Ian and Aaron discuss Aaron's trip to San Francisco, Bluesky vs. Twitter, and why Ian's not doing his secret side project plus our tier rankings for...pizza toppings?!
Sponsored by LaraJobs & Screencasting.com.
Interested in sponsoring Mostly Technical? Head to https://mostlytechnical.com/sponsor to learn more.
00:00 Strep Throat
04:57 Traveling Man
19:44 What’s Up With The Factory
26:51 Bluesky
38:33 Elon Derangement Syndrome
45:14 Pizza Toppings
58:46 Indie Hacking My Brain
Aaron
00:00:00 – 00:00:04
Hello?
Good morning.
How are we doing?
Alright.
Oh, no.
Aaron
00:00:04 – 00:00:07
Big head shake, exhaling, and alright.
That's not good.
I'm alright.
I'm alright.
A little tired.
Alright.
Hanging in there.
Aaron
00:00:13 – 00:00:16
dude.
You're not getting any better.
You're not convincing me.
Negative to say.
I'm I'm fine.
It's fine.
Aaron
00:00:20 – 00:00:24
Just just an just an average, an average Monday morning.
Aaron
00:00:24 – 00:00:24
Need a
little more sleep.
I'm working on that.
Need a little more, you know, there's still a little crazy stuff moving the parents and stuff like that, but I could see the end in sight of some of these things.
I'm hoping to everything dials down a little bit couple weeks.
So that that's kinda where I'm at.
Aaron
00:00:43 – 00:00:45
Okay.
Alright.
I will I will allow it.
What's going on with you?
Aaron
00:00:48 – 00:01:02
You'd be making a big trip?
Did a big trip, and then, of course, came home to sick kids.
So we took them to the took them to the one of the, you know, urgent cares yesterday, and Mhmm.
We got strep throat going through the family.
You hate
Aaron
00:01:02 – 00:01:03
You hate it.
Aaron
00:01:05 – 00:01:08
So not great.
Everybody's got it?
Little ones?
Aaron
00:01:11 – 00:01:32
I think one of the is so insane that twins is not descriptive enough.
One of the older set of twins and I think one of the younger set of twins has it.
We only have confirmation for the the three year old boy, but the little girl is coughing.
And so I think Jennifer's taken everybody to the pediatrician today because you don't
Aaron
00:01:33 – 00:01:33
You don't
Aaron
00:01:33 – 00:01:40
you don't wanna hit, infinite loop of kids getting better and then kids getting worse because that can happen, strep,
and you don't want that.
Man, I'm just I just had a more basic level.
I'm just, like, imagining Jennifer taking the children to the doctor.
Like
Aaron
00:01:51 – 00:01:53
Yeah.
Hysterical.
Aaron
00:01:54 – 00:01:55
It should be
Aaron
00:01:55 – 00:01:55
a sit down.
Aaron
00:01:56 – 00:01:58
Should be it should be a YouTube channel,
Aaron
00:01:58 – 00:01:59
but she said I could
Aaron
00:01:59 – 00:02:16
start one as long as she isn't in it and neither are the kids.
Oh.
That's that's what I'm doing already.
But, yeah, it's it's absurd, which is why we have an au pair.
Because imagine trying to get imagine trying to get four children that all need to be buckled in by an adult into a car and out of a car.
Aaron
00:02:16 – 00:02:17
Well, you can do
with you.
It's really There's nowhere to go.
Oh, especially, like, you're in the parking lot.
You're whatever.
You're you're trying to load the babies while the three year olds don't run into traffic.
Traffic and the whole thing.
Like, yeah, that's that's very
Aaron
00:02:30 – 00:02:30
difficult.
Yeah.
Oh, boy.
Wow.
Yeah.
Aaron
00:02:32 – 00:02:34
Not great.
Not great.
Not great.
I cannot do that.
That's like these people who have kids when they're, like, 45 or whatever.
Like, not not not Like, just just thinking about Jennifer doing that.
I'm exhausted.
I'm exhausted.
Aaron
00:02:44 – 00:02:52
Yep.
I'm exhausted.
I'm exhausted being 35 and doing it.
I just I can't imagine.
45 is basically dead.
Aaron
00:02:52 – 00:02:53
Sorry.
But We
already talked about Assad here last week or the week before, but, like, I get all these pictures from 02/2015 from Apple, like, auto showing them to me.
I'm just like, man.
And that was, like, not I was still I was, like, 39 or whatever, and I'm just like, man, we did so much.
How did we do that much?
Like, when kids were little, and we're running around and, like, trip and trip and this other thing, and they had all this stuff.
And I'm like, boy, that would, like, kill me.
Right?
I've they're, like, dead if I can do all that right now.
Aaron
00:03:15 – 00:03:16
Yep.
Yeah.
That's why you have the kids when you're young.
I'm a big fan of having kids when you're young.
Jamie disagrees in me, but I'm like, oh, I the kids should have kids when they're young, and you just they're out when you're 42.
They're in college or whatever.
That's the way nature intended it.
Not your even as old as we were, like, 27, I think Jamie was or something.
Yeah.
Aaron
00:03:35 – 00:03:36
Too old.
It's too old.
Too old.
You got a kid Too
Aaron
00:03:37 – 00:03:42
old.
14.
Foot in the grave when you hit 30, man.
You don't have time for that.
You have the kid at 16.
You're done by, you know, 34.
You're good.
Get your whole life out of you.
Aaron
00:03:50 – 00:03:57
I think Matt Wintzing has had his kids at, like, 22 or 23, and now he's 40, and his kids are in college.
Aaron
00:03:59 – 00:04:02
He's done.
It's glorious.
Yeah.
Sounds great.
Tom knows.
They have their kids young now.
I think I think she was, like, 19
Aaron
00:04:06 – 00:04:09
or something.
Their kids young.
That's right.
Big now, and they're not even 40 yet.
You know?
Seems awesome.
Bam.
Yeah.
Have the kids young.
You'll figure out the money later.
It's fine.
Aaron
00:04:17 – 00:04:26
Yeah, man.
I'm gonna figure out the money soon.
I'm gonna be so rich soon.
It's crazy.
I've been saying that for, you know, thirty five years, but I feel it.
Aaron
00:04:26 – 00:04:28
It's around the corner.
I'm getting there.
Do do they give the kids so when I was a kid, I get stripped through all the time.
Mhmm.
And my kids haven't had it nearly as much as I had it, but they give you the pink goop in the bottle.
I don't know if you had the pink goop.
Aaron
00:04:39 – 00:04:39
Is that
still what they're doing, or is it a pill
Aaron
00:04:41 – 00:04:41
or what's the deal?
Aaron
00:04:42 – 00:04:50
Still the goop.
It's still amoxicillin, but Yeah.
You know, now it's clear.
I I think it still tastes like strawberries, but, yeah, it's still like, it's not the
red the red 40 and all that, the
Aaron
00:04:52 – 00:04:56
good stuff.
I didn't try it, but I'll try it when I get home tonight.
I'll let you know.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Aaron
00:04:56 – 00:04:57
Next week.
COVID good.
Alright.
San Francisco, man.
You are on a plane again.
You're the traveling man.
Aaron
00:05:03 – 00:05:13
I'm a traveling man.
San Francisco, still alive.
Did not get stabbed at all.
I was bored.
Did see a lot of did see a lot of drug use.
Aaron
00:05:14 – 00:05:24
Crazy man.
Wide open.
Really, really sad.
Yeah.
But as long as you, don't go to that spot, it's mostly fine.
Aaron
00:05:24 – 00:05:35
Yeah.
So just I I totally get it.
Like, it's very beautiful.
The weather's amazing.
It does have I hate to say it out loud.
Aaron
00:05:35 – 00:05:37
It does have a certain energy, you know?
Aaron
00:05:38 – 00:05:49
Just hate to you hate to admit to it.
But, yeah, it was great.
So I went for this, I'm I have some new swag that I actually really love.
Sanity here.
Yeah.
Aaron
00:05:49 – 00:05:50
I got a sweatshirt from Sanity.
Aaron
00:05:52 – 00:06:17
So I went for this Sanity hackathon type thing.
It was, Jason Lingsdorf, big Internet guy, YouTube guy.
He has a YouTube series called the Web Dev Challenge, and it's like Great British bake off or the great British baking show, but for developers.
And so it's like you have four hours.
They give you a prompt.
Aaron
00:06:17 – 00:06:28
You have thirty minutes to plan and then four hours to build, just something, and then you present it at the end.
And so that's what we did, and it was fun.
It was a lot of fun.
And I did it.
I pulled it off.
Were you on your own?
Were you in team?
How does it work?
Aaron
00:06:30 – 00:06:30
So I
Aaron
00:06:30 – 00:07:00
was on my own, competing.
It's not really a competition, but competing against three other people, Kent c Dodds, Demetrius Clark, and then a woman named Charlie Gerard or Giroud or something like that.
Very, very fun.
Just a it was a real blast.
So we went to dinner the night before, just the, the participants in the challenge, and Joel Hooks.
Aaron
00:07:00 – 00:07:10
Joel Hooks came along.
I don't know if you know Joel, but, yeah, a guy guy that helps Kent with all his courses.
So that was fun.
He came along.
And then Simeon from Sanity also came along.
Aaron
00:07:10 – 00:07:27
And so we have this nice dinner.
Very, very fun.
Just this is like this is like pre Laracon basketball.
It's like you get a you get a chance to, like, get to know people and hang out.
And then when the event comes, it's way more fluid because you, like, you have this shared experience already.
Aaron
00:07:30 – 00:07:37
So that was super fun.
Sat next to Kent at dinner and we talked, you know, courses and business and strategy and dreams.
And it was
Aaron
00:07:38 – 00:07:45
So freaking fun.
First time I'd ever met him in person.
Absolute delight.
Wonderful person.
Really, really fun.
Aaron
00:07:46 – 00:08:00
And then the next day, we did this challenge kind of starting early in the morning, and it was proper.
Like, they had probably had three camera people, two sound people.
Yeah.
It was it was kinda wild.
It was so legit.
Aaron
00:08:01 – 00:08:16
And then after the web dev challenge, we kinda hung out, and then there was a sanity pre party for Next JS comp.
And so at the pre party, tons of people that we know showed up because they're all in town for, the next comp.
Aaron
00:08:17 – 00:08:25
And it turns out Notion comp was happening that day too across the street.
And so, do you know Thomas Frank, big YouTube guy?
Aaron
00:08:26 – 00:08:47
He, so I followed him for maybe a decade now.
He used to be like, kind of like bootstrap business builder guys.
He still is, but now very specifically in the notion space.
Huge YouTuber.
He wandered over and because he saw, he saw that I was going to be in San Francisco and he looked up, like, where the sanity thing was and it was literally across the street.
Aaron
00:08:47 – 00:08:58
And so he walked over and so he and I got to talk for, like, an hour or two.
Those it was great.
I had a blast, and then I took a driverless car back to the hotel and left the next day.
Wow.
It was amazing.
Aaron
00:08:58 – 00:08:59
Great trip.
Great trip.
I have questions.
I have questions.
Aaron
00:09:01 – 00:09:01
Yeah.
So what the heck is Sanity?
Mhmm.
Unless they they paid nice things for you, I think, and whatnot.
Tell us what they are because I have no idea what they are.
Aaron
00:09:08 – 00:09:27
Sanity is a headless CMS.
And so, it is like, maybe, I think.
So I heard somebody compare it to WordPress advanced custom fields, which I don't you're not allowed to say any of those words out loud, but Yeah.
It's
Aaron
00:09:27 – 00:09:45
the middle.
