think if you stick with it and if you actually put the conscious effort to improve the video every week by one small factor, and that's what mister B said. Like, look at your previous video they released on week zero and in week one, find one thing to improve on. Maybe your audio was shit, maybe your lighting was shit, maybe your editing wasn't choppy, maybe your font was hard to read. Yeah. Pick one of those things and improve in the next video, and do that for a whole year.
Speaker 2:And that's what I actually did. Like starting March when I started like YouTubing, I was like, I'm gonna do one video a week. Okay? Yeah. And I did that and I and I I haven't stopped doing that this whole year.
Speaker 2:But I was like, you know what? I'm gonna like push it. So I did two videos a week. And like that gap that like step is so hard. But even when shit's like low, even like my last like, you know, 10 videos have been flops, I'm just like, okay.
Speaker 2:Making sure I I end this year uploading two videos a week and making sure I'm improving everybody by one small factor. And, you know, at the end of the year, that's when I will take some time to really, like, reflect on all the videos I posted on, did I hit the goal? Did I not? Was I happy? Was I not?
Speaker 2:But that's the only time I actually give myself an opportunity to reevaluate that goal I set for myself in the beginning. But I want to make sure I don't quit that goal.
Speaker 1:Yeah. No. That that makes that makes a lot of sense. I think the thing that brings me a good amount of comfort is, the way I look at things is whether I'm not like in a binary sense successful or not, it's fully up to me. Like if you laid out that plan, it's up to me whether I follow through with that, it's up to me whether I put in the energy to improve every single week.
Speaker 1:If I do that, I will be successful. Whether I'm like, mister beast level successful or like, you know, something lower, that's not really up to me. That's like, I think of that more like, that's like fate, that's like things in the world, things kind of out of my out of my control. And I like looking at it that way because I think it's realistic in that, like, know there's some things that are out of my control but it also doesn't give me any excuses. Like, the binary fact of whether you get to a place that you're happy with your life and then what you've done is in your control.
Speaker 1:But like, don't have to like, be looking at the biggest people thinking like, how do I how do I get there?
Speaker 2:What do what's your opinion on people that quit? So like that person like an example, a person who sets themselves, like, sets that goal with one video a week and they quit like after a month. What's like your take on those individuals?
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's funny because, like, when you see someone set that goal and they do it, you perceive them in one way and when you see them set it up and then they don't do it, you, like, see them in a completely different way. So when someone doesn't do it, I, like to me, it feels like they weren't really thinking too hard about why they were doing things and they maybe just picked like something that they thought they were supposed to be doing and they like set it up and they got distracted. That person, that person that succeeded did the exact same thing like, but it just seems to me just weirdly seems like the other person thought about it more and like like set that goal with a lot more a lot more intention. I think I often see people like kind of flail when they like set these goals where they they don't really know what they're doing. They don't really know why they wanna do things.
Speaker 1:They're just like, okay, if I wanna do something, and that means I need a goal. And they just kinda pick something random. Yeah. What about you?
Speaker 2:I agree. I think goal setting is like super important. Like, goal setting isn't just something that you see some person you look up to and just like, okay, I'm gonna do what they just said because how can like, that's a recipe like, that's the secret. Right? Like, a goal is very personal and a goal is, like, very, like, is your current situation?
Speaker 2:And you have to set goals that set yourself up for success and not goals that will set you up for failure. And I think a lot of people don't actually realize that at all. Like, no one puts effort into goals they set. Like, if we take it away from even calling to our founding, like, going to the gym. Right?
Speaker 2:Yeah. Like the goal is, let's say you're just overweight or whatever. You're like, you you just need to go into the gym. Right? And you're like, okay, I'm gonna go starting January.
Speaker 2:I'm gonna go three times a week. And that's it. And it's like, well, that's on paper a great goal, but did you actually see like, what are you gonna do at the gym? Yeah. Did you actually set up a plan?
Speaker 2:Like, do you know what you're gonna do? Like, you can't just go to the gym on day one and be like, okay, now what? Like, there's gonna be machines there that you've never seen before. There's gonna be free weights everywhere. There's gonna be people doing exercise that you've never seen before.
Speaker 2:Like, you literally can't take it lightly. Like, for me, every time I go to a gym, I literally always go and I always take that free trial. I go and before I even set the goal, I check the whole like, I lay out the entire gym. Like, I I wanna know everything about it. I wanna know where all the equipment is.
Speaker 2:I wanna know if there's, like, you know, amenities like a pool, a sauna, whatever, just so then I can set my goal. But and then it's more realistic. Then it's like, okay. On like, you know, day one, two, it's gonna be upper upper and lower body split. And then third day, should be like swimming.
Speaker 2:Right? Like cardio. Yeah. And then it's like more realistic, and you're setting yourself up for a bit more success as opposed to a person who's showing up to a random like LA Fitness, and they should be like, I don't know what exercise to do. I've never been here.
Speaker 2:It's like, well, no shit. You know? Like Yeah. How are you gonna what were you expecting?
