Hafiz Bhuyan: Startups, History, Leadership, and Tech | #35 - The Drive Program

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Hello everyone.
My name is Tom driver.
And welcome back to anotherepisode.
Of the drive program.
Today, my guest is and I knowher fees through the society of
entrepreneurs.
It was a club that I was in atJMU.
I also touched base with himbecause we were both interested
in history, similar to theepisode with Marwan.

(00:22):
I posted out on Instagram.
Asking if there was any historyof nerds out there that would
want to do a podcast.
And Hafiz reached out.
But he's also an entrepreneur.
So we talked a lot about hiscompany as well.
So his company's name isactually very similar to my
company's name.
It's called Driven's.
a combination of driven andexcellence.

(00:44):
They actually started offwanting to create a platform for
online textbooks.
And then they pivoted to createvirtual business cards.
So one reason I bring that up isbecause me and Hafiz actually
talk about that pivot and likethe old idea.
Verse why he went in this newdirection.
But the new direction isessentially.

(01:04):
They actually do create physicalcards and then they're
scannable.
So then once you scan one of thephysical cards, it.
We'll send someone a virtualbusiness card.
The physical cards also pairwith an app.
And the app that they have iscalled the Driven's connect app.
So they actually just this week.

(01:27):
Relaunched their app.
So I'm going to be providing alink to their website.
To have visas Instagram.
And the description, butessentially they're just kind of
starting off.
So if you want to test out theapp or just be involved with
this startup, definitely reachout to Javi's.

(01:48):
And his, co-founders.
Personally, because they want tobe very involved with early
adopters.
So that's very exciting.
Like I said, I will providedetails about his company, uh,
links and everything you need toknow in the description.
So please go check thedescription out if you are.

(02:08):
Interested in Virtual businesscards, or even just using the
connect app that they're workingon.
So that's not all that we talkedabout.
As I mentioned, we talked a lotabout history.
specifically.
Uh, Viess was interested inJulius Caesar.
And Napoleon.
And then we kind of focused onleadership a lot because we

(02:29):
would draw comparisons between,you know, historical figures and
their leadership, and thencertain startups and tech
founders specifically.
He was a big fan of the Airbnbteam.
So we talked about them a lot.
And then near the end, we juststart talking a little bit
about, you know, the metaverse,and What kind of technologies me
and him are excited about forthe future.

(02:50):
So it was a great conversation.
I love connecting with Ravi'sand I mentioned this to him, but
if there's any other members ofthe society of entrepreneurs
listening, Let me know.
I love to interviewentrepreneurs, especially ones
that went to JMU.
I find that very exciting tohear what you guys are all
working on.
So if you want to.

(03:11):
Do an interview and want somehelp promoting your project or
company.
Please reach out to me.
Uh, reach out to heavies.
He'll put you in touch with me.
And here's a quick word from oursponsors.

(04:09):
This is episode 35 of the driveprogram.
With guests have fees beyond.

(04:32):
So hobbies I've been actuallypaying attention to your company
for quite a while because ourcompanies have very similar
names.
So it always draws.
It always captures my attentionwhenever I see it driven and
drive fitness.
Right.
I'm always, I'm always verycurious about what you guys are
doing because I don't know, justfor that reason.
So I feel like it's also veryfitting to have you on the show,

(04:53):
you know, the, the driveprogram.
you started this company calleddrivens, right.
And it started off as a textbookcompany.
Right.
And then you said it moved to acompany about business cards,
right.
So can you explain to me justinitially why you guys decided
to start a textbook company andwhat the initial kind of

(05:15):
business plan was, and thenwe'll get into kind of why you
pivoted, because I think that'sextremely interesting.
I think a lot of companies pivotand it's hard to make that
decision.
So it's always interesting tohear about where your guys'
heads were at first and whereyou pivoted to.
Right.
So tell me a little bit aboutthe textbook idea.
I know that you guys aren'tdoing that anymore, but tell me

(05:36):
about kind of the initial ideaand business plan first.
Yeah.
So from 20 18, 20 19 it was justme.
I didn't bring him myco-founders that points for
about, for about a year.
It's just me.
And so I came up with the idea,it was kinda like other, you
know, large companies come withtheir ideas where someone just
stumbled across one of thoseeveryday problems.
You know, I was looking fortextbooks and, you know, I think

(05:59):
the calculus textbook I waslooking at, I think I bought it
pretty early, so I got lucky,but afterwards, I dunno, for
some reason I just went back,just kind of see what the price
was.
It was like 200, two$50.
I was like, whoa, that's for onesemester.
And so, I don't know.
I think my gears were turningand I guess being around for a
whole semester did a lot of coolactivities, like idea creation

(06:19):
or just, you know, just problemsolving.
You know, I don't know, maybethere's a way to solve the
problem.
So you know, the same week and Iwas, you know, listen to
Spotify, I was like, you knowwhat?
This is like a subscription, thesubscription business model.
Hasn't really been applied, youknow, to textbooks.
So, you know, maybe try it andsee what happens.
And so, you know, I talkedaround a couple of students from
my high school and from Dora JMUthat I knew and also, you know,

(06:41):
talk with Patrick A.
Little bit.
I mean, he said, you know, thiswas a problem, but it was one of
those tough ones to solve justbecause it's, you know, just the
nature of that industry.
So through that, I mean, wedidn't really go anywhere.
We kind of just spinning ourwheels just because the way the
insurance industry set up,there's just too many big
players and you know what to doanything you just have to,
there's usually a lot of moneyor a lot of licensing stuff

(07:02):
involved.
So after two years, Even thoughwe barely get anywhere.
We still did learn a lot.
And then, what happened wasduring the pandemic, we got
lucky because everything wasvirtual.
We got to reach out to a coupleof professors at JMU and one of
them he connected us to his, oneof his publishers at one of the
larger, like textbook publishingcompanies and great guy.
We got to have two separatemeetings.

(07:23):
When our meetings with him, hetold us a lot about the industry
that we couldn't, we could notresearch.
It just wasn't out there.
And through that, we learnedthat one of the biggest things
that publishers either now or.
In the near future, they'regoing to start partnering
directly with the universities.
And I think Pearson recentlylaunched literally what we were
doing, like literally a monthago where they're offering like
literally the entire like stackof books, like, like 1500, 2000

(07:46):
textbooks for like again,subscriptions.
And so, you know, he told uslike, you know, this was
something that was going tohappen.
And like, there's just no reasonwhy they would give it to a
startup.
And because there's no way astartup can compete with that.
So like, all right.
That's.
Not even try.
And then I guess the biggestreason was we just, weren't
passionate about it.
Textbooks.
They're great, but it's notreally something that will make
me jump out of bed and, youknow, work on it for five, 10

(08:08):
years, however long it takes.
So yeah, we talked as a team,you know, by then we had it was
myself.
Chris was whose, who graduated20, 20, December, 20, 20 as an
econ major.
Henry.
Who graduated 20, 21 from CISand then Jack who actually kind
of jumped around a little bit,but they're all from JMU.
And by then we had all four ofus together.
We talked like, all right.
Yeah.
We greed that, you know, thoseare the reasons we don't want to

(08:29):
work on it.
And so we decided to spend thelast couple of weeks of 2020
just figuring out kind of, youknow, just changing our, you
know, what we were working on towhatever the next thing was.
Okay.
So the conclusion was, it was,it was still a good idea, but it
was going to take maybe someonewho was more established in the
textbook industry to kind ofconvert all of those textbooks

(08:51):
over to a subscription onlineformat.
And there wasn't enough momentumor reason for anyone to invest
in like a startup to do thissince maybe these textbook
companies already had thecapability of putting something
together like that, or they werealready working on stuff
similar.
Exactly.
Exactly.
Yup.
Okay.
Interesting.

(09:12):
And so how did.
Experience feel like in themoment to realize, Hey, like
this is not going to work out.
You know, where was your headat?
Kind of like emotionally youknow, like I said, like we, you
know, we took a step back whenwe realized that.
Our excitement about this,wasn't really about solving the
problem was most of it's aboutjust, you're excited that, Hey,
we're working on a startup, youknow, that's something cool.

(09:33):
You can bring up theseconversations or, you know,
talking to a recruiter or stufflike that.
And so, you know, not beingexcited about what you're
working on, that's, that's a bigdrawback.
Like I know you hear from likeall the founders that have made
it, like Steve jobs and youknow, Brian Chesky, they always
talked about, you gotta bepassionate about what you're
solving now, carry your further.
And so for us, it wasn't thatbig of a hit as it might've

(09:54):
been.
I mean, yeah, we did feel bummedout, you know, for two years we
were spinning our wheels reallydidn't really go anywhere.
But you know, we didn't, wedidn't, we didn't dwell on it
too long.
We just were like, all right,let's take a step back and take
a break and then go on to thenext thing.
Like, I mean, I, I love coding.
So for me it really wasn't muchof a let down or anything.
So it didn't really impact us asmuch as it could of.

(10:16):
I just picked her pieces back upand kept going.
Are you a computer sciencemajor?
No, I was.
But then I couldn't make any ofthe major sweat squash swapped
over to, I said, oh, I'm an ice.
I was an ice at major as well,man.
Yeah.
And then I heard I actuallylistened to the.
Episode you did with professorribbon and I have I have, and
this semester I had them lastsemester.

(10:39):
Tell him, I say hi.
Yeah, he was my favorite.
Well, he was, he was my captainadvisor and my favorite
professor.
So yeah, I was really honored tohave him on the show.
I mean, usually I interviewpeople who are my own age, so he
was definitely, probably one ofthe most, or the most credible
guests that I've had on, on theshow.
It's pretty cool.
So yeah.
Keep, keep in touch with him.

(11:00):
He's a, he's an awesomeprofessor and he really, a lot
of professors, I feel like losetouch with the younger
generation and I don't thinkhe's lost his touch.
I think he still kind ofunderstands what it feels like
to be the age of someone incollege, you know?
Yeah.
A hundred percent agree.
It's amazing.
Okay.
So.

