Ep: 222 - Year end special, AI design with Jamey Gannon (@Techbimbo), Disrupting the payment stack with John Egan (Polygon), retail investing in 2026 with Andrew McCormick (eToro US), and Quasimatt on Cultural Moods

[00:29] Here's this week's show. [00:31] you [00:33] Happy holidays. Happy holidays. [00:37] Welcome to the Christmas... [00:39] holiday special it is that Christmas Christmas and all of the holiday special any any holiday that anybody wants New Year's special as well including or just like Thursday to like PTO celebration yeah yeah [00:54] Uh, from boys club to you, from our club, from your club. [01:02] Here we are. Here we are. Someone in the chat just said locked in. I love that. If you are here, please jump in the chat. It's truly my favorite part of the whole thing. I have it open too, so I can see everything that people say, and I'm going to be locked in on the chat. And you have to click into the stream, and then there's the opportunity to chat. If you comment on the thread, you don't see it. We don't see it right away. So just so everybody knows. [01:20] We are locked in. How's it feel? [01:23] I'm Natasha. Oh, I'm Dina. [01:25] Miranda. [01:27] Special guest. Yeah, guest appearance. This is part of Boys Club. This is a few people from Boys Club. We have a really fun show. Just a quick rundown before we get started here. We have four guests. We're going to be talking about AI design prompting with Tech Bimbo. We have John Egan coming, who's the chief product officer at Polygon. He was formerly the head of CryptoStripe. He's a very serious person. We're going to talk about payments with him. Andrew McCormick, head of eToro US. I've never talked to someone from eToro before, so I'm excited to... [01:55] Have a chat with him. Talk about retail. I feel like I have some... [01:58] Was Anna Stone at eToro? I feel like I have a history with eToro, but I can't pinpoint why. You have a history email thread with them that I was reading through. Doing some recon. You've been chatting with them for a while, so that's all I know. I know that they've done some major out-of-home buys that I've seen. A taxi take, I think maybe London.

[02:19] We're going to find out. And then Quasimates coming to just close things out on a strong note. End of year special. End of year special. [02:28] of the year for, [02:30] the boys i want to get through a lot of stuff quick shout out to polygon we had some big news yesterday that i want to chat about but first if you've touched crypto in any way chances are you've already used polygon it's a chain quietly powering a bunch of stuff that actually works [02:43] that people actually use, like Stripe's crypto payments, betting on polymarkets, prediction markets, and a bunch more. [02:49] Big news out of Boys Club HQ re-polygon yesterday. Big news hit the timeline. [02:54] Big news at the tie line. We love Polygon. We've worked with them for the past year. [02:59] And we are entering a... [03:03] Official situation ship with an entanglement and an entanglement and a, um, [03:09] Yeah, and we're very excited about it. It's a huge deal for us at... [03:13] Boys Club, and I feel really blessed and honored to be in the situation that we're in and feel like we've worked really hard and it feels really nice when you work really hard and something comes together. [03:25] Totally. I think [03:27] It's really cool. And I think that in terms of... [03:31] what it means for us. It's just like enabling us to do what we're doing and amp it all the way up. This has been the case for the last couple of months. So [03:42] If it hasn't felt different to you, it probably won't other than you'll see. [03:45] More. More. Only good stuff. It will only mean more boys club stuff.

[03:51] in your life and on the timeline. And in many ways, nothing will change. And in other ways, there'll be just a lot more exciting stuff. Yeah, exactly. So we remain... [04:01] Totally independent, which is the exciting part of all of it. And I think that Polygon, yeah, we have been working together for the past year and we've gotten to know them. [04:11] like culturally, operationally, and they're [04:14] such a [04:15] standup squad across the board at Polygon Labs. Totally. Yeah. Long-time listeners know that we've had many different iterations of what Boys Club is and what the business is and what it isn't. And we've had many conversations with various... [04:30] Parties. Parties over the years about... [04:34] various different iterations of what like an entanglement could look like and [04:38] This is the first time it's felt like it really right for all the reasons. And so, yeah, excited to take the next step. Yeah, and I think the reason that you're maybe hearing vagaries is actually, like, intentional. Because, like Dina just said, like, it was the first time we were able to have a conversation that wasn't just, like... [04:57] standard cut and dry black and white. It was really about like, what does boys club need to grow and keep doing what we're doing on a larger scale? Yeah. Nuance. There was room for nuance, intentional nuance. And. [05:10] It's a dynamic environment. Boys Club, we love to never have something that's just... You know, we live in the gray. Womanhood is a spectrum. It sure is. It sure is. Anyway, I think that if you're looking for a feeling from the boys, it's...

[05:27] Really excited and feel really genuinely proud of it. [05:33] Every single one of us. Yeah. And thanks so much for everyone's kind words. Oh my gosh. Everyone was so nice on the timeline. What a wonderful response from so many people that. [05:43] I said this in a thread I did, but... [05:45] I've met so many wonderful people. And like the joke is, it's just about the friends you meet along the way. And that meme is true. It's funny because it's true. And I've met so many wonderful people doing this job. [05:58] have had many iterations of myself and of the work. And it's been really nice to be in and amongst people who leave a lot of space for that and – [06:09] Just love y'all. Love. And gratitude. Okay. We have a couple things we want to get through before first guest comes. Okay. Totally. The one other thing is I do want to say. [06:20] Ava, [06:21] is in the chat. She's the newest boy. She's in, I won't talk to where she is, but she's traveling for the holidays, but go follow her on Twitter. Nice. She's new to Twitter. The timeline. Um, but also, yeah, Ava has been, if you've been at our events, you've probably met Ava at some point in the last couple of years. She's been writing, writing hard, hard and working with us in all sorts of ways. And it is so awesome to have her. We've been wanting to, yeah, for so long. So it [06:51] Okay. We are going to do a little year in review. Great. I'm going to, you're going to bounce. I think so. But you have some funny things to say. Okay.

[06:59] Great. I was hoping you'd stay. Okay, so we have a few questions. [07:06] A Kate note? Okay. Posture check. I'm going to ask you the first one. Okay. And you can skip or... [07:12] Go. Okay. Man of the year. [07:15] Okay. I've prepared. I have a list. I know. You have a few different questions that I don't have answers to. Okay, great, great, great. Okay, I have a list and it's as a list of men, a list of men of the year binder full of men. I have a binder of men and I'm excited to chat through them all. Just I'll do a quick hits. [07:31] Jack Dorsey. [07:32] Interesting. Eric Adams. [07:35] Mira Mirati. [07:37] Okay. Nathan Fielder. [07:39] Okay. The Pope. [07:41] And Dr. Orna. [07:43] Wow. Incredible list. I was just like in a flow state this morning. I was like, okay, who, who's really, who's my men of the year and top of mind. And all of those, all of those, all of them have been an embodiment of [redacted address] or the other. A hundred percent. Yeah. Wow. I really love that. That's my list. What about yours? 50 cent. [08:01] Oh, he's my man of the year. [08:03] incredible have you watched the documentary over my timeline i haven't i haven't watched it i've watched some of it and it's a few things one once you know you get in an algorithmic hole and i have watched enough 50 cent clips now to be in one yeah and there's so many wonderful things about this person but one of them being that his level like his commitment to petty yeah is so powerful and i respect it and admire it and it couldn't be me but i i want to move closer to that type of

[08:33] yeah um he dated petty with a production budget petty with money yeah and also a few years ago i think it was maybe 10 years ago fact check me on this somebody because it's not accurate exactly but he ran out of money i think was fiscally irresponsible and found a wallet of bitcoin and that's what got him back to his are you for real i think so we need a fact check on that anyway incredible that's my minute any men for you i'm really racking my brain totally fair [09:03] Oh, I'm sorry. That's a private man. That's a private man. I actually, I guess. [09:08] Bye. [09:10] Thank you. [09:10] Mom Donnie comes out for me. Nice. Okay. It doesn't all have to be... I was taking it as a Time Magazine approach to it. Of course. Person of the Year. Of course. Which is... [09:21] Well, also, like, it's not only complimentary. It's, like, just big compliments. [09:25] Oh, interesting. Mind share. Yeah, I agree. Which is why I feel Mom Donnie ticks that box for me in a lot of different ways. So that's all I have to say on that. Okay, favorite day on the timeline. [09:37] Okay. Women in space. That was a really good one. I thought I thought that was really good. Katy Perry kissing the ground. The weird door not working. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, just so many. Also, the conspiracy theory around it not ever happening. Yeah, I loved it. Just like it being something. Just fun. Funsies. Totally. Funsies go to space. I don't know. Just everything about it is so ridiculous and enjoyable. Gail King, too, right? Gail King. She was in the crew. What is happening? It really was peak internet.

[10:07] Internet, like really wonderful. Yeah. You guys? Mine was Conclave, the Pope Day. Oh, that checks out. Pope Day was huge. Huge for some of us. Huge. And just was one of those days where it was like... [10:20] I [10:21] It was so wholesome. We're all just there looking at... [10:26] a chimney in rome and wondering what's going to happen yeah so yeah it was such a human uh mirenda do you have one uh yesterday oh that's cute that's so sweet i love that um okay best comeback [10:43] Thank you. [10:43] Elizabeth Holmes. [10:45] Oh. Nice. [10:50] Nice. She's back. Back on the timeline. I actually was falling asleep the other night, and I thought... [10:56] Yeah, she sold her Twitter. I had full body conviction about what has happened. Totally. Although I will say I have never subscribed to anyone on Twitter before. You subscribed? I subscribed. You're waiting. Watching and waiting again. Because she was like, I'm starting a book club. [11:12] And I was like, I want to be in her book club. And it was a dollar. And I was like, great. So you're her lead. I mean, voice club is one victim because no book club, right? No book club. I haven't seen a lot of book club yet. But I also like subscribers. She's going to be waiting a while. To give her money is. [11:28] And also it hit Dave's credit card. And he was like, what? He's like, what are you doing? [11:35] Oh my gosh. [11:37] what's the best comeback for you? Um, this is just felt top of mind. Lily Allen.

[11:42] Full Lilian comeback. Huge. Anti-Lilian. I could see that for you. I love, it's a bigger conversation. I was a huge fan when she first came out. And I do really like the album, but I find the press around it to be grating. [11:56] Totally. But I do think she's back, SNL, after 18 years. I think she's back... [12:02] Thank you. [12:03] that [12:04] I have a lot. Just say it, Dina. Well, I just like... [12:08] when i listen this is a larger conversation but like i'm listening it's layered to the album [12:14] And... [12:16] There was like some consent that she had. This is not totally off topic, but like there was some consent that she had in her relationship to have an open relationship. Yeah. And then she changed the goalpost and she got mad about it. And it's now this whole thing. I think that's actually exactly the opposite. I agree. Maybe, maybe not. Maybe, maybe not. But like, of course, she she is writing. It's the goalpost. That's one of her lyrics. All I'm saying to say is it's. [12:44] It's petty. It's petty. If nothing else. It's petty. Wait, petty is maybe my theme for it. Anyway, it was just the first one that came to mind, just for the record. It's not. It was definitely a big comeback, though. It was totally. Yeah, true on comeback. Tick. Maybe not going to endorse on. The way she went about it. See, for me, I'm like, I love a. [13:05] Scorch story. [13:07] Oh, I had a before he cheats idea in Hell Half No Fury in Tennessee or in Pinch and Forge where I went for Thanksgiving. They have this thing that's like they do there, which is dinner theaters.

[13:19] There's all sorts of different kinds. There's a Dolly Parton one, which is the one I went to. I was totally over-served there. And it was so much fun, and it was so kitschy in all the ways you can imagine. Anyway... [13:29] I had this idea as I think like in a hangover state the next morning where I was thinking of different dinner theaters that you could do. And I thought of a Carrie Underwood. What's his name? Carrie Underwood before he cheats style dinner theater where you're given a side of who it is. And like the whole show plays out in front of you. And wow. Wow. Good, right? High concept. I love it. Thanks so much. Okay. She needs a boost too. I think that from what I've read, she's been kind of down bad. [13:59] head with like a farm or something. I don't know. Oh, a dinner theater. Yeah, I think she should do that. I think she's been like not booked and busy. Okay, so Carrie, let me know. Yeah. Oh, my comeback also music is Biebs. Oh, totally. Just absolutely love music. [14:20] To see him return to the music scene. I saw that was on your top songs. I am in the top zero, 4%. Wow. Wait, did you see Lottie Day was Beyonce's top top? [14:31] listener of all time of all time number one it was incredible and the tweet i saw the thread i saw about was people people were like we've been looking for you and she's like like the bay hive it was so sweet i loved it wow achievement um but she was like yeah she like puts it on when she sleep like you have to be listening to it oh my gosh all the time in order to get to number one spot but it was impressive i do think there's like a real commitment to like supporting like the stream count in some of these right

[14:58] fandoms as well so yeah just like rolling it on on mute while you're sleeping um okay best quote i have one which was from uh this is kind of a niche throwback but [15:08] The Kid Rock World Queen moment. Oh my God. Honestly, Jess was thinking about that as comeback because he really reentered my orbit with that moment. That was the craziest video I've seen all year. That's saying something. Yeah. And the quote being, somehow I have one in my fucking house. We're talking about the orb. Incredible. Wow. That's really great. That's really great. Surprise and delight. Mine was everything is computer. [15:37] Yeah, I feel like that's a bearing. OK, last fumble. Biggest fumble. I have one. [15:44] Great. I don't really have one. I do. Oh, what's yours? Go. [15:47] Sean Wyatt and Nina. [15:49] This is pop culture. Yeah. Okay. So Nina Dobrev from Vampire Diaries. Does that ring a bell? Nina. I don't see that for Dina, but. Okay. Well, she's an icon, a legend, like one of the most beautiful human beings to ever walk through the face of the earth. Just, yeah, really. [16:06] A special bird. Sean White the snowboarder. And Sean White the snowboarder, who I referred to as Carrot Top Dupe earlier, because I'm so mad at that fumble. I can't even believe. And also they were engaged for like a long, long time. So everyone sort of saw it. [16:21] I think you cheated on her. That's the word on the street. I wouldn't even care about the fumble if it was just like they grew apart. But to have it be a story of...