Yeah.
It's basically like that.
It's kinda like a schema less data lake that has this nice user interface, and then you hit everything over API, which is what the whole kind of the whole challenge was.
Very cool, amazing tooling, especially if you're in the next ecosystem.
Aaron
00:09:45 – 00:10:02
But even if you're not, still pretty great tooling and super powerful.
Kinda like I I could I could see it being parts of, like, Filament or Nova, that sort of thing, where you could, like, build out a content management dashboard for normies, and then the developers could still hit it in a pretty nice way.
Right.
Okay.
Alright.
So how is this I mean, four hours to build something.
I mean, I can't even that's like it takes me four hours just get warmed up to build something.
I know.
How how did it go?
How'd you feel being live on camera doing it?
I assume there's, like, cameras in your face.
No.
Aaron
00:10:16 – 00:10:21
Cameras in my face.
The camera's, like, right over my shoulders.
I've tried to type in commands that I can't remember, and I'm like At
least if you were on a team, like, then you
Aaron
00:10:23 – 00:10:24
could have a share.
Yeah.
It's just,
like, just on you.
It's like, oh, man.
Aaron
00:10:26 – 00:10:27
Like, how do
you watch me as I look up the docs for something else I'm supposed to know?
Like
Aaron
00:10:30 – 00:10:44
At one point, I was having trouble, subscribing to a Reverb channel from Laravel Echo, and I pulled up Laracasts and was watching Luke Downing's Larabit on it.
And they came around with the camera, and I'm, like, watching a video tutorial of Luke, and I'm like Like,
I'll just take a five here.
Don't worry about me.
Let's get in some YouTube on here.
Aaron
00:10:50 – 00:11:07
So that was fun.
Yeah, it was it was a little bit stressful.
So we're on our way to dinner the night before, and everybody is talking about, like, hey.
So if y'all planned out everything you're gonna build tomorrow And everyone else everyone else is like, oh, yeah.
I was talking to my wife about it.
Aaron
00:11:07 – 00:11:09
Yeah.
I've been thinking about it for weeks, and I'm like, woah.
Woah.
Woah.
Woah.
Aaron
00:11:09 – 00:11:10
Woah.
Woah.
Woah.
Woah.
Aaron
00:11:10 – 00:11:10
Woah.
Woah.
Woah.
Woah.
Woah.
Aaron
00:11:10 – 00:11:10
Woah.
Woah.
Woah.
Aaron
00:11:10 – 00:11:15
Hang on.
What what are you guys talking about?
Like, oh, yeah.
We just we totally have already planned out what we're gonna build.
Aaron
00:11:15 – 00:11:16
I thought
you didn't know what it's supposed to be.
Aaron
00:11:18 – 00:11:19
Does it write that?
Time.
Yeah.
Aaron
00:11:19 – 00:11:36
Yeah.
That's what I thought.
So there's I told them there's a 40% chance I didn't read some emails.
But the email that I did read said, like, here's the prompt that we're gonna be working with at at the actual event.
And I read the prompt, and it was not clear.
Aaron
00:11:36 – 00:11:39
Like, it wasn't, fleshed out enough to build an app on.
Aaron
00:11:40 – 00:11:53
The prompt was basically just like, Santa's workshop is in disarray, and you need to build a tool to figure out, you know, what the problem is and how to fix it.
And so I'm thinking, okay.
When we get there tomorrow, we're gonna get, like,
Aaron
00:11:53 – 00:11:54
we're gonna get what the real
Aaron
00:11:54 – 00:11:59
problem is.
We're gonna get the data.
We're gonna get the bottleneck, and we're gonna have to write a tool to fix it.
Aaron
00:11:59 – 00:12:02
And that no.
They were like, oh, no.
That's the entirety of the problem.
Aaron
00:12:02 – 00:12:02
That's all
Aaron
00:12:02 – 00:12:10
you're getting.
You just you make it up, and they're like, yeah.
I've been planning out what my what my thing is gonna be for a while now.
And I'm like, shoot.
I don't like that.
I don't like that.
Aaron
00:12:11 – 00:12:13
I don't like that.
I don't like it.
Not one bit.
Because otherwise, if somebody could put in, like, two weeks of like, they have the whole thing built and, like, just That's
Aaron
00:12:17 – 00:12:17
what I'm saying.
Show up, basically, piping it.
Like, they already know what it is versus
Aaron
00:12:22 – 00:12:22
Yeah.
It's just me.
Everybody comes in, cleanses.
Aaron
00:12:24 – 00:12:25
Cold.
Yeah.
Aaron
00:12:26 – 00:12:27
I agree.
So
Aaron
00:12:28 – 00:12:36
Already feeling on the literally on the way to the dinner, everybody's kinda laughing, and I'm like, guys, I'm freaking host.
This I'm toast.
Aaron
00:12:37 – 00:12:42
Joel Hooks gave me a good idea that was was my ended up being my backup.
He
Aaron
00:12:42 – 00:12:42
said I
Aaron
00:12:42 – 00:12:54
could just build rebuild McMaster Carr's website, but for Santa's workshop.
And I was like, that's a pretty good idea.
Yeah.
Because, you know, it's hot right now, and that would be easy with inertia and view and stuff.
So I thought, that's pretty good.
Aaron
00:12:55 – 00:13:11
But what I ended up going with was, so this won't air until December.
So everyone was forgotten by then.
Yeah.
What What I ended up going with was a, basically a wish list builder for the kids.
But using the Elo chess ranking algorithm.
Aaron
00:13:12 – 00:13:20
Oh, fun.
So and so you put, you know, it's like you put two pictures up of toys side by side, and you pick which one you want more just, you know, compared to each other.
Aaron
00:13:20 – 00:13:28
And then it builds out your ranked list based on your revealed preferences versus, like, I think I want this to be number one.
And so it was fun.
It worked out really well.
Aaron
00:13:29 – 00:13:40
good shtick.
I got it done in four hours.
I used, of course, Laravel with inertia and view.
Got to use reverb for the first time, which was awesome.
Yeah.
Aaron
00:13:41 – 00:13:54
Yeah.
Everyone else can't use Remix, obviously.
Charlie used Next JS, and Demetrius used Astro.
So that was kinda fun.
Everybody was doing different stuff, and everyone was making fun of Next JS, which is always a good time.
Aaron
00:13:54 – 00:13:57
You know I'm there for that.
That was so easy.
So easy.
Aaron
00:13:57 – 00:13:57
At the next
conference, make a buzz.
Yes.
I love it.
Aaron
00:14:00 – 00:14:03
But, yeah, I got it done.
I demoed it, and it went great.
Are you a chess guy?
I've been getting I've been becoming a chess guy lately.
Aaron
00:14:06 – 00:14:09
There there have been periods of my life where I've been a chess guy.
Aaron
00:14:10 – 00:14:23
But I've been to it.
I I have had ideas like this before for a long time.
The, this is do you remember Social Network, the movie with Zuckerberg?
Not actually Zuckerberg, but the character of Zuckerberg.
Aaron
00:14:23 – 00:14:23
Yeah.
Aaron
00:14:25 – 00:14:39
This is face mash that like, when they wrote you know, writing algorithms on the window, at the very beginning of the movie, that was the Elo algorithm that they were writing out.
Oh, really?
Yeah.
And so what they would do is put up, you know, two pictures of people, and you'd pick which one's hotter.
Aaron
00:14:40 – 00:14:43
Yeah.
Exactly.
This is that, but for kids' Christmas toys.
Aaron
00:14:45 – 00:14:45
You got
Aaron
00:14:46 – 00:14:48
Got it done in four hours.
Solid.
Yeah.
Not
camera in your face.
Wow.
Okay.
It doesn't air till December.
I guess I'm excited.
So they went with the Santa theme.
I gotcha.
Okay.
Yeah.
Aaron
00:14:54 – 00:14:55
How many do they do
do they do, like, one a month or, like, they can't do that
Aaron
00:14:57 – 00:15:09
much anymore?
Many of these he does, but it's a it's a lot.
I think it is probably one a month.
And, typically, he flies people into his studio in Portland.
This was the first one he's done, like, on location.
Aaron
00:15:09 – 00:15:14
But, yeah, it's a real it's a real production.
Like,
get doing stuff like that in the factory.
Aaron
00:15:16 – 00:15:16
I
Aaron
00:15:18 – 00:15:18
I know.
Aaron
00:15:18 – 00:15:26
Deep stuff.
I know.
That's coming.
We we do need to talk about the factory.
But, yeah, getting four people cross country travel and then getting a The question.
Aaron
00:15:27 – 00:15:36
Like, film crew there.
Hotels, film crew.
Dinner.
Yeah.
Doing the doing the edit of, like, you know, whatever that is.
Aaron
00:15:36 – 00:15:38
Three or four cameras Yeah.
Plus screen share footage.
Aaron
00:15:41 – 00:15:46
So it's a production, but it was Write off, though.
It's all good.
Write off.
It is a write off.
Aaron
00:15:46 – 00:15:46
You don't
Aaron
00:15:46 – 00:15:53
about that part.
I hope this is about the money.
Margin is big enough because it seems like there are a lot of costs, but I don't know the structure.
This has never reached me.
I don't know anything about this.
I don't know who this person is.
So this is good.
Got you on there.
Aaron
00:15:58 – 00:15:59
Is it It's working.
It is interesting.
Right?
It's a way to it pulls in these different groups that now all the Laravel crew will know what this is and who this person is and all those type of things.
So it's pretty cool.
Yep.
Alright.
So you made several did you did you eat any good food?
Did you go to the arcade museum?
Aaron
00:16:15 – 00:16:16
No.
I didn't go to anything.
Man.
I know.
Okay.
We went
Aaron
00:16:19 – 00:16:22
to, we went somewhere for dinner that was great.
Okay.
Aaron
00:16:22 – 00:16:23
And then
No bakeries?
You're getting bread?
You're in San Francisco, man.
Aaron
00:16:26 – 00:16:29
Yeah.
Bread capital of the world.
I didn't get any bread.
Aaron
00:16:31 – 00:16:37
I understand that the the bread exists, but I did not get any.
Got some coffees in the hotel.
Oh, okay.
That's exciting.
Aaron
00:16:39 – 00:16:51
Went to one bar and got a drink and some French fries, and then went to one little hole in the wall taco shop, and it was awesome.
And then whatever wherever we went for the super nice dinner the night before.
Aaron
00:16:51 – 00:16:51
I
don't know.
Super nice dinner you can get everywhere, though.
That's not to me, that's not the special sort of stuff.
You see, I did about the And
Aaron
00:16:58 – 00:17:00
Jennifer listened to the last podcast and
Aaron
00:17:00 – 00:17:00
Yeah.
Aaron
00:17:00 – 00:17:06
Texted me and said, we've been to Tartine.
And I was like, great.
I'll tell Ian.
So I've been there.
That's perfect.
Aaron
00:17:06 – 00:17:09
I've been there.
It was great.
I totally remember it.
It's perfect.
Oh, jeez.
Thank you, Jennifer.
Wait.
Freak we gotta get the wives on the show.
We should have the wives do an episode.
That would
Aaron
00:17:17 – 00:17:19
be much better show.
It would be.
No.
That's seriously that has to happen.
Alright.
You've been in twenty eighteen, so that's good.
So you're good about it.
I'm not good about it.
I can't travel across the country and not stay, like, at least three or four days.
Aaron
00:17:31 – 00:17:32
Like,
that's, like, the bare minimum.
Like, you're you're in the plane.
You're traveling.
You're going back and forth.
No.
It's amazing.
You go out there.
You go out to these places.
You just come right back.
