Half-Baked TV Show Ideas, Miss Excel Making Millions, The Adventure Challenge, and More

Shaan Puri

I have just straight fire! We might need to split it up into multiple segments or multiple episodes because I just have too much fire for one day myself. Alright, we got a bunch of ideas today. If you like ideas, this is going to be one of the podcasts you like, I promise you. I didn't bring in any frameworks or life advice; we just went straight into cool businesses and ideas you probably never heard of. At the end, we brainstormed TV show ideas—ideas that could be made into TV shows. So, I think you'll like this episode. It's a classic; it's a Sam and Sean classic brainstorm. Alright, enjoy! Welcome everybody to the show! I hope we have the new intro music by the time this airs, but we may not. I don't know about you, but I've been jamming out to the new intro song pretty excessively, and it's been great.

Sam Parr

It's good. The guy who made it has a wonderful name. Did you say his name?

Shaan Puri

young spielberg that's his name

Sam Parr

A good name! I really like that you put "young" without an "o"—Y-O-U-N-G. Alright, we have to mention the clip contest. So, we're doing this contest. I think if people want to learn about it, they should go to **mfmpod.com**. They'll see it there. If you go to **mfmpod.com/clips**, you'll definitely see it. At **mfmpod**, you'll find a link. Did you see? So, these kids—it's mostly younger kids—are making videos. The contest, by the way, is you chop up these videos. Just go to our YouTube page, download the videos, and chop them up. Then, put them on TikTok, Instagram, Twitter, whatever. If you use a certain hashtag, **#mfmclips**, we'll find you. We're going to give $5 to some of our favorite clips. Yeah, based on that!

Shaan Puri

Off of that, some amazing things. I saw a few TikToks that were already past, I think, 100,000 views.

Sam Parr

so crazy

Shaan Puri

So, their TikTok accounts are blowing up just by taking our content and chopping it up. The guy who did the South Park-looking cartoon thing—that was amazing!

Sam Parr

Amazing! This... it's a young guy named Corey who I followed on his account. He's got like hundreds of thousands of views on a handful of videos. He launched the videos and within a day or two, he had all these views. It's wild! And then the guy who does the cartoon thing, I think he's launching a business and we are his first [clients].

Shaan Puri

right right

Sam Parr

because I filed his twitter account and he had 0 it was like 0 yeah so that's amazing

Shaan Puri

Anyways, $5,000. Go take our content, turn it into clips, let it go viral, and yeah, everybody wins.

Sam Parr

alright I've got a few interesting things you've got many interesting things you should go first

Shaan Puri

I have just straight fire. We might need to split it up into multiple segments or multiple episodes because I just have too much fire for one day myself.

Sam Parr

I know what the first one is and I think we should start with that

Shaan Puri

Okay, so I wanted to bring this up. We had talked about this in the past, but this is a story about Miss Excel. Her name is Miss Excel, and I don't know if you've ever seen her. I don't think you're a big TikTok guy, but I am. I had seen this person going viral on TikTok. Basically, it's a woman who puts out Microsoft Excel tips and tricks—little hacks. For example, "Oh, you know how your things are always poorly formatted? Just push Command + G when you're hovering over the column, and look! It auto-formats everything perfectly." Or, "Do you know what a VLOOKUP is? You do this, this, and this, and boom! You can find anything." So she puts out these little clips on TikTok, but it's not just the content. It's also the way she does it. It's what works on TikTok: cute girls dancing, humor—these are the things that work. She'll put a trending song on TikTok, dress up, and have the screen share behind her. She's kind of overlaid on top of it, showing something funny that's happening while explaining it quickly and in an entertaining way. Here's her story: she was a consultant, which is kind of a boring job. There are a lot of consultants and bankers who, if you watch Miss Excel, won't touch a mouse. They just use a keyboard like a wizard. They can do everything just by hitting shortcuts and macros on their keyboard in Excel. There are actually a lot of people who can do this.

Sam Parr

My... So she, who used to work at BCG [Boston Consulting Group], basically they had a mouse - like a wired mouse - that was clearly cut. The cord was cut, and they had it like in a frame on the wall. They're like, "That's what you're gonna do here. The mouse is cut to look like you don't use the mouse."

Shaan Puri

exactly and I don't know how any of this works but I've definitely seen a bunch of friends who can do this they it's kind of amazing when they're doing it so she basically took that idea and started turning it into interesting clips so she starts off and she tells a story where she's like you know I wanted to like try making some content and you know tiktok I felt embarrassed because like isn't tiktok like for kids and like it's just like the silly thing to do I I shouldn't I shouldn't make a tiktok account I'm a consultant and then her gut was like you should do a tiktok and so she listens to her gut she makes a tiktok and pretty quickly I think like within the 1st week or so she goes viral with 1 or 2 clips and she gets over like a 100000 views and she's like holy shit this is awesome and so she does it again and she does it again and then she starts to she like buys a little ring light and gets a green screen so that it looks a little bit better and she does it again she gets a video that gets a 1000000 views and it's like wow this is amazing and so she starts branding herself amazing branding by the way miss excel like she is the one she is the excel woman and and so I thought that was great and so she she starts doing this and she she's getting popular but she's not making any money and she reaches or who who what happened morning brew reaches out they're gonna do a feature story on her and they're like oh we wanna feature you and at the same time a business coach reached out to her and was like hey I saw you have this like really great following I think your your content is super unique you know and she was like yeah it's great I'm gonna be featured on morning brew they're like awesome like what do you have to sell and she's like oh I don't sell anything it's all free content and they're like if you're gonna get featured you should have something to sell and she's like okay challenge accepted you're right I'm gonna make a course and so she decides to make a course she's never done it before and I think she had like something like 2 weeks or something to like pull this whole thing off and she rushes to do it now let's fast forward to today she is making courses and she is making 6 figures a month off this thing so she's making single digit millions a year she has a few days of the year where she's made 6 fee over $100,000 on a day in course sales that's kinda like her black friday or black friday special or whatever where she where she sold her course and so she's doing 1,000,000 of dollars a year and she's working towards 1,000,000 a month that's like her goal I wanna hit $1,000,000 a month as miss excel and she is like Microsoft loves her they're like pumping her up you know she's featured in business insider she's featured in like buzzfeed she's featured in a whole bunch of places there's this great story she's featured on this podcast right now and so she is doing amazing what I love about this is she quits her job as a consultant she now works 15 hours a week unless she's making a course like but just like a normal thing is she's she's doing 50 hours a week she has one employee which is an overseas virtual assistant her cost structure is that overseas virtual assistant which I'm guessing is making something like 6 to $10 an hour so you know probably paying them like $500 a month ballpark + she pays $97 for thinkific which is the course platform and she pays a video editor to to edit the videos for the course so like all in all her expenses are probably like sub $1500 maybe sub $2,000 at the time and she's making 6 figures a month so she's profiting you know at least $100,000 a month doing this thing and there was a whole bunch of like little nuggets in there that I liked but that's the the overall story quick quick reaction to that amazing

Sam Parr

I don't think it's gonna maybe it will last maybe

Shaan Puri

That was my initial instinct. I was like, "Awesome, awesome!" But, you know, who knows if this is here two years from now? Then I changed my mind when I kind of read a little bit more about her. Here's what I like: Okay, so we had talked about Excel way back, maybe a year ago, when we were discussing creating a course. We had done a deep dive into what the best courses are. It's always Excel. Microsoft Excel is always in the top. If you go to Teachable's top courses or Udemy's top courses, learning to master Excel is always in the top 10 earning courses. I think, you know, it's hard to be the one, but it's a topic people will pay for.

