9 Killer Business Ideas The Internet Hasn't Caught Up To in 2026

0:00 All right, Steph Smith's here.

0:01 Steph is back and your whole thing is finding up and cominging trends.

0:05 I call them gold mines.

0:07 Some people just come back and show you a little piece of gold.

0:09 Steph shows you where the mine is.

0:11 We all run into these generation defining stats throughout

0:13 our lives and most of us are just like,

0:15 "Oh, that's cool." And so I compiled 100 plus of these.

0:18 There's so many here.

0:19 I love this one.

0:20 Breakup cake.

0:21 Nerd Neck.

0:22 The Dyson mask.

0:23 A search algorithm that was inspired by ants.

0:26 I need to write this down.

0:27 If you want to go down the rabbit hole,

0:30 I think there's a there's a growing business here.

0:43 We use this phrase one chart businesses because you

0:46 just see this chart and it like you said,

0:48 well there that thing's obvious just get into that industry.

0:50 You have one here.

0:51 You said in the uh in United States,

0:53 the US Bureau of Labor Statistics predicts that nursing

0:56 will be the fastest growing occupation between 2020 in 2030,

1:02 growing in number by 275,000 uh jobs.

1:06 That's insane.

1:07 That's insane.

1:08 Talk to me about this nursing thing.

1:10 Yeah.

1:10 Well, I mean again, it's like a pretty clear trend

1:13 that comes with a bunch of people getting getting older.

1:16 Like everyone's talking about AI and that's great.

1:19 Um but what about the billions of people around the globe that are

1:22 you know 65 plus that are just going to need physical human support.

1:27 So nursing is one area.

1:29 Also the the rest of that stat talks about in Japan

1:31 the number of nursing homes has risen nearly 50% over the last decade.

1:35 And Japan is interesting because it's kind of like this early case study where

1:40 they've hit this silver tsunami a little

1:42 earlier than uh a lot of other countries.

1:45 Why Japan?

1:46 I think they just hit the declining

1:48 birth rate earlier than many other countries.

1:51 And so, you know, another interesting, you could say it opportunity,

1:55 maybe just an interesting thing for individuals to explore.

1:58 But because Japan hit the like silver tsunami a little earlier,

2:02 they have this interesting thing where they're giving

2:05 away free houses or super cheap houses, sometimes free.

2:08 They're called a K I Y A.

2:11 I was in Japan this summer and we did a walking tour and they

2:15 took us around and they were showing us these houses and they're like,

2:17 "See this house?" And it was like in the middle of Osaka.

2:20 It was a little rundown for sure, but they were like,

2:22 "This this house is free." And we were like,

2:25 "What do you what do you mean?" But because there's so

2:28 many of these people who have grown old unfortunately passed away

2:34 and then there's also some social aspects of the aas where

2:38 in some cases not all because Japanese people really care about status.

2:42 If let's say they grew up in a poor neighborhood,

2:45 their parents passed away and then they've moved

2:47 into you know a different social strata they don't

2:50 want to claim the house because they're like

2:52 I don't want to be associated with that neighborhood.

2:55 And there's over there's tons of articles on this over 8 million AKAS

2:59 that are being given away by the government

3:01 um or again sometimes for very cheap.

3:04 So well have you heard the uh the theory about Osaka

3:08 and how a lot of people are lying about their age.

3:11 Oh yeah, the Blue Zones and how Yeah, there's a book called The Blue Zones.

3:15 And basically like I read it 10 years ago or something and I

3:19 was like this is my Bible for like living a long healthy life.

3:23 But the idea is that someone studied Osaka's population

3:27 and they found that too many people claim to have

3:30 the same birth date in Osaka to the point

3:33 where the only way that this could be possibly true

3:35 is if many of them committed fraud in order

3:38 to say that they are of a certain age so

3:40 they can start receiving social security and other like

3:43 benefits that you get when you hit a certain age.

3:45 And so it potentially puts a lot of like this idea of we

3:50 study this particular population for old health or you know old people and like

3:54 looking at like wow they're so healthy when they're just liars and they're

3:57 actually a lot younger they're a lot

3:59 younger potentially than they've said they are.

4:01 What are some other stats about this?