Aaron
00:17:40 – 00:17:52
Just come right back.
It's crazy.
When I went to wherever for for Laracon EU A Few Years ago, I don't even remember where it was.
I was out and back, baby.
Just That's out and back.
That's the tightest long trip I've ever gone on was the first Laracon EU.
I had just, had the old vasectomy.
Mhmm.
And, our daughter was, like, three months old or something like that.
Aaron
00:18:06 – 00:18:07
Oh, wow.
Three months old.
Aaron
00:18:07 – 00:18:10
Young days.
So so yeah.
So she was really new.
So I
was like, alright.
I gotta I gotta be back.
Right?
You can't be you can't be out there for too long.
So and I think I was there, like, four days or something, but that was already Europe.
Yeah.
But, yeah, I don't know.
You need the time.
You gotta just because the travel.
Just not just dealing with the airport and everything.
You're a good man.
You came back.
Aaron
00:18:25 – 00:18:29
I appreciate that.
I came back came back quick.
Came back to help.
Gotta do that.
Aaron
00:18:29 – 00:18:30
Well, you do have
sick kids.
You get the whole thing.
Well, they weren't sick when you left, though.
I think they
Aaron
00:18:32 – 00:18:35
when I left.
They saved that when I got home.
Yeah.
Oh, man.
Every time I go somewhere like that, something always happens at home, like, a % of the time.
People are sick.
We're going to the emergency room.
We're doing whatever.
There's always chaos.
Like, there's nothing happening.
Aaron
00:18:45 – 00:18:48
There's water on the floor.
I don't know where the water came
from.
Jeez.
The one we had somewhere and the heat stopped working the house in, like,
Aaron
00:18:54 – 00:18:55
oh, classic.
Yeah.
And, you know, it's freezing in New York and my wife's going to buy space heaters and like the whole, you know, the whole thing.
It's like,
Aaron
00:19:04 – 00:19:05
yeah.
So
that was when we find, I think that was what put us over the top.
We had this like fancy German little hang on your wall boiler for our house that was all high-tech and like broke every single year for like the first eight years we're in the house and in the winter.
And so then we were like, just give us the one that's all the parts are on the truck.
Like, just give us the most generic Yes.
Boiler thingy you have, and that's what they did.
And then we literally haven't had a single problem since.
And it's like, okay.
Great.
That's what I want.
Give me the basics.
Aaron
00:19:35 – 00:19:36
Take that, Germany.
Aaron
00:19:38 – 00:19:41
Probably some American manufacturing there.
Probably was.
Chicago.
It probably was.
Alright.
So what's up with the factory?
Aaron
00:19:45 – 00:19:46
What's up with the factory?
Aaron
00:19:47 – 00:19:55
We have a lease.
Are we missing?
We have not signed it yet, but we have a lease for a factory.
I don't know.
I haven't looked at it yet.
Yeah.
I don't like it anymore.
Aaron
00:19:56 – 00:19:58
Pages?
Oh, it needs to be fewer pages.
Hide people tried to screw me with this where it's, like, 52 pages.
And I was, like, went around asking me
Aaron
00:20:03 – 00:20:03
right now.
I was
like, should it be 52 pages?
And then everybody I was like, no.
It's usually, like, seven or whatever.
And k.
Yeah.
So don't get screwed if it's, like, ugly.
Aaron
00:20:12 – 00:20:21
Yeah.
I won't get screwed.
If it's too many checks away.
Pages, I will refuse.
I have texted a few lawyer friends and said, can you read this for me?
Aaron
00:20:21 – 00:20:21
Oh, yeah.
You got the lawyer friends.
Aaron
00:20:22 – 00:20:24
Got so many lawyer friends.
They're all lawyers.
Aaron
00:20:25 – 00:20:25
Why
Aaron
00:20:25 – 00:20:38
do we need so many lawyers?
So we have the least.
So I went back and toured the place one of the places again, this time with Steve on FaceTime.
Mhmm.
And I think I think this is the one.
Aaron
00:20:38 – 00:20:43
So the the setup of this one, I think this is the first set of pictures that I sent you first.
Right.
The more aesthetically pleasing The
Aaron
00:20:46 – 00:21:01
very aesthetically pleasing one, and your comment was it might be too small.
And I agree Yeah.
That it does feel it does feel a little small.
So it's a thousand square feet Mhmm.
Of which, I think, hundred what's 13 by 19?
Aaron
00:21:01 – 00:21:10
13 times 19 is two forty seven.
So it's a thousand square feet, 250 of which are dedicated to office.
Mhmm.
And the other seven fifty.
Is that right?
Aaron
00:21:10 – 00:21:11
That was close.
Aaron
00:21:12 – 00:21:15
No.
No.
No.
It's not oh, it's so early.
Seven fifties.
Aaron
00:21:15 – 00:21:34
It's 02:50.
That seems right.
The other x amount is dedicated to warehouse.
And so the wear the front of the warehouse has a roll up door with 11 foot clearance, which is great.
And then the office has the entrance door, and I think we're gonna start, January 1.
Aaron
00:21:34 – 00:21:34
I think
Aaron
00:21:34 – 00:21:36
we're gonna we're gonna pull the trigger.
Aaron
00:21:38 – 00:21:56
Two.
So we got it down to two from three because that was that was the, that was the compromise that I think we felt comfortable with was this does feel like this feels like the lower end of the amount of space we would need.
And so let's just do it for two years.
It's way more space than we're in right now.
Aaron
00:21:57 – 00:22:13
And so let's just do that.
And then once we get more huge and successful, we can spend money, getting a bigger spot and potentially potentially buying or building a spot in the future.
But for now, we're gonna rent out we're gonna rent out this little adorable warehouse office combo.
You never know if you like, the one next door becomes available too or something like that.
You can, like, get that one and bust a hole through the wall.
I know.
Now you have double the space or whatever.
Sometimes stuff like that works out potentially too.
Aaron
00:22:25 – 00:22:31
That would that would be ideal, honestly, if we could get the guy next to us to move out.
Maybe I'll make enough noise that he will, and I can just There
Aaron
00:22:31 – 00:22:33
I can just take over.
Aaron
00:22:34 – 00:22:39
really Yeah.
All that Piss him off.
Woodworking that I'm gonna do right against his wall.
Aaron
00:22:39 – 00:22:39
What are you
gonna do in the office?
Are you gonna put, like, your, like, main workspace in there?
Aaron
00:22:44 – 00:22:45
So what's
be like, what do you think?
Aaron
00:22:46 – 00:23:18
Steve and I talked about it a lot last week, and I think where we landed is so the office is thirteen by nineteen.
I think where we landed is that we can get two studio backdrops in that office.
And I think that will be the main recording space, because the acoustics are already so much better because it has the drop ceiling, whereas the warehouse is clear up to, like, 15 or 16 feet, after the trusses.
And so and it's, you know, concrete floors out in the warehouse, concrete walls.
And so very, very cool looking, but super reverby.
Aaron
00:23:18 – 00:23:32
So I think we're gonna move we're gonna set up, like, a l shaped studio.
One of the backdrops will be this one, and then another one running perpendicular to it will be off camera such that we can rotate the camera and shoot, you know, that way and have a different backdrop.
No.
It's still gonna be Rolly or not Rolly?
Aaron
00:23:35 – 00:23:48
I don't know if this big guy will be Rolly, but the other one will be will be Rolly or modular in some sort of way, whether that is, is, Rolly or we can just, like, put another backdrop on top of it,
Aaron
00:23:49 – 00:24:00
it won't be quite as complex as this one.
But, yeah, that's that's the plan is that we can have extra extra spots out in the warehouse that we could roll in and out, to change to change the set.
Now when I come down there, are you gonna be such that we can record somebody could sit in the other one at the same time?
Aaron
00:24:06 – 00:24:13
Not right now.
That is not the plan right now.
The the plan right now is to have one, recording happening at a time.
Aaron
00:24:16 – 00:24:23
But should we get there, that is something to consider.
I will say one recording happening in the studio space at a time.
Makes sure somebody could be in the other area.
Aaron
00:24:25 – 00:24:35
So I could have a guest instructor banging out, you know, some sort of Postgres on Rails or something, and I'm out in the warehouse Yeah.
Doing whatever I do in the warehouse, making videos.
Aaron
00:24:35 – 00:24:35
I was
thinking more if you were, like, doing a an interview or whatever, and you wanna be able to see the person, then they could just be in the other
Aaron
00:24:42 – 00:24:42
So we could have
Aaron
00:24:44 – 00:24:46
two people recording the same content.
That's what I mean.
That's what
Aaron
00:24:47 – 00:24:49
I'm saying.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Okay.
Like, you're interviewing somebody or you're on there and we're we're just recording the show.
And this way we're in the same space, but with 200% backdrops.
Aaron
00:24:57 – 00:24:58
We'll make that happen.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Aaron
00:24:58 – 00:24:59
I think that would be
Aaron
00:24:59 – 00:25:09
Probably on probably on the same backdrop.
We'll have, like, a, you know, couple of chairs and couple of mics.
The classic, you know, in person podcast setup.
Mhmm.
But, yes, we can totally totally make that happen.
Alright.
Alright.
So we're almost there.
So We're
Aaron
00:25:12 – 00:25:12
almost there.
Next show well, you're gonna be missing the next show.
Aaron
00:25:15 – 00:25:15
I am.
The show after we'll get the update.
We should be outside the lease.
That's nice.
Okay.
Aaron
00:25:21 – 00:25:23
The property empire expands again.
Aaron
00:25:25 – 00:25:42
So this I'm out of the apartment, I think, like, February 9 or something.
And so I'll have all of January to move stuff over, which is pretty important.
And we found, we found a videographer.
We found a kid.
Aaron
00:25:43 – 00:25:45
The kid worked out.
Aaron
00:25:45 – 00:25:58
So he's gonna come up here this week.
Today's Monday.
He's coming up on Wednesday to this studio for our first, like, our first interaction.
So we're gonna give him a test.
We're gonna do a studio tour in here Mhmm.
Aaron
00:25:58 – 00:26:01
So that we get some footage out of this before we lose it
Aaron
00:26:01 – 00:26:01
Yeah.
Aaron
00:26:01 – 00:26:12
And see just see if we get along, see if I like him, see if he's good at it.
And, yeah, he's he seems great.
So I booked him for one day this week and then one day a few weeks from now for some other stuff.
Aaron
00:26:13 – 00:26:21
Yeah.
And if it works out, we'll have him, you know, be at the factory one or two days a week.
Just doing who knows what?
Recording stuff.
Aaron
00:26:21 – 00:26:22
Yeah.
Alright.
Aaron
00:26:22 – 00:26:22
It's gonna be awesome.
Aaron
00:26:24 – 00:26:35
I know.
I know.
We're gonna need to figure out I got that I have that Synology, NAS, and everybody's like, you gotta use Tailscale.
Like, what the hell is Tailscale?
So I gotta figure what I I gotta figure that.
Aaron
00:26:35 – 00:26:43
I don't know.
These these NAS people are a lot they're just doing, like, oh, you gotta run your media server from it.
And I'm like, I don't know what that means.
I just use Netflix.
So Oh my goodness.
Aaron
00:26:44 – 00:26:49
I gotta figure out I gotta figure out some digital asset management stuff, but we'll get there.
It'll be fine.
That'll be a fun little adventure.
Alright.
The people have spoken.
Aaron
00:26:53 – 00:26:54
Yeah.
They want you on the sky with the rest of us.
They want you.
Ian.
Come come join us.
Aaron
00:27:01 – 00:27:01
I don't
We're over there.
It's so much fun.
