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Speaker 1: Welcome to Strictly Business, Varieties weekly podcast featuring conversations with

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Speaker 1: industry leaders about the business of media and entertainment. I'm

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Speaker 1: Cynthia Littleton, co editor in chief of Variety. Today, my

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Speaker 1: guest is David Rogier, founder and CEO of master Class.

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Speaker 1: After working in venture capital, David got the inspiration for

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Speaker 1: the online education platform from a bit of wisdom that

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Speaker 1: he learned from his grandmother. Education is something that no

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Speaker 1: one can take from you, she taught him. She also

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Speaker 1: told him to learn from the best, and he took

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Speaker 1: that to heart as he launched what became Masterclass in

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Speaker 1: the lockdown conditions of the pandemic, as you might expect,

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Speaker 1: was a big accelerant for master Class. In our conversation,

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Speaker 1: David talks about the hurdles of getting the service up

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Speaker 1: and running, the cold holes and the nose that came

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Speaker 1: in before a few keep people said yes. He also

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Speaker 1: offers insight into the entrepreneur's burden, what he describes as

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Speaker 1: the confidence you need to pursue your vision when everybody

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Speaker 1: else thinks it's a bad or an impossible idea. It's

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Speaker 1: all coming up. On today's episode of Strictly Business, Welcome back,

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Speaker 1: to strictly business. David Rogier, CEO and founder of Master Class,

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Speaker 1: thank you for joining us today. It is a pleasure

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Speaker 1: to be here. Thanks for having me. Tell us now,

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Speaker 1: as you look back on, you know, going on six

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Speaker 1: years of course and counting of Master Class, can you

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Speaker 1: talk us through. I mean, start with the spark of inspiration.

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Speaker 1: What was it that made you, you know, martial divorces

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Speaker 1: and get what you needed together to to to put

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Speaker 1: your first you know, to plant your flag first with

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Speaker 1: Master Lass. I wanted to start something and um and uh,

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Speaker 1: and I had some time and fun and fun and

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Speaker 1: funding to actually do it, and so um how it

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Speaker 1: started actually working in adventure. I was actually working as

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Speaker 1: an investor, and um, I was in investing in companies

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Speaker 1: and I actually missed building things. So I went to

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Speaker 1: my boss at the time and I told him, thanks,

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Speaker 1: thanks so much, but actually I want to go build.

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Speaker 1: I'm going I am going to quit. I think there's

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Speaker 1: you know, a little a little bit of shock on

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Speaker 1: his face. Um. And then he asked me what I'm

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Speaker 1: going to build and I said, I don't know. He goes, well,

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Speaker 1: why don't you think of some ideas and I will

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Speaker 1: fund you and I was like, man, I don't have

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Speaker 1: an idea or team. He's like, that's okay, And he

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Speaker 1: wrote me a check to go think of ideas. And

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Speaker 1: I was shocked. I called my mom. I mean, I

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Speaker 1: was shocked. You must have been a very good employee. Yeah. Um,

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Speaker 1: his job was to invest right company, So you know,

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Speaker 1: there was trying. I mean, it was such a kind

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Speaker 1: gesture and one that would only I think having because

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Speaker 1: I worked for him and knew him for a while.

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Speaker 1: But um, it was also it was terrifying. Um, it's

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Speaker 1: at a once in a lifetime opportunity that I don't

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Speaker 1: want to mess up, and you know, and it was

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Speaker 1: such a gift. But all of a sudden, you go

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Speaker 1: from having a structure job having no structure, and and

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Speaker 1: you know that was I didn't know what I was

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Speaker 1: gonna think of. But I felt pressure, you know, a

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Speaker 1: from him to come up with a great idea, felt

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Speaker 1: pressure from my from my from myself. Right, Um, this

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Speaker 1: is the once lifetime thing. I don't want to mess

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Speaker 1: that up. And you know, everybody asked you what you

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Speaker 1: are doing, and you're like, you know, I'm trying to

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Speaker 1: think of a great idea, and you know, I'm a

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Speaker 1: little stressed about it, and nobody gives you any empathy

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Speaker 1: or anything right because because it seems like it is

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Speaker 1: an amazing you know, chance opportunity, um or if I may.

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Speaker 1: I mean, you really were a blank slate at this point.