4:02 I love I love talking to you because you just have like

4:06 you actually have the data and the stats instead of just like guessing.

4:10 Um, okay.

4:10 So, we didn't really drill down as much on the I mean,

4:13 you talked about nursing homes and assisted living.

4:15 So, let me give you one more from um Numlock,

4:18 which by the way is a great newsletter.

4:19 Walt Hickey runs it and um people I feel like MFM listeners would love it.

4:24 It's great cuz you talk about these one chart businesses.

4:26 I've done a thread on something similar and I call them digits,

4:29 but he calls them just numbers, right?

4:31 So basically every single day actually he sends a newsletter of maybe five

4:36 or so different just small paragraphs

4:39 and each paragraph has just like one statistic.

4:41 And I like his because some of them are really important like you know

4:45 the silver tsunami and how that's going

4:47 to impact things much greater than ourselves.

4:49 But then sometimes it's like there's this random gerbil that it

4:53 has infested homes in South Carolina or something like that.

4:56 This is awesome.

4:58 Yeah.

4:58 um he sent this paragraph about assisted living.

5:02 So let me just read this out.

5:03 This is directly from NumLock.

5:04 From 2004 to 2021, the median annual price of assisted living

5:09 increased 31% faster than inflation and has hit $54,000 per year.

5:15 This is the crazy stat to me.

5:16 There are 31,000 assisted living facilities in the United States.

5:21 Four out of every five are run as forprofits and half of all the operators

5:25 in the industry are clearing annual returns

5:27 of 20% or more than it costs to operate.

5:31 With 850,000 older Americans living within assisted living,

5:35 the rents are getting jacked up.

5:37 So, I don't actually know how assisted living businesses are valued.

5:42 Like is it considered like a real estate valuation where it's just like a a way

5:46 to finance or pay for real estate

5:49 or is it considered like a proper operating business?

5:51 Like I guess you know how like hotels are classified as real estate.

5:54 I I would assume that's the that's the case of which 20% is is fantastic.

5:59 If 20% were operating profit on a on a proper like uh like internet business,

6:05 that's not that great.

6:06 But if it's on real estate, that's really great.

6:07 However, when I read this, I think, "Yeah, that's lucrative.

6:12 I don't want to operate this.

6:14 This sounds like the worst thing ever.

6:15 You'd have a funeral a day.

6:17 I would love to invest in a nursing home fund,

6:20 but I would not want to operate a nursing home."

6:22 Well, what I'll say is I mean,

6:24 my I have parents that are getting older and there's

6:26 also tons of assisted living for not just elderly, right?

6:29 People with mental illness or who need other support.

6:31 And I think what I've seen from like exploring

6:35 the space anecdotally is that most of the options really

6:38 suck as in like you you don't really feel great

6:42 about sending your parent or loved one to these places.

6:45 And so I I haven't explored this deeply enough.

6:48 This might exist.

6:49 So if if folks are listening and and they

6:51 know of this, I would love to hear about it.

6:53 But like imagine the the premium version of assisted living

6:57 where you feel really really good about sending your grandparent,

7:00 your mom, your sister, whatever it is to one of these places.

7:04 And obviously the you know the price would have to go way up.

7:07 Um but people are already like this stat is

7:09 saying they're spending $54,000 per year as the average.

7:14 And so you know for the wealthy like wouldn't you pay five

7:17 times that to send your loved one to something a lot better?

7:22 Yeah.

7:22 And I think people do like I I know people who have

7:25 people in nursing homes and they spend 20 or $30,000 a month.

7:29 It's insane.

7:31 It It's absolutely insane.

7:34 Okay, so you're 8 minutes into this episode and you

7:37 already can tell that Steph's

7:38 superpower is spotting generational defining trends.

7:41 She has spent hours pulling the most surprising under the radar stats

7:46 and data all for the purpose of basically uncovering interesting business ideas.

7:50 She's put it all together in a thing called the digits database.

7:53 And for you guys, the MFM audience, she has decided to give it away for free.

7:58 And so if you want it, just click the link below in the description and grab it.

8:01 All right, back to the show.

8:08 What do you guys want to do next?

8:10 Uh, let's do the sports one.

8:11 What's the sports data thing?

