Sam and Shaan discuss the early adopter mindset — how to spot trends before they’re obvious and why being wrong about new technologies is worth embracing. Topics include ConstitutionDAO’s attempt to buy the U.S. Constitution, Gary Vee’s NFT and book track record, future status signals (less screen time, saunas, cold plunge), and the power of building in public and planting your flag.
Speakers: Sam Parr (host), Shaan Puri (host)
Opening: Andrew Huberman and CIA Spy Guests [00:00:00]
Shaan: Did you see Andrew Huberman replying to my tweet?
Sam: Yeah, I did.
Shaan: I feel kind of giddy. I feel a little honored.
Sam: Do you feel like it’s kind of cool to interact with him?
Shaan: Yeah, I think he’s great. I really think he’s great. The cool part about this podcast is that me and you get to hang out often, and then once in a while there’s a bunch of guests — I would say for all the guests I like them all, but maybe two out of every ten I’m like, oh, this is a person — they’re my kind of people. I just really get along with them and I really respect what they’re doing. He’s definitely one of those people.
So hear me out. You have to go somewhere on Wednesday, so I went and found a guest. Tell me what you think about this guest. When I got this person, I realized we should do this way more often.
I met this guy and he has a business that’s like a fine local services business in California. I go, what did you used to do? He goes, I was in the CIA. I go, what did you do there? He said, I would go to the Middle East and I would try to get people to commit treason — I would try to influence and persuade them, basically get them to give me secrets so we could do espionage. And I was like, that’s the most amazing thing I’ve ever heard. Can you tell me everything?
I sat down for like an hour and asked him questions. He told me stories about being in an alley in Lebanon trying to get some person to show up — he’s got all these weird stories about persuasion and influence. And I realized: Shaan and I should just start doing that way more, just getting people who are interesting, regardless of whether it has to do with money or not.
Sam: Yeah, I think that’s cool. I met a guy once who was using our product — we held a meetup where like 200 people flew to our office, big party basically. This guy was always very mysterious because our product was kind of like Clubhouse, so you could sit there and hang out all day chatting. He was always online, and I was like, so you just don’t work? Or what’s the deal, you’re always online doing this? He’s like, oh, yeah, I’m in between gigs.
When he showed up I noticed two things. One, the guy was incredibly muscular — I kind of bumped into him and it was like I hit a rock. He wasn’t trying to look super fit but I could tell, it’s those people who could do 90,000 pull-ups. Your whole body is just made of muscle.
Then later that night I introduced him to two people. One person was from Russia — he spoke Russian with them. I introduced another person from Pakistan — he spoke Urdu with them. And I was like, how many languages do you speak? He’s a white guy. He spoke with almost a perfect accent. As the night went on and we were all drinking, he kind of confided: yeah, I was actually a spy for many years. And he starts telling me these stories and they’re so unbelievable that I’m just thinking, is this guy lying or telling the truth?
We go to the Battery later that night — the Battery is basically a private members club in San Francisco, like a Soho House for SF. On the way out, it’s like two in the morning, and at the elevator is Elon Musk. Him, Jason Calacanis, and two other people we don’t know.
So this spy guy is with me, and he goes — hold on. He walks straight up to them at the elevator, and he goes to Jason Calacanis, not to Elon: “Jason. I met you last year at the conference and I offered you a tour, but I forgot to give you my number. Let me give you my number now, and I’ll be able to get you that tour. And if Elon wants to come, he can come too.”
He basically focused on Jason, then just sort of like — “you could tag along” — and walked away. I was just laughing. It wasn’t that smooth, in my opinion, but it was still hilarious. He had the balls to approach, so good for him.
Shaan: So who was the guy?
Sam: I don’t want to say his name. I haven’t seen him since. That was my one night with the CIA guy.
Shaan: Well, this guy’s coming on when you’re gone. And long story short, we should do more cool stuff like that.
Sam: For sure.