Speaker 1:Yeah. The intentionality is big and this concept of, like I heard, like, the phrase cargo culting where everyone just kinda copies something that looks like the thing that leads to success but they don't really understand why it works. The that that phrase originates from something that seems really ridiculous but it's actually happens all the time. So I think it was during some war, I forgot it was some war where the military was like doing air, which was dropping supplies, on some like island where there were there were like remote tribes that were there that like didn't really contact like the rest of civilization. They would see that the cargo drops would come in.
Speaker 1:So they started doing these weird rituals where they would like, kind of act like the people on the ground, like calling in the airplane and doing like the air strip type of things. They would they would like do the same thing and in their head, they were like, if I do this, that means a cargo drop will show up with a bunch of supplies. So it obviously makes no rational sense, like that's not why the plane is coming, but they just picked this random behavior and they're like, that's what it is. And you see this all the time everywhere and I think I mean, going back to linear people like because they they've been, they've been just getting a lot of coverage just because of their their new fundraise. They talk a lot about like the way they do things.
Speaker 1:I really like them because the way they do things is exactly the way that I wanna do things. Like I really like we're we have like a lot of synergy with the way they wanna build companies. So everyone looks at that list of things they do and they're like, okay, I used to check a box and do all of those things and that means I'm gonna be successful. But the thing they miss is those people didn't do those things and then they were successful. They found a way to be successful so that they could operate in the way that they want.
Speaker 1:Like, this is this is the way they wanted to build a company so they found a way to do it so they could. It's like it's like actually exactly in reverse And you just see that everywhere. There's like a lot of box checking about the thing you're saying like, okay, I need to go to gym three days a week. I'm checking the box, going to gym three days a week. Like, but no, they need to be way more intentional about that.
Speaker 1:Like, who are you? Like, what what clicks for you? Like, what type of workouts click for you? Like, what can you actually stick with for years? Nothing is easy.
Speaker 1:Right? Nothing is easy just like ticking a box and there's no like generic solutions that that work like that for everyone. Yeah. You just see that all the time.
Speaker 2:Yeah. No free lunch. Another I don't know how much this relates, but I saw this really cool analogy once where it's like the behavior society, and it made me think about the cargo and, like, the story you just said. I don't know how much this relates to it, be honest, but I just wanted to bring it out. It's like scientists did an experiment where, like, they had monkeys in, a room or whatever.
Speaker 2:And there's a ladder, and it's, like, a light bulb on top or like a button, a red buzzer. And, like, if the monkey were to climb up and touch the red buzzer, they would get, like, a little electrical shock. Yeah. Right? And so every time the monkey be like, ah, that's bad.
Speaker 2:And so the monkeys would realize every time you touch this, I'll get shocked. That's pain. I don't like it. They won't do it. And so and this experiment lasted so long, and there was generations of these monkeys that lived in this controlled environment.
Speaker 2:Right? And so the next generation of monkeys were born, the ones after they were born, and even the late generation of monkeys that were born knew not to touch the light bulb because the like, their older generations never did so. But they themselves never actually touched the light bulb. They didn't know the impact. Right?
Speaker 2:But because society constructed this, like, their society should say, construct this environment where they knew don't touch the light bulb, they were just like, okay, I just know not to do that. Right? Without actually experiencing the consequence. So I guess what like, it's like the behavior society to follow a pattern without necessarily understanding why that's happening.
Speaker 1:Yeah. You know, and it's like when you That's exactly it. It's exactly the same thing. It's like, it's actually shocking how much stuff that people put time into that just has no value or like, it doesn't make sense at all. Like we, I've got, I like went through this myself when, because, you know, as I'm working at SST, I'm like, okay, I like have been programming for years, like, I'm not like super worried about that, but like marketing and like getting stuff out there.
Speaker 1:I gotta like learn that and I gotta get better at that. And initially, we were just doing what everybody else was doing, you know, when you release a feature, you like do some shitty screencast if you're using the feature and then you make like some shitty little blog posts that nobody sees And every single dev tool company does the exact same thing for every single time they do a release. And nobody stops to think like, why are we doing this? Like, does this actually get us anything? No, it doesn't.
Speaker 1:Like, those things can only ever get like a 100 views.
Speaker 2:Right? Exactly.
Speaker 1:If you actually wanna do marketing, you have to come up with something that can get it's not guaranteed, but at least has a potential of getting like, you know, tens of thousands of views. Yep. Yep. And if you actually think about that, you would not be doing anything that any of these companies are doing. Mhmm.
Speaker 1:Like I tweeted yesterday about case studies of being like, a lot these really early stage companies do these like big long case studies. And to me when I see that, I'm just like, well, they did that because they have one customer. They have the time to do this big case study, like nine people are gonna read that and that's like what they bucket under the marketing. Like, okay, we did marketing, check the box. But yeah, you just see that everywhere and it's crazy how much this doesn't make any sense at all.
Speaker 2:A company, and I know you're a fan of them, that I think beyond the actual experience and the tech they created, that do marketing super, super well is Drizzle.
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah.