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Speaker 1: You didn't you didn't have an idea of an area

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Speaker 1: or a sector of interest. You were really kind of

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Speaker 1: wide open. I mean I had lots of ideas and

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Speaker 1: thoughts um and different frame, different ways to think about it,

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Speaker 1: things like, Okay, what is something I really care about?

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Speaker 1: What's like I need in life? What are other people's

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Speaker 1: needs in life? What are trends in the market. I

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Speaker 1: had a couple of ideas, but nothing that was, you know,

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Speaker 1: I was sure about and um, So I asked people

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Speaker 1: for I wanted their I wanted their wisdom and advice.

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Speaker 1: And somebody gave me a great constraint. She said, choose

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Speaker 1: something that even if it fails, you are going to

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Speaker 1: be proud of it. That was a brilliant constraint. And

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Speaker 1: I think sometimes really good advice and sometimes having a

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Speaker 1: bit of some rules or a box allows you to

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Speaker 1: be more create more, you know, allows your your you

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Speaker 1: feel more free because you're like, Okay, the thing has

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Speaker 1: to be a half an hour show or a two

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Speaker 1: hour movie, or I have a budget. This was like,

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Speaker 1: if I did that constraint, then you're saying, okay, what's

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Speaker 1: something that even it fails, I'd be proud of. And Um.

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Speaker 1: I immediately thought of my grandmother. So I was in

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Speaker 1: part raised by her. Um and UM. I remember in

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Speaker 1: um second grade, I went to her house after school

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Speaker 1: and day. Um I would usually stay with her after

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Speaker 1: school and and I was complaining to her about all

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Speaker 1: the math homework I had, which obviously I didn't have

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Speaker 1: a lot because I'm in second grade. And my grandma

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Speaker 1: tells me this story that when she was sixteen years old,

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Speaker 1: she was living at a time in crack out Poland

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Speaker 1: her and her mom went on a family vacation. While

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Speaker 1: they're on vacation, didn't the Nazis invaded Um. They took everything,

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Speaker 1: they killed her father, Her and her mom fleet to

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Speaker 1: New York City. Only job her and her mom can

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Speaker 1: get is in a factory floor. Um, and they're working side.

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Speaker 1: They are working side side, eyes side in the factory

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Speaker 1: and my grandmother's side. She wants to become a doctor,

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Speaker 1: finds every medical school and the state of New York

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Speaker 1: applies to all of them by hand. I think it's

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Speaker 1: over twenty five schools. She gets a note from every

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Speaker 1: single one, working exactly. She keeps working. The factory applies again.

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Speaker 1: The next year, gets a note from every single one.

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Speaker 1: She starts calling the deans of admissions and asking why

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Speaker 1: am I not getting in? They all hang up on her,

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Speaker 1: except for this one guy who says, I'll be honest,

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Speaker 1: you have three strikes against you. You're a woman, an immigrant,

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Speaker 1: and you're a foreigner. Sorry, you are a woman, a immigrant,

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Speaker 1: and you're Jewish and hangs up the phone. My grandma

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Speaker 1: keeps working. Factory applies again. The next year, all twenty

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Speaker 1: five gets into one school and becomes a pediatrician. And

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Speaker 1: I remember I was staring at her because I'm in

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Speaker 1: second grade. I was just whining about math homework and

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Speaker 1: this was a heavy story to get in a response.

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Speaker 1: And my grandma looks at me and she's like, David,

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Speaker 1: the point I'm trying to make you is education only

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Speaker 1: thing that someone can't take away from you. And I realized,

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Speaker 1: I got this one chance. I want to build and

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Speaker 1: I'll be proud of it. The fails, I want to

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Speaker 1: build someng that other people can't take away from others.

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Speaker 1: I want to try to make it possible for anybody

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Speaker 1: in the world to learn from the best. Wow, that

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Speaker 1: is some determination in your gens there that you can tell.

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Speaker 1: I mean, she is my hero. What's her name? Her

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Speaker 1: name is Yanka. She passed away when I when I

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Speaker 1: was in college. That you know, was the spark of

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Speaker 1: the idea I did, you know, UM, I did more testing.

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Speaker 1: I posted some ads on Craigslist. UM offered to pay

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Speaker 1: people just to hear about their own educational path, mock

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Speaker 1: some things up, thought about why I don't take online classes,

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Speaker 1: And then you know, the idea came to try to

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Speaker 1: get the best in the world to actually teach UM

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Speaker 1: and we launched it about you know in two thousand.

