Ep: 217 - Daniel Kolitz on "The Goon Squad", Gretchen Andrew on Facetune Portraits, Bunny on Racer.fun, Mina Fahmi on Sandbar and AI Wearables

[00:00] Hi. How's it going? How's it going? Welcome to Boys Club Live. [00:05] Ish. Ish. We're doing a playback here, but so happy that you're here listening to us. We have a great show for you. Really great show. We had some great guests. We recorded this earlier today and then we're streaming it now. And four guests. [00:20] All with a... [00:22] vast [00:23] knowledge in different parts of the internet. Different corners of the world, I'd say. We start the show with Daniel Kolitz, who is a writer and investigative journalist. He wrote the viral Goon Squad report. [00:36] that is... [00:39] Shocking. Shocking. Upsetting and shocking. Yeah. Shocking and upsetting. But also funny. I mean, he's an incredible writer. So he's a really incredible writer. Really incredible writer. And there's moments in it where I genuinely... [00:50] Laughed out loud, there's other moments in it where I was, it was a full existential crisis. [00:55] throughout. Spiral. Yeah. So anyway, he came through and a few notes on this piece. Um, disclaimers. [01:02] One, it is extremely explicit, trigger warning. It's about masturbation and pornography and young men and in need of some assistance. [01:16] And if you are under 18, you should not be listening. Absolutely not. And if you are related to me in any capacity, like a mother or father or sister, also maybe not for you. Um, so you can skip right on that fast forward button. Totally. But I just want to say the reason why we thought it was useful to have him on is one, it took over my timeline. It took over yours. Um, so everyone was talking about it, everybody. And then, um, second, I think he, and he even sort of mentions

[01:46] And what... [01:48] It's like for some people to be online in the moment and it's scary and important to be like eyes wide open on what's happening. Yeah, it's it's something that's. [01:59] Really hard to look at, but... [02:02] I think you kind of have to. I wanted to send... [02:05] Venmo charge him for my... [02:06] therapist totally totally that I then um needed after um okay so that's our first guest uh-huh and then who's next Gretchen Andrew who is uh artist [02:18] incredibly wonderful soul yes a beautiful person uh she is an artist that's she's at that intersection right there juicy intersection art [02:30] And technology. She's right there. She... [02:34] has... [02:36] I... [02:38] Pieces in the Whitney, which now I know what that means, which is incredibly... In their permanent collection. Permanent collection, which is... [02:44] I understand to be quite the feat, uh, and has, yeah, a really fascinating story. And, um, [02:51] perspective on [02:53] I don't know. Again, sort of our times. It's kind of a conversation about our times and the algorithm and beauty standards and her art speaks to that. So she's wonderful. Loved having her on. Really loved that conversation. And then we had on Bunny. [03:06] Who we also love. Who we also love. And you'll know from the internet. Director of Nitro at Racer. Racer.fun. They are launching a crypto native game.

[03:17] On Thursday, we scooped it here. First time ever. There's some alpha in this interview that, yes, I believe it's the first time that we have any alphas. [03:26] podcast and uh really fun interview he's so great and anyway if you want to learn about the game that's launching this week give it a listen um it is i'll be there i'll be doing it i'm gonna be doing it too it's a uh yeah uh uh [03:41] I don't know. It's not a racing game, but it's not a racing game. It's a meme coin game. It's a meme coin game. It's a market cap game. It's a market cap game on Solana. So anyway, stick around for that because it's super interesting and we're going to both be playing. And then finally, very thoughtful conversation with Mina Fahmi, who is the founder at Sandbar.com. [04:01] an interface company, [04:03] AI wearable ring. Yes. And gorgeous. Gorgina. I love it. Yeah. I really loved the conversation with him and something that you and I have talked about post interview is that, [04:19] He... [04:20] is really intellectual. And, um, I come across people who are working tech and are [04:25] Interlectual. It's been a long day. Intellectual. Intellectual. A lot. And oftentimes I'm like, that's so cool. But where does that meet? Like, [04:37] Honestly, like, [04:39] capitalism and like making money and like and also the real world people using it that aren't like in the tech bubble. [04:44] Yes. And, um, it was so clear to me that, that his thinking and like thoughtfulness around the way in which people move around the world and talk to each other and talk to devices that like someone like him is who needs to be designing these types of interfaces. Totally. Um, so really enjoyed that. Really enjoyed that. So that's a show. Uh, a quick note from our sponsors.

[05:08] First of all, [05:10] Polygon. Polygon. Thank you so much for supporting this stream and podcast. If you've touched crypto in any way, chances are you've already used Polygon. It's the chain quietly powering a bunch of stuff that actually works, that people actually use, like Stripe's crypto payments, betting on Polymarkets, prediction markets. [05:27] and a bunch more, we are going to be with Polygon [05:30] Next week at their full day summit in Dev, at Dev Connect. In and at. In and at Dev Connect in Buenos Aires. Is Dev Connect in the room with us? Yes, it is actually. And it's going to be on the 18th of November and it's a full day of programming. Called Money Rails. Called Money Rails. Yes. [05:46] folks from MasterGard, Visa, [05:49] Ripio, Polygon, Sandeep, and Mark, the CEO of Polygon, are going to be there. Boys Club. Boys Club. We'll be live streaming from there. We will be live streaming from there. Yeah. And so if you're going to be in DevConnect and you want to yap, go. [06:02] uh, [06:03] come through. Come through. Um, we love Polygon. We do. We really do. We're also, [06:09] Throwing a party? Do we want to get into that? Yeah, totally. Okay. We are throwing, if there's anywhere to be, evening of December 18th in Buenos Aires. November 18th. November 18th. Yep, that one too. November 18th. [06:21] It is in... [06:23] At hard launch party by boys club with our friends at pod network and polygon. It's going to be a really fun time. I love, I love, [06:35] Throw a party. You do love to throw a party. Evening of November 18th, we're going to be doing it with our party pals also at Privy.com.

[06:43] And blockade... [06:45] Both great orgs and yeah, we're going to have a great time. I have to tell you. [06:52] And by you, I mean the greater you. Uh-huh. One. Um... [06:56] Just sign up now. R-Suite now, yeah. Space is limited. So get on the list now. [07:00] And don't mess around. [07:02] Don't be stupid. Just get on the list. Keep it simple. Plan ahead. [07:08] RSVP. Be a grown-up. Totally. Okay, that is all we have. That's the housekeeping. Just one more. Shout out to BitKey. Yes. [07:17] Our final sponsor here... [07:18] We love Bickey. Bickey is a... [07:22] Bitcoin hardware wallet. [07:24] It's very beautifully designed. Go to bitkey.world. Use promo code BOYSCLUB20.com. [07:30] if you are so inclined and we hope you are, it is from the makers of square. It's a, it's a block production, Jack Dorsey's, uh, joint, uh, square, uh, [07:42] Cash App. [07:44] very... [07:45] serious people doing very serious things, including now. [07:49] doing a hardware wallet that is [07:52] Gorgeous and also has this cool... [07:54] Um, [07:55] functionality functionality yeah some an innovation around how it works which basically [08:00] Makes it a lot easier. And it's like some fingertip... [08:05] activated and very cool stuff so that's viki we love them too and i hope you enjoy the show [08:11] Thanks so much.

[08:16] Daniel Kolitz, a writer and investigative journalist. We're going to be discussing your most recent... [08:24] mega viral report, The Goon Squad, which was published in Harper's [08:29] magazine. I have to say equal parts horrifying and fascinating. Big time. Because it was the aim more or less. You nailed it. Successful. You nailed it. Okay. Let's start by you telling us about your piece. [08:40] Sure, so the Goon Squad is sort of a... [08:43] as you said, an investigation into a very particular subculture of guys that love to masturbate. They love to masturbate a lot. [08:49] They don't just love to masturbate, they love to masturbate together in highly ritualized ways. [08:55] in [08:56] kind of discord servers. Discord seems to be the place to be this year. If you want to kill prominent figures or masturbate with your friends, things of that nature. And, uh, fundamentally gooning as an act is about reaching the goon state. Um, [09:11] which is kind of like a masturbation nirvana that you can reach if you're concentratedly [09:17] masturbating for hours or days, [09:19] at a time. But again, the communal aspect is very important here. There are all these discords, Goon Sluts, the Goon Verse, Goon Gardens. I was mostly hanging out in the Goon Verse where guys... [09:31] trade porn, play porn games, masturbate together on stream. And... [09:37] It is this whole thriving community, I would say largely [09:41] Gen Z centered but people of all ages, 40s, 50s, 60s.