8:12 Okay, so there's this website that aggregates a bunch of reports on sports,

8:18 which obviously people love.

8:20 Americans love sports.

8:21 So they have like a state of pickle ball report,

8:24 uh, state of the industry report.

8:25 I want you guys to guess what the fastest growing sports are.

8:28 The 25 fastest growing sports according to this SFIA research,

8:34 which is the sports and fitness industry association.

8:37 What do you guys think were the top fastest growing sports in America?

8:42 I already opened it and I could tell you I wouldn't have guessed one of them.

8:46 I already opened it as well, so the game is over.

8:49 Uh, but I would have said pickle ball

8:51 and and I would have said that game paddle.

8:53 Isn't there like another game that's just like pickle ball?

8:55 Uh, that's what I would have guessed.

8:56 It does seem like pickle ball is number one,

8:58 but number two I would have never guessed.

9:00 Alpine Touring.

9:01 I don't even know what that really is.

9:02 I think it's just like off off skiing.

9:06 Um, and then I have never heard of what is winter fat biking.

9:11 It's awesome is what it is.

9:13 It's like sounds like something I need to research.

9:17 Have these fat tire bikes are are really popular right now.

9:21 So, it's basically a bike with a just a really fat tire is what it is.

9:25 And they they are they're sick looking.

9:27 But is this a sport?

9:29 Yeah, it's just mountain bike riding, but the tire is particularly fat.

9:33 It that's all it is.

9:35 You know, we what do we say?

9:36 We like big and small things.

9:37 Imagine a bicycle that could drive on a beach.

9:40 Got it.

9:40 Number four, offc course golf.

9:42 Interesting.

9:44 And then number seven is trail running.

9:45 I could definitely see that.

9:47 That is the I I've get so many videos on my Instagram of trail running.

9:51 Dude, I was at a dinner and somebody said something as a joke

9:55 and I put up my finger to my lips and I said,

9:58 "Sh, I need to write this down because it was an incredible idea." The guy goes,

10:03 "You put his you put your finger on his lips."

10:06 And then my own lips bash back and forth.

10:09 And um I was like, "Say no more.

10:12 I need to don't I don't want to lose this idea.

10:13 Let me write this down." He said something.

10:15 He goes, "Yeah, I do the um the suburban triathlon." And I go,

10:20 "What?" And he goes, "Yeah, the suburban triathlon.

10:25 um you you walk a you walk a half mile, you to this bar,

10:30 you drink two beers, and then you go play nine holes of golf.

10:34 And I was like, what?

10:35 He's like, yeah, it's the suburb I forgot

10:37 he said suburban Iron Man or the Suburban Triathlon.

10:40 And I was like, this has legs.

10:42 And I I really think that if somebody

10:45 created some kind of um thing for, you know,

10:48 out of shape middle-aged guys to do, they'll do it.

10:53 And I think if you make it if you brand it almost like as the uh the nonfit

10:58 person triathlon and it's got to have like some

11:01 version of eating and drinking being one of the legs.

11:04 Dude, that's the ne next tough mutter.

11:06 I think that could be a massive a massive trend that people start doing.

11:10 This is this is definitely something that I I think would appeal to people.

11:14 What do you guys think?

11:15 Yeah.

11:16 Yeah.

11:16 And that's beautiful branding.

11:19 It's the brand.

11:19 We're working backwards from the brand.

11:21 We really don't even know actually what goes underneath.

11:23 It's just the the idea of the suburban triathlon.

11:26 It's like you bike to the grocery store,

11:28 you chug a beer, and then you like I don't know,

11:31 run an errand, and that's the suburban triathlon,

11:33 and you got to do it on Saturday mornings.

11:39 Next, gold mine.

11:40 So, I love this one.

11:42 Our world in data.

11:44 So, people have maybe heard of this website.

11:46 It's a website that tries to aggregate data that is

11:50 a reflection of of what's really happening in the world.

11:53 So, it includes things like data on poverty.

11:55 It includes really niche things like I found

11:57 I went through the website and there was

11:59 a graph that related to the day of the year

12:02 with peak cherry tree blossoms in Kyoto, right?

12:05 Like so random, but they're collecting data on this.