ConstitutionDAO: Crowdfunding to Buy the U.S. Constitution [00:08:00]
Sam: Speaking of cool stuff — can you tell me what’s going on with this ConstitutionDAO thing? Because it’s actually amazing.
Shaan: Yes. I got a DM a few days ago from someone who said, hey, a group of us are getting together to buy the Constitution. The United States Constitution.
I think there are 11 copies. There’s only one that’s in the hands of private buyers. This is the one being auctioned off by Sotheby’s. So they said, hey, there’s a Sotheby’s auction in a couple days — we’re gonna create a DAO, which is a crypto term for basically a group of people, think of it like a company. We’re gonna form this DAO, anybody can contribute any amount they want, and we’re going to try to buy the Constitution.
I was like, what? How much is it?
I think they said they’re gonna need around 20 million dollars to raise. Who messaged you?
Sam: It’s a small group of NFT collectors. They approached me and some others to try to help get the word out. The amazing thing is they’ve raised in three days — I think three million dollars from two thousand people.
Shaan: So the Twitter handle is @ConstitutionDAO. It says, “We the People, for the People — we’re buying the Constitution from Sotheby’s in four days. We need your help.” And their website says “We’ve raised 3.6 million dollars so far.” I think they need roughly 10 to 20 million dollars.
Sam: That’s crazy. It’s actually pretty amazing. How does it work? Who owns it? How are investors protected?
Shaan: The way the DAO is structured, there’s a wallet that holds the NFT. It requires a certain percentage of votes to do anything with it. So you vote as a group — if over 50 percent of people vote for something, it happens.
The guy who reached out — Austin Kane — goes, “We are literally purchasing the Constitution of the United States.” They’ve had ten million in soft commitments and 3.6 million actually funded. And they plan to hold the physical constitution in like the Smithsonian or something.
Sam: Does Austin make a profit for organizing?
Shaan: I don’t know. There’s not a ton of details about how the DAO is structured or whether they have any preferential thing. Same thing we had for the Jordan idea, yeah.
Sam: Looking like I was talking to a friend about that the other day — I still think that would be great. The only reason we haven’t done it is if Jordan found out someone was gonna do something specific, he’d be like, no, I don’t want that. The Constitution is likely just being sold to the highest bidder.
Shaan: Have you heard of Krause House?
Sam: What’s that?
Shaan: Krause House — it’s a DAO of basketball fans, and they’re crazy enough to try to buy an NBA team. They’re trying to crowdfund and buy an NBA team. Today NBA teams are owned by billionaires — Steve Ballmer types who buy these teams for one to two billion dollars. The idea is: why wouldn’t all the die-hard fans of, say, the Grizzlies band together? Could they raise enough money between fans and investors who would love to own a piece of an NBA team?
Sam: Well, the issue is it’s impossible. Or not impossible, but you have to get approved by the other 30 owners, so they can vote to block you. I don’t think it’s a given they would block it, but money is actually not the only limiting factor — you can’t just get the money and go buy it. You’d have to come over the top with the bid, pay way more than the market price.
Shaan: There’s another group that’s doing this in a more practical way — they’re buying a fourth-tier soccer team in England. So there’s a ranking system where you can ladder up. They’re buying one at the bottom, kind of like the show Ted Lasso. They bought this joke of a team for like 10 million dollars, they’re crowd-controlling the whole thing, minting NFTs because they own the IP of the team brand. They sold 20 million dollars of NFTs for their team. They’re trying to literally rank up and eventually get into the Premier League.
Sam: I don’t want to spend much time talking about NFTs and crypto because I’m so bored of it, but I just read this amazing Wall Street Journal article about Gary Vaynerchuk.
Gary Vee’s Track Record: Trading Cards, NFTs, and the 1M Book Launch [00:18:00]
Shaan: Tell me what stood out to you.
Sam: Gary’s been on the pod a ton — everyone probably knows who he is. He owns an agency that at this point is quite large, I’d say probably a 200 million revenue business. He bootstrapped it and he is on fire lately.