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Speaker 1: In two thousand, fifaunched it and you got you know,

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Speaker 1: you got Dustin Hoffman, you You've got you know, big

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Speaker 1: names right off the start. How did you do that?

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Speaker 1: How did you How did you convince people to to

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Speaker 1: take a chance on something that was you know, very

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Speaker 1: new and and even in a new format that we're

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Speaker 1: now very familiar with, but weren't just just five short

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Speaker 1: years ago. It was really hard. I mean the third

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Speaker 1: I mean, everybody said it's a bad idea, it's not

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Speaker 1: gonna work. Those same people now say, I always told

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Speaker 1: you it was gonna be a great idea. Um it was.

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Speaker 1: You know, it was a lot of cold calling, cold emailing,

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Speaker 1: talking to anybody who knows anybody. Um, you know, the

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Speaker 1: first three years were Dustin Hoffman, Surreen uh Serena Williams

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Speaker 1: and James pat and James Patterson. After we had maybe

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Speaker 1: five to tend, the flywheel started spinning, so it got

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Speaker 1: easier and easier. I mean we now say no to

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Speaker 1: nine attent people. But you know, early on it was written,

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Speaker 1: it was so hard, it was so hard. H And

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Speaker 1: how did you, um, how did they sort of design?

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Speaker 1: There's a there's a design to the classes and a

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Speaker 1: and a there's a there's a sense that kind of

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Speaker 1: goes across them. Of course they're different people in different subjects,

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Speaker 1: but there's a kind of a rhythm and a pacing.

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Speaker 1: Did that come by trial and error or did you

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Speaker 1: have a did you at some point have a vision

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Speaker 1: for what a master class would look like? I would

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Speaker 1: love to say that we came into the first shoot

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Speaker 1: with a you know, a solid vision that you know,

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Speaker 1: stayed true to out. It was definitely a work in progress.

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Speaker 1: I mean we did test classes with my parents, UM,

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Speaker 1: so we filmed them. Our early classes were directed by

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Speaker 1: j Roach, who directed Meet the Parents. Um, and he's

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Speaker 1: fantastic director. Bill guten Tag, who's a two time Academy

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Speaker 1: Award winn Doc filmmaker, directed early ones. Um. I mean

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Speaker 1: we got We had lots of help from lots of people,

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Speaker 1: but it was a lot of you know what you know. Uh.

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Speaker 1: We kept thinking, how do you bring the joy back

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Speaker 1: to learning? If you talk to most people if they

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Speaker 1: like school, the answers no. If you ask most people

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Speaker 1: if they love to learn, the answers of course. And

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Speaker 1: so there's a gap there. And so start thinking what

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Speaker 1: how do you bring it back? And you know, for us,

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Speaker 1: the answer was why, you know, aspirationally, why can't it

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Speaker 1: be as enthralling as a movie? Um? Yet you know

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Speaker 1: as educational is your favorite class in school, and so

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Speaker 1: trying to merge those two worlds, um. And so from

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Speaker 1: a pacing standpoint, how tight do you make it versus

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Speaker 1: how much you let it air out? Um? How do

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Speaker 1: you create a sense of intimacy? How long should it

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Speaker 1: be you know, making sure it doesn't feel scripted, because that,

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Speaker 1: you know, it has to feel you wanted to feel

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Speaker 1: like you are sitting on a couch or a or

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Speaker 1: a bass couldball Corps or a film set with these

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Speaker 1: people and they're just doing a brain dump to you

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Speaker 1: of all the things that they wish somebody had taught them. Um,

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Speaker 1: when did you get the sense that the business Like,

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Speaker 1: when did you get the sense the business was really

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Speaker 1: having traction kind of in in in pop culture or

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Speaker 1: at least among your target consumers. Yeah. I mean the

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Speaker 1: first day we launched, I went home crying, So I

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Speaker 1: thought it wasn't gonna work because our sales weren't as goes.