[16:29] Mm hmm. Non consenting, unethical cheating. Not not for you. No. OK, mine was mine's a little bit more pointed. Great. Farcaster. Yeah. [16:38] Oh! [16:40] Whoa. And here's the thing. Here's what I'm going to say. It's not a fumble on anyone individually. Totally. I actually think that Dan... [16:49] has been a great founder through this and like has taken a lot of heart, made a lot of hard decisions. I, I, however, think that like there was an experiment that failed around decentralized social, at least for now, but, [17:04] And it will work in the future in some way or shape or form. Man, that just brought up so many other PR fumbles for me from this year. Really? Yeah, totally. [17:13] Um, [17:15] BlockWorks announcement of their shift from media into consulting and data platforms. That was just an interesting case study around... [17:24] Having the right comms partner in the room. And honestly, so was Dan's recent. [17:29] announcement around the farcaster thing like that felt like actually his message was it's not working we're going to try this other thing for growth we're going to keep the social network we think that the wall it's really important for the growth of the social network totally all of that was there but the way that he announced it order of operations was off yeah same with i would say a similar kind of totally and i think the lesson in that is that people don't read people don't read perception is reality and call boys club if you want a comms partner that can help i love that i'm gonna head okay okay great let's bring up our first guest [17:58] So Jamie Gannon at Tech Bimbo, your bio, a very good branding and AI person based in New York City. I love that. The creator of buildmyaesthetic.com, which is an AI design course. Just overall, a great follow if you're interested in creative prompts, design inspiration and AI and branding. And so excited to have you on the show. I've been a longtime follower of Voice Club. Oh, that's so nice. Thank you. Okay. So tell us about your background. How did you get into the prompting game?

[18:27] Yeah. So I am a brand strategist and creative director. I mainly work with early stage tech companies, sometimes e-commerce. I also had a crypto phase. That's like many of us. Totally. I guess you guys are still in the crypto thing. But yeah, I guess. So I do a lot of branding work. And I also have a supplement company that I run with my boyfriend. It's called. Supplement? Okay. It's called Portal. It's a sleep supplement. Okay. [18:57] ton of time into it so we don't have like a huge like bankroll to get a ton of like people to do websites or product photography and stuff like that so um as a designer i want the site to look really good because it's kind of a reflection of me and also it's just like fun and it's just like [19:13] Uh, so I was kind of exploring like, okay, how do we get better product photos? Like, how do I get a better website and just make everything look better? And I realized like doing the product photography or, or buying stock photos or doing a photo shoot is like really expensive. Um, [19:27] So I started playing with [19:29] uh, AI to just as simple as like, just doing like, it's, it's a drink. So like just making the drink. And then it got into like making like really editorial, like stock photos and like, you [19:40] you know, how to's of like how to use the product. Um, and now I'm doing like full on product photography, um, [19:46] Also, like, UGC. So that was, like, the first, like... [19:50] real flow where I could build like an entire brand yeah using AI where it like really unlocked for me I will say the there's a lot of people who are doing like prompt design stuff but I will say what sets you apart

[20:02] Like in the top point zero, like by a huge mile is how editorial – [20:08] and differentiated all your stuff looks like all of it that I've seen. It's really, it's really impressive. Thank you. And yeah, we're just so into it. How do you like get to that? [20:18] Yeah, I mean, I think... [20:21] It's not much different than any other creative process. You know, you have to have... [20:26] a goal in mind of what you're going for, but [20:29] At the end of the day, you're just... [20:31] iterating obviously there's like certain tools that are going to be more likely to give you like a super realistic look or like a super editorial look but even if like you know that [20:40] You still have to... [20:42] have a good references and like create a mood board and like know, [20:46] what you want. [20:47] in terms of giving a direction. So it's just like creating a logo. You start with... [20:53] You know, what what am I making? What is like the style going to be? Let me find some references. Let me think about. [20:59] I want to go about this. And then it's just trial and error. It's a lot of like, [21:03] iteration and like seeing what works and then [21:07] Mm. [21:08] You know, if you get to like a point where it looks really good, but like, let's say in Mid Journey, like the style is really cool, but like the skin is kind of like smooth, like the hands messed up, then I know, okay, I should move it into a different tool or maybe even just Photoshop. [21:22] to kind of like finish it out, basically. Do you, how have you gotten to the tools that you are using? [21:29] Do you use a mix of all of them? Do you have some favorites? Like, [21:32] I feel like that's, I get stuck even there where I'm like, where do I start? Yeah. So I would, um, I started using obviously chat UBT for like tech stuff, but, um, I started with mid journey and I think it's a good place. Is it still only in a discord? Yeah.

[21:47] No, it has a beautiful app. Oh, wow. [21:51] Yeah, a really good agency to sign up. I'm blanking on the name right now, but – or web platform, whatever. It's really beautiful. I like – [21:57] recommending people start with my journey for a couple of reasons. And I'm doing this in my course as well. It's like really easy to use. And there's also a lot of like levers you can play with similar to like a VSCO or something. [22:10] Not exactly like filters, but in terms of like... [22:14] It's not just like an empty prompt box, you know? Okay. You can have mood boards. You can have personalization. Oh, cool. Okay. You can tune up the style or tune down the style. There's also like a whole community of like... [22:26] People that you can, like, take their prompts or, like, take their profile codes. So that's a really good place to start. And then also if you want something that will, like – [22:34] Almost 100% give you like a beautiful image, maybe not necessarily realistic or exactly what you prompted for. Mid-Journey will do that. But something like Nano Banana. [22:43] like in a banana pro, it might just look kind of boring or bland. Okay. I feel like where I... [22:50] Something that you've been able to like pierce through that I have not yet and I haven't seen a lot of other people is that everything that I generate – [22:58] There's like a... [22:59] sheen over it that I'm like, oh, this is clearly AI generated. And like, it's usually fine for what I'm doing. Cause I'm not at the level of like product, whatever, but like, [23:09] Everything is like even today, the Cathie Wood. Did you see the Cathie Wood thing? [23:13] Or it's like, [23:14] And like, ma'am, that's obviously like an AI-generated child and like a photo. Like you can tell from that thing. But your images seem to like have –

[23:24] Are you a texture that... [23:26] It's... [23:27] sets really sets it apart are you pulling it into photoshop and then like finishing things there like how i i don't do any like retouching in terms of like style the only retouching i'll do is like you know if there's like a weird [23:40] I don't know. Like – [23:41] Really small stuff. Okay. Or like making a mock-up or something. Yeah. When it comes to like the texture stuff, I think... [23:48] It depends on what you're making. Like, I had this one sort of series go viral, like my, like, Party Girl series, where it was all these, like, super grainy, like, 2000s Lindsay Lohan-inspired, like, digital camera photos of, like... [24:02] Kind of like influencer girls today in that style, like partying or on boats or whatever. And that happened to look really real because... [24:11] I nailed that like... [24:13] digital camera sort of like prompt and mood board. Oh, or like input system, basically. But if you try that same thing, [24:21] And in my course, I talk about this. If you apply that to skiing, go skiing. I take digital camera pictures when I'm skiing. You would think that, OK, if this digital camera [24:31] system works for this. It should work for this other one too, but it's, it's not how like the model works. It's, it's way too focused on like being dark and grungy and, and the references that I've given it. So yeah. [24:41] You have to kind of... [24:43] change your approach depending on the mood and what you're making. So my process is like different. If I want something like really... [24:51] dslr and like crisp i'm gonna use like different prompts different references than i am for the like digital camera stuff yeah so it's not one thing

[25:01] So what's your take on AI art versus, like, there's, you know, a lot of discourse around that right now. Yeah, I mean... [25:09] If we're just talking about the art, [25:13] I mean, I feel for the artists that like, you know, they're like, it gets in the way of like, [25:18] important things in the process even if let's say the output's good like yeah there's important things when you're making it that like make art what it is uh but i think in terms of like [25:26] commercial artists or like designers it's just so much cope and it's really funny because I actually saw a talk about this a couple months ago by this guy Claudio [25:36] And he was going over like... [25:38] basically like Luddite thinking throughout all these different times in history. And like, [25:44] artists when the camera came out were saying the same thing they were even like the camera's going to steal your soul um musicians when i guess like the synth came out or like whenever like electronic music started coming in same exact conversation i also didn't know this like even like graphic designers massima vignelli i think [26:00] like did like the subway in New York, he didn't like Photoshop even. So like even tools is like, yeah. [26:07] you would think it'd be universally loved. He was like, no, it's gonna get in the way of my design process. So this is just like a tale as old as time. [26:15] And yeah, I think a lot of it's co-presentation. [26:16] And a lot of the people that like, [26:19] really hate on it, make it their like brand to hate on it are kind of just losers that like, don't, like they don't even have, they're defending these like great careers they don't even have. [26:30] Heard. Heard. Heard. Heard. Nice. Nice. Shots fired. No, I get that argument very much. And I think that there's, yeah, like the democratization of tools.

[26:41] And yeah, music tools, I think there's the same sort of stuff that's rolled around when that happened as well. And I think it's like... [26:47] You have to see that as net positive for more people to be able to like create. Not everyone's going to create well. And like that's always going to be the case. But like that doesn't mean that. [26:59] that. [26:59] shouldn't be available to them to use. What's you seem to go viral or like have these viral moments every once in a while? Like, do you get a lot of stuff back? That's, [27:10] If I go really viral, yeah, there was one. I did a post of like – [27:15] Like hot girls are using AI. I got like 27 million views, but are you monetizing? Yeah. Oh, great. I put it in the newsletter. Elon box. Yeah. It's great. Oh yeah. The UBI. [27:27] Oh, no, no, no, no. I put your hot girls are using AI in the newsletter. Yeah. Yeah. So they like, basically they take a regular photo and they're like, put a horse behind me or put a puppy in front of me and it went super viral. And, [27:37] the quote tweets were like so vicious i had so many like other kind of like design thinkers reaching out to me they're like i knew the ai hate was like bad but it's like so delusional people were quote tweeting with like collages they made on like pixart they were like here's something i made in like 2014 that's so much better and it was like [27:54] objectively worse right like just horrible and then there's people commenting like you know [28:01] Imagine how many trees they killed to make this. They're killing the environment just like... [28:05] insane, like anti-AI psychosis. [28:10] What do you say to stuff like that? You just ignore it?

[28:12] Yeah, I mean, I think that [28:15] It's better for me because like the less people that know how to use these tools, like the more I use them because people are going to want them. Yeah. Obviously, or businesses at least so. [28:25] Yeah. Okay. I want to get into some of the work that you've seen using AI that feels really good to you. So best campaign campaign. [28:35] Well, I mean, I think the best AI campaign, we probably don't know about it. Okay. Okay. Yeah. [28:42] I don't think that. [28:43] I don't think we're going to know. [28:45] What did you think of the J.Crew drama? [28:49] I think I read an article about that. Did you see that they did a campaign with AI? Yeah. I'm trying to remember what I thought about that. I think I liked it. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. The thing that upset me about it was there were some very obvious errors. There was a leg that was like... [29:05] pointed... [29:07] backwards. And I was like, how did that get greenlit? It's a little bit weird to me how... [29:12] Um, there's, [29:15] It seems like there's not like checks and balances around AI production in traditional businesses now. [29:22] They don't know how to do that yet. Yeah. I also think this is something that I've been like learning too, as I get better at it over the last like six months to a year is like, you're so excited by like the novelty of it. And the fact that you can like produce something at all that like, [29:36] that high lasts for a long time. And then you look back like three months later and you're like, Oh my God, like that totally looks like AI. Um, or you're like, Oh, it's fine. Like, it's fine.