He launched a thing with Michael Rubin — the NFT trading card one — and he also has a new book coming out. He launched this thing about a year ago we had him on for called VFriends, which I think is a collection of NFTs worth north of 500 million dollars.
His latest thing: he’s got this new book, and he created this rule where if you bought 12 copies you would receive a mystery NFT. He did a three-hour live YouTube and Instagram thing where he told people to buy the book. And so far, as of today, it is the largest pre-order ever in publishing history. He has sold one million copies before it’s even gone live. And people have no idea what they’re getting — the token’s utility is still to be determined.
Shaan: You know why people are buying this? Because of his track record of being early and right. You might have missed VFriends, you missed the NFTs when he told you about them, you missed the basketball cards before they got hot. Get this one right. That’s what’s happening — people are like, all right, I’m in.
Sam: I was actually watching another cool thing he did — an interview with Mark Zuckerberg.
Shaan: That was so good! He steamrolled Zuck.
Sam: He kept interrupting him. The comments were just ripping him for it. But someone said in the comments: “Gary’s talking to Mark about social like he’s his big brother and Mark’s his little brother.” Because like, Gary was right about social media. He was saying he knew NFTs were going to be big because of Farmville — people would pay for badges. He referenced another Facebook app and was like, that’s how I knew it was going to be big. And Mark goes, “You know, I never really thought of that.”
Also, Mark’s haircut was horrible. Like they just put a ball on his head and cut the bangs around it. What’s he doing?
Gary had a great line where he said basically Mark already looks like a sim — he looks more like a character from a video game than a human being. He wears the same exact thing every day on purpose, which is what your character in a video game does. And he nagged him about that but was also kind of complimentary.
Status Signals: What Rich People Will Do in the Future [00:28:00]
Sam: Let me ask you a quick question. I’ve been thinking about this. I did a short amount of research. What trends have existed that separated rich people from poor people?
In the Greek and Roman era, being very pale and white was a mark of wealth because you’re not outside working hard. That changed in the 1960s when being tan meant you have leisure — you have enough time to go hang out outside. Coco Chanel around the 1930s and 40s talked about being bronze. So that became popular.
What do you think, in 20, 30, 50, 100 years, is going to be that thing?
My opinion is it’s going to be a lack of screen time. Not like “I use a computer” — more like, rich people won’t be on their phones. Mark Zuckerberg said his kids don’t get screen time. Bill Gates said something similar. A few of my pretty wealthy friends will be like, “Yeah, our kid has never seen a phone — we don’t use our phone in front of them.” And then you go hang out with other friends who maybe aren’t in that position and they’re playing on the phone through the whole dinner.
Shaan: I totally agree. And I think it’s already happening. In the next 20 to 30 years — there’s a few more in this category:
Back in the day being fatter used to be a sign of wealth. Obviously you had enough means to eat food, you had a leisurely lifestyle. Now it’s the exact opposite — having abs is seen as a higher status thing.
I think being away from the digital experience is going to be a status signal. It’s going to be rare. More rare than a diamond or gold. Because everybody is going to be completely engrossed in the online world.
Have you heard of the Light Phone?
Sam: I keep hearing people talk about this.
Shaan: Basically it’s a really minimalistic-looking phone — clean design, looks like an old flip phone but cleaner. It’s just a phone without apps. You can text and call, but you can’t use the internet beyond that. I think it’s great. The problem is the inconvenience, like switching your SIM card every time. But I think the idea is great. I’m gonna buy it.
Sam: I think in-person experiences are going to have a premium — travel, meetings, concerts. If most meetings just happen over Zoom, then you’ll fly and meet somebody face to face, and that’ll be special. Same thing with concerts. I was talking to a comedian and he said demand is roaring back even higher than pre-pandemic. So you’re asking what else is like this — I have a couple.
