WEBVTT - The Moment a Most Famous Dotcom Millionaire Knew the Party Was Over 0:00:10.400 --> 0:00:14.160 Hello, and welcome to another episode of the Odd Lots Podcast. 0:00:14.200 --> 0:00:17.600 I'm Joe Wisn't and I'm Tracy Hallaway. So, Tracy, I 0:00:17.640 --> 0:00:20.520 think you know, and I think listeners know that, at 0:00:20.600 --> 0:00:23.360 least for me, my interest in markets like really came 0:00:23.400 --> 0:00:25.680 about during the dot combo. Yes, you have brought this 0:00:25.800 --> 0:00:28.480 up a number of times, and I have to say, 0:00:28.520 --> 0:00:31.040 I love hearing the stories of you losing money during 0:00:31.360 --> 0:00:34.000 the bubble. I made a little money. I made a 0:00:34.000 --> 0:00:36.520 little money too, but I also I also lost them. 0:00:36.560 --> 0:00:39.640 But for me, like so many things, are things that 0:00:39.640 --> 0:00:42.639 I've sort of like learned or like internalized about how 0:00:42.680 --> 0:00:46.040 that markets work, like still come from more or less 0:00:46.400 --> 0:00:49.960 that period. And I think it's obvious that on some 0:00:50.080 --> 0:00:53.360 level what we're seeing now in markets, we've seen in crypto, 0:00:53.560 --> 0:00:57.080 we've seen in tech, has some pretty obvious parallels to 0:00:57.120 --> 0:00:59.279 that period. I feel like the late nineties early two 0:00:59.320 --> 0:01:02.280 thousand's tech bubble would be a good grounding for the 0:01:02.360 --> 0:01:06.319 current market situation. Uh So I envy you that experience. 0:01:06.560 --> 0:01:10.120 But the thing that interests me a lot about two thousand, 0:01:10.120 --> 0:01:12.959 when the bubble burst and all the tech stocks collapsed 0:01:12.959 --> 0:01:16.720 and all of that, is when did people actually declare 0:01:16.840 --> 0:01:20.600 like tech is over, the tech bubble has burst. This 0:01:20.680 --> 0:01:22.720 is it? Because this is a question that comes up 0:01:22.760 --> 0:01:25.920 a lot now, right, right, So it's like what is 0:01:26.080 --> 0:01:29.679 over and what is real? And one like, so obviously 0:01:29.720 --> 0:01:31.600 a year ago there were a lot of people who 0:01:31.800 --> 0:01:34.120 on paper were worth a lot more money than they 0:01:34.120 --> 0:01:37.680 are right now. But presumably, you know, people are like, well, 0:01:37.680 --> 0:01:40.720 what's the bottom? When does this bounce back? What's what? 0:01:40.720 --> 0:01:42.320 What do we? What do we? What sticks with us? 0:01:42.360 --> 0:01:45.479 Like these are all really interesting questions, and of course 0:01:45.520 --> 0:01:47.960 no one knows the answer. But you know, all of 0:01:48.000 --> 0:01:52.600 these conversations happened after the late nineties dot com bubble, 0:01:52.760 --> 0:01:55.200 and you know, I think people forget like for years 0:01:55.240 --> 0:01:58.240 no one talked about Amazon, like two thousand one through 0:01:58.280 --> 0:02:01.360 say two thousand ex or seven. It was not a 0:02:01.440 --> 0:02:05.080 particularly prominent company that people talked about, right. So this 0:02:05.160 --> 0:02:07.320 is the other thing that interests me. It's what comes 0:02:07.360 --> 0:02:11.200 out of the wreckage of a bubble bursting. Because everyone 0:02:11.280 --> 0:02:13.840 was very excited about the Internet in the late nineties, 0:02:13.880 --> 0:02:16.000 and so you saw a bunch of companies rise up 0:02:16.040 --> 0:02:19.400 to come up with some sort of internet based business model, 0:02:20.000 --> 0:02:21.959 and then it all kind of went away after the 0:02:22.000 --> 0:02:26.560 bubble burst, but some companies that did phenomenally well decades 0:02:26.680 --> 0:02:29.600 later actually emerged out of that rubble. And the question 0:02:29.639 --> 0:02:31.680 of course now is whether or not the same thing 0:02:31.720 --> 0:02:35.400 might happen. So the question is like, how how do 0:02:35.440 --> 0:02:38.440 you know it's over? What comes after that? What is 0:02:38.480 --> 0:02:42.760 it like to lose on paper? Sort of like unbelievable 0:02:42.800 --> 0:02:44.639 gobs of money, which a lot of people are going 0:02:44.680 --> 0:02:47.280 through now. So you know, obviously there were a lot 0:02:47.320 --> 0:02:49.520 of like the dot com I p o s people 0:02:49.560 --> 0:02:52.840 remember pets dot com was sort of infamous or like 0:02:53.000 --> 0:02:58.200 hundreds and tons, but like I think the real first one, 0:02:58.240 --> 0:03:00.640 the one that really caused people's attention just like, wow, 0:03:00.680 --> 0:03:02.920 this is unbelievable amount of wealth here. I don't know, 0:03:04.080 --> 0:03:06.800 do you remember the globe dot com? You know what? 0:03:06.960 --> 0:03:10.639 It rings a bell, But I'm not that familiar with it. 0:03:10.720 --> 0:03:13.160 I think it was famous for at the time being 0:03:13.200 --> 0:03:16.960 like the biggest one day pop in IPO history. Yeah, 0:03:17.240 --> 0:03:19.080 it was, I think at one time, and it was 0:03:19.120 --> 0:03:21.080 definitely like one of the first lenges, like a little 0:03:21.080 --> 0:03:23.320 bit earlier than the rest, and so it sort of 0:03:23.320 --> 0:03:28.480 had this media ac rise um and then fall. Anyway, Uh, 0:03:28.639 --> 0:03:32.120 the the fact the co founders of the company. They 0:03:32.120 --> 0:03:35.040 were like in the media and they're famous for like 0:03:35.080 --> 0:03:39.200 being really young and really rich and wearing plastic leather 0:03:39.320 --> 0:03:42.600 pants to parties, as one does when you're young and 0:03:42.680 --> 0:03:46.160 really rich, and then of course the bubble collect that's 0:03:46.200 --> 0:03:48.200 what you were doing. But I was like, oh, this 0:03:48.240 --> 0:03:51.520 is like really cool anyway, so I'm very excited. I 0:03:51.560 --> 0:03:53.080 just want to jump right into it. This is like 0:03:53.200 --> 0:03:55.960 a personal thrill for me because of course there's got 0:03:56.000 --> 0:03:59.640 me interested in markets. We're gonna be speaking with Stefan 0:03:59.720 --> 0:04:02.280 Pat don't know. He is currently the co founder and 0:04:02.360 --> 0:04:06.440 executive chairman of Slated, which is an online film finance marketplace, 0:04:06.720 --> 0:04:09.880 but also he was the co founder and co CEO 0:04:10.080 --> 0:04:12.200 of the Globe dot com. So we're going to hear 0:04:12.280 --> 0:04:14.920 some stories about what those years were like and maybe 0:04:14.920 --> 0:04:17.920 some takeaways for people today. So Stefan, thank you so 0:04:18.000 --> 0:04:21.760 much for coming on odd lots my pleasure. That's quite 0:04:21.760 --> 0:04:25.800 an intro. So let me start with like maybe an 0:04:25.800 --> 0:04:28.360 embarrassing question, And I don't know if it's an embarrassing 0:04:28.440 --> 0:04:31.520 question for me or maybe it's an embarrassing question for you, 0:04:31.560 --> 0:04:33.760 But you know, I know a lot about the Globe 0:04:33.760 --> 0:04:36.400 because I remember the surge, I remember the I p O. 0:04:36.880 --> 0:04:40.159 I remember that you and your co founder were extremely rich. 0:04:40.200 --> 0:04:43.080 I remember you're in the media. I remember the plastic pants. 0:04:43.480 --> 0:04:46.080 What I don't remember is like, and I don't even 0:04:46.120 --> 0:04:47.520 think I knew it at the time. What did the 0:04:47.560 --> 0:04:51.800 Globe do? What was the Globe? Well, you're not the 0:04:51.839 --> 0:04:54.880 only one who may have known the Globe, primarily because 0:04:54.920 --> 0:04:58.600 of its stock price. Yeah, much to my chagrin, the 0:04:58.600 --> 0:05:01.120 Globe dot com was one of the first virtual communities. 0:05:01.560 --> 0:05:04.000 So back then we didn't call the social networking. It 0:05:04.080 --> 0:05:06.840 was called virtual community. Uh. And it was a much 0:05:06.920 --> 0:05:10.960 broader idea that the Internet was new, and there was 0:05:11.000 --> 0:05:14.960 this idea that maybe people could plug in, log on 0:05:15.360 --> 0:05:19.000 and exist online and build relationships online and interact with 0:05:19.040 --> 0:05:23.160 other people online. And that was the concept of virtual community. 0:05:23.600 --> 0:05:26.880 The tools to do it hadn't been built yet, right, 0:05:26.920 --> 0:05:30.799 So chat rooms and forums and homepage building, all these 0:05:31.120 --> 0:05:34.640 basic primitives is what we needed to build um And 0:05:34.680 --> 0:05:36.640 now we take for granted today, Right, you don't think 0:05:36.680 --> 0:05:38.919 of these basic primitives and anymore. Just think you know, 0:05:38.960 --> 0:05:41.479 I'm on Facebook, I'm on TikTok, I'm on I'm on Twitter, 0:05:41.520 --> 0:05:42.800 I'm on any of these things and you know, I 0:05:42.920 --> 0:05:45.600 just upload and share and post. That's just it just works. 