(11:20):
You guys, I guess kind ofrealize you were mostly just
excited about starting acompany, the textbook, you got
the passion wasn't really inthere along with some other
reasons.
How fast did you pick this newroute of, of a business card
company?
uh, We stopped textbook thing, Iguess officially around like
November 20, 20, and then wepicked this new one up like

(11:41):
literally a month after.
So the right at the, as 2021 wasstarting because like I still
just in the background, we'relike, you know, like a lot of
people would have said we hadjust had like a folder of like
all these ideas.
So I was like, all right, whichis the one that's not going to
take as much money.
It's something I can just buildjust on my own.
digital business cards wassomething.
I had no idea how to startbuilding it.
Which kind of learned as we, aswe went, kinda like the whole

(12:02):
thing.
But starting out instead of juststraight out, just going in is
trying to build, which I knowmost engineers do.
We spent a couple of months, Iguess until spring break would
be a good time marker from likeJanuary to March, like mid-March
kinda just reached out to onLinkedIn to a lot of the
founders we met whether theywere JMU connected or like, ah,
we did Y Combinator startupschool for a couple, a couple

(12:25):
times.
That's kinda like a, kinda likea, like a whole course, but they
connect with a lot of foundersbecause they do these like
programs and they're justfounders from all over the
place.
You know, some are from the U Ssome are from Europe and we
just, you know, reaching out to.
We didn't even pitch the digitalbusiness card.
Just ask them three questionsabout business cards.
Like, you know, how much are youspending now?
do you buy business cards aslike a generic, like company

(12:46):
business card, you buy it, youknow, one free Shipley and like
how to use it.
And from that we gathered that,you know, maybe there is a spot
for a digital business cardbecause people were spending too
much.
You know, there's just like allthese problems that they were,
give it to us.
And so after that, after springbreak, we kind of consolidate
with like, all right, this issomething, you know, as, you
know, little by little try tobuild it, see what we can come
out.

(13:06):
So yeah, for us, it didn't taketoo long to kind of pivot over.
I mean, it took us a while tostart building, cause we didn't
really know how to build it.
We just kind of learn as wewent.
Yeah.
Okay.
So how does it work?
Like the functionality of theapp?
Is it something that you canscan like a barcode scanner and
then the business card is on theother person's phone or.

(13:27):
What, how, how does it kind offunction?
Yeah, so we have two componentsto it.
So one is the app itself.
So that's mainly for like, youknow, virtual connection.
So that has a QR code, which youcan send, you know, via email, a
text or really any method kindof like you, wouldn't like if
you want to send like aInstagram post to gives you all
those options same feature.

(13:48):
And then we are also building aphysical business card, which is
like, basically the way wemarket it is it has the look and
feel of a credit card, but ithas a utility of a business
card.
So it's got that same plasticfield, but instead of, you know,
exchanging financialinformation, it's just your
contact info, you know, yoursocial media accounts.
And the reason we did that asone so one, our timing, we

(14:09):
realized it was pretty spot onbecause virtual events have
started to really kick up.
Like, I think.
We found on a Statista that like40% of events this year 2022
will be either fully virtual orhalf virtual and big events that
are going to DC startup week.
I got to go to it for the firsttime solely because it was
virtual and we had people from,you know, Seattle signing in.

(14:32):
And so we realized that sure, wewere kind of beating herself up
for the last idea that we spenttwo years, but we realized that
this one, we kind of started itat a pretty good time because
now we can for, we can build outthis app early on, which is,
which costs us almost nothinglike we're using Google
Firebase, like the free tier.
So it's almost costing usnothing to build it, get those
early traction and then even thecards itself.

(14:53):
So we're using Acrylic sheets,which is basically just like
really thin pieces of plastic.
We're using X labs.
They have these massive like Iguess, cutters, vinyl, cutters.
They also got painted, goteverything over there.
X labs is really cool.
And those costs a dollar to adollar 50, including everything
to make and maybe to ship out.
So like starting out yeah, it's,you know, something simple we
can build.
We'd started with bothcomponents, virtual and physical

(15:16):
because we realized, you know,eventually you want to go to a
physical, sometimes you want tostay in a virtual setting.
All depends on your mood.
It all depends on the eventitself.
So yeah, we, so that's how itworks.
I mean, the virtual is all justto get, keep our code.
That's how going to start out,but eventually we might want to
try to maybe spice it up alittle bit.
Maybe, you know, we'll keep thatQR technology, but.
Maybe add other aspects.
I'm not sure where we're goingto go.

(15:37):
And then for the digital, forthe cards itself, that's
something you just kind of swipeeither on someone's phone or
eventually against someoneelse's card.
And that automatically transfersthe information.
Okay.
So when you hand someone, doyou, you don't hand these cards
out to people, right?
You just keep that one card andget it through a QR code or

(15:58):
something.
It goes onto their phone.
Okay.
And then, is there a way tocreate the actual business card
through your app?
Is it kind of like a canvas typeapp where you can design the
look and feel of the businesscard?
Or is it more just you importfrom somewhere else?
And then it's like a walletwhere you hold other people's

(16:19):
business cards or how does thatwork?
Actually, so the carton, so theway we're planning it now is we
just kind of build it initially,just us.
You just send the info you wantto put in.
And then you're like, you know,shipping information so we can
ship it out.
So like, you know, you put yourname, the company work email,
and then we just kind of buildkind of a generic card for
everyone uh, that we can ask,you know, if like a color that
they want.

(16:39):
But eventually we do want to addthat kind of custom build, like
where we can just pick yourcolor if you want to add your
logo or you can add like, youknow, special design however you
want, you know, kinda integrateCanva or any other kind of
design tools.
Um, But yeah, for just startingout with sending you a step,
we'll just, you know, just five,two pieces information you want
on there.
We'll definitely, upload pictureof your logo.
So you can put that on there aswell.

(17:00):
Etched in their laser laser, cutit in there and then just ship
it out.
We're gonna keep it simple,starting out.
And then, you know, depending onthe demand that we can like dial
it up.
Cause I know it does as you, asyou start adding more to, it
does add up the cost, so, okay.
So then, but the virtual cardwill look the same thing, the
same exact way.

(17:21):
Yeah.
And then, is it kind of like awallet of view of you can store
and hundreds of people's cardsin your wallet as well?
Or, yeah, I mean, we haven't, wedidn't call it a wall, I guess
we didn't really come up withthe name, but yeah, it's just
kinda like, you know, yourLinkedIn connections that has
like all the people you'veconnected with, it has, you
know, the basic info for themand, you know, reach out, send

(17:41):
an email.
We're I think we're trying tointegrate a way to send messages
through the app, but I thinkwe're going to hold off on that
for a little bit.
And we're just gonna allowpeople to just, you know, just
email first and then eventuallykind of Firebase that costs do
start adding up and we want tokind of keep it low, starting
out.
So you do use Firebase for thebackend, right?
How did you develop the frontend of the app?

(18:02):
Is it native iOS or.
Yeah, the front end is all reactnative.
And then we use Firebase for allthe backend and react native
does have there's a packagebuilt by a great team.
that allows you to import all offire bases, services, everything
from fire store, storage,dynamic planes, what everyone

(18:23):
did the whole suite of stuff andjust import it.
And you just use the Javascripts.
You don't have to use any otherlanguage.
The whole app is literally justJava script and thanks to all
those teams that, you know,integrated Firebase and allowed
us to build the app prettyquickly and easily so that we
wouldn't have to, you know,learn separate languages you
just use one language and itmade it a lot easier for, you
know, a two person team doingit.

(18:45):
Nice, man.
Yeah.
I used ionic with my app.
I think it's similar to react.
It does use a lot of JavaJavaScript and I actually did
start with Firebase as mybackend at first.
Then I switched over to AWS.
And the SQL style database.
So have you run into anytechnical challenges or what
have you kind of learned aboutmaking apps from the purely

(19:07):
technical standpoint?
No, I mean, we've, you know,you've hit the usual bugs here
and there and that's usuallyjust, you know, you call the
wrong function or you asked for,for a user to write to the fire
base, but fire store or anyother service, even though they
don't have permission because hewrote those rules down.
So it kind of, it gives you thatthose errors.
But other than that, the GoogleFirebase team did a pretty good

(19:28):
job of building it out and alsowriting up the documentation.
And then also the react nativepackages that you use their
documentations almost is alsoreally well-written like, you
can just read through it.
Yeah, so we haven't had anyproblems on it.
Usually if we do, we just kindof Google it and these packages
are so widely used that chancesare someone's already fixed it,
or at least there's some kind ofdiscussion going on.

(19:49):
And if it's pretty recent, thenyou know, a case of bug, they're
probably gonna fix it soon.
So yeah, we haven't had any bigissues.
It's just normal everyday bugs.
You get when developing thesetechnical projects, but uh,
yeah, nothing big Firebase isgreat.
We've loved it.
I mean, our website, is it amain thing?
So that's still AWS because wealready had it all set up
through that.
So we don't even feel likechanging it, but our app that's,
that's using Firebase justbecause, you know, they have

(20:10):
packages already that can beeasily used to connect the app
ends back in.
Is it on the app store?
Is it, or is it still in atesting stage?
It was on the app store.
We did try to launch it a coupleof times, but about a week would
go by and it was like, allright.
We don't like the design.
We don't like, we know what itis.
And so yeah, it is technicallyAbstra well, I did take it off
take it off from sale.

(20:31):
I think that's how they call it.
We can like temporarilydelisted.
So, you know, people can'tsearch it or did that just so we
don't have anyone downloading itwhile we're trying to launch
again.
Hopefully the next few weeks.
Okay.
Yeah, I've done.
I've taken my app off the appstore several times to tweak it
and stuff.
I understand.
So are you going to be able to,are you a senior, first of all?

(20:52):
Yep.
Last year or where you were you,does that make you a freshmen?
When I was a senior?
Yeah, I'm a fifth year seniorright now.
Okay.
Yes, I was a fresh.
Okay.
I graduated at 17.
Yeah.
I graduated in 2018.
Oh yeah.
Okay.
So were you in, were you in thesociety of entrepreneurs?