Sam Parr

Ankur from Teachable is a good Twitter follow. He tweets out some of the biggest earners. He won't explicitly say who they are, but he'll say things like, "One earner we just paid... they just crossed $20,000,000 in revenue" or in earnings. Then he'll also say something like, "The top course is this Excel thing." So you can kind of triangulate from that information.

Shaan Puri

Exactly. On Udemy, I think I was able to do this as well. I was able to search and sort for the top best-selling courses, and Excel was in the top as well.

Sam Parr

that's amazing

Shaan Puri

And so, I think Excel has real demand. Then the question is, who's going to be the best brand in the Excel space? She's the horse I would pick. So why do I think that? First, her content is fundamentally better. She has the best top-of-funnel strategy. It's highly exciting, quick-hitting, snack-sized TikTok videos. TikTok itself is like the crack cocaine of content, right? A 10-second video with music overlaid—that is crack cocaine for content. She's using that for Excel when all the other Excel creators are like bloggers and stuff like that. They're like a stale old thing. Then her brand and her personality—Miss Excel—she's a good-looking woman who understands how to do content. I know she understands the content. When I was researching her, I found that she is really into some of the things I'm into that are kind of off the beaten path. She was like, "Most people, when they think of content strategy—especially for this B2B type of content—it's always strategic and intellectual, trying to figure it out." She goes, "I spend most of my time just getting into a certain state of mind." She said, "The way I run my structure for my business is through energetics. Most people don't even know what the heck that means." She explained, "I get my energy to a place where my presence is truly magnetic. I get a vision of what's going to go viral, then I run to my computer and I create that." And sure enough, it goes viral. She said, "Most content people don't understand that content is just energy transmission."

Sam Parr

yeah

Shaan Puri

I'm having a great time. I'm excited about this topic, and so I'm gonna push that through the phone into you. Sure enough, you're gonna learn something, but you're also gonna smile while you're watching my content. You're also gonna laugh while you're watching my thing, and nobody else is doing that. I've read that and I go, "She gets it." She gets one of the most important things about business and life, which is just... maybe being able to manage your own energy. But the second part is she gets the content strategy in a way that I don't think anybody else is gonna really get in this space.

Sam Parr

did you say something oh go ahead go ahead

Shaan Puri

She now has scale. At first, I was like, "Oh, okay," but she's just an individual creator on TikTok. Who knows? Maybe the TikTok algorithm changes. So here's what she's doing: she basically is like, "I'm gonna scale in two ways." First, she's expanding it to the whole Microsoft suite. It's not just Excel; she's doing PowerPoint, Word, Outlook, and everything that, you know, a billion people on Earth have to use professionally. Microsoft is helping her, and every time they're releasing a new feature, she's getting a first look at it. She gets to come out right away with the content that highlights this new function or feature that you get to use. That expansion gives it more legs than just Excel. The second thing is she now hired a performance marketing agency. She's like, "Yeah, get my brand to grow." The beautiful thing is, I don't sell my course; I just put one of my most viral things and put ad spend behind it. People love it! They love that content, and they comment on it. So Facebook's algorithm promotes it. I was like, "Oh, that's kind of an unstoppable flywheel." She's going to keep creating this juicy, quick life hack type content, then she's promoting it. That's already inherently viral. Then she's putting paid ad spend behind it. She's growing her following on Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, and all these different places. She's like, "Oh yeah, reels came out," so then I just jumped on reels and became one of the most viral reels creators on Instagram. Now she's diversifying the audience, and she's got the courses behind it. She's going into more parts of the suite. I like that formula.

Sam Parr

I was wrong she's gonna she she's gonna crush it

Shaan Puri

I think she's going to make a bold prediction: she's going to reach $100,000,000 in sales. That sounds outrageous.

Sam Parr

I would love to say $100,000,000. I think she could... I think you could do $100,000,000 a year or a lifetime.

Shaan Puri

a year

Sam Parr

Yeah, I actually agree with you. I think that's bold. I think likely she'll get to like $25,000,000 a year in revenue and could probably actually do that for many years, right?

Shaan Puri

So, it's something that's crazy. I loved her thing. There were also these other little nuggets. She basically works 15 hours a week. Then she's like, "Oh cool, I quit my job. I'm gonna be a digital nomad," something you kind of did last year. She's like, "Every month, my boyfriend and I just move to a different state. We just want to experience it." So, they'll just move to a different state in America and hang out there for the month, and then they hop around. The other thing that I liked was that she does these webinars because she understands there's a top of funnel. If you don't know, the top of funnel is basically how you get new customers to even get in touch with you.

Sam Parr

your case is it's just going viral on tiktok

Shaan Puri

Going viral on TikTok, Instagram, or YouTube is great. Then she has the middle of the funnel, which is where a lot of people fall out. That's okay; you've touched base with me once, but you're not ready to buy something just yet. How do I actually get you to participate in a deeper way, to invest in a deeper way? For her, she runs these webinars, and she calls them "high energy Excel parties." She invites people to these, and what happens is, of course, it's like someone from BCG [Boston Consulting Group] comes in, and they go, "Oh, this is amazing!" Then they're like, "Hey, we'd like to buy like 1,500 seats for your course for our company." Or, "Hey, I work for Target corporate training, and we have 25,000 employees that we think would benefit from this. How could you create something custom for us?" And it's going to be like, "Yeah, here's the same thing, but now I say the word 'Target' at the beginning, and I charge you, you know, $5,000,000 for it." I have a buddy who's doing this. He does top-of-funnel newsletters, then he does these webinars, workshops, and podcasts that go deeper. At the bottom, someone from Procter and Gamble will reach out and just be like, "Hey, cool! We got 50,000 global employees. We would love to have you come speak at our headquarters once a month, and we'll pay you basically like a $100,000 retainer per month. How's that?" And he's like, "Whoa, okay, that's like way easier than trying to..." He teaches basically... I don't want to give away too much because I can't say the numbers, but he teaches a version of...

Sam Parr

like

Shaan Puri

He has a growth mindset. Are you familiar with that? So, he's kind of one of the thought leaders in growth mindset. Big companies, like sports teams, have him on retainer, as well as major corporations like Coca-Cola. They will pay him and say, "Look, we think your stuff is great. We have 50,000 employees. How do we package this up for all those employees?" Then, guess what? They want to do this every year. So, that turned out to be a very big business for him. He's just trying to figure out what to charge a company like this. He'll just name a number, and sure enough, they'll pay it. He's like, "Oh man, maybe I should have set a higher number." He thought that was a crazy high number, but I guess for them, it was like they didn't even blink. They just said yes. So, shit.