[09:46] 70 year olds not so much. No I think I saw 70 something, they might be lying you don't know. [09:52] Uh... [09:53] But yeah, you know, [09:56] Had been aware of the concept of gooning. I don't think I realized that it was this whole ritualized practice. Mm-hmm. [10:02] But... [10:04] a couple, I guess it would have been a year and like three months ago, [10:08] Now I decided to dive in and see what was going on there and learned... [10:13] A lot. My experience of your piece was I saw it going viral on Twitter. I saw people talking about it and [10:22] Then I was like, oh, this is interesting. I've heard of this concept before socially. And then I started reading it and then I sent it to like three or four of my mom friends who have boys. And I was like, really? [10:33] Like you need to read this to understand what's happening with like I [10:37] young men right now, essentially. And then I got halfway through it and I said, maybe you actually don't need this and just keep your kids off the internet. Like that's, that was my, my feeling around it. But I do think like your piece did a really good job of [10:51] not like moralizing. Like it was, it was very well written. It was very clear that there are some very dark corners of this. And I have my own personal feelings about [11:01] what this means for society and men, but I think you did a good job of not being like really pearl clutching about it. [11:09] And just saying like, this is what's happening. And these are the corners and like the facets of this thing that's [11:15] really taken hold to a

[11:17] subset of [11:18] men online. Yeah. I mean, that was my ambition. I didn't want to be apocalyptic. I don't think this is the worst thing. [11:24] that could be happening. [11:26] probably doesn't bespeak [11:28] you know, too many good things for society in some ways. But I really, I mean, when I was in the thick of it, I was just like, this is, I was just genuinely fascinated by what was going on there. I mean, this is, [11:40] An extremely bizarre and also extremely complex world with all these sorts of [11:45] like codes and art forms and like structures and... [11:51] just figuring out how it worked, unpacking it as if I was someone in the community, that was sort of like fun enough for me that I wasn't even, at a certain point I forgot that this was sort of unusual. [12:01] in any way because it's so normalized. Yeah, genuinely. How long were you in the trenches? [12:07] You know, the whole process start to finish was like a little more than a year. As far as like really in their daily watching five, six hours of porn a day with my Boona friends. I mean, that was like maybe four or five months and the writing period was... [12:21] two or three months but I mean it was I was clocking into the pornography factory every day I was waking up and I was watching my PMVs porn music videos and talking to my my porn friends and you know wank battling on occasion I mean just you know really. As you do. As one does. As a goon does. And do you feel changed by that experience? [12:42] Do I feel changed by that experience? I mean, [12:46] I definitely maybe have a clearer idea of what goes on in certain parts of the internet. Me personally, I mean, I don't know. I don't want to say I was unfazed by it and there were definitely...

[12:56] Parts of the reporting... [12:58] where I was like despairing. And that was really on learning some of the [13:04] truly dark sides of this culture. But, you know, mostly, and maybe this is like, you know, the guilty sort of like Safari reporter thing, I was mostly just excited to be, you know, [13:15] in touch with what seemed to me like the leading edge of whatever... [13:19] this present moment is, you know, like this is this, this felt like now to me. And, you know, I'm a guy that's mostly reading in my room. I've not even that long, like online, to be honest. Oh, really? Wow. No, I mean, I'm online. I know what's happening in like media Twitter discourse, but I don't, I don't like use TikTok. I don't pay attention to reels or whatever. So I, to be able to kind of immerse myself as kind of a Luddite in like the hyper moment, you know, felt amazing. [13:47] I don't know. Exciting. Yeah. [13:50] Okay, so this piece comes out... [13:54] Everybody's talking about it on Twitter. What... [13:58] was the reaction? What was your experience as the writer of this thing? Uh, you know, it was polarizing. That was my experience. It was polarizing. I would say like, you know, it was largely positive, but the, the serious negative stuff that existed on the one hand, it was like, wow, everyone should be nice to me. Why are they saying, [14:15] Mean things about my article. On the other hand, it's like flattering. Honestly, genuinely. Like I was watching a TikTok the other day, two days ago. [14:25] that had like a bunch of likes about someone really...

[14:28] going in on the article and, uh, [14:31] A, I was just flattered that it had generated this much discourse. B, I found this person with a very disquieting affect. I thought he was weird. And so if you gotta have haters, it's good to have them, you know, be sort of strange. But... [14:44] No, I mean... Was he, like, as a representative of the Gooner community? No, well, he looked like it. I don't know. I mean, no, I shouldn't say that. I don't think any Gooner looks any particular kind of way. I mean that. I think they look all kinds of ways. But... [14:58] No, I mean, there were some lines of attack or whatever that I, you know, made me rethink what I'd done. And I thought maybe were valid. Uh... [15:08] There was stuff that I thought was ridiculous. I didn't think that the good, I thought in a sense that I'd written a rhetorically airtight piece in the sense that come out against it, you have to be like, I think it's good to masturbate for nine hours a day. And I don't think anyone would want to put themselves in that position. But there is, it did turn out to be a big contingent of sort of... [15:26] Gooner defenders. And I'm not, but the ironic thing is I'm not a gooner decrier. Yeah. You know, I don't, the way that I structured the piece, I mean, there are definitely moments of like horror and there are moments of like despair about certain aspects of the culture, but I certainly did not go in there with the intention of [15:43] I don't know, you know, ridiculing people. Is the defender take like... [15:48] to each their own. I would say it's a to each their own line. Okay. I fully [15:54] it will come out as, I think this is bad for society. - Yeah, I don't think it's great. - I think people should not be doing this. - I'm sort of now warier of expressing a direct opinion. I've never been to the subject of discourse before, genuinely.

[16:07] And it was a little bit traumatizing. I mean, it's clearly, you know, I don't know if it's like, [16:14] I'm not putting a moral valence on it, right? I think it is bad just from the perspective of like, how one spends one's time, one's limited time on Earth, [16:24] You know, and the ironic thing is that, you know, I've heard from many gooners who were perfectly happy, very happy with the way they've been represented. [16:34] You know, the whole part of the Gooner kink, to the extent that it's a kink, and I think they perceive it as such, is like, I am doing something bad that no one should be doing. Yeah, I actually want to talk to you about this, because I, when I, you know, when you're watching a video, and you're like, [16:50] it's like a weird video and you're like you don't do reels or tiktok but occasionally you'll swipe into a video oh i've seen and you're like i haven't i've seen plenty of videos yeah so you have that experience where you swipe in and you're like [17:00] This is kind of weird and off. [17:02] And then you're like, oh, this is fetish content. And it can be anything, honestly. Anything can honestly take a turn and go towards like kinky, fetishy content. And part of me... [17:14] has been wondering in reflection on [17:16] like the humiliation seems to be really embedded in the fabric of the Gunnar culture. And... [17:24] Part of it is like, is your article like playing into some weird fetish? And like, does that, does that, did that come up for you at all? No, because here's the thing. Okay. So people have pointed out like, oh, you're giving the gooners what they want. They want to be humiliated and they're going to get them off. I think that that is not giving the gooners enough credit as rounded human beings.

[17:45] sex lives, solo sex lives. But it's not that when I was speaking to them, they were like in a state of erotic frenzy and they were like trying to get my disapproval for, um, [17:56] erotic means. I mean, these were people that were just talking to me in a very sort of [18:00] straightforward way about their lives and their jobs and their hopes and aspirations. [18:05] And... [18:06] Gooning happens to be a part of those lives, but I think... [18:10] I don't know. I don't think it's that... [18:13] But that kind of, the connection I don't think would be made in that way. Okay. You know, I don't think that I'm helping the gooders get off. Now, I have seen the article repurposed into pornographic memes and sort of like, you know, pornographic, I don't know if it's fanfic. Okay. So not no. Not no. I guess not fully no. But the article itself in a realistic sense. I mean, yes, the article is being repurposed. But at this point, after reading your article, I'm like, what can't be repurposed? [18:43] It's a porn. I mean, that's the whole... And they dream of, you know... [18:47] Times Square filled with pornography and all the billboards. It's not even a joke. That is part of the culture. It's like... No, at its furthest extreme, the kink is like a world that has been completely pornified. Oh, my God. In which, like, you know, you cannot walk down the street without, you know, encountering, you know, people. I mean, that, you know, that is the idea, is like porn universe. Okay. Uh-huh. This is... [19:09] - Poor universe. - Poor universe is hilarious. Okay, this is my, I guess,

[19:16] take on it. I read it and I got to the end and I fully was like, I'm, I'm fully spiraling. I think that this is your therapist about it. I know. Literally I went into my therapist. I need to talk to you about something. And I was like, are you familiar with the goon squad piece? And she was like, [19:33] I am not, you teach me so much. And I was like, no, no, no, no. And anyway, I was like, I, [19:40] feel as though I'm reading something and [19:43] I am [19:45] genuinely wanting to be someone who can hear... [19:49] so many types of experiences of being on this planet, [19:53] and have openness and empathy for all humanity. [19:58] Having said that, I was like, this is... [20:02] um like where where you take this porn universe the end of this whole situation [20:10] Is... [20:11] The end of humanity in my opinion and I'm like thinking about my first exposure to goon behavior was I had a friend and [20:19] a male friend who [20:21] is Gen Z who, [20:23] would call himself maybe like goon adjacent. [20:27] And which I don't know how you would feel about this as a, and I told him I'm having this, I was talking about my dating life and I was like, I'm having this, this was a while back. And I was like, I'm having this weird experience where I'm matching with men on hinge or Raya or whatever. [20:39] or chatting, they follow me on Instagram, and then I never hear from them again. [20:44] And but. [20:46] "They watch all my stories. What is that?" And he was like, "That's goon behavior." And I was like, "What's goon behavior?"

