Things I Learned This Week - AI Taking Your Job (But Only If You're An Autozone Engineer), Being Censored, Echo Chambers, Harvard Picnics, Falling Too Fast, Tattoos

I haven’t written in a while.

Over the last few months I’ve purchased a house, been let go from my startup job (went out of business), started a new company, almost needed shoulder surgery, hit the fundraising trail, found my first 10 customers, and released new music.

I’ve also been making videos. I started making daily short videos maybe 3-4 months ago because I wanted to help people. I’ve read a lot of books, lived a lot of life, and made a lot of mistakes—at least for a 30 year old—and all of those have given me perspective that people in my life tend to appreciate. My plan was to make videos to more widely share the bite-size advice that I would have historically peppered into conversations or writings.

I love writing, and my writing gets a fair amount of praise (a few “I liked that”s will go a long way), so naturally I decided that I should start making videos to share my ideas, rather than well, writing.

But I don’t like making videos. I did Toastmasters for 6 months and did develop my speaking skills, but guess what? Speaking is not making videos. Recording, coordinating with an editor, writing scripts, etc. etc. is making videos.

There’s also way too much left to chance. Making a viral video is gameable, but not for the kind of content I like creating. I don’t want to compete with hot girls and Jake Paul for 14 year old’s attention, and I don’t want to be at the mercy of the algorithms, which are tailored to the 90% of people that can’t watch anything longer than 15 seconds.

3 months, posting a good piece of well edited, thoughtful content every day, and I got a whopping 20 followers across 3 platforms, with average views staying in the 500-1000 range.

That’s not terrible, but it’s terrible for someone working 60+ hrs a week while juggling a rock band and the stress of not butchering a cap table or fumbling customers. And maybe more importantly, for someone who doesn’t like making videos.

So I’m back home.

I’m also back home because of censorship.

What do I mean? Well this is learning number 1 of the week.

You Can’t Know The Truth If You Can’t Get The Truth

It bears repeating. You can’t know the truth if you can’t get the truth.

It sounds boomer-y, but there’s a lesson here. We lose freedom over time, mostly irreversibly.

100 years ago, you could kinda just kill people (I’m glad we lost that one), 50 years ago you could drink and drive (I’m also glad we lost that one), but today you can’t say a lot of things, and most of those things fell within the Overton Window just 5 years ago. Will we look back in 50 years and be glad that we couldn’t say things?

What am I talking about?

Well, I experienced first hand how the censors censor. I’m not an idiot (most of the time), so I don’t see something on social media and base my whole reality on it, but I did this week, kind of.

I made a video on assimilation.

But it wasn’t actually about assimilation. It was about authenticity.

Authenticity is contextual. It was urging people to figure out where they are before deciding to blithely say and do whatever they want. Sure, be you, but be you in the context of your environment. Learn the office culture before you wear jorts to work (I’m wearing jorts right now). Get to know someone before you show them your weird side. Learn the country you’re visiting before you do something that offends the people that live there. 😱

I think it was the last one.

Okay, so is that statement bad? Well if you’re in literally any country outside of Europe or the North America, I’d say that’s a totally reasonable thing to say. And what about if you’re in those countries? I’d still say it’s fair game, but China doesn’t want that idea getting out.

Being censored for something so trivial would have flustered me, but it wouldn’t have driven me to quit. The game was still winnable at that point.

But that wasn’t the end of it.

It has kept happening. Now, almost every video I post gets censored. Usually I can appeal and the video gets posted a few hours later, but why am I being censored so regularly now? And why does it always results in much less engagement?

I’m being censored for something called “hate speech”. My most recent video was about finding people who make you a better person, and spending more time with them. There’s no twist. That was it.

Is that racist or discriminatory or “hateful”? I don’t think so. Is it because I’m an American man in America? I don’t know, I won’t get political.

But I will get critical.

My message can’t get out. How many messages can’t get out because they don’t align with some content policy?

Where could this message even get out nowadays?

I don’t know if it can…

I’m not saying my specific message for those of you who aren’t picking up that I’m speaking generally. My message could be any message.

Was my 30 second video about learning the rules of the game before playing it disinformation or misinformation or hate speech? If you thought “maybe”, I want to you try to theory of mind your way back to 2007 when race relations were at their highest. Would it have been divisive then? No.

What about 2013, right before race relations got obliterated by social media. Also no.

Sharing ideas via social media is off limits (besides Twitter). Print media is off limits. TV is off limits. Where else do messages come from?

Whoever controls the platforms controls the world.

Spooky stuff.