0:05:46.160 --> 0:05:49.159 But back then that wasn't obvious. So that's what we 0:05:49.160 --> 0:05:53.960 we created its first generation primitives for virtual community, and 0:05:54.160 --> 0:05:56.719 lo and behold, it became one of these stickiest business 0:05:56.760 --> 0:05:59.599 models we could have ever imagined. And of course, um, 0:05:59.640 --> 0:06:02.840 you know, Facebook ran with that much more successfully than 0:06:02.920 --> 0:06:06.560 us in the early two thousand's. What was the journey 0:06:06.600 --> 0:06:11.400 like from starting this virtual community to eventually, you know, 0:06:11.520 --> 0:06:15.200 listing in a public market, because that seems like, you know, 0:06:15.720 --> 0:06:19.719 it's quite an upward trajectory, So how did that work? Well, 0:06:19.760 --> 0:06:24.080 it's it was non obvious. Um So of course, looking 0:06:24.160 --> 0:06:27.119 back thirty years later, and that's terrifying to even admit 0:06:27.160 --> 0:06:29.800 that it's been that long, it all seems obvious, like 0:06:29.839 --> 0:06:31.880 this was always going to happen. But back then, no 0:06:31.880 --> 0:06:35.719 one understood what the Internet was, right. Tim Bernard Lee 0:06:36.839 --> 0:06:40.800 is one of the creators of the HTTP protocol and 0:06:41.040 --> 0:06:44.680 h t M l UM and it's something that's super fringe, 0:06:44.920 --> 0:06:47.080 running on the dark one that that's been built, and 0:06:47.480 --> 0:06:51.800 only university professors and some really geeky university students are 0:06:51.880 --> 0:06:56.800 logging onto the Worldwide Web and creating web pages, and 0:06:56.800 --> 0:06:59.320 you really could only go browse other university websites, so 0:06:59.360 --> 0:07:01.880 it was really cryptic, hard to use. You really needed 0:07:01.880 --> 0:07:04.440 to know what you were doing, and to even get started, 0:07:04.440 --> 0:07:08.479 you needed to download what was called a browser, and 0:07:08.560 --> 0:07:11.440 the first one was really Mosaic. It was a old 0:07:11.520 --> 0:07:14.520 beta version of Mosaic, which was something that Mark Andreson 0:07:14.560 --> 0:07:19.120 had created before Netscape. And it just so happens that 0:07:19.440 --> 0:07:23.720 my old college friend, best friend at the time, Todd Kreiselman, 0:07:23.760 --> 0:07:27.560 and I we downloaded Mosaic. We we found her. We 0:07:27.560 --> 0:07:29.760 we had dial up modems. I was using a fourteen 0:07:29.760 --> 0:07:31.800 four modem, he had a nineteen point to kill a 0:07:31.840 --> 0:07:34.920 bit modems, so super slow, but we both logged in 0:07:35.000 --> 0:07:37.280 and found our way into what was the first chat 0:07:37.360 --> 0:07:41.600 room we ever experienced. That's how primitive things were at 0:07:41.640 --> 0:07:46.720 the time, and startup culture wasn't typical. Not everybody was 0:07:46.720 --> 0:07:49.400 doing startups. That was very very much a Silicon Valley thing. 0:07:49.760 --> 0:07:52.000 Most people who were in university like us, were there 0:07:52.000 --> 0:07:54.080 to go get their degrees and then go and maybe 0:07:54.360 --> 0:07:58.480 become a banker, a lawyer and you know, earn your 0:07:58.520 --> 0:08:00.680 stripes that way. So for us to want to go 0:08:00.800 --> 0:08:03.840 and try to do something different and create a startup 0:08:03.840 --> 0:08:06.520 in college, let alone one in this new universe called 0:08:06.520 --> 0:08:09.640 the Internet. Was super risky. Our parents didn't understand what 0:08:09.640 --> 0:08:12.320 we were talking about, most of our professors didn't understand 0:08:12.320 --> 0:08:15.040 what we were talking about, and we just sort of 0:08:15.040 --> 0:08:16.600 had to wing it and say, look, I think Todd 0:08:16.600 --> 0:08:19.520 and I want to we think there's something there. There's 0:08:19.520 --> 0:08:22.080 this thing called the Internet. It's just beginning. There's only 0:08:22.120 --> 0:08:24.360 a few million people around the world using it, but 0:08:24.520 --> 0:08:29.760 we've stumbled on this social experiment and chat that is 0:08:29.800 --> 0:08:32.080 so addictive. We think that could be the beginning of 0:08:32.120 --> 0:08:36.080 something huge. So that's where it started. Non obvious. We 0:08:36.120 --> 0:08:39.000 were taking the path less traveled by, certainly not the 0:08:39.040 --> 0:08:40.920 safe choice that you know, most of our friends were 0:08:40.920 --> 0:08:43.280 gonna go and get jobs and earn fifty six seventy 0:08:43.320 --> 0:08:46.320 thousand a year. We were gonna go make nothing. There 0:08:46.400 --> 0:08:49.480 was no such thing as online advertising or e commerce 0:08:49.600 --> 0:08:51.880 or any way to make money. So it was going 0:08:52.000 --> 0:08:54.360 we were going into the great scary unknown with this 0:08:55.360 --> 0:08:58.160 um well before there was ever the concept of an 0:08:58.200 --> 0:09:01.160 I p O related to the Internet space. So let's 0:09:01.160 --> 0:09:03.240 talk about that I P O I think it was, 0:09:04.440 --> 0:09:07.040 which is a little bit earlier than the real man, Russ. 0:09:07.040 --> 0:09:08.680 You're a little bit earlier out of the gate than 0:09:08.720 --> 0:09:12.559 a lot of these companies. The stocks surge six six 0:09:12.679 --> 0:09:16.000 percent of Clinic to something I'm reading here, Um, it 0:09:16.200 --> 0:09:18.400 was market Camp was a little bit under a billion. 0:09:18.679 --> 0:09:20.439 What was that like? What was that day like? And 0:09:20.520 --> 0:09:23.200 how much were you worth like the day before that day? 0:09:23.520 --> 0:09:25.959 And how much were you worth that day? Well, I 0:09:26.000 --> 0:09:29.600 think for for you to fully comprehended, for your audience 0:09:29.640 --> 0:09:32.000 to fully comprehend what it felt like that day, you 0:09:32.040 --> 0:09:34.640 would have to understand that. Uh. You know, for the 0:09:34.760 --> 0:09:38.040 four years between the inception of the Globe and US 0:09:38.080 --> 0:09:41.480 going public, there was no I P O Mania. Only 0:09:41.520 --> 0:09:43.440 a few companies had gone public in this space. One 0:09:43.480 --> 0:09:45.840 of them was Yahoo. One of them was Netscape first 0:09:46.000 --> 0:09:47.559 and it sort of blew up and it became this 0:09:48.040 --> 0:09:50.880 news item. Yahoo went public and then not also became 0:09:50.920 --> 0:09:54.680 a news item. But in the short months after they've 0:09:54.679 --> 0:09:57.880 gone public, their stocks have tanked. So people were going, Okay, well, 0:09:57.960 --> 0:10:00.199 I don't we don't quite understand what this Netscape is, 0:10:00.240 --> 0:10:02.280 this Yahoo thing is. It doesn't seem to be working. Well, 0:10:02.920 --> 0:10:05.040 what is the Globe bringing to the to the table 0:10:05.120 --> 0:10:08.679 that's new or different. Well, what we were bringing to 0:10:08.760 --> 0:10:13.920 the table in four years later was this super addictive 0:10:14.840 --> 0:10:19.319 social interaction online that was capturing people's imagination. It was 0:10:19.360 --> 0:10:22.160 still at a point where the market wasn't receptive to 0:10:22.240 --> 0:10:24.240 I p O, so we didn't know that our I 0:10:24.360 --> 0:10:26.480 p O was gonna work. We were actually coming We 0:10:26.559 --> 0:10:30.800 were in a recession in the summer of the markets 0:10:30.840 --> 0:10:33.720 have come down because long term capital management had collapsed. 0:10:34.160 --> 0:10:36.640 We were running out of money and we were thinking, 0:10:36.800 --> 0:10:38.760 I don't know that we're gonna be able to go public. 0:10:38.800 --> 0:10:40.680 We're probably gonna run out of money and our business 0:10:40.800 --> 0:10:43.400 is just gonna go under and everyone will No one 0:10:43.400 --> 0:10:46.480 will ever discovered with the internet is let alone virtual community. 0:10:47.120 --> 0:10:48.640 And that's a bummer because we've just been at it 0:10:48.720 --> 0:10:53.040 for four years talking about virtual community. But by November, 0:10:53.160 --> 0:10:59.200 and it really was on Friday November, the market turned 0:10:59.679 --> 0:11:02.800 that week and suddenly there were a couple other companies 0:11:02.840 --> 0:11:05.760 that went public. Company called Fox went public, and then 0:11:05.800 --> 0:11:08.800 a couple other small dot coms went public that went 0:11:08.920 --> 0:11:13.000 up pretty quickly. And suddenly, um after having done a 0:11:13.080 --> 0:11:15.199 three week road show for our I p O and 0:11:15.240 --> 0:11:17.760 having been turned down by all the institutions that we're 0:11:17.800 --> 0:11:21.000 looking at the marks collapsing as the market turn. The 0:11:21.040 --> 0:11:23.040 phone start ringing off the hook, calling all of our 0:11:23.080 --> 0:11:25.559 bankers saying, hey, hold on, what's this thing you guys 0:11:25.600 --> 0:11:27.920 have been saying again about the Internet and virtual community, 0:11:28.160 --> 0:11:30.920 the globe dot com. We want in. And suddenly this 0:11:31.040 --> 0:11:34.640 little three million share offering we had had something like 0:11:34.800 --> 0:11:41.200 forty five million shares of demand, massively oversubscribed x UM. 0:11:41.320 --> 0:11:43.400 We didn't manage to move the price up much again 0:11:43.400 --> 0:11:45.520 because we were worried that the market would turn again 0:11:45.720 --> 0:11:48.040 and r S one filing would go stale, and that 0:11:48.120 --> 0:11:50.120 the ICHO again would never happen and we would die 0:11:50.240 --> 0:11:53.280 right there, right right, you know, at the goal line. UM, 0:11:53.440 --> 0:11:55.800 So we just we we just told the bank let's 0:11:55.800 --> 0:11:57.240 not try to mess with the price. Let's just take 0:11:57.280 --> 0:12:01.080 what we can get. And that day we were pricing 0:12:01.120 --> 0:12:04.120 at nine dollars a share, which was way down from 0:12:04.160 --> 0:12:06.240 what we had been hoping to raise earlier in our 0:12:06.280 --> 0:12:10.240 I p O process. But that um, there was enough interest, 0:12:10.360 --> 0:12:12.520 and that morning the bankers were telling us, hey, guys, 0:12:12.600 --> 0:12:16.000 the interest is climbing. Um, we're gonna go. You guys 0:12:16.040 --> 0:12:18.640 should be pricing right around eleven a m. It's nine 0:12:18.760 --> 0:12:20.680 thirty ten am, but it looks like this is going 0:12:20.760 --> 0:12:23.520 to price at thirty dollars a share, and we were like, wait, 0:12:23.600 --> 0:12:25.640 weren't we priced at nine dollars? How's it going up 0:12:25.679 --> 0:12:29.480 to twenty thirty? What's going on? Because this was very unusual. 