[20:52] This was a year ago. Then I read your article. [20:54] Then, similar timing, I was on a plane and I watched Eat, Pray, Love. Great film. I don't remember any Gooner content. No, no. I'm going to tie it all back. Don't you worry. And there's this moment where Julia Roberts has this friend who she makes friends with in Italy. And they go to Naples and they have... [21:12] this perfect pizza and her friend only has one slice. And she was like, what are you doing? [21:17] And she's like, I've gained weight. I can't eat this whole pizza. I need to like cut back. [21:21] And Julia Roberts goes on this whole monologue about, have you ever been in a bedroom naked with a man, [21:28] "and he turns you down." And the woman's like, "No." And she was like, "Yeah, of course, he's hit the jackpot. "He's in a bedroom with a naked woman." And as I was watching this, I was thinking, this sentiment no longer [21:40] Works. Because men... [21:43] all over the world are in bed. [21:46] in their bedrooms with naked women, [21:49] for. [21:50] Like, [21:51] Unending, in your article, unending amount of pornography. And so the end of this is the end of humanity. Yeah, I think so. I mean, you know, if there's any... [22:02] Silver lining line of hope, I think that most people in the Julia Roberts scenario you're describing, I think that, you know... Not all men. Not all men. I would think it's a minority, but it's a significant minority of... [22:16] of guys who are [22:18] I don't know, giving up on real life contact. And, you know, some of them aren't even doing it because they have porn. I mean, a lot of people, as we know, as we read in,

[22:27] Op-eds and as I've seen in my own personal life are staying in because they're playing video games or staying in because I [22:33] you know, losing sex drive through any number of sort of modern interventions. And so I think porn is one part of it, but there is like a [22:43] a mass retreat away from what I would think of as healthful, fun, you know, socializing and things of that nature. Yeah, I feel like I you see on on Twitter or on X the [22:55] birth rate [22:57] constantly birth rate charts, constantly people are pushing out. I mean, even Elon himself, it's like birth rates in decline. It's in sky sky. [23:05] falling. [23:07] Skyrocketing in the bad way. [23:11] And [23:12] For a while, I was like, whatever, whatever. You guys are being, like, reactionary. And, like, this is, I don't know, some weird... [23:19] MAGA thing that I like I'm not going to subscribe to this discourse but after reading your piece I was like uh well it is factual I mean actually I know but like you can make facts look any kind of way and so that's why that's sort of always the perspective I have when I've seen when I would see those statistics charts um but I don't know now I'm like I I kind of [23:38] see how what's happening, what's happening. [23:42] Yeah. And of course, there's a whole confluence of reasons and. [23:46] And... [23:47] It's not all Kooning, but it doesn't help. No. It doesn't help. And it's like, especially... [23:54] That it seems to be driven by a younger generation is...

[23:57] the part that feels the most... [23:59] concerning because it's not like [24:01] I don't know, a bunch of, I don't know. It feels like that's something that only gains momentum. Okay, I have two questions for you. [24:07] - Yeah, please. - What I couldn't get from this is like, what is the scale? [24:12] That's a very good question. I mean, [24:15] You know, you go into like a discord like that owned by Noodle Dude, the king of the porn music videos, has about 100,000 people in there. We say only half of them are active gooners and half are just PMV fans, you know, but that would just be one. [24:30] There's like dozens of these servers. I mean, we'd have to distinguish, right? People who are dipping in and out of goon culture, who are maybe gooning once a month. How many of that are-- - Goon adjacent. - Goon adjacent. I'm sure there's a huge number of goon adjacent. [24:44] People, I mean, if we're talking about the hardcore community, the people that are wank battling and feeding each other pornography and, you know, masturbating on stream... [24:52] It's hard to say, but there's a ton of them. I mean, a ton to the point that you can go into these servers and just never see the same names twice, and there's just a constant churn. And it is global. I mean, you know. Totally. Most people I spoke to were like, [25:07] Western Europe, US, but it's all over the world. Any women? [25:12] Not really. I don't think so, no. [25:17] You didn't, you didn't count or any in your travels. Not, not really. Okay. And then my other, uh, [25:26] question for you.

[25:28] is... [25:29] What was my other question for you? The scale... [25:32] And then... [25:34] Fuck. [25:35] No worries. [25:36] It's going to come back to me. It's going to come back to you. So what's next? What's next? Yeah, what happens next? Where do we go from here? I have no idea. I was so sort of immersed in this thing. I mean, the way that I kind of write things like this is like, [25:50] I don't have like I don't walk down the street and like have an idea to like go out and find an idea and I found the goony thing and just gave it gave it my all for a long time yeah uh but probably some kind of piece of writing that's what's next okay it's uh [26:05] longer probably, maybe a book, we'll see. [26:08] I don't know. About Goonies? Not a Gooner book. Probably not a Gooner book. I don't know if it's the market. Oh, I remember my question. Okay. [26:16] This to me, I read this and I think, [26:20] Like male loneliness epidemic. Like it's just so, it's just so obvious to me that they want to like be connected. It's also, there's like so much homoerotic and like, you kind of speak to this, but I'm just like, [26:33] This... [26:35] I don't know. Like... [26:37] What do you think about that? [26:39] I mean a lot of these are genuinely [26:42] Lonely man. Yeah. And you can have in these gooning spaces a certain kind of camaraderie, you know, it's a kind of juvenile camaraderie. It's a kind of like limited prescribed. [26:52] camaraderie, you're not having real conversations, you're just sort of [26:56] talking about your favorite [26:57] porn but having you know as i sort of allude to or write about a bit in the article

[27:04] try to engage in this kind of stuff. [27:06] myself, what I did notice was [27:09] when I was interacting with a guy named Cum Dumpster, someone named Feed Bitch [27:16] And, you know, I was talking to them and I'd never actually like, so I interacted in the past as a journalist, right? I'd say, hey, I'm from Harper's Magazine, I'm writing this piece. But I'd never just said like, hey, I'm another gooner, like what's going on? And the people did... [27:27] seem [27:28] Very real to me. [27:29] in a way that I wasn't expecting, just, you know. [27:32] as another person, as a living presence on the side of the screen, so I could see how [27:37] you know, that can satisfy some real need for friendship. I don't think that's good. That is where people are finding, you know, that kind of sucker connection. But it is definitely, you know... [27:50] simply one facet of what is clearly... [27:54] a massive loneliness crisis that has all kinds of causes and all kinds of solutions. I mean, again, [28:00] I think video games, I really sound like I'm 90 years old when I talk about video games, but I hate them. I hate them. I'm going to call out two friends of mine right now, a friend named Connor, a friend named Ben. [28:11] Ben and Connor shout out. Yeah. And they're losers. They're gaming constantly. They're not losers. They're wonderful guys, but they're constantly gaming and they're never going out. [28:20] And, you know, I just I have no respect for for, you know, but I love my friends. These are my two buddies. I love these guys. Yeah. But I think that. [28:30] There is just such a turn away. I mean, I love hanging out. There's nothing I love. My life is so thickly peopled and rich was sort of like encounter.

[28:38] And I'm so continually disgusted by, I mean, I hope Ben and Connor never hear this. I mean, I say this to them, you know, but I'm so disgusted by this just retreat inwards. And I understand that people are anxious that it's not that easy to... [28:55] I don't know. Be with other people sometimes. Be with other people sometimes, but you gotta, you gotta. And some people are more inclined toward, towards it than others. I mean, I understand that I just have some kind of wiring that makes me want to seek out the company of other people. But I think also it's the kind of thing that if you do it, the more you do it, the easier it becomes to do. And the conversely, the less you do it, the harder it becomes to do. And I think that also applies certainly to dating in this kind of gooning context where you're [29:19] The longer you go without trying to connect with a woman or whatever, the more daunting and difficult the prospect becomes to the point that it really does become easier to sink deeper and deeper into... [29:31] something else. The porn universe is what we were discussing. Yeah. Wow. Daniel, well, thank you for your service and your willingness to do this work to educate us all. And you're, you're great at this. You were all, I don't know, but yeah. [29:46] It's 10 out of 10. Thank you for coming on. [29:52] Gretchen Andrew hi welcome to the show how to follow that right I should have warned you I should have warned you no it's okay I definitely write a little bit about it ahead of time but I need to read the full report you need you need to yeah I yeah I will say it's.

