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Speaker 1: So I say, fan base is going to allow a

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Speaker 1: musician to make more money than he can make in

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Speaker 1: the record industry. It's going to allow actor and actors

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Speaker 1: to make more money than they could do working for

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Speaker 1: a movie studio or a TV studio. It's going to

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Speaker 1: allow athletes to make more money they could playing for

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Speaker 1: a sports team. That's the disruption that flips it on

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Speaker 1: its head, because there's nothing in between you and whoever

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Speaker 1: has a smartphone and the ability to hit subscribe to

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Speaker 1: pay you directly.

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Speaker 2: Here, everybody, Welcome to another episode of butteron NOMICGS. I'm

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Speaker 2: your host, Brandon Butler, found the CEO of Butter atl

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Speaker 2: and today I got a special guest in the building

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Speaker 2: when he's not out here building. You know, huge apps

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Speaker 2: and huge tech companies and filling around with Aire just generally,

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Speaker 2: you know, just ravel rousing people sometimes because you know

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Speaker 2: what I'm saying, he knows how to get the people going.

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Speaker 3: Of course, the.

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Speaker 2: One, the only mister Isaac has. Sir, how you doing today?

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Speaker 3: Man? I'm good man? What's up?

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Speaker 2: I was any better? I'd be you, brother, no the

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Speaker 2: other way around. Glad to see you up in here, man,

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Speaker 2: Thank you for having me man, hey, man, I appreciate you.

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Speaker 3: Now.

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Speaker 2: Look, man, I'm sure people you know, think they know

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Speaker 2: or got some perspectives and all that stuff. But we

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Speaker 2: do something little bit different here at Better Nomics. Man,

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Speaker 2: what I like to do to start off is I

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Speaker 2: asked chat gpt to write a bio on my guests.

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Speaker 2: So I'm gonna read you the bio that chat gpt

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Speaker 2: wrote about you. I won't you tell me if it's on,

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Speaker 2: if it's awful, were looking like, if it's missing anything? Okay, okay.

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Speaker 2: All I put in was what do you know about

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Speaker 2: Isaac Hayes Third in Atlanta. That's all I gave it.

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Speaker 2: This is what it came back with. Isaac Hasey Third

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Speaker 2: is a music producer, voice, actor, and tech entrepreneur and

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Speaker 2: the founder and CEO of fan Base, a social media

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Speaker 2: platform focused on monization equity for creators, especially those from

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Speaker 2: underrepresented communities. He's a son of legendary soul musician Isaac Hayes,

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Speaker 2: and while he carries the way that that legacy, he's

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Speaker 2: carved out of distinctly modern path rooted in ownership and innovation.

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Speaker 2: Before launching fan Base, Hayes has a strong career in

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Speaker 2: the music and entertainment industry, producing tracks for artists like

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Speaker 2: Little Scrappy, Kiki Palmer, and Redman, and lending his voice

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Speaker 2: to shows like The Boondocks. Over time, he became increasingly

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Speaker 2: focused at the intersection of black culture and tech, realizing

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Speaker 2: that while black creators fuel global trends, they rarely benefit

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Speaker 2: from the platforms they build value for. That insight led

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Speaker 2: him to create fan Base, the hybrid of Instagram and Patriarmeriter.

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Speaker 2: Users can follow creators for free or subscribe for exclusive content.

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Speaker 2: The goal isn't just likes of views, but ownership. Hayes

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Speaker 2: raised millions to equity crowdfunding, making fan Base one of

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Speaker 2: the few black owned social platforms to secure that level

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Speaker 2: of public investment. He's outspoken about the need for black

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Speaker 2: culture to move from influence to infrastructure and to stop

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Speaker 2: being the engine and start owning the vehicle. He's also

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Speaker 2: deeply rooted in Atlanta, where fan Base is based, and

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Speaker 2: continues to be a vocal advocate for building tech and

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Speaker 2: media ecosystems that reflect and serve the communities driving culture forward. Wow,

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Speaker 2: that's what we were just talking about. That that's what I

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Speaker 2: got to say about.

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Speaker 3: Thank you, AI. I think that's pretty accurate. That's pretty good.

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Speaker 3: That's pretty good.

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Speaker 2: I didn't know the Boon Dogs. Who's what you doing

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Speaker 2: on the Boon Dogs?

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Speaker 3: Man? I did one.

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Speaker 1: I did Aquatine. I did little stuff, though I did

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Speaker 1: I did big stuff on Aquatine. I never did a

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Speaker 1: recurring character on a lot of shows.

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Speaker 2: I used to watch.

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Speaker 1: I was a Brude Witch. Okay, oh yeah yeah, Demonic Sandwich.

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Speaker 3: Yeah yeah.

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Speaker 2: Man, look at that, man.

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Speaker 3: Yeah.

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Speaker 2: And now you're hear building tech companies. Man, Man, we

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Speaker 2: get all that, man, but just tell people, like, what

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Speaker 2: made you actually pivoted that? After being in the music

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Speaker 2: and entertainment space for so long.

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Speaker 3: I had no plans on building a tech startup. Zero.

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Speaker 1: I was born in Memphis, Tennessee. Moved to Atlanta when

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Speaker 1: I was three. I have always loved social media. I

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Speaker 1: was on Instagram in twenty eighteen and I saw this

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Speaker 1: kid go viral from Memphis, Tennessee and he was dancing

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Speaker 1: a Spider Man costume in a game stop to Aha

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Speaker 1: take on Me and he went viral.

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Speaker 3: He was black. I saw him.

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Speaker 1: A DM said hey, congrats young Memphis, and he hit

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Speaker 1: me back, was like, yo, are you a manager? Manage people?

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Speaker 1: I need a manager. Here's my number. I'll come to Atlanta.

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Speaker 1: I'm like, he's like seventeen. I was like no, but

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Speaker 1: I understood the urgency that he was trying to capitalize

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Speaker 1: on the momentum he had from going viral, and I

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Speaker 1: was like, Yo, we need an app where people can

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Speaker 1: follow people like Instagram, but subscribe to the very same

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Speaker 1: person like you would subscribe to Netflix, but make it

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Speaker 1: a social media platform. And that is what led me

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Speaker 1: to say, Okay, I think we need to build this,

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Speaker 1: but I have no I'm not from the tech business,

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Speaker 1: so I just started researching competitors first, like what else

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Speaker 1: is out there at the time, And the only two

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Speaker 1: companies I could find were Patreon founded in twenty thirteen,

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Speaker 1: which was just a website, and then OnlyFans, which was

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Speaker 1: just a website but it was highly pornographic. But there

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Speaker 1: was no mobile app that allowed you to actually mobilely

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Speaker 1: subscribe to someone like you would a game or like

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Speaker 1: Spotify or Apple Music.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, and I mean even when building that out, there

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Speaker 2: have been things that you all have done from a

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Speaker 2: fan base standpoint that like didn't even exist from a

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Speaker 2: feature like I think with the ability to subscribe and

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Speaker 2: stuff like that or things that you all help create essentially.

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Speaker 1: And in that purchase subscription like peer to peer didn't

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Speaker 1: exist before fan Base, And I know that sounds. I

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Speaker 1: like to talk about that because I want people, especially

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Speaker 1: black people, to know that your innovations are real. And

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Speaker 1: you may think that someone else in this entire planet

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Speaker 1: has the idea that you have, but in the entire

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Speaker 1: nine billion people on this planet, no one had never

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Speaker 1: built an app to say, hey, I want to easily

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Speaker 1: subscribe to another person the same way I scrip survived

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Speaker 1: to a video game or something like that. And then

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Speaker 1: Apple wouldn't let us build it at first, and I

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Speaker 1: was scared shitless because I had spent like two hundred

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Speaker 1: thousand dollars to start to build this app. They told

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Speaker 1: us some things that we could and couldn't do. We

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Speaker 1: followed their rules, and then we launched an MVP of

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Speaker 1: fan Base that allowed you to subscribe to a person

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Speaker 1: using Apple Pay and Google Pay.

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Speaker 2: What do you remember most about that time, like before

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Speaker 2: it even got launched, right like, cause again, there's a

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Speaker 2: lot of people that don't come from the text. It's

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Speaker 2: like you said, you didn't come from and they don't

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Speaker 2: really understand what it really takes to build something like that,

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Speaker 2: especially from a money standpoint or just from Look like,

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Speaker 2: what do you remember most about those early days when

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Speaker 2: you all were just getting like working through the prototypes

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Speaker 2: and early iterations of the app.

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Speaker 1: I was so excited at the future of what this

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Speaker 1: is going to be, and I still am because people still,

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Speaker 1: I don't think understand what what fan base can do

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Speaker 1: or what where we are right now in the world

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Speaker 1: I was excited about. I'm just running numbers. I'm looking

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Speaker 1: at like I'm looking at platforms like, well, why are

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Speaker 1: these Why are these platforms not letting you see all

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Speaker 1: the people that want to see see the content you

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Speaker 1: want to see. So my point is like, if I'm

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Speaker 1: someone like you know, Beyonce, and I have a three

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Speaker 1: hundred and eleven million followers, why can't three hundred and

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Speaker 1: eleven million people see what she posts? And I was

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Speaker 1: just like, that's crazy, and I said, oh, I know

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Speaker 1: why because the moment that video got added to social media,

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Speaker 1: everybody became a television network. Essentially, there's a lot of

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Speaker 1: quiet things that social media platforms don't want people to know,

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Speaker 1: so they act like they don't exist what they do.

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Speaker 1: So to everybody out there, every single person has a

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Speaker 1: social media platform. You're a television network. So Beyonce has

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Speaker 1: three hundred and eleven million people that follow her on

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Speaker 1: social media, so that means that she has three times

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Speaker 1: the reach of the Super Bowl twenty four hours a day,

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Speaker 1: seven days a week, and super Bowl commercial costs eight

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Speaker 1: million dollars for a minute, So if someone wanted to

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Speaker 1: post a one minute video on Beyonce's page and reach

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Speaker 1: three hundred and eleven million people, she could charge twenty

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Speaker 1: four million dollars for every post that she posted.

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Speaker 3: It never work again.

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Speaker 1: Then I went to look at her views and I

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Speaker 1: was like, wait, her videos only have like nine million views,

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Speaker 1: four million views, and thirteen million views and twenty seven

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Speaker 1: million views. It was never consistent, and I was like, oh,

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Speaker 1: they're doing that because then the brands would come directly

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Speaker 1: to Beyonce and never spend money running ads on Facebook

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Speaker 1: or Instagram. And so that's the part that I was

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Speaker 1: excited about, is the disruption because I see so much

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Speaker 1: about how black culture is always the oil and never

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Speaker 1: the well, the you know, the gas, but never the vehicle,

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Speaker 1: and we're indoctrinated to be excited about the few that

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Speaker 1: make it as opposed to the many that benefit from

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Speaker 1: the culture.

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Speaker 3: And I was excited to be able to break that wall.

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Speaker 1: I want to break that wall down where black culture

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Speaker 1: gets compensated on an infrastructure level from the energy and

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Speaker 1: the creativity and the revenue it brings to all these businesses.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, no, I's doping, says, to the oil and not

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Speaker 2: the whale. Like, why do you think that is? I mean, again,

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Speaker 2: I've seen things because I was in the tech space

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Speaker 2: as well, and you know, I've talked to people about

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Speaker 2: even stuff as simple as just getting access to capital.

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Speaker 2: Why do you think it is that we only on

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Speaker 2: one side but not on the other side of that equation.

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Speaker 3: It's intentional, it's done by designing.

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Speaker 1: Well first, I mean historically you got to think black

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Speaker 1: people did that, and then our businesses were burned and

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Speaker 1: destroyed and we were murdered. And let's keep it one hundred, like,

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Speaker 1: you know, they ran you out of your town. You know,

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Speaker 1: Tulta had oil wels and banks and telephone companies and

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Speaker 1: they burnt all that stuff down and bombed it. And

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Speaker 1: so that was the first, you know, and then you're

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Speaker 1: getting into that again more too. The Jim Crow South

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Speaker 1: where it was illegal. You couldn't do this, and we

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Speaker 1: didn't want you to do this, and moving were redlining

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Speaker 1: and stuff like that. And so now we've moved into

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Speaker 1: the area now where technology has kind of connected all

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Speaker 1: of us in a way that we have the ability

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Speaker 1: to elevate businesses and scale them. So I just think

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Speaker 1: it was done by design, and we got used to it.