Sam Parr

Did you see this weekend the World Excel Financial Modeling Championships happened?

Shaan Puri

no but that is amazing I love that

Sam Parr

It went viral, Ben. Look this up. It's like, look up "Financial Modeling World Championship."

Shaan Puri

it went why did I think of that idea that's such a me idea to think of

Sam Parr

It went viral, and there are these guys—it's like, no disrespect, but it's all nerds doing it, obviously. You see pictures of them, and you see memes that say, "This is what peak male performance looks like."

Shaan Puri

funny okay what what do they actually do what is the competition

Sam Parr

So, they're all like, you can... it was like Twitch. They were streaming their screens and they were asked to do certain things. Then they had to, like, in real time, make this model. I don't actually know how they judged it; I didn't pay attention. I just paid attention to the memes. I think Seth Smith tweeted something funny, like, "This is a gift from God." He showed a picture of them on there. It's amazing! It was hilarious, and all my Indian friends were sharing it this weekend and making Indian jokes. It was awesome; it was so funny. But who owns that? Who do you need to see?

Shaan Puri

it's probably like you know deloitte

Sam Parr

But anyway, that was amazing! I'm on board with this. That's awesome! I love Mix Miss Excel. When this article on The Verge went live, I had so many people DM me and say, "You guys gotta cover this!" I was going to do it, and I'm so happy you did. Baller! I think that I've talked to a couple of friends who have course businesses. My best friend, Neville, had a course called the Copywriting Course. It honestly changed my life. He made this one course like 12 years ago, and it's been paying his bills every single year since then. He does other stuff like I...

Shaan Puri

took it as

Sam Parr

Well, he updates it, and now he has a membership thing. But this one thing that he filmed years ago, it's like... that's it.

Shaan Puri

Been his career, by the way, in terms of transferring energy, Neville is exactly like that. If you watch his course, he does this... Most courses are like, "Here's an hour-long session about X." His is almost like a blog post. It's like one minute where he's teaching one concept. The camera will be on, and then he'll pop out from under the table and be like, "Yo!" Then he'll say the thing. In the next segment, he's got a guitar in his hand, and he's like, "If I'm writing an email and I want to get a reply..." and he's singing a song. He makes it entertaining, and there's something that makes you smile. It keeps you engaged and involved with it. You know, people will forget the content, but they won't forget how they felt taking your course. So they'll still recommend it, refer it, and be happy with their purchase. Can I...

Sam Parr

I'm going to tell you about one or two really quick things, and I think we should spend most of the episode on your stuff because it's actually pretty good. This adventure book thing looks amazing. One very quick thing: Monthly.com. Did you know what that is? Yeah, you see the...

Shaan Puri

but ex explain it for me

Sam Parr

so it's just like because

Shaan Puri

I think it's pretty under the radar

Sam Parr

It's pretty much the exact same thing as MasterClass, but only for creators. It's kind of cool! I just signed up for my first one with Casey Neistat.

Shaan Puri

which one

Sam Parr

is launching a youtubing and storytelling class do you see it

Shaan Puri

oh amazing

Sam Parr

yeah so I signed up for it so that's like a cool find so it's dude

Shaan Puri

How is he not at the **fucking** top of the screen right now? He's just in the middle of this long list. What are they doing? It's monthly, you know? Founders are monthly. I think I've talked to them before. They were cool. They knew they were cool. That's alright. I was like, "Hey, this is awesome!" They were like, "Yeah, it's awesome." I was like, "I'd love to invest." They said, "Yeah, a lot of people want to invest."

Sam Parr

that's alright I I appreciate that so I just

Shaan Puri

I respect that

Sam Parr

I signed up for that. I'm so excited to do it! Like, I bought it full price and everything. I'm pumped. The second thing... another cool product that I've been fooling around with... Well, we'll do actually 3. The second one is Descript. Have you seen Descript?

Shaan Puri

Yeah, we've talked about it. Descript is kind of like editing software for audio or video. You record something, and then it transcribes it automatically. Then, if you delete a piece of text from the transcription, it deletes that part of the video, which is like magic.

Sam Parr

amazing I've been playing with this for my youtube stuff

Shaan Puri

what do you do with it

Sam Parr

Alright, so you film a video. Let's say I film a 10-minute video. It uploads the video and automatically transcribes it. I can edit the video by editing the transcription, like a Google Doc. I can copy, paste, and move stuff around, and that edits the video. It's amazing! It's almost transformative because when I think about what I'm going to film, I think about the narrative. A story is just a long narrative, and it's harder to think in video clips. It's much easier to think in transcripts, in text. It's super cool! I actually think this company raised money recently at a $200 million valuation. I believe this is a company that's going to be significantly larger than it is now. It's going to be pretty epic! The guy who started it also started Groupon.

Shaan Puri

yeah wasn't andrew

Sam Parr

mason

Shaan Puri

Mason, he's dope. Also, the best part about Andrew Mason that I respect is that he started Groupon. Groupon went on this crazy run where it was, at that time, like the hottest startup in the world. It was copied by every... you know, every Joe Schmo was copying Groupon. Groupon raised all this money and ended up going public. Then, the world kind of turned against Groupon. It's like, "This is not a good business. It's not going to work." People started pulling out. It's still, I think, like a $1,000,000,000 company, but you know, it lost its shine. He was in Chicago, I think, and then he quits or whatever.

Sam Parr

he got fired

Shaan Puri

I think he got fired. I think he wrote something really hilarious on the way out.

Sam Parr

he wrote like an email he goes

Shaan Puri

then pull that up

Sam Parr

He goes, "Today, I'm paraphrasing, he's like, today is my last day. I've been fired. You probably know why."

Shaan Puri

Yeah, you know that video I made making fun of that CEO who botched the layoffs? This was the opposite. This is the CEO who gets it. So, he wrote this letter saying, "I was fired today." Then he takes a year off and creates an album—a music album, like a rap album of him just... and he's not good, but it's hilarious. We should pull up one of the videos of his rap album or whatever. Yeah, and he releases that. Then he came back with Descript, and it started off as this walking tour thing.

Sam Parr

which was amazing by the way

Shaan Puri

the new editor

Sam Parr

The walking tours were amazing. I bought a lot of them. It was really cool, but... not that good of a business. Because, I mean, I was a super fan, but like most people, you're never gonna do this. And if you do, you're gonna do one in your life. But yeah...

Shaan Puri

Exactly! By the way, what a great lesson the walking tour was. It's like what people should do... makes them be more active and learn things in the world. And then Descript is like, "Hey, it's products that make it easier to be lazier." It's like, "Hey, you know editing video is hard, let's make it easier for you."