[29:44] Let's focus on like this subject, like this looks so good. And they forget the broken leg or whatever, because the rest of it is like so fun and cool. [29:50] That's like a part of like getting good AI is like being like radically honest about like [29:54] Does this look good? Same thing for design or even like fashion too. Like tell ourselves all sorts of lies. [30:00] Yeah, totally. [30:03] Okay, worst campaign. [30:05] I was wracking my brain trying to think of this earlier. I think I haven't seen too many bad ones. I think people are still being pretty careful. I know the Coca Cola one went pretty viral that had a lot of hate. [30:17] But honestly, I mean... The McDonald's one last week, too. Yeah. Yeah. [30:21] Oh, yeah. Oh, the Skechers one was bad. Yeah, the Skechers one was bad. [30:27] Oh, I haven't seen that one. There's lots of like regular bad campaigns too. Totally. Yeah. That's kind of how I took this question. I was like, I mean, look at a luxury perfume ad. [30:36] Like, and they probably spent like... [30:39] I don't even know production budgets, like upwards of like hundreds of thousands of dollars to produce that when like you probably could have just done – [30:45] The thing with AI. [30:46] too. Hire Jamie. [30:48] There you go. Um, what, how do you think marketing roles are going to evolve over the next few years with all these tools? [30:55] Yeah, I mean, I think... [30:57] This is a big question. I think high level like design and marketing. [31:03] And like storytelling, it's all going to kind of become like one role or one team in some ways. I think like the top 10% of like anything... [31:12] you know, whether you're an illustrator or a designer or marketer, like you're, you'll, you can stay kind of like in your niche, but

[31:17] Overall, the fields are going to kind of meld together and, um, [31:22] I think that's because like... [31:24] With... [31:25] marketing and design, because I do a lot of branding, obviously. When you're interacting with your brand guidelines or trying to make a website or an ad, it's not going to be using a template or using just your brand guidelines anymore. It's probably going to look more like [31:40] using chat GPT, you might like... [31:43] have a design system that you make and a set of like negative prompts and like [31:48] rules and context that you give this ai that you can then like prompt in the natural language to like make you a holiday poster uh you know in your brand style or make you a landing page um and then like on like the even like crazier end is like let's say you're like [32:05] a skincare brand and you have this like, [32:08] AI interface that has all of your product photography. Uh, it can make any new product photography, uh, [32:14] It has all your design systems. It has all the sentiment about what people are talking about. [32:19] And you're like, hey, I want 30 static ads with testimonials, all new original customers for each one. And I'm going to plug you into Meta. And I want you to use my like top 10 segments. So that might be like women with aging skin. That might be new moms. That might be teenagers. And then it'll write. [32:39] Each ad. [32:40] like for them in that context. [32:42] with your brand guidelines and then maybe even be able to like, [32:46] take the results that those ads get,

[32:49] and refine them and like do it all on its own marketers, marketers, [32:53] especially are going to be more like brands like engineers in a sense. I don't know what word is like the right one at this point, but yeah, they're going to be doing a lot more, [33:03] prompting, curation, [33:05] I hate to use the word taste, but taste is going to be a big deal. Knowing what to make, why to make, and when to make it, versus the actual execution, which will be totally... [33:16] I feel like what I've learned from this conversation is that the mood board and the briefing process to the AI is everything. And that you're particularly... [33:26] part of your talent and what you found is like that really being intentional about that stage, like inputs affect your output and like, you're not going to get a good output unless you're like very, very, [33:37] intentional about like how you're shaping what you want to be in the upfront yeah i like barely in my course like i go over prompts a lot but like [33:46] Most of the prompts, and I posted about this, are, like, one or two sentences max. Yeah. Oh, wow. Like, depending on what kind of thing I'm making, like, if I'm just making, like, sexy girl sentences. [33:55] For example, with some of my mood board systems... [33:58] I can just literally say, like, sexy girl, and it'll come out, like... [34:02] Super realistic, super cool. Versus other people, you know, if they don't have this, like, system kind of built up. I hate calling it a system because, like, everyone calls their... [34:12] system workflow process.

[34:16] Yeah, they have to do like this huge JSON prompt, and it's a hard way to work. Okay, should we do show a minute? Yeah, I think so. Great. So we have a... [34:25] A fun bit here that we do, which is we have our guest, Shil. [34:31] Something, anything for one minute. [34:34] And we'd like to do it with you. Do you have something prepared? [34:39] I don't. I mean, I can do my course. Okay. Great. I kind of wanted to hear about your supplement. Oh, okay. Okay. Great. Ready? [34:49] go okay so portal is an all-natural sleep supplement it uses magnesium l-theanine epigenin and glycine uh and basically my boyfriend and i created it a couple years ago uh we based it on andrew huberman's like sleep stack um so it's all like clinically validated doses and science fact and basically what it does we have a whole science page that is going to explain this way better than i do but all these ingredients not only like help you relax and fall asleep but they do a bunch of [35:19] brain and in your muscles to like make your recovery better. So if you've ever been like really sore from the gym, [35:25] Um, and you take a magnesium bath, you take a magnesium supplement, you'll usually wake up like way less sore than you would have been otherwise. Um, [35:31] And glycine, too, it makes people dream a lot. But it actually gets in your brain and helps your body cool down, which helps you fall asleep faster and stay asleep. We're out of time. But that was absolutely perfect. Where can people get it? Withportal.com. Withportal.com. Yeah.

[35:49] We'll drop in the chat. And then your course, how can people find out more? You can go to buildmyaesthetic.com or just follow me on X at Jamie Gannon and I'll be providing updates. Hopefully it's coming. Like. [36:03] Jan 1. Great. A little sooner. Yeah. [36:06] You'll see us there. Thank you so much for coming on. Thank you. So nice to have you. [36:13] We have John Egan, Chief Product Officer at Polygon, formerly head of crypto at Stripe. Welcome to the show. Thank you. Thanks for having me. So excited to have you. We have spent some time together and heard about your vision and excited to talk about it today. But you are a man that knows a lot about crypto. You know a lot about sort of how institutions, I think. [36:33] Think about crypto more than a lot of other folks who are working in this industry. So I'm curious, what's your sort of take on where the industry is at right now? Just sort of high level like CloudCheck. Yeah, I mean, it's a pretty exciting moment. I think like stable coins are here to stay. No one's really arguing about that anymore. Yeah. There's sort of a joke in the industry now. It's like stable coin panels are the most boring panels to go to. We don't have anything to disagree about anymore. We all stand up there and say, oh, it's going to be amazing. We're going to connect the world. [37:03] is [37:03] And everyone just sort of nods. Yeah. That's probably going to happen. No conflict. Yeah. And I think you could argue the boredom is exciting, right? Like we're finally not arguing about whether or not this core capability is possible anymore. We're arguing about like what's the right way to bring it to the world. And that's really cool, right? So that means we start to see winners in the space like Polymarket emerging who are really winning on UX for the first time, right? Like crypto is winning on UX instead of like winning on some kind of an arbitrage. And so I think that that's really exciting.

[37:33] We're going to start seeing more brand names kind of come into the space. Polygon worked recently with MasterCard, worked with Revolut. These are consumer-facing brands that are more going to rely on crypto rails in a way that doesn't feel like some arm's-length moonshot bet. It just feels like here's how we're going to deliver our services to you better. Here's how you're going to start your business, and it's going to work all over the world on day one. And I think that that shift will just go exponential over the next year. [38:03] You know, a lot of crypto companies that sort of offshored out of the U.S. to sort of escape what they thought the regulatory environment was going to be years ago, like are all coming back now. We're seeing a big inflow back from London to the U.S. that's really exciting. New York specifically is getting a lot of crypto excitement. Yeah, we're trying to build a polygon office here, like larger and larger. So I think we're going to see way more of that. And you're going to have a lot more conversations about like the application of what the blockchain is being used for. [38:33] that the point where we've reached the beginnings of table stakes for like moving tps is getting up to the number we wanted to get to sort of like the moment when the electric car came in and we all stopped talking about zero to 60 because okay fine like two seconds is probably fast enough for a consumer car like we're getting there we're not there yet we're still a little ways but we're getting there in crypto so really exciting time okay so table state uh yeah you spoke about sort of there that it's arrived we're here it's the technology is to a point to a point where it's

[39:03] really usable as chief product officer? Like what is the shape that you think it will take? [39:10] Yeah. So maybe I could like go backwards a little bit. I was previously at Stripe running crypto there. And the pitch at the time was sort of, OK, the only way we're going to get all of these traditional folks to sort of move towards crypto was to go ahead and like build crypto into the payment processing system that they're already sort of attached to. You're sort of working your way down the stack from like the application towards the metal. Abstracted. Right. Right. But now like working downwards. Right. Because we want to, you know, in a company like Stripe, you want to expand the amount of the stack that you own. [39:40] At Polygon, we're already at the metal. That's sort of the exciting part. And when you think about money movement globally, it's already happening. Polygon was early in LATAM. Polygon was early in APAC. And because of that, the money's already started to move. And it's almost the opposite challenge. It's like, how do we move up the stack? [39:57] How do we go and get closer and closer to the brand being the brand that you rely on from the moment of the decision to move the money all the way through to the metal that moves it itself? [40:06] And so there's a lot of big plans in place kind of coming up over the next year that will make it easier for everyone from a consumer to be able to think about Polygon when they're moving money and be able to execute on that sort of brand recognition. All the way to institutions like banks, you know, or like money movers or remittance companies who can all rely on Polygon end-to-end products. [40:28] as an application partner, as well as a kind of core technology partner at the Metal. And so we've always been this to a certain extent. Polygon's always been really deeply a kind of shepherd to the community. If you're running a bank and you're thinking about crypto, you've probably talked to our BD team, you know, sort of expanding that.

[40:45] Oh, uh, off where we can be sort of the first party to help you also move that money directly. So there's a lot of plans kind of coming into place there. I think Mark had spoken a little bit about some big moves we're planning to make in the acquisition space recently. I think there's going to be a lot there that gets to come out soon. So that's like, that's the high level. Um, you know, maybe as you get like deeper down, it's also all about like, well, what does that open up for the world? Right. What does it mean to, you know, run your business on Polygon? [41:11] That means your business can start global from day one. That means your business can gather yield no matter where your money is being stored and in what currency. That means that your business can run 24-7. [41:22] as it's translating into and out of local currencies as necessary. You should be able to think about the brand that way, not just in terms of like, okay, this is the metal on top of which I might be able to build those applications. So it's a little bit of a duality of sense for the brand, but it's a really exciting moment for an opportunity to kind of expand out into ownership of the stack. I've heard you talk about some of this before, and I think some of the solutions that you spoke to, [41:47] get at it, but I think there's a... [41:50] foundational misunderstanding for a lot of people in this industry, but I think just generally the general population of people who work in tech who don't have an understanding of how difficult it actually is to move money. And I wonder if you could just talk a little bit about that, like what is actually happening? [42:08] at Stripe or at a bank or behind the scenes of these things that feel I get pushed back a lot from people saying like, well, money is already digital. Like, what's the point of crypto? And so if you could just speak to that a little bit, I think. Yes. So much of our perception of moving money today is really this like virtualization layer that's been created, which is actually backed by various types of credit and deals and signatures on pieces of paper and middlemen and risk assessments. So when you go and like tap a credit card, it's in the name, it's credit,

[42:38] It's not actually getting out of your account. Even when you go tap a debit card, it's really not. We're running on banks. These things are running five days a week, eight hours a day, cutoff times, sometimes worse than that. And so the reality is you have sort of this virtualized layer that works really well for specific applications, like tapping a credit card. And then a settlement layer underneath it, which is where the money is actually moving. And that layer is still trapped in the 50s. [43:01] That layer is moving very slowly. It's moving over systems like the wire system, which is kind of like an email system for money. You're opening up your list of wires, you're clicking through them, you're bringing them inwards. And that really only works in the geos that you are most local to. So in the US, we have access to the US market for this, which is great. But... [43:20] If you wanted to go and take an immediate payment from a higher-risk geo, someone you don't know, you can't risk assess somewhere in APAC, it's actually pretty tough to do because of that virtualization layer. You can't make a risk assessment on them. You can't make a credit decision about them. So you really don't trust that transaction until it gets to the settlement layer. And that's why so many businesses and people, too, are so geographically constrained without some kind of middleman between them and the business. [43:50] look at like the AliExpresses of the world as kind of these like, okay, now I have a trusted middleman who deals with all of this complexity on the other end for me. Like what's really cool about bringing the settlement layer up, right? Like making that the high speed, easy to access programmable layer is you don't need all of those middlemen anymore. You really just need the settlement layer. So I can say, send me $10. And thanks to stable coins and thanks to on and off ramps globally, you know, and thanks to better application layers helping you connect into the

[44:20] Make that transaction happen. Know that it's not reversible. Trust that the money's actually been moved, even though it's 11.58 p.m. on a Saturday. And then deliver your what's increasingly becoming a digital good or service back to [44:33] without any of the overhead. And I think that that's like the thing that's changing at a wide level, right? At a global scale. And it's working its way down into the local scale. You can actually think about email this way, right? When email first came out, it was super clear why it was valuable for trying to send an email to India. Clearly that was better, right? Than sending a letter. But it didn't actually make that much sense to send an email to your neighbor. [44:57] Right. Why wouldn't you just walk next door and like carry a letter over? Because your neighbors got to dial up. Right. And chew up their phone line and wait for AOL to open and get the you've got mail. Right. And hope their kid doesn't pick up the phone and wreck it before they open it. You know, but over time, all of these other things started to happen at the technology layer. Right. We got Wi-Fi and high speed Internet and we got our phones and we got push notifications. And all of this cool stuff happened around the. [45:20] this very core thing that was shifting, which was how we move messages. Same thing is happening, I think, today for the first time really globally for crypto. That's a really great way to bring it to life. I think one thing that comes up for me when I hear you talk about sort of moving that settlement layer up to the virtualization layer, is that what you called it, is that – [45:39] As a marketer, one hurdle that I can see is that you're moving into a domain where there's [45:48] brands that have been building equity for decades, if not centuries, that you're starting to compete with the visas or whatever point of sale.