It's like early Twitter.
All our friends are there.
Everybody's even the big dogs are dipping their toes in.
Come on, Eric.
We need you, buddy.
We
Aaron
00:27:11 – 00:27:11
need you.
Aaron
00:27:11 – 00:27:15
I don't I don't get it.
If I'm being honest, I don't I just don't
get it.
It's Twitter.
It's literally Twitter without all the overhead of all the terrible parts.
Aaron
00:27:19 – 00:27:19
It's
Aaron
00:27:19 – 00:27:25
great.
Yeah.
I think we might have def different, like, degrees, which I think Twitter is terrible.
You love the dildo ads?
Is that the thing?
Aaron
00:27:28 – 00:27:42
Don't put that on me.
I do not wanna be associated with that word in any transcript ever.
I'd like to have that Twitter.
Like to have that redacted.
I don't get the ads on Twitter.
Aaron
00:27:42 – 00:27:43
I don't I don't see them.
You pay the max tier?
Crazy tier.
Aaron
00:27:46 – 00:27:50
I don't know if I do, but I have ad blockers, so I never see the ads on Twitter.
Aaron
00:27:51 – 00:28:14
And I just use the web interface like a normie.
So I do use the web interface.
I don't mind I don't mind the ads because to me, they do not exist.
And then for the most part, my feed is very clean because of all the people and words that I have muted, and so I don't super mind it.
I will say this weekend, I was starting to get a lot of foreign language tweets and a lot of, like, hot moms over 50, and I'm like Sure.
Aaron
00:28:14 – 00:28:15
Oh, okay.
Aaron
00:28:16 – 00:28:26
I don't want this.
And so I spent, you know, spent thirty minutes just not interested.
Not interested.
Not interest.
At one point, my entire my entire screen, like, one scroll worth of screen
Aaron
00:28:26 – 00:28:26
was not interested in this tweet.
Aaron
00:28:26 – 00:28:32
And I was like, golly.
That's, like, 10 or 15 in a row that are terrible.
Aaron
00:28:33 – 00:28:33
That's what
we're talking about.
Get out of there, man.
Aaron
00:28:35 – 00:28:41
So but but riddle riddle me this.
What's going on on blue sky besides talking about Twitter?
Like, are you
No.
It's not like that.
It's always that.
You get
Aaron
00:28:45 – 00:28:45
you get
Aaron
00:28:45 – 00:28:52
you log in, and it's all like, wow.
Sure.
It's great.
Hate the bird app.
Everybody calls it the bird app, which is cringey.
Aaron
00:28:52 – 00:28:56
guys, all you're doing is posting screenshots of Twitter on Blue Sky.
Say threads was, is very much like that.
Awful.
Like threads is so heavy with the algo and it's like, okay, the Twitter tweet posts are what get people to engage.
And so like, you just get infinite of them and that's where, like, that got super annoying.
But at least so far, I've not seen any of that.
And then blue sky is a really, the smartest thing they've done is they have these starter packs.
Aaron
00:29:16 – 00:29:16
That is smart.
You can create this group of people you follow, you think people should follow, and then you can share that and then people can come in and follow everybody all at once.
So you feel like people are following you.
You're the right people kind of just gets you going versus that cold start.
Just, yeah.
I have zero followers.
I'm not following anybody.
It sucks.
It's stupid.
It's like, no, like it just, boom.
I just instantly get a bunch of followers.
I instantly follow a bunch of people.
It's very nice.
It's great.
It's great.
Laravel Laravel is moving over there, baby.
We finally got him.
We hooked him.
Aaron
00:29:46 – 00:29:54
That was never that was never a question for me.
Like, the the problem and that's the same thing.
Like, that's the blue sky.
That's pinkery.
That's Mastodon.
Aaron
00:29:55 – 00:29:57
The problem different.
The problem
Aaron
00:29:57 – 00:29:58
is, like not terrible.
Aaron
00:29:58 – 00:30:09
Mastodon's terrible.
All the all the, like, hardcore Laravel or tech people move over, but it's the rest of the world.
Like, the rest of the world isn't gonna be over.
I've gotten I feel like I have a good chunk of most of the rest of the world is there too.
Like, a lot of them are just cross posting right now and stuff like that.
But a lot more more than I would say, like, I found on, like, threads when I was trying that out and stuff.
I feel like there's a good amount of the rest of the world.
Not everybody for sure.
So you still have that that rub, but I felt like mostly the rest of the world was at at a lot of these other ones, but it wasn't the like closer circle people that I know better that would go, they would all stay on Twitter.
Like the tech people wouldn't go other places like, yeah.
Bloomberg's posted everywhere.
Cause what do they care?
And so you got the, they don't care about accounts everywhere.
Aaron
00:30:46 – 00:30:47
Yeah.
I like
Aaron
00:30:48 – 00:30:49
I don't care about them.
But yeah.
But then I wouldn't have, you know, the the regular folk, but, now the regular folk are there.
I'm telling you Yeah.
So cross post automated.
That's a little stream for you.
You automate your cross post.
Aaron
00:31:01 – 00:31:17
I don't know.
See, the problem here's the problem with automating the cross posting.
And and, frankly, here's the problem with automating the first posting.
This is why I don't do this is why I don't do Twitter scheduling or, like, fill up Monday morning, write a bunch of tweets.
I am not I'm not an entity.
Aaron
00:31:17 – 00:31:30
I don't want to become an entity.
Right?
And so if I'm just, like, cross posting to Blue Sky, that is in pursuit of a media, like, brand.
And the like, what I the value I
Aaron
00:31:31 – 00:31:35
Twitter, which is what I am, but not what I am.
Okay?
So there's nuance.
Aaron
00:31:36 – 00:31:51
value the value I get out of Twitter is being a human being on Twitter.
So everybody's like, you know, lots of the big dogs are like, oh, the algorithm sucks.
And then you look at their tweets, and it's like, yeah.
That all makes sense to me.
Like, I understand why you're not getting reached because your tweets suck.
Aaron
00:31:51 – 00:32:05
Yeah.
And so if I were to just automate to blue sky and then never engage over there, it just feels disingenuous.
Like, hey.
I'm, you know, I'm Tim Ferris now.
All I do is automate, and I don't ever respond or hang out with the people.
Aaron
00:32:05 – 00:32:07
I just feels icky.
I don't wanna do that.
It's
true.
I can see that.
That makes sense.
That means you just need to move over.
That's fine.
Aaron
00:32:11 – 00:32:13
I don't I don't know.
I don't know.
Aaron
00:32:13 – 00:32:24
go tell him.
Yeah.
I know.
I was telling I think it was Kent this week, at the thing.
It's like my my goal is to just just retire before then.
Aaron
00:32:24 – 00:32:30
Like, if it if it actually Twitter if Twitter actually goes down, which I think is an awesome question that we could talk about in a second.
Aaron
00:32:31 – 00:32:59
My my goal is to not have to do another one of these things.
And, like, I will feel some sort of loss because there are people with whom I casually engage that I probably won't take to, like, Telegram DMs or something, and I will lose those interactions.
And that would be that would be sad.
Yeah.
But just the, like, man, you know, when you finish a project and you look back on it and you're like, if I had known what was going to what it was going to take,
Aaron
00:32:59 – 00:33:01
I'd never have signed up for that project.
Aaron
00:33:01 – 00:33:08
That's how I feel.
Yeah.
Looking back at, like, Twitter's, like, if I had known what that was gonna take, I don't know if I would do it.
But see, really so here's the thing, though.
It's almost like I feel like you should be using Blue Sky like Twitter of old, which is what you're kind of describing.
Right.
Which is like, you know, you got yours,
Aaron
00:33:21 – 00:33:21
be a person
acquaintances, be a person respond to people, right?
Like get a feel of the new packages coming out in Lara Bell and what's going on.
Whatever.
Like, that's just like your little information zone, little circle of friends.
And Twitter is just where if there's still people, like, buying courses off Twitters and stuff like that from you, then fine.
You could still do some stuff there.
I mean, like, you've talked about here.
You're pretty, like, methodical with how you tweet.
You're like, on launch day, I do a single tweet, and I don't tweet anything else so that the algo doesn't get confused about what's important.
Right?
And, like Mhmm.
Whatever.
So you could still approach it that way.
It's just another channel.
You know what I'm saying?
Aaron
00:33:58 – 00:34:05
I do.
Hey.
I it's not 0% compelling to be there.
Yeah.
It's not I'm it's not more likely than not.
Aaron
00:34:05 – 00:34:15
So it doesn't break, you know, it doesn't break the 50.1, but it's not zero.
Like, there's some part of me that thinks, yeah, if all my friends are there, that would be fun.
But here's the other thing.
All my friends are still on Twitter.
Aaron
00:34:17 – 00:34:29
So I don't know.
I don't know.
Here, if if, I think there are two things.
I think after the election, I think a lot of people are just gonna come back to Twitter.
That's my that's my thought.
Aaron
00:34:29 – 00:34:31
Because here's what I think is happening.
Aaron
00:34:32 – 00:34:43
there's so much political content on there, and the chief the chief twit, who's an idiot in this regard, Yes.
Great at rockets.
Just an idiot otherwise.
Fifteen years ago, he was
good at rockets.
I don't know if he's good
Aaron
00:34:44 – 00:34:49
at rockets.
Time.
But tunnels are also awesome.
We gotta have more tunnels.
We gotta have
Aaron
00:34:49 – 00:34:50
some throwers.
He's the best
main power guy out there.
Aaron
00:34:51 – 00:34:52
We love it.
We love it.
I'm and won't make him credit for that.
Aaron
00:34:53 – 00:35:06
Stupid, but I'm I'm proud of him for trying something at avant garde.
Sure.
Anyway, on Twitter, he's an idiot, and I Yes.
Greatly dislike him.
And so I think what's happening is there's a lot of content right now that people don't wanna see.
Aaron
00:35:06 – 00:35:24
And so then they go to the refuge that is blue sky where it's like, oh, it's all happy go lucky here.
And you're like, well, it's not really.
And then, the election's going to end.
People will be mad for a little bit regardless.
Either way, people are gonna be mad, and then it'll die down, and then people are gonna be like, you know, Twitter's not that bad.
Aaron
00:35:24 – 00:35:26
Yeah.
I know.
That's that's what I'm thinking.
It's an interesting theory.
I I don't agree, but not for the reason you might think.
I just think that, you're not wrong in that.
Like, yes.
Like, right now he's putting his finger on the scale
Aaron
00:35:37 – 00:35:37
Mhmm.
For the thing he wants.
Right?
Which is to elect Trump and fight.
Aaron
00:35:40 – 00:35:41
Mhmm.
But I think that now that it's just become his personal playground.
Right?
Like Yeah.
That's just the next thing.
Okay.
So election's over.
You're not gonna see any more politics stuff in that of about an election.
Aaron
00:35:51 – 00:35:52
Right.
But what's the next thing he wants to do?
Okay.
So now he wants to get big government contracts to go to Mars.
Okay.
So now you're gonna get, like, all that stuff shoved in your face or whatever whatever he's into.
Who knows what he's gonna be into.
Right?
Like, whatever he's into is what's going to be pushed to you because you're just now in this personal guy's thing that just whatever his whim is is what he's gonna do.
Right?
And so I just think that's a weird setup for a social media platform.
It's like we're all just in whatever Elon's into right now is kind of what he's we see a lot of.
Yep.
I don't know if that's gonna be compelling even after the election.
So I don't know.
Aaron
00:36:27 – 00:36:32
Here's here's a here's a great trick to be able to stay sane on Twitter.