Sam Parr

So, **Descript**... I've been playing with it. I think it's called Descript. I've been calling it Descript unless it's Descript, so sorry. Awesome, under the radar, cool. And then the last thing I'm going to tell you about that's kind of interesting is **Storyworth**. So, Sean or Ben, go to storyworth.com. This is a crazy fascinating thing. It's a very simple product. I actually knew the guy, Nick; he started it. I shared an office with him, and he's still, I believe, the only employee. It's kind of cool. When I logged in or when I used it years ago, all it was is you pay like $100 a year or $200 a year, and it sends emails to family members that you sign up. It asks them about certain memories. It asks them so much over the course of a year that at the end of the year, if a lot of your family members have answered some of your prompts, you now have a book describing their childhood. So, it'll be like, I sent it to my Aunt Debbie, and she was asked a question. I don't remember all the questions, but it was something like, "What's the best memory of your father before you were 10?" And she was like, "You know, on Halloween, we did this thing." And it's like, oh my gosh, I'm learning about my family! At the end, I printed out this book. Super fascinating! And it's super fascinating because it's a one-person business. It's just him, and right? It's really simple, very easy. I love that ancestry stuff so much; I'm a big fan of that. Anyway, that's all.

Shaan Puri

Yeah, that's cool. That's really cool! I've never used something like this. So, isn't it kind of a lot of work for the other person to write an answer?

Sam Parr

like I

Shaan Puri

feel like people don't like to do stuff like that

Sam Parr

But if you get well, you get one a week and you spend like 10 minutes journaling. Yeah, it's work, but I told my aunt, "Hey, this is important to me." After a while, she was like, "Oh, I kinda like doing this. I'm remembering a bunch of stuff." It's a lot of work.

Shaan Puri

We had done a version of this, or there's a version of this that's a little easier. I don't know if you remember, but I had my mom over.

Sam Parr

she was doing a podcast with her

Shaan Puri

And I recorded a podcast with her. The podcast was so much easier because really all they had to commit to was one time, "Hey, let's sit down and talk." You get this hour-long thing with their voice, and they don't have to... People can get pretty intimidated having to write something. There's this pressure internally to do good writing. I think school traumatizes the shit out of people. This podcast thing worked great. I had an amazing podcast with my mom. I recommend it to anybody. You don't need to be a podcaster, by the way. I don't publish this anywhere, but it's just a memory I'll always have. It was a conversation that I wouldn't have otherwise had. More importantly, I don't even know if I'll ever go back and listen to this. Maybe someday on that really horrible day, you know, when she passes away. I'll be happy I have this. But more importantly, so much of life is so surface level. We're just talking about me and my life all the time. If I'm talking to her, it's about what we're doing today or whatever. I realized I do very little about her, her family, and what made her who she is, like her upbringing. You know, I don't know. That's just shit in the past. Even she forgot a lot of these things, and in the conversation, it all was coming flooding back to her. So I recommend everybody do that with their parents. Just sit them down and record a one-hour thing. I can share the questions I asked or whatever, but it really doesn't matter, to be honest with you.

Sam Parr

have you done ancestry or 23andme

Shaan Puri

I've never done it no

Sam Parr

They're awesome. 23andMe is awesome, Ancestry is, I think, cooler because I've spent hours on it like building up my family tree. 23andMe... I've thought about getting it. I have it, and I thought about buying it this Christmas for my family members. The reason I'm not... I may not do it. Have you heard of this thing called GEDmatch?

Shaan Puri

no what's that

Sam Parr

oh have you heard of the golden state killer

Shaan Puri

no

Sam Parr

okay so in the 19 seventies there was this guy

Shaan Puri

call you

Sam Parr

Yeah, that was my nickname in high school: **Golden State Killer**. In the 1960s, 70s, and I think the 80s, there was this guy who basically raped about 50 women and eventually murdered around 20 of them. He was a serial killer and got away with it for years. No one knew who he was. Patton Oswalt's wife, Patton Oswalt the comedian, who recently died, published her life's work right before she passed. It was about the Golden State Killer and how he had never been caught. This renewed interest in the case, and then the FBI got involved because of all the press. They eventually used a website called GEDmatch. It's public, so anyone can use it. It analyzes all the information from 23andMe, Ancestry, and other databases. They put the Golden State Killer's DNA, which they had, into this GEDmatch thing. They realized that the daughter or granddaughter of the killer had recently signed up for 23andMe. So, they staked out this guy's house, dug through his garbage, and found evidence. They went, "Boom! Got him!" That's how they arrested him. They caught him when he was elderly and dying. If you Google "Golden State Killer," you'll see pictures of this old man. He got away with it for so long, but eventually, they brought him to justice. Now, they've caught many dozens, maybe even 100, of killers or rapists this way, which is good, but it's kind of scary.

Shaan Puri

so I was gonna say so you're you're worried about this why why is this worrying

Sam Parr

I'm because it's being used for good

Shaan Puri

get grandpa in trouble

Sam Parr

It's being used for good now, but like you could see...

Shaan Puri

I wanna be in this database

Sam Parr

Wanna be in this database? This is one thing I'm a bit worried about. You can go to GEDmatch and upload your results. It can tell you all types of information about your results. You can see a lot of interesting stuff. If you can somehow get the DNA from an FBI case, which I believe in some cases you can, you can upload it. There are thousands of these internet detectives using this database to solve crimes. It's kind of fascinating, it's kind of interesting, and it's definitely a little scary.

Shaan Puri

wow is there like a subreddit for these you know like sort of like public crime solvers

Sam Parr

There is, and it's very, very interesting. Most of the time, they're wrong. If you remember the Boston Marathon bombing, they named these three guys and they kind of messed with these guys' lives. They didn't end up doing it, but everyone was certain on that subreddit. They were uploading pictures and saying, "This guy works at this place." It wasn't them; they were wrong. No one guessed it was the two actual guys. This is a little bit different because it's DNA, but DNA isn't perfect. It can say something like, "This person is 5% related to this person." So, it's like, "Alright, let's see what that is." That could be a distant cousin. You track your way down to that and build these family trees to figure out, "Oh, you know, it's kind of weird that this matches this person and they also live in the same area." So, it's not perfect, but it's pretty good. Anyway, I thought that's why I may not get 23andMe.

Shaan Puri

Yeah, I also know people who have gotten it and realized that their dad is not their real dad. I think that...

Sam Parr

that happened to a family member of mine

Shaan Puri

I think that's a, you know, side effect to be aware of. Sometimes, ignorance is bliss.

Sam Parr

A family member of mine found out that their parent cheated on their spouse and had a kid. So they logged on and said, "Oh man, I've got a second brother," or whatever, you know, like a stepbrother or a half-brother. It changes things. Yeah.

Shaan Puri

I was gonna say, without getting too personal, that they went public with it or they just kind of kept that information to themselves.

Sam Parr

No, no, no. They did not go public with it, but it was very... I don't know. They haven't talked about it with me too much, but it seems like it was somewhat earth-shattering.