[30:09] It's upsetting. It's hard to get through, but it's really, I mean, it's really well done and really well written. And there's moments of levity in it and, and funniness and he manages to keep it. [30:22] Um, [30:23] really [30:25] interesting and so yeah I really really recommend a full read. Okay I'm excited to talk about your work. Quick introduction here. You're an artist, you use painting code, [30:35] digital intervention to hack systems of power and visual culture. You are highly regarded. You've been covered in all of the big publications, Art Forum, Vogue, The Washington Post, Financial Times, Los Angeles Times, [30:47] The list goes on. You've shown all over the world. And recently, the Whitney Museum acquired two of your paintings in its permanent collection. Wow. So a lot to talk about. So happy to have you on. Thank you for being here. Thank you for having me. OK, I want to start really with your story, because I think it speaks a lot into the work that you are currently doing and sort of what you're excited to talk about. But you started your career at Google. You left. Now you're an artist. How did that all happen? [31:17] I had what was supposedly a very good job and I was unhappy in it. [31:22] And I so believed in technology as a tool of personal transformation, of betterment, [31:28] And [31:29] but was seen as used to manipulate our attention, sell us things we don't need, [31:33] a lot of false promises from Silicon Valley and [31:38] I said, okay, no, like, [31:39] I'm just out of university.

[31:42] I'm not ready to just have a job. I don't want a work-life balance. I want a life's work. I'm going to use the internet to make me into an artist. [31:49] I had no skills, no connection, no funding, just was like, I think YouTube is... [31:55] And-- [31:56] Everything else online can get me there. [31:59] And you did it. Here we are in the Whitney. So tell me, fill in the blanks a little bit on that story. Yeah. So I quit my job. I had $5,000 savings. I moved into my art studio illegally. I got a membership to 24 hour fitness to shower. [32:15] And I just started watching YouTube videos, how to draw hands, how to paint clouds. I took online courses for free. I spent time in studios with artists anytime I could find one who would let me be there. [32:29] Over time, it really merged into a combination of like, you know, sort of [32:34] yeah, like tech bro hustle plus developing real skills [32:38] And I think also, honestly, just like a lot of therapy and awareness, which is also another set of skills you can learn, [32:45] Not entirely online, but, you know, there are... [32:48] there are opportunities to look at what we're doing in any regard and say, [32:53] "This is whose opinion I trust, "and they don't think this is good enough." And I think that's one of the big things that holds a lot of artists back, is finding the people where they can learn that awareness and that skills, [33:04] at the right time before they feel like their artistic vision is being infringed upon. So where you did all this incredible work and you formed yourself as an artist, where are you today? What type of art

[33:18] are you working with and like find meaning in? Yes. I'm working on what's called face tune portraits, which is what the Whitney just acquired. And, [33:27] What these are are portraits that show the invisible scars of social media filters. [33:33] What I do is I take [33:34] AI-driven beauty standards that are perpetuated through face tuning and Instagram and our cell phone cameras. [33:42] And [33:43] Usually these filters are applied as digital modifications that are invisible. [33:48] But I make that process physical using paint, robotics, and materialize those changes in a way where they become marks and scars, right? [33:57] and we can see the contrast between who we are and who AI says we should be. [34:03] - And okay, so part of what, as you created these, there's like robotics involved in this, in the creation of these, right? - Yeah, yeah. - Can you talk a bit about that? - Yeah, the robots essentially apply the filter. So we have this special printer. It's a lot like, have you ever had a photo printed on a birthday cake? [34:21] Oh, yeah. Okay. I mean, not for me, but I know the concept. You know the concept. Well, next time we'll have to do the next birthday. It's very special. [34:29] So I work with a company called Matter Labs, and they have a special printer that basically does the same thing in oil paint, where there's a layer of white paint. [34:37] the frosting, and then the photograph gets printed on top of it. [34:41] A lot of Web3 artists will use this to break into a physical market. Why I love it is because it gives me a wet, painty photograph that I then give to this robot, this next robot,

[34:53] And it applies these filters. It looks at the difference between our bodies and the filter body. [34:59] our face and the filtered face. [35:01] But instead of invisibly moving pixels, it makes marks and scars and drags paint around. [35:07] So they become these somewhat absurd, grotesque portraits [35:11] that are... [35:12] violated by the algorithm, that are violated by the robot. [35:16] And the robot, it does feel very violent. The robot's kind of carving up, making the boobs bigger and the lips bigger and, you know. [35:25] All of that. And this series, a lot of it has been sort of rooted in... [35:31] uh, what's it called? Beauty pageants? Like, yeah, so I've been working with the Miss Universe contestants. Okay. And they are absurdly beautiful. They are from all over the world. [35:44] And they should look different. [35:46] Miss Jamaica should not have the same [35:49] body as Miss Philippines, who should not have the same eyes as Miss Finland, who should not have the same arms as Miss Venezuela. [35:57] But not only are these beauty standards creating a physically impossible condition, [36:02] aspiration. [36:04] We and young people are looking at images online of faces and bodies that literally do not exist all day now. [36:11] So [36:12] they are also homogenizing and compressing all of human diversity into a single look. [36:18] There have always been beauty standards, but never before has there been a single international beauty standard that is a patchwork of, it's not just Western, it's like...

[36:29] You're supposed to have a tiny, tiny waist and a huge ass and big boobs and huge lips and the eyes of an anime character. And it's increasingly... [36:39] becoming clear that this standard [36:43] is being created not just by AI, not just by algorithms, [36:47] But by the amount of time we spend on screens, [36:51] looking at each other in two dimensions. [36:54] So many of these changes are driven by the fact that [36:58] When we have a screen, [37:00] We're flat. [37:02] And we're trying to convey... [37:04] whether it's on Zoom or on Instagram, that we do have a third dimension. So for men, this materializes in a certain jaw that all these manosphere influencers and YouTubers and increasingly tech bros in Silicon Valley getting [37:17] facelifts, or trying to look [37:20] more like what they expect themselves to look, but on Zoom or on Instagram or on YouTube. And the female lips is like a very similar thing where from the front, big lips are desirable, but from the side, they, you know, if you get them too big, they create this duck lip. [37:35] Sing. [37:36] And... [37:38] we've deprioritized the side view because it doesn't matter on Zoom. [37:42] - Sad. I'm surprised. - Man, a lot of parallels to what Daniel was talking about. You're like on this sort of other side of the spectrum for, or the other side of the coin, I guess, for [37:55] - Like visual representation of women basically. - Yeah. - But I do wanna say not just women. My new series is looking at men. I'm using soldiers instead of

[38:05] Oh, wow. Beauty pageant contestants. [38:09] And... [38:10] This is not the gender equality I wanted, you know, judging men based on how they look instead of what they do. [38:16] For women, this has been an ancient practice. [38:19] But men are increasingly under this pressure as well. [38:22] And there's just a Wall Street Journal article, facelifts among tech bros are on 50%. Oh, my gosh. Wow. And so it's in a certain way there's increased validity to the conversation because it is impacting men just because, you know, it is. [38:38] Definitely touching the epidemic of male loneliness, the desire to belong, these ideas of expectations around what it means to be a man and how feminine power has been. [38:48] demasculated a lot of men. And I do think they're very connected conversations. Yeah, I agree. I think, um, [38:54] also sort of ties into something else we've been talking a lot about and just reading about it boys club is like the like Chinese peptide trend and look maxing and like now this sort of [39:04] the way that like what cosmetic [39:08] the rebranding of really like cosmetic modification and beauty standards that women have been doing forever, or at least as long as I've been alive. Um, [39:18] is like how wellness has been rebranded as longevity. I feel like, like cosmetics and sort of beauty has been rebranded as like biohacking and Chinese peptide usage. And it's all sort of connected. I feel like to this conversation as well. Oh, I think that's so insightful. The, [39:35] the desire to...

[39:37] I think one of the things you're getting at there is like it's being sold to us and not just as an idea as an actual series of products we can buy and [39:47] Tina Fey in her book Bossy Fans. Oh my gosh, I was going to bring this up. I think I know what you're talking about. Go for it. So Tina Fey in her book Bossy Fans, which is like at least a decade old at this point, she talks about how she's like, when I grew up, if you weren't pretty, that was it. You were just not pretty and you developed a personality. But now you're expected to do something about it. And you're expected to buy the lip fillers and get the facials and do the ozempic and do it. [40:11] There's this faux sense of agency around the consumer choice with beauty here and an association of poverty or laziness or lack of aspirational culture if you're not making these changes. [40:25] And, [40:26] I love to ask men how much they think lip fillers cost because I have not gotten an estimate over $75. [40:35] Wait, are you for real? Oh my gosh. Whoa. And like what? Like 350, 500, right? Like for a month or something? Like I... [40:44] Wow, that's really interesting. It's like when you ask a really famous person, like how much does a milk carton cost? And they're like, I don't know, $13? And you're like, okay, like totally wrong. Yeah, exactly. And so I think there's such a... [40:59] an opportunity cost, like a literal one, and one that... [41:05] shows a lot about, portraits have always shown