Speaker 2:Because Drizzle, the way they do their marketing is so counterintuitive and it works, and you can't disagree that doesn't work. Like, they almost like, Andrew, like on his personal account, would post memes, essentially bashing Drizzle, making fun of Drizzle. And if you didn't know Andrew is like one of the main people at Drizzle, you'd be like, oh, like what the hell? Like Drizzle might suck then. But no, like, it's like this counter, like, curiosity thing that they did and it's just working so well.
Speaker 2:Even their main Drizzle account on Twitter, it's like they post memes and they know that memes on tech Twitter are like a hot thing. And that's what gets people to click. So it was super interesting to see how that team over there handled their marketing. And that's not even talking about how great of a tool it is itself. Right?
Speaker 2:That speaks for itself. But no matter how good the tool is, if don't have good marketing, no one's gonna no one's gonna use it. Right?
Speaker 1:Yeah. Yeah. It's just yeah. They're excellent. I would probably put them as like number one of people that I think it's funny because they're so small and they don't like you would never think of them this way but even companies that have raised like a $100,000,000 like do not get anywhere close to being as good as what these like, you know, three people are doing it on the on the marketing on the marketing side.
Speaker 1:So again, that's what I saying earlier. It's leverage. Right? They found a way to are three people, but they're, like, out marketing these giant companies. They found a way to build this this crazy lever.
Speaker 2:They don't have those guardrails. Right? They don't have that red red button not to touch.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Exactly. Exactly. Like, if you pitched any of what they did and had to go through, like, the meetings and all and all that, like, just would not it just would not happen.
Speaker 2:Exactly.
Speaker 1:But yeah, like, it's just it's crazy to me that people just don't think. And I guess it's not that crazy because I remember myself, I used to, like, just not really think and I was like, oh yeah, I'm doing marketing but not realizing I wasn't. Yeah, it just it's like, it's once you're on the other side, you just feel like, wow, how could I have been so naive and stupid?
Speaker 2:Yeah yeah.
Speaker 1:The other thing that I find interesting is, before you're actually in, I mean, to use the quote, before you're actually in the arena, you have all these like, intellectual thoughts on like this idealized version of how things are. You're like, well, if I'm gonna make content and it's gonna be so good and it's gonna be so like good content that like, I don't have to do all these other things. Then you get thrown in the arena and guess what, nobody gives a shit that for like whatever like weird philosophy you have. And you just get to the point where you're like, yeah, I'll fucking take my shirt off and dance, like whatever the audience wants like that, like, I just gotta do the stuff that works. Like, when you're actually in that position, all of your, like, weird notions of how you think things are supposed to work just just go out the door.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Exactly. And I think, like, Prime, he DM'd me saying like, yo, he he's, like, recently getting into Go. Look, not even that recent, but, he's been getting into Go heavily and he and he even sees, the benefits from the content wise. He's like, yeah, you know, I post a video on like like other languages, they don't do as well as like Go content.
Speaker 2:And he's like, that's why he like doubled down on the triple down on Go. He's like, I can see that like, you know, he likes the language whatever from a practical perspective, but also from the perspective of just, like, from content, which is one of his priorities, he sees it resonating with his audience.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Find those little opportunity. You just start to fall in love with whatever is working, like, whatever there is an opportunity for. I think so people, like, I think what's great about being a software engineer is you can work in like any industry, like you can be doing, I don't know, like you can be working in the finance industry for a while and like overnight switch to like a completely different place. And people have always asked like, oh, like, but like, don't you want to find a field you're really interested in?
Speaker 1:I'm like, well, my experience has been any place I've been in, I've just gotten really interested in whatever they're doing because there was an opportunity there to do something. So, and that's what's awesome about being a software engineer. You get the exposure to all these different places and you can literally be part of anything that's happening. Kind of very untrue for other fields where you have to, like, kinda really dedicate yourself to one to one dimension.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Exactly. Exactly.
Speaker 1:We're at an hour. You got anything else?
Speaker 2:I got nothing else. This is this is like a loaded conversation.
Speaker 1:Yeah. I'm glad you suggested this. Good to have you back on.
Speaker 2:We should do these more often. I love opportunities to speak Yeah. To you. I was gonna talk about CDK, but I was like, no. This is way more interesting.
Speaker 2:Yeah. This could than CDK. So
Speaker 1:Yeah. It's funny because we, this is actually a great example of what we were just talking about. So and I see when me and Adam started doing this, we're like, okay. This is like a tech podcast. We need to talk about tech stuff.
Speaker 1:Like, we had these notions of, like, what this had to be. And then we just kinda, like, ran out about tech stuff to talk about because, like, there's not, like, new interesting stuff happening every week. There was for, like, a little while, but then there wasn't. So we just started talking about other stuff and it started doing way better. So, you know, there's this idea what we had of what this thing was supposed to be, turns out, like, we were wrong.
Speaker 1:Like, when you're actually in there experimenting, you, like, you learn that something else actually is better.
Speaker 2:Yep. Cool. Thanks for having me on.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