Shaan Puri

Yeah, there's a thing that I've heard about, which is people who use sperm banks. So, like, a sperm donor will take the... or, sorry, people who didn't realize that their parent had used a sperm donor or whatever, they will get the sequencing done and find out, "Oh my God, I have 42 half-brothers or sisters out there." It's like, "Oh my God!" Yeah, this was a person who donated a bunch. So, you actually do genetically share with all these different people. Like, wow, that's really crazy! There are all kinds of interesting stuff, and I think 23andMe, their business model is to sell your data, right? Like, I think that is the core business model: they sell.

Sam Parr

it to pharmaceutical companies yeah

Shaan Puri

For, you know, the research or whatever, I don't know if it's messed up or if it's for the good of science. But I don't think you really know or opt in. It's not clear that, hey, like...

Sam Parr

it's not clear

Shaan Puri

yeah it's not clear it's probably it's definitely the terms you know but nobody's reading the terms and so that's the problem

Sam Parr

It's like a benevolent dictator. It's cool when they're making the trains run on time, it's not cool when they start killing people. You know what I mean? It's like, it's good when it's good, and then... it could go bad really easily.

Shaan Puri

yeah alright what else we got

Sam Parr

do adventure book

Shaan Puri

Alright, so this is another... To me, the mystics' cell thing was one thing. This other thing I think is really interesting. So, the adventure book... Let me tell you about this story. Have you heard of or do you know what this product is, the adventure book?

Sam Parr

I have no idea what it is

Shaan Puri

ben have you ever heard of this thing okay alright so you guys are also not on tiktok enough this is like the number one ad on tiktok that I see I don't know if I'm just in their market or they just run a shit ton of ads but I've been seeing it for like a year so basically it's a it's kinda it's a book you buy and it's like a high quality big book and what it is is like there's a bunch of imagine like a scratch off like a lottery so there's a bunch of things you a bunch of adventures that you could scratch off so you open the book to a random adventure you scratch it off and it reveals a thing you're gonna go do like it might be like I don't know I've I've never bought the book so like you know bad example but like you know you're gonna go into a store today and you give out 10 compliments to people in the store or you're gonna go streaking around your neighborhood or whatever like an adventure a thing you can go do and so this idea and and and they pair with it like a camera so you you're supposed to take a polaroid of you doing it so it becomes a scrapbook so on one side it triggers you to go do something that you've never done or that's like you know gets you out of your comfort zone and then it gives you the ability to capture it and paste you you glue the photo in and it becomes this memory book of all your adventures like cool kind of novel idea so I hadn't seen this and I was like oh that's that's a cute idea it's novel idea what I didn't realize is this is a $100,000,000 business that was created in the last like 2 years so how do I know this you know like for the podcast I don't know if you get these emails but I definitely do there's a bunch of people that have like booking agents and we get all these emails which is like hey sean love my first million have you thought about having you know joe joe on and they're like you know it's like oh first they're they're complimenting me so I like open it and I'm like because like I don't wanna be a a member of any club that will have me you know so it's like that's how I feel about the guest thing so normally I write all these off but this one caught my eye which was they said would you like to have brian ellis on he is a high school dropout now owns a $100,000,000 business called the adventure challenge and I was like it's like that that adventure book thing and he and so I replied I go a $100,000,000 no way that sounds high and she goes yeah like it's been incredible they've grown blah blah blah and I said 100 I just had to clarify I'm like 100,000,000 cumulative revenue annual revenue what are you saying here and and so she goes yeah like the the they'll do 85,000,000 in revenue this year and they have a few big bigger partnerships the distribution partnerships that will get them over a 100 like in the next year and you know so the business is valued over a $100,000,000 with 85,000,000 in revenue and I was like what the fuck and so I go and I start researching this and so here's the story so this guy bryant he's I so I couldn't confirm the high school dropout part I don't know if that was just like some post fact shit like like to make this sound better but like let's assume it's true so high school dropout I think his job was he had some job which was like

Sam Parr

he was a a skyscraper inspector so he was like you

Shaan Puri

know some low man on the totem pole doing a job he didn't love and he's like so he's like you know some low man on the totem pole doing a job

Sam Parr

he didn't love and

Shaan Puri

he's like alright I'm just doing this for the money

Sam Parr

he wanted to make a business

Shaan Puri

Like, he just... he's like, "My whole life, I just always have ideas. I wanted to create a product." So, he's doing this job and he had this idea to create an adventure box. His original idea was to take a machine, create a box, and you push a button. It would print out a receipt, and the receipt would be like the adventure you're going to go on. So, you get a random adventure that comes out. Cool idea, right? And that was the original idea. He tells a couple of people about it, and they're like, "Oh, that's cool." He's like, "Great!" But he's just doing his job and hasn't really figured out exactly how to do it or whatever. Then, everything's on hold until he gets fired from his job. He makes a mistake, and they think he committed fraud. His boss is like, "No, no, no, this is an honest mistake." But either way, he gets fired. He's like, "Alright, what do I want to do?" So, he decides, "I want to go to acting school." But he needs to pay for life, so he thinks, "I need to create a side hustle that's going to make me $2,000 a month. That's my goal." Then he's like, "What about that adventure box challenge thing?" Over the course of a few months, the idea had evolved. He's like, "Alright, what if it was actually like a book that you could scratch off the adventure?" He tells a couple of people about it, and they're like, "That's actually a really cool idea. You should do it." So, he goes to Hobby Lobby, buys some paper, some scratch-off material, and he goes to a different store to buy a camera. He starts coming up with this idea and spends 6 to 8 months prototyping it. Nobody had really done an adventure-style scratch-off book before, so he's creating an actual physical product. He has this idea and just keeps telling people about it.