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Speaker 1: We just kind of got beat down, like, oh, they'll

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Speaker 1: never let you know, here's the okay, and this is

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Speaker 1: something that's important that I have to say. My optimism

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Speaker 1: comes from what I saw my father do. So we

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Speaker 1: get used to saying, oh, like they'll never let no

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Speaker 1: black man be president, you know what I mean? Stuff

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Speaker 1: like that. So I remember when my father was going

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Speaker 1: to get the oscar. He was going around and meeting people.

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Speaker 1: He was nominated for an Academy Award and he could

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Speaker 1: potentially be the first black man to ever win an

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Speaker 1: Academy Award for music, and people around Memphis and around

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Speaker 1: were saying, thank gonna let no nigga win no oscar,

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Speaker 1: you know what I mean, Like that ain't to happen,

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Speaker 1: and he did it. And so a lot of times

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Speaker 1: I always think about that moment when it's like, oh, yeah,

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Speaker 1: they're not gonna let you do anything, It's like, well,

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Speaker 1: it's not about letting you do anything. It's also about

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Speaker 1: the conviction and the belief and the faith that you can,

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Speaker 1: and then the preparation and the effort and energy that

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Speaker 1: you put into it. The effort and energy that my

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Speaker 1: father put into creating music and being a great musician

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Speaker 1: and studying the craft. So I felt like if I

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Speaker 1: put that amount of energy into learning tech and understanding

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Speaker 1: it and the business of it, that I could break

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Speaker 1: down that wall.

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Speaker 2: Do you think a lot of that comes from again,

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Speaker 2: like watching him grow up. I've seen you talk about

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Speaker 2: how you manage your state. Now you've done things to

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Speaker 2: help make sure you're securing you know, the royalties and ownership,

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Speaker 2: Like you kind of learn that all that just watching

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Speaker 2: because I don't know, like was it necessarily teaching you

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Speaker 2: or were you just seeing it and kind of just

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Speaker 2: noticing how the game worked and saying, when I get

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Speaker 2: a chance to kind of play this game, like, let

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Speaker 2: me make sure I'm doing it the right way.

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Speaker 1: And that was the difference between why I didn't really

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Speaker 1: I didn't last very long in the music business.

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Speaker 3: I didn't last very long.

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Speaker 1: The reason being is because I entered it with this

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Speaker 1: hesitation and the bias of already knowing that it was

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Speaker 1: a very cutthrow business. And I saw my father lose easily,

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Speaker 1: probably one hundred million dollars that he never saw that

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Speaker 1: our family never saw one, because he filed for bankruptcy

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Speaker 1: a year before I was born. But not because he

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Speaker 1: spent his money, but because the label he was signed to,

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Speaker 1: Sax Records, owed him about twelve million dollars in nineteen

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Speaker 1: seventy four, which is like fifty sixty million dollars today.

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Speaker 1: He took out a loan, He defaults about his loans,

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Speaker 1: So instead of garnishing your income stream, they took my

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Speaker 1: father's asset. So they took the writer the actual ownership

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Speaker 1: of his writer shares. And then at some point in

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Speaker 1: like the early eighties, they got auctioned off from like

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Speaker 1: fifty grand. The two white guys, there were only two

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Speaker 1: people that showed up to an auction. Those two individuals

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Speaker 1: wound up purchasing Isaac Hayes's rights, his songwriting rights royalties,

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Speaker 1: four years before Sample came out. So you got to

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Speaker 1: think all the nineties records that sampled Isaac's Tupac, Doctor

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Speaker 1: j Stoop Dogg, Biggie Bu Tank Clan. All these songs

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Speaker 1: over the last thirty five years have made about sixty

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Speaker 1: million dollars that our family never saw. And so coming

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Speaker 1: into the music business, I never wanted that. My publishing

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Speaker 1: was always I held on to it like if I

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Speaker 1: can't own my publishing, I'm not doing any deals to

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Speaker 1: cut people in on parts of that. And I didn't

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Speaker 1: last very long. So I started so learned about music licensing.

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Speaker 1: So music licensing is, oh, you want the permission to

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Speaker 1: use my song in this movie, here you go. I

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Speaker 1: get a checked, do that. And I just took my

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Speaker 1: entire catalog put it into this company. And then my

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Speaker 1: music started winding up on like you know, loving hip

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Speaker 1: hop and Real Housewives and NBA on TNT and stuff

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Speaker 1: like that. And I would just go to the mailbox

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Speaker 1: every quarter and get a check. But I was still

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Speaker 1: music adjacent. But it gave me the understanding of how

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Speaker 1: to navigate the music business without compromising ownership of what

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Speaker 1: I do.

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Speaker 2: You definitely have a deep understanding of that. One thing

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Speaker 2: I love you to explain is this is something I

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Speaker 2: always even struggle with, is like can you explain publishing?

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Speaker 2: How does publishing work? Because I hear people talk about

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Speaker 2: it like only your publishing and all that stuff, I

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Speaker 2: feel like you can break it down in a way

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Speaker 2: that it's going to be very easy to other say.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, So publishing is basically a pizza. You cut it

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Speaker 1: in half. Half of it is publishing, the other half

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Speaker 1: is writing writer shares. The publishing side has all the

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Speaker 1: legal control to say who can and cannot use that music. Simultaneously,

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Speaker 1: whenever money comes to the publisher, they get paid by law,

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Speaker 1: they split that with the writer. So if one hundred

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Speaker 1: dollars comes in, whoever the company is pays the publisher

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Speaker 1: one hundred dollars, it's up for the publisher to pay

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Speaker 1: the writer the fifty dollars and they keep the other fifty.

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Speaker 1: So that's typically what happens. So in situations like that,

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Speaker 1: a lot of times publishing companies will come along and

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Speaker 1: purchase the rights for a length of time years for

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Speaker 1: the publishing that you're going to make off songs, and

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Speaker 1: give you an advance, not knowing whether you're going to

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Speaker 1: be in a amazing songwriter or a crappy songwriter. It's

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Speaker 1: an investment, but imagine I give you one hundred thousand

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Speaker 1: dollars for fifty percent of your publishing. Right, so now

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Speaker 1: it's four people before it's like, you know, get I

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Speaker 1: get the publishing, you get your writers.

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Speaker 3: We're splitting that.

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Speaker 1: And now you go on to make sixty million dollars

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Speaker 1: writing songs over the next ten years. And I just

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Speaker 1: gave you one hundred thousand bucks. That's why it's like, oh,

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Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying. So it's these it's the

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Speaker 1: worst loan ever. If I get explained a publishing deal,

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Speaker 1: I get played a publishing deal like this to be terrible.

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Speaker 1: Let's say you had a pizza restaurant and you had

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Speaker 1: a million dollars worth of pre orders of pizza, right,

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Speaker 1: but you would only get paid over the course of

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Speaker 1: a year. I walk and you said, Brandon, I'll give

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Speaker 1: you the million dollars you're about to make off this

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Speaker 1: pizza restaurant in his first year, right now, so you

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Speaker 1: don't have to wait all way till twenty twenty six

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Speaker 1: to get your million dollars. Cool, you got to pay

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Speaker 1: me that million dollars back, but now every other pizza

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Speaker 1: restaurant you open for the next ten pizza restaurants, I

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Speaker 1: get fifty percent of the revenue.

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Speaker 3: Terrible deal. No, that's terrible, terrible deal.

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Speaker 2: And that's how these deals are actually working.

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Speaker 3: That's how those deals work. They're terrible deals.

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Speaker 1: But you got to think these are very, very creative people, talented,

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Speaker 1: and not the best financial situations. They want to get

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Speaker 1: out of hard times. So one hundred thousand dollars to

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Speaker 1: somebody is like, yo, I'm out, not knowing that you

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Speaker 1: just gave up twenty four million dollars over the next

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Speaker 1: ten years.

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Speaker 2: So what's your perspective of while these companies are buying

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Speaker 2: up all these you know, these these artists of you know,

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Speaker 2: publishing and you know all their records and albums and

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Speaker 2: stuff like that.

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Speaker 1: Well, I mean two reasons people wanted to come and

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Speaker 1: buy my father's publishing from us, but I did not

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Speaker 1: do that. And you've seen a lot of other artists

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Speaker 1: start to sell their writer Actually still their writer's share

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Speaker 1: is not even their publishing because they' publishing hasn't even

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Speaker 1: reverted yet, which is a whole nother thing. But the

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Speaker 1: writer's side that I talk about, they're able to sell those,

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Speaker 1: and so I have mixed feelings about that. But they're

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Speaker 1: getting these large sums of money up front that before

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Speaker 1: fifteen twenty years ago it might not have been a

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Speaker 1: good idea. But now there's so many ways to take

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Speaker 1: large amounts of capital and invest it into things in

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Speaker 1: startups and stuff like that, you could take it. So

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Speaker 1: you've seen people like The Dream sell a portion of

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Speaker 1: his catalog, but then he might open up a whole

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Speaker 1: bunch of Popeyes Chicken franchises, so he can take that

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Speaker 1: money immediately, can do that, and he's still alive, so

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Speaker 1: he can still perform and write songs and do all

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Speaker 1: that kind of stuff. They're buying that catalog because streaming

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Speaker 1: has nowhere near peaked and the amount of revenue it's

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Speaker 1: ever going to make. So when you think about the

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Speaker 1: people on planet Earth that have a smartphone in their

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Speaker 1: hand that could have a music streaming service on it,

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Speaker 1: it's about six billion people, all right. So currently there's

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Speaker 1: probably about six hundred and seventy million people that have

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Speaker 1: music streaming services on their phone.

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Speaker 3: So think about that.

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Speaker 1: There's another you know, five billion people that could have

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Speaker 1: Spotify or Apple Music if they wanted to.

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Speaker 3: So the amount of.

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Speaker 1: Money that's going to be made out streaming is going

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Speaker 1: to be trillions of dollars, So buying it now and

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Speaker 1: being able to hold it for the next thirty forty years,

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Speaker 1: it's a lot of wealth there. And then also you

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Speaker 1: got to remember because of streaming, streaming gave infinite revenue

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Speaker 1: to records that did not have that it didn't have before.

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Speaker 1: So even my father's category songs my father, So my

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Speaker 1: father wrote a song called hold On Upcoming by Sam

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Speaker 1: and Dave before streaming. The only way he would make

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Speaker 1: money off that is they played it on the radio

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Speaker 1: an oldie station, or somebody went into some old mom

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Speaker 1: and pop store and bought the forty five. Now it's streaming.

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Speaker 1: It's available globally worldwide, twenty four hours a day, seven

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Speaker 1: days a week. So now it's an infinite revenue cycle

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Speaker 1: that's there. So every song ever created has the opportunity

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Speaker 1: to make money. And also those songs have the ability

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Speaker 1: to go viral years later or become popular way after

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Speaker 1: the fact. So when you've seen records like sure Thing

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Speaker 1: like My Miguel that went viral maybe two years ago,

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Speaker 1: but that record came out like he wrote that record

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Speaker 1: like two thousand and eight, he made more money off

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Speaker 1: that record two years ago than he did when he

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Speaker 1: wrote it and they released it on an album. So

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Speaker 1: you got to think about all the songs that are

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Speaker 1: going to go viral that were written over the last

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Speaker 1: thirty forty years. So whoever owns a publishing on that

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Speaker 1: is sitting on a potential goal mine?

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Speaker 2: Oh okay, okay, So how does that then relate back

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Speaker 2: to creators and what you're doing now? Like you see

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Speaker 2: the same opportunities, you see the need for equity, but like,

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Speaker 2: how does all that stuff that you learned now roll

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Speaker 2: into what you're building with fan base?

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Speaker 1: So it was cool because when I got into the

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Speaker 1: tech space, I started asking questions about the business. First

403
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Speaker 1: first thing I did when I came with Families trademark

404
00:18:37,080 --> 00:18:40,919
Speaker 1: the name. The next thing I did is I incorporated

405
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Speaker 1: the company. I created two classes in stock voting and

406
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Speaker 1: non voting shares. This is all before I raised money

407
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Speaker 1: because I thought about again, as a black person, I

408
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Speaker 1: always have this like anxiety like somebody's gonna try to

409
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Speaker 1: steal my shit. So I trademarked the name. I remember

410
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Speaker 1: that Steve Jobs was a brilliant innovator, but he got

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Speaker 1: kicked out of Apple. I was like, how did that happen,

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Speaker 1: and that's because he had a board, and the board

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Speaker 1: had board seats and voting shares and all that kind

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Speaker 1: of stuff.