Shaan: Splitting time between cities. I’m doing it now and I realize I’m in a fortunate situation, but I think that’s going to be far more common. Like having a few Airbnbs or homes and just shifting throughout the year based on where you want to be in whatever season, not having a hometown.
And here’s one I’m getting into: did you see what I tweeted asking people how to optimize my house for longevity and health? The most consistent answer was cold plunge and sauna. I just bought a sauna two days ago.
Sam: I know, I saw that. What’s his name — Huberman — said don’t do infrared and you’re like… but I bought an infrared.
Shaan: There’s a sick company — check this out — it’s called Florens, F-L-O-R-E-N-S. Basically he’s built a custom new version of an in-home sauna. It plugs into a normal outlet — when I was looking up saunas, one big thing is you have to get an electrician out to handle the power. This is small enough where it fits in a room, like made for one person. Really clean, modern design — most saunas kind of look like the same cabin feel, but this looks like it fits in a modern home.
And then there’s one in the Presidio called Ancient Ritual. I think it’s almost like Peloton for the sauna. You get in, normally you’re on your own, but I think what Ancient Ritual’s doing is guided meditations, sounds, scents, talking you through what to do — like Calm or Headspace meets a sauna.
Sam: I’ll have to remember the exact study, but there was a very reputable one that said if you sauna for two 20-minute sessions a week, it decreases the likelihood of cardiovascular disease by something like 30 to 40 percent. Three sessions a week, it decreases it by like 60 percent. The numbers are astronomical. Just from two to three sessions, let alone zero to two.
Shaan: I think if you fast-forward 10 years, sauna and cold plunge is going to be as common as a swimming pool in America. I could see a world where that’s the case.
The Early Adopter Mindset: Lean Into What You Don’t Understand [00:45:00]
Shaan: I want to put an end point on this. We talked about this because we’re interested in it. But I’d also say there’s been a big lesson I’ve learned: any time you discover a group of people who are living a lifestyle different than yours, it’s very easy to write it off. Oh, that’s frivolous, that’s whatever.
When I saw gamers and people streaming video games, it was so strange. I remember making fun of this kid in college because he was watching somebody else play a video game on a live stream — the guy was playing in Korea. I was like, you’re watching a dude in Korea play a video game? Why don’t you just play? Better yet, why don’t you go get some food? I made fun of him. Then years later I’m selling my company to Twitch, talking about how great this trend is. And he called me like, you motherf— you made fun of me for this ten years ago.
That’s happened to me so many times in life. Now I go the exact opposite way. When I discover these things, I lean in. That’s become some of the best discoveries, life changes I can make, or investments. You’re actually on the cutting edge of stuff, you’re in early.
There’s a famous business book — I think it’s Crossing the Chasm — where he talks about this bell curve of people. It’s: innovators, early adopters, early majority, late majority, and then laggards — people who still have AOL email addresses and are looking for Blockbusters.
For a lot of things, you would be on the right side — either an innovator or an early adopter. I’m intentionally trying to go that way.
I remember the first time the iPhone came out. I was like, who wants to read tiny text on a screen like that? Nobody’s gonna watch a movie on this tiny square. I was a junior in college saying these things to people. I was wrong.
Snapchat — I was wrong. My username still has the word “test” in it because I was so certain it was stupid — just for kids and whatever.
Bitcoin — guys in my office were telling me about it back in 2012, 2013, and I was laughing, saying, “Guys, let’s focus on something legit here.”
I’ve been wrong so many times that I’ve flipped the script. Instead of writing off strange things as dumb, I now invert. I ask: what would it take for me to do that? What’s making people want to do this when I think it’s so strange?
Emmett at Twitch — there was a small corner of Justin.tv where these guys were watching video games. Two percent of the traffic, but spending a significant amount of time. He was like, that’s the one we’ve got to go to. And the company split — most of the talented people wanted to go work on Social Cam, the Instagram-for-video idea. Jacob, the OG designer at Twitch, said I actually wanted to be on Social Cam. They just said, “Team’s full, go work with Emmett.” And that turned into a billion-dollar company.