[41:09] what a culture values. [41:11] Sometimes historically portraits, the person has a lot of papers and receipts and jewels because they're trying to show that they're rich and busy. And it's like it's just like our Instagrams. [41:20] What I see in the desire to have this particular face [41:25] this particular body is not just a desire to be beautiful, [41:29] but a fear of standing out and a fear of being an individual. And in collectivist cultures like China, there's a longer history of, [41:37] Yes, of course, like when I lived in Japan, I'll never forget my first Halloween in Japan, where 45 friends, [41:44] would buy the same store-bought costume and all wear the exact same store-bought costume. [41:49] And it's wild walking around Shinjuku. That's pretty. [41:52] And that's something in the West that we would, [41:55] you know, never do. [41:57] But that's what we're doing with our faces and our bodies. We're literally commodifying ourselves. [42:03] I think that there's a lot of fear of individuality, a fear of standing out that I'm seeing within this. So I don't even think of it as a beauty standard. I think of it as a... [42:11] a standard. Like assimilating almost. Exactly. I feel like [42:17] Part of when I feel like I've spent too much time in the algorithm or on a screen and I'm starting to get like, yeah, algorithmically... [42:26] pushed [42:27] facelift content or upper bleph, like I will get deep into a rabbit hole around cosmetics or like very invasive cosmetic surgeries because that's what I spend time on. And that's what I'm like watching because I've been nudged in that direction. Sometimes I'll be like, okay, you know the meme that's like Shaq going pause. It's like, pause. How did I get here to like actually considering upper bleph surgery, which is fine if you want to get it, but there's,

[42:57] It's like a surgery and it's, [43:01] entirely [43:02] pinned to my media diet and entirely pinned to how much time I'm spending on a screen. And when I like [43:10] touch grass when I get offline and when I'm off it. [43:14] it's, I'm fine about the way I look, but as soon as I'm [43:19] in the feed around it. I'm all of a sudden not. But then I'm like, [43:24] I like the way I look, and that's okay, but that's such a radical concept right now, to be like, [43:29] I'm fine. I love the way I look, actually. That's a radical act. And it's driven by this algorithmic nudging that is crazy. [43:39] Yeah, and the, so I don't want to introduce any shame into this conversation. Totally. My. By the way, I still might get an offerplot and a facelift, so that might be coming. Big reveal. Yeah, I always say that. [43:53] our appearance should reflect our love of self. And if we're doing something out of self-love or fun, but if we're doing it out of insecurity, it's usually not the end of the story. - Totally. - And a lot of these procedures that are driven by these AI standards [44:05] throw things off pretty quickly. So as soon as you get one thing done, you have to get the next thing done, the next thing done. [44:11] Thank you. [44:11] And I... [44:14] I think it's interesting the way that [44:16] plastic surgery, [44:18] A lot of people come with these apps to plastic surgeons and say, "Make me look like this." [44:23] And even aside from the app, like we're talking about, [44:27] when you see yourself on Zoom, you look different. If you take the same photo with the new iPhone, the old iPhone, the old Android, a regular DSL camera, a Polaroid camera, you will look completely different.

[44:41] because [44:41] all cameras are making algorithmic choices and, [44:45] There is not... [44:46] there is no such thing as neutral in this. [44:50] But when the new iPhone camera comes out, and we're like, oh, it's so much better. [44:54] a lot of what's changing is the algorithm about how it treats our face and body. Because like we have had an iPhone for what, a decade that can make a billboard size photo. Like it's not the pixel quality that's getting better here. [45:06] it's that our expectations of how we want to look in that image are more in line and more in line. And so, [45:13] It's not even... [45:15] this thing of like, oh, I don't filter, oh, I don't get lip fillers, oh, I don't, [45:19] It's like, [45:21] It's pervasive, it is unavoidable, [45:24] And it changes the idea of how we think we're supposed to look, even when we're aware that it's going on. Yeah. Yeah. Wow. I love this. I want to we have a few minutes left. So I do want to talk about you talking right about sort of like hacking systems of power. [45:42] Can you expand on this? Like when I imagine hacking, I'm thinking of like... [45:47] Um... [45:48] North Korean spy, like deploying phishing schemes on like wallets and things like that. How are you using hacking as sort of like a medium in your work? So my passion is around making technologies visible and so that we can see both its vulnerabilities, its absurdity, and maybe take a little bit more power back from it. [46:08] The Facetune series is about like, let's see these modifications. But my big series before that was around manipulating Google search results. And so...

[46:17] I was able to change the search results for the 2020 presidential election on Google. And I do not have a troll farm or an association with North Korea. I just had an understanding [46:31] how the internet works and how it doesn't work. I did all of this through... [46:35] Basically like, [46:36] thinking about how we think about language and how tech thinks about language and [46:42] The issue with [46:45] Google, AI, everything, [46:47] One of the issues. [46:49] is that we've built large language models and the entire internet and searched before that. [46:53] on language and language itself. If you're like me and you love literature and poetry and post-structuralism, language itself is unreliable and difficult and there's slippage. And even when we're trying to communicate in the same language, [47:08] and we want to talk about the same thing, it's not perfect. And that's both beautiful [47:14] And... [47:15] has a lot of opportunity for like, not, you don't need a troll farm to hack language and AI. What you need is just to understand, [47:22] the difference in how words can be treated [47:25] And particularly I was looking at [47:28] how when I say what I want to you, [47:30] "You know I don't have it yet." [47:32] But through Google, through AI, I was just building relevance. And it compressed all of human experience into relevance. And so when people saw my work come up, [47:42] as the top search results during the presidential election on Google. [47:46] I wanted them to be like, wait a minute, if she can do that, we are fucked. Yeah. How is anything else getting here and why should I trust it? Mm-hmm.

[47:55] - Right. [47:56] Incredible stuff. Gretchen, what's next? I have some Facetune portraits going to Art Basel, Miami at the Untitled Art Fair. Amazing. So do stop by the heft booth at Untitled. I will be there. I'd love to hear people's opinion on this. Great. And I do want to hear from more men because I am going down that rabbit hole right now and it is deep. You should talk to Daniel. I will. Thank you so much. Thank you so much, Gretchen. [48:26] Bunny's here. Hello. Okay, you're going to need to pull this mic in. Wow, we have a prop. We have a prop. We have a couple of props, actually. Oh, we have a couple of props. Can you move the mic closer to you? Sorry, just so we can make sure. Yes, I will put it. [48:37] Can I bring the... [48:38] - Third prop real quick. - Yeah, we can bring third prop. - Okay, I'll bring the third prop. - Let's do it. [48:44] director of... [48:46] Nitro at racer.fun? [48:50] Great. I saw a lot of a lot of racer guys on the timeline. Everyone's racing. Everybody's racing. Racing is so in right now. Racing is very in right now. This is a third problem that is just a gift. Oh. Thank you. Wow. A treat. We love a treat. We're big on treats. Thank you. [49:14] Okay, so tell us, [49:16] What is... [49:18] What is race for dot fun? [49:20] Uh... [49:22] Razer.fun is a PvP multiplayer game on racing game on Solana. Okay. And you're going to be able to... This is the first time that we're talking about this live actually. Oh my gosh. We've been very super secretive about it. Oh my gosh. It's been very self. Is this a scoop? It is a genuine scoop. Oh my gosh. Scoops. Wow. Excited. Scoops. Bangles wrote about it today, but they didn't put anything that... They put only the stuff that we said publicly.

[49:45] Okay. More of a scoop. Thanks for, let's say. There you go. Thank you for doing it here. I'm sorry, David. I'm sorry, David. It's okay. He's like climbing somewhere in Argentina. He's fine. He's fine. He's chilling in Buenos Aires. [50:02] Okay, so Razer Fun is a PVP multiplayer racing game of Solana. We're going to let people create teams. The team leaders are going to, they're incentivized to rally people behind them. Every single team is a car. The market cap of the [50:16] the team decides how fast the car goes. The first team... [50:21] top four cars on every single day, get on the race for one hour. If you make it to the finish line, you win the Solana Grand Prix prize pool. So then every single day, people are able to create new teams, [50:35] And create a new, be able to race to the finish line. If you make it there, you and your entire wing just like win this gigantic prize pool that we're releasing a couple of new seasons. The first season goes live on Thursday. [50:48] We have a couple surprises. Maybe if you win, you'll go to Abu Dhabi. - Okay, fun. - You get F1 tickets, you'll be getting Meteora, [50:59] - Met Davi tickets, Salon Breakpoint tickets, amongst [51:04] Maybe a couple other things. Okay. Wow. So let me make sure I'm understanding. Yes. There's... [51:09] Every day or every week, there's a game. Every day. Every day. Twice a day, sorry. Twice a day, there's a game. Okay. And there's four teams and the teams are cars. Yes. So it's like, is it a ticker? Is the team a ticker? The team is a ticker as well. Okay. So it's like ticker Ferrari. Ticker. Yes. We do have the ticker Ferrari. Okay. For some reason, it's the one that people like.