Aaron
00:36:33 – 00:36:54
to mute Elon the person.
Sure.
You have to add Elon and Musk and Tesla and SpaceX to your muted Right.
Word list.
And that, like, honestly And you have to mute every every time you see one of those, like, you know, Tesla of Santa Fe just posted this video of a Cybertruck being awesome.
Aaron
00:36:54 – 00:36:55
You're like, no.
I don't wanna see it.
Mute it.
Think about the amount of work you're talking about.
I just think I know.
Want to do that level of work.
Aaron
00:37:01 – 00:37:06
Garnting must be tended.
I totally agree.
I totally agree.
It's insane.
Need to do that much work somewhere else potentially.
Now, again, you have critical mass, which I totally agree.
Yeah.
Not yet.
And who knows?
They say they're gonna go a little different approach.
Maybe they're not.
In the end, maybe they're just, like, big algo feed work best.
Aaron
00:37:18 – 00:37:18
They
Aaron
00:37:18 – 00:37:20
just raised a ton of money, didn't they?
I mean, 14,000,000 is not a ton, but, yes, they did raise some money.
So I don't know.
I don't know.
They're definitely gonna have to make money.
I want them to make money because I want them to stay in business.
Right?
So there's, like, a rub.
You have both ways of all these platforms is, like, they need to somehow make money in order to survive, which is fine.
So I don't know.
I just think there's more to it than that.
And like, I just think tech Twitter is one of the last bastions.
Like so much of the rest of it's already gone.
Like, I mean, they've lost like 80 something percent of the users and it doesn't feel like
Aaron
00:37:46 – 00:37:47
it's
our circle.
Yeah.
It's like 80 something percent.
Mm-mm.
Of the revenue anyway, I guess maybe users slightly different, but I mean Yeah.
It, I think it's a reasonable approximation.
So I don't know.
I just think it's not, maybe it's going to come back and he's going to turn it around.
I mean, I think Elon's capable of turning it around.
Like I think he decides to,
Aaron
00:38:08 – 00:38:09
you know, hardest thing in the world.
Yeah.
I don't know what he's gonna do.
Aaron
00:38:11 – 00:38:12
I think
Trump loses, it's more likely that he's like, okay, well that didn't work.
I'm gonna like try doing something different and changes direction.
Right.
And, maybe that that does it.
I think if he wins, I think you're just gonna get more of the same.
Aaron
00:38:26 – 00:38:38
He's he's suffering from the same thing that photo Matt is suffering from, which is that he he's not listening to anyone.
I just wanna, like, I just wanna grab Elon by the shoulders and be like, dude, stop tweeting.
Aaron
00:38:38 – 00:38:39
Just
love I actually think what he's doing is super smart.
Honestly, it's the smartest thing he's done ten years probably in the sense of, like because here's the thing.
He's playing a zero downside game, which is I'm all in on Trump.
I'm gonna be here at your Nazi rally.
I'm gonna jump around like an idiot.
Right?
Like I'm gonna do all this stuff.
Aaron
00:38:57 – 00:39:00
He does jump like an idiot.
I will say whatever.
I'm gonna I'm the star mag of whatever.
Okay.
I'm all of this things.
Right.
I'm gonna donate.
I'm gonna give people a million dollars to vote, which is illegal, but whatever.
Fine.
I'm gonna put, I'm gonna do every skeezy thing I can do.
And at the end, if Harris wins, nothing's gonna happen to him.
She's not gonna, like, play outside book.
She's not gonna punish him in some weirdo way.
Yeah.
And if Trump wins, he gets to take credit and be like, look at you were losing.
I got involved.
I won you Pennsylvania.
I won you these states.
Nobody look.
I paid all these millions of dollars to buy these votes.
Thank give me the power.
Right?
And Trump has already said he's gonna be in charge of the Doge department, which is hysterical.
Aaron
00:39:40 – 00:39:43
That is hysterical.
What does it say?
Department of what?
Aaron
00:39:45 – 00:39:46
Efficiency.
Efficiency.
Yeah.
So I'm gonna be in charge of the Doge department.
Aaron
00:39:49 – 00:39:53
These people are idiots, but it's hysterical.
You can't live away.
I'm in charge of the government.
Guess what?
I'm gonna get lots of big contracts for big things.
Right?
So, like, he Cars on the
Aaron
00:39:59 – 00:40:00
table, boys.
Of course.
So, like, in that regard, it's like, hey.
This is actually the first non stupid thing he's done.
If you're gonna buy a social media platform and run it in the ground
Aaron
00:40:09 – 00:40:10
stupid.
The tunnels are the tunnels
Aaron
00:40:11 – 00:40:12
And they're not running
into the ground for a purpose that benefits you potentially with low downside.
So in that regard, I think what he's doing makes sense.
But You've got
Aaron
00:40:20 – 00:40:25
you've got the old Elon derangement syndrome.
Here's here's here's that's a good strategy or that's
Aaron
00:40:26 – 00:40:33
That's a good take.
That is a good take.
Politics politics aside, he's still a bad tweeter.
Aaron
00:40:34 – 00:40:41
He's not funny.
He's annoying.
He's very.
He's very.
He just first of all, he just steals memes, which is entirely inappropriate.
Aaron
00:40:42 – 00:40:44
Straight steals them.
And second of all, they're not funny.
It's like
Aaron
00:40:45 – 00:40:56
02/2011 era memes, and you're like, this isn't funny.
Don't make a four twenty or a 69 joke.
Nobody cares.
This is embarrassing.
Like, you look like an idiot.
That the people pretend they love I don't know.
Aaron
00:40:57 – 00:40:58
That's all they
pretend.
Actually love him?
Do they pretend they love him?
I don't know.
Aaron
00:41:01 – 00:41:02
Funny, guys.
Aaron
00:41:02 – 00:41:03
like the
Aaron
00:41:04 – 00:41:05
funniness heroes.
Cheering at the rocket, and it's like they're so fake in their faces about the cheering.
It's like
Aaron
00:41:10 – 00:41:12
It doesn't have to come back to the rockets.
But, anyway, yes.
The tweets are terrible.
Aaron
00:41:14 – 00:41:15
The tweets are terrible.
But he's like every ultra ner I mean, listen.
I was the ultra nerdy guy making the bad jokes, but he's still there except that now that he's got a billions quarter of a trillion dollars
Aaron
00:41:24 – 00:41:24
True.
He is people are just like, you're so funny, but, like, he's not funny at all.
He's not
Aaron
00:41:30 – 00:41:36
I think that's the one maybe the one thing that I still have on Elon.
I think I'm funnier than Elon.
Oh, you have a lot on Elon, and funnier is definitely
Aaron
00:41:39 – 00:41:46
Funnier funnier is definitely one of them and maybe the most important in in my mind.
As long as I'm funnier than Elon, that's
Aaron
00:41:47 – 00:41:55
I appreciate that.
I don't know if I I definitely don't have more kids.
I might have more twins.
I don't know if that's true.
To be fair, I think he's got at least one set.
Aaron
00:41:56 – 00:42:00
With the early twin.
Yeah.
I don't think he has two.
So I I had a few things on
end of things.
Like, this guy probably knew how to have kids.
Aaron
00:42:03 – 00:42:04
He's not great.
Aaron
00:42:04 – 00:42:04
He's not great.
He's got eight kids he never sees.
Like, the whole thing is Not great.
You're flying back from San Francisco on a one night trip so you could be home with your kids.
This guy's like, I got kids everywhere.
I never see them.
Whatever.
I sleep my own.
Yep.
Yep.
This is the guy I
Aaron
00:42:16 – 00:42:22
really love to.
I'm potentially a better dad than Elon Musk.
I think potentially.
Possibly.
I don't wanna do the
Aaron
00:42:22 – 00:42:22
old parent comparison thing because that's never Nobody has
Aaron
00:42:22 – 00:42:24
their own style.
Yeah.
I think I got it.
Thing because that's never
Aaron
00:42:26 – 00:42:29
Yeah.
I think I got them on this one just, you know, looking from the outside.
Aaron
00:42:32 – 00:42:55
Alright.
Luke Scott, if it's still around in if it's around, if it's still hot, between Thanksgiving and Christmas, so in in the doldrums.
If it's still hot around there, I will I'll dip a toe in.
And I can go get I can go get aaronference.com because of your cool DNS trick.
Like, I own AaronFrancis.com, but I can be AaronFrancis.com on Blue Sky, which is kinda neat.
Aaron
00:42:55 – 00:43:01
So cool.
So I'll try.
I'll I'll dip a toe in in the doldrums if it's still, like, if that's still the hang space.
I think that's fair.
I like this.
This is a fair compromise we've reached here on the show.
Deal.
Nice.
Very god I would do a godfather reference right here about the meeting of the five families.
Aaron
00:43:10 – 00:43:10
Totally.
Yeah.
Seen it.
So at some point
Aaron
00:43:12 – 00:43:24
There's a, in in the office, there's a meeting of the five families where everyone in the office park comes together.
Vance Refrigeration, Yes.
The office, and some are in the
Aaron
00:43:26 – 00:43:30
Yeah.
In in the I think it's in the later seasons,
Aaron
00:43:31 – 00:43:33
Kevin in office, the show.
Aaron
00:43:33 – 00:43:37
Yeah.
Yeah.
Kevin Kevin and Andy call a meeting of the five families.
Aaron
00:43:38 – 00:43:48
It's, the motorbike guide, Vance Refrigeration, Crest Tool and Die, Dunder Mifflin, and somebody else.
I forget.
So I get it.
You could you could use that reference.
Aaron
00:43:48 – 00:43:51
a corollary in some other pop culture,
Aaron
00:43:51 – 00:43:52
I'll get it.
Aaron
00:43:52 – 00:44:00
I'll totally get it.
And here, I just wanna make a note about blue sky.
Y'all please don't DM me and ask me to join blue sky.
I've already gotten so many DMMs.
Aaron
00:44:01 – 00:44:07
So many I've gotten so many DM.
DMs are like, hey.
Are you gonna come join blue sky?
And I'm like, no.
So Send him the starter packs.
He doesn't know.
Aaron
00:44:10 – 00:44:11
No.
I know about the starter.
Aaron
00:44:12 – 00:44:17
I know about them.
He doesn't Listen.
If I join, I wanna be in a starter pack.
Who do I have to talk to?
Aaron
00:44:17 – 00:44:17
We'll get
Aaron
00:44:18 – 00:44:19
I wanna be in a starter pack.
Kinda kick this all off, I would say, because he built the Laravel
Aaron
00:44:22 – 00:44:24
starter pack.
He did.
He's left Twitter ten times.
Aaron
00:44:25 – 00:44:26
Justin, what are you doing?
You can't keep it out.
Twitter.
Like some of the rest of us.
We want out.
Aaron
00:44:29 – 00:44:36
Oh, goodness.
Justin.
He's he's left for every new thing.
And he they that here's the thing.
He always comes back.
Aaron
00:44:36 – 00:44:38
They all do.
They all come back.
Aaron
00:44:39 – 00:44:40
So I hear You'll get
in the starter packs.
I guarantee you.
Aaron
00:44:42 – 00:44:47
Okay.
That's what I want.
I hear you.
Your feedback has been received.
I I know about this stuff.
Aaron
00:44:48 – 00:44:50
I'm representing you.
Me.
I'm your I'm your front man.
Aaron
00:44:53 – 00:45:01
And as a second derivative, don't DM me a joke about how you're not DMing me about this guy.
How many derivatives do we have to do?
I think we should all DM him about your take on Elon's funniness.
DM Aaron.
Aaron
00:45:07 – 00:45:10
Yes.