0:12:29.559 --> 0:12:32.520 Stocks weren't popping that that way back in the day. 0:12:33.240 --> 0:12:35.439 And another half hour later, they're saying, oh, never mind, 0:12:35.480 --> 0:12:37.400 it's not gonna go at thirty dollars a share, and 0:12:37.440 --> 0:12:39.720 we're like, okay, so what is it? Nine ten eleven 0:12:39.760 --> 0:12:41.560 and they're like, no, it's actually gonna fifty to sixty 0:12:41.559 --> 0:12:44.400 dollars a share, Like okay, wait, wait, what's going on? 0:12:44.559 --> 0:12:47.120 And within another half hour, right as we're coming up 0:12:47.160 --> 0:12:50.640 to eleven o'clock, the main trader that day suddenly yells 0:12:50.679 --> 0:12:55.640 out eight seven seven and the and I just remember 0:12:55.720 --> 0:12:58.720 that hundreds of bankers on that floor at bear Sterns 0:12:58.760 --> 0:13:02.080 stood up to look where we were standing, not understanding 0:13:02.120 --> 0:13:05.120 what was going on. And it turns out our stock 0:13:05.200 --> 0:13:08.319 had run up from seven in the span of a 0:13:08.400 --> 0:13:11.439 couple of hours. And we started getting phone calls on 0:13:11.480 --> 0:13:13.920 our cell phones and people were telling us, oh my god, 0:13:14.520 --> 0:13:17.600 it's there's something on CNN and CNBC and they're talking 0:13:17.640 --> 0:13:21.319 about the globye yo and the world record, and you know, 0:13:21.400 --> 0:13:23.040 so my partner and I talked. We were like totally 0:13:23.040 --> 0:13:25.199 caught off guard. This sort of blew our minds away. 0:13:25.880 --> 0:13:30.320 It was headspinning. It was exhilarating. It was also terrifying. 0:13:30.640 --> 0:13:32.280 We didn't really know what an I p O was. 0:13:32.800 --> 0:13:35.480 We were twenty four years old, and the fact that 0:13:35.559 --> 0:13:37.679 it went out of control up a thousand percent and 0:13:37.800 --> 0:13:40.760 was all over the news was unusual. And they're telling 0:13:40.840 --> 0:13:42.679 us it's a world record I p O. Is that 0:13:43.080 --> 0:13:45.560 is that good? Well, it's good because you're all over 0:13:45.600 --> 0:13:47.720 the media. But very quickly it was like my god, 0:13:47.760 --> 0:13:51.480 you guys left so much money on the table, Like okay, 0:13:52.040 --> 0:13:54.320 well but beer Stairs didn't want to reprice this up, 0:13:54.520 --> 0:13:57.600 you know, to ten or eleven or twelve, let alone seven, 0:13:58.280 --> 0:14:00.800 So there was you know, it was it was an exhilarating, 0:14:00.960 --> 0:14:02.800 crazy day, but we knew we had a new lease 0:14:02.880 --> 0:14:05.800 on life. Our company was going to survive. Everyone was 0:14:05.880 --> 0:14:09.000 now saying, whoa what is this internet thing going on? 0:14:09.280 --> 0:14:12.760 And our I p os somehow ended up becoming this 0:14:12.920 --> 0:14:15.840 lightning rod and kicking off I p O mania right 0:14:15.880 --> 0:14:18.240 where every dot com wanted to go public and the 0:14:18.280 --> 0:14:20.880 same thing happened, and then that we just happened to us. 0:14:34.440 --> 0:14:37.400 I have so many questions, Um, I'm gonna try to 0:14:37.560 --> 0:14:39.880 fit them all in into one mega question. Okay, One, 0:14:40.400 --> 0:14:43.000 what did you do that night? Yeah? Did you go 0:14:43.080 --> 0:14:46.360 out and celebrate? Secondly, what do you think accounted for 0:14:46.960 --> 0:14:48.960 the big pop? You know, this was a sector that 0:14:49.000 --> 0:14:51.560 a lot of people were unfamiliar with. As you mentioned, 0:14:51.600 --> 0:14:52.840 there had been some I p o s that had 0:14:52.840 --> 0:14:56.280 flopped recently, So like, why did everyone suddenly come together 0:14:56.640 --> 0:14:59.560 and you know, seemingly want to have a slice of 0:14:59.600 --> 0:15:02.880 the globe dot com? And then thirdly, what was it 0:15:03.000 --> 0:15:05.920 like pricing with the bankers? Because you know you mentioned 0:15:05.960 --> 0:15:08.920 you you went public at nine dollars, it felt like 0:15:09.160 --> 0:15:12.480 you might have left money on the table. Um, how 0:15:12.520 --> 0:15:16.440 did they actually work out that number? Well, let me 0:15:16.520 --> 0:15:20.280 start with maybe this last question and then work my 0:15:20.320 --> 0:15:24.920 way backwards from there. Um, So there had been a 0:15:25.000 --> 0:15:27.520 huge amount of capital sitting on the sidelines in the 0:15:27.560 --> 0:15:29.960 market because of the recession that had kicked in. Long 0:15:30.040 --> 0:15:33.960 term capital management had unwound. Everyone was freaking out capital 0:15:34.000 --> 0:15:35.720 pull out of the markets. So there's a lot of 0:15:35.960 --> 0:15:39.080 money sitting there waiting to be deployed, and something like 0:15:39.120 --> 0:15:42.880 a hundred plus UH road shows had been canceled, so 0:15:43.040 --> 0:15:45.360 tons of companies that would ordinarily go public that year 0:15:45.400 --> 0:15:47.000 had haul pulled their I p o S were one 0:15:47.000 --> 0:15:49.000 of the last companies on the road show that refused 0:15:49.000 --> 0:15:50.600 to quit because we knew we were going to go 0:15:50.680 --> 0:15:53.400 under if we didn't raise the money. Um. The way 0:15:53.440 --> 0:15:55.840 that the pricing worked was, you know, the banks would 0:15:55.880 --> 0:15:58.440 like you to believe that there's some giant, brilliant formula 0:15:58.520 --> 0:16:00.520 behind behind all this, but all they can never really 0:16:00.560 --> 0:16:02.560 do is look at comps and what are comps based 0:16:02.600 --> 0:16:05.120 on other comps? And what are those comps based on 0:16:05.200 --> 0:16:08.960 other comps? So it's like, okay, it's basically, what are 0:16:09.000 --> 0:16:11.640 other companies similar to you in concept? What are they 0:16:11.720 --> 0:16:13.800 trading at? What's their multiple to revenue? Or in the 0:16:13.880 --> 0:16:16.920 case of Internet companies that have very little revenue, it was, well, 0:16:17.040 --> 0:16:19.400 you know, how big is your audience? You know, you 0:16:19.440 --> 0:16:22.600 guys have you know, x millions of users versus Yahoo? 0:16:23.520 --> 0:16:25.040 How do we you know? What have they valued at 0:16:25.160 --> 0:16:27.480 right now? Well? There, their stock is low, So maybe 0:16:27.480 --> 0:16:29.440 you guys shouldn't have such a high stock price either. 0:16:29.480 --> 0:16:32.040 So it was it was it's very much. It's arbitrary, 0:16:33.560 --> 0:16:37.320 and um, you know, bear Stearns had basically said to us, listen, 0:16:37.360 --> 0:16:39.600 we're gonna take you on the road show to our institutions, 0:16:39.680 --> 0:16:42.520 to the t ro prices and Jenas funds, and we 0:16:42.840 --> 0:16:45.440 think we can sell this at you know, let me 0:16:45.560 --> 0:16:50.200 think finger in the air. Um, you know, a hundred 0:16:50.240 --> 0:16:53.400 million dollar company and that would price you guys at 0:16:53.440 --> 0:16:55.360 and the numbers may be an accurate because it's been 0:16:55.360 --> 0:16:56.920 thirty years and I don't remember exactly, but you know 0:16:56.960 --> 0:16:59.880 that's at eleven to thirteen dollar a share price. And 0:17:00.040 --> 0:17:01.680 as we went onto the road and we said, okay, fine, 0:17:01.800 --> 0:17:04.120 hundred million dollar company or ninety million dollar company eleven 0:17:04.200 --> 0:17:06.840 or thirteen dollars a share. We don't have a better guess. 