[51:31] quite a bit. - I get that. - Instead of Lambo, which is interesting. - And you have a ticker Lambo? - No, instead of Lambo. - Oh, instead of Lambo. - Which I think is interesting because we had the Lambo meme for a while. - Okay. The brand of Ferrari's strong. - It might be strong. - Charles Leclerc is doing a lot for it. Okay, so you have a ticker Ferrari. - Yeah. [51:49] I could join [51:51] the team with my ticket. Join in or you can also... [51:56] Launch a team as well. Oh, sorry. If you have the Solana Grand Prix ticket, you can then launch a team. [52:01] So the NFTs allow you to launch a team. So they are actually fun to you in that manner. They're not going for like [52:08] one soul, just a magic hidden. Okay. People want to be able to launch a team because they also get an extra [52:13] If your team wins, you get 10% of the prize pool just by being the creator of the team. Okay. Right. Okay. I'm sorry. Just to clarify, I really want to make sure I'm understanding this. For sure. Is this like a Mario Kart situation? It is. It is. Mario Kart. But the Mario Kart. Mario Kart. [52:31] Mario. Mario. Yeah. I don't know. I guess I've never said that a lot before. Okay, wait. Yeah. But the way that you win is the market cap. The market cap of the... So you're not racing cars. No, you're racing the market cap. [52:43] - The market cap, yeah. - Okay. - In the exact same way that you would [52:47] Speed up. Dina was imagining. No, literally. I'm like, it's not that. It's not that. Okay. But there are mini games that you, so within the one hour races, there are mini games. [52:59] such as, I don't know, maybe like

[53:02] Thank you. [53:03] Oh, I forget the one, the game where you draw a map with your finger and you cannot leave the boundaries. So if you're able to complete a minigame, like in Mario Party, right, you get a nitro boost. So then if you get enough nitro boosts, then maybe your ticket, maybe your card team doesn't have to be the most valuable one, but it can be the one where you and your team coordinated the most such that then you're able to get to the finish line faster. Okay, so... [53:28] We're not driving, but the cars are being powered by the market caps of the teams. And that is... [53:34] - Plus the mini games. - The mini games, yeah. If you're a really good... [53:39] If you're a good gamer, then maybe you can win against a coin that has 10 times the market cap. Okay. And then the market cap is people just trading against that team or are they... Yeah? Yeah, just trading the team's coin, right? Trading the team's coin. And so the market cap is going... If people are thinking that, okay, this [53:58] This team is doing good. I'm going to... [54:01] get involved in that coin, then... [54:05] - Yeah, I think it's like the challenge is, who can run up the market cap the fastest? - Who can run up the market cap faster? - In that one hour period. - In that one hour period. - Okay. - And also there is another counter [54:17] There's another counter incentive, like maybe someone has run up the market cap to 1 mil, [54:23] and it's like 1,000 people. So then that 1,000 people will win the prize pool equally, right? Okay. At the very end of the race. You could theoretically at the very last minute just leave that team, dump, hijack another smaller car, and then run that one up.

[54:39] So then you're depreciating the leading car and then you're pumping the even smaller one that is easier to pump, right? Just because it's quintessentially smaller. - There's some strategies here. There's some strategies. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. [54:49] win a lot more just by yourself. - Okay, four teams every day. - Yeah. - Two games a day. - Two games a day. - One hour each game. - One hour each game, yes. - How long is racer.fun gonna happen? [55:00] The season one is seven days. Seven days. But, you know, we'll... [55:05] We'll see how the seven days go. I think that people are already excited being able, even just by being able to trade the NFTs. Like we haven't seen that much NFT volume in general for a while. I'm like, what's an NFT? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, no, I don't know. I have no idea. It's a very deep philosophical question, actually. [55:23] It's very spiritual. At this point it is, yeah. I have heard Gwenny Paul to ask me what is an NFT and it's been quite interesting, you know. [55:33] Um... [55:33] Thank you. [55:34] Well, yeah, I think that... [55:38] You'll see how it goes for the seven days. We'll see how it goes for the seven days, but I mean, there's always plans for season two. You can just release new minigames. You can release new nitros. We already got... [55:48] We did some collaborations with Teva Meteora, Jupiter. We made some collabs with the teams at Magic Eden. So right now I feel like there's a lot more community buy-in. - Okay. - That happened even just over the past two, three weeks. - Okay. - So we can always [56:03] You know, there's a new app out there that wants us to add them as a mission. We can add a Boys Club mission specific thing as well. Okay. Boys Club car. And it's on Solana. Yeah. Okay. Boys Club car. It's a Subaru. I love that. Like if you enter. I love that. If you enter Boys Club code that you can get like.

[56:20] 25,000 fuel points and whatnot. - Oh, oh, oh. - Which it is sizable, I will say. - Cool. - Yeah. - Oh, I have a racer NFT. - It's as much as we gave to Matura. [56:29] So, okay, I have a racer NFT, right? Yeah. That's what we telegrammed about? Yes. Okay. And so on Thursday... Mm-hmm. [56:37] I sign, I go to racer.fun. Mm-hmm. [56:41] And log in with my wallet. Correct. Mm-hmm. [56:44] It's been a while, honestly. And then I can choose what team to join. You can either launch a team or you can choose what team to join. Yeah. I think you should start a voice club team. A voice club team? Yeah. The Subaru. The Subaru team. [56:59] Jacked up Subaru. And then I launch a team. I'm just really wanting to win some money. So I'm really trying to understand here. Okay. So I launch a team. [57:07] And then I go to all my boys club girlies and I say, bye-bye. [57:11] - Ticker Subaru? - Yeah. You hit up the, buy Ticker Subaru, you hit a winter mute, you tell them, "Hey, winter mute, please run this up." [57:18] - Okay, okay. - Pulling every favor that you can. - There's some market maker moves to be had. There's some insider trading to be had. - It is a few thousands, right? It feels... [57:30] It will be sizable. Okay. Okay. So, yeah. The prize pool you're speaking to. The prize pool, yeah. Okay. And the trading. And the trading. Like, if I launch the team, I get 10% of the. You get 10% of the total jackpot at the end of the hour, yeah. Okay. Okay. And so, where is the size pool? Where is that money coming from? We are putting it. We're fronting that. You're fronting that. Yeah. Okay. We're fronting that and it's.

[57:54] It will be given to you back on the main like [57:57] in-game ticker. We're launching one specifically for the game. So then in the exact same way, let's say [58:05] POMF accrues the fees, technically accrues the fees, and also has a buy and burn mechanism from everyone launching a POMF fund. [58:13] maybe that can be recreated for a video game. Oh, there's a lot of layers. There's a lot of layers. In a certain way, that's, [58:20] Sora allows you to launch every single post on Sora's technical token, and then the fees also go back, accrue value back to the main Sora token. [58:29] you can maybe recreate and make an A-Semoc Solana, which no one has actually launched or improved on. There are some [58:35] things that you can make such that it's [58:38] it can be a little bit, you can incentivize usage a lot more. Okay. Okay. Wow. [58:43] Fun. Okay, um... [58:45] What is DotFun? What is DotFun? DotFun Labs is the development company behind Racer.DotFun. Are you involved with DotFun? I am there now with being the director of Nitro. [58:56] meaning growth. I think that over the past couple of years I've become very [59:01] acquainted and very close with quite a few people on the Sloan ecosystem. So it's been very fun to actually put all of that to use. I didn't realize that, um, [59:09] you know, Queenie now does lead to good BD and growth. Yeah. Awesome. Okay. So racer.fun. Yeah. On Thursday. On Thursday. But you could buy an NFT right now. [59:20] You can buy the NFT right now. You can sell your NFT right now. [59:24] I much recommend holding on to it if you have it already because I have gotten some

[59:29] crazy the answer being like hey can i mint right now and i was like no actually it's minted out it's mint yeah i think mine you sent me something and it it minted out before i was able to get it you didn't get yours i was having some phantom issues oh phantom issues well i have a new computer and i actually got it and i was like oh i need to go home i i need to go home and get my other computer so that i can mint this and then i did that night oh good for you i got it good for [59:59] It was not for lack of trying. No worries, no worries. It happens. Yeah. Okay, so... It was just funny because we did sideline random communities that would have been good to have, like... [1:00:09] I won't say like which app on Solana, but I had to text them earlier today telling them, hey, you can no longer post all this, but we'll give you extra fuel points. Oh, wow. Okay, okay. You're laying down the law. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, because you cannot... [1:00:21] We're not just randomly gonna meet more NFTs, right? - Yeah, totally. - Totally. - Yeah. - Okay, so season one starts Thursday, seven days, potentially there'll be a season two, TBD. Okay, and anything else you wanna share about how people can get into it, get involved? - Just follow racer_that_. [1:00:43] Labs. [1:00:44] Um, [1:00:46] Oh, you're going to put the helmet on? Should I put this on? [1:00:50] Oh, the reveal. Oh my gosh, you're so right. So every single ticker is also, sorry, every single Solana Grand Prix ticket is also an NFT that is revealing itself today. Okay. So you will have your own profile pic on the game.