You can tell me I'm funnier than Elon.
That's fine.
Aaron
00:45:10 – 00:45:13
Don't tell me about blue sky.
Alright.
What's next?
Alright.
Next on my list.
So this came up on pizza toppings.
Aaron
00:45:17 – 00:45:18
Pizza.
We're gonna look pizza conversation.
I wanna have a little short conversation.
I wanna do a little side adventure.
Aaron
00:45:23 – 00:45:24
K.
Conversation was it came up.
I didn't even remember what the conversation was to start it up, but that you are a pineapple pepperoni man.
Aaron
00:45:32 – 00:45:37
Love it.
Love it.
Love it too.
We love a dichotomy.
We love the dichotomy in pizza.
Aaron
00:45:38 – 00:45:39
It's so good.
Now I will say plain pizza to me, that is the holy ground.
That is, like,
Aaron
00:45:43 – 00:45:44
what you
rate a pizza on.
Yes.
Like, a pizza place.
If you're like, is this pizza place good?
You don't get any toppings.
Aaron
00:45:49 – 00:45:50
No.
Aaron
00:45:50 – 00:45:50
You go
in there, you get the plain, and you see how it goes.
But when you wanna change it up and all that, you get the pepperoni pineapple.
It's so good.
Aaron
00:45:58 – 00:46:04
We love a pepperoni pineapple.
A little a little salty.
I love it.
A little sweet, a little hot, a little cold.
It's it's great.
Now I don't know about down by you, but they have the Hawaiian pizza up here, which is traditionally ham No.
Gross deli ham that's been sitting in a pizza shop Nope.
And pineapple, and it's disgusting.
It's terrible.
Aaron
00:46:15 – 00:46:22
Ham ham is a is a hard pass for me on pizza.
I can't, it's all big and wonky and it's like,
Aaron
00:46:22 – 00:46:24
it's never crispy.
It's gross.
Either way, it's bad either.
It's chunks of real ham, which I guess I would prefer at least for its realness, but I don't like the texture on pizza.
And then, or it's deli ham, which is thin little slices, which is so disgusting.
And I refuse to eat that from a deli or from a pizza place that, you know, is not going through a sufficient quantity of this, and it's getting gross.
So the pepperoni, obviously, is good forever.
It's, like, totally artificial and, like, preserved.
And then pineapple is awesome.
Aaron
00:46:50 – 00:46:51
Yeah.
It's great.
It's great.
Aaron
00:46:52 – 00:46:59
love it.
Love it.
And pie I don't understand, first of all, this is like the whole is die hard a Christmas movie thing.
Why do people talk about this all the time?
Aaron
00:47:00 – 00:47:05
are people so mad when you're like, I like I like pineapple on my pizza, and they're like, you're insane.
Aaron
00:47:06 – 00:47:07
about that.
It's good.
I I do like it.
I like a little sweet on my pizza.
Like, the drizzle of honey.
Oh, that's funny.
Honey.
The hot honey type of thing.
I'm down with, the pineapple.
Yeah.
All that stuff's good.
Aaron
00:47:18 – 00:47:34
Like There's a place right across the parking lot from the apartment that does, a pizza called, pardon my French, called the honey bastard, and it is unbelievably good.
It is pepperoni and hot honey, and it is I like that.
Incredible.
Aaron
00:47:35 – 00:47:36
I get that.
Aaron
00:47:36 – 00:47:36
I get
Aaron
00:47:36 – 00:47:44
I some Fridays, I'll go down there and eat a pizza just by myself, and it's Hope pizza.
The dream.
Not not a whole pizza.
I will eat pizza by myself.
Yeah.
Do you so in the South, I'm gonna stereotype.
I'm stereotyping now,
Aaron
00:47:48 – 00:47:48
but
I have this both from my own knowledge and people I know in the South that there tends to be, which is Texas in the South, the whole other thing.
Yeah.
Aaron
00:47:55 – 00:47:56
It's not.
But yeah.
A lot of, like, mostly chain restaurants, A lot of chain restaurants.
But you're more towards the city.
So is there, like, a lot of, like, mom and pop pizza places, or is it all Domino's and that type of thing?
Aaron
00:48:10 – 00:48:23
It's definitely not all Domino's.
I think there are a lot of, there are a lot of hipster small chains.
Like, the one I'm talking about is called Coneroso, and it is a chain, but it's not like a nationwide thing.
It might
Aaron
00:48:24 – 00:48:29
They're a little Texas.
Yeah.
Texas plus the South.
Okay.
Texas is not the South.
Aaron
00:48:29 – 00:48:37
But there is there are rather several, like, artisanal, hipster, indie restaurants, especially here in Dallas.
Nowadays, there's more of the hipstery stuff going on, especially if you're near a city.
So there's it's maybe changed the vibe.
Aaron
00:48:43 – 00:48:54
There's also there's also a dive called Louie's, and it's it's like it's been the same since gotta be the eighties.
And it's in this little rundown building.
Aaron
00:48:55 – 00:49:18
They make the biggest, dirtiest martinis you've ever seen, and their pizza is unbelievable.
That's It is.
It is my number my number one pizza in in Dallas is at Louie's.
And they're so mean you that you call They gotta be mean.
You call and they answer the phone, and this woman that's been smoking for a thousand years answers.
Aaron
00:49:18 – 00:49:20
And all she says is Louie's.
And you're like
Aaron
00:49:20 – 00:49:22
Of course.
Right.
Aaron
00:49:22 – 00:49:25
I'd like to order pizza.
What do you want?
Aaron
00:49:25 – 00:49:26
It's just,
Aaron
00:49:27 – 00:49:30
like, they don't need you.
If you hung up right now, they would be happier.
Sure.
Yeah.
Not even They're bothering them.
Yes.
They were on
Aaron
00:49:34 – 00:49:39
they were on break.
I'm sorry I called to order.
Sorry I called to order.
Aaron
00:49:40 – 00:49:41
Purchase some food from you.
Aaron
00:49:41 – 00:49:42
But, yeah,
Aaron
00:49:42 – 00:49:48
they want an up only.
You go in.
It's crowded.
They're rude, but the pizza is to die for.
So, yeah, that's a pizza place.
Interesting.
Aaron
00:49:50 – 00:49:53
Because it's, like, full on like, they serve you in the
Aaron
00:49:54 – 00:49:58
It feels I don't know what Chicago is, but it feels very Chicago.
Like, you go in
there pizza?
Is it, like, you know what bar pizza is?
Is it, like, barbecues comes to be, like, thinner and, like, not like, almost a cracker and it's, like, smaller.
Aaron
00:50:06 – 00:50:13
No.
It's pretty It's like a regular pizza.
Yeah.
It's not thick crust, but it's not, like, thin cracker crust either.
Okay.
Interesting.
So I gotta get down there.
Aaron
00:50:15 – 00:50:17
So good.
Don't take reservations.
Yeah.
Reservations?
They don't wanna bother reservations.
No.
I don't know about that.
Credit card do they take credit cards?
Aaron
00:50:24 – 00:50:25
They do take credit cards.
Okay.
Yes.
Yeah.
So they're modernized a little bit.
Aaron
00:50:28 – 00:50:34
A little bit.
Yeah.
It really does feel like when you ask them for something, you have offended them.
I like those places, man.
Aaron
00:50:36 – 00:50:45
Hey.
Could I could I maybe get another martini?
Yeah.
Sure.
I'm like, I'm sorry.
Aaron
00:50:45 – 00:50:47
What what am I supposed to do here?
Especially at a bar where it's, like, pure profit.
Like, this is $50 of pure profit.
Aaron
00:50:51 – 00:50:51
I know.
I was
like, oh, I guess.
Like Alright.
Ten minutes.
Aaron
00:50:54 – 00:51:00
And I walk over and they point, what do you want?
I'm like, shoot.
I don't know.
Whatever your anything.
You choose.
Aaron
00:51:01 – 00:51:12
No.
So yeah.
But, yeah, we have, we have indie shops, and and Lou's is Lou's is probably the best one.
And then we have stuff like Greenville Avenue Pizza Co.
There are maybe, like, two or three of those locations.
Aaron
00:51:12 – 00:51:17
We have Efratelli, which is maybe nationwide.
I don't know.
But lots of lots of good pizza dough.
Okay.
Alright.
Alright.
Alright.
Not bad.
Alright.
So I wanna do this on the show.
I figured pizza toppings would be a good one.
We're gonna use the tier maker.
We're gonna make tiers of pizza toppings.
Aaron
00:51:28 – 00:51:32
a tight this tier maker.
I don't understand this.
Why is s at the top?
What does that even mean?
You don't know.
I don't know the tier maker.
Youtuber.
Aaron
00:51:35 – 00:51:46
No.
I am a different I'm a different man.
This is why I don't feel like I fit in anywhere because everybody's like, oh, Versus Code s tier.
And I'm like, I don't know what that means.
What do you mean it's
s tier?
Alright.
Hold on.
We gotta can I do a can I share my screen on this thing?
Let's see if I can think I can share my screen.
Aaron
00:51:54 – 00:51:57
It isn't it is a primarily audio medium.
So Let's
say, oh, you know, careful.
Let's say, okay.
Alright.
We're gonna do we're gonna do we we got a couple on YouTube.
Aaron
00:52:04 – 00:52:15
S a b c d a b c d, I get.
Totally makes sense.
Although, d being the greenest and and s being the top at red, that doesn't make a ton of sense to me.
It should green should be at the top.
Green for good.
Give you the background.
Are you ready?
Aaron
00:52:17 – 00:52:18
I'm ready.
So the tier maker, first of all, is this app where you can, you know, make groups and tiers and prioritization or whatever.
Aaron
00:52:24 – 00:52:24
It's a
great name.
And the YouTubers use this to make tiers of things and have discussions.
Aaron
00:52:29 – 00:52:31
Shit on stuff is what they use it for.
And s is, from it's kind of like a Japanese thing where, like, the Japanese I think they use it in Japanese schools as, like, the suit like, the superior tier, like, the above an
Aaron
00:52:45 – 00:52:47
a.
Have that word too?
That's it.
Yes.
Yeah.
Let's say you should.
The gamers, I think it's like a Japanese gamers thing where, like, this is s tier, whatever.
I don't know the full, but that's where the basic background of it's from.
So s is the absolute top.
You have your a, b, c, and d, which, obviously, if we did this on our scale, it'd probably be more like a through f or something like that, but whatever.
We're gonna ride with this.
Aaron
00:53:07 – 00:53:11
Alright.
So s is superior despite being red.
S is good.
Okay.
S is hot.
It's good.
It's like a flamethrower.
Think of it
Aaron
00:53:14 – 00:53:26
as a b c d.
Red hot s.
Alright.
So, we've got a we've got s a b c d as a rose at the top.
And then below that, we've got a bunch of images of Of toppings.
Aaron
00:53:26 – 00:53:35
Toppings for pizza.
Alright.
This is, I I think I I'm gonna have a a a few s's and a bunch of d's, but let's go.
Aaron
00:53:35 – 00:53:36
We can do yeah.
Aaron
00:53:36 – 00:53:37
We can do this.
Aaron
00:53:39 – 00:53:41
D.
Below d.
Aaron
00:53:41 – 00:53:42
D.
D
f.
We need to agree on that.
Aaron
00:53:44 – 00:53:47
The board.
If I wanted fish, I would eat fish.
That's the gross
Aaron
00:53:49 – 00:53:49
thing I've ever heard.
Okay.
And so be is terrible.
Aaron
00:53:51 – 00:53:52
That's an a for me.
Oh, bacon on pizza is an a?