0:17:06.920 --> 0:17:08.800 I mean, either way, we were only generating a few 0:17:08.840 --> 0:17:12.760 million in revenue, so these multiple seem big. Who were 0:17:12.800 --> 0:17:16.000 we to complain? But as we went on the road 0:17:16.000 --> 0:17:18.200 show and the markets were crapping out and all that 0:17:18.320 --> 0:17:22.280 capital got pulled out, m everyone would take the meeting 0:17:22.320 --> 0:17:24.920 with us. They all thought the concept was I guess 0:17:24.960 --> 0:17:27.000 a little bit mind blowing. Okay, there's this thing called 0:17:27.000 --> 0:17:30.280 the Internet. There's virtual community. People are interacting with each other, okay, 0:17:31.200 --> 0:17:33.000 and no one has seen the matrix yet, right, And 0:17:33.080 --> 0:17:36.080 most people people hadn't read Neil stevenson snow Crash, right, 0:17:36.080 --> 0:17:37.840 so they couldn't really imagine a world. Will you plug 0:17:37.920 --> 0:17:40.680 into this thing called the metaverse? But there was something 0:17:40.800 --> 0:17:43.320 to our story a virtual community, right that we're not 0:17:43.400 --> 0:17:46.040 just a site online where you look up information. It's 0:17:46.040 --> 0:17:48.360 not just a magazine online. It's not a place where 0:17:48.359 --> 0:17:50.600 you just shop online. It's a place where you will 0:17:50.640 --> 0:17:53.800 build relationships and spend hours of your life, because that's 0:17:53.840 --> 0:17:56.560 what our users were doing, spending hours of their lives 0:17:56.800 --> 0:18:00.840 in chat rooms. Something about that resonated with all the 0:18:00.880 --> 0:18:03.680 institutions on the road show. But what didn't resonate with 0:18:03.760 --> 0:18:06.680 them was the markets are collapsing. You guys should stop 0:18:06.720 --> 0:18:09.240 your ip O. Didn't you notice everybody else cancel it? 0:18:10.320 --> 0:18:13.720 So we, unfortunately, after the three week road show, had 0:18:13.800 --> 0:18:17.040 no choice. The bear Sterns trying to lower the price, like, well, 0:18:17.080 --> 0:18:19.000 no one's taking it at eleven and thirteen, they're not 0:18:19.080 --> 0:18:21.040 taking it at ten, they're not taking it at nine, 0:18:21.280 --> 0:18:23.960 they're not taking it eight like okay, so no price 0:18:24.119 --> 0:18:27.440 is low enough, and eventually bear Sterns and this is 0:18:27.600 --> 0:18:30.480 just I guess their sterns where they got some of 0:18:30.560 --> 0:18:35.240 their reputation. They were like thinking that we'll we'll scoop 0:18:35.320 --> 0:18:36.720 up the whole of the globe and by the whole 0:18:36.760 --> 0:18:38.879 thing is six dollars a share, and it felt like 0:18:39.080 --> 0:18:41.840 so sharky of them to want to pull that, and 0:18:41.960 --> 0:18:43.119 we were like, no, we're not going to do that. 0:18:43.160 --> 0:18:47.359 So we held off. And it's only because the market 0:18:47.760 --> 0:18:51.359 turned around at a critical juncture where everyone was suddenly 0:18:51.400 --> 0:18:53.320 going okay, okay, okay, what are the what are the 0:18:53.359 --> 0:18:56.000 new I p o S on deck? Fox Cool? That 0:18:56.119 --> 0:19:00.600 got priced tent below their their pop so it's well priced. 0:19:00.640 --> 0:19:02.560 And then there was another little dot com called earth 0:19:02.640 --> 0:19:05.560 Web that went up a couple and I think that 0:19:05.680 --> 0:19:08.720 made everybody click and go, oh, the action is where 0:19:08.800 --> 0:19:12.040 these dot com companies are. Who's the last company we 0:19:12.119 --> 0:19:15.440 all met with that we liked the globe? So so 0:19:15.560 --> 0:19:19.320 suddenly the timing those vectors came together and Bear Stearns, 0:19:19.400 --> 0:19:21.240 you know, we then had to twist their arm to 0:19:21.320 --> 0:19:23.440 convince them, listen, move the price back up, you know, 0:19:23.520 --> 0:19:26.520 six bucks of shares insulting you know, like, okay, eight, Like, 0:19:26.640 --> 0:19:28.400 come on, that's way below our I p O price. 0:19:28.400 --> 0:19:31.320 It should have been eleven and thirteen. Okay, fine, nine, 0:19:31.440 --> 0:19:33.400 But we can't go higher or we'll lose the interest 0:19:33.920 --> 0:19:35.920 and everyone will walk and your s one's going to 0:19:36.000 --> 0:19:38.760 go stale on Monday, and it's it's it's Thursday today. 0:19:39.480 --> 0:19:41.240 So we felt we were sort of stuck between a 0:19:41.320 --> 0:19:44.080 rock and hard place. Um, they wouldn't want it. They 0:19:44.119 --> 0:19:46.520 didn't want us to interpret the forty million shares of 0:19:46.560 --> 0:19:49.400 demand is something that should require moving the price. Even 0:19:49.440 --> 0:19:52.880 though everyone on our team thought the price should move, 0:19:53.560 --> 0:19:56.840 we kept it at nine. And that's how it got 0:19:56.880 --> 0:19:59.399 set at nine. It's because of an accident in our market. 0:19:59.480 --> 0:20:03.280 Timing brought us further down. Everyone else that went public 0:20:03.760 --> 0:20:07.240 the following week and thereafter we're suddenly coming in way 0:20:07.320 --> 0:20:09.840 above their price ranges. Forget eleven to thirteen dollars, they 0:20:09.880 --> 0:20:12.720 were pricing thirty dollars a share on the you know, 0:20:12.800 --> 0:20:16.520 the same scale, And so we realized that this sort 0:20:16.560 --> 0:20:19.840 of blew everything up for everybody else. Unfortunately, we were 0:20:19.880 --> 0:20:23.639 the guinea pig. And and what's more unfortunate for us 0:20:23.720 --> 0:20:26.159 is that all of these institutions these big players that 0:20:26.200 --> 0:20:28.879 are supposedly there to own shares in your company and 0:20:29.000 --> 0:20:30.960 hold for the long haul. And the banks, you know, 0:20:30.960 --> 0:20:32.520 when they're taking on the road show, they're telling you 0:20:32.600 --> 0:20:34.960 all about their institutional clients are gonna hold your stock, 0:20:35.040 --> 0:20:36.840 and you know they're they're big buyers, buying you know, 0:20:36.960 --> 0:20:39.480 five million dollar chunks and they're gonna hold it for 0:20:39.560 --> 0:20:41.160 the long haul, that that's going to be your base. 0:20:41.320 --> 0:20:43.320 You know, very little piece of it will go to retail. 0:20:43.840 --> 0:20:45.320 But what happened is is the day of the I 0:20:45.440 --> 0:20:47.359 p O, when the stock went up a thousand percent, 0:20:47.880 --> 0:20:50.359 all these institutions that bought in at nine dollars were like, 0:20:50.520 --> 0:20:54.560 holy shit, Christmas came early, we're dumping it. So they 0:20:54.880 --> 0:20:57.439 sold all their stock to the highest bidders, which were 0:20:57.480 --> 0:21:00.080 the ones bidding all the way up to the are 0:21:00.080 --> 0:21:03.080 a lot of institutions and day traders at that time 0:21:03.160 --> 0:21:05.159 that didn't put in limit orders, so they were just 0:21:05.320 --> 0:21:09.320 buying at market, you know, at seven ninety seven, and 0:21:09.720 --> 0:21:12.520 you know, and it meant that all the institutions dumped 0:21:12.560 --> 0:21:15.560 the stock. The stock traded hands on average five times 0:21:15.680 --> 0:21:18.120 that day, so fifteen million shares and a three million 0:21:18.160 --> 0:21:21.560 share offering and it meant that the globe was left 0:21:21.600 --> 0:21:26.240 being primarily held by retail investors, people who didn't understand 0:21:26.280 --> 0:21:29.160 what was going on. You know, the institutions did extremely well, 0:21:29.200 --> 0:21:31.360 but it meant that we had a base of investors 0:21:31.520 --> 0:21:36.560 that weren't classically long long holders of stock. So sort 0:21:36.600 --> 0:21:38.800 of that that's set us up for not a good 0:21:38.920 --> 0:21:41.240 start to our our public life. And what did you 0:21:41.320 --> 0:21:45.719 do that night? Yeah, yeah, so yes, that night there 0:21:45.840 --> 0:21:49.040 was some celebration. UM. Bear in mind, the day before, 0:21:49.200 --> 0:21:50.960 two days before, we didn't know we were going public, 0:21:51.560 --> 0:21:53.840 so we didn't really have time to call up all 0:21:53.840 --> 0:21:55.840 of our friends and tell everyone, like, guys, you know, 0:21:55.880 --> 0:21:58.879 Friday night, we're gonna be celebribrating. It's very impromptu. But 0:21:58.960 --> 0:22:01.600 there was going out. Um, there was you know, some 0:22:02.240 --> 0:22:07.200 champagne or and or vodka one of my favorite nightclubs. Um. 0:22:07.600 --> 0:22:10.679 And you know, me explaining to my then very new 0:22:10.760 --> 0:22:13.600 girlfriend that something had crazy had just happened that day 0:22:13.680 --> 0:22:15.200 and she didn't really understand what the hell I was 0:22:15.240 --> 0:22:18.920 talking about. But it was a surreal evening for me 0:22:19.080 --> 0:22:22.600 and for Todd and for our company. Um. Again, we 0:22:22.880 --> 0:22:25.680 went from our company is going to go under two 0:22:26.080 --> 0:22:28.240 new lease on life and apparently we did a world 0:22:28.280 --> 0:22:31.680 record with it, so this can only mean good things. 0:22:32.320 --> 0:22:35.280 So how much was so? How much were you personally worth? 0:22:35.600 --> 0:22:37.480 How much were you and Todd? Are you personally worth 0:22:37.520 --> 0:22:39.520 at the top? And what was the deal with the 0:22:39.560 --> 0:22:42.960 plastic pants? Because, like I said, I didn't remember question. 