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Speaker 1: I thought. On the second day, I knew it was

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Speaker 1: going to be a big business. Okay, Yeah, I mean

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Speaker 1: I remember I went home the first I cried, actually,

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Speaker 1: and I'm not a crier, but I was like, what

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Speaker 1: am I gonna do? How am I gonna go to

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Speaker 1: all these people that you know, really bet on me

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Speaker 1: and us that this is gonna work? And then the

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Speaker 1: second day on in the office and one of our

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Speaker 1: marketing at team members is there and hit a big

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Speaker 1: smile on his face, and I went to him I

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Speaker 1: was like, what's going on. He's like, this is gonna

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Speaker 1: be a huge business. I was like, wait why, And

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Speaker 1: he's like, look, if you look at the traction that

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Speaker 1: we are getting, we can really blow this out. And

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Speaker 1: you know, it just kept growing and growing. Um I

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Speaker 1: think so you know along the way, there's all different

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Speaker 1: points where you know, it's a step level function. I mean,

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Speaker 1: getting the first three people to teach that was huge.

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Speaker 1: You know, Uh, launching Aaron Sorking class was another step

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Speaker 1: function in the Christian Aguilara class. I mean every year

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Speaker 1: those things. Last year, Um, we we were spoofed on

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Speaker 1: on SNL. That was you know, I mean that that

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Speaker 1: was That's a real tribute. You've made it. You've hit

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Speaker 1: the pop culture consciousness. Yeah, it's very hard whenever you

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Speaker 1: see that because you're like, they're making fun of us.

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Speaker 1: But it's but it's funny and you know, and so

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Speaker 1: you know, and you probably saw a commensurate you know,

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Speaker 1: you probably just saw a lot of traction after that,

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Speaker 1: people going, you know, what is that thing? Yeah? Exactly, exactly, yeah, Um,

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Speaker 1: that's uh. And what did you do initially to get

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Speaker 1: the word out? Wasn't like at all? Digital advertising did

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Speaker 1: you spend any money on old fashioned TV or or

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Speaker 1: outdoor or anything. In the beginning, it was all digital.

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Speaker 1: We now do print in an outdoor and television, But

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Speaker 1: in the beginning, I mean, you know, one of the

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Speaker 1: best things about the Internet is you know, you can

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Speaker 1: use these different platforms and sites to target people you

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Speaker 1: think are going to be interested. Right. You know, if

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Speaker 1: you're if you're like Photoggerfy and or Annie Leebwitz fan,

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Speaker 1: you know, probably you're gonna be interested in taking her class.

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Speaker 1: If you're a Walt Disney fan and an entrepreneurship the

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Speaker 1: Bob Eiger class, you're probably gonna want to take it. Um. So,

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Speaker 1: you know, early on it was very helpful to aim

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Speaker 1: at that niches. But now you know, we have our

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Speaker 1: hundred classes across multiple fields, and so doing that broad

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Speaker 1: based advertising works incredibly well for us now. M So

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Speaker 1: you must have a team. You must have like a

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Speaker 1: real audience development team that kind of tracks how you

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Speaker 1: how you know kind of who to go, what the

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Speaker 1: avenues are to reach the target demos for various classes.

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Speaker 1: Do you still kind of employ that very targeted strategy?

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Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I mean we do lots of work. I

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Speaker 1: mean in picking an instructor who's you know, who, who

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Speaker 1: are they going to appeal to? Who's who? The thing

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Speaker 1: they're teaching is that field? Who? Who? What does that

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Speaker 1: feel that's gonna appeal to folks? Um? You know what

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Speaker 1: things people want to learn from that person after we

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Speaker 1: make the class, you know what what parts do people

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Speaker 1: like and not like? What far as they find impactful

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Speaker 1: and the exact same thing on the mark on the

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Speaker 1: marketing side too. Um. You know, but what I think

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Speaker 1: what's been really awesome I need to see is you know,

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Speaker 1: over the last couple of years, as people have gotten

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Speaker 1: more familiar with our brand, they will trust us with

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Speaker 1: instructors that they maybe don't know but are equally deserving

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Speaker 1: and masterful. So you know, for example, last year, we

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Speaker 1: launch a class with Ron Finley. Ron Finley is a

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Speaker 1: self distract self described gangster gardner um and he's rebuilt

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Speaker 1: parts of Los Angeles through planting and gardening. And it's

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Speaker 1: an at is a gardener, an amazing one, but also

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Speaker 1: in an activist. And you know, we launched his class

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Speaker 1: and people didn't hear of Ron Finley before this, right,

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Speaker 1: they heard of a Martin's Corsese or a Christian Aguilera,

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Speaker 1: but they're like, hey, you know, if Ron Finley is

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Speaker 1: on the same site, he's probably pretty interesting. And he

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Speaker 1: took his class and it did fantastically well because it's