So: lean into things you don’t understand. That’s my point.
Sam: I do this on Reddit and niche forums. You can just type in any hobby and “forum” and find these communities of people who are kind of freaks, and it’s fun to learn about it. Intermittent fasting was mocked by Business Insider eight years ago — Microsoft executive does intermittent fasting, what is this? But there were online communities where people have been doing this forever. Fasting is now mainstream.
Silicon Valley’s latest craze — meditation. They made fun of it. Guess what, that’s what everybody’s doing now.
I think breathwork is where meditation was. I invested in this thing called Otherships, they just launched their app — I use it every single day. I do it outside because Huberman said get light on your eyes first thing in the morning. I’m sitting in my driveway doing breathing techniques, and neighbors are walking by walking their dog. What they feel is a totally normal behavior. And I go louder as soon as somebody walks by because I want them to know they live next to somebody from the future.
Shaan: There’s this guy — Bill Bowerman, a track and field coach at Oregon in the 1970s. He went to New Zealand and learned from Arthur Lydiard, who had his runners doing 120 miles a week of slow distance running. Bowerman comes back, University of Oregon gets really good at track, and he starts making shoes for his runners — calls the company Nike, with Phil Knight. The other thing that happens: he writes a book called The Joy of Jogging. The idea of just going out and running for fun wasn’t even a thing in the 70s. Prior to that, people didn’t just go out and run. That was a jogging craze. And Bowerman created Nike to capitalize on it.
Announce What You’re Trying to Do [00:58:00]
Shaan: So the last thing — this came from the Zuckerberg-Garyvee interview. Gary goes, you changed your company name to Meta. What’s the thinking behind that?
And Zuck said something I thought was really true: you know how it is when you run a company with thousands of employees — it’s really hard to get the message out inside your own company. One of the best ways to get your company to realize you’re serious about something is to go talk about it externally. When a statement gets made publicly, inside the company they also read that article and say, I guess we are committed to this. I guess that is a top priority. Product managers start adding features for that thing. Top talent switches to that division because they know it’s an area for growth.
Then he goes, the other thing is we wanted to put a message out to the world — to say what we were doing so that people who want that to exist will come work for us.
It repels the people who find it off-putting, and attracts the people who want it.
I thought that’s such a powerful concept for anybody, regardless of the stakes. I’ve done this when I hire interns. Instead of writing a normal job description that says the role, responsibilities, requirements — you think about who the ideal person is and you ask: what would make them stop what they’re doing and think, holy shit, I gotta reach out to these people? So you’re going to repel people who aren’t a fit and attract the ones who are.
I put a thing up on Twitter once. It kind of looked handwritten. I said: hiring an intern. You’re gonna get three years of experience in the next 12 months. I don’t drink coffee so you’ll never have to go fetch me some. You’re going to work on this, this, and this for me because I’m trying to do X. And I basically laid out what I was trying to build. I got hundreds of applicants — just because I said what the hell I’m trying to do, and it attracted the type of people who want to do something like that with their life.
Sam: I kind of did that with the fitness influencer thing, to be honest. I said I’m going to focus on being a fitness influencer — half joking, half serious — and then I started posting content every day. I’m sure some people made fun of it or left jabs, but my DMs are full of people sending me cool equipment ideas, flying out to meet me.
Shaan: Have you read 48 Laws of Power?
Sam: I haven’t read it fully, but I’ve heard some of them.
Shaan: Law 25 is to always recreate yourself. Be the master of your own image rather than letting others define it for you. Incorporate dramatic devices into your public gestures and actions, and your power will be enhanced. Your character will seem larger than life.
A lot of people and companies get made fun of for doing that, but these huge gestures often work out. Here’s a little example of it: I had a Twitter bio for the last few months that was very controversial. Instead of the past — “I did X, I sold Y” — I said what I’m trying to do right now. I planted my flag: I’m trying to be in a great mood daily, I’m going to get into phenomenal shape for the first time in my life, I’m going to make 10 million dollars by December, and [something about family].