12:08 And I checked this website a few years ago and I

12:11 want to say there was maybe 200 graphs on here.

12:15 And if you go to their rworldanddata.org/charts page,

12:20 I want to say there's thousands of different data points.

12:24 Now, I just clicked on one.

12:25 It's adjusted net savings per capita from 1970 to 2020.

12:30 And you can see like how much per capita a variety of countries are saving.

12:35 So like it's just like literally thousands of like different charts.

12:39 You know, Sean talks about these like one chart businesses.

12:41 One of them is this uh population of the world distribution.

12:46 So basically this is a chart that is looking at how many of all

12:50 the people in the world how many are young right now meaning under 15.

12:54 How many are working age 15 to 65 and how many are elderly 65 plus.

13:01 And the shocking thing about this chart this is a one chart.

13:03 This is a one chart business right here which is the elderly curve goes

13:08 from today right like kind of like

13:09 the 2020 early 2020s where it's under 1 billion.

13:12 It's by far the smallest line to it's going to cross over the young population

13:17 and be at you know by the end of the where this has it projected 2.5 billion.

13:22 And so that's the biggest grower.

13:23 The working the working age one kind of flattens out.

13:27 The young one kind of goes down and the elderly one has this huge spike.

13:31 And so if you're building anything that's in the elder care

13:35 that you're going to own for let's say 10 20 years,

13:38 you have this immense tailwind behind you which

13:40 is just that the population of people who fit,

13:42 you know, the customer base is going to grow dramatically.

13:46 We're going to go from under 1 billion people to over

13:48 2 and a.5 billion people that are in that market.

13:51 And so that's a it's you know a case to say you know if you

13:54 go there let's say let's say it's like real estate like if you owned senior

13:57 living facilities or something like that you would

13:59 be able to just benefit from the fact

14:02 that oh occupancy is going to go up over time in this in this way.

14:04 Now of course technology may may completely upend

14:08 things and AI and all that but it

14:10 you could see these like huge trends that are going to be very hard to reverse.

14:14 So it's hard to imagine a scenario

14:16 that we we change the direction of these lines.

14:18 It would take like a whole societal shift,

14:20 population level shift to change where these lines are going.

14:24 There's so many here.

14:25 Which ones stick out to you, Steph?

14:27 So, I just linked another one that I

14:29 think again is this like one chart business.

14:32 This one's hard to get involved with, but I

14:34 think it's it it's the lithium production.

14:36 If you pull that up, I just linked it in the documents.

14:39 And you can see that lithium production,

14:42 which obviously is the core ingredient in many of our batteries,

14:46 is concentrated in just a few countries.

14:49 A lot of it's in China.

14:51 A lot of it's in a few countries in South America.

14:53 That's another example of just as you're

14:56 browsing through a bunch of these these charts, I think that one jumps out.

15:00 But the one I wanted to dive into in depth is air pollution.

15:03 So, if you click the the the stat uh in here in our document

15:09 that says air pollution is one of the world's leading risk factors for death,

15:14 which maybe is obvious to some people, but to me when I think about it's like

15:18 what are what are the key causes of death?

15:19 What am I afraid of?

15:21 Air pollution is not at the top of that list.

15:25 However, um I also stumbled upon Patrick Collison's pollution page.

15:30 He's got a bunch of cool pages on his website.

15:32 He's got a page with just a bunch of questions.

15:34 Uh, one of them's on pollution and he says

15:36 that the World Bank indicates that 3.7 billion people,

15:41 so about half the world's population,

15:43 are exposed to this metric of PM 2.5 that that has

15:48 to do with like the size of particles in the air.

15:51 They're exposed to around five times the the unit of measure

15:54 that he correlates with a bunch of things which include lower GDP.

15:58 It includes stock market returns being lower,

16:01 people making worse decisions like chess players making mistakes,

16:05 politicians using less less complex speech.

16:07 So those are just, you know, some fun facts,

16:09 but I think what's what's really important

16:12 is obviously the the health side of things.