Shaan Puri

Where he's prototyped the idea several times and there's videos I found online of like he's creating a vlog while he's doing it he's like alright it's 11 pm april 1st I just cut this really cool material for the scratch off I really like this one but but I'm having trouble with the bindings you know and he's like so maybe I'll try this other thing tomorrow and then like he has the next video you know a week later he's like okay I figured out the bindings part and now I need to figure out this other thing I love seeing the the start the early stages of these ideas so he creates a a kickstarter he's like I'm gonna do a kickstarter it's gonna be great I wanna raise $10,000 for this book and kickstarter goes live he makes $1300 the first day and he's like fuck yeah I'm the man he you know goes to a coffee shop he's strutting in he's like I made $1300 today I don't know about you guys I'll take you know your best give me your finest coffee and he's like alright we're you know we're already 13% of the way to the goal let's keep going but day 2 $400 day 3 $0 and like the kickstarter like runs out of steam he's like shit I was kinda just banking on this going viral and now it's not viral so what now and so he's like alright basically he's gonna throw in the towel because like for for for only $1700 I can't even get the quality of book pay that I want maybe I'll just quit so he's like I need to get a job to pay for life you know like I'm I'm out of money and so he's like he's like oh maybe I'll contact my buddy I don't forgot his name but ben my my buddy ben to to get a sales job he has like this company I can do sales so he calls him up he gets a sales he's like I wanna do a sales job I wanna do it for 1 year and I'm just saving up money so I'd go back out there and build a product and the guy's like alright cool that's fine like you're upfront about it like I'm down with that let's do it so he gets a sales job there and while he's there he's telling people at work this idea he can't shut up about the idea and and the guy there was like you know have you tried ads he's like oh dude nobody clicks ads like ads like or ads like ads are scams basically like that was his mentality at the time and the guy is like no like that's how we grow our business like you know you should try so he puts a little money in the ads he's like I don't know if it worked or not but like you know I got this like 10 x roas and the guy's like what like no way and he's like yeah like people really like the the ad or whatever and so the guy he partners with his buddy the guy who hired him and he so I'm fast forwarding some parts of the story but basically he ends up leaving that guy partners with him that guy is like look we're gonna grow this thing through ads and and they basically run a shit ton of tiktok ads facebook ads whatever and they've grown this thing to now 85 if this is true $85,000,000 in sales they've sold about 2,000,000 copies of this book it's like a $40 book which is like you know something 70 something $1,000,000 in sales if you do the math and and yeah what an adventure and now they have like a couple's book so you're like 50 fun adventures to go on with your date they have a a family book here's some things to do with your family a friend's book and then a by yourself book and yeah it's kind of amazing

Sam Parr

I am into these notebooks I told you I used one of these best self co right

Shaan Puri

yeah but that's different that that doesn't have like a pro it doesn't get you to go do things in the real world

Sam Parr

It does. The one I use, I use like a relationship one. And so I'm into this. This guy is amazing. How old is he?

Shaan Puri

he seems very young so I don't know how old he is he looks like he might be 25

Sam Parr

is amazing

Shaan Puri

max I don't know

Sam Parr

I think these box things are cool. We talked about one that was doing like $100,000,000 in revenue. Remember it was that "catch a criminal" box? You remember that?

Shaan Puri

oh what was that that what is that one that's

Sam Parr

Is it a true crime thing? It was a true crime thing. It was $30 a month, and they send you a box where you solve a crime with your friends. It's so good! It was so fun. This is in that same world. I think it's cool to order something and to see a physical item. I’m into it. I think this is badass. This is so awesome!

Shaan Puri

True crime is better than this because that's a repeat. It's like a recurring one where it'll have more repeat purchases than this. It's so fun! I buy this thing called Kiwi for my niece, which is like a science fair project. Basically, it's a kit where she's going to build a little mini tractor. It's sort of like Legos, but it's not just one specific thing. Oh, sorry, it is one specific thing. It's like, "Here's how you'll learn about electricity through this little box" every month. It's not great, but it's good enough, and she loves it. So now, if I cancel, I have the guilt of her not getting the toy she wants. I'm like, "I'm going to just keep this $20 subscription forever," I guess.

Sam Parr

I'm on board with this. I think this is awesome! By the way, whoever's making clips, this should be the clip that you make. This guy's story is like... I was enthralled. This is amazing! Wow.

Shaan Puri

alright what else what else do you wanna do I have a

Sam Parr

keep going

Shaan Puri

Okay, I have a segment. It's not even a full segment; it's just the start of a segment. I think this one might be bad, but let's try it. I basically pretend I'm drunk, and then this will be like, "Oh, that's pretty good for a drunk guy." I have a bunch of half-baked TV show ideas.

Sam Parr

do do you even drink

Shaan Puri

I'll drink, you know, if the occasion calls for it. I'll drink, but not regularly. Okay, but I want to pretend I was drunk when I came up with this list because it's kind of just like a random list of weird ideas. So, these are half-baked TV show ideas. This is for the producer who listens to the show, the Netflix guy who listens to the show. You're welcome in advance! I want to get your reaction to my concepts. Okay, I'm going to pitch you three ideas. I don't know if you have any TV show ideas, but I'll pitch you three. Okay, the first one is called **Frat U**. I love... I don't know if you've seen the football one that's on... oh my god, what's it called? There's like a football one called something on Netflix. It's like one of their original shows that basically follows a junior college football team around. It’s like, "Here's the coach, here's the players," and it picks six players. You kind of get emotionally invested in their story. There's a Formula 1 show that's just like this. It's like, "Here's these six drivers," and you get invested in their...

Sam Parr

it's amazing

Shaan Puri

Their story... there's a cheerleading version of this that I watched. I think it's called *Cheer*. I don't know what it's called exactly, but it's like, here's this... the best cheer.

Sam Parr

bro you know that that was like you know that that was like the most popular show and it's not like something you discovered

Shaan Puri

I'm a pretty good curator here. I don't know, but a lot of people have been watching the show because it's like, "Why would I watch a TV show?"

Sam Parr

heard of this thing called squid games

Shaan Puri

So, I signed up for this service called Netflix. It's pretty great. Alright, so this same model, I think it'll be applied to a whole bunch more topics. The one I'm surprised at is, why is there not a reality show just inside one of the craziest frats in America? Because you know that they would basically go all out, sell out to make the show entertaining because they want the fame.

Sam Parr

well I bet I think it's a faux pas have you ever talked to like an 18 year old man they're woke

Shaan Puri

no dude no that's are

Sam Parr

they in

Shaan Puri

The press is just like the 18-year-old who's talking to older people like us. Most 18-year-olds don't interact with people like us. They're very normal and just trying to have a good time in college. They're not like...

Sam Parr

are frats are frats popular you think I would think they're going down dude they are

Shaan Puri

Super popular because it's a bubble. When you go to a college, it's like in such a little bubble. It's not really affected by the way the world is changing.

Sam Parr

You don't have to... You're not convincing me. I understand the value, but I didn't even... I just thought that, with everything going on, that it...

Shaan Puri

Was like a faux pas? No, dude. I mean, if you go to Arizona State or you go to, like, you know, wherever... Georgia? Do you think they give a shit about, like, you know, wokeism and they're disbanding the frats? Hell no! They are... Have you seen? [They're] doubling down.

Sam Parr

Well, there are these girls on TikTok that do this challenge. I forget what it's called, but if you're a TikTok guy, you probably know. Sarah showed it to me. It's these girls who are like pledging... I think that's what it's called. I wasn't part of that. I don't know what you do; it's like a tryout. They always talk about what they're wearing. I'm an old man, and I was a dork. I wasn't part of a frat, but they talk about the clothes they're wearing to their pledge ceremonies and things like that. It's gone very viral on video. So, how about the clothes they're wearing? I don't know, but it's just funny. It's just hilarious because, you know how in the South, like at Ole Miss and stuff like that, the sororities do these... yeah.

Shaan Puri

yeah like I went to a southern college yeah yeah for sure like

Sam Parr

They all look exactly alike, especially the blonde-haired girls. They dress exactly alike, and that's like the joke—they show what they're wearing.