(21:15):
When I was there?
Did we overlap at all or maybefirst semester?
I don't know.
I mean, there were a lot ofmembers back then, so we
might've brushed past, but Ithink it must have been very
brief.
I mean, I heard things about,you know was it Josh, like
either the metrics celebrated alot of the people that she did
it with, I got to meet, youknow, the human team Sienna, and
then Josh all those guys, I kindof heard about you through them,

(21:35):
but yeah.
Okay, cool.
Did you end up making this, yourcapstone project through Isaac?
No, I did not know that that'ssomething else.
We're doing, what do you, whatdoes that, bro?
What are you doing for yourcapstone?
I mean, this could be a separateteam, but we're trying to build
like this, a web platform tohelp high-school upperclassmen,
like juniors and seniors, likebetter pick give them an, an

(21:57):
additional tool so they can picka major or career path, much
easier.
So, you know, they put it inlike, you know, stuff, they like
doing their strengths orweaknesses, hobbies, and then
we'd just give them a list oflike here here's, you know,
majors that you might want toexplore.
And then we, you know, give themlike resources that they can
use.
Cause I know like when I kind ofchose, I kind of, I won't say
blindly, but it was, I didn'thave as many resources.
So we just thought, you know,that this might be another

(22:19):
additional tool that, you know,these, these juniors and seniors
can use to better picksomething.
Hopefully, hopefully somethingthat they'll like, and they
don't have to constantly secondguess themselves.
What platform and software stackare you using for that capstone?
That one's really simple.
We're just using AWS.
I set all that up.
You know, as a backend this isthe basic stuff to get a website

(22:40):
up.
And then for coding for thefront end, it's just the basic
web text, HTML, CSS, JavaScript.
We have no reason to, you know,add any frameworks, like react
because it's gonna try to makeit as simple as possible.
Have the backend.
I think I want to use PHP causethat's what I'm more used to,
but you know, if they want touse, if rest of my team wants
use Java, then that's fine too.
It doesn't matter.

(23:00):
Cool, man.
Yeah.
Okay.
So what, what, how has yourexperience just in the society
of entrepreneurs been?
Because that's kind of how weknow each other.
I've I found it very.
Inspirational and, and helped alot.
Just kind of believing inyourself and keep moving forward
since starting your own companyis, it seems like you've got a
big team, but it's usually sucha solo tasks that you kind of,

(23:23):
you don't get a lot ofreinforcing positive feedback,
always, you know, to keep goingforward.
So I found it very helpful justto have other people I could
relate to and get a differentperspective on things from, but
how has your experience been andhow has that helped you with the
company at all?
Yeah, I mean, I know.

(23:44):
After, I believe after eitheryou left or maybe you're after
that we had like a massiveamount of seniors graduating.
So I think it came down toliterally just me, Josh Clements
and Ty Dan we, I think we did,Dan was president and then Josh
was V VP.
And then I think I was likesecretary of some of the third
role and we just kind of pickthe pieces back up cause
everyone just graduated.

(24:05):
So it was just us three of us.
But between then and now we, wedefinitely grew not as big as it
used to be when I was afreshmen, but definitely there's
that quality is still there.
So there's probably about 10 to15 now.
mean we're still kind ofrecruiting in a way, so it might
be 10 to 20 before I leave.
But the good part is I'm theonly one graduating and the rest
of the guys that are stayingback, they are, you know, super
passionate.

(24:25):
We got people from all over, youknow, we have, we have one
freshman from engineering.
We have people from marketing.
We got I think we have a fewfrom like the fine arts, but
yeah, I mean just being aroundthem We've been Nestle as a
whole.
It's definitely helped me breakout of my shell.
I know when I came in, I waspretty, very, very introverted.
Like I would not like I hatedpublic speaking.
It was not my strong suit, butnow, I mean, I love, I mean,

(24:47):
yes, that, that little bit ofnervousness is still there, but
now, I mean, I'll go up and talkabout, you know, whatever, you
know, my company, or like, youknow, my experience at JMU.
I sat, whatever I know as asenior I think we've gone to a
couple of the freshmen ISATclasses.
It's kind of talked about ourcapstone.
So it was kind of publicspeaking stuff that I definitely
helped me out.
I mean, so he just helped meout, you know, just all these
like interpersonal skills that Iwouldn't, I honestly would not

(25:10):
have learned if it wasn't forjust being around all these
other students that are alsobuilding stuff.
But yeah.
So he was, I guess like anintegral part of like, you know,
not just driven, but also just,you know, me becoming like
better, I guess, student betterprogrammer better, like almost
everything.
I mean, I interviewed Josh onthe podcast too, and I reached
out to Ty, Dan.

(25:31):
I almost interviewed him once.
I need to just jump on a zoomcall with him at some point, but
I was for awhile, I was prettybent on trying to interview
people in person.
And I, I also just liked thatguy.
So I was trying to see, I wastrying to see him and do an in
person interview, but at somepoint probably the summer I'll
reach out to him and see howhe's doing, because I just love

(25:51):
his brand.
I would always wear my diabetesshirt even to this day, you
know?
So why did you name it driven?
What does the name mean?
I'm always curious by why peoplename things the way they do.
Yeah.
So I just kind of give myself aweek.
I just started, you know,writing things down and like,
okay, what, what do I want torepresent all these things?
Like I Googled, you know, howdoes branding work?

(26:12):
I Google like all the storiesbehind, like, you know, the name
of Starbucks, Lego, Ikea.
Like some of them really outthere, some of them really
intriguing.
Like I know Ikea is a, the inkor the initials of the founder
and the eat and a is like hisvillage and like the county.
So like pretty abstract stuff.
So I was like, all right, Iguess it doesn't really matter
what you name it.

(26:33):
me, I just want it to sound, Iguess the techie I wanted it to,
you know, try to, so based on mythree criteria for it was I had
of sound tech.
You had to be one word, it hadto be a.com available for the
domain.
And so I just started tobrainstorm.
I don't even know what I wasbrainstorming.
I just started listing off namessounded cool.
And then eventually I was like,okay, these one name.
Really don't work.

(26:53):
And so drivens is likecombination of the words driven,
driven to excellence, which Itake that to mean, like, just
getting up every day and justlike being better than you were
the day before.
It's constantly improvingyourself.
They're going to just, you know,one step that's still better
than you were the day before.
And what's cool is like, thereason I like the name is like,
it's pretty abstract so we canreally be about anything.
So like we can be buildingwhatever and can still make

(27:15):
sense.
Like we don't have to go out andget a new domain name.
We don't have to change ouremails.
Everything can stay the same.
And yeah, we just liked the nameand we liked kind of what it
represents.
And then, yeah, that's just howwe came up with it really
wasn't, you know, They're justlike making sure that, you know,
it just sounds cool.
It's got the name, it's gotthe.com domain, which we got our
actually I know excellent.

(27:36):
Spelled a C E N C E, but drivenswith a seat.com was taken.
So I was like, all right, let'sput an S and N germans.com with
an S there's a car.
Right.
Perfect.
So NAB that.
And that's how we spell it oneof my friends that was in the
venture started with it, he'slike, Hey, you spelled it wrong.
I was like, no.
Yeah, man.
That's awesome.
I obviously love the namebecause it's got a very similar

(27:58):
theme to my podcast, right.
I, I actually, at first thepodcast started off as just me
interviewing people that couldhelp me with, or relate to my
app in some way.
So it was just called, likedrive fitness, but you know, the
whole dry part has always beenthere.
And the new theme of thepodcast, I guess, is just me
talking to people who are thosetype of driven people who are

(28:19):
going above and beyond either infitness or in business or tech
or really anything.
Right.
I want to, to open up to just beanything.
But I do, if there's onestipulation, it's just, they
gotta be driven.
You know, they gotta bepassionate about something and
they got to really just be thekind of person that, that is
always taking that next stepforward, you know?

(28:41):
So, so I love it.
I love that.
Let's see, so we originallyconnected because I posted on my
story for any history nerds tohit me up and you reached out,
so let's try and talk abouthistory for a couple minutes.
Yeah, yeah.
That goes I actually, I talkedto someone else about a recently
and I think the, the one thingthat you mentioned that I never

(29:02):
got the chance to talk with himabout is kind of like the
history of technology ingeneral.
So why are you interested inhistory?
You know, why did you reach outabout that topic?
And then specifically, why areyou interested in kind of how
technology evolved throughhistory?
Yeah.
So for me, history, it wasalways like.
Like an easy subject for me,like school.

(29:25):
Like I was always fascinated byit and it made it easier cause
like all the teachers I've hadeven the, one of the gen ed
classes I took at JMU, theprofessor I had was amazing.
Like you can tell, like theyhad, they were very passionate
about the topic.
They just wanted to share itwith their students and like
that combined with just, youknow, just fascinating.
I just love learning about allthese different things.
And you know, because of that, Ijust loved history and you know,

(29:47):
I won't say I'm a scholar oranything, but you know, I try to
learn as much as I can.
And I, and I, you know, youasked me kinda like what time
periods?
I got fascinated.
I mean, I love the Roman period.
I love just like learning kindof how, you know, people that
same goes like Rome wasn't builtin a day.
And just like actually goingthrough the trudging through
that history of like men, ittook them like hundreds of years
to get to where they were.

(30:07):
And then even it took him acouple more hundred techs, feet,
I guess, collapse.
And then I know in a historyclass, he told us all the time
Where, you know, we learnhistory, like, you know, we
learned Greeks first and learnedthe Romans and learned the
British and just go throughthere, but then they're like,
but then if you line upeverything on the timeline you
realized, like when Alexanderwas over in India doing his
thing, Rome was just gettingstarted.
So, so if Alex I think, I don'tknow if it was a YouTube video

(30:30):
or it was a class like adiscussion, but it was like, if
Alex was still alive, we have,if he decided to swing west,
could he have taken out theRomans before they became Rome?
And so, I don't know.
It's just, it's just afascinating topic.
Like there's so many things youcan go around.
And then I don't know, Polianakind of got into him and then I
know, you know, just kind of, Iguess like a little side, but
like there's this video game Ilove it's called total war and

(30:51):
it's basically, they take thesetime periods.
Like their most popular ones arearound and it's Tila.
He also, you know, God until the18th century where it's just.
You know, like I'm a gamer, butlike those kind of help you like
delve right into thosehistories.
Like you get to play as likeJulius Caesar and like conquer,
gall, like take his lesions,like do all these things.
And I don't know, just likehistory is just one of those
things.
That's always stuck by me.

(31:11):
It's easy for me to grasp.
And it's just really cool tokind of see like, you know, how
all these people kind of livedand how, it's kind of
fascinating how we went fromhorse-drawn carriages to rocket
ships.
And like, not even 50 years,like in like 19 hundreds, we
were like horse and buggy andlike 1950, we were almost
putting a guy on the moon andthat's just like an insane so I

(31:32):
guess using that, like going onlike technology I mean tech like
the history of technology, soI'm not too.
Like, you know, I don't knoweverything about it, but, you
know, I know about the.comcrash.
I know, you know, how differentlanguages are involved.
I think I learned about like,you know, how like, you know,
DARPA and invented the internetfirst and then recently, and
then after that to kind of giveit, I guess, to the public.
And I think it's Tim BernersLee.