16:14 And there's another stat um that I'll just quickly share which

16:17 is uh from a newsletter called charter which says that India's capital

16:22 this was recently breached the 450 mark on the air quality index

16:26 over four times the healthy level and basically they're in this hazardous

16:31 zone which is akin to smoking 25 to 30 cigarettes a day

16:36 and obviously that is an outlier but I wanted to call

16:39 this out because I think air quality is something that is

16:42 a problem in a lot of places clearly um some more than others,

16:46 but it's something that I think people are going to be caring about a lot more.

16:49 And maybe one one product that came out in the last year or so that's

16:52 indicative of that that a lot of people

16:54 made fun of was the Dyson mask headphones.

16:58 So, I'll I'll stop there.

16:59 What What What were those?

17:00 Yeah, I never saw those.

17:02 They are headphones that have a uh basically

17:06 a a mask a air purifier attached to them.

17:09 Wow.

17:10 And they're expensive.

17:11 They're $1,000, I think.

17:12 Right.

17:13 They are $700 from what I can see.

17:16 And what this came out and people just made fun of him.

17:18 Well, if you if you Google images,

17:20 it's like a white guy in like the New York subway wearing it.

17:24 You know what I mean?

17:25 Like it's a little off on cuz you're

17:28 talking about India and uh a few other countries,

17:32 not maybe the New York subway.

17:34 So, it's kind of like a it's kind of like a misleading ad they have.

17:37 But that's pretty fascinating.

17:39 Is this Are these taking off?

17:40 No, I think they're in that zone of a lot of people making fun of them.

17:44 However, the reason I'm calling this out is because

17:46 I think there is this understanding that, you know, it's just in New Delhi.

17:51 It's not, you know, anywhere close to home.

17:53 But I think, have you guys ever used like a an air

17:57 quality index um measurer in your home or like a CO2 monitor?

18:01 Yeah, I have multiple times.

18:02 And I bought like these air purifier things that also measure the air

18:06 quality in my house and I have them and it's like shocking whenever

18:10 it'll like it basically turns red and it's like oh god there's something

18:14 going on you know what we need to air this place out or whatever.

18:17 Yeah.

18:17 Yeah.

18:17 Yeah.

18:17 So, I mean, air quality changes over time and I don't know.

18:19 I've been noticing more even in San Francisco a few days where people are like,

18:23 "Oh, I'm I'm wearing a mask at work, not because of COVID,

18:25 but because like, oh gosh,

18:26 like I have you checked the air quality?"

18:28 And a lot of people aren't doing this still today, but I think that'll change.

18:32 And I think if you use some of these, like the CO2 monitor,

18:35 for example, you literally, like,

18:37 if you go to bed with your door closed and you wake up and you check that thing,

18:40 it is wild um how high it is.

18:43 and you know all you need to do is open

18:45 a window or you know circulate the air in your home.

18:47 But I think as the stuff um I guess is people are more educated on it.

18:52 I think some of these devices like the air quality

18:55 uh monitors are going to take off and you can

18:58 see some of this data in Jungle Scout as well

19:00 of just like the kinds of products that people are buying.

19:03 Do you see uh did you see anything in Jungle Scout that stood out?

19:05 any product that's Okay, so there's one product which is uh has

19:09 to do with uh an AC furnace and an air filter.

19:14 Um but guess how much this thing sells every single month.

19:19 What is it?

19:19 It's an AC furnace air filter and an air quality monitor.

19:24 So I'm seeing four entries in Jungle Scout and um they are 17 million,

19:29 12 million, 8 million, and 8 million.

19:31 So what is that all total?

19:33 That's like over 40 million per month.

19:38 This is this is what Jungle Scout is saying.

19:39 So, you know, take it with a grain of salt.

19:41 I'm not sure how they measure, but they tend to be pretty accurate.

19:44 And so, that's an example of I think as people

19:48 again like try to understand the air quality around them.

19:52 I think there's a there's a growing business here.

19:54 I feel like one missing gap with air quality

19:58 readings and devices and all that is it's not obvious.

20:01 as in I feel like most people would be surprised to be like,

20:04 "Oh my gosh, I inhale all this stuff and it has these adverse effects and it's,

20:07 you know, it ranks here on, you know,

20:10 the the likelihood of of death, but it's not obvious.

20:13 It's not in your face like let's say like the GLP1s.

20:17 People see themselves every day and they're constantly trying

20:19 to improve their image and how other people interpret them.