[45:57] that consumers are used to seeing and to trusting. And I guess, you know, [46:02] question for you is kind of a hot seat question. Like how does, [46:05] Polygon has polygon able to play in that space or is it not going to be Polygon and it's going to be a partner like Revolut or someone else? Like what's what's your sort of perspective on that? I mean, the easy answer to that is that's a partner initially, right? Like Visa becomes better. [46:22] thanks to Polygon. Visa does rapid settlement thanks to Polygon. This gap between a merchant making a sale and a settlement happening decreases because Visa's a lot of different things. Visa's a UX layer [46:34] which is like I go have a credit card that looks cool and I tap it. And then it's all that underlying capability. A lot of that is pain for them. [46:41] that they are abstracting for the user. So it's not actually like a guarantee that Visa has to disappear. Visa's front-end consumer-merchant relationship is pretty valuable regardless of what settlement layer is in the middle. So I think that's like the maybe – [46:55] easy get out of it answer, right? Maybe the like less get out of it answer is, you know, [47:00] As we get like mobile application revolutions for how we move money around, right, the value of that card might start to change. And instead I get to pick, right, PayPal was like into this ages ago thinking about it. And a lot of the rest of the world is already there. And if you're in Argentina, everything you do, right, goes over Mercado Libre, right? And everyone has the app and everyone's scanning QR codes. And we're behind in the U.S., just like we were behind with Tap2Pay. We were behind with like, you know, scanning cards. And so that shift changed.

[47:29] brings a lot of disruption opportunity when you also don't have the technology challenge underneath. So you could look at it through both lenses. But I try not to underestimate just like the consumer brand value of like a credit card today. Because for consumers, you're also getting, you know, rewards. You know, you're getting a good user experience. You're getting financial planning. There's a lot to be built. And the opportunity is there in crypto for that now to be rebuilt, you know, by new people. Or for the incumbent to go and move quickly and adapt. [47:59] lucky position at Polygon, we get to sort of play both games. We want developers to create the new, and then we want to be able to help players like Visa take advantage of this new technology quickly. Yeah. I also think there's no other industry where consumer trust is more important. [48:13] And so that brand is so valuable. [48:16] I want to talk a little bit about you came from Stripe. You could have gone anywhere. Why did you end up at Polygon? Because I saw Polygon everywhere. Like I kept running into it. It was sort of like the quiet layer on blockchain that was actually doing the valuable thing, right? It was the first chain that was integrated at Stripe for stablecoin transactions. We'd go to LATAM, and that's what everyone was already moving money around on. That's what, like, applications were already being built on. [48:46] It's unavoidable. It's the reason it comes up so many times. I'll probably say it seven or eight more times in this conversation. But I care a lot about brands. I think it's tough to build a brand. It's tough to take even a good product and fix a broken brand attached to it.

[49:01] And, you know, I think it's the right moment as well for a chain. [49:06] to start to own the wider stack. I don't think that's been true. [49:10] for a really long time, or maybe ever, right? For it to like start working its way up. And when I do that sort of evaluation, Polygon's unique in that the foundation and the labs organization are incredibly close. [49:20] So Sandeep is sort of the spiritual leader, even though Mark is kind of our CEO in the labs organization. That is not true. [49:27] of most chains. Most chains you go in the labs organizations and they're really far away from each other. Yeah, yeah, you know, technology decisions are being made over here and labs is over here kind of taking guesses. Yeah, and I think you have to push those two things together. [49:38] really closely. And if you don't do that, you know, you really can't move fast enough for when the opportunity arises. So I think like all of those, the team's amazing. You know, I think Sandeep's story is indicative of like the kinds of people who ought to be running crypto organizations, right? Comes from a place, you know, where if he'd had access to these types of tools on day one, he could have built the types of businesses that he had to go and build the tooling to be able to build. Yeah. [50:03] And I think that's... [50:04] organic and very real. I also just think, you know, crypto is an interesting moment. It's like a good time to come into the chains. Like I joined I joined Stripe when the public value that they'd sort of announced had been slashed. You know, I joined Facebook just before the IPO crash. Right. It went IPO at what, $38 immediately almost crashed to like 16. [50:23] You know, crypto is on its back foot in a couple of ways for chains right now. And I think it's doing that kind of Amazon thing where like the price is dropping, but all of the internal metrics are skyrocketing. Yeah. And that's I can't think of a better time to get in. Yeah. For realists. Okay, so big vision. And I love to hear you talk about this idea of owning that whole stack. And it's huge as an idea. What do you think are the...

[50:51] hurdles. [50:52] that [50:54] can come in the way of that vision being expressed? I think the order that you go and execute against something like that's pretty tough to decide. You can sort of look at the world and start just throwing things against the wall and almost look more like a labs organization than you want to. The journey of here's a blockchain, now here's the next layer, let's make it easier to get in and out of fiat for everyone in the world. So when you're using Polygon, you're guaranteed to be able to off and off ramp. [51:18] like easily obvious step, right? Like that ordering, I think is really important. I think the UX that gets built on top of it is really important. I don't think we have kind of a standard solution to the like payments experience, even peer to peer today on chain. The idea of a receipt is pretty complicated. Still, the idea of like what your address is, is pretty confusing. Yeah. And I think all of the attempts to do that thus far have been pretty [51:45] you know, early stage. You know, it's like even like .eth, you know, web addresses. You know, you're sending money to like a domain. It's a little bit strange. There's a lot there, I think, that needs to be dealt with. And if you don't do it just right, consumers will sort of, [51:59] Just move on, right? Consumers are practical and for good reason, right? We don't have time to go figure out everything the market's doing. So the actual go-to-market here is, [52:07] is a huge chunk of the work. I don't know if you could sit there refreshing the Polygon page. But even just the way we iterate talking about ourselves, Polygon's been around for a long time. We're incredibly reliable. [52:18] It's a little bit weird for us to think of ourselves as the stalwart, trustworthy thing in an industry of disruptors. But that's a lot of what Polygon is today. It's trustworthy.

[52:30] I think our website says it's not our first billion right now. We've been moving this money for ages and we don't lose it. I think that's really important. So when I think about challenges for the team, a lot of it's execution, go to market, order of operations, partners, making sure we're going to market with the right people. It was the Zelda beginning. It's dangerous to go alone. So you can take a sword or you can take another person. We'd like to take other people with us. [52:55] So I think that's like the biggest stuff. And it sounds like just core foundational stuff of a company, but it is. That's a lot of where we are. Like we are a startup against a lot of this work. [53:05] with a really strong history. So those are the things that I spend most of my time thinking about. Also just industry shifts that we're also catching, agentic. [53:13] is getting really exciting. Volumes are still super low, but we're starting to see agentic take over. And I'm really bullish on like agentic commerce. I expect agentic transactions to overtake human transactions in the next like two or three years, probably faster than we expect. [53:28] Figuring out how to make the right bets in those spaces while not getting distracted from the core value props that we're trying to deliver for payments. Those challenges are the big ones in front of us right now. I had a question here around where you think we're going in 2026. It seems like Agentic would be on the list. Anything else? I think we're going to see just like global payments work better first. And Agentic is going to follow.

[53:58] winter break and build something interesting. And they're all going to probably do it in AI. [54:03] Those are just the tools there. If I was a 20 year old going home from college, I would spend my entire time [54:10] playing around with AI models, right, for coding or anything else. I hope people go home and play around with, like, commerce, right? [54:16] Right. What does it mean to be able to spend, you know, tens, hundreds of a penny and create marketplaces out of that? What can you do? You do some kind of cool stuff. Right. You create brokers. You know, you can replace the idea of Google. Right. With the idea of like pushing a dollar into a system where it's searching for the best option and then getting back results from various language models. So much you can do. [54:37] I'm really expecting 2026 to bring both things, the beginning of kind of the exponential growth curve for agentic commerce and really sort of the like. [54:47] solidification of like the global commerce side of like crypto and actually moving money in a regulated fashion globally exciting stuff okay show a minute show a minute yes okay so 60 seconds on the clock the concept is [55:01] Chill anything you want for 60 seconds. Yeah. [55:03] I sort of already did it. I'm sorry. I just like, I hate to just show like an idea, but I was talking to a friend in VC the other day and he was really lamenting, [55:12] that like the average age of the blockchain builder was like increasing. [55:16] He was like, we need more young people in here building and experimenting and creating. It's never been easier to get into this space. So if I was going to shill something, it would be like, go home, build something with AI, and do something with global money movement. Forget about borders. Forget about trying to pay your local store. Think about what you would do with global access to dollars. Build a system on top of that enables other people to do something with it. You're building the marketplaces.

[55:46] with that stuff. It's never been easier to do. [55:48] than it is today. Nice. I love that. I am too. We missed out on timing there. But I do think that like, and this is a side note, but one thing, I've had a lot of conversations with our mutual friend, Maddie, about this idea of agentic [56:02] payments and sort of [56:04] Like you're saying, the technology is here. It's ready. [56:08] And the builders haven't – there's not a lot of use cases that have been built around it yet that have felt really compelling. And I think – [56:16] to what you're speaking to, like, I'd love to see like an idea... [56:20] Like – [56:22] An idea doc or dump of stuff that's like, here's what you're speaking to, but like list it out because I do think that like – [56:32] Part of like personally, when I'm like thinking about what I'm by vibe coding, it's like I get stuck at that phase where it's like, OK, no, there's a huge opportunity here. And I think a lot of people feel this way. There's a huge opportunity. Agentec payments are here. The technology is ready. And what's the thing? Like, I think that's a I can throw an idea out. Let's do it. Like seed it. So here's an idea. [56:50] One of the biggest challenges of building a business is figuring out how you're going to monetize the thing. You go and you have to come up with subscription plans and freemium and later and tiers and call us if you want enterprise. All of that can go away. [57:03] In a world where you can just make a crypto payment, like you could use like X402, right, for an immediate payment without even creating a user account. You can get rid of a user account. You can create your service. It could just be as simple as like a data service. We're going and getting pricing information on chain. And instead of having to create like a subscription concept and an account concept and a user management dashboard, now you can just create an API. Right.

[57:25] You can put X402 in front of that API, right, such that when you try to call it, that's where you pay, and you're done. Now it's monetized, and you can start making money the next day. [57:34] I think that alone should cut the time that it takes to create a SaaS service for someone in half. [57:41] Nice. Yeah. [57:42] I feel like that's a great note to end on. Yeah, totally. Someone go build it. Hit us up when you have it. Thank you so much for being here. [57:51] Andrew McCormick, head of eToro US. Yeah, that's me. Welcome to the show. How are you doing? Yeah, doing well. You know, just came back from the Caribbean yesterday. I'm so excited. I love it. My wife and I yesterday are 20th. I feel like I should be like 19 or 20. Almost 43. So yeah, went down there for a few days. [58:19] Kids' grandparents watched the four kiddos for a couple of years. Oh, wow. Nice. And then came back to Jersey, New York, and there's snow on the ground. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I love that for you. I'm happy for you. Okay, I want to start with an easy softball. What is eToro? Yeah, so eToro, we're a retail trading platform focused on normal, everyday Main Street investors. [58:38] We're 75 countries. We're not quite an OG, but we've been around a long time, almost 20 years. Do crypto stocks, ETFs. What makes this really unique is our idea of social investing. [58:49] Community because whether you're eating going to movies sports. [58:53] Life's more fun together, so why not investing? So within our trading app, there's also a social media app where people can –

[58:59] Share ideas, the good, the bad, the ugly, discuss markets, and not just in your own little bubble, but from – [59:04] all around the world. Yeah, I feel like eToro has a lot of brand equity. I've seen it. It's a very recognizable brand. Were you guys [59:13] big in the UK. Was there a big UK? Yeah. Like global, like curious where the biggest like hub, or maybe it's in the US, but just curious from a brand perspective where you guys have the most penetration. Yes. We're relatively new in the US compared to UK and Europe. So biggest market is UK. Okay. Europe, non-UK is right behind it. UAE, other Middle East places are growing. It's also big in Australia. In the US, we're about five years here versus 20 years overseas. Okay. [59:43] and excited. But yeah, huge global company, really complicated being 75 countries and a million regulators and rules and expectations. But yeah. [59:51] Truly have helped people for a long time. So really thankful for that. Yeah. Cool. Okay. So you guys are up to a few things. You launched staking in the U S in September. How has adoption been? What are you guys sort of seeing from the retail side? [1:00:04] Really excited. I mean, the last couple of years in the U.S. has been tough in the crypto space with lawsuits, regulations or the lack of regulations and regulators suing everybody. So our U.S. crypto offering, we kind of took a time out the last couple of years, especially when we're in 74 other countries where that's not the case. So let's invest in those areas. But. [1:00:24] Things have changed some in that space, of course. And we had our IPO in May on NASDAQ. And that was like the big to-do list. Thank you. Probably the hardest work experience in my life, the constant pressure, noise. And we're trying to do this during all the...