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Speaker 3: I said, I don't want that.

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Speaker 1: And then I saw that Zuckerberg had done that with Facebook,

417
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Speaker 1: where they created two classes of stock and he had

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Speaker 1: the majority of the voting shares so he could never

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Speaker 1: get kicked out of the company. So I said, yeah,

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Speaker 1: I want that. And then I said, Okay, I need

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Speaker 1: to build. So now I have the ability to go

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Speaker 1: as far as I possibly can. And the only thing

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Speaker 1: that's really in my way at this point now is money.

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Speaker 1: Is how we're going to raise the money to be

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Speaker 1: able to do that. So when I look at content

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Speaker 1: creators who generate billions of views that don't get the

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Speaker 1: credit or the compensation that other creators who are usually

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Speaker 1: white get, because it's great business. And I explain this

429
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Speaker 1: all the time to people that get mad about the

430
00:19:47,840 --> 00:19:50,919
Speaker 1: inequity of black creators versus white creators, they should not

431
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Speaker 1: get mad at that, and they should not be mad

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Speaker 1: at the creators. So for every Charlie Demeilia or Addison

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Speaker 1: Ray or all these people that get famous that are

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Speaker 1: white on TikTok, and they get that dance from some

435
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Speaker 1: of you young black girl like Julia Harmon or whatever. Right,

436
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Speaker 1: you can't be mad at Charlie Demilion in those individuals

437
00:20:07,080 --> 00:20:09,359
Speaker 1: because that's what tiktoking needs to have to do. You

438
00:20:09,400 --> 00:20:11,120
Speaker 1: do the dance, I do the dance. You do the trend,

439
00:20:11,160 --> 00:20:11,920
Speaker 1: I do the trend.

440
00:20:12,000 --> 00:20:12,160
Speaker 3: Right.

441
00:20:12,840 --> 00:20:16,320
Speaker 1: The problem is that these platforms are based on advertising,

442
00:20:16,400 --> 00:20:19,320
Speaker 1: and so again, as I always say, things presented or

443
00:20:19,359 --> 00:20:21,919
Speaker 1: sold by white people are typically deemed to be for

444
00:20:22,000 --> 00:20:25,840
Speaker 1: all people. Things presented by black people are deemed to

445
00:20:25,920 --> 00:20:28,520
Speaker 1: only be for black people. So if you're advertising something,

446
00:20:28,720 --> 00:20:30,640
Speaker 1: if you want to cast the widest net of people

447
00:20:30,720 --> 00:20:33,040
Speaker 1: that might buy your product, it be who's you to

448
00:20:33,040 --> 00:20:35,280
Speaker 1: have a white face, a young white girl selling dunkin

449
00:20:35,320 --> 00:20:38,040
Speaker 1: Donuts coffee, then a young black girl trying to sell

450
00:20:38,080 --> 00:20:40,879
Speaker 1: dunkin Donuts coffee. So therefore it be whose platforms like

451
00:20:40,880 --> 00:20:44,080
Speaker 1: TikTok and Instagram to have very very famous white creators

452
00:20:44,080 --> 00:20:46,639
Speaker 1: to be able to sell more ads. The inequity happens

453
00:20:46,640 --> 00:20:50,040
Speaker 1: that they're taking this content and then they're not getting

454
00:20:50,040 --> 00:20:52,320
Speaker 1: paid the brand deals. Black creators aren't getting paid the

455
00:20:52,359 --> 00:20:54,000
Speaker 1: brand deals and all that kind of stuff. So when

456
00:20:54,040 --> 00:20:56,960
Speaker 1: you move out of ad revenue and that bias that exists,

457
00:20:57,000 --> 00:20:59,520
Speaker 1: and you go straight to talent and support and subscriptions

458
00:21:00,040 --> 00:21:02,919
Speaker 1: and it's like, okay, you can subscribe to support me

459
00:21:03,680 --> 00:21:05,679
Speaker 1: in the content that I create for whatever I do,

460
00:21:05,680 --> 00:21:08,200
Speaker 1: I don't care if I'm doing makeup, I'm dancing, telling jokes, singing,

461
00:21:08,280 --> 00:21:10,920
Speaker 1: whatever it is, gardening, it doesn't matter. So now we

462
00:21:11,000 --> 00:21:13,639
Speaker 1: have a level playing field where people can scale businesses

463
00:21:14,280 --> 00:21:17,920
Speaker 1: through subscription and not have to worry about those games

464
00:21:17,920 --> 00:21:20,760
Speaker 1: and get played on social media platforms with advertising.

465
00:21:20,640 --> 00:21:22,760
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean coming from the advertising space, that's what

466
00:21:22,840 --> 00:21:25,359
Speaker 2: you call general market versus multicultural. And it's like super

467
00:21:25,359 --> 00:21:29,359
Speaker 2: weird because yeah, if you're essentially a cis white male, right, like,

468
00:21:29,400 --> 00:21:32,040
Speaker 2: you're considered general market, right, and that means you can

469
00:21:32,080 --> 00:21:34,840
Speaker 2: advertise to anybody. But if you're a woman, if you

470
00:21:34,920 --> 00:21:36,520
Speaker 2: have any kind of color, all of a sudden, you

471
00:21:36,520 --> 00:21:39,520
Speaker 2: get relegated like the multicultural correct, and you're only for

472
00:21:39,560 --> 00:21:42,440
Speaker 2: whatever reason considered it can talk like that specific audience

473
00:21:42,480 --> 00:21:42,919
Speaker 2: of people.

474
00:21:43,160 --> 00:21:43,440
Speaker 3: Correct.

475
00:21:43,440 --> 00:21:44,960
Speaker 2: And it's always weird because when you think about the

476
00:21:45,000 --> 00:21:47,199
Speaker 2: way that even way culture looks like like multiculture, like

477
00:21:47,240 --> 00:21:50,080
Speaker 2: what is multicultural? Like culture is everybody there's all kinds

478
00:21:50,119 --> 00:21:52,280
Speaker 2: of people in it. So this idea that if you

479
00:21:52,280 --> 00:21:53,879
Speaker 2: look a certain way, you can only like you only

480
00:21:53,920 --> 00:21:56,520
Speaker 2: get to brief from a Black History Month and Sinko

481
00:21:56,520 --> 00:21:58,600
Speaker 2: to Mayo. But then you know, if you're not you

482
00:21:58,600 --> 00:22:00,600
Speaker 2: can get it for anything. That's however, size and industry

483
00:22:00,600 --> 00:22:02,120
Speaker 2: has worked for a long time, so now they're trying

484
00:22:02,119 --> 00:22:03,640
Speaker 2: to flip it on our head and say, no, there's

485
00:22:03,680 --> 00:22:06,520
Speaker 2: like general market is multicultural. But to your point, that's

486
00:22:06,520 --> 00:22:07,800
Speaker 2: why those ad dollars go that.

487
00:22:07,720 --> 00:22:10,840
Speaker 1: Direction exactly, And that's that's very frustrating because now you

488
00:22:10,920 --> 00:22:14,240
Speaker 1: have a world of creators that are breaking their next

489
00:22:14,320 --> 00:22:17,000
Speaker 1: to try to create all these views and doing things

490
00:22:17,000 --> 00:22:19,040
Speaker 1: that are inauthentic to who they really want to be.

491
00:22:19,440 --> 00:22:21,520
Speaker 1: So you got to act, pose five dance videos a day,

492
00:22:22,080 --> 00:22:23,480
Speaker 1: you know all that, and that's not even really what

493
00:22:23,560 --> 00:22:25,520
Speaker 1: I want to do. I'm just doing this so hopefully

494
00:22:25,560 --> 00:22:27,600
Speaker 1: I'll get a brand deal and make some money. Yeah,

495
00:22:27,680 --> 00:22:31,120
Speaker 1: As opposed to when you see the success of streamers

496
00:22:31,640 --> 00:22:34,000
Speaker 1: that are doing things like on Twitch like Kasanat where

497
00:22:34,040 --> 00:22:37,200
Speaker 1: he just gets to authentically be himself and make more

498
00:22:37,280 --> 00:22:41,359
Speaker 1: money without having to actually dance, sing or whatever. He

499
00:22:41,480 --> 00:22:43,720
Speaker 1: just gets to be himself and then people support him.

500
00:22:43,760 --> 00:22:47,480
Speaker 1: And what I love about the mistake that I think

501
00:22:47,520 --> 00:22:49,960
Speaker 1: people are making is that you think that subscriptions are

502
00:22:50,000 --> 00:22:54,480
Speaker 1: all about content, but it's about support. Kystannot doesn't provide

503
00:22:54,480 --> 00:22:58,200
Speaker 1: any content exclusively. His subscribers just come because they want

504
00:22:58,200 --> 00:23:00,960
Speaker 1: to support him, right twitch, So he's not even he

505
00:23:01,000 --> 00:23:03,720
Speaker 1: hadn't even gone the exclusive role yet. So even people

506
00:23:04,280 --> 00:23:06,719
Speaker 1: are detached from the fact that people will support you

507
00:23:06,800 --> 00:23:10,280
Speaker 1: and pay for content. You just don't know it. Humans

508
00:23:10,280 --> 00:23:12,640
Speaker 1: are transactional. We're not stingy for every reason. I don't

509
00:23:12,680 --> 00:23:15,760
Speaker 1: know why people think that humans will just have money

510
00:23:15,760 --> 00:23:18,280
Speaker 1: and just hoard it. We will openly give money to

511
00:23:18,880 --> 00:23:21,040
Speaker 1: a multitude of things, things that we care about, want

512
00:23:21,040 --> 00:23:24,359
Speaker 1: to support, or whatever. So that route opens up the

513
00:23:24,359 --> 00:23:28,200
Speaker 1: door for the average individual to make more money being

514
00:23:28,240 --> 00:23:30,600
Speaker 1: a content creator than having a nine to five job.

515
00:23:30,760 --> 00:23:33,000
Speaker 1: I know people with millions and millions of followers on

516
00:23:33,040 --> 00:23:36,920
Speaker 1: social media that are broke, right, But I tell people, imagine,

517
00:23:36,960 --> 00:23:38,760
Speaker 1: out of a planet of six billion people, if you

518
00:23:38,800 --> 00:23:41,040
Speaker 1: can find five thousand people to pay you two dollars

519
00:23:41,040 --> 00:23:44,120
Speaker 1: and fifty cents a month, right, that's twelve thousand, five

520
00:23:44,160 --> 00:23:45,920
Speaker 1: hundred dollars a month. That's one hundred and fifty thousand

521
00:23:45,920 --> 00:23:47,639
Speaker 1: dollars a year. That's more than ninety seven percent of

522
00:23:47,640 --> 00:23:48,280
Speaker 1: Americans make.

523
00:23:48,960 --> 00:23:49,160
Speaker 3: Right.

524
00:23:49,560 --> 00:23:51,720
Speaker 1: Meanwhile, that means you could just that means you can

525
00:23:51,760 --> 00:23:53,800
Speaker 1: make more. You don't have to go work for nobody.

526
00:23:53,920 --> 00:23:56,440
Speaker 1: You literally could just get up every day, be yourself

527
00:23:56,920 --> 00:23:58,479
Speaker 1: and make one hundred and fifty thousand dollars a year.

528
00:23:58,520 --> 00:23:59,480
Speaker 3: And that's the tipping that.