0:22:43.119 --> 0:22:46.080 I didn't remember what the Globe dot com did, but 0:22:46.240 --> 0:22:48.320 I do remember that you were in the media for 0:22:48.400 --> 0:22:51.120 wearing plastic pants. So what do you answer? But so, yeah, 0:22:51.200 --> 0:22:54.480 that's the story fashion choices. So you know, it's like 0:22:54.520 --> 0:22:56.080 I wouldn't want to look at what I was wearing. 0:22:56.520 --> 0:23:00.480 Vinyl was big in the late nineties. It was I 0:23:00.520 --> 0:23:02.600 think I just think I just were a little too 0:23:02.640 --> 0:23:06.159 farn uh. So yeah, I mean Todd and I each 0:23:06.200 --> 0:23:07.760 had a million shares in the company. We owned ten 0:23:07.760 --> 0:23:10.560 percent of the company each, so technically at that peak 0:23:10.680 --> 0:23:12.800 day we were worth ninety seven million each. And that 0:23:12.920 --> 0:23:15.280 was sort of the headline at the time, you know, 0:23:15.840 --> 0:23:18.760 net geeks strike it rich on the cover of the 0:23:18.800 --> 0:23:23.159 New York Post and pretty much all the tabloids. Um. So, 0:23:23.440 --> 0:23:25.840 suddenly having my dorman at the building recognized and go, 0:23:25.960 --> 0:23:29.600 oh my god, congratulations, it was I felt suddenly very 0:23:29.680 --> 0:23:34.240 vulnerable that everybody knew too much. Um, but yeah, the 0:23:34.359 --> 0:23:39.240 vinyl pants that happened a year later, among all of 0:23:39.320 --> 0:23:43.760 the wonderful media coverage and celebration and growing the business 0:23:44.119 --> 0:23:47.560 and becoming somewhat of a sensational story because back then 0:23:47.920 --> 0:23:49.840 dot com whiz kids wasn't a thing, so this was 0:23:49.880 --> 0:23:52.240 sort of the beginning of that whole thing, and everyone 0:23:52.400 --> 0:23:56.159 was fascinated, like international media in particular. For them, this 0:23:56.240 --> 0:23:59.639 is a quintessential Americana dream. Not only in America can 0:23:59.680 --> 0:24:03.760 you be a young entrepreneur, a young celebrity and make 0:24:03.840 --> 0:24:06.920 it rich, And that doesn't happen in Europe. So Europeans 0:24:06.960 --> 0:24:10.399 were just fascinated with this story. You know, a dorm 0:24:10.840 --> 0:24:14.920 dorm room college startup that suddenly ends up, you know, 0:24:15.000 --> 0:24:17.480 the nexus of Wall Street worth a billion dollars like 0:24:18.119 --> 0:24:21.040 that was completely surreal to them, and it was pretty 0:24:21.160 --> 0:24:23.200 novel as well in America. But in America, you know, 0:24:23.280 --> 0:24:25.600 there was a much more entrepreneurial spirit in general, and 0:24:25.760 --> 0:24:27.760 the start up the concept of startups was not a 0:24:27.840 --> 0:24:31.600 typical um, you know, maybe a public company at twenty 0:24:31.640 --> 0:24:34.399 four was a little bit atypical. So some of the 0:24:34.480 --> 0:24:36.160 media wanted to just you know, most of the time 0:24:36.160 --> 0:24:38.080 when we were being brought into interviews, it wasn't to 0:24:38.080 --> 0:24:40.440 get into the nitty gritty of our platform. It was 0:24:40.560 --> 0:24:42.360 to be like, oh my god, what's it like being rich? 0:24:42.800 --> 0:24:44.800 If you guys bought new houses, new cars, tell us, 0:24:44.800 --> 0:24:46.480 tell us, tell us, you're getting marriage offers. It was. 0:24:46.720 --> 0:24:49.440 It was sensational, and so to a certain extent, Todd 0:24:49.480 --> 0:24:51.919 and I accepted that, like if if we've become these 0:24:52.000 --> 0:24:54.880 dot com whiz icons, Okay, let's let's just play that game. 0:24:55.200 --> 0:24:56.840 This is how we get the media coverage and drive 0:24:56.880 --> 0:25:01.120 our traffic up. Let's not be boring about it. Let's 0:25:01.320 --> 0:25:04.359 let's let's play into that fantasy. Let's explain to them 0:25:04.400 --> 0:25:07.160 this great new virtual world we've created. Let's let's act 0:25:07.240 --> 0:25:09.639 like we're the cool We're the cool kids who always 0:25:09.720 --> 0:25:12.239 knew um what they were doing and that they were 0:25:12.240 --> 0:25:16.560 ahead of their time. We didn't. But eventually, um, you know, 0:25:16.720 --> 0:25:19.080 CNN came calling and they wanted they were launching a 0:25:19.160 --> 0:25:22.919 new series camera what's called I think it's called CNN Movers, 0:25:23.440 --> 0:25:27.880 half hour documentary with jan Hopkins, and um, they wanted 0:25:27.880 --> 0:25:29.520 to follow us around. They wanted to know what what 0:25:29.720 --> 0:25:31.639 was the what was the life like of twenty four 0:25:31.760 --> 0:25:35.680 year old public company CEOs. So they are there. I 0:25:35.760 --> 0:25:39.520 made the faithful decision to let them into my life, 0:25:39.640 --> 0:25:41.760 you know, let them into our homes. That's what they 0:25:41.800 --> 0:25:44.520 wanted to do, and follow us out. They knew that 0:25:44.600 --> 0:25:46.840 I like to go out and go to a club 0:25:46.960 --> 0:25:49.040 and go dance, and they're like, can we follow you? 0:25:49.160 --> 0:25:51.639 And I said sure, Well I wasn't gonna go on 0:25:52.040 --> 0:25:59.879 CNN and just dancing jeans was I Obviously important decisions taken. 0:26:00.119 --> 0:26:03.840 You got a dance vinyl pants exactly look I mean 0:26:03.880 --> 0:26:07.520 and back then, you know, this was way before the 0:26:07.600 --> 0:26:10.600 days of you know, Elon must smoking weed on Joe 0:26:10.720 --> 0:26:13.960 Rogan and like that's just you know, typical Thursday afternoon. 0:26:14.640 --> 0:26:16.600 I was thinking, what's the most crazy thing I can 0:26:16.680 --> 0:26:20.280 do that will capture everyone's imagination and go, yes, this 0:26:20.520 --> 0:26:23.240 is the embodiment of the American dream. Well, I'll put 0:26:23.320 --> 0:26:26.680 on my vinyl pants in some tight T shirt and 0:26:26.840 --> 0:26:29.080 spike my hair with gel and we'll go to a 0:26:29.160 --> 0:26:31.239 club and I will dance on a table and make 0:26:31.280 --> 0:26:33.600 sure that there's other pretty girls dancing there, and you know, 0:26:33.680 --> 0:26:36.000 shake a bottle of champagne. I don't remember everything I did, 0:26:36.440 --> 0:26:40.520 but the cliche what is now clearly a cliche, But now, 0:26:40.560 --> 0:26:44.440 of course it's so tame, it's it's honestly like it 0:26:44.480 --> 0:26:47.280 would it wouldn't make any news anymore today because it's 0:26:47.359 --> 0:26:50.760 just not that interesting. So part of me wants to 0:26:51.040 --> 0:26:52.960 just ask questions about what it was like clubbing in 0:26:53.000 --> 0:26:55.040 the ninety nineties, because I think that would have been 0:26:55.040 --> 0:26:58.040 an interesting experience. But um, I want to ask a 0:26:58.080 --> 0:27:00.720 serious question, which was you did the I p O. 0:27:00.960 --> 0:27:03.520 You raised a bunch of money, you had fundraisings before that. 0:27:04.080 --> 0:27:06.600 What were you planning to do with all the money? 0:27:06.720 --> 0:27:10.600 Like was there actually a plan for expansion or acquisitions 0:27:10.640 --> 0:27:15.560 and things like that? Yes, uh so there wasn't. There 0:27:15.720 --> 0:27:17.679 was definitely a method to the madness, and we had 0:27:17.760 --> 0:27:20.920 raised I think a couple hundred million dollars over like 0:27:21.119 --> 0:27:25.480 quarter five six rounds of financing. It's nothing magical. It's 0:27:25.840 --> 0:27:28.159 you raise the money you need to buy more servers, 0:27:28.240 --> 0:27:31.120 hire more people, and build out your infrastructure and your team, 0:27:31.320 --> 0:27:33.240 and you know you never have enough money, right because 0:27:33.359 --> 0:27:37.160 back then it was called Netscape poin the term GDF 0:27:37.280 --> 0:27:40.600 get big fast, So it was all about spend, spend 0:27:40.680 --> 0:27:42.400 it as fast as you can, to grow as fast 0:27:42.440 --> 0:27:44.440 as you can. Everyone the only thing they cared about 0:27:44.480 --> 0:27:46.640 were eyeballs. Whoever is getting the biggest audience doesn't matter 0:27:46.720 --> 0:27:49.600 what your revenues are. Yet it doesn't matter forget profits. 