[1:00:38] tariff tweet drama. So we're like, hey, let's play it. Even if you're just having a party and you're like, let's have a party. [1:00:47] We have to reschedule schedule based on how liberated everybody was feeling. [1:00:52] Getting that across the finish line was great. But after that, it was like it's all in on crypto again in the U.S. The summer we added 100 crypto assets. Like you said, we added staking in September with three assets and looking to keep growing that. Doing more and more wallet features seems like every month just because that's such an important bridge, I think, from TradFi to DeFi. Yeah. [1:01:14] You know, candidly, like I hate those terms now. And I look forward to it's just... [1:01:18] finance. Yeah, these like kind of cliche words, but wallets are such a great bridge to really leaning heavily in that space. So [1:01:25] A lot going on. Probably need to sleep more here and there. But yeah, it's an exciting time for sure. Cool. You don't have to tell me exactly, but I'm curious what the sort of split is with people who are... [1:01:36] On eToro, U.S. [1:01:38] for crypto versus stocks like just roughly ballpark it'd be interesting to know like what the appetite is on your platform for crypto yeah the large majority is crypto okay which is which is exciting that's part of the reason i came to etoro i was on wall street and i liked it and it was fun but i wanted to do something more in that space and so i'm excited to see our user base has that kind of same mindset yeah i think it's great for everybody to be diversified and do lots of stuff but we're still our heartbeat in the u.s is truly like the crypto and why did you want to do [1:02:08] crypto.

[1:02:09] Yeah, it's weird. My dad got me into the space, which is like strange because he's not the stereotypical like trendy cutting edge. This is like 2014. He's like, Andrew, have you heard of this website, YouTube? I'm like, yes, like nine years ago. But he retired and found two things and he was an early adopter, Bitcoin and pickleball. So like 2013, 2014. Yeah. And so it's like. [1:02:37] Caught me off guard, but he started talking about Bitcoin and Pickleball all the time and blew it off for a couple of years. Like, this is crazy. Lost a lot of money in blowing it off. Don't remind me. [1:02:50] I'd probably be sitting on that. But, you know, like I'm a big believer in not just. [1:02:56] Bitcoin as like an investment, but it's like... [1:02:59] building a better financial system that's more fair and accessible. [1:03:03] to everybody. So that caught my eye. And when you're sitting out in a Wall Street firm, that's not always the passion of the firm. So let's build, let's break down barriers and make things better for Main Street. And so that's what I wanted to build and jump into that space. [1:03:19] Nice. Okay. So we wanted to have you on to talk specifically about the retail environment, the retail market, retail investors going into 2026. [1:03:28] It's been a kind of weird, choppy, sideways market, down market, honestly, for the past couple years. [1:03:35] Weeks, I guess. It was weeks, really. We don't talk a lot about price on the show, but I'm curious, just vibe check overall going into next year. How are you personally feeling, setting aside Itoro? Yeah.

[1:03:48] Yeah. So I have the same reaction, like everything feels down and negative and you've seen all the negative headlines. [1:03:56] But even like earlier today, I looked at the monthly chart, the six-month chart, and everything's positive. [1:04:01] Despite this past month feeling negative and scary, it's like up three – they're like S&P 500 just as a proxy. It's like up two or three percent in the last month. But – [1:04:11] Going to the 26th, I think there's this cautious optimism. Yeah. Right? Maybe we can coin a turn. [1:04:18] We can work on that where people are excited. They still believe in American innovation and technology and those kind of efficiencies, but... [1:04:30] Seen a lot of drama, not just this year, but prior years. And so there's always that like... [1:04:34] Hey, what could be tweeted next that could send this market way up or way down? But we actually – we live and breathe data. I'm more of a motion and feelings, but we have a lot of great people on our team like – [1:04:45] all data and it's a good, it's a priceless skill set. And so every quarter we do surveys of actual retail investors, like thousands of them in the U S and all around the world. And I think something like 60,000. [1:04:56] 63% said in 26 they expect... [1:05:00] It was stock market as a proxy to keep going up, keep improving. So it's like, you know, [1:05:05] Not just like barely majority, but a healthy amount. Yeah. Feel positive, but it's not 90%, not 80%. So... [1:05:11] Yeah, cautious optimism is kind of like how I'm thinking about it. Yeah. I'm curious if you'd say the same thing about this, but if rates do come down, but it still sort of feels like the political and economic environment are –

[1:05:24] sort of uncertain, what do you expect will happen with retail? [1:05:29] Yeah, so I try to be optimistic in my own life, but when you said like, but, or if there's political... [1:05:35] Yeah. Uncertainty. That thing's it's here to stay. [1:05:38] I think no matter what, for a few years at least, we're going to have this political drama and everything is loud and chaotic and fearful at times. So I think that's here to stay, but I think people have almost baked it in. [1:05:51] And accepted it, right? So like, in April, where all the tariff tweets were like, up and down, like, every time something like that came out, the market would go way up or way down. But that isn't really happening more with different announcements. I think people are... [1:06:05] Assuming there's going to be... Some bit of resilience around it. Yeah, no matter what, there's going to be political drama and uncertainty. [1:06:12] There's a lot of optimism in the tech space and the efficiencies. And that's good and bad, right, and what that can bring. And I think we're very early stages and people are overall excited about it. Yeah. And it's one of those possibly like once in a lifetime opportunities where we're like on the precipice or just starting on some massive technological change. Some's good, some's bad, some's scary. [1:06:35] But [1:06:36] the impact that can have on like business in America is huge. Yeah. What do you think is the biggest, like unspoken about threat to retail going into retail? [1:06:46] 2026, obviously political uncertainty is top of mind, but is there anything else that comes to mind that... [1:06:51] you think could be sort of on the horizon. Yeah. Like when our survey we did, it's political uncertainty is number one. Okay. You hear people talk all the time about,

[1:06:59] AI overvaluation. Yeah. Right. That sparked a lot of market moves recently. Yeah. I think stuff that people aren't maybe talking about are like the... [1:07:07] Broad kind of AI stuff. Okay. [1:07:10] So the videos and the content that AI can put out is just incredible now, and it's so early. I have a Sora account, and I let my kids get on there, and they make these crazy videos that look just like me, sound just like me. So you think if you could do that with some huge CEO of a massive publicly traded company, have them saying something crazy, does that – [1:07:32] Take the stock. Yeah. So I think that kind of like AI... [1:07:36] world is like a risk that maybe people aren't talking about. And also... [1:07:40] Some of these companies have... [1:07:42] increase in value so much the last couple of years. So, [1:07:46] And today, yesterday, at some point, I was looking up at the S&P 500 top 10 stocks. [1:07:51] companies [1:07:53] What would you guess the percentage they make up of the entire market cap? Oh, my gosh. S&P 500. S&P 500. [1:07:59] Top 10? Mm-hmm. [1:08:00] So it's 10 and there's 490. I think like... [1:08:04] Like 80. [1:08:06] Yeah, I would say over 75. Yeah, it's just 40%. Okay. Not as... We've got some room. Yes. So we're maybe headed there, but what's crazy is five years ago it was 30, 10 years ago it was 20. If we're heading out. Oh, we're heading out. Maybe it's like society in general, the haves and have-nots are getting further and further apart. Okay. So even an S&P 500... [1:08:25] that's such a big concentration. So like, [1:08:28] A problem in one of these massive tech companies can have huge downstream effects. And you have tons of people where there's retirements, pension plans. They have no interest in high-flying tech, but they just S&P 500, ETF. But because of that, you are 40% of your funds are in...

[1:08:44] like a more risk like tech companies, that kind of over concentration of tech companies, [1:08:51] And S&P 500 and those kind of indices, I think, is a risk like no one's talking about. And so far, it's been great for holders in those assets, but... [1:09:00] You never know. Yeah, yeah, totally. What behaviors do you... [1:09:04] There's a fly. That's really. [1:09:06] What behaviors do you see that are like signals for retail that they're more risk on? [1:09:12] In a particular moment. [1:09:13] Yeah, I think it's the stereotype of crypto in tech companies. You know, it's interesting, despite this year of what feels like a very loud year of uncertainty, like I don't know if retail ever went risk off. [1:09:25] And what we saw on our own platform, like when the peak like tariff drama days in April were our like biggest buying days. It was actually April 8th was the low of the market this year. [1:09:37] Also, like, our biggest buying day. Oh, interesting. Wow. Wow. So investors are seeing this as, like... [1:09:43] buying opportunities. Yeah. Just like, look, it's Christmas season, Black Friday, all this kind of stuff. If you're going down the store and there's, [1:09:50] a purse, a suit, whatever you've been eyeing, and now it's 20% off suddenly, you'd be excited. And I think retail maybe has that same mindset of like, I think this company is great. Now it's on sale, and I want to hold it for a long time, so let me snap it up. Yeah. [1:10:03] That's interesting. I'm happy to hear that. Yeah, me too. That's not how I relate to those days, but I'm happy that other people do. It hurts in the short term, but I think if you have that long-term mindset, like, I believe in this company.

[1:10:18] I like it. I think it's doing good in society. It can help make me money. You maybe have that long-term vision. It hurts. [1:10:25] It helps to do that. Yeah, totally. Okay, should we do a show minute? Yeah, let's do a show minute. Okay, 60 seconds. Chill anything you want. It can be anything. It can be your Caribbean vacation if you want. It doesn't have to be E-Tour or U.S., although it could be if you want it to be. And I'm going to start at the clock now. Let's go. I'm going to try to do three things in one minute. Oh, let's go. And none's about finance. Okay, great. That's maybe even more important. First, people should go on walks like every day. Wow. I swear. All right. The crowd loves it. [1:10:55] 25% of the world's political, social drama and unrest [1:10:58] Be soft if people just go walk outside. [1:11:01] take stuff away from their phones. Great. Second, stretch to four kids. My four kids are so limber and flexible, and I look at them almost like lust, like, wow, I wish I could do that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I want that. But as you get older, you get... [1:11:13] you know, less flexible and stuff hurts, your back hurts. [1:11:17] So stretch every day. Uh-huh. Hard. [1:11:20] Journal. Life is short. It's priceless. A lot happens. There's a lot of noise and it's so easy for the days to blend together. The memories blend together. You forget a lot. But there's a lot of like joy is the good, the bad. [1:11:33] Write it down. Reflect. Great. I love that. Excellent. Perfect. All right. Yeah. I love that so much. Can I just, just one thing on the journaling note, because I saw a tweet today that was similar to that. That was like about parenting specifically that was saying, you know,

[1:11:50] you... [1:11:51] Miss... [1:11:52] Like as a parent, [1:11:54] If you're not journaling, you forget – as your kids get older, you forget a lot of what it was like in the day-to-day grind of like – of your kids and their lives. And that I have had that experience where my – though my kids are younger, like I've already had that experience where I'm like, man, I miss like – [1:12:07] I don't even remember the time. And I remember I have a body memory of it being insane, but I can't remember the actual memory of what happened. But I always even – [1:12:16] Always when I think about starting a journal, I'm like, well, I've missed so much. I can't start now. It's too late. I'm too far gone. But even just personally, we've all journaled starting today. But I don't know why I get so stuck on what I've missed. Same thing with investing. Start today. But journaling, like... [1:12:37] I had similar when I first – I had twins at the start and I always loved journaling. So I first started doing like handwritten notes. So you started from the top though. But then I faded because I was trying to do like handwritten letters and this is not realistic. Then I started emails – [1:12:50] And then that was not realistic. I had two more kids. So like there's this great app, Day One Journal. You can just put notes in so quickly. I've missed Day One. No, Day One's today. Yeah, today's the day. Today's the day. It's 2026 New Year's resolution. There you go. Okay, I'm traveling. What's great is like it feeds you like every day. It's like the last five years ago, four years ago, three years ago. And there's so many little nuggets. Yeah. I would have forgotten. And the hardest thing I've had about being a parent is not the late nights,

[1:13:20] emotional of like, I love seeing my kids grow up. [1:13:24] And I hate seeing my kids grow up because once they do, those little moments are gone. But the journaling helps them live forever. I love that. I really love that. Andrew, thank you so much. Yeah, well, thank you so much. It was a joy. Thanks, Andrew. [1:13:36] Thank you. [1:13:40] This just in. [1:13:42] Our joke race is live. Our joke race is live. Shout out to David Phelps. It's for best. [1:13:49] Podcast of the year. Podcast of the year. [1:13:52] And we're up against Bankless, the Roll Up, the Chopping Block. And I think, honestly, we should win. Yeah, hearing those names, I think we should definitely win. So let's drop the link. All those people are our friends, and they're great. Oh, we love them all. We love everyone, but we should definitely win. We want to win. We like to win. So we're going to drop a link. [1:14:15] in the chat and... [1:14:17] Go vote for us. We have one more guest, but Dina and I are going to spend some time just chatting with [1:14:23] Quasimates is going to come on soon. He did come in and eat a burrito in the studio and it did smell. So he's here in spirit already, which I love a burrito. So honestly, I'm jealous. Okay. [1:14:37] Dina, you have some things on here that you... Okay. I have gotten a real kick out of the story that went live this morning. I'm going to pull it up on the screen here. Okay. I had to get the unpaywalled version because...