529
00:23:59,480 --> 00:24:02,280
Speaker 1: That's not We're not even talking about really famous people

530
00:24:02,560 --> 00:24:04,600
Speaker 1: or people with extreme talent that people are willing to

531
00:24:04,640 --> 00:24:09,520
Speaker 1: pay to see people perform, like Beyonce or athletes like

532
00:24:09,600 --> 00:24:11,920
Speaker 1: Anthony Edwards and stuff like that. We haven't even gotten

533
00:24:11,920 --> 00:24:13,640
Speaker 1: to that point. And now you're getting to people where

534
00:24:13,640 --> 00:24:16,080
Speaker 1: I can make hundreds of millions or not billions of

535
00:24:16,119 --> 00:24:19,960
Speaker 1: dollars with subscriptions, more than what the industries that exist

536
00:24:20,080 --> 00:24:22,280
Speaker 1: pay me. So I say, fan base is going to

537
00:24:22,280 --> 00:24:24,800
Speaker 1: allow a musician to make more money than he can

538
00:24:24,880 --> 00:24:27,480
Speaker 1: make in the record industry. It's going to allow actor

539
00:24:27,480 --> 00:24:29,320
Speaker 1: and actors to make more money than they could do

540
00:24:29,480 --> 00:24:32,240
Speaker 1: working for a movie studio or a TV studio. It's

541
00:24:32,280 --> 00:24:34,480
Speaker 1: going to allow athlete to make more money they could

542
00:24:34,520 --> 00:24:37,240
Speaker 1: playing for a sports team. That's the disruption that flips

543
00:24:37,240 --> 00:24:39,880
Speaker 1: it on its head because there's nothing in between you

544
00:24:40,320 --> 00:24:42,320
Speaker 1: and whoever has a smartphone and the ability to hit

545
00:24:42,359 --> 00:24:45,639
Speaker 1: subscribe to pay you directly. And that's the most disruptive

546
00:24:45,680 --> 00:24:48,000
Speaker 1: thing about fan base. And the reason why none of

547
00:24:48,000 --> 00:24:51,159
Speaker 1: these other apps have even begun to do that is

548
00:24:51,160 --> 00:24:55,439
Speaker 1: because they are the seismic giant tankers of advertisment that

549
00:24:55,480 --> 00:24:58,800
Speaker 1: can't turn on a dime. Ninety seven point five percent

550
00:24:58,840 --> 00:25:02,240
Speaker 1: of Facebook's revenues through advertising. They can't go to subscription,

551
00:25:02,280 --> 00:25:04,600
Speaker 1: they can't, they can't even begin to stop. The company

552
00:25:04,680 --> 00:25:07,640
Speaker 1: runs off of advertising, and they double and triple down

553
00:25:07,640 --> 00:25:10,080
Speaker 1: on the fact that there is advertising. And so for me,

554
00:25:10,200 --> 00:25:11,879
Speaker 1: I'm just a little speed bowl in the water just

555
00:25:11,920 --> 00:25:15,120
Speaker 1: to say subscriptions, tipping, you know, and get to do that,

556
00:25:15,400 --> 00:25:18,240
Speaker 1: and it gives us an opportunity to kind of lead

557
00:25:18,320 --> 00:25:20,840
Speaker 1: that market more so than anybody else. While these other platforms,

558
00:25:20,840 --> 00:25:22,600
Speaker 1: while they dabble, they don't add it. They'll put it

559
00:25:22,600 --> 00:25:23,840
Speaker 1: over there and the side to see if they can,

560
00:25:24,119 --> 00:25:25,720
Speaker 1: but they can't make that their bread and butter.

561
00:25:26,440 --> 00:25:28,600
Speaker 3: No pun intended, No again.

562
00:25:28,680 --> 00:25:30,280
Speaker 2: I mean you look at these platforms like a good

563
00:25:30,320 --> 00:25:32,760
Speaker 2: friend of mine sets even from an influencer standpoint, like

564
00:25:32,760 --> 00:25:34,679
Speaker 2: look at the ones that generate the most AD revenue,

565
00:25:34,680 --> 00:25:36,320
Speaker 2: because those are the ones that have the revenue. And

566
00:25:36,440 --> 00:25:38,920
Speaker 2: they said, if Facebook's pulling in that much money from

567
00:25:38,920 --> 00:25:41,160
Speaker 2: ads or I would tell people like, look, if it's free,

568
00:25:41,200 --> 00:25:43,119
Speaker 2: you're the product in some capacity, right, And so you've

569
00:25:43,160 --> 00:25:45,679
Speaker 2: got to realize that's how they're using these tools. Like

570
00:25:45,680 --> 00:25:48,800
Speaker 2: from a fan based standpoint, how do you get people

571
00:25:48,800 --> 00:25:51,440
Speaker 2: to really understand the value proposition and see like, look,

572
00:25:51,440 --> 00:25:53,440
Speaker 2: you can go over here and do stuff and try

573
00:25:53,480 --> 00:25:55,639
Speaker 2: to wait for these creative reward programs to kick in,

574
00:25:55,760 --> 00:25:57,480
Speaker 2: or you can actually start talking to your audience and

575
00:25:57,480 --> 00:25:58,320
Speaker 2: get subscriptions.

576
00:25:58,840 --> 00:25:59,879
Speaker 3: That's a layered question.

577
00:26:00,800 --> 00:26:02,560
Speaker 1: You get asked that question, how do you do that

578
00:26:02,600 --> 00:26:05,960
Speaker 1: as a white founder with capital, or how do you

579
00:26:06,000 --> 00:26:09,000
Speaker 1: do that as a black founder, first time founder that

580
00:26:09,560 --> 00:26:14,800
Speaker 1: doesn't have VC dollars and that way, So number one,

581
00:26:14,920 --> 00:26:18,520
Speaker 1: convinced people that you have the ability to build a

582
00:26:18,560 --> 00:26:21,359
Speaker 1: product that's comparable to an Instagram or Facebook as a

583
00:26:21,359 --> 00:26:22,840
Speaker 1: black guy coming from the music business.

584
00:26:22,840 --> 00:26:23,760
Speaker 3: That's the first thing you gotta do.

585
00:26:23,760 --> 00:26:25,960
Speaker 1: You got to win the trust of people, and then

586
00:26:26,000 --> 00:26:27,439
Speaker 1: you have to win the trust of people enough for

587
00:26:27,480 --> 00:26:29,520
Speaker 1: them to invest in you to do that. So I

588
00:26:29,520 --> 00:26:31,920
Speaker 1: think the first thing that I had to do was

589
00:26:31,960 --> 00:26:34,480
Speaker 1: build something and validate it in a way that no

590
00:26:34,520 --> 00:26:38,360
Speaker 1: one could tell me no. So what I don't want

591
00:26:38,400 --> 00:26:41,679
Speaker 1: to do is and most of what I know about

592
00:26:42,640 --> 00:26:45,399
Speaker 1: tech or my perspective of tech, comes from being in

593
00:26:45,440 --> 00:26:47,800
Speaker 1: a music business. So you don't ever want anybody to

594
00:26:47,800 --> 00:26:50,200
Speaker 1: tell you no. So if you walk into an interview

595
00:26:50,280 --> 00:26:51,879
Speaker 1: and no one can kind of throw something at you

596
00:26:51,920 --> 00:26:54,439
Speaker 1: that you don't know already, then do that. So one

597
00:26:54,440 --> 00:26:57,960
Speaker 1: of the first things that I did after one of

598
00:26:57,960 --> 00:26:59,960
Speaker 1: the first VC meetings that I took, was with a white,

599
00:27:00,000 --> 00:27:04,520
Speaker 1: white woman at a VC company, and I knew what

600
00:27:04,680 --> 00:27:08,119
Speaker 1: separated fan base from every other platform, because I recognize

601
00:27:08,119 --> 00:27:12,240
Speaker 1: that black culture is literally the economic engine of social

602
00:27:12,320 --> 00:27:15,639
Speaker 1: media when you demystify things. So I'm not a I

603
00:27:15,680 --> 00:27:17,240
Speaker 1: didn't go to college, But all I try to do

604
00:27:17,320 --> 00:27:19,880
Speaker 1: is take something and break it down to the simplest

605
00:27:19,920 --> 00:27:23,840
Speaker 1: form that I can comprehend, which is, if black culture

606
00:27:23,920 --> 00:27:26,280
Speaker 1: left all of these apps, these apps will be void

607
00:27:26,480 --> 00:27:30,320
Speaker 1: of the fun shit that keep people on them, that

608
00:27:30,560 --> 00:27:32,879
Speaker 1: entertain them, while we fill all the other stuff in

609
00:27:32,880 --> 00:27:37,960
Speaker 1: the middle. And so when black culture is the gas

610
00:27:38,280 --> 00:27:41,800
Speaker 1: and the app is the vehicle, then who's making all

611
00:27:41,840 --> 00:27:43,640
Speaker 1: the money. It's the person that owns the car who

612
00:27:43,640 --> 00:27:46,880
Speaker 1: owns the infrastructure, right, So I'm like, well, somebody's got

613
00:27:46,880 --> 00:27:49,520
Speaker 1: to build infrastructure. Somebody's got to build the infrastructure and

614
00:27:49,560 --> 00:27:53,679
Speaker 1: then bring those two worlds together. And then that scares

615
00:27:53,720 --> 00:27:56,560
Speaker 1: a lot of people because the people that benefit from

616
00:27:56,600 --> 00:27:59,320
Speaker 1: black culture and these vcs are looking at this guy like,

617
00:28:00,600 --> 00:28:02,600
Speaker 1: so wait a minute. So you're telling me that the

618
00:28:02,680 --> 00:28:05,200
Speaker 1: culture and the infrastructure gonna be owned by black people

619
00:28:05,200 --> 00:28:06,240
Speaker 1: and it's gonna circulate.

620
00:28:07,560 --> 00:28:08,640
Speaker 3: It's a circular build.

621
00:28:09,920 --> 00:28:12,240
Speaker 1: They're gonna own the app and they're gonna use that

622
00:28:12,440 --> 00:28:15,560
Speaker 1: and they're gonna make money. Like, oh shit, So don't

623
00:28:15,560 --> 00:28:18,440
Speaker 1: nobody want me to succeed? So, because that's why you've

624
00:28:18,480 --> 00:28:22,280
Speaker 1: never really seen anybody in this space succeed, because you've

625
00:28:22,280 --> 00:28:24,640
Speaker 1: got to be crazy to try to do this shit.

626
00:28:25,280 --> 00:28:28,600
Speaker 1: But the one thing that the white woman BC told

627
00:28:28,600 --> 00:28:30,359
Speaker 1: me in our first meeting, she goes, why would you

628
00:28:30,400 --> 00:28:35,040
Speaker 1: want to build something that's competing with Mark Zuckerberg and Instagram?

629
00:28:35,080 --> 00:28:35,760
Speaker 3: They're giants?

630
00:28:36,640 --> 00:28:39,320
Speaker 1: And I calmly told her I can build anything that

631
00:28:39,360 --> 00:28:42,560
Speaker 1: Mark Zuckerberg can build, but Mark Zuckerberg can't build black people.

632
00:28:43,760 --> 00:28:45,840
Speaker 1: And that's the difference. And no one ever walks into

633
00:28:45,880 --> 00:28:48,520
Speaker 1: a room and says that to them, like, you're screwed.

634
00:28:48,760 --> 00:28:52,600
Speaker 1: If black people ever get together collectively and just invest

635
00:28:52,640 --> 00:28:55,280
Speaker 1: in infrastructures across every sector, I don't care.

636
00:28:55,280 --> 00:28:57,320
Speaker 3: If it's a store like Target.

637
00:28:58,000 --> 00:29:00,960
Speaker 1: I don't care if it's an auto vehicle company like Tesla,

638
00:29:01,400 --> 00:29:03,760
Speaker 1: an app like fan Base, it doesn't matter.

639
00:29:03,920 --> 00:29:07,640
Speaker 3: You're cooked. Because black is the cool of the world.

640
00:29:08,000 --> 00:29:12,120
Speaker 1: It is impossible to promote something is being cool without

641
00:29:12,120 --> 00:29:14,600
Speaker 1: the intenses of black people. It cannot be done. It

642
00:29:14,640 --> 00:29:17,920
Speaker 1: can be romantic, it can be sentimental, it can be adventurous.

643
00:29:17,960 --> 00:29:19,360
Speaker 1: All those can be done by white people.

644
00:29:19,960 --> 00:29:20,280
Speaker 3: Cool.

645
00:29:21,360 --> 00:29:23,520
Speaker 1: You got to have our dances. You got to have

646
00:29:23,720 --> 00:29:25,720
Speaker 1: somebody from our culture, you got to have our music.

647
00:29:25,760 --> 00:29:28,160
Speaker 1: You got to throw Montel jord in there. You need

648
00:29:28,280 --> 00:29:31,760
Speaker 1: something in there to validate the coolness of what you're doing.

649
00:29:31,960 --> 00:29:34,600
Speaker 1: And that is a trillion dollar value that black people

650
00:29:34,640 --> 00:29:41,520
Speaker 1: do not leverage against any kind of business nowhere near

651
00:29:41,520 --> 00:29:44,200
Speaker 1: the way that they need to to drive that value

652
00:29:44,200 --> 00:29:50,240
Speaker 1: back to our community.