[1:01:05] Oh, okay. So, okay. That profile fake also has a rarity. The more rare your NFT is, the faster the card that you can launch. Oh, cool. One. Okay. Okay. So the, you, I'm just repeating everything back so much. Oh, good. Sorry. I got the Grand Prix ticket. There's a lot of stuff. We got a gamer girl. I got a Grand Prix ticket. Yeah. That Grand Prix ticket today reveals an additional NFT. It reveals that it transforms into the NFT. Okay. And that has some rarity involved in it. [1:01:35] Subaru's speed. Exactly. Take her Subaru's speed. [1:01:40] Okay, great. Amazing. Bunny, always such a pleasure to have you on. Of course. You are so much fun. I can't wait to play with you. I hope we win a lot and I hope that I learn something also. Of course. I'm always happy to be in here. Great. Thanks, Bunny. [1:01:56] . [1:01:59] We have Meena Fahmi here, who is the founder of Sandbar, which is an interface company, interface and hardware company. [1:02:08] right? A little bit of everything. A little bit of everything. We're going to be talking about the stream and stream ring today, which is an AI wearable. I see a very cute little box. I'm hoping that there's something in there. And you went to MIT. Previous startup was acquired by Meta. Congratulations, smart guy. Welcome to the show. Thanks for having me. So happy to have you. Okay. So I was exposed to you and what you're building at a launch event that you guys threw

[1:02:38] I, [1:02:39] really respect when I go to something and it's like a chic experience. I was like, okay, I'm paying attention. I'm tuning into what's happening here. Um, and also saw a live demo of your product and was really, um, genuinely like impressed with. [1:02:54] We've seen a lot of AI wearable-- - It's really hard to impress her, I will say. Very hard, especially-- - Thank you. - It is. - Yeah, yeah. - And she called me right after your event and was like, "You gotta tap into these guys at Sandbar. They're doing something really cool." - Really cool. - So that's high praise. - High praise, totally. And I think, like, I wanna talk about your product, I wanna talk about what you're building, but-- [1:03:13] I think you have a very unique perspective on what's happening in hardware right now. It's sort of having a renaissance. It's having its moment. And we have, you know, the friend AI. We have the humane pin situation. [1:03:27] What's your POV on like the macro... [1:03:31] moment of hardware right now in tech? [1:03:34] Yeah, I feel like it's [1:03:36] Can you put the move? Yeah. I feel like it's exciting in a really rare and new way. I think a lot of things are converging where [1:03:47] For a while if you wanted to build a new hardware the most interesting thing you could do was try to replace the phone because there wasn't like much more you could really propose that wasn't just a gadget. [1:03:57] Yeah. [1:03:58] Whereas when LMs came around, suddenly you could do all kinds of interesting things. You could talk to a machine, you could look at things in your environment and understand it better. [1:04:08] And at the same time,

[1:04:10] the ability to rapidly prototype overseas became way faster and way higher quality. So, you know, anyone with a computer who wanted to design their idea and ship it off to a fab could do it in like a few weeks. There are still parts of it. [1:04:28] that are excruciatingly hard. I can imagine. We were, you know, working with a tier one manufacturer and we had to like negotiate with them for well over a year in order to land that contract. Okay. [1:04:40] But [1:04:41] Unless you're trying to go for something like that, getting started is, I think, both a lot easier and there's a lot more interesting things that you can do. Hmm. [1:04:51] Okay, so tell us about the ring. Yeah, so this is the stream ring and [1:04:57] And we think of it as the mouse for voice because it allows you to hold [1:05:02] Speak. [1:05:03] and release. And if you have earbuds in or your phone's open, [1:05:08] you can hear a response from what we call your stream, or your self-extension. [1:05:13] So we have this [1:05:14] Nice little... [1:05:16] Sandy companion app, and if I try speaking into it, [1:05:20] Hey, can you hear me? [1:05:23] Yeah, I can hear you. You out walking right now? [1:05:28] No, I'm actually in like a... [1:05:32] podcast studio, which I didn't know existed. I mean, I lived like a few blocks from here. [1:05:36] And it-- [1:05:37] I had no idea. [1:05:39] That's funny how something like that can be hiding in plain sight. What brought you to the studio?

[1:05:47] Um, we're talking about you actually. Um, [1:05:50] Can you maybe explain a little bit about why... [1:05:53] Your voice was designed to sound a little bit like me. [1:05:56] Amen. [1:05:57] Yeah, so the idea was that I'd feel like a natural extension of your own thinking. If I sounded too different, it'd feel like talking to someone else and... [1:06:06] Wow, honestly, live demos make me so nervous. Like the whole time I'm just like, I hope it works. And obviously it does. But it's it's like, yeah, it's so [1:06:18] What I have seen with this AI device more than any other one that I've seen is that there's [1:06:25] I see it and I'm like, oh, I can imagine myself doing that. Where when I saw the AI pin or the humane pin, I was just like that. I'm in space and like, I don't want to be in space. Like, I just want to be here in my life and be more efficient. And like, I think that's sort of what you're. [1:06:41] designing for, but I'm curious, like as you [1:06:45] Like, what do you use it for? Like day to day. [1:06:49] Yeah, I think it started from a very... [1:06:52] Uh, [1:06:54] practical challenge I had, which was like, I walk everywhere where I city bike. And sometimes I'll think about like, [1:07:02] an essay that I want to write or like before I was working on Sandbar, I was thinking about company ideas. [1:07:08] And I would either want to riff about them or save them into like my Apple notes. And doing both of those things was really effortful because if I wanted to riff about it, I would either, you know, need to try chat GPT voice mode and be shouting into my earbuds or like texting on my phone. And same thing with Apple notes where I'd have to pull it out and navigate. Uh...

[1:07:30] And [1:07:31] This, in many ways, lets you do everything related to talking through and saving ideas while staying in the moment. Which, again, now for me is like mostly company stuff, but it's also like... [1:07:44] Uh, [1:07:45] I just went on that date. How do I feel about that? Or I'm going to go on a trip this weekend. I want to like save some to do's of things I need to pick up beforehand. So stream is half conversational partner and half notes app. I have a question. Stream is the app. [1:08:02] - Yes. - Stream ring is, and that's like the interface, and then the ring is obviously the ring. - Yes, exactly. - Okay, so when you talk about that, [1:08:08] And then is stream something that I could use if I don't have the ring. [1:08:12] So if you lose it, you can still interact through the phone. But we found that being able to have it at your fingertips and whisper and hold changes it quite a lot. - Okay. Are you pressing a button or like what's the act that you're-- - Yeah, actually I can pass around [1:08:27] I'm not sure. [1:08:29] Oh, fun. So these are some prototypes and then this is what it'll look like when it finally ships. Okay. Oh, wow. Gorgeous. Cool. [1:08:38] And so there's a little capacitive touch surface here and a little motor inside. So whenever you hold it, you feel a little click sensation. - Can I hold it? - So that one isn't running, but-- - And then is this the mic? [1:08:54] Uh, yes. Okay. So you're like that. Exactly. Cool. Yeah. [1:08:58] So if you hold this one, and then if you hold the surface,

[1:09:03] You should feel a little vibration. [1:09:05] Okay. [1:09:06] Whoa. Okay. Oh, wow. Wow. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. That's crazy. Okay. And then you're saying this is the mic on the other side. This is the mic. Okay. And this is what you're speaking. That's cool. That's beautiful. [1:09:17] What are they... [1:09:19] going to go for? So the silver will go for $249. Okay. And then the gold for $299. Oh, wow. That's, that's crazy. That's way cheaper than I thought. [1:09:29] Yeah, me too. [1:09:31] Okay, so... [1:09:34] As you've been designing this and thinking about [1:09:37] What I personally really like about the way that you guys have positioned it is it's not like this is a companion. [1:09:42] I think people could use it that way if they wanted. And obviously, like... [1:09:46] what [1:09:48] he was saying back to you was like, I'm similar to you. Like I've been designed to feel like an extension of yourself as opposed to like, I'm talking to a friend. [1:09:56] And I'd love to sort of just understand the decision making around that and like what made you decide to go from like [1:10:02] it's an extension as opposed to like, [1:10:05] Siri, who's like clearly someone else. [1:10:09] I think part of it is that's something I've always cared a lot about. Like most of my background was in neural interfaces and things of that nature because I wanted that feeling of something being part of you. [1:10:19] And I remember when ChatGPT first came out, [1:10:23] I saw how the chat bubbles were on opposite sides of the screen. And I was so frustrated by this because I thought it created the illusion of otherness. [1:10:32] When I see a lot of, especially the fear of,

[1:10:36] outside of tech towards these new machines, especially like in New York, I think a lot of it comes from that sense of otherness that this thing will replace you or it'll automate your work or take away your relationships. [1:10:50] When. [1:10:50] I think if we treat it as something that is fully under our control, that you can interrupt just by tapping, that isn't soaking up all of your ambient surroundings, you can achieve a relationship that is very... [1:11:05] productive and useful without the social consequence. - What has the response been from people who aren't in tech? [1:11:12] I think really encouragingly positive. We were, you know, building kind of quietly for two years, but we would wear the devices and prototypes outside freely. And I'll share it with my barista. I'll share it with, you know, whenever I'm getting clothes. [1:11:30] And I often hear people say this is the first thing they've seen that they could imagine themselves using. [1:11:37] Yeah. I think part of that for me at least is like, [1:11:40] It doesn't feel like a surveillance device. I do want to talk about that, though. What's the privacy? What's the-- like, how is it encoded? Like, what's the surveillance-ishness around it? So it's really designed-- [1:11:53] just to pick up like what's right ahead of it. Um, so you can whisper and it'll hear you really clearly even in really loud environments. Mm-hmm. [1:12:02] All your data is encrypted in transit and at rest. We're not going to be looking at your interactions.