(31:52):
He was like the founder.
He's like one of the, he waslike, I think he led the team or
if he was powered at the, he waspart of the founding team that
took the internet and open it upto the world.
It's just pretty crazy how justlike technology has exploded in
just the past couple of years.
And like how it's pretty openNally, anyone from anywhere can
really develop cool tech.

(32:12):
Since I'm in the community, youknow, just try to see kind of
where it was and where it's,where it is now and where it's
hopefully going to be.
Yeah, man you mentioned Rome.
I had a big conversation withsomeone recently about Rome that
I'm excited for that podcast tocome out, because that is just a
crazy, interesting civilizationthat really impacted modern
culture.
Right.
And then if you're interested inthe history of tech, there's a

(32:34):
book called innovation and howit works.
I think, I think by Matt Ridleyand it's a book that kind of
details all of these littleinnovations across history,
right?
Like one of the big one is, isthe Wright brothers and the
plane.
But there's some interestingstuff in there.
Like they had a whole chapter onthe screw and how the screw
evolved over time and howimportant to screw us.

(32:54):
You know, we think about stufflike the airplane airplane in
the rocket ship, but I neverreally thought about.
How goddamn important it was to,to invent screws, you know, and,
and how much change thataffected everywhere.
And that was, that was a superinteresting read, you know, to
hear about all that kind ofstuff.
I don't remember everythingabout that book, but that was
one of the things that reallystood out to me is, is just like

(33:16):
how, how much we were able tobuild once we mastered, you
know, the screw itself.
So what, what are, what are someof your favorite innovations,
you know, and which, which kindof technological innovations do
you think had some of thebiggest impacts across time
then?
I'd say like in general atfirst, I guess like all these

(33:38):
open source technologies likereact native.
I know you said ionic.
I know, I appreciate that.
It's open source as.
People creating these projectsand then allowing other people
to kind of build on top of it.
And so things like GitHub repo,and just being able to
collaborate using differenttools like GitHub or Google
drive.
Yeah, I guess not really anyspecific technology, but I think

(34:00):
because someone one starts onething and then you just like
kind of piles up on top ofanother let's eventually build
something.
Cause usually those, thosetechnologies are built for a
specific purpose, but thenpeople realize, oh, you know, we
can definitely build more.
Yeah, I mean, I guess nothingreally specific that I can pull
it out, but okay.
So what about someone likeNapoleon or who's one of your

(34:22):
favorite storable figures then.
Why are you interested in thatperson?
Yeah.
One of the guys always stands upto me is the Julius Caesar.
He was like, just as a leader,like he could inspire people.
Even though he was basicallygrew up with a silver spoon in
his mouth, he grew up wealthyfrom a wealthy family.
You probably never had to worryabout, you know, food, like

(34:44):
other Roman citizens had to, butat the same time, he was able to
like inspire, you know, like ahundred thousands of soldiers to
literally turn on their owncountry, literally across the
Rubicon, just cause he said,Hey, you know, follow me, but
that's just kind of the leaderhe was.
And I know he also, he tookinspiration from Alexander, the
great, who was probably the bestwell-known The guy, but I guess
Julius Caesar stands out themost because he wasn't just a

(35:06):
conqueror, but he also like justbuilds an empire.
He conquered all of modern dayFrance with just like, you know,
a handful of soldiers.
And, you know, I watch, youknow, like documentaries on
YouTube of like all hisdifferent battles, like polizia
or how you invaded Englandwithout even knowing what
England was.
He just kind of went there andhis troops followed him.
And like just those simplethings of, you know, just
getting all these soldiers tofollow you, even though they

(35:29):
know they might not make it,like those kinds of small
things, especially for likegenerals.
It's like always fascinated me,like how they're able to just,
just inspire these guys.
And then, you know, you know,cause because I know, you know,
one of the things that Caesarused to do is like when its
troops started getting tired,he'd get off his horse and just
start walking with them.
Or like he wouldn't, he didn'thave like a fancy tent.
He'd just sleep on a regular,you know, on the ground, on the

(35:51):
regular, basically do what hissoldiers were doing and like.
That's what, that's one of thethings I was always emphasized
because I did actually takeLatin all throughout high
school.
And, you know, we did touch alot about, you know, Caesar and
like all his books.
And that's one of the thingsthat always stood out was just
the love his troops had forforum.
And, you know, not just astroops, but every time he'd go,

(36:12):
he'd come back to Rome.
He'd always take care of thepeople.
Like when he became a quoteunquote dictator you know,
people got scared that he usedto take this power and it's
gonna go to his head, buthonestly, like he's probably
just going to make the empirebetter.
And then also watch the showRome that was on HBO for like
two seasons, which was twoseasons way too short.
Like they could have gonefurther, but that was such an
incredible show.

(36:33):
Great cast.
And that really.
Put Julius Caesar, wasn't kindof visualized him.
Like you got to see him, likewhen he, obviously it wasn't,
you know, perfectly, he can't,we know what happened there, but
a lot of stories, he said like,you know, praise it.
I was probably the closest thingthat could get.
And unfortunately they didn'thave the most funding so they

(36:53):
can be shown all of it.
The parts that sticks out to meis like, right before you cross
the Rubicon with his troops, hekind of just stands out in front
of us.
Okay.
You know, they declared me atrader, they called me a
criminal, which means you're allcriminals.
They were like, Hey, no, that'snot what we are.
And he's like, all right, let'sliterally become actual traders.
Let's cross the Rubicon.
It's like, they followed him.

(37:13):
And I don't know, just him as aperson, he almost seems like
just like he was larger thanlife, but he kind of knew who he
was.
He knew he didn't, he, he knewhow to kind of command his
presence.
And people knew me showed up.
And like, when he died, like thewhole world kind of just like
almost froze, like his soldiersloved it.
And even after that, they helpedhis Was Augustus and Mark
Anthony days stayed with themand like help them like get

(37:36):
revenge.
So like being someone like thatin life.
And then after even now like2000 years after he's dead, like
I'm still talking about him.
So definitely he was definitelyone of those guys that just like
the way he inspired people, butsee how you as a leader, how he
kind of just went about hislife, even though he was rich
and he still took care of thepeople that were, you know, I
guess in a way like societalleaders below him.

(37:58):
So you have, for me Julius,Caesar's the guy that always
stands out as like this guy inhis history that, you know, I
was loved reading about alwaysknowing more about them.
Yeah.
At one point you mentioned howhe would see what the soldiers
and stuff.
It, it reminded me of one of myfavorite kind of quotes or
pictures.
It's the picture of a guycracking the whip and he's, you
know, commanding people frombehind them to run faster or

(38:20):
whatever.
And then it's like trueleadership and it shows the guy,
the leader is in front of thepack, right.
Like leading the way.
And, and I really think that issomething I always try to keep
in mind with my company or withany, with any leadership
opportunity, but I'm alwayswilling to kind of get down, get

(38:40):
my hands dirty and make sure,you know, everyone knows that
I'm not above doing the smallesttasks, you know and, and, and
doing what everyone else isdoing in order to lead by
example and not just lead bycommanding people, you know,

(39:00):
Yeah.
What other than that, what doyou think makes a leader?
Great.
What do you think makes someonelike a person inspirational and
maybe is there any otherexamples of, of people from it
could be from history or fromlike startup companies that, you
know, are, are really you thinkreally great other great

(39:21):
examples of, of leaders andinspiration, inspirational
people.
Yeah.
So for me, I think one of thethings that I guess, like a
philosophy or like a principlethat I came up with for
leadership is one, like a goodleader knows when to show his
heart.
But he also knows when it showsstrength.
Like you, don't a leader,shouldn't be someone that can
just walk over.

(39:41):
But at the same time, theyshouldn't be completely like
jerk to the people that they'releading.
And so, you know, just havingempathy for all the people that
you know, are either followingyou, whether, you know, you
know, it's a job or it's, youknow, some other setting just
having empathy, knowing whatthey're going through, being
able to talk to them as a personand not as a bus follower
mentality.
And just like, I guess just notnothing good of yourself as too

(40:05):
high might even be more, youknow, following you.
And yeah, it's, it's, I guessit's not many things.
Just like just being a person,just knowing like, yeah.
People are following me becausethey see something in me, even
if you don't see it in yourself.
And a lot of leaders that, youknow, you know, you like, you
know, as companies, many of themwere just, you know, just
regular people.
And then they eventually, youknow, are leading companies that

(40:26):
are employing thousands ofpeople, many of them to start
out the artists are just coders.
They built something andeventually became a massive
company.
I don't know, I don't know,outside of history.
One of the founders that I'vealways looked up to as well, not
one finally the whole foundingteam of Airbnb Brian, Joe, and
Nathan I mean, cause I've, I'veheard both of their, all their
stories.
I listened to their podcasts forhow I built this, which is

(40:47):
amazing podcast by guy Razi andinterviews, kinda like what
you're doing.
Interviews all these foundersfrom almost like literally every
industry everyone from theAirbnb team to the strike team,
to the founders of dipping dots,to, you know, the Dyson guy and
founder of Dyson.
And I, I just love how they leadtheir team.
And actually one of the thingsthat stood out to me, it was
like a running with the pandemicstarted.

(41:08):
This is great.
And it, a story that he toldactually in, in the podcast was
that, you know, right on thepen, Starbuck, Airbnb is like
travel company.
So, you know, shutdowns werehappening, people weren't
traveling.
And so in about, I think it's athree or four weeks 80% of the
business that spent that tookthem eight years to build it was
just gone.
And so they had to fire almostlike 1400 people.
And, you know, he sent out aletter.

(41:30):
To all the employees.
And it's just like, I, I keepmeaning to read the letter, but
what he say, he was just veryvulnerable.
Like, you know, this isn'tsomething that, you know, he
wants to do, but he kind of hasto do it just to save everyone
else.
And that's just like the natureof what their business was.
But what stood out to me waswhat they did after they did
that was all those 1400 peoplethat would continue getting paid

(41:51):
for 14 weeks after they wouldcontinue receiving health
insurance for another year,because his justification was
like, you know, we're in apandemic, people need to, you
know, take care of their health.
And then at the end, what hasthe adding the 12 that the
founding team.
So Brian, Joe and Nate, theykind of met.
They're like, Hey, you know,let's, you know, let's have our
own hiring team help these guys,these 1400 new jobs.