0:27:49.680 --> 0:27:53.080 Just grow grow, grow, grow grow. So after our I 0:27:53.240 --> 0:27:55.359 p O and I p Omnia kicked in and all 0:27:55.400 --> 0:27:58.120 of our competitors, you know, we'd raised twenty seven million 0:27:58.200 --> 0:28:00.600 or I p O everyone else was raising sixty two 0:28:00.640 --> 0:28:03.000 hundred million, We're like, oh my god, they're outspending us 0:28:03.040 --> 0:28:06.359 in ads and servers and hiring. It became this race. 0:28:06.520 --> 0:28:09.040 And by the way, these are the parallels of every 0:28:09.119 --> 0:28:13.639 single crypto boom bust cycles. It's interesting you see that 0:28:13.680 --> 0:28:17.000 because you know, we an that Escape was of course 0:28:17.320 --> 0:28:19.600 uh founded, as you mentioned by Mark Andreas and get 0:28:19.640 --> 0:28:21.800 big Fest. We like just didn't interview like you know, 0:28:21.880 --> 0:28:24.920 now think about all the Andres and Horowitz companies. That's 0:28:24.960 --> 0:28:28.080 sort of like how many hundreds of or thousands of 0:28:28.160 --> 0:28:33.840 companies have essentially taken jeep that netscap, Netscape GBF model, 0:28:33.920 --> 0:28:36.040 and now it's like that is the thing or that 0:28:36.200 --> 0:28:39.960 is really defined tech in this modern age. Yeah, well, look, 0:28:40.080 --> 0:28:43.040 every boom bust cycle goes through that, right. But when 0:28:43.080 --> 0:28:47.400 you start off building something on really uncharted territory, no 0:28:47.480 --> 0:28:50.400 one's exciting. Everyone thinks they're crazy and they're very scared 0:28:50.400 --> 0:28:52.400 about putting money in. Right, So first you have to 0:28:52.480 --> 0:28:56.000 tell the story and build a market and get the users, 0:28:56.200 --> 0:28:58.840 and then other companies need to tag along. And eventually, 0:28:58.960 --> 0:29:01.720 when the demand is there and the excitement is there, 0:29:02.240 --> 0:29:05.959 fomo kicks in. Right. That's when all the fast followers 0:29:06.080 --> 0:29:09.080 come in, and of course investors they go through their 0:29:09.120 --> 0:29:11.480 wave as well. Right, there's the there's the laggards, and 0:29:11.560 --> 0:29:14.520 then there's the ones with the fomo. Not right in 0:29:14.560 --> 0:29:16.400 the beginning, but a little bit later, who go, oh 0:29:16.480 --> 0:29:18.240 my god, everyone's doing well with that. I got a 0:29:18.280 --> 0:29:21.520 pile in. That's where valuations go sky high. That's where 0:29:21.520 --> 0:29:24.160 the industries get built because billions of dollars flow in. 0:29:24.480 --> 0:29:29.080 But inevitably we passed keep madness and then you know, 0:29:29.200 --> 0:29:32.040 eyeballs isn't enough. We need revenues. And then revenues isn't enough. 0:29:32.080 --> 0:29:35.160 You're losing money like crazy. You know, remember Amazon, they 0:29:35.200 --> 0:29:38.720 were losing billions of dollars a year famously, and it 0:29:38.840 --> 0:29:41.360 takes a shakeout. Right, So when the bubble burst in 0:29:41.440 --> 0:29:45.200 two thousand, two thousand one. It's because there wasn't enough profits. 0:29:45.240 --> 0:29:47.560 There wasn't enough advertising dollars or e commerce, or the 0:29:47.640 --> 0:29:49.760 margins weren't big enough to sustain all of this. So 0:29:49.880 --> 0:29:54.160 the these using capital as this defensive moat to just 0:29:54.360 --> 0:29:57.920 outspend your competition. That started in the dot com era, 0:29:58.320 --> 0:30:01.320 and then it got carried through again in UM the 0:30:01.520 --> 0:30:08.760 twenty I see omnia. It also has been part of 0:30:08.800 --> 0:30:12.600 web two point oh right, just who from Uber to 0:30:12.760 --> 0:30:17.240 Lift to UM just you name it, everybody. Capital is 0:30:17.280 --> 0:30:21.160 a defensive moat became a core strategy and in notably 0:30:21.320 --> 0:30:25.360 always leads to this shakeout. So that's part. That's the 0:30:25.400 --> 0:30:28.320 bus cycle. But the beautiful thing is is we always 0:30:28.360 --> 0:30:30.240 come out of the bus cycle eventually. Right. Some of 0:30:30.280 --> 0:30:34.280 the original players who usually started before a maniac kicks 0:30:34.320 --> 0:30:36.920 in and have have been working from first principles, not 0:30:37.080 --> 0:30:40.120 from crazy had a money pouring showering down on them, 0:30:40.160 --> 0:30:45.040 but from really good first principles. Usually those players survive, 0:30:45.960 --> 0:30:48.080 some of them don't UM, but it's the ones who 0:30:48.080 --> 0:30:50.239 work from first principles who usually do the best. Then 0:30:50.280 --> 0:30:52.320 the ones that are the most disciplined and not spending 0:30:52.360 --> 0:30:55.840 their money as fast as they can, who then continue. 0:30:55.920 --> 0:30:58.840 But those who come in later at the point of FOMO, 0:30:59.520 --> 0:31:02.240 will do so much spending to catch up and try 0:31:02.280 --> 0:31:04.440 to overtake the market, they will be the first to 0:31:04.560 --> 0:31:23.160 get to implode when there's a market controversion. So can 0:31:23.240 --> 0:31:27.480 I just ask when did you actually know it was over? 0:31:27.640 --> 0:31:29.800 Or let me ask two things? Okay, One, when did 0:31:29.880 --> 0:31:32.320 you know it was over? That the bubble had burst? 0:31:32.400 --> 0:31:36.600 And then secondly, what was your first sign of real trouble? 0:31:36.720 --> 0:31:40.680 Like is there a moment or thing that you can pinpoint? Yeah? 0:31:40.760 --> 0:31:43.120 So we we for better or worse? Where the canary 0:31:43.160 --> 0:31:45.959 in the coal mine with the globe right. We were early, Um, 0:31:46.120 --> 0:31:47.920 we could see this was going to be exciting before 0:31:47.960 --> 0:31:50.960 everybody piled in. And then we could see that as 0:31:51.000 --> 0:31:52.880 everyone piled in and more and more money was getting 0:31:52.920 --> 0:31:57.040 burned by all companies, that it was becoming untenable to 0:31:57.200 --> 0:32:00.640 keep spending our way to stay ahead. And spending your 0:32:00.640 --> 0:32:03.920 money meant using some of that cash to launch huge 0:32:03.960 --> 0:32:08.800 ad campaigns, you know, hiring more staff, bigger sales teams. 0:32:09.600 --> 0:32:11.560 You're doing that, But some of the cash and your 0:32:11.640 --> 0:32:14.320 stock as a public company was to acquire more companies 0:32:14.320 --> 0:32:16.600 as well. If we can't organically grow fast enough, we 0:32:16.680 --> 0:32:20.440 will acquire companies. Then you acquire some companies, but their 0:32:20.520 --> 0:32:23.760 valuations are going up too, so you're now paying inflated 0:32:23.840 --> 0:32:26.720 prices for other small companies to try to bulk yourself up. 0:32:26.880 --> 0:32:31.080 And you name it all the major companies, Facebook, Alphabet 0:32:31.080 --> 0:32:33.719 and all that. They they bought hundreds of companies over 0:32:33.800 --> 0:32:37.200 the years that don't largely get reported, So all you 0:32:37.320 --> 0:32:40.840 really ever see is this big top line growth, But 0:32:40.920 --> 0:32:42.880 what you don't realize is what fraction of that was 0:32:42.920 --> 0:32:46.440 the original organic stuff versus all the acquisitions and then 0:32:46.480 --> 0:32:49.160 the padding and sandbagging of their numbers so that the 0:32:49.200 --> 0:32:52.600 analysts can't quite see how you're you're buying your traffic, 0:32:52.680 --> 0:32:55.080 you're buying the revenues to try to help goose your 0:32:55.440 --> 0:32:58.800 your overall top line figures. And we were having to 0:32:58.880 --> 0:33:01.000 do the same thing. We're buying more and more companies. 0:33:01.160 --> 0:33:04.440 They were helping, but not enough. And you know, a 0:33:04.480 --> 0:33:06.920 lot of there wasn't enough advertising dollars to go around 0:33:06.960 --> 0:33:08.400 for all the Internet companies, so there's a lot of 0:33:08.440 --> 0:33:11.240 barter advertising going on, which was getting accounted by a 0:33:11.280 --> 0:33:13.960 lot of companies as revenues, but it wasn't real revenues, 0:33:14.440 --> 0:33:17.880 so there's some you know, some percentages phantom revenue. And 0:33:18.520 --> 0:33:21.160 we could see that we're on the little, you know, 0:33:22.440 --> 0:33:24.720 guinea pig wheel here, running as fast as we can, 0:33:26.160 --> 0:33:28.040 and it's getting harder and harder to keep up with 0:33:28.120 --> 0:33:30.400 that wheel. We can't feed the beast fast enough. So 0:33:30.520 --> 0:33:32.280 we could see the writing on the wall here that 0:33:32.360 --> 0:33:35.680 at some point the music is gonna stop and there 0:33:35.680 --> 0:33:38.320 won't be enough chairs to go around. So we kept 0:33:38.360 --> 0:33:40.600 playing the game and doing pretty well all the way 0:33:40.640 --> 0:33:42.840 into the beginning of the two thousands. We had our 0:33:42.880 --> 0:33:45.040 best quarter ever, which I believe was like a ten 0:33:45.080 --> 0:33:48.760 million dollar quarter million dollar a year a run rate, 0:33:48.840 --> 0:33:50.720 which back then that was a big deal. But we 0:33:50.800 --> 0:33:53.360 were still losing money. But that's when my partner and 0:33:53.440 --> 0:33:56.440 I have felt like we couldn't keep up anymore. Um, 0:33:56.600 --> 0:33:58.840 the sky was gonna start, it was gonna fall, and 0:33:58.920 --> 0:34:01.680 it was gonna fall maybe on us first, and my 0:34:01.920 --> 0:34:03.360 my partner and I taught, and I we ended up 0:34:03.360 --> 0:34:06.800 resigning and bringing in a new CEO with more experience 0:34:06.840 --> 0:34:08.959 than us could. We could bring more discipline and maybe 0:34:09.000 --> 0:34:12.239 help control costs and would maybe navigate what we thought 0:34:12.239 --> 0:34:17.680 would be an upcoming storm better than us, and unfortunately, 0:34:17.800 --> 0:34:22.640 you know, even though our revenues were climbing, traffic was climbing. Uh. 0:34:23.120 --> 0:34:25.400 We could see the storm coming. My partner and I resigned, 0:34:25.440 --> 0:34:29.319 bring in the new CEO. And then months later, um, 0:34:29.560 --> 0:34:32.719 other dot com started going under. They were running out 0:34:32.760 --> 0:34:35.360 of cash, and then the stock market started to slide 0:34:35.400 --> 0:34:37.800 over the course of like mid two thousand, spring of 0:34:37.880 --> 0:34:40.160 two thousand, all the way until the beginning of two 0:34:40.200 --> 0:34:45.640 thousand one. Everything fell, so, you know, the globe. Unfortunately, 0:34:45.680 --> 0:34:47.880 we got called out early. As you know, this is 0:34:47.920 --> 0:34:49.880 exactly what's wrong with the whole Internet space. It was 0:34:49.960 --> 0:34:52.359 always a giant hoax, you know, run by these dot 0:34:52.400 --> 0:34:56.360 com kids. But two months later everyone went down. Yahoo, 0:34:56.400 --> 0:35:01.800 Amazon drops in their stock. Um. Luckily for the big players, 0:35:01.920 --> 0:35:04.879 they market consolidated under them, right, They got to buy 0:35:04.880 --> 0:35:06.520 a lot of companies up on the cheap, they got 0:35:06.600 --> 0:35:09.719 to hoard enough cash, uh, and they made it through. 