20:22 So, I think maybe one thing that if if someone was going to go figure this out,

20:26 you guys have talked about um the the water filters.

20:30 People go into your home and like they say like,

20:33 "Did you know like you're drinking like this much of of like

20:37 basically like rocks and other sediment and lead in your your water,

20:40 can you believe it?" And they show you.

20:42 And so I feel like there's an element of that where as it's going

20:46 to take a while for people to really care about the air quality stuff,

20:49 but there may be some middle ground where some

20:51 company is able to effectively give people that aha.

20:54 Yeah, I I would put it differently.

20:55 I don't think it's going to take a while.

20:57 I think it's going to take a marketer for people to care.

21:00 It's just going to take a marketer and a product design that puts it

21:02 in your face and that educates you about this and kind of scares you about it,

21:06 but then says, "Don't worry, there's a solution." Yeah.

21:08 And that's how a lot of things get done is, you know,

21:11 a great marketer or product designer figures out the way to put it in your face.

21:19 I spend way too much time online.

21:21 Um, I think a lot of people do, too.

21:22 So, I've got a bad case, hopefully improving case of nerd neck.

21:26 Some people call it forward uh head posture.

21:29 Um, but basically, it's just cuz we're we're

21:30 hunched over at a computer all day long.

21:34 And I haven't done a ton here at like I'm

21:36 kind of on the like very early part of this curve,

21:39 but I have played around with I'm not using it right now.

21:42 Hold it up.

21:43 There's this thing I I don't know if I vouch for it or not yet,

21:46 but this thing called betterback I'm looking at it.

21:49 I think any any time that you have to use one of these devices,

21:53 I tend to get nervous that it's legit.

21:55 But go ahead.

21:56 What is it?

21:56 Well, that's why I don't know.

21:58 So, it has helped me sit up more.

22:00 basically like it runs around your knees and your back

22:02 and I like it better than some thing.

22:04 There's things you you can put on your back that like

22:06 zap you and stuff and I feel like that's really unnatural.

22:09 But this actually just because it's like fixated around your knees.

22:13 You just sit up straighter.

22:15 So for for those listening,

22:16 it's basically like a strap that when you're sitting down,

22:20 it wraps around your back and then attaches to your knees.

22:23 And in doing that, it kind of forces you to sit up.

22:27 Yeah.

22:27 Exactly.

22:28 There's other um for the women, the your four female listeners,

22:31 there's a sports bra that I haven't tried yet called form,

22:35 which apparently like folks like Taylor Swift have used.

22:38 If you look at her posture a decade ago, it was way way worse.

22:41 So there like there's a small part

22:42 of me that believes that something like that works.

22:44 Can I use this?

22:48 You can.

22:49 Like you're telling me just like this like shirt that I mean for me

22:53 it would be a shirt that's going to make me have better posture.

22:56 What is this thing?

22:57 I haven't tried it, but um it's it's

22:59 a sports bra that people vouch helps your posture,

23:02 but I think generally, as I've explored this a little bit,

23:06 it is a function of your muscle, right?

23:10 Like if you have strength in your abdomen and your back,

23:14 like you're going to sit up straighter.

23:16 But there's a video I shared, we can include all this in the show notes.

23:19 This is actually just like an email I sent or I'm

23:21 going to send to the Internet Pipes crew this month,

23:23 but like it's um a video from Brian Johnson around his posture.

23:28 He worked with a posture coach for several months.

23:30 And then Tim Ferrris has recommended something called the ego skew method,

23:35 which I have not tried.

23:36 Um and what's this Brian Johnson video?

23:39 What how do I just make my posture better?

23:42 There's three different exercises that he does every single day

23:45 and he shares them in this video um that improved his posture.

23:50 And what's this ego ego escu?

23:53 It's a method that I think you need

23:55 to like work with a practitioner for, which is

23:56 why again I'm not um I don't I don't think I'm vouching for this in any way,

24:01 but it's just something that came up.

24:03 Dude, there's this great uh TED talk that you should watch it.

24:07 Why sitting down destroys you.

24:09 I think it's by Roger uh Frampton.

24:12 I believe that's the one.

24:14 Uh but it's a a TED talk that has millions of views.