653
00:29:56,760 --> 00:29:58,479
Speaker 2: So then what's your vision. It is the end to

654
00:29:58,480 --> 00:30:01,240
Speaker 2: own the infrastructure for more. He's not just for the application,

655
00:30:01,320 --> 00:30:03,320
Speaker 2: but just in general from a cultural standpoint, Like I

656
00:30:03,400 --> 00:30:05,880
Speaker 2: was talking to Ryan Wilson about this, and it's like

657
00:30:06,200 --> 00:30:07,760
Speaker 2: he's like, yeah, you know, if you really think about it,

658
00:30:07,800 --> 00:30:10,080
Speaker 2: there's not a place in Atlanta that, if you need

659
00:30:10,080 --> 00:30:12,040
Speaker 2: it to, you know, rent out for a thousand people,

660
00:30:12,120 --> 00:30:14,520
Speaker 2: that anybody black owns, you know what I mean, Like,

661
00:30:14,920 --> 00:30:17,000
Speaker 2: we don't own these levels of infrastructure, but you see

662
00:30:17,040 --> 00:30:19,160
Speaker 2: us outside right, you see it's kicking it right. So

663
00:30:19,320 --> 00:30:21,400
Speaker 2: to your point, it's all about owning the infrastructure, starting

664
00:30:21,400 --> 00:30:23,640
Speaker 2: to own those, as I say, like the streets and

665
00:30:23,680 --> 00:30:25,880
Speaker 2: the roads and the highways that connect these different things.

666
00:30:26,040 --> 00:30:28,960
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's the secret of Atlanta, right, that's the gift

667
00:30:29,000 --> 00:30:33,360
Speaker 1: of being in this city. I know you're you're heavily

668
00:30:34,200 --> 00:30:36,320
Speaker 1: an advocate of Atlanta just as much as I am.

669
00:30:36,680 --> 00:30:39,840
Speaker 1: And so I recognize that. And Atlanta produces a different

670
00:30:39,840 --> 00:30:42,280
Speaker 1: type of black person. And I know this sounds and

671
00:30:42,320 --> 00:30:45,440
Speaker 1: I know cause black people. I don't I don't say

672
00:30:45,440 --> 00:30:47,640
Speaker 1: this to offend anybody that's black.

673
00:30:47,800 --> 00:30:49,800
Speaker 3: You just kind of be here to kind of get it.

674
00:30:50,280 --> 00:30:53,120
Speaker 1: Yeah, And so, but I always always do the litmus

675
00:30:53,160 --> 00:30:56,000
Speaker 1: test of people that are not from Atlanta to Atlanta

676
00:30:56,040 --> 00:30:58,080
Speaker 1: and when they get here, and I don't have to

677
00:30:58,120 --> 00:31:01,960
Speaker 1: say much, I'll just them somewhere, and then I watched

678
00:31:02,000 --> 00:31:04,560
Speaker 1: them go, what are all these black people doing here?

679
00:31:04,840 --> 00:31:07,200
Speaker 1: And I'm like, did you hear what you just said?

680
00:31:08,280 --> 00:31:11,200
Speaker 1: You're black and the fact that you are surrounded by

681
00:31:11,240 --> 00:31:15,640
Speaker 1: your own people makes you uncomfortable. Let you know that

682
00:31:15,680 --> 00:31:18,680
Speaker 1: you have lived a minority existence your entire life, and

683
00:31:18,720 --> 00:31:22,560
Speaker 1: the sheer sight of your own people existing and doing

684
00:31:22,600 --> 00:31:26,760
Speaker 1: normal things, hanging out, having drinks, running in the park,

685
00:31:27,080 --> 00:31:31,040
Speaker 1: you know whatever. Just operating businesses is foreign to you,

686
00:31:31,520 --> 00:31:35,600
Speaker 1: and that is every day in Atlanta, Georgia. So I say,

687
00:31:35,640 --> 00:31:37,560
Speaker 1: I grew up in Atlanta, Georgia. I've never felt like

688
00:31:37,560 --> 00:31:41,240
Speaker 1: a minority in my entire life. In fact, I've never

689
00:31:41,800 --> 00:31:47,320
Speaker 1: made money through the acceptance permission of white culture my

690
00:31:47,480 --> 00:31:49,520
Speaker 1: entire life. I've never needed that because I was in

691
00:31:49,520 --> 00:31:51,520
Speaker 1: a music business. So it's like I went to high school,

692
00:31:51,520 --> 00:31:53,000
Speaker 1: then go to college. Once I got a music I

693
00:31:53,080 --> 00:31:55,920
Speaker 1: just I'm usually just making records and I'm selling my

694
00:31:56,000 --> 00:31:58,800
Speaker 1: music or whatever. But it wasn't a permission, It's not

695
00:31:58,880 --> 00:32:01,360
Speaker 1: I had to fight my way through anything. And then

696
00:32:01,400 --> 00:32:04,440
Speaker 1: starting businesses and looking at other people start businesses and

697
00:32:04,520 --> 00:32:07,920
Speaker 1: understanding how Atlanta was built off joint venture contracting and

698
00:32:07,920 --> 00:32:10,000
Speaker 1: all the things that Maynard Jackson did to set up

699
00:32:10,000 --> 00:32:12,160
Speaker 1: the way that black people can make money. It's just

700
00:32:12,200 --> 00:32:15,520
Speaker 1: a different type of black person. You don't get Ryan

701
00:32:15,560 --> 00:32:18,920
Speaker 1: Wilson's or La and Babyface saying we need to get

702
00:32:18,920 --> 00:32:20,440
Speaker 1: at a La Mooe Atlanta and we're gonna build a

703
00:32:20,480 --> 00:32:22,920
Speaker 1: record company and make Face Records, which is probably the

704
00:32:22,960 --> 00:32:26,360
Speaker 1: biggest Black R and B label ever produced some of

705
00:32:26,400 --> 00:32:28,600
Speaker 1: the most iconic artists. Or Tyler Perry saying, Yo, let

706
00:32:28,600 --> 00:32:30,440
Speaker 1: me get up out of it, let me drive to Atlanta,

707
00:32:30,480 --> 00:32:33,680
Speaker 1: Georgia start doing plays and you know Will Packer coming

708
00:32:33,760 --> 00:32:37,000
Speaker 1: up from fam you to and doing Rainfall. You don't

709
00:32:37,080 --> 00:32:41,920
Speaker 1: get those type of people except here. And then factor

710
00:32:41,920 --> 00:32:45,000
Speaker 1: in the fact that layered into all this is a

711
00:32:45,080 --> 00:32:49,160
Speaker 1: political infrastructure that grants the permission and the opportunity to

712
00:32:49,160 --> 00:32:52,080
Speaker 1: scale your vision bigger than what you would be allowed to.

713
00:32:52,680 --> 00:32:55,560
Speaker 1: So it's like, oh, you want to build a recording studio, Okay,

714
00:32:55,600 --> 00:32:58,360
Speaker 1: in Cincinnati, No, you niggas can't have no recording studio.

715
00:32:58,640 --> 00:33:00,360
Speaker 1: You want to build a move stud You want to

716
00:33:00,360 --> 00:33:02,720
Speaker 1: build a movie student in La Tyler Perry, no, Negro,

717
00:33:02,840 --> 00:33:05,360
Speaker 1: you can't do that. But in Atlanta, the mayor is black,

718
00:33:05,440 --> 00:33:06,960
Speaker 1: so Hey, Mayor, I want to go build this movie

719
00:33:06,960 --> 00:33:08,480
Speaker 1: studio over here at this military base.

720
00:33:08,680 --> 00:33:10,480
Speaker 3: Can I buy that from you? Yeah? You can have

721
00:33:10,480 --> 00:33:12,840
Speaker 3: three hundred fifty acres for thirty five million dollars. Done deal.

722
00:33:12,880 --> 00:33:14,800
Speaker 1: Now, it's the largest movie study the entire country owned

723
00:33:14,840 --> 00:33:17,600
Speaker 1: by a black man. That would never happen unless there

724
00:33:17,600 --> 00:33:19,400
Speaker 1: was a black mayor, because that land would have been

725
00:33:19,400 --> 00:33:21,040
Speaker 1: sold to some white guy to build his movie studio.

726
00:33:21,440 --> 00:33:23,040
Speaker 1: So that is the point and purpose of why I

727
00:33:23,040 --> 00:33:26,880
Speaker 1: talk so much about Atlanta, because there's this relationship, and

728
00:33:26,920 --> 00:33:29,040
Speaker 1: it is something that we take for granted, is the

729
00:33:29,080 --> 00:33:31,880
Speaker 1: fact that none of this works without political power. None

730
00:33:31,880 --> 00:33:33,440
Speaker 1: of this works without black mayors. When I was gonna

731
00:33:33,440 --> 00:33:34,920
Speaker 1: say fan base, I would have not made fair. I

732
00:33:34,960 --> 00:33:37,120
Speaker 1: would never built fan base in any other city again,

733
00:33:37,280 --> 00:33:39,400
Speaker 1: which is why I say black Plane is the last

734
00:33:39,440 --> 00:33:42,600
Speaker 1: time we ever been this close. That was two thousand.

735
00:33:43,000 --> 00:33:46,520
Speaker 1: It's twenty twenty five between now and then. You and

736
00:33:46,560 --> 00:33:49,200
Speaker 1: I know that there are tens of thousands of black

737
00:33:49,200 --> 00:33:51,560
Speaker 1: people that have way more money than I do and

738
00:33:51,640 --> 00:33:54,600
Speaker 1: are way smarter than I am, but no one builting up.

739
00:33:55,080 --> 00:33:57,920
Speaker 3: So there's something missing, right because it could be done.

740
00:33:58,960 --> 00:34:01,240
Speaker 1: So what is the what is that you know, like,

741
00:34:01,280 --> 00:34:04,480
Speaker 1: what is that that recipe that creates the environment for

742
00:34:04,560 --> 00:34:07,320
Speaker 1: something like this to grow? And I say that it's Atlanta.

743
00:34:07,360 --> 00:34:09,360
Speaker 1: You got to want to be here. You got to

744
00:34:09,440 --> 00:34:11,600
Speaker 1: have the courage and the guts and be like, man,

745
00:34:11,880 --> 00:34:13,799
Speaker 1: f these people. Man, we're about to do our own thing.

746
00:34:13,840 --> 00:34:16,600
Speaker 1: To be able to do that, and so that that

747
00:34:17,040 --> 00:34:20,680
Speaker 1: energy is why fan Base was important. That was the

748
00:34:20,760 --> 00:34:23,319
Speaker 1: challenge in saying, how do I get people to come

749
00:34:23,360 --> 00:34:25,520
Speaker 1: to a platform and do that? Well, First I have

750
00:34:25,560 --> 00:34:27,280
Speaker 1: to gain their trust and I feel like I've gained

751
00:34:27,320 --> 00:34:31,080
Speaker 1: their trust. Now I have to execute. But again, I've

752
00:34:31,080 --> 00:34:33,279
Speaker 1: been raising money a lot differently than most of these

753
00:34:33,280 --> 00:34:36,520
Speaker 1: other guys. I had to do it three ninety nine

754
00:34:36,520 --> 00:34:39,719
Speaker 1: at a time, not here's forty million dollars and go

755
00:34:39,719 --> 00:34:40,359
Speaker 1: build your app.

756
00:34:40,680 --> 00:34:41,920
Speaker 2: Yeah, And I was just about to ask about that.

757
00:34:42,000 --> 00:34:43,640
Speaker 2: I guess I have to school. I am an investor

758
00:34:43,800 --> 00:34:46,040
Speaker 2: in fan Base. That was in the very first round,

759
00:34:46,120 --> 00:34:48,799
Speaker 2: I believe it was. But like, what's that process been like?

760
00:34:48,840 --> 00:34:51,600
Speaker 2: Because to your point, these guys can scribble out an

761
00:34:51,600 --> 00:34:53,840
Speaker 2: idea in the back of a napin in a coffee

762
00:34:53,840 --> 00:34:56,640
Speaker 2: shop and get twenty thirty million dollars, right, and then

763
00:34:57,000 --> 00:34:58,680
Speaker 2: if it doesn't work out, Everybody's like, oh, you know,

764
00:34:58,760 --> 00:35:00,080
Speaker 2: it's too much. You know, it is what it It

765
00:35:00,160 --> 00:35:02,160
Speaker 2: is like you've gone to start e ginerute, you've had

766
00:35:02,200 --> 00:35:03,799
Speaker 2: one of the biggest campaigns, or like, how much are

767
00:35:03,880 --> 00:35:04,560
Speaker 2: 'all at right now?