Shaan Puri

At Duke, you weren't even allowed to throw a party if you weren't in a fraternity or sorority. They literally were like, "You better join this or you don't get to have a social life."

Sam Parr

Dude, it's weird. It's so weird to me. That's so weird. Also, whenever I go to one of these frats, I'm like, "This is disgusting." I don't want to live with a bunch of dudes who are alcoholics. There's like 80 of them in this crappy house, and there's beer everywhere.

Shaan Puri

shit like

Sam Parr

taped on the wall

Shaan Puri

how about you when you were like getting drunk all

Sam Parr

the time even back then even back then I'm like this is filthy I wanna be the filthy one

Shaan Puri

I don't wanna place

Sam Parr

I just don't wanna be around a bunch of like degenerates all the time

Shaan Puri

Oh, okay. Well, you're alone in that. I would love to go back and experience college again. I think it was a great time, and living in one of these houses was, yes, messy but fun. Anyways, you go to a party school like Ole Miss, Georgia, or Santa Barbara, and it's frat life. You basically just follow around with a king alpha frat. You go inside the house and you pick the five characters who are going to have all the elements of a great TV show. They're going to have relationship drama, infighting, camaraderie with the boys, hazing, and a pledge process that's going to be controversial. They’ll get involved in all kinds of outrageous stunts. It's all baked in; the show basically writes itself.

Sam Parr

have like like one guy questioning his sexuality exactly

Shaan Puri

he comes out

Sam Parr

he's another guy who also follow

Shaan Puri

Along with people, him, but they accept him. There's the person who gets canceled for doing something racist or sexist or something like that. It's got all the elements. Then you could just hop from school to school, and the schools will be excited. "Oh shit, Frat U is coming! We gotta represent!" Because, you know, Georgia looked like they had a good time. So now, all of a sudden, Clemson is like, "Oh, you think Georgia was hardcore? Look how we party! Look how we do our thing!" I think this is a no-brainer franchise that somebody needs to create, and you could put me down as executive producer.

Sam Parr

alright next back to basic to

Shaan Puri

Baller basic to baller. Okay, what is this? I recently met somebody, and I'm going to have to do a separate episode on this, but I met someone who was completely middle class or a little lower middle class. They didn't have any money, and all their tastes were that of a basic person. They didn't shop at Whole Foods; they shopped at Kroger. They didn't eat fancy stuff; they ate, you know, like McDonald's and things like that. They didn't drive a fancy car; they drove a Camry. So, that was their taste. I thought, what if you had a show where you just give a really basic person "fuck you" money, and they get to come ball out? You get to see their reaction. There are already shows where people ball out, like "Million Dollar Listing," "Selling Sunset," or "The Kardashians." It's nice to see the lifestyles of the rich and famous, but those people are already rich and famous, and they can come off as snobby and materialistic. What if you transformed somebody? You gave them the Cinderella treatment. They went from the bottom to the top suddenly, and they're now just discovering all these things for the first time. Hilarity ensues. Okay, that's my second question.

Sam Parr

Let me put a twist on it. I actually think that you could do this, or someone listening could actually do this immediately via a YouTube series. In 2005, there was a documentary called *Reversal of Fortune*. It was on Showtime, and it was amazing. The question was, "What would a homeless person do if they were given $100,000?" So, they found this homeless guy, gave him $100,000, and showed him going to a hotel for the first time and sleeping in a bed for the first time. He said, "I don't like this," and ended up sleeping on the floor of the hotel because he found the bed uncomfortable. They gave him $100,000, and it doesn't end well. He spends all of his money on women, buys a $35,000 truck, which is basically $35,000 of the $100,000, and blows through all the money. He does get a job, but all the money is gone on partying. At the end of the movie, he only has $5 left and is sleeping at his sister's house. But okay, I actually think we... great for him.

Shaan Puri

but sounds like great tv to me

Sam Parr

It was great TV. I was watching it the whole time. So I think what you should do is just get $100,000 and do a YouTube series on this. I think you could make your money back in ad revenue.

Shaan Puri

that's

Sam Parr

that's how

Shaan Puri

I always set that up I think if you did it with a homeless person you might get some blowback now so you know

Sam Parr

Yeah, not with a homeless person, but like, you know, what would happen if someone who's in need or doesn't have much is given a lot?

Shaan Puri

And I think it kind of needs to be temporary. You know, with shows like *Pimp My Ride*, where Exhibit shows up at the door and then your life just sort of changes overnight. Or like *Wife Swap*, where it's a very short period—it's like a month or something like that. I think you need to let them ball out and then let them return back to reality. You see that sort of yo-yo of emotions between them. Okay, so that's my second one. The third one is very easy: I just need a show that's background noise. Are you a background noise kind of guy? Do you just have something on because it feels better to have something on?

Sam Parr

In our office, we had white noise machines throughout, and I enjoyed that.

Shaan Puri

babies to sleep what were you doing

Sam Parr

It was so you could have like hard comp. Like if you want to have a conversation in a conference room and for it not to bleed through the walls, right? And it was...

Shaan Puri

for like newsletter conversations yes

Sam Parr

Or, like when you have an open office plan, you put it in pods of desks. That way, the people eating lunch don't bother you. Now, I keep the fan on.

Shaan Puri

Well, you're also like a music video guy, right? I remember we were at your house, and you were throwing up a bunch of music videos on Apple TV.

Sam Parr

I have music videos playing throughout the day

Shaan Puri

yeah okay so that's the behavior I'm talking about I think that netflix does not cater

Sam Parr

does anyone else do that you don't do that you don't have

Shaan Puri

Music videos... but my wife, she'll always put on *Friends*. I'm like, "Dude, you're watching *Friends*." And she's like, "No, I'm not! I'm not watching." I'm like, "Then why do you have it on?" I kind of turned it off. No, no, no, I like having it on. It's like, she doesn't like if there's kind of an empty home feeling. Also, it's this comfort safety blanket where it's like, I already have seen all the episodes. This is why *The Office* and *Friends* are such valuable catalogs. People just put them on and they can only pay 10% or 20% attention to it. The other 80% can be on the thing they're trying to do. They can just glance up and see certain parts, but then they just don't. It's a low-maintenance show. When you go on Netflix today, so much of it is high-maintenance attention. It's like, "Oh, here's this intense story about this bank heist." That's great when you want a Friday night intense drama, but I think they're underserving the background noise. I also learned this at Twitch. When I was at Twitch, we looked at some of the usage data. Somebody was pointing out, like, "Oh yeah, like x%..." I can't say the exact percentage, but like a significant percentage of the viewing time is when it's not the tab that's in the forefront on people's computers. I was like, "Oh, so we should just throw that out, right? They're not even watching; they just accidentally left it open." I was like, "Why is this such a high percentage? Do we have some bug that keeps it open in the background in some weird way?" They're like, "No, this is actually the use case." All the developers were like, "What are you talking about?" The developers who actually use Twitch all the time were like, "This is how I use Twitch all the time. I'm coding; I just have it on in the back. I'm just listening to it." It's like you're listening to somebody play video games. If there's one thing weirder than watching somebody play video games, it's listening to somebody play video games. I was like, "No, I just like it as an ongoing background stream. It's kind of my favorite streamer, and I don't really need to pay attention to it, but I'll hop in if I hear something cool happening." I was like, "Holy shit!" So there's this big genre of background entertainment that I think, if you specifically tried to make background entertainment, you could create some really successful franchises.