Online Groups Are Keeping Us Lonely

I hear a lot of people cite their online community as making them feel less alone in the world.

These people are inevitably the most lonely and depressed people I know.

Now yes, online communities involve real people, but me playing Guild Wars with a bunch of “real” people in a virtual world, or even Halo with a bunch of “real” people on the mic kept me from ever actually making any real friends for the first 2 decades of my life.

Many people opt for their perfect online community match. 15 year old middle class chubby losers who like Guild Wars (me 15 years ago).

Great. When I’m playing Guild Wars, I feel like I’m a part of something.

But I can’t play Guild Wars 16 hours a day. And If I did, that’d be a problem, which I’d hope you agree with.

Also that’s not life. I can’t self-actualize in Guild Wars. I can’t (read: shouldn’t) find love, or create value, or start a family in Guild Wars.

Where does that leave me during the rest of my life besides disaffected, lonely, and judgmental of everyone not in my online community?

Sound familiar?

Real life will challenge you to become better, to make something of yourself, to change. Online communities will reward you for staying the same.

Map The World, Find Opportunity

I was at a Harvard picnic the other day.

What I mean is this girl I know was visiting SF. She went to Harvard, so all of her friends (besides me) went to Harvard. It was at a Harvard picnic.

I got talking to a girl who works in private equity. As we talked, we started swapping notes. I’m a startup founder, so I taught her about venture capital, picking a market, making money out of thin air.

She taught me about acquisitions, roll ups, and exit strategies.

We both walked away from this not only knowing what the other does, but also with an enriched mental map that showed how our once-thought-to-be-somewhat-disparate industries were actually the same industry in different stages.

By learning more and fleshing out our mental maps of the world, we each understood more about our own industries as well as new opportunities, ways of thinking, and tools.

More knowledge of how the world works, no matter how seemingly irrelevant, can only help.

It’s Not Yours Yet

You’ve done this.

You meet someone, you find the perfect job, you apply to your dream school. And then your imagination starts cranking.

You future family. How much money you’re gonna make. How much status you’re gonna get.

You’ve done this.

But here’s the thing. It’s not yours yet.

And here’s the better part. You ever get the thing? It’s not as good as you thought it was, is it?

It’s kind of a needy sometimes. Or maybe the hours are awful and your coworkers suck. Or maybe the culture sucks and you miss home.

I’m not saying it’s bad, but it’s definitely not perfect.

You probably suffer more from losing the perfect version of it in your imagination than the real, flawed version of it if you were to get it.

So what’s the lesson here?

Everything sucks.

Wait, no, that’s not it.

Oh yeah.

That energy you’re putting toward wanting? Put it toward doing.

Become a person worth committing to. Study for the interview. Build identity capital.

You’ll end up further ahead, and you won’t get your heart broken if things go awry.

Trivializing Big Decisions

Tattoos, investment deals, burning bridges. What do these all have in common?

They don’t affect you today. In fact, they might even help you today, but I’m here to tell you fun is awful. That anything that feels good today yet ambiguous tomorrow is a BAD THING.

I’m mostly kidding, but not totally.

I don’t typically date girls with tattoos.

Okay.

Why?

I’m fairly low openness and I have a special blend of neuroticism and puritanism that means I crave predictability and stability, and to me tattoos signal openness, excitement, etc.

But here’s the thing. I’ve been tempted dozens of times to get tattoos. I lead a rock band, I race motorcycles, I love bodybuilding. Tattoos make all of those things better, and they would probably aid in me signaling my competency and status in those things. But those aren’t who I am, and more importantly, those aren’t where I’m going.

70% of the time I am an introvert who likes being alone, working on stuff, writing, and I plan to do more of that, not less, as I get older, so that tattoo would signal to the world I’m 100% Vin Diesel Fast and the Furious when I’m actually only 30% Vin Diesel Fast and the Furious.

People with tattoos have committed to at least signaling they have different values than me, and I’ve committed to signaling my own, much less exciting values. Yes, rock n roll, speed, testosterone are big parts of me, but are those the values I most identify with? No.

So yes, I would have loved a tattoo when I was 23 and trying to get even a single girl to talk to me instead of the successful 30 year olds (sorry 23 year olds of today), but I’m glad I didn’t, because I would absolutely regret it and all that it signals about me as a 30 year old.

In a way more boring vein, early in fundraising you have a clean cap table. It feels easy to ink deal with investors. $200k for 20%, that’s fine, you have $0 today and can give away 20% no problem, but what about 2 years from now?