0:35:09.800 --> 0:35:12.560 Yeah who obviously didn't make it through for very long 0:35:12.719 --> 0:35:17.520 after the Internet renaissance, But out of the ashes, um, 0:35:17.760 --> 0:35:21.680 you know, Amazon came back super strong, and then of course, 0:35:21.800 --> 0:35:25.360 you know, the next generation portals came along, like Google, 0:35:26.200 --> 0:35:28.960 and then eventually the next generation social networks like Facebook. Right, 0:35:28.960 --> 0:35:31.719 so there needed to be a total washout. All of 0:35:31.760 --> 0:35:34.880 the cost the costs of building dot coms needed to 0:35:34.960 --> 0:35:39.640 come down for all these new second generation web two 0:35:39.680 --> 0:35:41.560 point oh companies to sort of be borne out of 0:35:41.800 --> 0:35:46.320 and have succeeded since. So what is it like on 0:35:46.400 --> 0:35:51.040 a personal basis to go from hundred million dollars plastic 0:35:51.160 --> 0:35:54.880 pants got the model girlfriend time to live an egregious, 0:35:54.920 --> 0:35:58.160 frivolous life. Is I think you're quoted to assume something 0:35:58.200 --> 0:36:00.759 a little less egregious and frivolous, said a little less 0:36:00.920 --> 0:36:03.160 than a hundred million. I don't know what's that like? 0:36:03.640 --> 0:36:04.800 And then how do you I mean, you have a 0:36:04.840 --> 0:36:06.320 new company now, So what don't you just talk a 0:36:06.360 --> 0:36:07.840 little bit about because there's gonna be a lot of 0:36:07.840 --> 0:36:09.879 people right now going through that who were like, we're 0:36:09.880 --> 0:36:11.920 at a billion last year and now we're you know, 0:36:14.080 --> 0:36:17.640 how do you how much that process? Like, look, I 0:36:17.680 --> 0:36:22.040 went through an existential crisis when when the globe essentially 0:36:22.280 --> 0:36:25.479 folded a year later after the dot com bubble burst 0:36:25.560 --> 0:36:27.880 and the Internet went under and the media was basically like, 0:36:28.000 --> 0:36:32.400 ha ha, we told you so you know I it 0:36:32.480 --> 0:36:35.520 made me question my own sanity. Wait, what were we 0:36:35.600 --> 0:36:37.799 all crazy with what this internet thing could be? Were 0:36:37.880 --> 0:36:41.319 we crazy? What? So? What virtual community the potential it had? 0:36:41.400 --> 0:36:44.520 Maybe we were. And it took a couple more years 0:36:44.680 --> 0:36:48.080 of licking my wounds and retreating from the world. And 0:36:49.000 --> 0:36:50.320 by the way, by the end of all of this, 0:36:50.600 --> 0:36:52.640 not only did I not have ninety seven million dollars, 0:36:52.680 --> 0:36:54.640 I was a million dollars in debt because I had 0:36:54.640 --> 0:36:57.400 borrowed a million dollars against my stock to try to 0:36:57.480 --> 0:37:01.360 also bet on other dot COM's day went under, So 0:37:01.440 --> 0:37:04.440 all of a sudden, I'm retreating from the world. I 0:37:04.520 --> 0:37:07.160 had to, you know, ask my parents to help me 0:37:07.880 --> 0:37:13.200 with to keep my roof over my head. And I 0:37:13.320 --> 0:37:17.640 barely pulled through financially. And luckily, the reason I was 0:37:17.640 --> 0:37:20.800 able to pull through financially ultimately is because three or 0:37:20.800 --> 0:37:23.279 four years later, in two thousand four, the dot com 0:37:23.440 --> 0:37:26.560 world came back with a vengeance. The Internet renaissance kicked in. 0:37:26.680 --> 0:37:29.000 You know, Google appeared and then if Facebook appeared, and 0:37:29.840 --> 0:37:33.799 I was able to corral enough of my original investors 0:37:33.840 --> 0:37:38.040 who had made returns on the globe they had invested 0:37:38.080 --> 0:37:39.440 in early and sold at the I P O and 0:37:39.520 --> 0:37:42.200 made a killing, and luckily many of them said, hey, steph, 0:37:42.280 --> 0:37:45.719 whatever you do next, we're in okay. Um, well, I 0:37:45.760 --> 0:37:47.719 don't want to run another company right now. I'm like 0:37:47.840 --> 0:37:50.719 still in shell shock here. But I see a lot 0:37:50.760 --> 0:37:52.640 of other entrepreneurs now who are going and doing their 0:37:52.680 --> 0:37:55.279 second companies. So I think the Internet is really coming back. 0:37:56.120 --> 0:37:58.359 And so I created a bunch of angel funds, brought 0:37:58.400 --> 0:38:02.320 in my my angel investors alongside me, made some bets. 0:38:02.760 --> 0:38:06.360 Those companies ended up doing really well. Uh without getting 0:38:06.360 --> 0:38:08.160 through a list of all the things they did, they 0:38:08.200 --> 0:38:11.000 were part of the new fabric of Internet two point oh. 0:38:11.480 --> 0:38:13.120 And so that got me back in the game and 0:38:13.239 --> 0:38:16.560 rebuilt my confidence as as an investor and as somebody 0:38:16.560 --> 0:38:19.560 who understood the market well enough to see what good 0:38:19.600 --> 0:38:24.600 products might disrupt the world. Um, but you know, look, 0:38:24.640 --> 0:38:27.239 it's to be honest, my confidence was really shaken as 0:38:27.280 --> 0:38:29.600 a CEO, and as you know, had hitting such a 0:38:30.080 --> 0:38:32.399 flying that close to the sun and having my wings melt. 0:38:33.680 --> 0:38:38.239 It took me ten fifteen years to really want to 0:38:38.600 --> 0:38:43.080 to really consider getting back in the CEO set. And 0:38:44.280 --> 0:38:46.440 just on that note, I mean, when you when you 0:38:46.520 --> 0:38:49.680 look at what's happening in markets, right now. I mean 0:38:49.760 --> 0:38:52.719 like the nasdact down. I think so far this year 0:38:53.040 --> 0:38:56.920 crypto crashing, people talking about a crypto winter. What do 0:38:56.960 --> 0:38:58.480 you think is happening here? Is it? Is it the 0:38:58.560 --> 0:39:01.720 tech bubble all over again? Or is there something different 0:39:01.760 --> 0:39:08.480 about this cycle? Nope, it's the same game, new players. 0:39:08.760 --> 0:39:12.120 It's the same game. Uh. And it's it's It's quite obvious. 0:39:12.280 --> 0:39:15.279 And by the way, when I had my doubts and 0:39:15.600 --> 0:39:18.120 I went lived, I got into bitcoin back when it 0:39:18.200 --> 0:39:23.239 was at Mount Cox at sixty dollars a bitcoin um 0:39:23.520 --> 0:39:26.279 and I appreciate, enjoyed watching it go from sixty to 0:39:26.400 --> 0:39:29.560 six and thought to myself, well, Jesus six d I 0:39:29.640 --> 0:39:31.919 better sell it now. And then it only went up further, 0:39:32.000 --> 0:39:33.880 so I bought back in and then it only crashed. 0:39:34.520 --> 0:39:37.160 So I realized, Okay, me trying to time the market 0:39:37.280 --> 0:39:42.640 and figure out you know, mass investor psychology, uh is 0:39:42.760 --> 0:39:44.480 not working. So what I'm gonna do here is go 0:39:44.560 --> 0:39:48.560 to first principles. Is this a long hold? Is the 0:39:48.640 --> 0:39:53.239 promise of bitcoin or really brought more broadly, blockchain, does 0:39:53.280 --> 0:39:55.680 it really have the potential to change the world? And 0:39:55.800 --> 0:39:58.640 my feeling was yeah, but this is actually more like 0:39:58.840 --> 0:40:02.520 the dot com bubble before one point oh. This is 0:40:02.600 --> 0:40:06.279 like the laying down of DARPA net. This is like 0:40:06.400 --> 0:40:08.920 before people all get dial up modems and before all 0:40:08.960 --> 0:40:12.680 of the great utilities of the Internet appeared. Right, this 0:40:12.800 --> 0:40:16.480 is laying down the fabric of of the of web. 0:40:16.680 --> 0:40:19.359 What is web three point oh now? And so I'm 0:40:19.360 --> 0:40:21.280 gonna be a long halt. And it's once I stopped 0:40:21.280 --> 0:40:23.880 trying to bet the market and repeat people's minds and 0:40:24.080 --> 0:40:26.480 tea leaves about buying and selling that I started to 0:40:26.520 --> 0:40:28.600 do really well. And I went through the first bubble 0:40:29.080 --> 0:40:32.880 and crypto winter, and then the second, and then the third. 