(42:15):
And so, you know, I, I sharedthis story with like my own
team.
I was like, you know, that's howyou're supposed to lead.
I mean, it, it happens like itwas a pandemic, it's a travel
company, but like how you takecare of them after that.
Oh, that's just very inspiringto me.
Like no one wants to, I know, Iknow the Airbnb team, I don't
know the like, you know,closely, but from what I've
heard, they seem like amazingguys.

(42:35):
They're not guys who just wantto fire 1400 people.
But you know, just taking careof your team, even after this
fortunate, like that happens,like that's leadership, like
that's like take care of you.
Don't fire us.
That's in complete contrast towhat the better.com CEO did, who
just sent us to call fire 900people.
The benefits to God were almostnothing.
And I think last week, Pelotonfired a bunch of people.

(42:56):
And again, same thing.
The benefits were almostnothing.
Like you just kicking thesepeople to the curb in the middle
of the pandemic.
And that's just not how leadersare supposed to be like the way
the Airbnb team did.
I don't know many othercompanies probably do the same
thing.
Like either they did somethinglike Peloton day, they just
fired him.
Just kind of kicked me to thecurb or they did some like the
Airbnb team and that kind of, Ithink the pandemic.

(43:17):
In a way kind of showed kind ofhow people lead.
Like either you're going toticket, you're going to dial it
down and just take care of yourteam, or you're just going to
be, I guess, a jerk then kickpeople to the curb.
So yeah, I mean, I like, youknow, that's definitely
inspiring to me just seeing likehow during these difficult
times, like they're able to kindof dig deep and really show how
they are as leaders.
And so for me, those Airbnb teamhas always been, you know, like

(43:40):
the north star for us.
Like they've been, even thoughthere are industries are
completely different, but itjust us founders, like they have
been incredible.
But yeah yeah, I mean, it seems,it sounds like he showed some
true empathy and really, youknow, felt bad, not bad, but he
really understood what everyonewas going through and did the
best he could to help out and,and explain to everyone and

(44:01):
really.
Sympathize with the people beinglaid off instead of just
treating it like a statistic,you know, which is, yeah, I
don't hate my past company.
Micro-strategy at all.
I think they're great, but itdid feel a little bit calculated
and less empathetic, you knowwhen they let go a lot of people
as well, you know, so yeah, man,that, that can be a really rough

(44:22):
situation.
So I'm glad Airbnb handled itproperly.
Yeah.
What else do you like aboutAirbnb and their idea?
I feel like your, your firstidea of the textbook ideas, not
crazy different from them,right.
I mean you're, you're kind ofcreating a platform for other
textbooks.
Like they created a platform forother hotels.

(44:43):
I'm sure that was your mindsetgoing into it.
I mean maybe related to Uber orsomething, but what do you think
about these companies that havebuilt platforms without ever
owning a car or owning a pieceof real estate?
What do you think is theirtrick.
Like we, like you said, you weretrying to build this textbook
platform without ever, you know,writing a textbook first.

(45:06):
And it turned out that maybesome of the textbook companies
were more suitable for that.
So, but it never felt like oneof the taxi companies were more
suitable to be Uber.
Right.
So what do you, what, what doyou think makes the Uber ideas,
the Airbnb idea ideas, soperfect for the industry.
And then I guess what other typeof types of industries or

(45:30):
situations or things do, do youfeel that.
W would work with, with thatkind of business plan?
What do you think makes thattype of business plan so
successful?
I guess my hypothesis for it wasthe 2008 recession that
happened.
I think that's when all thosecompanies, Airbnb door, dash
Uber, like the wholepeer-to-peer industry, I feel

(45:50):
like the eight recession wasreally what kind of helped them
out.
Because one, you have people onone side, especially in the
travel industry, you have peopleon one side that want to just a
cheaper way to kinda getsomewhere.
Cuba would stay.
And on the other side, you hadpeople who, you know, want to
just make extra money and yougot that perfect mix.
I feel like if it wasn't forthat, you know, that downturn

(46:10):
and everyone's, you know, adownturn in the economy where
people were looking on bothsides.
Cause, and these markets youneed, it's the chicken and egg
problem.
Like, you know, you gotta getproperties first, but you also,
but people aren't really gonnaput the properties if you have,
if you have users activelylooking for them But, you know,
during that downturn, sincepeople are looking to make extra
money, some people are trying tofind better ways to get around

(46:31):
the city or better, cheaper wayto stay in the city whether
business or, you know justpersonal well, yeah, that was
just like, my thing is like, ifthat didn't happen, I don't
think any of these companieswould have, well, they probably
would have succeeded at somepoint, but just not, they
probably wouldn't have gottenthe success that you have now
because eventually that successkind of started rolling and they
just kinda went with it.
And you know, we just got biggerand bigger, but I guess that's

(46:53):
just my way of thinking.
I mean, I know there's.
One company, probably a bunch ofthem where I don't know, we used
it when my family, when I wentto Miami for spring break, 2018
and 2019 where my dad basicallypaid for.
So hotels you know, people, youdon't park there too much.
And so especially up in the DCarea.
And so this is these startupscome up to him and basically,
Hey, just tell them, Hey, youwant to like, you know, I guess

(47:15):
like sell parking spaces, theseunsold parking spots.
And he just given to travelerswho don't want to pay those, you
know, expensive airport parkingfees.
And so we paid, I think likevery cheap.
I, it was like 20,$30.
I don't even know if like awhole, you know, weekend.
He just kept at the hotels likeMarriott.
They just had all these emptyspaces.
They're like a bunch ofcompanies that do that.
And there was another one wherepeople who do park at the

(47:36):
airport, they can actually like,I guess kind of like Touro where
you can kind of go rent your carout in a way, except it's like
specifically park it at theairport or something.
But yeah, like all these, like.
I guess platforms and stops arecoming out where people use
things that they already own.
And these comp you're justgiving a platform with a K you
can make some extra moneyrenting these out.
I don't Turo.

(47:56):
I saw him like for the firsttime, like two years ago, like a
downloaded, there'll be like, Ican, DCW people renting out like
their, you know, their beefed upMustangs or like Aston Martins
or Porsche's for like a coupleof hundred oh an hour, like a
couple of hundred a day, whichis much cheaper than most like
rental companies.
It's definitely with thoseindustries, that's definitely
booming.
You know, people want to makemoney and people want to have a

(48:17):
cheaper way of doing differentthings.
Definitely has a lot of room togrow.
I dunno if I don't know whatother industries haven't been
touched yet.
I mean, yeah.
Delivery of accommodationsparking it seems like you need
to identify some value, right.
That someone is sitting on andthen give them a way to share
that or, or sell that value.
Right.
And I guess the textbook ideawas going to be more within like

(48:40):
a B2B paradigm, but maybe ifthere was like a used textbook
idea right.
Where people are sitting ontextbooks and maybe they could,
I mean, I'm sure there's alreadyplatforms like that.
It exists, but something likethat because the text textbook
companies don't want to workwith something like you, someone
like you.
Right.
But someone's sitting on 12 usetextbooks from college, so they

(49:00):
don't use anymore.
That's a similar comparison towhat like the Airbnb companies
are doing.
Right.
Just finding value sittingaround that, that no one is
really capitalizing on, youknow, it just seems to be like,
there's so many situations likethat.
Right.
But I've thought about it beforewith gym equipment.
Like, is there a way I cancreate a platform that people

(49:21):
can share fitness equipment orsomething?
And I was like, nah, you don'twant someone just walking into
your like in-home gym and thenusing it.
It's not maybe, maybe, but Ithought of an idea like that
too.
Right.
Where something like that couldbe done.
I think a couple of our SOE geta preacher.
You've seen it.
A rectory was a Griffin and aGriffin Nick Sipes.

(49:42):
And then I forgot the thirdco-founder, but like, yeah, it's
basically just like a, like thisbox where they have like all
these rental equipment.
I mean, I don't think it's meantfor gyms.
I think it's mainly, it's notreally peer to peer, but it kind
of gives they buy the stuff toput in there, but.
You know, they just put it, theyhave one in Charleston towns,
like four of them inHarrisonburg.
It's these boxes with like, youknow, maybe like athletic stuff,

(50:03):
like basketballs or volleyballs,all these things that, you know,
you don't have to necessarilybuy yourself cause it's already
there.
So I think that that's kind oflike peer-to-peer, but it's
kinda like kind of knocking offthe, getting rid of the chicken
and egg problem.
Cause you already have thestuff.
So people just go up and get it.
You don't have to wait for, youknow, you know, not like Uber
where you need to have a bunchof users and then you also need
a lot of drivers at the sametime.

(50:24):
But yeah, I feel like that'skind of close in a way, no.
Yeah, that's definitelyinteresting and probably more
doable than the gym equipmentidea because gym equipment is
heavy, heavy and hard to move.
So this is a question I've I'vefound is kind of fun to ask
people who are into history.
If you had to be a foot soldierin one army, and from any point
in history, which one would youchoose and then a general in any

(50:48):
army, which one would you chooseand then like a dictator or a
leader, or like a president?
Like the highest ranking personin a society throughout history
for those three categories.
What, what three kind ofcivilizations or armies or
categories are you picking?
Ooh, I mean, in one way, I'd seea room for all three, but you

(51:08):
can't pick this up, so which onefor Rome, would you be a foot
soldier, a general or a, like adictator so for Rome, I think
I'd definitely be a general justbecause.
Just at that time, generals werejust frankly, more powerful
than, you know, the consolewhere the emperor was in a way,
because those soldiers were, Iguess, from what I've read, they
were more loyal to their to thegeneral than they were to, you

(51:32):
know, whoever the, you know,console or that Burt was as a
foot soldier I'd have to say itwould be someone that the 18
hundreds, so like they'reNapoleonic or like American
civil war.
I'm not sure why it's highly, atleast if it wasn't a poli, I
know that his leadership stylewas similar to Caesar's, but his
upbringing, it was muchdifferent where Napoleon came up

(51:53):
from, basically the slum waslike, he wasn't playing, he
didn't have a silver spoon inhis mouth.
Um, And so just being a soldierin that army would be pretty
cool cause the DBC decimatedtheir way through Europe and
just being part of that history,if I can survive it, I guess.
And then I guess for a presidentI probably have to deal with
like world war II, that era,like, I don't, because by that

(52:14):
time general would probably beclose, but I feel like as a
president, you can do a lot moreyou have a lot more influence,
like being like, you know,Roosevelt or Churchill.
Cause like, I think couple ofmonths ago back when Netflix had
it and we saw my family and I,we watched the movie with
Churchill, I think it's it was adarkest hour, I think.
It was with Gary Oldman of agreat movie, really show like
sure.
Show being like, you know, likethe politician he was, but like,

(52:34):
yeah, just, those would be threeseparate times.
Just cause just cause thoseroles were so much different.
Like being a general in worldwar two.
the effects, the dynamics ofbeing a general at that time, it
was much more different than youwere in Rome.
And being a general Rome, youdidn't have like, you know,
radios, you didn't have plainstouts.
You literally had dues on horsesand, you know, at the most would

(52:54):
be drums.
Just that different atmospherewould probably make more things,
things a lot more challenging.
But yeah, those were, I guess,three separate times that
fascinated me.
That would be those differentparts.
Yeah.
Every leader from world war IIis iconic in history, right?
Like Hitler, Stalin, Roosevelt,Churchill.