[1:14:52] I don't have a Wall Street Journal subscription. Oh. However. Oh my gosh. I saw this. This is so funny. Deeply funny. The... [1:15:00] The header... [1:15:02] Headline is... [1:15:04] One thruple had three separate design tastes. How did they manage a renovation? [1:15:10] And it's crazy that the Wall Street Journal. [1:15:14] I am obsessed. Wait, wait. You have to show the image. The image is what got me. I'm in the unpaywalled one. So hold on. Okay. The image is what got me. No. What's insane to me is like I think about who I know that has a Wall Street Journal account [1:15:26] subscription they are the most conservative people i have in my life but also look at these guys [1:15:32] They look quite conservative as well. If you had said, if you had given me a lineup, well, it's not on the screen yet. Oh, it is. Oh, okay. Oh, there it is. If you had given me a lineup of, let's say, eight men. [1:15:44] and said choose three to be in a throuple, these would have been the last picks. No matter who the other people were. Crazy. Also, they seem to have pretty similar design tastes based on all of them having a... That's why they made such a good throuple, because they all were like... [1:16:00] I see myself. [1:16:01] Uh-huh. Well, I will say this is where they differ because I was reading that too. I wanted to understand actually make – We got a khaki for the listener, not watcher. You need to just look at it. They say explicitly what – It says like one is really into plants. [1:16:16] One is more conservative and one likes minimalism. Conservative, traditional. Traditional. So a traditional taste is...

[1:16:24] Minimalists. Plants. We've got one note. Plants. And they're like, nah. I'm a minimalist. No plants. No plants. I don't have any plants. Do you have plants? We have some plants, yeah. I have no plants. I couldn't. All the travel I do, those things are dead. Totally. Immediamente. Totally. I'm not taking care of them. We do have plants. But anyway, all that to say, I do think that this is a big day for the Wall Street Journal. They have... [1:16:46] burst their thruple cherry they had to define thruple in the world they had to of course they did it of course they did it says um what's the um what's the biblical biblical okay hold on hold on hold on also it it was a covid thruple so they were they were the two were together before that they had met the third they brought their third in the covid hit they had to formalize things and [1:17:16] had to like you remember that time of course time when we were like who are real friends because like of course it was like to throuple or not and so they became the a covid trouble and then they bought this home together 4 000 square foot duplex with a 2 000 square foot roof deck in chicago okay four bedrooms three and a half baths [1:17:38] 1.71 million in June 2020. Okay. So they got... [1:17:43] They try. Yes. What's it called? No, dink. Trink. Trink. Trinks. [1:17:51] Tinks. Tinks. Trying.

[1:17:55] Okay. [1:17:57] They don't. Well, it doesn't appear that they have kids. Can you imagine that would be an additional two or one aesthetic to add? Also... [1:18:05] June 2020, they got a really good work rate, too. Yeah, they got a 3%, probably. They got a 3%. All three of them became owners of the condo, but they drew up a private agreement for how to handle how it would work in practice. So, like, they... [1:18:17] have some sort of agreement in place, which I think is great. And I'm supportive. You're supportive of that. So supportive of that. And then the article goes on to talk about how it's like, [1:18:27] A trend like real estate agents are noticing more couple throuples and polycules buying homes together and that there's like a little burgeoning. [1:18:37] Trend market market for that. Can you imagine being the real estate agent who's like, well, my specialty is throuples. That's what I think. Okay. I think we should move to the next story. Okay. Yeah. Just quickly. This is how wall street journal defines it. The throuple, which is a committed romantic or sexual relationship between three people. Okay. So they established that that's now in the wall street journal forever. And it's, [1:19:02] Happy for everyone. Totally. Crazy stuff. Okay. Okay. [1:19:06] My man, Dave Portnoy. Dave Portnoy, huge Netflix deal for video rights to three of his podcasts. Okay, this is what I feel with this man. [1:19:16] People are always like, you're such a big fan. You're such a big fan. You are. I do think of you as a fan. [1:19:20] Oh my God, everybody in the room gave it. [1:19:24] And Kate's on my side about this. Kate doesn't surprise me either, which I love.

[1:19:28] This is what I think about this man. This man is a dealmaker. [1:19:33] He is, he knows how to make a dollar. And I respect that so deeply. And he reminds me. [1:19:40] of... [1:19:41] Um, [1:19:42] A man who will remain nameless on this pod, but that we both know. And that I actually briefed Kate on in Abu Dhabi. She learned about this person for the first time. And that man's ability to... [1:19:57] make deals and make money. And I think he was deeply unethical. He's not an idol to me, but I... [1:20:06] It's really impressive. It's the art of the deal. You respect the art of the deal. I respect the art of the deal. And you know what? As a media mogul myself, I'm a fan of the art of the deal. [1:20:15] Dave and I, I would love to walk in his footsteps. Let's just say that. Totally. You know, one bite, everybody knows the rules. [1:20:22] What is that? It's his pizza bed. It's his pizza bed. Oh, the pizza bed. And then he eats like the whole pizza. Uh-huh. He's like, one bite, everybody knows what he wants. Oh. [1:20:30] He rates the pizza. Okay. Yeah, it's a whole thing. You've never seen these videos? I've seen these videos. I've only seen the one that went really viral that we talked about. Incredible. There's like six people. You can't make that stuff up. Yeah, yeah. The one thing I will say about this is that... [1:20:43] This is... [1:20:44] Is anyone watching the morning show? Was there a disclosed amount? [1:20:47] Oh, the biggest deals never have a disclosed amount. Just so everybody knows. [1:20:52] No, no disclosed. OK. Is anyone watching The Morning Show with Jennifer Aniston on Apple TV? No. And it upsets me. Everybody. Every time somebody asks me. No, I'm just like, we're still doing that. OK. Season four, season five.

[1:21:04] It's Reese Witherspoon and Jennifer Aniston. I love Jennifer Aniston. Yeah. [1:21:09] There is a plot line that's this, that... No one's a watcher, so... Okay. Well, someone listening, right? Yes, great, great. We have a comment. She's watching. So this is the bro plot line on The Morning Show. Anyway, funny to see. Art imitates life. As it always does. Okay, this next one here is just a tiny little bit, but I thought was really crazy, which is... [1:21:32] Poly market on [1:21:35] Will DraftKings launch a prediction market in 2025? The snake eats the head of the tail. People are so degenerate about betting that they're betting. Will a betting platform launch a betting app? Launch another betting app in this year? I don't know what it is in me that... [1:21:57] right now. You're about to [1:21:59] Oh, yeah. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Let's go. I think like what... [1:22:05] what this brings up for me and what I feel when I see this type of thing. Like, I don't know why I... [1:22:12] Just... [1:22:13] like, [1:22:15] degenerate behavior like i just see that and i like it and i what is broken in me that that is what i feel you feel it's entertaining totally it's entertaining [1:22:25] Obviously, gambling addiction is a horrible thing. We should put the hotline up. [1:22:30] All the time. More than we do, which is never.

[1:22:35] I guess also part of it is [1:22:38] Yeah, I think there's just a lot of humor in it. A lot of humor. And I appreciate that. And then the second thing is that I saw this live market this morning also. [1:22:46] that is tracking the price of Bitcoin. [1:22:48] I've never seen before on Polymarket. Oh, interesting. Yeah. Those are my bits. I love your bits. Those were great. Do you want to take your screen down and maybe we do one more end of year? [1:22:58] Like, I don't even know the word. I don't know why. My brain just went completely... [1:23:04] Wrapped. There it is. Review. Favorite. I did. I put it up and I... [1:23:09] I did a whole thing. Oh, I've watched that show too. Great. See, there are some watchers. I'm sure there's four or five seasons. Like there's gotta be people watching. Yeah. Shout out to my morning show. Are you watching the HBO? [1:23:22] No. Oh, I just started that too. Heated Rivals. [1:23:25] What's he to rivals? Oh, it's a gay love movie. [1:23:30] Loose story. Love. I don't know. Great. Probably great. It's based on a book. It's based on a book series. It's about hockey players. [1:23:37] Who are intimate. It's all over the internet. I can't believe... [1:23:41] I've not really been on the internet. There's a lot of discourse around it, and I have been wanting to watch it. And then I thought... Oh, is it... [1:23:51] Is it for adults? Yeah. [1:23:54] Okay. And I want, I've been wanting to watch it. It's been on my list. And then we had a lot of travel time and I was like, downloaded it for the plane. And then I got on the plane. I'm like, I can't watch this on a plane. Yeah. Okay. Totally explicit. I was like, that's a crazy move. That's like a crazy move to do that. So anyway, I'm looking forward to that. That is a crazy move. I don't know how people. I can't believe you've missed this. This is like so up your alley. I'm so excited. So exciting for you.

[1:24:21] series on HBO Max. Wow. Yeah. Right. Right. To rival professional hockey players. Yeah. I've been looking for a show. I've been really in the I started watching. [1:24:32] Victoria which is you love we both love a period period piece yeah this one is not that good but it's on Netflix and it's a Queen Victoria like they you know they did the crown with the last queen oh I already watched this this was a while ago you watched Victoria [1:24:46] I think so. It's about her and the king, and he's like... [1:24:50] Oh, it's been out for like four years. They've also been dead for 200 years or something like that. Yeah, mental illness, that's... [1:24:58] I don't know. [1:25:00] I don't know that he has special health. Okay, I think we're talking about different things. Okay, anyway, I mean, favorite subject line. [1:25:06] . [1:25:07] Um... [1:25:09] oh i don't have you don't have one i the one miranda just put out i like that one oh name of my twins mergers and acquisitions that's your line that's your line and name of my twins mergers and acquisitions what's your favorite um the one that just like i as i was perusing i was just like man this did really make me laugh when i wrote it uh tylenol is making you autistic no s real question mark nice classic classic um okay should we bring up quasi matt [1:25:36] please [1:25:37] Okay, we have Quasimatt on Boys Club Live. Friend of the live. Friend of the live. Second time. Internet it boy. Yes. Welcome to the show. Thank you. You're welcome. I'm so happy you're here. I cornered you at a party and I said, you have to, you have to, well, actually, I went up to you and I said, hi. And it was dark, to be fair. And you were like, hi. And I was like, excuse me. And then you're like, oh my gosh. And then you recognize me. Oh, is that actually true? Yes. Oh. And then you were like, sorry.

[1:26:07] this as a moment but there was a moment where I was like [1:26:09] Is this really going to pretend like he doesn't know who I am? No, that's so crazy. I never intentioned, like I would never do that. When people do that, I get really scared of them forever. Like to me, that's like, you can't recover from that. You can't. That's a fumble. Like you're such a weird freak for doing that. Totally. Totally. And then we had a fun conversation, but, and then I was like, you have to come on the pod and give your end of year musings. Yeah. Something like that. To start, you're wearing true religions. Yeah. [1:26:35] Yeah. And I was going to put that on my in list for 2026. [1:26:39] But talk to me about that. Okay, so basically I found these. I like when the details are a different color. So, like, these I like because they have, like, red thread, really big, really popping out. Merry Christmas, yeah. [1:26:51] um but i saw these ones that were like black and white and i just like the contrast they looked kind of gothic and i was like okay well i can't commit to a full goth aesthetic that's not really my thing but i would like to lean that way a little bit i would like to be a goth sympathizer or like at least appropriate the culture if not totally adopt it totally um and they had some sort of sale so i was like well let me oh these are they're new on that no no this was like a year or two ago no no but i'm saying like these aren't like a thrift these are from true religion on yes [1:27:21] but I went on there. [1:27:22] And Kate's giving a, they're back. Are you going to be wearing True Religions this coming season? [1:27:28] Okay. Is it a low rise for women? [1:27:33] Can we pull up a... [1:27:36] A true religion on the screen for the mood board. I wanted true religions so bad when I was in high school. I was dying for them. And there's two reasons it didn't happen. One, I couldn't afford them. And two, religion.

[1:27:47] no it wasn't a religious thing which i love that okay i love that they're not the true religion like someone truly unreligious no at the time and and we've evolved as a society which is great but i didn't have the figure for them but now i think anybody could wear them and happily i'm gonna buy a pair they're ready yeah ready they're waiting to happen waiting and they're amazing yeah totally i love them are you pulling up an image here [1:28:16] Oh, okay, great. Yeah, link me. I want to get on this. I think my time might have passed for True Religions, but I'm happy to check out. I feel like you could do like Sisterhood of the Traveling True Religions. I love that. I feel like that could be a fun little moment. That would be such a great bit. Let's do it. We'll ship them to each other. [1:28:31] Wait, what was the other brand? Seven? No. Seven Jeans. Seven to me was very different than... [1:28:40] Thank you. [1:28:41] Oh, there was a song. A Diesel, also a genom that had a similar vibe. [1:28:46] Yeah. I don't really know my genes, Laura, but I know true religions. Okay. True religions and gene codes. Okay. They're all about the contrast itch. [1:28:53] Yeah. [1:28:54] Like they're really doing something. They're not being boring. Like jeans are often boring, but they figured it out. Are you sharing? Here it is. Oh, spin to win. [1:29:02] Here it is. Okay. These are $146. [1:29:07] Oh, we had very different... [1:29:10] We had very different reactions to that price point. We had different clothing budgets, I think.

[1:29:17] Okay, this is great. We can... [1:29:20] Come back to, you know, so what are some of your musings for either 2025 or 2026? Yeah. [1:29:30] Yeah, so I just want to, like, some context. It's like I'm really obsessed right now with this idea of a cultural mood. Incessant tweeting about it. Yeah. I appreciate it. Commitment to the bit. Yeah, yeah. Like, start... [1:29:40] there because i think like every once in a while i'll just get really obsessed with like a phrase or like a way of stringing words together and i think like the word mood to describe something that's like decidedly not a mood like a culture can't like have a mood in any literal sense okay there was this meme like two years ago or something where someone just completely made up that this pop artist called brooke candy they like misquoted her in an image of her saying you already know joe [1:30:10] said that. Like, she never would say that. It's just, like, an incredibly weird thing to say. And I got so... [1:30:16] So obsessed with it. And I'm just like, I'm just, I love the idea of something being a whole nude. Yeah. So when this appeared, it was like through this Instagram magazine. [1:30:23] Which I... There's this new thing where magazines... Like, first it was like there's a fake podcast where it's only TikToks and there's no actual podcasts. And then now we're doing fake magazines on Instagram. Oh, I didn't know we were doing that. Yeah, where they'll give like an image with a headline and then like the... [1:30:37] article will just be like the caption of the Instagram, which I love. I honestly think it's not a million miles away from Voice Club, honestly. Yeah, I mean, maybe something to think about with all your new money that you just received from Polygon is doing some sort of Instagram magazine.