[1:12:10] Um, [1:12:11] Because it's encrypted at a device level? It's encrypted, I think, where the data [1:12:18] sits, which isn't always on the ring itself. You can imagine like this doesn't have much storage to save anything on it really. [1:12:24] But it's not like an ambient recording device. It's like saving all the ambient audio and information. [1:12:29] It's only happening when [1:12:32] It's only listening when you're tapping it. - Yes, and when you bring it up, like you have to be speaking straight into it. - Okay, okay. [1:12:38] Um, so [1:12:41] Obviously, you've thought a lot about [1:12:43] this topic in hardware, and I'm curious, like, [1:12:46] What... [1:12:47] in five years, in 10 years, like what do you think? [1:12:50] the modality of these will be like, [1:12:54] Do you think it'll be continue to be wearables? Do you think it'll be things that are implanted? Like, where do you think we're headed? [1:13:00] And maybe five to 10 years is too soon, but I think like, what is the future of [1:13:04] this type of device and the way that we engage with it look like. [1:13:08] That's a really interesting question. [1:13:10] Thank you. [1:13:12] I think for a lot of my life, [1:13:14] I was incredibly interested in neural interfaces and I still am, but [1:13:19] uh, [1:13:21] I've seen a lot of time and effort poured into things that are maybe... [1:13:26] Uh, [1:13:27] logical from like a cold systems perspective of saying, how do we optimally design the human machine cyborg? [1:13:34] And, uh, [1:13:35] I guess not as much attention paid to what's beautiful and what feels good to use like in a normal everyday existence. Mm-hmm.

[1:13:43] Um, [1:13:45] For example, a really [1:13:47] like counterintuitive benefit of having this here is that when you're interacting, you're partially covering your mouth. [1:13:53] And it creates like a social signal that lets other people know, hey, I'm doing something private right now. [1:13:59] Uh, that doesn't really change. Like, uh, [1:14:03] Since antiquity, people have been doing this gesture when they're thinking, or they cover their mouths when they're trying to speak quietly. And so I could see something like this persisting for a very long time. [1:14:14] At the same time, while we think this solves voice interactions, it clearly doesn't solve every part of human computer interaction. [1:14:22] It doesn't solve vision, it doesn't solve [1:14:26] Maybe other things you might want to be doing in a productivity context or in a home context. So there are other devices we're experimenting with and that we'd like to build, but we're not yet sure. Okay, well, this is the next thing we're going to continue seeing in the next two, three, four, five years. [1:14:46] as a founder, like on a business level that [1:14:49] Johnny Ive and Sam Altman are looking at what you're doing and looking at what you're shipping and being like, yeah, great. We'll do that. Except that like. [1:14:55] a thousand X more resourced [1:14:58] Like, do you get nervous about that from that type of competitor? [1:15:02] It's a good question. I feel like [1:15:04] Um. [1:15:05] I feel like over the past few years, like most... [1:15:09] competitive fear has been burned out of me. I respect that. Like,

[1:15:17] I think in practice, it's very rare for a company to... [1:15:20] be doing the exact same thing as another company. They're very different priorities. [1:15:26] Uh, [1:15:27] I would say Sanbar is the only company... [1:15:30] I think, focused exclusively on human augmentation. We aren't trying to create autonomous entities that are performing the work of humans. We're not trying to persist existing business interests. We're just trying to make it easier for people to express what they're thinking in the moment. [1:15:51] and hopefully feel more freedom in doing so. [1:15:54] which I expect will lead us to a very different path. Mm-hmm. [1:15:58] Do you think that as people are using it, or I guess, is it designed for as people are using it and [1:16:05] their content is in stream, and you have these different sort of like notes and to-do lists and reflections and things like that. Is that going to become like a personal LLM that's then, I don't know, feeding you [1:16:20] recommendations or what what's the end state of like it learning about you I guess. [1:16:25] Yeah. [1:16:26] It's funny. I... [1:16:28] Find that stream knows more about me [1:16:32] than basically any other product I use because... [1:16:36] Since the friction to input is so low, I share so much. A lot of that is the form factor, but a lot of that is how we designed stream to be [1:16:46] really good at asking questions, really good at providing helpful information and doing that in a non parasocial way without like an identity of its own.

[1:16:56] And we're really interested in giving people flexibility to use that context that they've built into Stream across wherever they want. Because if you think of Stream as an extension of you that holds all of these ideas and in-the-moment thoughts... [1:17:12] that design philosophy would imply that you should have autonomy over, uh, [1:17:17] where that memory and information gets moved. So that's more of like an aspirational goal where we haven't perfectly figured out, okay, well, this is the format that you'll be able to move things. [1:17:27] But it's definitely something we aspire to. Yeah. [1:17:31] Cool. [1:17:33] Okay. [1:17:34] We have a few more minutes here. I... [1:17:38] have Reggie introduced us. I think I've looked at your work online. Like you're a very creative person. Like, I think you think a lot about storytelling and design. Um, do you think of hardware as like, uh, [1:17:50] a medium? Like, are you thinking about these devices as [1:17:54] Yeah, like a way of a new way of being in the world. And then also in that question, like when people are thinking about a hardware device or they're thinking about an extension of themselves, like what should they be considering when looking at these different products and deciding like what makes sense for them? [1:18:09] Yeah, I think it's a great question. [1:18:12] I think there are [1:18:13] like at least two things that are really important to me. One is... [1:18:18] Uh, [1:18:20] Considering a device in social context, like a wearable quite specifically,

[1:18:26] is jewelry. And I think it should make you feel good to wear both [1:18:32] as a projection of your own preferences and style, as well as something that people around you would enjoy to be around. [1:18:40] And [1:18:42] And sometimes I find that kind of lacking. And it's something that I think living in New York has like very softly beaten into me is the importance of of of that detail. [1:18:55] I think the other thing is to remember that [1:19:00] Hardware... [1:19:01] doesn't matter very much in isolation. [1:19:04] Um... [1:19:06] we call ourselves an interface company and not a hardware company and not a software company [1:19:11] because hardware and software are a means to an ends, [1:19:14] And to us, that ends is... [1:19:17] interfacing you to things that are important, helping you interface your thoughts out into the world, or all the other kinds of things that Stream can support. [1:19:27] And so [1:19:28] I think hardware is exciting because it gives you something physical to latch on to. But in order for a product to be successful, it actually needs to be useful as part of the whole system and not just like a gadget that you leave on a counter. Yeah. [1:19:43] Yeah. [1:19:44] Um, [1:19:45] Are we going to get like necklaces and earrings or do you think you'll stick with ring? [1:19:50] I think we're really excited about the Ring, but we're also going to be exploring other form factors. [1:19:55] Uh, as long as like it helps people do useful things. Yeah. Nice. Are you guys based in New York? Uh, we are, we're in Flatiron and I live like a few blocks away. Nice. Yeah. Nice. What, uh, you seem like a very thoughtful person and I just really, that's so cool. And you're a really nice person to be around and I'm like, wow, what a great energy he has. Um, what inspires you in your work?

[1:20:18] Huh. [1:20:21] I think... [1:20:23] That's a thoughtful question. Thanks. Um, [1:20:28] I think like this philosophy of... [1:20:31] technology as an extension of oneself has been extremely important to me ever since like [1:20:38] I was very, very young. [1:20:41] And that motivates me to continue trying to express that in the world. Um, [1:20:48] uh like one note I once saved to myself through stream I remember I was looking through them before this was like [1:20:53] Sandbar is a philosophical text. It's an expression of a belief. [1:20:58] Um, [1:20:59] I find [1:21:01] close friends incredibly inspiring. Building a company is like an excruciating journey. Yeah. Uh, and, uh, [1:21:09] uh, [1:21:11] I'm just like so humbled by people who continually show up at the low points and [1:21:18] are there to provide a perspective or a presence or a belief that what you're doing is good. [1:21:24] and [1:21:25] It's like incredibly motivating to do it with people who believe in you. Yeah. Yeah. I love that answer. Okay. So you guys are open for pre-orders, right? We are. Okay. And then do you have an estimated shipping, like when people would expect to receive? Yes. We're shipping summer 26. Okay. Okay. Cool. So exciting. December 26? Summer. Summer 26. Yes. I was like, oh, wow. Okay. Okay. Summer 26. Cool.

[1:21:49] Cool. Thank you so much for coming on the show. So excited. Love what you're building. Thank you for coming. Maybe I'll buy one. I know. I think I'm going to. I think I'm going to hit the pre-order. Yeah, yeah. Totally. I usually bring parting gifts. Oh, great, great. [1:22:05] Thank you so much. Thank you. Great to have you. Great to have you. Cool. [1:22:09] Okay, that's our show this week. Join us live on Twitter every Wednesday at noon. Or here, I guess.