(53:16):
Right.
All of those people are soiconic.
So that would be a good timeperiod to be the absolute like
leader, you know, and everydecision they made made was so
crucial and important.
And just like you were saying,it was touched such a different
battle, it wasn't numbers on theboard.
It was true strategy, you know?
And then you said Napoleon, youseem interested in, in Napoleon

(53:37):
and his era.
Why, why him?
Why are you interested in him?
Yeah, pretty similar to thereason for Caesar.
It is just like how you led, butalso how you know, when he
conquered all of Europe, he was,I think I read it again, like
either from like a documentaryor from like book, but like at
that point, when you had all ofEurope, you know, he reached all
the way to Russia.
He was the only emperor slashking in Europe that wasn't from

(54:01):
like a Royal lineage.
So he was the only guy leadingdidn't get his position passed
down to him, like every other.
So like England, Prussia,Russia, all of them, they were
Royal lineages.
So they all got threatened.
And how it took literally all ofEurope to come together.
Probably I think the only timein history when.
You know, those countriesactually came together to take

(54:22):
down to the pulling.
Like it took the whole strengthand, and, you know, there were
other stuff I know he went toSpain, but that didn't work at
Spain was basically like hiscold war.
And that was at Vietnam.
That was in Afghanistan.
He just couldn't, you know, techsucceed in Spain.
Like he couldn't other places,but yeah, I mean, it's just like
him just coming up from almostnothing and just using, I guess,
in a way using the Frenchrevolution to his advantage.

(54:43):
But then his troops loved them,just like, you know, Caesar's
lead just loved him.
Like, you know, when thosetroops, the first time he was
exiled before, what is thebattle of Waterloo?
Like he came out of exile.
He literally uses, grabbed aship came to some town in
France, the.
The temporary king sent itstroops down to arrest him.
But they're just like, yeah,we're not arresting him.
We love this guy.
He literally went up and huggedhim.

(55:04):
Like he literally came back toParis, the troops that were sent
to like arrest him like that.
That's like Caesar level crazy.
Like, and then just him justwinning all his battles, like,
you know, being able to movetroops from one place to another
that would take days and did anhours.
And then his, like, I guess hisequivalent of generals.
So he called him his marshals.
Like they were super talented,like, like I'd watch like all

(55:25):
the battles that they did andit's just him just kind of
goading his enemies.
Like forced them to kind of, youknow, move to the low ground and
give up the Hills.
Like he knew, like he, he knewhow to play as opponents and
like this almost chess, likemaneuver and like, yeah.
I don't know if you've seenthose like YouTube videos where
it kind of like shows like thebattles of shows, like how, you
know, trips for mood, but likeyou just see it, you just kind

(55:46):
of see how, you know, like thiswas before radio, just before
all these technologies, like heused all these primitive stuff
and he still won battles where alot of times it looked like he
was gonna lose.
you know, similar to kind ofCaesar in a way, but just the
style, the way you led theimpact he had on history.
I mean, he only lived not likehis rain wasn't even that long,
like I think not even a decadeand a half, but even during that

(56:07):
small period of time.
Oh.
And then, I mean, he did sell,you know, Louise and purchase to
America's best.
That was pretty big too.
But yeah, like just the impacthe had in history, even for the
short amount of time that he wasthere.
It's honestly pretty incredible.
Just like considering just likewhere he came from and then what
he ended up becoming.
Yeah, man.
So I talked about Julius Caesarand Hitler some with a guy named

(56:31):
Marwan, who is someone else whoreached out, who was interested
in history.
And we kind of decided that thatJulius Caesar was more of a
morally just person, right.
That he, he did want what wasbest for Rome.
And he did kind of try to putthe country before himself.
Like he wasn't, he was adictator, but he wasn't like an

(56:52):
evil self-absorbed person.
Right.
But, but then obviously Hitlerdoes fall under the category of,
I mean, we pin them as evil.
And, and he is someone who had alot of moral flaws with him and,
and, and was not a morally justperson Napoleon to me, feels
like.
He's in a gray area.

(57:12):
Right.
So I've seen people throw him inthe category with Hitler.
Like he's not a Hitler, but buthe gets tied in there with him
sometimes.
And then you're kind of loopinghim in with Caesar.
Some, you know somesimilarities.
Do you think that Napoleon was agood person or do you, do you
think that he was more of anevil dictator?

(57:33):
the stuff I know about the pointis mostly just from like the
books or movies or, you know,you know, those cool
documentaries they have onYouTube.
And I've never really heard ofany of like the, I guess, evil
stuff, at least to the scalethat Hitler did ever happening.
Like I never heard of any, like,you know, civilian casualties
that happen in battles.
I mean, there are obviouslysome, but he always.

(57:55):
Yeah.
You know, at least it's like,you know, cities will be
evacuated or something.
There weren't any like mass likethese atrocities that would have
happened even during that era.
Especially cause I think maybejust because Napoleon was, you
know, from a, from a smallerupbringing, probably like
empathize with these people morethan, you know, if it was like
someone else, like a king wasleading his troops at that time.
So yeah, I don't, I know like atthat time England was doing like

(58:17):
their only campaign againstthem.
They were painting him as likethis evil man who was, you know,
trying to take away their ticketwith their lives, you know, come
over invading England.
So like maybe that's probablyjust the residue of all that,
all those campaigns of likeEngland just painting the Polian
is a bad guy, even though, Imean, you know, we weren't
there, so we can't really pinanything, but from what I've

(58:38):
read and seen, like he.
He didn't do atrocities at leastto the scale of what, you know,
Hitler other people that wecould serve bad.
Did he seem just like knowbetter leader in a way?
Yeah.
Okay.
Yeah.
I mean, he did try to conquerall of Europe.
Right.
I mean, that was kind of hisgoal.
Do you know why he wanted to dothat?
Did he have any, any reason thatmade a lot of sense or do you

(59:03):
know what, what was the rereasoning?
Right.
I mean, it wasn't in aself-defense situation.
He was on the attack.
Right.
You know?
Yeah.
I mean, I don't know if thereever was earliest kind of
finding justification.
I think it was, might've beenkinda like the whole, like, you
know you know, Aftermath of theFrench revolution where, you
know, they're all poor, but likeall these European countries are

(59:26):
being ruled by these, you know,selfish king selects, I guess,
in a way, try to liberate them.
Cause I know there were a coupleplaces you went to where he did,
he was treated more as likeliberated or than a conqueror or
maybe it was someone else.
But I know you did want to reachdown to like all these, like you
basically want to be, you wantto do what Alexander did.
Like, you know, just, I guess,quote unquote, conquer the
world.
But I mean, he only got just aEurope, but even that was a lot,

(59:48):
but yeah, I don't know ifthere's any, I guess, direct
justification that you'd have.
Doing what you did.
Maybe it's like, you know, youjust had this massive army,
those loyal teams.
He's like, all right, let's justshow our muscle.
You know, I think, I think itwas, I think it was more of a,
one of those a good defense is agood offense.
So you just tacked first andthen, you know, that way they
just attack first and then beforced them on the defensive.

(01:00:11):
So they might've been that.
But yeah, I haven't seen anydirect things for why he
actually did it.
Yeah.
It's crazy that someone likeAlexander the great goes down as
a hero.
Right.
And Napoleon wasn't toodifferent, but he just kinda
goes down a little bit more ofas a villain.

(01:00:31):
Right.
Because he didn't succeed inwhat he set out to do the same
way.
Right.
So, yeah, it's weird that heprobably would have been viewed
as more of a collaborator.
Right.
If he had.
If he had held his ground causehe law here, he lost.
Right.
I don't want to say, yeah, Ithink he, towards the end, he
just, I think he was, what isthe battle of Waterloo's where

(01:00:52):
he just, he just couldn't musterup the troops, like all the
troops that he had were just soinexperienced, like his early
battles, the reason he wants somany of them was because the
troops that he had were likesuper expensive there.
They were like, you know, thebest experience troops you can
get, like they held theirground, they fought uphill.
They did all these crazy things.
But after years and years offighting, eventually like many

(01:01:13):
of them just died or got woundedto the point where they can
shoot.
So eventually his second exilewhen, after that he didn't
return you know, he had to relyon just fresh recruits and they
didn't have the same impact inthe battle.
so those like veterans, when itshoved the battle, like the
other enemies that know like, ohmy God, they fought multiple
battles.
Like they know what they'redoing, but we don't.
And so like that, that shock andall that they would have just

(01:01:36):
being on the field.
But eventually when he had torely on all these new guys, they
didn't have the same effect hekind of had to have their
handheld.
When, you know, 10 years prior,we had all these experienced
tubes, they could kind of justfight on their own.
They didn't need to pull instanding and watching them.
So, yeah, that was one, butyeah, eventually you just lost
because there's just too manyenemies.
Like everyone when all theseother kingdoms that he
eventually conquered realizedthat the plane was getting

(01:01:57):
weekly.
The kind of just turn tail.
He just flipped on like half ofall of Italy.
All the countries took outfirst.
Like they just all startedswapping sides and like and then
Spain was like, is, you know,like I said, I was like his
role, Russia was one, he lostcrapped on a tombstone troops up
there.
And then Spain, like he had alot of troops that were held
down there and a lot of it islike experienced veterans were

(01:02:18):
killed there too.
And so, yeah, just like acombination of a lot of things
he eventually just could notcontinue.
I'm going to ask a little bit,some basic questions, but I
don't know much about Napoleon.
I do, I obviously know of him,but I don't know a lot.
So these might be stupidquestions, but maybe there's,
maybe there's a listener thatdoesn't know like me, does this
war have a name?
Was it just the NapoleonNapoleon Moore or where does it

(01:02:42):
get?
Does it have a different name?
Yeah, I think we just call itthe era.
They just call it after him justcause, I mean they're okay.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Is the whole blanket statementfor the whole thing.
That's what I thought.
That's what I thought.
And then who did England defeathim or who put him in his place?
Yeah.
So it was it.
Yeah, the battle of Waterloo.
It was England and I believe itwas Prussia.