I got maybe five really important messages from people who were like, yo, respect — I might be able to help you with the fitness thing, or I see you have the mood thing, what are you doing for that? Or: 10 million bucks, how are you planning to do it? How far along are you?
One guy kept emailing saying how inspired he was — his goal wasn’t 10 million, it was 100,000, but he was energized by it. It attracts like-minded people.
Sam: What does your bio say now?
Shaan: I’m building a 100 million dollar brand, and I’m investing in badass companies. What are the odds it’s gonna work out?
Sam: Seems like it might work.
Shaan: I think it’s gonna work. The reason I’m doing this — I wanted to start a business with my wife. She’s not into tech or the stuff I’m into. I’d come home and she’d say, how’s your day, and it’s hard to go much deeper than that. This was something we could do together while we’re having our first two kids. Also as a challenge — we have a couple friends who do e-commerce really well, so I thought I can learn from them.
Would you sell it next year for 20 or 30 million?
No. I think it can get to 100. I think we should just go all the way.
Sam: That’s pretty awesome. Our buddy Suli — he’s like a business mentor to me — he said something I loved. He goes, I’m only happy in a prison of my own making. I don’t want to do nothing. I like doing hard things and challenging things, as long as I get to choose what the hard and challenging thing is. If it’s something I don’t want to do, even if it’s slightly hard, I’m like a whiny baby. But when it’s really hard and I chose it, I picked this poison — I have so much fun. I wake up every day energized.
Shaan: Yes. We can wrap up there. I like the philosophical wisdom stuff at the end. It got my wheels turning about what I can build in public and how I can put myself out there more.
Sam: Building in public is overrated, by the way. I’m gonna do it with this ketchup thing, but I think it’s overrated. You know what’s better? Just doing cool stuff and not talking about it.
Shaan: Fair. I’m actually doing both right now — one thing that’s private and a bunch of stuff that’s public.
Ben, if I said what are you trying to do — how would you plant your flag to attract like-minded people?
Ben: Well, I mean, obviously a lot of people know about my podcast How to Take Over the World. I’m trying to make it a top 100 podcast in the world across any country. We’re trending in the right direction but I haven’t really put that out publicly yet.
Shaan: And now it is. Sam always says every goal or dream should have a time associated with it.
Sam: How much time is left in 2021?
Ben: About six weeks.
Shaan: All right everybody, go subscribe. If you’re listening to this, go subscribe to How to Take Over the World. It’s an amazing podcast. In six weeks, let’s see where we are.
The best way to get to that statement is to put zero pressure on it and say it out loud. Play with the ideas until something sticks. Then ask: if that’s the dream at level seven, what would it be at level ten? What would it be if I turned the knob up to twelve?
Sam: By the way — where’s my number, where’s my timeline? I’m being called out. Mine is to be 185 pounds by January 15th. I have it written down. I’m currently at 196. That’s 11 pounds in two months.
Shaan: Sam basically says in the next two months I want to lose 11 pounds. Now what will that attract? Other people who also want to lose weight, or have just done it. Those are the two people who are going to reach out: “Me too” or “I just did it, here’s what worked for me.” That’s the power of saying it out loud.
Sam: The manifest cowboy is hilarious. My buddy has the best nickname I’ve ever discovered. He showed up for something, and someone said, “That’s why they call him Mr. Show Up.” And he goes, yeah. Anytime somebody needed a ride to the airport, oh, I’ll be there in 15 minutes. You’d give them a throwaway invitation to a party — he’d go. They’re like, you showed up to the party? You don’t know anyone here. And that became his reputation. I wish that was my nickname, because Mr. Show Up is gonna win in life. Eighty percent of life is just showing up, and if you’re Mr. Show Up, you’re acing that part.