24:16 And he basically goes through this idea of how he

24:21 worked I I think he worked in in the Amazon.

24:24 He worked with some like indigenous tribe where they didn't have

24:26 a they didn't use like a lot of chairs or something like that.

24:30 And what he found was that basically the people who in in today's age,

24:34 we don't really do this, but we used to where if you stand a lot,

24:38 you squeeze your ass.

24:39 Like imagine you got a you got a little penny in your butt

24:42 cheeks that you're trying to keep from falling down on the ground.

24:44 That's basically what you do.

24:45 You like squeeze your butt together when you're standing.

24:48 And there's a reason why our glutes typically tend to be our largest muscle.

24:53 It's because we were supposed to use them a lot

24:55 and how we don't really use them too much anymore.

24:57 And so instead when we stand we kind of uh lean forward.

25:00 And he was like no you should actually when you stand he was like

25:04 a lot of babies actually if you watch like a kid you'll notice they

25:07 they they do a good job at this but you squeeze your butt together

25:11 and and and and you flex your abs as opposed to just falling forward.

25:16 And if you work on it you can actually hold

25:18 that for like a fairly long time when you're standing.

25:21 And that's the proper way to stand.

25:23 And so it's not just sitting that will destroy you, but standing uh incorrectly.

25:28 Yeah, totally.

25:29 Well, even in the video I did watch with Brian Johnson,

25:31 he was talking about how most people when they think they want good posture,

25:34 they like tilt their head back and that's bad as well.

25:38 Like they're kind of like, "Oh,

25:39 I have good posture like this." And you really want to be

25:41 more like head your the back of your neck should be absolutely straight.

25:45 So, uh, what's this, um, ask nature thing?

25:54 So, if people want to go down the rabbit

25:57 hole of exploring kind of not just like, let me go look at pictures of animals,

26:02 but understanding like how do animals produce color?

26:06 What are the examples of technology being inspired by natural design,

26:11 for example, like a search algorithm that was inspired by ants?

26:15 This is so fascinating.

26:17 So, Ask Nature has this um they have

26:21 this like there's all stuff you can click on.

26:22 So, there's one about the African darter.

26:26 Apparently, that's a type of bird and it

26:28 has a very special feather that is incredibly waterresistant.

26:34 And then it tells you like different applications that this potential

26:37 feather or like inspiration of this feather could have.

26:42 And it talks about like the strategy of how

26:44 it works and like the potential for copying this feather.

26:48 This is amazing.

26:49 How did you find this website?

26:50 This is really cool.

26:52 So someone shared it within internet pipes.

26:54 We have this survey whenever people join

26:56 which just asks like what's your favorite tool?

26:58 A lot of it ends up being what you expect chatbt huffs etc.

27:02 But there are a bunch of gems that come through like this.

27:05 And so by the way is internet pipes.

27:07 It's literally just tons of different resources for finding these things.

27:12 So what the product started as it was I hate

27:15 the term course but it was a course that existed to say a book.

27:19 It was a book.

27:20 It was a book.

27:21 It exists in notion and there's videos and there's text and now

27:24 there's a community and now there's things databases like the digits database.

27:28 But the origin was okay.

27:30 The most common question I get asked is,

27:32 you find all this cool stuff online, how do you find it?

27:34 And so, Internet Pipes was showing people how

27:38 to find this information through a series of tools.

27:42 And that's why it's called Pipes, right?

27:43 It's like, use this tool to make sense of all

27:46 of all of the purchase that purchases that are happening on Amazon,

27:49 all of the pages that exist on Wikipedia,

27:52 all of the searches that are happening on Google.

27:55 And, you know, you go down the line, this data exists.

27:58 And by the way, we're at a unique period where like it didn't quite

28:01 exist 15 years ago and 15 years from now probably everyone will know it exists.

28:06 And so it's like this internet pipes is a course, a book,

28:10 whatever you want to call it to learn how to do that.

28:13 And you've made a lot of money off of it so far, haven't you?

28:18 Yes.

28:18 That's pretty dope.

28:18 When you answer just yes, that means I'm not going to ask how much.

28:22 Six figures.

28:22 There's a pretty wide range of, you know, does the six figure include the 0?