(01:03:05):
I don't know.
It was one of those like centralEuropean countries that like
kind of the last two that kindof had enough troops to kind of
challenge and cause like boweljust went off for so long.
A lot of country.
I don't rush out.
I just didn't have the troopsready.
A lot of us didn't have capacityto wait another war.
So it's those two.
What's funny is like think Iwatched one of the documentaries
where at the end like depressionguy, he wanted to name the

(01:03:26):
battle something, and it wasactually a really cool name.
It was like the Englishtranslation was like unity or
like hope or something likereally nice way to tie the bow.
But like the British guy waslike, now we're just named a
Waterloo.
We doesn't mean anything.
But yeah, it was England.
I mean, I think Waterloo is thefirst time was the only time
where England actually puttroops on the ground.
Cause I don't, I don't know why,but they just use their Navy to

(01:03:48):
kind of cut off France.
But like they never actuallydeployed troops.
They just gave money or supportor supplies to like countries.
They were fighting him.
But yeah, it was like England.
And then like, it was probablypressure Sweden or somebody that
will like help them out.
Yeah, I figured England seemedlike the only person that I
could kind of put him in hisplace around that time.

(01:04:09):
I'm not surprised, but I didn'tknow that for sure.
So does, after his fall, the,this ward is, does this kind of
lead to England?
Like the British empire kind oftaking over is, is that, does
that though do the timelines onthose two events kind of line up
where not soon, AF not too longafter Napoleon's reign the next

(01:04:29):
big power is the British empire,or am I not.
Yeah, I'm not sure exactly, butyeah, I think that sort of lines
up.
Cause I mean, up until thatpoint, it was always, you know,
England versus France, like theywere going to know just vying
for whoever, you know, couldtake the mantle of like, you
know, world power.
But I think after the two kindof pulling in, I think they just
installed a new government.

(01:04:50):
They redrew were not redrew.
They put the lines of thecountries back to where it was
before Napoleon.
So it kind of just erased allthe work he'd done.
But yeah, I think after that, Idon't think anyone could match
up to England and have, causelike I said, England didn't
deploy new troops until thatlast battle.
So they had most of theirmilitary still intact while rest
of Europe is kind of just inshambles kind of just picking

(01:05:10):
their pieces.
it was a pretty good turningpoint for them, but I think it
was, might've been in likeinternational relations class,
but I think after the Napoleonicwars, your pad, you know,
relative piece for very longtime, I think it was like.
Maybe until world war one, maybebefore that for pretty long
time, like there wasn't any likemassive conflict, like pulling
words.
It was pretty relatively, theydid a good job of like keeping

(01:05:32):
everything settled.
So it wasn't all bad.
Yeah.
The, the British empire seemsalmost like a trick, like
sneaky.
Right?
Cause they, they had all thesecolonies and stuff and they
didn't just declare war oneveryone and start trying to
take over things the way likegroan did the way Napoleon did,
even the way later on Hitlerwould try to do right.

(01:05:52):
They just sort of like took overthese colonies and tax them and
had certain ways of controllingthem without making them feel
like they were just, you knowThey made them feel like a part
of England system instead ofjust bulldozing them over and,
and, and, you know, calling themEngland.

(01:06:14):
Right.
they let a lot of the culturesstay in tact.
they had a terrible outcome forplaces like India and stuff.
Right.
I mean, they didn't.
Yeah.
I don't think that they'rebetter at all, but I think that
their strategy with their empirewas different than anyone had
tried.
Right.
They weren't, trying to takeover the same way.
All these other people havetried to take over England, you
know, I mean, I mean, Europe,you know, Maybe it was in high

(01:06:38):
school teacher, but someone saidthat, yeah, I think it was nice
when we were talking about likecomparing the differences
between how America, like the 13colonies, how they like post
England, how they were able tokind of pick themselves back up
much better than what, like, youknow, south America or places
like France or Spain conquered.
And it was because of like howthey govern these places like
France or Spain, they like havethis direct government.

(01:07:01):
I think, I think it's the termslike where they literally send
their own people.
And I was like, all right, nowyour French government, your
French, your Spanish, like, andthen once, you know, those
colonies eventually got theirindependence.
They really didn't know how togovernance.
They kind of have to like learneverything on their own.
But England, on the other hand,they had like an indirect rule,
I think, where, you know, like,I think we might've learned

(01:07:22):
about it, but like during likethe 13 colonies.
Like all these towns and states,they were ruled by their own
people, like, Virginia was likegoverned by Virginia, not an
English person, like not like aperson from England.
And they were governed by theirown people.
So like when they eventually gotfree, they had that experience
of, Hey, we can governsomething.
So it was a lot easier.
So I think that, you know,that's a big difference between

(01:07:44):
like all the English coloniesand all the rest of the colonies
of like how they will to, youknow, govern themselves posts,
you know, being independent.
And I think that's a big dividebetween like, I guess the
developed world and thedeveloping world.
Cause the developing world, ittook them a lot longer to like
really figure out who they wereas a country and places that
England conquered.
They already knew they weren'tbecause England never, I guess

(01:08:05):
they weren't, they were nevergood, but they never took those
identities away.
He kinda just went over and justkind of took what they could,
but they'll let you know Americabe America.
They let all these places bethemselves.
But yeah, I know that was likethe big.
Like comparison.
We did, I think in high school,but it kind of, it, it was a
pretty big eye opener, like,okay.
That makes a lot more sense.
Why, you know, these countriesare where they are now because

(01:08:26):
they kind of had like, almostlike a headstart.
They knew how to governthemselves yeah, it's so
interesting to me, how Englandnever really never really fell
like that empire that was therenever really fell.
So they were able the way that,like you said, they didn't take
away people's identity.
They understood that if you justbulldoze a culture then what

(01:08:46):
right.
You, you, you can't just forcethem to be your culture all of a
sudden, so they kind of letpeople exist.
And then once the revolutionarywar happened once like in India,
you know, Gandhi helped likepeacefully resolve the, the rain
over there, they were able tojust retreat back into England
cause they never, they neverreally.

(01:09:07):
Push back too hard on, on thecontrol they had over people,
right?
I mean, they fought us for therevolutionary war, but they
never really fell.
And they, I feel like they'vestill, to this day, maintain
power, right?
Like everyone talks about theEnglish museum.
Like England apparently has thismuseum from, from when they were

(01:09:27):
the British empire of all ofthese crazy artifacts.
And it's like, how do we justlet them have that it's cause
they just, they conquered placesor they didn't conquer.
Right.
But they controlled areas for solong.
They just absorbed all of theresources and the interesting
pieces of culture and stuff likethat.
And then once that place wasstrong enough to fight back.

(01:09:48):
They just left, but it's like,they never really were defeated
by anybody.
So they still are just sittingon, they still have more, more
wealth than most places in theworld.
And they were able to basicallysteal like all of these crazy.
Cultural artifacts from all ofthese places that they oversaw
during the British Empire'srain.
Right.
I mean, if they had reallyfallen or defeat were defeated,

(01:10:11):
then they wouldn't be sitting onthat museum.
You know, it wouldn't be, thereis to have the same way.
Yeah.
So since you're into technology,looking towards the future, what
what technology and innovationsare you excited for?
What are your predictions forthe way technology is going to
impact us in the next, you know,10, 20, even maybe 50 years?

(01:10:36):
Yes.
I know.
I feel like we talked aboutthat.
I said, I don't know if you'vetaken like the, it was like
ethical courses.
I don't know Dr.
York.
I took most of her courses, butlike, yeah.
I feel like we talk about thatas well, but I feel like in
there we kind of talk more aboutlike the negative sides, but I
think there's a lot more,there's just many, if not more
like positives that would comeout.
I think one example like moredirect example is one that mark

(01:10:59):
Andreessen gave.
So, you know, mark Andreessen,he was the founder of Netscape,
you know, eventually sold thatto AOL.
Then now he, along with BenHorowitz, they founded
Andreessen.
Horowitz which is like a big,massive venture capital company
down in the valley invested inlike almost every tech company
that's out there.
But in an interview that he didwith re Hoffman, but it's just
two of them, but he cleared outbasically the idea of

(01:11:21):
self-driving cars and how that'sgoing to impact the future.
And, you know, Actually wentback in history and talked
about, you know, when the firstcars were being invented people
were getting crazy.
Like, you know, this is going todestroy the economy.
Like, back then the horse waslike the central mode of
transportation.
So people that were tied to thehorse economy and the, of the
stable, the blacksmiths, likeall these people were like, oh

(01:11:41):
my God, we're gonna lose ourjobs.
It's gonna destroy the economy.
AI and machine learning, allthese things that people are
scared of that's happeningagain.
But he said that, you know, whenthe car was invented and allowed
people to go further outside oftown and it created all these,
you know, first, second andthird tier industries related to
the car, you know, like, youknow, making the car,
maintaining it you know, gasstations for when people, you

(01:12:03):
know, convenience stores forpeople went out hotels went
further.
And so he's saying the samething with these, you know,
self-driving cars with AI wherewhat's gonna happen is people
are gonna be able to live muchfurther.
And then just, you know, causelike, you know, you can wake up
at five because it's sleep inyour car cause it's been take to
work.
So you can live like two hoursaway.
So all these small towns likeHarrisonburg or like in Nova,
like in Winchester, they mightgrow faster just because people