Sam Parr

so can I can I can I tell you something that validates this so you know chive chive.com

Shaan Puri

I think it's just like a news website or something I don't really know much about it

Sam Parr

A little bit... it's like basically Barstool, but with a slightly different demographic. Mostly the same, though. They created this thing called Chive TV. What they did was, since they're based in Austin, they gave a little Amazon Fire Stick to a bunch of bars in Austin. They said, "You can have this stick for free, and on this stick, we're going to put loads and loads of different clips." Basically, it's like America's Funniest Home Videos—guys getting hit in the balls and funny bar stuff that you don't actually need any sound to understand or enjoy. It included silly stunts, guys jumping off skyscrapers, and skydiving. Eventually, they spun this off and created a business called Atmosphere. This was making tens of millions of dollars in revenue pre-pandemic. I believe they raised tens of millions of dollars at a $200 million valuation. They would give these Fire Sticks to loads of different people, and then eventually, you could just download this app. They would fulfill the content in the pipe and put ads on it. That's how they made all their money. They would say to advertisers, "Look, you're reaching all of these bars."

Shaan Puri

Right, yeah. That's "Bars" - it's a great one. That's like perfect background entertainment. Alright, so those are my 3 TV show pitch ideas, half-baked ideas. Do you have any ideas? Is there a show that you think could exist or would exist or should exist? I know I'm putting you on the spot here.

Sam Parr

No, but love both. So, one that has caught my eye on YouTube... CNBC is doing something that I think is actually amazing. It's called "Millennial Money." Stupid name, and the branding's really dumb, but what they do is actually cool. They convince these people... The idea is cool though. My friend Steve was on it the other day. They convince these people and they say like... and the titles are like: - "Here's how we live on a $1,000,000 a year in Silicon Valley" - "Here's how we live on $40,000" - "Here's how we live..."

Shaan Puri

on a $50,000

Sam Parr

What you should do is get... you could do it one of two ways. I've always thought that you could maybe have a podcast or get actors. I bet you if I sent out a survey—and I've done this before—we did this at The Hustle. We sent out a survey, we posted on Hacker News, and we got like 3,000 people to tell us how much money they have in their checking account, how much they have in investable assets, how much they spend each month, and then just a comment box where they could leave comments. If you search for "The Hustle founder bank account," you'll find that we did an article on it. People would give us all their information, and it was all anonymous. It was pretty great. I always thought it would be interesting to do a podcast where I just ask these people questions, and then I'll hire a voice actor just to read their responses.

Shaan Puri

Right, right, right, right. I like that. I also really like that survey kind of idea because people are very willing to share. There's no cost to them; it's anonymized. It's not being publicly shared that it's their information, but people really benefit from seeing what the aggregate is doing. So, we talked about this with salaries with Levels.fyi. I also heard the story about Levels. Someone heard our podcast about Levels, and they made it for doctors. Then it got acquired by Levels, and so they now work there.

Sam Parr

oh it got acquired

Shaan Puri

They got acquired. They got "acqui-hired," maybe is a better way to phrase it. Those guys now are like, you know, doing their thing at Levels. He's like, "Dude, thanks for that idea. It led me to... it got me off the path I was on. I built something cool, I got to learn from that, and then I got a sweet opportunity at Levels through that." But there's another one that's going viral right now. I think about 175,000 tech workers have put their stuff into this spreadsheet.

Sam Parr

yeah I've seen that what's that called it's literally just a Google sheet

Shaan Puri

"Sheet, it's like it's broken because it has too many rows now. Nobody can use it. They're asking for Excel experts to help them format this so that they don't lose the data, but people can still put their stuff in."

Sam Parr

I saw that they're basically doing it because they want to end, like, maybe if you're a minority or something at Facebook, you're like, "I don't know if I'm getting screwed here." Can everyone please enter their salary anonymously so I know, like, is this fair or not fair? Yeah, and that's how it got started. People were rallying behind it, and it went viral. I saw that, and that was pretty cool.

Shaan Puri

Yeah, alright. That's all I got for today. I have a couple of other ideas, but I'm going to save them.

Sam Parr

alright I think that was a good one

Shaan Puri

Benjamin, what do you think of this one? Give it a grade.

Sam Parr

this was an a

Ben Wilson

this was an a -

Shaan Puri

okay walk me through that

Sam Parr

it was an a it was an a it was an a because it

Ben Wilson

It was good, top to bottom. Like, all of it was good. Then I decided to add the "-" at the end because it was missing a "hose water sam" moment. It didn't have anything that I was like rolling on the floor laughing at or anything like that. So, I docked it to a "-".

Sam Parr

Dude, it's because my freaking camera's screwing up. It knocks me off my flow so much; I can't stand it. Apparently, some people say we're funny, which shocks me. The other day, Noah was like, "You have to take notes about reading a book." I'm like, "Dude, I just read a book about the Navy SEALs. What am I supposed to take notes about? How Bin Laden was shot in the head?" Apparently, people wrote in the comments that they like when we say dumb stuff like that, and that shocks me. People say they listen, and I'm like, "Really?" So, I don't know if...

Shaan Puri

You're just doing that thing where it's like **fake humble**. Like, "Gosh, I didn't know that guy." I think it's funny. I think it's funny that most...

Sam Parr

People are funny. I think you're funny as a group. I would say we're like mildly funny, but I wouldn't say "funny" is an attribute that I would give this show.

Shaan Puri

But people find it funny, and I think you're way funnier. Also, I even texted you this because you had sent me something that was so funny, and I was like, "Dude, you're funny."

Sam Parr

No, you said a "left-handed compliment." You're like, "I don't think a lot of people understand this, but you're pretty funny." I made a joke the other day. Someone posted a picture of themselves with Apollo Anton Ohno, the ice skater. I was like, "I don't know who that is." They said, "That's Apollo Anton Ohno." I replied, "Oh, sorry, I didn't recognize him without a skate somewhere." There are little comments like that, and no one laughed at it. I was like, "Guys, that's hilarious!"

Shaan Puri

that was funny that was funny

Sam Parr

I I

Shaan Puri

Should've given you a laugh because that was a good one. Yeah, so I think we're funny. You have a... you're blunt, which is funny in itself, right? You just say something and you don't hedge, which makes it even funnier because everybody hedges nowadays. So you don't hedge or apologize, which is hilarious. And then you have some good phrases or one-liners that hit.

Sam Parr

Well, I'll take it. So, Ben, a... but we'll try to get some hose water stuff. People are still calling, people tweet at me and call me hose water.

Shaan Puri

I love it alright we're out of here