[1:30:55] The headline that they gave was Claro became a cultural mood. Oh, I can't stop thinking about it. Uh huh. But it was not a magazine. [1:31:04] Well, it's like a magazine. What does it mean to be a magazine? Yeah. Similar to being a mood, maybe the same thing. And so is Claro a... [1:31:15] a cultural mood? So yeah, I think she is. So like, I was thinking, okay, so what is a cultural mood? Like, how do I compile this list? [1:31:22] And it's like, okay, something has to happen. Like an event has to happen. So like Clara releasing music or Clara existing. Is that enough? I guess that counts as an event. Okay. And it has to be like, okay, she did something, but it also maps to the way that like everyone feels. Okay. So like there's this event that represents like the mood of everyone. And then like the so-called article was basically saying that. [1:31:41] claro like tapped into this like bedroom pop aesthetic where she's not she's not like a cultural icon she's a cultural mood instead because she's like intentionally being that really checks out to me yeah yeah and it's like you can like i listen to claro and i'm like okay me af like she's sitting in her room and like having feelings and like yearning yes in like writing things and i'm [1:32:02] Exactly. I don't look at Taylor Swift and go, "Oh my God, yes, agreed. So true." She has a place in society. Cool. [1:32:12] Far away from me. A hundred percent? But like, it's just like a different thing. So she's not in a mood. Okay. This is my, I agree with you wholeheartedly. [1:32:20] I was probably... Clara was definitely in my Spotify wrapped last year. I haven't done mine for this year, but it's up there. I listened to that. You haven't done it? That's really crazy. I haven't updated it on my phone, so it's not prompted me to do it. So I don't know. I should do it. Maybe we should do it live. But anyway, I think that...

[1:32:39] That album was great. She's an Epo baby. There's a lot to be said about her as a person, but I love her music. She is an Epo baby. Yeah. I can't remember who her parents are, but. Her dad is like a C-suite executive at a Fortune 500 company. And then her career is predicated on like early connections to Fader. [1:32:54] I didn't know we could be an F-O-Babies without having a connection to the industry that the person is successful in. [1:33:00] That's loose. If he's a C-suite executive at Fader... [1:33:03] No, but there was some sort of connection. I think it's like, okay, if you're a C-suite exec at a Fortune 500 company, you can just pull a lot of strings regardless of the industry. But I don't know, because there's rumors, and you can contextually kind of understand that there's probably some Napa activity involved, but there's not... No one's pulling up an email from her dad being like, make Clara famous. Has she owned the Napa baby allegations? This is something I don't understand about her. I've never... [1:33:29] seen a huge fan never seen any videos of her speaking. [1:33:34] And that's why she's a mood instead of an icon. I totally understand her through her art. Although to answer your question, she dismissed the allegations as misogynistic, which is importantly, like not an actual, not engaging with the accusation itself. Right, right, right, right, right, right. It's adjacent. It's not the same thing, but it's adjacent to the Sydney Sweeney interview to me. [1:33:54] Where it's like, oh, we're doing something. We're taking this in a different direction completely and ignoring the question. Did you guys see the Kate Winslet Nepo Baby fumble? No. I know. A rare fumble. We love Kate Winslet. What happened? [1:34:07] Big L on the board. She was basically like...

[1:34:10] And she has kids, and there was, like, photos of her with her kids on the red carpet, and then she was like, they're not Nepo babies because – [1:34:18] um they used to like stand on their own two feet and everyone was like don't say that totally and they like want to be actors and just everyone's like everyone's like just own it go own it yeah okay with like if you're a nepo baby and you're like releasing immunity like if you're clara and you're making you're literally establishing a cultural mood i'm like okay good use of nepo resources like go off i feel like you're being sarcastic about i don't think i don't know no i'm like i love clara's music okay yeah like there is something and maybe it's just your personality but [1:34:48] That's not all together. I need to add something to this. Okay. Okay. [1:34:52] I responded to your tweet with this sitting on a plane, the fourth or fifth tweet that you had about Claro being a cultural mood. It's early. Yeah. [1:35:01] Only five came up on my feed. And as I was sitting there reading that. [1:35:06] On a Delta flight. [1:35:08] I... [1:35:09] over the speakers. [1:35:11] While people are boarding. [1:35:13] She's playing. Wait, which song? [1:35:14] And was it her or was it sexy to someone? Oh, okay. A string cover of it. No, it was her. It was her. Okay. [1:35:21] And I was just like, I'm upset. I'm upset because my cultural mood shall not... [1:35:26] intersect with this group of people coming onto this plane. Okay. Someone is saying who in the comments. So I'm going to, I'm going to, that's totally fine. That's fair. No, no, that's fair. That's fair. That's not, it's not their cultural mood. No, it's not.

[1:35:40] Yeah, are you just going to spell it out for them? Like, so they can, like, I would go listen. Her album Immunity is really good. I would start there. [1:35:47] Great. Sophia is a banger. So, yeah. [1:35:51] Give it a listen. Give it a listen. She's a musical artist who makes... Oh, yeah. I guess we can start. Here she is. Here she is. Zero context environment. We're not providing the most basic info. Okay, wait. Let's see. Anyway, how do you feel about her playing on a Delta flight? [1:36:08] While people are getting into their seats, putting things in their... [1:36:12] um thing well it's like how i feel about all of the things that i like getting popular which is like it's always mixed right like i'm glad that people are appreciating something that i like but also like i think that things are better enjoyed in a more curated context and like it's like the thing where like retail employees will be like oh i like hate ed sheeran simply because i have to listen to him constantly and it's like well maybe like shape of you is actually one of the best songs of all time and like your environment has just led you to dislike it and i think like you [1:36:40] traumatic experience of flying on a plane. Yeah. And like having to associate that with Clara is quite unfortunate. Totally. I'm sorry for that. Thank you. I appreciate that. I will say shape of you, my friend's child who he's eight, [1:36:53] can play it on the piano and, [1:36:55] sings it and oftentimes when i come over he's like can i perform view oh i would live and i'm like 100 next time i will but the it's quite explicit for an eight-year-old like he sings it sometimes and i'm like oh i didn't even think about that but ed sheeran there's something about ed sheeran that is so sexless that i feel people can like yeah he's a very like neutralizing factor exactly exactly okay any other cultural moods you're excited about wait i have a list so oh

[1:37:25] Okay. [1:37:25] Oh my God, I'm going to actually read an article because I thought I was going to have to read the Clara article in order to talk about it, but then there wasn't one. But I did some other research. Wait, there was a Clara article? Oh, the magazine, the fake magazine. Oh, okay, I'm tracking. Okay, so really the first one, and this is really just about like a timeline, in January, the Trump meme coin. [1:37:43] to me was like a big cultural mood because 2025 was really sort of Machiavellian. And that was where we were like, oh, like public service, like, oh, like you're supposed to represent other people like, no, actually, you're supposed to scam everyone. Yes. And we just like all sort of were collectively forced to be okay with that. Yes. Did you buy? Yes. [1:38:02] So I like had like a huge come up on the Trump coin, actually. Yeah, which I'm like shocked by that because. [1:38:09] Usually that's not how it works for me. But that was like actually probably my biggest financial win of the year. Me too. [1:38:17] Yeah. Yeah. Which is like really good company. Yeah. Like, I guess we're like, we're really early to. I could have made more. [1:38:26] But I didn't. [1:38:27] I mean, that's always the case. Yeah. You were really in the trenches at that point in time. I remember you being very locked in. I was living in the trenches. You're really feeling a lot of feelings around having missed the earlier, like you got in [1:38:41] early, but you were having angst about having missed it really early. And I was like, whoa, Natasha, it's fine. It's fine. Well, we don't have to spend too much time on this, but I will say I was in... [1:38:53] I made a huge... [1:38:55] This was my fumble of the year. This was my fumble of the year.

[1:38:58] I was in a moment, I was at a bar, very little service, very low battery life, 5%. Okay. [1:39:06] I didn't... Kate is my external hard drive or external battery. And I was with a friend and I opened my... I saw what was happening. It was happening and it was like, this is real and... [1:39:20] I, it was at $7, I think $3 or $7. And I, [1:39:27] the person I was with was like, [1:39:29] everything you have in this wallet needs to go into this meme coin port full port and i was like no i'm gonna do like two soul and see what happens and they were like what like they were so upset and they were like took my phone and they were gonna do it and i was like no like no i am not like you i'm not like you and then moments later literally like maybe maybe 10 minutes later it was at like it was at 12 and then it was at 16 and then slowly i'm like putting everything in my [1:39:59] at me like you're an idiot and i was like i know i am totally that's the point yeah totally like what are we here for if not to be idiots totally exactly anyway that was my biggest problem but i still biggest bag i had this year i can't believe that was this year but february yeah no yeah i think it was january but okay well whatever early on in the year it set the tone okay great set the tone it really did okay the second thing [1:40:19] is oh this is like a sort of esoteric moment i don't even know if you heard about this but pete davidson got rid of his tattoos or like i was tracking that oh okay this is not really in my universe i was just asking around like hey guys what are the cultural moods and my friend was like

[1:40:33] Pete Davidson getting rid of his tattoos. And there's like this obvious... $200,000 to get them removed. Yes. Oh, wow. [1:40:39] I'm really honest. I'm in the cultural ways. I hope I can keep up. And I think it's like there's the very literal reading, which is like, OK, aesthetically tattoos are maybe like waning. People are not into tattoos anymore. It's like a part of the whole like clean girl thing. But I think like the spiritual thing that is more important on a mood level is like he's just like going back on everything he's ever done and said. [1:41:09] and say I'm not who I was yesterday and I don't hold those opinions and I didn't do those things. Wow. [1:41:13] And like my identity is actually fragmented and I started to exist right now. Oh my gosh. I love that so much. And I also think that approaching the world in that way and having that space for your friends to show up new and new. [1:41:25] any day is the most generous act that you can do in a friendship, I think. You can let someone show up in any way that they're going to show up and not having, they're not a chair that shows up exactly the same way. And I think that... [1:41:35] genuinely it's like i love that it's a growth that i've had to force myself to do and i found it it's really powerful yeah so i love that for you yeah and i think like consistency is i used to actually pursue consistency in the sense that i was like oh i'm like actively trying to be predictable in a way but i think it's like that's it's really weird to think of consistency as the end point where if you think about like just [1:41:57] naturally, if you're a person who cares about things and like has hobbies and interests, like you just will end up having some level of consistency by...

[1:42:05] being a person yeah with like an identity and a life uh-huh and so there's like no need to be like oh like gotta be consistent because it just happens yeah yeah totally well there's also like consistency on a deeper like values level [1:42:16] And maybe like how that's expressed is different every day. Yeah. I try to do it with my kids anyway. I'm like, I can't. [1:42:21] Like I, the way I speech my kids, it's like, I can't, I really have to catch myself when I'm like, yeah. [1:42:27] thinking of them in certain rigid ways [1:42:29] ways. And it's like that doesn't let them be [1:42:33] Yeah, it's not facilitating their... [1:42:35] Yeah. Full sleigh. Anyway. Yeah. [1:42:38] Okay, what's next? Okay, so there's two left, and they're actually related to one another. So the first is getting brain damage from overusing LLMs. Oh. Fair. So in order to kind of illustrate this, I asked ChatGPT, what are the cultural moves of 2025? And it said... [1:42:56] Rainbow Emoji won. No. [1:42:58] Authenticity, imperfection and real humanity. And it's like, well, I don't think that means anything. I don't think that has anything to do with 2025. Like, I just feel like that's kind of like a trend that people may have been thinking about for a while now. And it may have been like hashed and rehashed. [1:43:13] And we could maybe move on to something that's more appropriate for the time. Yes. The nuance of a cultural mood is completely lost, it seems. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Totally. I mean, granted, like, I'm the one that prompted it. So it's like... [1:43:22] I guess my fault, but like, whatever. And then it's that brain emoji to... [1:43:27] mental health and well-being as cultural priorities. [1:43:31] Oh, they said this. Or they said this. Okay. [1:43:34] That is... [1:43:35] Maybe like what it made sense in like 20...