768
00:35:04,920 --> 00:35:08,880
Speaker 1: So so I say this too, we're at about twelve million,

769
00:35:08,880 --> 00:35:11,560
Speaker 1: but collectively, over four rounds of equity crowdfunding, I raised

770
00:35:11,560 --> 00:35:13,960
Speaker 1: twenty two million dollars and then we close around I

771
00:35:14,239 --> 00:35:15,480
Speaker 1: raised twenty seven million dollars.

772
00:35:15,520 --> 00:35:16,400
Speaker 3: Again, this is history.

773
00:35:16,960 --> 00:35:19,560
Speaker 1: None of this stuff ever gets reported, like I'm the

774
00:35:19,560 --> 00:35:21,719
Speaker 1: first black man to ever raise twenty seven million dollars

775
00:35:21,719 --> 00:35:25,400
Speaker 1: in equity crowdfunding for anything. Nobody's talking about that I

776
00:35:25,440 --> 00:35:29,839
Speaker 1: invented in that purchase, peer to peer subscription, that Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat,

777
00:35:30,040 --> 00:35:33,000
Speaker 1: all these platforms are using now to try to put subscriptions.

778
00:35:33,280 --> 00:35:34,279
Speaker 3: No one talks about that.

779
00:35:34,680 --> 00:35:38,080
Speaker 1: So and on purpose, because again it's like, we can't

780
00:35:38,160 --> 00:35:40,919
Speaker 1: let the world know that this innovation is coming from

781
00:35:41,239 --> 00:35:43,680
Speaker 1: black people. And I say, because I want people to know,

782
00:35:43,719 --> 00:35:45,520
Speaker 1: you ain't got to be a rocket scientist to invent

783
00:35:45,560 --> 00:35:48,800
Speaker 1: some cool shit. So we've raised that amount of money

784
00:35:48,960 --> 00:35:51,760
Speaker 1: and it was it was a blessing but it also

785
00:35:52,000 --> 00:35:54,240
Speaker 1: became a passion of mine because once I got introduced

786
00:35:54,280 --> 00:35:57,359
Speaker 1: to equity crowdfunding, it also opened up the idea that

787
00:35:58,000 --> 00:36:01,880
Speaker 1: I can make you rich. So typically when all these

788
00:36:01,920 --> 00:36:03,759
Speaker 1: startups happen, it's a group of small you know, ten

789
00:36:03,800 --> 00:36:06,640
Speaker 1: to fifteen people get together raise the million two three

790
00:36:06,680 --> 00:36:09,880
Speaker 1: million to start their company. That company scales, exits, and

791
00:36:09,960 --> 00:36:12,080
Speaker 1: then those people wind up making thirty forty fifty, one

792
00:36:12,120 --> 00:36:14,160
Speaker 1: hundred million and a billion dollars off their initial investment.

793
00:36:15,480 --> 00:36:19,280
Speaker 1: What I love about equity crowdfunding is that it allows

794
00:36:19,360 --> 00:36:23,560
Speaker 1: anybody to invest in a company and see a return

795
00:36:23,719 --> 00:36:26,840
Speaker 1: at limited risk because the minimums to invest are not

796
00:36:26,960 --> 00:36:29,359
Speaker 1: big two hundred and fifty dollars three ninety nine. Now

797
00:36:29,360 --> 00:36:31,719
Speaker 1: you can put large amounts of money. We have large investors.

798
00:36:32,000 --> 00:36:34,000
Speaker 1: But the ability to say I could put two hundred

799
00:36:34,040 --> 00:36:36,759
Speaker 1: and fifty bucks into a startup and potentially turn that

800
00:36:36,800 --> 00:36:39,160
Speaker 1: two hundred and fifty dollars into two hundred fifty thousand

801
00:36:39,160 --> 00:36:43,120
Speaker 1: dollars or half a million dollars or a million dollars.

802
00:36:43,640 --> 00:36:47,200
Speaker 1: You have better odds at investing in startups that way

803
00:36:47,239 --> 00:36:50,400
Speaker 1: than playing the lottery or gambling in the long run.

804
00:36:50,560 --> 00:36:54,000
Speaker 1: But again and so and the rules which were in

805
00:36:54,040 --> 00:36:58,600
Speaker 1: place before the Jobs Act, which spawned equity crowdfunding, which

806
00:36:58,640 --> 00:37:02,200
Speaker 1: was a regulation that only allow out rich people, certified

807
00:37:02,280 --> 00:37:06,040
Speaker 1: investors credited to be able to invest in early stage startups.

808
00:37:06,560 --> 00:37:08,880
Speaker 1: Then yeah, so then all the white people got to

809
00:37:08,920 --> 00:37:14,480
Speaker 1: invest in Apple, Google, Microsoft, Dell, Facebook, you know Uber.

810
00:37:14,520 --> 00:37:16,399
Speaker 1: I always talking about Aoron Michaels. I'm gonna meet oorrom

811
00:37:16,400 --> 00:37:18,279
Speaker 1: Michaels one day because I probably said his name about

812
00:37:18,400 --> 00:37:20,480
Speaker 1: ten thousand times in the last five years. But orm

813
00:37:20,520 --> 00:37:24,440
Speaker 1: Michaels was the smallest investor in Uber ced round whereas

814
00:37:24,480 --> 00:37:26,440
Speaker 1: half a million dollars in twenty ten. To get started,

815
00:37:27,000 --> 00:37:29,759
Speaker 1: Ormichael put five thousand dollars into Uber. Now I'm not

816
00:37:29,760 --> 00:37:32,200
Speaker 1: counting everybody's pocket I know you got five thousand dollars. Man,

817
00:37:32,239 --> 00:37:34,719
Speaker 1: I got five thousand dollars even I didn't me you

818
00:37:34,760 --> 00:37:36,759
Speaker 1: and add the people could get five hundred dollars a piece

819
00:37:37,280 --> 00:37:40,920
Speaker 1: and put five thousand dollars in Uber in two thousand

820
00:37:40,880 --> 00:37:44,960
Speaker 1: and nineteen, nine years later, but Uber went public that

821
00:37:45,040 --> 00:37:47,279
Speaker 1: five thousand dollars was worth twenty four million dollars.

822
00:37:47,600 --> 00:37:50,800
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's a flip exactly. It's a flip.

823
00:37:50,880 --> 00:37:53,799
Speaker 1: It's like, oh my god, right, But again, no one

824
00:37:53,920 --> 00:37:56,160
Speaker 1: knew if Uber was going to fail or succeed, but

825
00:37:56,600 --> 00:37:59,600
Speaker 1: just the opportunity to try. But my point is they

826
00:37:59,600 --> 00:38:02,680
Speaker 1: can get Uber, but you can only go gamble at

827
00:38:02,719 --> 00:38:04,480
Speaker 1: the lottery and in Vegas.

828
00:38:04,760 --> 00:38:06,440
Speaker 2: Well even that's the point that always annoys me when

829
00:38:06,480 --> 00:38:07,960
Speaker 2: I see people talk about that stuff, like, you know,

830
00:38:07,960 --> 00:38:10,480
Speaker 2: if you would have invested four thousand dollars in Netflix,

831
00:38:10,520 --> 00:38:12,640
Speaker 2: It's like yeah, but also you leave another party. You

832
00:38:12,640 --> 00:38:14,439
Speaker 2: had to be a credit investor, you had to get

833
00:38:14,520 --> 00:38:17,319
Speaker 2: an opportunity to invest. And the kids getting these deals like,

834
00:38:17,360 --> 00:38:18,759
Speaker 2: they let who they want to get in, So to

835
00:38:18,800 --> 00:38:21,560
Speaker 2: your point, you're actually letting people get in on the

836
00:38:21,600 --> 00:38:23,480
Speaker 2: ground floor of a deal as well.

837
00:38:23,600 --> 00:38:25,920
Speaker 1: Right, And I have introduced many people into equity CRAWDNK.

838
00:38:25,960 --> 00:38:29,400
Speaker 1: I referred probably five or six companies to raise capital.

839
00:38:29,680 --> 00:38:32,120
Speaker 1: But what I loved about technology is the fact that

840
00:38:32,640 --> 00:38:34,920
Speaker 1: the scale potential of a social media platform can get

841
00:38:34,960 --> 00:38:36,919
Speaker 1: into the hundreds of billions of dollars. When I'm looking

842
00:38:36,960 --> 00:38:39,080
Speaker 1: at Facebook as a market cap of one point five

843
00:38:39,160 --> 00:38:41,840
Speaker 1: trillion dollars, and I'm not saying fan base will be Facebook,

844
00:38:41,920 --> 00:38:44,880
Speaker 1: but you know, expair company byte dances worth three hundred

845
00:38:44,920 --> 00:38:45,640
Speaker 1: billion dollars.

846
00:38:46,239 --> 00:38:48,799
Speaker 3: I'm like, man, that's a huge flip, right.

847
00:38:49,120 --> 00:38:51,200
Speaker 1: So I'm like, if Byite Dance can be worth three

848
00:38:51,239 --> 00:38:54,319
Speaker 1: hundred billion, I know that I could probably give fan

849
00:38:54,360 --> 00:38:57,000
Speaker 1: Base to one hundred billion. And when I thought about that,

850
00:38:57,040 --> 00:39:00,360
Speaker 1: I'm like, my first valuation was twenty million dollars for

851
00:39:00,440 --> 00:39:02,120
Speaker 1: fan Base when I raise. So if you invested in

852
00:39:02,160 --> 00:39:05,800
Speaker 1: fan Base that earned that first round, that means whatever

853
00:39:05,840 --> 00:39:09,319
Speaker 1: you invested when fan Base gets to one hundred billion,

854
00:39:09,320 --> 00:39:12,040
Speaker 1: because I'm gonna claim it, whatever you put in will

855
00:39:12,080 --> 00:39:14,880
Speaker 1: have that same five thousand extra turn that on Michael's had.

856
00:39:15,040 --> 00:39:16,799
Speaker 1: So if you put two hundred and fifty dollars into

857
00:39:16,840 --> 00:39:19,600
Speaker 1: fan Base in twenty twenty, twenty twenty one, and fan

858
00:39:19,640 --> 00:39:21,879
Speaker 1: Base reaches one hundred billion dollar valuation and somebody either

859
00:39:21,880 --> 00:39:24,239
Speaker 1: acquires us or I go public, that two hundred and

860
00:39:24,239 --> 00:39:26,680
Speaker 1: fifty dollars be worth one point twenty five million. Now,

861
00:39:26,760 --> 00:39:30,439
Speaker 1: that for black people is the largest distribution of wealth

862
00:39:30,440 --> 00:39:32,399
Speaker 1: to black people in the history of the country ever.

863
00:39:32,760 --> 00:39:35,200
Speaker 1: Bob Johnson made the most millionaires ever when he sold

864
00:39:35,239 --> 00:39:39,080
Speaker 1: bet I want to obliterate that record because now we

865
00:39:39,160 --> 00:39:42,239
Speaker 1: can take that wealth and acquire other things and build things.

866
00:39:42,400 --> 00:39:45,520
Speaker 1: Not much target is worth and gets how much Target's

867
00:39:45,520 --> 00:39:48,840
Speaker 1: worth probably what two hundred billion dollars, No, forty.

868
00:39:49,280 --> 00:39:51,239
Speaker 3: That's not a lot, it's billions, but it's not yet.

869
00:39:51,800 --> 00:39:54,479
Speaker 1: So imagine being able to say, Okay, well, a whole

870
00:39:54,480 --> 00:39:57,000
Speaker 1: bunch of people get together and black people, let's buy

871
00:39:57,080 --> 00:39:59,320
Speaker 1: Target and make it our own black Target.

872
00:39:59,560 --> 00:40:00,840
Speaker 3: You know what I'm saying, Well, that's the get you know.