Aaron
00:53:55 – 00:53:56
What is it for you?
The thing is a pizza quality bacon is often rubbery.
I'm not a big rubbery bacon fan.
So
Aaron
00:54:03 – 00:54:07
So, that's a good question.
Are we assuming are we assuming,
Aaron
00:54:09 – 00:54:10
Yeah.
All of these
Aaron
00:54:10 – 00:54:15
are top quality.
Quality or all of these are your average experience?
Oh, see, if it's average experience, you rarely get
Aaron
00:54:17 – 00:54:21
the bacon.
Experience, the the bacon is usually not good.
I would agree.
It's like a d or a c.
Like Yeah.
I think we should do average experience.
Aaron
00:54:26 – 00:54:27
Alright.
Then let's let's do a c
for bacon.
C?
Alright.
Yeah.
It's probably it's not anchovies, but it's not I I wouldn't prefer I would never order it, I don't think, actively.
Aaron
00:54:34 – 00:54:35
Mhmm.
Alright.
Barbecue chicken.
Aaron
00:54:37 – 00:54:38
That's up there.
Aaron
00:54:38 – 00:54:43
I'm a b.
Up there.
I'm going I'm going a b on barbecue chicken.
Aaron
00:54:43 – 00:54:43
I
was going a.
I like the barbecue chicken.
So you see what you think.
Aaron
00:54:46 – 00:54:48
Yeah.
Right?
Yeah.
For sure.
Aaron
00:54:49 – 00:54:51
That's a no for me, dawg.
That's a d.
A d all the way to d?
I I kinda like the texture.
Yeah.
Alright.
I'll I'll go d with you.
I don't I don't hate them, but I would never order it.
Aaron
00:55:00 – 00:55:00
Get out
Aaron
00:55:00 – 00:55:06
of here.
Get out of here, Canadian bacon.
Bacon.
You're below American bacon.
That's for sure.
Aaron
00:55:07 – 00:55:08
d for sure.
Disgusting necessarily, but I would never order
Aaron
00:55:11 – 00:55:11
it.
Aaron
00:55:13 – 00:55:14
Corn.
This
Aaron
00:55:15 – 00:55:17
Not a pizza topping.
No.
Sorry.
Disqualified.
Alright.
This is
Aaron
00:55:19 – 00:55:24
just a hamburger.
And it's a picture of a full hamburger.
It's like a full hamburger with, like, a bun and I'm just
Aaron
00:55:28 – 00:55:32
picturing, like, the state fair where they give you a pizza with a full hamburger on
top of it.
Right on top.
Yeah.
Aaron
00:55:34 – 00:55:36
I would never order hamburger on my pizza.
Aaron
00:55:37 – 00:55:38
It's not bad.
I
was never aware.
What about c?
Aaron
00:55:40 – 00:55:42
I would go c with bacon.
Alright.
Let's go c.
Alright.
Ham, we had this discussion where where no on the ham.
Aaron
00:55:47 – 00:55:48
Yeah.
D.
I was thinking lowest one.
Aaron
00:55:50 – 00:55:51
Not bad.
Aaron
00:55:51 – 00:55:51
I would
Aaron
00:55:52 – 00:55:54
Would do an I would do a b on Italian sausage.
I'll go b.
It's not as good as barbecue chicken.
Aaron
00:55:56 – 00:55:57
I agree.
On the average, anyway.
Jalapeno.
Are you a spicy
Aaron
00:56:01 – 00:56:03
That's a no.
That's a no.
That's a d.
Yeah.
I'm not really a a jalapeno on a pizza guy.
Alright.
Onions.
Aaron
00:56:07 – 00:56:09
Same.
D.
Oh, no.
Onions are good.
Can we go c?
Aaron
00:56:12 – 00:56:15
You can go c.
You can bring it up to a c.
Let's just
bring it up to a c.
Alright.
Pepperoni.
Aaron
00:56:17 – 00:56:19
Hey.
Straight down the middle.
Give me an s.
Aaron
00:56:20 – 00:56:20
Give me an s.
Bad pepperoni is good pepperoni.
Aaron
00:56:22 – 00:56:24
Bad pepperoni is good pepperoni.
Not our first s.
So right now, coming into the closing round, we have pepperoni s, barbecue chicken a, Italian sausage a b.
We got bacon, hamburger, onion at c, and then we got jalapeno anchovy, bell peppers.
It's gonna be a bacon and corn at d.
I think we're gonna have some pushback on jalapenos.
Aaron
00:56:44 – 00:56:44
gonna leave
Aaron
00:56:45 – 00:56:48
People are gonna be furious that we put jalapenos at d.
Yeah.
I think so.
Alright.
Pineapple.
I'm sure we had this discussion.
Aaron
00:56:52 – 00:56:54
Let's make them furious.
That's an s for me.
That's an s.
Pineapple.
Pepperoni at the top.
They're at the top, baby.
Aaron
00:57:00 – 00:57:02
That's a good list.
That's a good list.
Making me hungry, actually.
Aaron
00:57:03 – 00:57:04
Me too.
Is an interesting one.
Extra cheese.
Yeah.
Aaron
00:57:06 – 00:57:12
You know, I love the cheese.
I don't order extra cheese a lot.
Order it, but I don't mind it when it's there.
Aaron
00:57:14 – 00:57:16
No.
I would go a.
A?
I would go a or b.
Yeah.
Okay.
Let's go a with the extra cheese.
Yeah.
Alright.
Black olives?
Aaron
00:57:22 – 00:57:23
No.
No.
No.
That's a no.
That's a no.
And mushrooms.
Aaron
00:57:26 – 00:57:27
Also a hard pass.
For me, and the in if we're going with the average, it's a hard pass.
Yep.
Okay.
So there you go.
That's our list.
Aaron
00:57:34 – 00:57:35
Aggressive list.
It is aggressive.
I'm pretty happy with this list, though.
Aaron
00:57:38 – 00:57:40
Lot of disqualifieds down there.
I wish we could add our own, like, on the fly.
Can I add on the fly?
Like, I wanna put honey on there, but I don't think I
Aaron
00:57:45 – 00:57:51
You can.
It says add image, add additional images to your tier list.
Image, though.
Like, I just wanna I don't have an image handy here.
Yeah.
I guess we could we would have done honey, which would probably be
Aaron
00:57:58 – 00:58:00
Honey would be for me.
Herb sorry.
SA for sure.
Aaron
00:58:02 – 00:58:03
I think
these are kind of the other main one.
A garlic.
I like garlic.
Aaron
00:58:06 – 00:58:08
Fine.
It's a it's not a topping.
It's just a it's a thing.
Doesn't really add that much even when you order it, but
Aaron
00:58:11 – 00:58:12
okay.
Aaron
00:58:12 – 00:58:17
Oh, this is gonna round the people up.
Save it, download it, and tweet it, and see what, see how mad people get.
Alright.
Yeah.
We'll put that up.
Alright.
Aaron
00:58:21 – 00:58:24
That's my first tier that's my first tier list maker.
Look at that.
Yeah.
Look at that.
That's my first, on an actual show.
I've been I've been trying to concoct, reasons to to bring it on the show.
Aaron
00:58:34 – 00:58:34
That's a good reason.
Perfect one.
That was perfect.
Well, we'll keep this in our back pocket if the people like it.
We might we
Aaron
00:58:39 – 00:58:42
might have some other tears.
Yeah.
I like it.
It's a good segment.
Oh, man.
We're already at an hour.
Holy cow.
Aaron
00:58:45 – 00:58:46
Do we have more topics?
What do we have?
I mean, I have my little secret side project thing, but really, I just need to wait.
Aaron
00:58:50 – 00:58:51
No.
No.
No.
No.
We need to
Aaron
00:58:52 – 00:58:53
We should talk about this.
Aaron
00:58:54 – 00:58:55
you ever gonna tell me what it is?
So here's what I'm gonna do.
K.
I'm gonna tell you about what last week's secret project was because now I'm onto
Aaron
00:59:01 – 00:59:03
a different one.
Secret project.
Aaron
00:59:03 – 00:59:07
Ian, are you an indie hacker?
You you might just be an indie hacker.
I just indie hack in my brain so I don't have to bother with all the, like, doing it and throwing it away.
I can just, like, get it through my system and move on to the next thing.
Aaron
00:59:16 – 00:59:18
Alright.
Tell me.
What was the what was the old one?
The old one was just too big.
It was too real.
I don't have time for anything
Aaron
00:59:22 – 00:59:23
gotta dream big.
Real.
So what it was was an applicant tracking system.
Okay.
So There's money.
Just went There's money in there.
Process.
It was so bad.
We use workable.
I mean, it's it's fine for what it is.
I don't wanna, like, totally disparage workable, but, like, it was not the way I would want it done.
It was super clunky.
How you move people through a process is clunky.
The whole thing, so many ways it could be better.
So many ways AI can make it better.
Like, when you go to interview somebody, why isn't it coming up with, like, hey.
Here's, like, a bunch of questions for this type of interview.
Like, boom.
Like, maybe you have some
Aaron
00:59:59 – 01:00:00
I don't know.
You write yourself that are always locked in, but then it could create some based on the person's resume and blah blah.
Like, a lot of cool things you could do right now.
Aaron
01:00:07 – 01:00:19
We might we might have to edit this out.
I think you need to do that.
We can't we can't reveal this to the people.
You would pressure this.
This is so this is so right down the middle, Landsman.
Aaron
01:00:19 – 01:00:20
Like, you a
Aaron
01:00:21 – 01:00:31
You have a lot of opinions.
It's firmly b to b.
It's basically just forms.
Like, it's just a cred app.
Like, you could kill at this.
Aaron
01:00:31 – 01:00:34
Why are you not doing that?
It's too big.
It's too big.
What do you mean it's too big?
Aaron
01:00:34 – 01:00:35
This is
Aaron
01:00:35 – 01:00:36
one of my team.
A b to b app.
Right?
I I need to do more marketing with and things like that.
This is just another b to b app.
That's like, Just heavy.
It's gonna take a long time.
It's like a lot of work to get into the b2b now once you get in there, it's good because people don't leave and all that stuff, which is great, but I just don't have I don't think I could totally commit myself to it now.
I thought about like a lighter version.
Can I do a lighter version?
Possibly with just the core elements?
Aaron
01:01:02 – 01:01:02
Mhmm.
No.
It just felt like it was too much.
It was too I'm unmoved.
Aaron
01:01:05 – 01:01:05
I think you
Aaron
01:01:06 – 01:01:09
I think you should do it.
I really do.
I think it would be great.
It's a good idea.
Right?
See, I think idea.
Yeah.
And it is a good idea.
Aaron
01:01:13 – 01:01:29
It's a it's a validated market.
Your b to b Gathering market.
Straightforward application.
This is one of those that's like, you don't have to build you don't have to invent something from whole cloth.
You just build a better version with your with your take on it.
Aaron
01:01:29 – 01:01:30
You just do it.
Some people in our circles that use this kind of software.
Yes.
There's some early customer opportunity there.
The good news is this is the nice thing about having an idea for something that already exists and that there's already hundreds of is that it's not, like, super risky to let this idea out there because this idea exists.
So, like, whatever.
That idea will still be there a year from now if I decide a year from now.
You know what?
I shoulda done that.
Aaron
01:01:53 – 01:02:00
What what what about the what if we revisit the challenge and you let somebody build it for some for some
So here's the thing.
Uh-oh.
This is let me tell you that what our circles need more of.
Aaron
01:02:07 – 01:02:08
Yeah.
That would crush is more people focused on marketing and less people focused on development.