(01:12:26):
like their, you know, their costof living is lower too.
So people they won't have tolive in all these congested
cities, they can spread out moreand all these towns will start
springing up and there might bemore, you know, second or third
tier industries.
From machine learning from AI,from the self-tracking cars,
that'll pop up that we probablyhaven't even thought of yet.
And so, yeah, like I think, youknow, we get scared so early on

(01:12:47):
from like, you know, what mighthappen directly, but like the
whole car industry is probablymore valuable than anything the
horse, you know, industry hasever came up with just because
there's so much stuff beyond it.
So yeah, that's like a directexample, but I think there's
gonna be some so much coolstuff.
Like I know I don't, if peopleare scared of the metaverse, but
I mean, it is, it is prettyunique.
I think it's, I think it's apretty cool place, like,

(01:13:08):
especially like virtual eventsand virtual stuff have lot of
people from all the worldsconnect.
Like I know I went to, you know,I've been to, like, most of
these events are free, so youjust pop in, and, you know, you
have people from was it like,you know, the west coast, you
have people from Europe you've Ithink I've had people from like,
like Indonesia, Japan, jobjumping on these calls, like
2:00 AM over there.
They're still popping in andjust, you know, everyone's
sharing their thoughts and like,you know, the metaverse, I think

(01:13:31):
it's, if it's done right, Ithink can really can really help
people.
And it'll just make things a lotmore, I guess.
Cool.
Just to get whole another mediumthat you can just go out.
I don't know, what's in storefor it, but maybe it's just like
a whole, another virtual, likevideo game kind of thing.
It's just like super exciting iflike what's being built and you
know, all the people that arebuilding, I don't know, there's

(01:13:52):
stuff happening all over theworld.
I know with the like Penn todemic venture capital firms in
the U S started investing inplaces like Nigeria in India, in
Indonesia, places that beforedidn't really get much
attention.
And so like, you have all thesedifferent areas that weren't a
part of this like globalizedeconomy finally coming in, you
have more people developingtechnology from a clean energy

(01:14:14):
to like solar powered planes,like all these cool stuff that's
just made.
Like obviously there's alwaysthese negative effects, but I
feel like there's more positivesout there and like, people are
just building cool stuff.
And I know it's definitely gonnabe more positive than the
negatives that people, I guess,in a way, I guess either
intimidated or scared by, butyeah, I think there's a lot of
good things that's coming from.

(01:14:36):
Yeah, man.
I think there's a lot morepositives.
This is going to come out of themetaverse and ideas like that.
Then the negatives, to behonest, I think that we already
spend a lot of time isolated andstuff.
And the people who liked to goout in the real world and be
active, are going to continuedoing that.
And the people who are alreadyisolated and enjoy playing video
games all day are just going tohave a better experience, you

(01:14:59):
know, doing what they're doingand it's going to feel it's
going to feel more like the realworld, you know?
I really liked what you saidabout smart cars personally.
I am excited to work in my car.
I am excited to sleep in my car,but the safety, the safety of
the factor of it all.
I'm so excited for it becauseI'm not the best driver.
I've had a couple incidents hereand there and you know, it.

(01:15:23):
Absolutely blows my mind thatwe're still all driving around
in these big giant deathtrapsright.
I mean, there's certaininnovations that are inevitable,
but the car and giving everyonetheir own ability to drive a
machine like that at any pointis really, I don't know why it

(01:15:43):
happened the way it did.
Like we could have had trainsonly like train systems
everywhere or whatever thatwould never crash into each
other.
You know, like we did not haveto innovate this way where it's,
it's so easy for the averageAmerican accidentally crashed
their car into something thatthey shouldn't, you know?
And I think it's going to beabsolutely insane to look back.

(01:16:06):
Our childhoods and be like, wow,I was driving my own death trap
at six 16.
You know, I really am excitedfor a day when I don't have to
worry about that anymore becauseI mean, I live in Florida, man.
These people drive crazy downhere, dude.
It's badness, especially witheveryone moving down here,
there's a lot of differentdriving styles, just colliding.
I feel like in Florida.
And it's, it's, it's crazy.

(01:16:27):
I I'm, I'm very excited to own asmart car someday, but yeah the
metaverse is really interesting.
I, I, I saw Tik TOK recentlywhere someone was saying the
metaverse isn't even an idea.
It's more of a vibe because it'snot like VR already existed, you
know?
So VR headsets already existedideas like crypto and up tees,

(01:16:48):
they exist and they are kind ofpart of the metaverse, but.
It's hard to put your finger onwhat the metaverse is.
Everyone is just kind ofaccepting it these days as a
thing.
But I mean, this, this person onTik TOK was saying, it's more of
a vibe.
Like it's not really, it's notreally an innovation, you know?
So I don't know.
What do you think about that?
What do you, what is themetaverse to you?

(01:17:09):
Because I don't think thatthere's a direct answer for it,
you know?
Yeah.
I think it's a mix of, honestly,there's a movie called ready
player one.
I don't know if you've watchedthat.
Yeah.
I think it's that combined withmaybe a little bit of what
swirled, where it's just like,it's like virtual world.
You can just go in the promostuff that that Zuckerberg has

(01:17:30):
been doing.
I mean, it seems pretty cool.
I can play tennis with likesomeone from California while
you're in Virginia or, you know,you can go to a virtual club.
I know there's like virtual.
Islands that are being sold orwhatever, but like, is there any
difference between that idea andjust virtual reality, the
virtual reality idea?

(01:17:50):
You know, I think it's takingit, but I think it's like
putting it all into like oneplace instead of like, you know,
one virtual video game, onevisual thing here.
One thing here, here, here.
I think it's just like a way tokind of connect it all.
Cause I mean, at least that's myguess.
I mean, I'm not entirely sure.
I mean, You know what you seeFacebook, they're putting a lot

(01:18:10):
of money.
I think they're, I think they'rehiring like 10,000 engineers
just to build out thismetaverse.
So from, from my guests, I thinkit's just taking these NFC is
taking these crypto, taking allthese VR stuff.
That's already there, you know,adding their own.
And that eventually, maybe justconnecting it into this one,
massive like just world oruniverse that there makes, I
think that's gonna be my guests.

(01:18:32):
I love to see where it goes.
I mean, if it's any different, Idon't, I don't know.
It's pretty cool to see.
Yeah.
I guess with the idea of NFTsand owning digital assets, then
lead leads to people owningdigital real estate, which makes
it feel more of a, metaversemore of a place that you can go
and own a chunk of it instead ofjust of virtual reality, which

(01:18:55):
is like someone else's game,you're stepping into A place
that's owned by the game companyitself versus the idea of owning
a piece of digital propertymakes it, feel more than just,
you know, Facebook's place.
Right.
But it's weird.
I don't like the idea ofFacebook just completely owning
the thing.
And, and even if we can buy, buyreal estate bear, whatever,

(01:19:20):
having them control all the insand outs of this, this place
should be more decentralized andshare ownership of the actual,
idea to, you know, yeah.
I think what is it?
I know a lot of brands are.
I don't know how they're acting.
They're just like allowing theirintellectual property.
I don't, Nike was the first.

(01:19:40):
And I know the other, a lot ofother, like, I guess modern
luxury brands are like doingsomething with Cedar NFTs or
like joining the metaverse.
Are they successful?
Like the articles, like titleit, like, you know, this
company's joining the metaverse.
Yeah, I mean, I know, I know atsome point I know all the other
big tech companies are at leastat some point, probably gonna
either try to build somethingsimilar.
I mean, actually that'd be,that'd be cool to see is just

(01:20:02):
seeing if like Google or apple,if they either try to join what
Metta is creating like theirmetaverse or if they're gonna
make their own.
Google metaverse and applemetaphysics.
Cause I don't know.
We'll see, like, that'd bepretty cool because they all
have, they all have the moneyand the capacity to build and
I'm pretty sure they will.
I mean, if they see thatFacebook or Meadows doing well

(01:20:24):
in this, I'm pretty sure thoseguys will follow suit and then
yeah.
But just be like anotherproduct.
Yeah.
I think that there will bedefinitely, at least some
competitors are, but probably alot of different platforms that
you can go to.
And I guess what makes it themetaverse is that with the web
three technologies, if it's allusing the same type of

(01:20:44):
blockchain under the hood, Ifyou have your digital NFT, let's
just say you could put it up inyour, in your hotel, in your
Facebook, in your Facebook'splatform.
And then also bring that over toGoogle.
So usually like, like if your,your likes on Instagram don't
transfer over well to the likeson Twitter, for instance,

(01:21:06):
something like that, where Ithink with, with all the web
three technologies, what makesit feel like its own universe is
that the Google, if Googlebuilds a platform and Facebook
builds a platform and it's allusing these NFT tokens, then
there will be more connectedthan, than just two separate

(01:21:27):
platforms.
I'm hoping, basically, I don'tknow if that that lady was right
when she said it's just a vibebecause I do think, I do think
it's, it's, it's the combinationof VR technology and.
And web three and like tokentechnology and blockchain
technology that does make itsomething more than just those
two things separately, But yeah,man, let's wrap it up.

(01:21:49):
So I, I really liked hearingabout your company.
That sounds awesome.
Let me know when you put it backout on the store and honestly
we'll probably can hold off onreleasing this episode until it
is.
Okay.
Depending, but, so there's achance people listening right
now, they can go download it,but either way, let me know, and
I'll check that out myself.
I'm excited.

(01:22:09):
And thanks for talking abouthistory and stuff and, and the
future and just leadership.
That was a cool conversation.
Also let something.
People in S SOE, the society ofentrepreneurs know that I'm
trying to do an episode everyweek right now.
So I'm definitely open totalking to a lot of different
people.
I really like startups, but ifthere's anyone else at JMU, I'm

(01:22:32):
from Jay, you know, I went toJMU.
I was in necessarily ofentrepreneurs.
So those guys I know I woulddefinitely like to talk to.
but if there's anyone else thatyou, you know, from JMU that
would like to be a guest man,let me know.
Because I love talking to theJMU people.
Yeah.
Appreciate it.
Thank you for having me.
It was awesome.
Yeah.
Thanks for coming on man.

(01:22:52):
And good luck with everything.
I hope it goes well, take iteasy.
Take it easy.

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Hafiz Bhuyan: Startups, History, Leadership, and Tech | #35

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Hafiz Bhuyan: Startups, History, Leadership, and Tech | #35