873
00:40:00,840 --> 00:40:02,960
Speaker 2: Again, like and even in the state like Atlanta, right, Like,

874
00:40:03,640 --> 00:40:05,000
Speaker 2: that's what I tell people is like when you heard

875
00:40:05,000 --> 00:40:07,120
Speaker 2: things like the PayPal mafia and all this stuff, right, Like,

876
00:40:07,480 --> 00:40:10,120
Speaker 2: that's where this stuff comes from. Is people get on,

877
00:40:10,239 --> 00:40:11,920
Speaker 2: they get it, and you know, getting these companies. These

878
00:40:11,920 --> 00:40:14,960
Speaker 2: companies go public, they get their windfall from it, and

879
00:40:15,080 --> 00:40:16,919
Speaker 2: it's like you know what, yeah, now you know, hey, yeah,

880
00:40:16,960 --> 00:40:18,879
Speaker 2: you go kick in fifty grande hundred grand. I'm gonn

881
00:40:18,920 --> 00:40:20,480
Speaker 2: kick in fifty hundred grand and go do this thing.

882
00:40:21,080 --> 00:40:23,200
Speaker 2: Like you know, even when Mailchimp got sold a couple

883
00:40:23,239 --> 00:40:24,919
Speaker 2: of years ago, like in Atlanta, I said, it's great

884
00:40:24,920 --> 00:40:26,920
Speaker 2: that it got sold, but the problem is it didn't

885
00:40:26,960 --> 00:40:30,920
Speaker 2: create this influx of millionaires in Atlanta because again, when

886
00:40:30,920 --> 00:40:33,120
Speaker 2: that was like a couple billion dollars, it got sold

887
00:40:33,160 --> 00:40:36,279
Speaker 2: for you should have been at least ten twenty millionaires

888
00:40:36,280 --> 00:40:37,560
Speaker 2: that came out of that, and it was a very

889
00:40:37,600 --> 00:40:41,320
Speaker 2: small amount, you know, because it was privately held. Nobody invested.

890
00:40:41,719 --> 00:40:43,760
Speaker 2: And but again, you think about these companies that happening

891
00:40:43,800 --> 00:40:46,000
Speaker 2: on Silicon vallec I talk about all the time. I

892
00:40:46,040 --> 00:40:47,680
Speaker 2: have a buddy of mine, his wife or to Airbnb

893
00:40:47,760 --> 00:40:50,600
Speaker 2: when they went public, she was in customer service and

894
00:40:50,640 --> 00:40:54,239
Speaker 2: she made over a million dollars just because she was there.

895
00:40:54,680 --> 00:40:56,560
Speaker 2: She was like a customer service manager, you know what

896
00:40:56,640 --> 00:41:00,319
Speaker 2: I'm saying, Like, imagine if that happens at scale, and

897
00:41:00,360 --> 00:41:01,960
Speaker 2: now all of a sudden, you've got one hundred two

898
00:41:02,040 --> 00:41:04,560
Speaker 2: hundred one thousand new black millionaires running around.

899
00:41:04,560 --> 00:41:07,040
Speaker 1: There's twenty two thousand investors in fan Mase majority are black.

900
00:41:07,040 --> 00:41:10,360
Speaker 1: So imagine you have twenty two thousand men like Bruh.

901
00:41:10,440 --> 00:41:12,160
Speaker 1: And I guarantee you the next time I build something,

902
00:41:12,239 --> 00:41:14,040
Speaker 1: y'all put your money into that one too, Like what

903
00:41:14,080 --> 00:41:16,880
Speaker 1: we're doing next, Let's go or let's go. Because my

904
00:41:16,880 --> 00:41:18,719
Speaker 1: point is it gives us the ability to buy these

905
00:41:18,719 --> 00:41:21,719
Speaker 1: infrastructures and scale. And that's the thing that's like, it's

906
00:41:21,760 --> 00:41:25,200
Speaker 1: just crazy to me that not being included in these

907
00:41:25,239 --> 00:41:28,040
Speaker 1: deal flows and then being able to scale those companies.

908
00:41:28,120 --> 00:41:31,759
Speaker 1: Like you said, Mailchimp, I mean that is again a

909
00:41:31,840 --> 00:41:34,480
Speaker 1: small group of people being able to invest and then

910
00:41:34,760 --> 00:41:36,239
Speaker 1: and then that same small group of people get to

911
00:41:36,239 --> 00:41:37,640
Speaker 1: take that money and do it over and over and

912
00:41:37,640 --> 00:41:39,880
Speaker 1: over again, and none of that money goes to black people.

913
00:41:40,080 --> 00:41:42,080
Speaker 1: And we got to start thinking like that. But the

914
00:41:42,160 --> 00:41:46,839
Speaker 1: problem is that outside of Atlanta, you are taught that

915
00:41:46,920 --> 00:41:51,120
Speaker 1: you have to infiltrate this system to gain wealth through that,

916
00:41:52,120 --> 00:41:55,319
Speaker 1: and that is not necessarily the case. And especially now

917
00:41:55,360 --> 00:41:58,200
Speaker 1: with technology, we're all connected, so we could scale. We

918
00:41:58,200 --> 00:42:01,400
Speaker 1: could take black people, could take any business they wanted

919
00:42:01,440 --> 00:42:03,840
Speaker 1: to and turn it into a billion dollar business overnight

920
00:42:03,960 --> 00:42:04,560
Speaker 1: by will.

921
00:42:04,960 --> 00:42:06,680
Speaker 3: We literally could do that.

922
00:42:07,360 --> 00:42:11,279
Speaker 1: The problem, I think is that we don't activate on

923
00:42:11,360 --> 00:42:13,279
Speaker 1: the ability to do that because we don't have the

924
00:42:13,320 --> 00:42:15,239
Speaker 1: infrastructure to do it. We're not connected in a way

925
00:42:15,239 --> 00:42:17,200
Speaker 1: that we can do it, which is another reason why

926
00:42:17,200 --> 00:42:20,720
Speaker 1: I think which makes fan Base an extremely important company,

927
00:42:20,760 --> 00:42:24,000
Speaker 1: because now you're taking technology that allows people to build community,

928
00:42:24,360 --> 00:42:26,680
Speaker 1: so when people can have these conversations and circulate that

929
00:42:26,719 --> 00:42:29,680
Speaker 1: information and do that just by people using social media

930
00:42:29,719 --> 00:42:31,879
Speaker 1: on a regular level to be able to scale, So

931
00:42:32,400 --> 00:42:35,239
Speaker 1: the equity crowdfunding route. And that's something else that I

932
00:42:35,280 --> 00:42:37,880
Speaker 1: wanted to talk about too, is when you were just

933
00:42:37,880 --> 00:42:41,760
Speaker 1: talking about those companies though that exit. Here's the difference

934
00:42:41,760 --> 00:42:46,759
Speaker 1: though too. I've learned a lot from watching tech companies

935
00:42:46,840 --> 00:42:49,760
Speaker 1: and coming from the music business, because again I understand publishing.

936
00:42:49,760 --> 00:42:52,879
Speaker 1: I know percentages. I would ask anybody to go look

937
00:42:52,880 --> 00:42:55,839
Speaker 1: at those companies that do raise that money and see

938
00:42:55,840 --> 00:42:57,720
Speaker 1: how much equity those people give up in their companies.

939
00:42:57,719 --> 00:43:00,520
Speaker 1: So when they take money from venture capital five percent

940
00:43:00,560 --> 00:43:04,000
Speaker 1: at the time, chunk here And the reason why I

941
00:43:04,040 --> 00:43:06,360
Speaker 1: spent two hundred thousand dollars in my own money to

942
00:43:06,400 --> 00:43:09,080
Speaker 1: build fan base, and I advanced myself that money from

943
00:43:09,080 --> 00:43:13,160
Speaker 1: the publishing that I was making from licensing my music

944
00:43:13,200 --> 00:43:15,560
Speaker 1: because I didn't sell my publishing, so I had the

945
00:43:15,640 --> 00:43:18,680
Speaker 1: money to do that probably save me twenty percent of

946
00:43:18,680 --> 00:43:20,400
Speaker 1: the company that I would have had to give up

947
00:43:20,400 --> 00:43:22,520
Speaker 1: if I want to give start out saying hm, and

948
00:43:22,520 --> 00:43:24,200
Speaker 1: then I would have had to have a board probably,

949
00:43:24,680 --> 00:43:26,279
Speaker 1: and then let's say and then so then the board

950
00:43:26,280 --> 00:43:29,000
Speaker 1: thing comes in and says, okay, Ike, so fan base

951
00:43:29,080 --> 00:43:31,920
Speaker 1: is worth now one hundred and sixty million dollars. Well,

952
00:43:31,960 --> 00:43:34,279
Speaker 1: I would almost guarantee you that if fan Base had

953
00:43:34,280 --> 00:43:37,640
Speaker 1: a board and it was other people on the board

954
00:43:38,200 --> 00:43:40,920
Speaker 1: and they were like, Ike, sell fan Base right now,

955
00:43:40,960 --> 00:43:43,799
Speaker 1: one hundred and sixty million dollars. Come on, man, you

956
00:43:43,800 --> 00:43:46,560
Speaker 1: did great. It's great. You'll be able to say you're

957
00:43:46,560 --> 00:43:48,440
Speaker 1: a tech founder. You know, I might walk over with

958
00:43:48,440 --> 00:43:50,800
Speaker 1: twenty thirty million dollars walk around at Land of the

959
00:43:50,840 --> 00:43:52,879
Speaker 1: rest of my life like, yeah, I'm a tech guy.

960
00:43:53,400 --> 00:43:55,879
Speaker 3: I'm newslash, y'all. I'm not in it for that. I'm

961
00:43:55,880 --> 00:43:56,080
Speaker 3: in it.

962
00:43:56,200 --> 00:43:58,920
Speaker 1: I want I'm trying to f it up, like I'm

963
00:43:58,960 --> 00:44:03,200
Speaker 1: trying to run the bag so far up that everybody

964
00:44:03,239 --> 00:44:05,759
Speaker 1: eats in a way that's a lot more powerful. And

965
00:44:05,800 --> 00:44:07,439
Speaker 1: so boards would do that. They'll tell you that because

966
00:44:07,440 --> 00:44:08,840
Speaker 1: they don't want you to get your vision all the

967
00:44:08,880 --> 00:44:11,560
Speaker 1: way to the top. They're like, if he keeps going this,

968
00:44:11,680 --> 00:44:13,279
Speaker 1: Negro is gonna be as rich as Elon Musk.

969
00:44:14,080 --> 00:44:14,840
Speaker 3: Yeah, he's gonna be.

970
00:44:15,160 --> 00:44:18,080
Speaker 1: And there's never been anybody that's as rich as Elon Musker,

971
00:44:18,520 --> 00:44:19,040
Speaker 1: Mark Zucker.

972
00:44:19,120 --> 00:44:21,640
Speaker 3: We never had what I call a super nigga. I

973
00:44:21,760 --> 00:44:22,840
Speaker 3: you know, I know, I know.

974
00:44:22,960 --> 00:44:26,360
Speaker 1: Excuse me, my language, Excuse me, I'm being canned and

975
00:44:26,440 --> 00:44:29,680
Speaker 1: funny but the amount of wealth that you could throw

976
00:44:29,719 --> 00:44:33,080
Speaker 1: away if you wanted to, that could change the direction

977
00:44:33,160 --> 00:44:33,720
Speaker 1: of an election.

978
00:44:35,120 --> 00:44:35,319
Speaker 3: Right.

979
00:44:35,760 --> 00:44:39,120
Speaker 1: So you know when Bloomberg ran for president, he spent

980
00:44:39,200 --> 00:44:41,319
Speaker 1: a billion dollars on his campaign and lost. He even

981
00:44:41,320 --> 00:44:44,080
Speaker 1: make it close. Imagine being able to blow a billion

982
00:44:44,120 --> 00:44:47,600
Speaker 1: dollars as a black person. But I said, I'm not.

983
00:44:47,719 --> 00:44:49,000
Speaker 1: But I'm not gonna blow. I'm not gonna blow a

984
00:44:49,040 --> 00:44:51,840
Speaker 1: billion dollar. I'm gonna take a billion dollars in fund

985
00:44:52,200 --> 00:44:55,280
Speaker 1: five thousand new black owned businesses, but only in Atlanta, Georgia,

986
00:44:55,280 --> 00:44:57,040
Speaker 1: because you got to move here, number all. You got

987
00:44:57,080 --> 00:44:57,960
Speaker 1: to live here to be able to do it, because

988
00:44:57,960 --> 00:45:00,040
Speaker 1: I got to make sure that Atlanta stays black, and

989
00:45:00,320 --> 00:45:01,160
Speaker 1: we got to get a black.

990
00:45:00,960 --> 00:45:01,600
Speaker 3: Governor and all that.