Like if you're in this world and you're a developer to
Aaron
01:02:17 – 01:02:19
hear this,
you wanna make more money, like get focused on marketing because there's a million developers.
Maybe the AI's gonna replace us all.
Who knows?
Yep.
But what there isn't is a bunch of freaking marketing crushers that the developers could team up with to sell the shit they build.
It's like, everybody's out there building cool stuff, but if you don't market it, it doesn't matter.
And there's nobody out there to market it.
And there's really not a lot of marketers out there, period.
Like there's big corporate marketers who are like useless for the kind of stuff we do.
And then there's not really many others out there.
It's like you have to make your own or grow them.
And, yeah, like, get into marketing people.
That's that's where the money's at.
So I would love to have that, but I don't wanna do all the see, to me, it's the marketing is even the part that's, like, I know is super important with this type of product and is gonna be a lot of work.
And I already have my own b to b product that needs that same exact type of marketing.
And it's like, well, I I'm no.
I'm not gonna have the, like, just sort of desire to do it for both of them.
Like, I'm not gonna be able to get myself juiced up enough to do both of those.
And so, yeah.
So that's the part.
It's like, yeah, I could outsource the development to a thousand people we know.
Right?
But it's like somebody still has to sell it, and that'd be that I'm the person that has to sell it.
And I can't be the person who has to sell it.
So that's where the rub is.
Yeah.
Even if it was like B2C, like the other idea I might do is much lighter and is more it's really a B2C type of thing, which would be interesting because it would be different.
But also I feel like even outsourcing the marketing is, is actually a little more possible in B2C some level if it ever needed to be.
There's just more companies out there doing that kind of thing, like making videos and things like that that don't really work so well in B2B.
And so the b two b is a certain type of marketing that just oh, it can be outsourced for lots of money, but it's not Yes.
Money I wanna spend on it.
And so that's where the the kind of rub is with that.
So that's my idea.
I do think I have some interesting takes, at some interesting angles on it that none of the other tools seem to do, because they all also get big and they, you know, it's kinda interesting.
My other idea too has the same thing applies.
It's like something starts and it gets successful and then it gets big.
And then it's like workable is workable HR, and they're trying to sell you all this HR stuff.
Right?
And it's like, I don't want any HR stuff.
I just wanna track job applicants, but now there's, like, all these other features and all this stuff to make it work with the HR and blah blah.
And so they outgrow that initial market, and then they leave that space underneath.
Like, that's a good bootstrapping strategy in general.
Right?
It's like where the big players moved up and now underneath has been abandoned.
That's usually a good spot to sneak in.
Aaron
01:04:52 – 01:04:53
The old
Aaron
01:04:53 – 01:05:03
the old bundling unbundling cycle, the TikTok of we're gonna do an everything app, and then people are sick of everything apps, and we're gonna do discreet apps.
And then it's like, oh, it'd be nice if everything worked together.
Aaron
01:05:03 – 01:05:03
And then Yeah.
Exactly.
It's a cycle.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So so that's where I feel like a lot of those apps are is, like, they a lot of them were started, like, ten years ago and they got big.
And so then they needed to grow more and they added HR and they added other things.
And now they're big complicated messes that are super expensive and all that stuff.
And they've kind of abandoned those straightforward use case of, like, I just wanna put up a job ad and, like, collect resumes and maybe have you helped me filter through the 1,500 resumes a little bit and, make it easy to communicate with the people and make it easy to communicate with my internal people and pick a person and have a nice flow for that whole thing.
So
Aaron
01:05:43 – 01:05:57
Alright.
So let me let me let me hit you back with this.
What about sales?
What about proper sales?
So we have we have been doing what I, think is proper sales over here at the TryHard Studios.
Aaron
01:05:57 – 01:06:21
Mhmm.
And it seems to be working pretty well.
And so, like, we're doing, of course, marketing on, you know, Twitter and YouTube and stuff like that.
But, also, just fired up some emails, looked through the list, found, you know, some domains, and now we're doing outbound to, like, land some accounts.
And, also, Steve is doing, like, cold outbound for people that aren't, you know, on the list at all.
Aaron
01:06:21 – 01:06:31
Right.
And it's working.
And so I think there is, like, yes, marketing is terribly important.
But at the beginning, maybe it's just sales.
Maybe you just need to do sales.
That's true too.
That's definitely, a way to go about it, which obviously people have a lot of success with.
That's not always really been my angle, but it could be an angle.
It still is fairly expensive route to go.
Like, you guys are cofounders, so it's different.
It's not costing you anything for Steve to go and do that.
I mean, it's costing his time, but whatever.
He has more time in this regard, and he's going off and doing it.
But, yeah, definitely a possibility.
Something that even with the help spot, we should be doing more of probably.
But yeah.
I don't know.
I I'm just not into the sales end of it.
Like, I'm just not I'm just not that guy.
But those people and again, that's the same thing as marketing people.
Like, get really good at sales
Aaron
01:07:17 – 01:07:18
Become that guy.
To sell price.
Yeah.
Become that guy.
Yeah.
Be the dev guy who knows sales.
Be the dev guy or gal.
Be the dev guy or gal who knows marketing.
Right?
And you're gonna print money because, like, people are always looking for somebody like that to partner with and
Aaron
01:07:32 – 01:07:33
to Yes.
Or to just buy your services or whatever.
So hard to find those people.
They don't yeah.
They're just not out there, I think.
Aaron
01:07:41 – 01:07:42
They're not
out there.
They're not they're not enough of them out there.
So but, yeah, sales, is definitely a route to go.
Not something I've been as interested in generally, traditionally, but But the thing is the a t s is really big too.
It's like just think about what I described even if that's the very core flow, right?
It's like Okay, the standard crud app part, which is fine and not we know that can be done fairly quickly, but there's email.
I don't wanna do I don't really wanna do more email.
Like, I have a app that does a lot of email.
So, like, okay.
It's like now I gotta have inbound and outbound email because you wanna communicate with the clients or the, applicants, your staff, and all that.
You have it's multi tenant, multi user people doing stuff and all that stuff.
So, you know, it's dealing with privacy stuff.
So you have people's resumes and addresses and phone number, you got security and all that stuff.
So there's it's a lot of stuff to it.
It's, like, too big.
Aaron
01:08:39 – 01:08:44
That part's easy.
Just don't let any Europeans enter any information.
Worry about that.
Yeah.
You'll have to worry about privacy.
Aaron
01:08:44 – 01:08:45
All the
resumes are public.
It's all about matter.
It doesn't matter.
That's true.
Aaron
01:08:49 – 01:08:49
You should team.
Aaron
01:08:49 – 01:08:50
You should
Aaron
01:08:50 – 01:08:53
team up.
You should team up with Adam Wathan, and y'all should build this together.
Wow.
Then oh, man.
That he would be awesome to team up.
Aaron
01:08:56 – 01:08:56
You know
Aaron
01:08:56 – 01:09:04
how much he hates systems?
He hates systems.
Y'all should team up together.
Oh, man.
It'd be awesome.
Jeez.
That would be fun.
Well, I I know I can't keep up with Wathan.
He's too he's too
Aaron
01:09:10 – 01:09:11
He's too s tier.
Aaron
01:09:12 – 01:09:14
He's something I know.
Yeah.
Know he doesn't need
to be dragging me behind him.
He needs to build his own app with your tracking thing.
I just wanna be I wanna be here's what I really want.
This this is really the dream.
Aaron
01:09:22 – 01:09:23
Tell me.
Wathan to build this, and then I just wanna be, like, on the board.
I just wanna have my week
Aaron
01:09:29 – 01:09:30
wet, be
Aaron
01:09:30 – 01:09:32
We gotta get on the board of stuff, man.
Dying to get on the board or something, man.
I'm dying.
Somebody invite me on the board.
Aaron
01:09:37 – 01:09:43
Man, being on a board is getting paid to have opinions.
Yes.
How am I not on a board?
Give me some stock options.
Give me a few bucks.
Fly me out to Vail twice a year for our on-site.
Like, let's do it.
I'm available.
See, that's the amount of
Aaron
01:09:55 – 01:09:56
time I have.
I'm on your board.
That's what I want you to be
Aaron
01:09:56 – 01:10:07
on board.
Get me get me, an embroidered vest, fly me out, put me in a boardroom, and let me opine on stuff for a day or two.
I'd We got lots of ideas.
I would crush at that.
Aaron
01:10:08 – 01:10:09
Great ideas.
Other people's time, other people's money.
I got lots of ideas for that.
Aaron
01:10:13 – 01:10:15
Yeah.
For real.
Absolutely.
Aaron
01:10:18 – 01:10:19
We gotta get there.
We'll get there.
Aaron
01:10:19 – 01:10:20
I gotta
Aaron
01:10:20 – 01:10:20
figure out how to
do that.
Yeah.
I wanna be on a board.
If you have a board you need me on, let me know.
Reach out.
Aaron
01:10:26 – 01:10:27
Let me know.
Reach out.
Yeah.
Reach out to both of us.
We're
Aaron
01:10:28 – 01:10:30
at you.
We'll both we'll both be on the board.
We're like the guys that do the, the, like, Avengers movies.
Like, what are they?
The Rizzo Brothers
Aaron
01:10:36 – 01:10:37
or something?
Rizzo Brothers.
Yeah.
Russo Brothers.
Yeah.
Aaron
01:10:38 – 01:10:38
That's us.
Aaron
01:10:39 – 01:10:42
exactly like that.
We are the Russo brothers.
Aaron
01:10:42 – 01:10:43
Yeah.
We
Aaron
01:10:43 – 01:10:46
are as successful and have such a proven track record as
the Russo brothers.
Brothers.
We're like them.
Aaron
01:10:48 – 01:10:48
Yes.
We're
Aaron
01:10:49 – 01:10:50
Yes.
Exactly.
Aaron
01:10:51 – 01:10:58
the cops.
Your board.
There's no discount for getting the two of us.
We'll give you, you know, full freight, but put us on the board.
It'll be awesome.
Aaron
01:10:58 – 01:10:59
We have so many opinions.
You you can get coverage on the show.
It's gonna be
Aaron
01:11:02 – 01:11:08
awesome.
Right.
And we'll balance each other out.
It's like, you know, it's a yin and yang sort of situation.
So it's perfect.
Perfect.
Perfect.
I love it.
I'll cover Blue Sky.
He'll cover Twitter.
Aaron
01:11:13 – 01:11:13
That's right.
Aaron
01:11:14 – 01:11:15
That's right.
Alright, man.
I don't know.
You have anything else?
Aaron
01:11:17 – 01:11:18
I don't have anything else.
I think that's good.
I think that's good.
We gave the people a nice little show there.
We sure did.
Pizza toppings.
We got San Francisco.
We got Elon.
We got else.
We got all the good stuff they want.
Alright, everybody.
Thanks a lot.
Follow us at mostly technical dot com at mostlytechpodmostlytechnicalpodcast@Gmail.
Aaron won't be here next week.
We will have a guest host that I've already identified who's got a whole list of things he wants to talk about.
So it should be
Aaron
01:11:44 – 01:11:49
came in strong with his with his pitch.
I really like this.
That.
Yeah.
So, that will be a fun app next week with the with the guest host.
You rest up.
You take care of yourself.
Aaron
01:11:55 – 01:11:56
I will.
Aaron
01:11:56 – 01:11:56
And you
don't forget that you're supposed to be watching a movie while you're resting.
Aaron
01:11:58 – 01:11:59
So I will.
That's right.
You will watch that movie.
Hey.
Alright.
We will talk about it the week after.
Alright.
Aaron
01:12:05 – 01:12:06
See you.