Is temporary peace of mind today worth indefinite disquiet in 2 years when you realize you gave away a lot for a little?

And finally, burning bridges.

It’s NEVER a good idea. Do you want more or less people in the world on your side? I’m guessing more.

Do you want people to build you up or tear you down when you’re not around? Probably the first one.

That little bit of power or smugness or peace of mind you feel when you dunk on someone or slap a bandaid on an open wound will turn into regret, and it may even bite you down the line.

It’s All Product Messaging

I just moved, and of course across the street is an eccentric man’s art studio. I’m friendly, so I introduced myself (well, he came over in the middle of the move and asked for a tour of the new house), and after the initial intro, he asked me to come by for his upcoming art studio party.

I had little intention in going. I like to go to things I’m invited to to build goodwill, but it was Sunday night, and that day I had spent something like 10 hrs working, on the heels of a 10 hr workday Saturday, on the heels of a 55 hour M-F. I was tired, and I had honestly mostly forgotten about it.

A music buddy texted me to come to a concert he was playing.

I forced myself to go to the concert as a way to get out of the house, take a drive, show my face on the music scene.

I walked out of my house to go to the show when I’m waived down.

“jAAAAACCKkkk”

Oh yes. The party.

I walked across the street and into the studio.

The first thing I noticed besides the art, was the, um, guest, wearing full latex and clown makeup. Everyone else was dressed normally. I didn’t ask questions.

There was another guy wearing sweatpants who looked like a fish out of water. The host had flagged him from the street just before I had been, so he too was getting the tour. We’ll call him T.

T and I got the tour together, and after hearing that the host throws “all sorts of interesting parties”, and me introducing myself as a startup founder to a bunch of people from the Mission who didn’t want to hear that, T turns to me and asks me about my startup.

I tell him it’s in the AI companion space, and we’re figuring out differentiation. He tells me he once sold a company that everyone told him Google would eventually kill because the market was limited and Google already dominated it. He said that everyone was wrong: as time went on, the market grew and it became complex enough that there was actually more room for nuanced solutions.

He said it was all about Product Messaging.

Many products in his market did approximately the same thing, but how they positioned themselves, branded themselves, and messaged themselves made it so a somewhat simple market could still support a bunch of companies (e.g. some versions were good for realtors, executive recruiters, etc. etc.)

He then turned to me and said “who are you targeting?”

I told him “people building AI companion apps. I have a backend that removes 90% of the work for them and fully supports ALL ;) of their use cases.”

He was like “there you go. Find the top 3-5 biggest problems that those people specifically have and tailor all your messaging around those problems. That’s it.”

I left this strange art studio party with newfound conviction in what I was building. Thanks T, and thanks neighbor for flagging me down and being a generous host.

AI Is Coming For Your Job, But Only If You Are An Autozone Engineer

Cursor and AI co-pilots have taken the world by storm.

I went from mediocre engineer to shipping dozens of features a week thanks to Cursor. Cursor is coming for your job…buy only if you’re an Autozone engineer.

What does that mean?

Let’s use an analogy.

When your car needs some trivial work like an oil change, you Google the problem, figure out how to fix it, and go to Autozone. You don’t understand the problem and it’s nuances, but you can get it done with Google and Autozone.

When Google fails you though, you have to go to a mechanic. A mechanic understands how an engine works, so they can diagnose and fix even the most complicated problems, because they know how everything in an engine works.

What’s more, what if the problem is with the design of the engine? Or what if you need to build an engine from scratch? Then you need a mechanical engineer. We’re now two steps beyond Autozone at this point.

To me, Cursor is Google + Autozone. Even mechanical engineers need to replace a part every once in a while, so AI can help everyone do the trivial stuff. But most people aren’t going beyond that without at least some level of real expertise.

So AI has killed the Autozone Engineer. The Google-it engineer who never actually learned how software works, and definitely never learned how to design good software. That engineer will be unemployed very soon and arguably wasn’t an engineer to begin with.

If you’re an Autozone engineer job, move up the stack.

Closing it Out

I am upset I got censored, but if it means writing instead of making videos, I think I’m okay with it.

I’ll plan to do more of these, as they’re much lower commitment than the typical essays I write, and I can pack more of a punch with them by braindumping all the stuff I’ve been thinking about while I’ve been thinking about it (as opposed to waiting to record a video a week later).

If you liked this, give me a follow here or on Twitter. I’ll be posting about Rock n Roll, starting a company, bikes, bodybuilding, books, and the random happenings in my life.

Thanks for reading. Love,

Jack