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Speaker 1: an amazing class, right, And so part of our responsibuilding

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Speaker 1: role is to find people you don't know, but once

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Speaker 1: you do, you will love them and love the last

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Speaker 1: We'll pause here for a moment and be right back

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Speaker 1: with more from Masterclass CEO David Roggier. And we're back

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Speaker 1: with more from Masterclass CEO David Roggier. At what point

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Speaker 1: along the way did you find that you needed to

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Speaker 1: raise more capital for the business? A lot of points

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Speaker 1: long the way? Um? You know, Um, film production is expensive,

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Speaker 1: ask any Hollywood ceo. Yeah, so a bunch of times

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Speaker 1: long the way. And also you know, I wanna grow

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Speaker 1: as fast as we can and reaches many focus as

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Speaker 1: much as possible, and I and UM, and I wanna

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Speaker 1: I want us to define the space. And so really,

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Speaker 1: you know, we've raised you know, quite I think you know,

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Speaker 1: um up to this, you know, point over two million? Um?

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Speaker 1: And yeah, did you find when you went out didn't

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Speaker 1: did investors get it? Like since it was something they

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Speaker 1: could see, did they get it or was it they?

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Speaker 1: At first? It was at first it was very hard,

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Speaker 1: very very very re few investors. At first I understood it.

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Speaker 1: Now you know, most do, But in the beginning it was.

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Speaker 1: It was very hard. And I think that's a part

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Speaker 1: of entrepreneurship I didn't understand. To be honest, I think

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Speaker 1: so much of our society and culture trains us to

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Speaker 1: seek praise um in the form of grades of a

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Speaker 1: comp you know, of a promotion and a job, you know,

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Speaker 1: things like that, and and starting a company or joint

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Speaker 1: or you know, a brand new project or joint to

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Speaker 1: join one that is not the ground. Yet you have

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Speaker 1: to reject those societal norms because you're by nature you're

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Speaker 1: choosing to do an idea that most people think is impossible,

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Speaker 1: because if they thought it was possible, they would be

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Speaker 1: doing it right. But I mean, you know, anybody who

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Speaker 1: started a project or wrote a piece that other people

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Speaker 1: thought was gonna be dumb. I mean you're used to

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Speaker 1: hearing that, and only after the idea works do people,

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Speaker 1: you know, get really jump off mo with you. So

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Speaker 1: you're gus, um, you know, I still do not hear that,

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Speaker 1: but like, but you know, but but I you know,

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Speaker 1: I think you have to gain the self confidence and

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Speaker 1: faith that your ideas, even other people might not think

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Speaker 1: they're good, you still feel they're good. And that is

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Speaker 1: a terrifying thought. But once it works, it builds a

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Speaker 1: self compidence that is addicting. Have you hit the break

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Speaker 1: even point? That's not something that we share or disclosed.

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Speaker 1: But but what I can't tell you, I mean, um,

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Speaker 1: the growth and traction that we have seen not just

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Speaker 1: in the past year, but the year before that, I

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Speaker 1: mean was way past our forecasts and estimates. I mean,

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Speaker 1: you know, before before covid UM we were growing. We

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Speaker 1: were growing way above what even we had forecasts and

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Speaker 1: plant in covid we didn't know what was gonna happen.

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Speaker 1: There were weeks that we were ten x year over

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Speaker 1: year UM. But to me, what's happened last year is

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Speaker 1: an ex It's it's acted as an accelerat of trends

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Speaker 1: we believed were already true. Did you learn anything? I

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Speaker 1: was just about to ask you kind of what you're

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Speaker 1: learnings from the pandemic? Where did you see any like

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Speaker 1: you know, as the world went into kind of shock

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Speaker 1: in March in April, did you see a spike or

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Speaker 1: did you see a decreases people fit like, I'm curious

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Speaker 1: if you saw patterns over the sort of the twelve

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Speaker 1: months from like March to March. We did, but they're

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Speaker 1: not easy to decipher, so we definitely saw spikes. The

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Speaker 1: hard part of the deciphering is not every country or

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Speaker 1: every state was going was going through the same thing

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Speaker 1: at the same time, so you have to really partition

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Speaker 1: it out based on part of the world. So it's

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Speaker 1: very hard, you know, just to understand all those trends Um.