0:40:33.360 --> 0:40:35.239 And it's in the third I c omania where I 0:40:35.280 --> 0:40:37.640 was like, there's this other thing called Ethereum World computer. 0:40:37.880 --> 0:40:39.880 I'm all in on that, and it's the same thing. 0:40:40.000 --> 0:40:41.640 It went all the way up, then came crashing all 0:40:41.640 --> 0:40:44.359 the way down, just kept holding. And if you look 0:40:44.440 --> 0:40:48.480 at the four or five major bubbles and crypto winters 0:40:49.200 --> 0:40:52.240 on a log arrhythmic scale, they keep moving up another 0:40:52.400 --> 0:40:55.960 order of magnitude higher each time. And yes, because there's 0:40:55.960 --> 0:40:58.000 a huge amount of speculation and there's a huge amount 0:40:58.000 --> 0:41:00.239 of huge amount of capital and fomo and people growing 0:41:00.280 --> 0:41:04.719 money at bad blockchain concepts and bad level one or 0:41:04.760 --> 0:41:07.160 bad level two or god knows, God knows what other 0:41:07.320 --> 0:41:11.439 ponzi schemes out there. But that's what had to happen 0:41:11.520 --> 0:41:14.200 with the Internet to begin with. Until you got to 0:41:14.239 --> 0:41:16.480 Internet two point oh, you could truly say Internet two 0:41:16.560 --> 0:41:19.600 point oh was where the world discovered the real value 0:41:19.600 --> 0:41:23.920 of the Internet. It just became hyper centralized. Well, we're 0:41:23.960 --> 0:41:26.040 still most of the world hasn't even dipped their toe 0:41:26.120 --> 0:41:28.520 in yet to crypto. Right, it's all been about the currency, 0:41:28.920 --> 0:41:32.720 not the utility. The utility it's all started and focused 0:41:32.760 --> 0:41:35.640 on the lego blocks, the building lego blocks of the 0:41:35.719 --> 0:41:38.239 financial systems you defy, right, And then it started to 0:41:38.280 --> 0:41:40.560 find a broader utility with n f t s, but 0:41:40.640 --> 0:41:44.600 again very gimmicky like you know, board eight board apes 0:41:44.640 --> 0:41:46.600 and yacht clubs and god knows what that that's cool 0:41:46.719 --> 0:41:51.080 for capturing people's imagination, but that's not the true unlocking 0:41:51.400 --> 0:41:54.120 of the broader utility of what blockchain can do. That 0:41:54.160 --> 0:41:56.920 will come later. So it's a ten to twenty year 0:41:57.040 --> 0:42:01.320 play before the world will discover the true utility with 0:42:01.440 --> 0:42:05.160 a staying power um and that will become Web three 0:42:05.320 --> 0:42:09.160 and I am beyond bullish despite seeing my crypto networth 0:42:09.239 --> 0:42:14.040 plump plummet. No problem. I haven't been buying into it 0:42:14.160 --> 0:42:16.280 because of Fomo. I've been in it since the beginning 0:42:16.480 --> 0:42:21.239 and it's still early, early early days. Imagine people panicking 0:42:21.480 --> 0:42:24.359 after Internet one point, oh bubble burst and dumping their 0:42:24.400 --> 0:42:28.080 Amazon stock. Right there, We're dumping their Apple stock right there. Oh, 0:42:28.120 --> 0:42:30.200 it's all going under. It's all a fat well. You 0:42:30.239 --> 0:42:32.480 would have missed out on one of the greatest returns 0:42:32.520 --> 0:42:34.759 you could have ever had in the history of investments 0:42:34.800 --> 0:42:38.960 with Amazon, So you got you gotta sit tight. Stefan Patterne. 0:42:39.640 --> 0:42:42.520 Honestly a real pleasure, in a real sort of thrill 0:42:42.719 --> 0:42:45.800 to chat with you and some incredible lessons. I actually 0:42:45.840 --> 0:42:47.480 like we hit we should we should have you back. 0:42:47.600 --> 0:42:49.719 I think, you know, we could talk for like two 0:42:49.800 --> 0:42:52.680 more hours about so many like here you talking about 0:42:52.719 --> 0:42:57.040 capital markets and that process was fascinating. You can talk 0:42:57.160 --> 0:42:59.759 longer just about like the period of be ingregiously rich. 0:43:00.000 --> 0:43:01.960 I'm talking about there's so much more. Thank you so 0:43:02.120 --> 0:43:04.160 much for coming on, Odd Lodge. I thought there shows 0:43:04.200 --> 0:43:07.680 like a real treat and some like extremely interesting perspective 0:43:08.040 --> 0:43:10.400 on the Internet and what's happening now in market. So 0:43:25.400 --> 0:43:28.000 that was fantastic. I love that. I love that conversation. 0:43:28.120 --> 0:43:30.239 There were so many interesting things, you know. I was 0:43:30.280 --> 0:43:34.919 just looking at the Globes chart, you know, which was crazy. Yeah, 0:43:35.040 --> 0:43:36.800 but it's crazy that you can still actually call that 0:43:36.920 --> 0:43:39.480 up because I think it turned into so if you 0:43:39.560 --> 0:43:41.319 have a terminal, you can look at the Globe dot com. 0:43:41.360 --> 0:43:43.359 I think it turned into like a shell company. Yeah, 0:43:43.480 --> 0:43:45.200 and I think they were like doing voipe stuff for 0:43:45.239 --> 0:43:47.919 a while. But what's crazy, And Jim Channo has talked 0:43:47.920 --> 0:43:50.160 about this in a recent episode, like how tiny it 0:43:50.320 --> 0:43:52.239 was because like you know, he had his beak, it 0:43:52.360 --> 0:43:55.200 was like a hundred million. The company itself never was 0:43:55.280 --> 0:43:57.800 worth a billion. And then of course last year with 0:43:57.960 --> 0:44:00.920 like the Spacks, we'd have these like fort intollar companies 0:44:00.960 --> 0:44:03.040 that didn't do it. It's crazy how small the numbers. 0:44:03.440 --> 0:44:05.840 The other thing that struck me about that conversation was 0:44:06.200 --> 0:44:09.600 when he was talking about get big fast, Yeah, and 0:44:10.000 --> 0:44:13.240 it does feel like a lot of startups have internalized 0:44:13.600 --> 0:44:16.399 that motto and you kind of wonder if it's ever 0:44:16.680 --> 0:44:19.239 going to go away, or if like just raising as 0:44:19.320 --> 0:44:21.520 much money as you can to get market share as 0:44:21.600 --> 0:44:24.680 quickly as possible expand as quickly as possible if that's 0:44:24.760 --> 0:44:27.400 just the standard forever and the market injuries and through 0:44:27.480 --> 0:44:30.239 line the fact that start that model like started Netscape 0:44:30.280 --> 0:44:33.560 and now purveys through entrees and Horowitz. It's really interesting 0:44:33.840 --> 0:44:37.040 also that the not just the get big fast, but 0:44:37.200 --> 0:44:40.359 the cycle and how the late players entered the game 0:44:40.440 --> 0:44:43.200 have to spend even more and so it creates this race. 0:44:43.680 --> 0:44:46.600 And then to hear him describe how an early two thousand, 0:44:46.960 --> 0:44:48.880 the sort of like hamster wheel is on, it's like 0:44:49.160 --> 0:44:51.560 we can't We're spending so much money and it's just 0:44:51.719 --> 0:44:54.919 like the marginal value of those acquisition dollars or growing 0:44:55.000 --> 0:44:58.279 traffic starts to decline. Like I think serious lessons for 0:44:58.400 --> 0:45:00.920 like thinking about things that upen during this second but 0:45:01.080 --> 0:45:04.600 also the realization that he described about having to bring 0:45:04.640 --> 0:45:07.360 in a new CEO and someone who could actually instill 0:45:07.360 --> 0:45:09.560 a capital discipline and maybe have like a bit more 0:45:09.560 --> 0:45:12.440 of a strategy around finances, because it feels like with 0:45:12.520 --> 0:45:15.279 a lot of these startups by you know, I don't 0:45:15.280 --> 0:45:16.960 want to call him a tech bro, but you know, 0:45:17.160 --> 0:45:22.480 technology brother, technology brother, it feels like technology brother and sisters. 0:45:22.800 --> 0:45:27.640 It feels like what you need to start something up successfully. Sorry, 0:45:28.040 --> 0:45:31.840 in a garage and like developed new technology may not 0:45:32.080 --> 0:45:34.520 be exactly what you need to run a multi billion 0:45:34.560 --> 0:45:37.200 dollar company, right, Yeah, No, it's so much stuff. I 0:45:37.320 --> 0:45:40.520 love that. We gotta have him back. Yeah, all right, 0:45:40.560 --> 0:45:42.239 should we leave it that? Let's leave it there. Okay. 0:45:42.400 --> 0:45:45.280 This has been another episode of the All Thoughts podcast. 0:45:45.400 --> 0:45:47.680 I'm Tracy Alloway. You can follow me on Twitter at 0:45:47.719 --> 0:45:50.680 Tracy Alloway. And I'm Joe Wisenthal. You can follow me 0:45:50.920 --> 0:45:54.800 on Twitter at the Stalwart. Follow our guests Defawn Pattern 0:45:55.160 --> 0:45:58.120 on Twitter, He's at Stefan Pattern, and check out his 0:45:58.200 --> 0:46:01.240 book All About This, a very public offering the story 0:46:01.360 --> 0:46:04.600 of the Globe dot Com in the first Internet Revolution. 0:46:05.080 --> 0:46:09.080 Follow our producer Carmen Rodriguez at Carmen Arman, and check 0:46:09.120 --> 0:46:11.920 out all of our podcasts at Bloomberg under the handle 0:46:12.239 --> 0:46:13.960 at podcasts. Thanks for listening.