991
00:45:01,640 --> 00:45:04,920
Speaker 1: It's all, all of this is done intentionally, in my opinion,

992
00:45:05,360 --> 00:45:07,520
Speaker 1: or not not even my opinion. In fact, by me,

993
00:45:07,840 --> 00:45:10,480
Speaker 1: I'm intentional about this because I understand that for this

994
00:45:10,520 --> 00:45:14,640
Speaker 1: to continue to grow, we need black political leadership, We

995
00:45:14,719 --> 00:45:18,000
Speaker 1: need more black people in Atlanta. Atlanta's not full. Don't

996
00:45:18,040 --> 00:45:19,960
Speaker 1: fall for the bullshit, and we need to be able

997
00:45:20,000 --> 00:45:23,160
Speaker 1: to scale those businesses. But those founders that have lost

998
00:45:23,719 --> 00:45:26,279
Speaker 1: so much equity in their company by doing the VC

999
00:45:26,360 --> 00:45:28,640
Speaker 1: route and equity crowdfunding. I've been able to maintain and

1000
00:45:28,719 --> 00:45:31,279
Speaker 1: keep that equity, so they hate that too. So not

1001
00:45:31,360 --> 00:45:33,360
Speaker 1: only have you been able to raise twenty two million dollars,

1002
00:45:33,480 --> 00:45:35,040
Speaker 1: you haven't had to give up eighty percent of your

1003
00:45:35,040 --> 00:45:38,280
Speaker 1: company to get it. Right, It's like, ah, so now

1004
00:45:39,120 --> 00:45:41,760
Speaker 1: it's just a numbers game for me. So now fan Base,

1005
00:45:42,080 --> 00:45:46,799
Speaker 1: I say, the apps are the artists, the vcs are

1006
00:45:46,840 --> 00:45:49,560
Speaker 1: the record companies, and the app store charts are the

1007
00:45:49,600 --> 00:45:53,239
Speaker 1: billboard charts. I'm an independent artist. As an app I've

1008
00:45:53,320 --> 00:45:55,919
Speaker 1: raised twenty two million dollars selling stock out the truck

1009
00:45:55,960 --> 00:45:59,520
Speaker 1: of my car. Right I I'm not signed to deaf

1010
00:45:59,640 --> 00:46:01,680
Speaker 1: Jam or I'm not with A sixteen Z and all

1011
00:46:01,680 --> 00:46:04,480
Speaker 1: these other companies. I'm out here start engine it the

1012
00:46:04,520 --> 00:46:08,279
Speaker 1: indie label. So now all I gotta do is make

1013
00:46:08,320 --> 00:46:11,200
Speaker 1: fan Base a hit. And so when fan Base is

1014
00:46:11,239 --> 00:46:13,000
Speaker 1: sitting up at the top of the app store charts,

1015
00:46:13,560 --> 00:46:17,000
Speaker 1: my phone's gonna ring. It's We're like, hey, we want

1016
00:46:17,000 --> 00:46:18,839
Speaker 1: to invest in fan Base. How much do you want?

1017
00:46:20,360 --> 00:46:23,320
Speaker 1: Give me one hundred million at a billion dollar evaluation.

1018
00:46:23,400 --> 00:46:26,080
Speaker 1: So I'll sell ten percent of company. And that's how

1019
00:46:26,120 --> 00:46:28,799
Speaker 1: I've set this whole thing up to say that not

1020
00:46:28,840 --> 00:46:31,239
Speaker 1: only can I scale the company, I can scale it

1021
00:46:31,280 --> 00:46:33,280
Speaker 1: in a way that gives me enough to raise capital,

1022
00:46:33,440 --> 00:46:38,520
Speaker 1: really be disruptive, but maintain control, equity ownership, and be

1023
00:46:38,560 --> 00:46:39,879
Speaker 1: able to do the things that I do. And that's

1024
00:46:39,880 --> 00:46:44,000
Speaker 1: why equity crowdfunding is such an important thing for all entrepreneurs.

1025
00:46:44,080 --> 00:46:44,840
Speaker 3: That's any business.

1026
00:46:44,840 --> 00:46:46,759
Speaker 1: You keep control of your company, you constructure the way

1027
00:46:46,840 --> 00:46:49,520
Speaker 1: you can, you can scale your business. You don't have

1028
00:46:49,560 --> 00:46:52,799
Speaker 1: to get involved in all the because you know, we know,

1029
00:46:53,920 --> 00:46:56,160
Speaker 1: I don't know how many entrepreneurs that I know that

1030
00:46:56,200 --> 00:46:58,800
Speaker 1: are taking venture capital and gotten kicked out of their companies.

1031
00:46:59,320 --> 00:47:01,520
Speaker 1: You know, they have forced out or whatever, the board

1032
00:47:01,600 --> 00:47:03,480
Speaker 1: fires them or whatever. They can't say I met. I

1033
00:47:03,560 --> 00:47:05,239
Speaker 1: met a group of I met these I'm not going

1034
00:47:05,320 --> 00:47:06,480
Speaker 1: to say who they are, but I met a group

1035
00:47:06,520 --> 00:47:09,920
Speaker 1: of girls over the weekend, two black entrepreneurs that have

1036
00:47:10,000 --> 00:47:12,959
Speaker 1: a business, and I said, oh, y'all need to raise

1037
00:47:12,960 --> 00:47:16,040
Speaker 1: some money for equity crowdfunding. And they go, yeah, we

1038
00:47:16,080 --> 00:47:18,160
Speaker 1: took some institutional capital and they're not allowing us to

1039
00:47:18,200 --> 00:47:20,359
Speaker 1: do it. See that's already a problem, and you need

1040
00:47:20,400 --> 00:47:22,920
Speaker 1: the money. They're slowing down the ability for you to

1041
00:47:22,960 --> 00:47:25,279
Speaker 1: scale your business because somebody else is allowing you to

1042
00:47:25,320 --> 00:47:27,279
Speaker 1: tell you what you can do with your business. See

1043
00:47:27,280 --> 00:47:29,359
Speaker 1: that's what the music, see all that stuff, my dad.

1044
00:47:29,360 --> 00:47:31,040
Speaker 1: I don't want nobody to be able to tell me nothing.

1045
00:47:31,239 --> 00:47:33,360
Speaker 1: If I can't have control, I don't want to be

1046
00:47:33,400 --> 00:47:36,000
Speaker 1: a part of it. And so that's the challenge in scaling,

1047
00:47:36,440 --> 00:47:38,120
Speaker 1: you know, fan base. But we're doing a good job

1048
00:47:38,160 --> 00:47:40,680
Speaker 1: and now we've gotten some Now because of this large

1049
00:47:40,760 --> 00:47:42,759
Speaker 1: round that we're about to close, I've been able to

1050
00:47:42,760 --> 00:47:45,960
Speaker 1: bring on some really cool people that allow me to

1051
00:47:46,000 --> 00:47:48,360
Speaker 1: really focus and actually scale the company, because again, you

1052
00:47:48,400 --> 00:47:51,000
Speaker 1: just got to hire people that know way more than you.

1053
00:47:51,080 --> 00:47:53,240
Speaker 1: And now I've got some. I've got some really good advisors.

1054
00:47:53,239 --> 00:47:56,000
Speaker 1: I got two advisors by the name of Alvin Bowles

1055
00:47:56,040 --> 00:47:59,280
Speaker 1: and Tie my tailor. They were both at Meta Album

1056
00:47:59,400 --> 00:48:01,799
Speaker 1: was at me Up for like ten years. Tie was

1057
00:48:01,800 --> 00:48:05,600
Speaker 1: at Meta and Snapchat and he ran TCHX for George Lucas.

1058
00:48:06,040 --> 00:48:10,200
Speaker 1: So these guys are like the shit and they're my

1059
00:48:10,320 --> 00:48:13,480
Speaker 1: advisors in how to navigate this tech ecosystem, specially by

1060
00:48:13,520 --> 00:48:16,160
Speaker 1: way of even if we think about venturing into advertising

1061
00:48:16,160 --> 00:48:17,560
Speaker 1: stuff like that. And then we have some great new

1062
00:48:17,600 --> 00:48:20,879
Speaker 1: hires locally here in Atlanta, two black women, and they're

1063
00:48:20,920 --> 00:48:24,719
Speaker 1: over product and product marketing. And so I'm just excited

1064
00:48:24,719 --> 00:48:27,480
Speaker 1: because I'm building the team that I know I always

1065
00:48:27,520 --> 00:48:29,600
Speaker 1: wanted to build, but I'm building it in a way

1066
00:48:30,200 --> 00:48:32,360
Speaker 1: that still allows me to keep the culture of the

1067
00:48:32,400 --> 00:48:36,160
Speaker 1: company but still be a tech company, but out of Atlanta.

1068
00:48:36,320 --> 00:48:38,600
Speaker 2: No, Man, look, all the pieces are there. Again, you're

1069
00:48:38,600 --> 00:48:40,719
Speaker 2: doing it in public, and like I said, Man, a

1070
00:48:40,760 --> 00:48:43,600
Speaker 2: great product with a great team is positioned to go far.

1071
00:48:43,719 --> 00:48:46,399
Speaker 2: So you know again, Man, congratulations and everything you've built

1072
00:48:46,440 --> 00:48:48,839
Speaker 2: out before we get out of here. Mantel folks, how

1073
00:48:48,880 --> 00:48:51,759
Speaker 2: can they support fan Base? How can they invest? How

1074
00:48:51,800 --> 00:48:54,120
Speaker 2: can they support y'all? I give them all the things, man.

1075
00:48:55,160 --> 00:48:57,640
Speaker 1: Start engine dot com slash fan bases where you can invest.

1076
00:48:57,680 --> 00:49:00,960
Speaker 1: The minimum to invest it's three hundred nine dollars. You

1077
00:49:00,960 --> 00:49:04,000
Speaker 1: get sixty shares of stock and fan base. Download fan Base,

1078
00:49:04,239 --> 00:49:08,440
Speaker 1: create an account, join the community, follow me at ISACSE

1079
00:49:08,440 --> 00:49:11,280
Speaker 1: three on all socials, but especially on fan base tap

1080
00:49:11,320 --> 00:49:12,880
Speaker 1: in And if you don't know what fan base is,

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00:49:13,920 --> 00:49:18,160
Speaker 1: it's just a free social media platform that allows people

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00:49:18,160 --> 00:49:21,280
Speaker 1: to subscribe to you if they want to for content

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00:49:21,320 --> 00:49:24,439
Speaker 1: that you can put behind paywalls, and it's photos, videos, audio, chat,

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00:49:24,520 --> 00:49:27,920
Speaker 1: live stories, long form all there straight out Atlanta, Georgia.

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Speaker 2: So well, I love it. Congratulations everything y'all. Get y'all

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00:49:32,640 --> 00:49:34,799
Speaker 2: fan base up. Let's get it going. We got an

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00:49:34,800 --> 00:49:36,319
Speaker 2: account on there too. We got to get back on

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00:49:36,320 --> 00:49:37,759
Speaker 2: it some more. You know what I'm saying. We get busy,

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00:49:37,800 --> 00:49:40,000
Speaker 2: but look we're about to take this taking this thing up, man,

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00:49:40,040 --> 00:49:43,040
Speaker 2: absolutely and get this thing going. So with that said,

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Speaker 2: we out y'all. That's the pot. You've been listening to

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00:49:46,200 --> 00:49:49,640
Speaker 2: button Nomics and I'm your host, Brandon Butler. Got comments, feedback?

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00:49:49,760 --> 00:49:51,520
Speaker 2: Want to be on the show. Send us an email

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00:49:51,560 --> 00:49:54,840
Speaker 2: today at hello at butteronomics dot com. Butter Nomics is

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00:49:54,880 --> 00:49:58,400
Speaker 2: produced in Atlanta, Georgia at iHeartMedia by Casey Pegram, with

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Speaker 2: marketing support from Queen and Nikki. Music provided by mister Hanky.

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00:50:02,200 --> 00:50:04,480
Speaker 2: If you haven't already, hit that subscribe button and never

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00:50:04,480 --> 00:50:06,560
Speaker 2: missed an episode, and be sure to follow us on

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00:50:06,640 --> 00:50:09,839
Speaker 2: all our social platforms at butter dot at l. Listen

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00:50:09,880 --> 00:50:12,719
Speaker 2: to better Nomics on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or

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00:50:12,719 --> 00:50:14,239
Speaker 2: wherever you get your podcasts.