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Speaker 1: But one of the trends we saw which was interesting

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Speaker 1: is the what classes and what parts of classes people

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Speaker 1: watched a lot. So one lesson that really spiked UM

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Speaker 1: was we have a new negotiation class with Chris boss Um,

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Speaker 1: who's a former lead FBI hostage negotiator, and he has

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Speaker 1: a chapter called Tactical Empathy, which is like how to

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Speaker 1: deploy empathy in a way to get what you want.

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Speaker 1: And it's Mike, We're like, why is that spiky? And

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Speaker 1: you talk to people are Oh, I'm negotiating with my

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Speaker 1: husband or with my wife or my kids. Who's gonna

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Speaker 1: get to work in the office or who's it going

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Speaker 1: on the WiFi now? Right? And so we saw that

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Speaker 1: spike Ron Finley on the gardening side, we saw that

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Speaker 1: spike a lot. We launched a class on in tier

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Speaker 1: on tier on, tier on interior design that Spike, and

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Speaker 1: also a lot of the business classes, so the Bob Iger,

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Speaker 1: the Sarah Blakely's Uh Animal Tour, because people trying to figure,

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Speaker 1: I think, how to lead in this new era. And

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Speaker 1: that's a book that hasn't been written yet. M Absolutely,

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Speaker 1: did you find your given the conditions that you knew

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Speaker 1: a lot of you know, the US was in, did

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Speaker 1: you find yourself adding classes to think, you know, looking

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Speaker 1: to develop classes that might be appealed to people that are,

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Speaker 1: you know, mostly stuck at home. Yes, and we were

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Speaker 1: lucky that we had already had some of those planned. Um.

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Speaker 1: But we also saw you know, um, we had a

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Speaker 1: chess class with we had we actually had we do

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Speaker 1: have a chess class with um Gary casper Off and

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Speaker 1: these Gambit spiked. We saw that class spiked. Um, we

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Speaker 1: have classes from Pen and Pen Pen and Teller on magic.

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Speaker 1: And we saw that spike with parents want to do

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Speaker 1: it with their kids. Um, I'm thinking of other ones

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Speaker 1: we saw spike. We have a step Steph curry on

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Speaker 1: on basketball, people doing that with their kids. And then

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Speaker 1: also a lot of the acting and filmmaking classes. Um,

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Speaker 1: I think people having time to dive into things they

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Speaker 1: really cared about, you know, the Samuel l Ja accs

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Speaker 1: in Spiked Lee. I mean those classes have done fantastic too,

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Speaker 1: in generally speaking, not just in pandemic times but over

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Speaker 1: the over the years so far. Are there certain topics

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Speaker 1: that are just always popular for you certain kind of

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Speaker 1: broad themes of like cooking, more business or anything like? Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I mean cooking appeals to lots of people all the time.

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Speaker 1: So everybody from you know, Thomas Keller, chef Chef Ramsey,

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Speaker 1: I mean those you know, those class always end well.

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Speaker 1: But I mean it's really what we found is interesting

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Speaker 1: is people go broad. I mean people are multi height,

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Speaker 1: so you might start with the Steph Carey basketball class,

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Speaker 1: but then loves to take the like Steve Martin class. Um.

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Speaker 1: And so people actually go broad in their interests, which

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Speaker 1: is really neat. I made the assumption when we started

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Speaker 1: talking that this is largely a US business, but I

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Speaker 1: know you do reach overseas. Can you characterize you know,

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Speaker 1: kind of what roughly like what percentage of businesses in

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Speaker 1: the US person's overseas. Yeah, about a third of our

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Speaker 1: businesses outside the United States. That was shocking to us

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Speaker 1: because our classes right now are only in English. UM.

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Speaker 1: In this year we will launch in other languages and

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Speaker 1: other parts of the world. But it's been amazing to

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Speaker 1: see that. You know, this desire to learn from the

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Speaker 1: best is not an American trade, right, I mean, this

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Speaker 1: is a global trade in you know, humanity. UM. And

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Speaker 1: so yeah, we're very excited to launch international and will

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Speaker 1: you launch in in will you launch versions in local languages? Yea.

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Speaker 1: You know everybody is always saying they're looking for a

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Speaker 1: scalable business. This is like, as you say, like you know,

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Speaker 1: education and learning at this level with these people, as

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Speaker 1: you know, it seemed to be about as about as

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Speaker 1: scalable as a gift. I think so too. But you know,

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Speaker 1: early on the beginning, you know, there were questions about that. Um.