[1:43:38] 14 we're past that or like 2015 or something like that's not the cultural mood of 2025 no but like obviously the the greater trend is like okay you used to go at very well i mean [1:43:48] Way back in the day, you would like talk to people and read a book or whatever. But like that's irrelevant at this point. So it's like you go like three years ago, you go on Google. You are at very least curating the sources from your Google query. But now it's like when I have a question, I don't even Google it. I go to Shadjubuti. I'm not even curating the results. Like I'm getting like the monoslop, like the same exact thing that would be given to [1:44:11] anyone else, like directly from the LLM, like from chat GPT. And I think that's just really scary. Yeah, it's great. Controversial, but related to your wellness take, is Brian Johnson a cultural mood? [1:44:26] Thank you. [1:44:28] Silence. Not mine, but is he a cultural? Oh, yeah. Yes. I think he reflects something that is true of society. Yeah, his way of being. Yes. I also think... [1:44:38] that the cultural mood of 2025 as it relates to wellness and well-being is actually not a [1:44:47] like health and being caring for your mental health. I think it's actually quite the opposite. I feel like, [1:44:55] nihilism and... [1:44:57] negative mental health just inject the peptides yeah like truly i don't think that i think it's in yeah self-destruction is seen as entertainment exactly yeah so actually it's quite the opposite yeah yeah

[1:45:12] I think it's like... [1:45:13] It's like radicalized in both directions. Like there's like the health maxers and then there's like the more nihilistic. Yes. It's just like we're approaching the polls. Okay. Okay. What's your last cultural mood? Okay. Okay. The last one. [1:45:26] is, and this is like I have sort of a PhD thesis on it, so you could cut me short if I'm not explaining it properly or something. Great. [1:45:33] The cultural mood of 2025, I think, is... [1:45:37] Six, seven. [1:45:41] Okay, I'm in. Say more. Oh, you're in. Okay, I thought I was going to get – because it's sad for me to admit. It's like I don't want it to be – I don't like it, but I'm willing to hear what you're – I have so many thoughts. Keep going. Okay, okay. [1:45:53] We're going to talk about horseshoe theory. Does everyone know this or should I explain horseshoe theory? Okay. Okay. [1:45:58] So, yeah. [1:45:59] Normally, usually when we think about politics, we're like, OK, there's like the right and the left and it exists on this line segment. And so people who are on the extreme left and the extreme right are actually like extremely opposed to each other and have very little in common. [1:46:10] horseshoe theory posits that the... [1:46:14] line segment is actually a horseshoe. And when you get like radicalized and you go to the end of the horseshoe, you're actually really close to one another. So like a radical right... [1:46:22] politics person is closer to a radical left person than like a centrist. It would be easier to make that gap, make that jump. [1:46:28] Yeah, exactly. Yeah. [1:46:30] Like they just want something to be crazy and they don't really care how or why. Yeah. [1:46:33] So I think that 6-7 is about context. You can understand yourself in a low-context way or a high-context way. So a low-context way of understanding yourself is like,

[1:46:44] I'm going to take all of these trends that are in the news, macro cultural trends, the global economy, all these like really, really big things. And then I'm going to find a way to use those big ideas to understand myself. So it's like a top down approach. OK. And then like a high context way of understanding yourself would be like I'm going to examine my direct relationships with the people around me and what I do every day and what I eat and like things that are very like visceral and real and like specific to me. And that's how I'm going to understand myself. OK. [1:47:11] And so 6-7 is like... [1:47:14] radically [1:47:15] lacks context. Like it's so it lacks context so much that like being in on six, seven is simply understanding that there's nothing to be in on. Like the whole point is that there's no context. [1:47:28] So... Okay. [1:47:29] It's like... [1:47:31] Cultural trends, mainstream media, whatever, is like asking you to view yourself as just like one of millions of people who's subject to like the whims of the economy and like the political complex and whatever. And six, seven to me is like people hyperbolizing that idea and saying, oh, there's a narrative that fits everyone. [1:47:47] Well, then let's come up with something that's like absurdly... [1:47:51] simple, like that truly applies to everyone. Like I understand what a number is. [1:47:55] Yeah, that's what we all have in common. That's what brings us together with the six, seven meme. And so it's kind of like poking fun at. [1:48:01] the idea that we can [1:48:04] understand ourselves like in this extremely general way there is like a story that applies to all of us which is that we're sort of an empty container [1:48:12] Thank you. [1:48:13] Yeah, yeah. Like like that. We can understand for meaning that we just pour whatever we wanted to. Yeah, yeah.

[1:48:19] And so I think like, [1:48:22] would six seven is us jumping the horseshoe is like us like recognizing like, hey, we've been asked to [1:48:29] Like, people are telling us how we should think about ourselves. The media, the powers that be, are telling us how we should think about ourselves. But 6.7 is so loose that in order to give it any meaning, you have to, like... [1:48:39] do a joke with your friends about it. So like a second grader doing a six, seven joke is like, Hey, I'm taking this like really absurd thing that doesn't mean anything. And I'm forcing it to mean something to like me and my friends during math class, because the answer to the math problem was six, seven, and we're all going to queen out about it. And like, there's something like beautiful about that translation from taking something meaningless and being like, Oh, I'm [1:49:00] interpersonally meaningful out of it. Uh-huh. I... [1:49:04] I see this. I can see it. [1:49:07] And accept it. I don't know that I love it. I don't know that I love it. But I do think... [1:49:17] When I think about all the times that I've heard 6-7 over the last... [1:49:21] Let's call it three months. [1:49:23] That has ranged... [1:49:25] Every age... [1:49:27] every type of person, every... [1:49:30] corner, every social economic background, it's everyone. And so I think I agree with what you're saying. [1:49:38] But there's a sadness to that. [1:49:41] I guess you can look at it two ways. There's a sadness to the emptiness of it. Or... [1:49:45] It's a beautiful... Canvas. Humanity. Yeah. We're all connected. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's like this substrate on which we can build our own meaning. Right. Yeah. And hey, maybe it's a new...

[1:50:00] Maybe it's what will be what unites us all. I mean, I think it has been. It is because it has – there's no in-group. There's no out-group. [1:50:10] We're all in the in-group in it. It's like anti-gatekeeping. The point, the bit is that there is no way to gatekeep it. Yes. There's like nothing to get. We reach across the aisles. Yeah. And 6-7. And we all go 6-7. I do think one problem I have with it. [1:50:26] is... [1:50:27] I, when I see women my age saying it, I have a good. Women your age are saying it? [1:50:34] Yeah, like on... [1:50:36] I don't see women your age. Oh, like not Dakota Johnson, but like, what's her name? [1:50:43] Name and shame. Name and shame. Name and shame. Let's hear it. Like a celebrity. Amanda, she's in this new movie, the Housemaids movie, Sheffield, Amanda Sheffield. She's saying it as a joke. [1:50:53] Like, they're on Jimmy Fallon. Uh-huh. And then she says... [1:50:57] 6'7", or Kim K says 6'7", and I'm just like, I have a physical... [1:51:02] Embarrassment, body embarrassment for them. So that actually goes against your theory. Well, I think that actually says more about you than it does about anyone else. Yeah, I would say the same. Yeah. Okay. I think you're going to have to bring that to... [1:51:14] my therapist it's like one of those things where it's like you are allowed to find it distasteful obviously but it's like it's kind of like okay this is like cringe or i don't like it it's not the same as like uh oh you shouldn't be doing that it just means like oh that's not really for me yeah okay that's fair that's fair which yeah i think like like you're allowed to have like taste and opinions it's not like you're saying like oh like kim k is an idiot for doing that you're just saying like i don't like that that's true that's team that's like so real of

[1:51:44] for it. [1:51:45] 2026? Well, Brian Johnson, I think was my cultural mood. Oh, okay. No, no, no. For you personally, what is your cultural mood for 2026? Well, related peptides. That's your cultural mood? Yeah. Okay. I woke up after my ham party to a text. I got really, I had a ham party a couple weeks ago and I got... [1:52:01] I was over served by myself at this ham party. I served myself a ham party. It's a white millennial woman thing to do. Wait, ham? Ham. Oh, okay. I've never even heard of this. [1:52:13] You'll be invited to my next hand party. You'll have a great time. Okay, thank you. Do you know how Alison Roman is? [1:52:17] No. Okay, no problem. You're the wrong demographic for her. But she, honestly, I got it from you who got it from her. She has this sacred text now, which is about how you throw a ham party. I threw a ham party. You bake a big ham. Informed by Natasha. Ham parties are a cultural mood, honestly. They really are. You both have been to my ham party. [1:52:35] Okay, review on the ham party. [1:52:38] Great is what she said. Delicious is also what she said. Fun, too. Basically, you bake a big ham. [1:52:43] And then you have all these different sauces and mustards and pickles and breads. And then people make all their little sandwiches. And it's really fun. Oh, wait, I love that. Yeah. Anyway, I woke up the next morning to a text that said, OMG, you didn't get a chance to talk to me about Chinese peptides. Oh, God. And I was like, oh, my God. I know. And I was like, oh, my God. What was I spouting off last night to like moms in Nashville? In Nashville. Yeah. Like the neighborhood mom group that came over to like my hand. [1:53:13] So anyway, that's definitely like top of mind for me, clearly, if that's what I'm talking about when I'm drunk. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Totally. No, I see that and hear that. What's your cultural mood? I'm really trying to think of something that feels...

[1:53:24] Right, for the next year. [1:53:26] Sorry. [1:53:28] Oh, you're talking about for 2026? Yeah, yeah, looking ahead. So think on it. We'll come to you. Oh, yeah, no, I have a closing statement. Oh, great. Okay, I guess when I'm struggling with the cultural mood is like, [1:53:39] is... [1:53:41] I want it to be a piece of media or an artist of some kind. [1:53:46] to like cover the year, but I, [1:53:51] This is more of my... [1:53:52] intention for 2026. So we're just going to go with this. So I was served a reel with Dakota, Dakota Johnson and Chris Evans. We're all familiar. [1:54:02] I don't know who Chris Evans is. Captain America. He was in the materialist with her. Oh, they were on a press tour. That's right. And he actually gives her like a real genuine compliment, like in this. And it's it is disarming to her. You can tell she like breaks her like press. [1:54:20] vibe like persona yeah and he was like one thing i love about dakota [1:54:24] She's a very on-purpose person and that everything about who she is comes from a well of very intentional decisions that she's made about her life. And it makes her... [1:54:35] And someone, when you're around, there's so much intention to the things that she says and the way that she presents herself in the world and how she cares for her friends. And it was really like a beautiful thing to say about somebody. And I was like, wow, I would like that to be said about me, that I am an on-purpose person. That same compliment. Yeah, I mean, it seems like I want to be Dakota Johnson, which is not what I'm saying. But that cultural mood, I guess, of being intentional.

[1:55:05] Thank you. [1:55:06] Yeah. In the way that you show up and that you can show up every day, someone different, but as long as there's a purpose in the way that you are showing up, that's what I would like. Period. Yeah, I know. That's amazing. That's a good like personal cultural mood. Thank you. Yeah. We're manifesting. [1:55:21] Is having a crush a cultural mood? [1:55:24] I think yes. I think yes, but I don't think it exists. [1:55:28] Say more about that. Yeah. Oh, I think everyone's asexual now and like – [1:55:32] No one has sex anymore. What? That's true. The cultural mood is asexuality. No, I haven't heard this. Like, I actually would love to hear a defense of this claim. I mean, I'm... [1:55:40] I'm a married woman. I can't really speak to it too much, but like the reading that I do is that [1:55:46] There's very much a trend of people having a lot less sex. [1:55:50] considerably less sex than they used to than they were before than they were before but that could either mean that people are yearning harder like that could that could increase the desire because there's no outlet for it there's no way of getting over it because you're not like [1:56:02] So there's more crushing actually happening. There was also that piece of Enfero that was like, everyone's really hot, but no one's doing anything about it. Oh, no. That is a cultural mood. The cultural – I think – [1:56:13] The cultural mood... [1:56:15] of i'm not saying for me personally i'm saying for people on the world is a combination of increased yearning and crushing uh-huh with less sex uh-huh yeah so nightmare situation i think globally [1:56:27] That would be my two cents on that. Totally. Yeah. I think like the interesting like trend is, [1:56:33] This is kind of what you were saying. It used to be, back in my day, people would want to be hot for sexual access. But now people want to be hot for just attention. It doesn't necessarily... I don't even think there's anything wrong with that necessarily. But it's like...

[1:56:51] it's like a different type of performance like you're not craving like intimacy necessarily like a certain type of like intimate access you're craving like the opposite of that like extreme like publicity whoa i that's interesting i think that that's true okay what's your closing statement for maybe it's 26 maybe i have to think on this okay um which is that that's the only camera right [1:57:14] let me settle for a moment okay [1:57:16] Yeah. [1:57:17] . [1:57:19] Many cultural moods were had in the year 2025, the most important of which was 6/7. [1:57:26] It's easy to imagine that [1:57:29] These trends can be imposed on us from the powers that be. 6.7 emerged online, was adopted by the media, made it into the halls of institutions, [1:57:37] and was understood by many. [1:57:40] But I think we're focusing on the wrong 6-7. [1:57:43] What I want for our cultural mood in 2026 is for us to turn to those around us. [1:57:49] our friends, our family, our collaborators, and our coworkers. [1:57:54] I want us to look around at the six or seven people right next to us and build a cultural mood with them. [1:58:03] Amen. [1:58:05] Thank you. Klaasimat, you're a performer, an artist. You are a cultural mood. Thank you. You are a cultural mood. Thank you for being on the show. Yeah, thanks for having me. Perfect. It was perfect, as always. I think we should maybe just wrap it up. That's the holiday special of Boys Club Live. We will see you in 2026.

[1:58:26] Okay, that's our show this week. Join us live on Twitter every Wednesday at noon. Or here, I guess.