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Speaker 1: You know, how much appeal is there for this? You know,

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Speaker 1: do people really want to learn? Are they're gonna want

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Speaker 1: to learn online? And I think you know, this goes

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Speaker 1: back to you when I were discussing. You know, early

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Speaker 1: on in a project, you have to you are going

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Speaker 1: to be doing things other people think are impossible or

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Speaker 1: dumb or bad ideas, and that's okay, that's okay. Um.

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Speaker 1: You know, right now in the media, in the media landscape,

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Speaker 1: there's a lot of M and A activity, there's a

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Speaker 1: lot of activity in the equities markets to talk about

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Speaker 1: you know, prop the market for I pos and spacts. Um.

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Speaker 1: I've heard people talk about Masterclass potentially being a nice

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Speaker 1: fit with you know, media media companies that have you know,

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Speaker 1: that have big television assets, that have those kind of platforms.

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Speaker 1: Is there any is there a scenario that you are

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Speaker 1: considering in which Masterclass you know, has a transformation as

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Speaker 1: a business. Would you consider a merger with a potential

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Speaker 1: partner if that, if the opportunity was right. It's not

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Speaker 1: why I think about a lot, to be honest, because

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Speaker 1: I think it's it's for me. It's about the impact

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Speaker 1: and reach. So I want to get you know, I

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Speaker 1: want to be in every household in the world, and

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Speaker 1: I want, you know, someday somebody, I want somebody to

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Speaker 1: be able to take a class we've never had access to.

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Speaker 1: These people get inspired, become a master and come back

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Speaker 1: to actually teach. And you know, to me, it's about

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Speaker 1: reaching impact. So you know there are ways to work

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Speaker 1: with other people to maximize the reach, of course, but

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Speaker 1: it's it's well, we will absolutely stay too. David, tell

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Speaker 1: me a little bit about your background. How did you

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Speaker 1: find yourself at a venture capital company in the position

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Speaker 1: to take to take that first step toward building this company.

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Speaker 1: I was a curious kid from day one. Um, but

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Speaker 1: I also stuttered. I still do, but as much for

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Speaker 1: as his kid, and lots of people who stutter. Your

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Speaker 1: first instinct and mine is like you want to hold

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Speaker 1: back or you don't want to expose it. You want

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Speaker 1: people to know, you know that you've stuttered. And my

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Speaker 1: parents would not allow that. I mean my parents when

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Speaker 1: they had friends over to eat dinner, their expectation was

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Speaker 1: that I sit with them and their friends, even as

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Speaker 1: a young kid, and I engage in discussion with them,

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Speaker 1: and my parents would not let me use that as

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Speaker 1: an excuse for anything. And that was really hard. It

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Speaker 1: was to use the school, but it also built that

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Speaker 1: self confidence a little bit, that hey, I have interesting

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Speaker 1: things to say. No other people might not think that,

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Speaker 1: but you know, but and that, I think empowered me

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Speaker 1: to ask questions more and to kind of chase that down.

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Speaker 1: So I think, you know, combining that with want to

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Speaker 1: do some good in the world kind of fueled me

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Speaker 1: to to to want to find things and to do things,

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Speaker 1: and to learn and to and and and I think

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Speaker 1: you know, from a very early age. That's hard to

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Speaker 1: say what left Edi a mastercask with. Those are some

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Speaker 1: of the bread some of the bread drums. M absolutely absolutely,

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Speaker 1: I hear you. Um. Let me ask you as we

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Speaker 1: wrap up here, Um, is there a person as do

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Speaker 1: you have a wish list of somebody that that you'd

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Speaker 1: love to have a class that you haven't quite been

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Speaker 1: able to get to yet? Oh? Sure, um um. And

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Speaker 1: if anybody listens to this and you know you were

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Speaker 1: one of these people or no one of them, please

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Speaker 1: I'm trying to tee it up here. I mean, look,

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Speaker 1: I would love a class from Spielberg. I would love

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Speaker 1: a class from Donald lover her. Um. I would love

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Speaker 1: a class from Michelle and Barack Obama elon musk we love.

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Speaker 1: I mean, there's lots of that we love. Thanks for listening.

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Speaker 1: Be sure to leave us a review at Apple Podcasts.

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Speaker 1: We love to hear from listeners, and be sure to

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Speaker 1: tune in next week for another episode. Of strictly business,

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Speaker 1: keep him