28:28 So, it could really be like $1,000.

28:31 It's eight figures.

28:32 Now, got it.

28:36 This is a really, really cool website.

28:38 I could spend hours just looking at this.

28:39 Like, there's an article about like camels fur and how uh

28:44 it keeps people cool or it keeps camels cool in the desert,

28:47 but also warm at night.

28:49 And why that particular type of fur is special for this.

28:52 The reason it's kind of interesting is like

28:54 the the two that I've named are clothing related,

28:56 but like if you had a clothing related brand,

28:58 like some type of like it's stealing the story for you.

29:01 Like it's like or not stealing, it's giving you the hook.

29:05 Exactly.

29:05 Exactly.

29:06 And by the way, like people in our world in business

29:09 tech are always talking about the like lindyness of something.

29:13 How long has something existed for?

29:15 And it's like you are learning from millions of years of evolution, right?

29:20 um of these these animals that have become purely optimized for this purpose.

29:26 And to your point, I think like the marketer and both of us

29:28 is like what could you know what products could you make off of this?

29:32 Like there's one like the otter where it's like

29:34 it keeps it keeps heat in and cold water out.

29:36 So Otter and I'm sure every single wet suit company

29:39 has like stolen this marketing for their branding or whatever,

29:42 but like so it's like really fascinating.

29:44 Sorry.

29:44 Go ahead.

29:45 Well, did you ever see you know Mischief, right?

29:48 Mischief the brand.

29:49 Shiff is uh the company like weird projects like they did like

29:54 a a blood shoe for with Lil NasX or something like that.

30:00 Yeah.

30:00 Yeah.

30:00 So they've they've done a ton of shoe collabs.

30:03 They did one I think it was I don't remember if it was

30:06 with Jimmy Kimmel or they just announced it but it was called the Gob Stomper.

30:10 Did you ever see this?

30:11 No.

30:12 It's Jimmy Kimmel still a celebrity that one wants to collab with?

30:16 I didn't realize he was like booing.

30:18 I don't know.

30:19 Maybe it was Maybe they just announced it there.

30:21 Um, but these gobstomper uh sneakers that Mischief created,

30:27 I thought they were kind of cool.

30:28 They basically the bottom uh foundation of the of the sneaker

30:34 comes gray at first and then as you wear it more,

30:38 basically like as your shoe wears away, it looks like a gobstopper.

30:43 And it was just like which is the candy that you suck

30:45 on and each shell layer of shell it turns colors.

30:48 Okay, cool.

30:49 Yeah, exactly.

30:50 And so my like you might think this is the silliest idea ever,

30:53 but when I went to the Gopagos and I saw

30:56 these redfooted and these blue-footed boobies, and by the way,

31:00 fun fact for the listeners, the reason that these um that these birds have

31:06 different colored feet is because of what they eat,

31:08 which I just thought was like so strange and interesting.

31:11 But imagine a sneaker brand that was, again, stick with me here.

31:17 This might be a really awful idea that's related to health in some way.

31:21 So like, let's say you're wearing a CGM and on your shoes,

31:25 your shoes change color in some way based on how like

31:31 if you're in range or some other metric that you care about.

31:34 But basically, you're able to signal something

31:37 in a way that changes through your feet.

31:40 Like that awful idea.

31:42 Well, it could be like if you know,

31:43 we could we could we could show you're fertile or something.

31:46 It's like those parties, right, where you wear like what are they called?

31:49 The stoplight parties where you wear red, yellow, red, or green.

31:53 That's pretty.

31:53 So, we could stop light shoes.

31:55 Maybe that's a better version of the idea.

32:02 Okay, let's do a quick one,

32:03 which is I actually saw this in the trends newsletter a while ago.

32:06 I didn't write this, but it was this stat,

32:08 which is the average person spends $15,000 after a breakup.

32:12 I have no idea where this stat came from, but definitely got

32:17 the wheels spinning and they came up with a bunch of different ideas,

32:20 which I think actually are getting some traction.

32:22 Divorce party ideas is something that gets search volume.

32:25 Breakup cake.

32:27 um people throwing their own breakup parties and I was just like,

32:30 "Huh, I don't know if there's,

32:32 you know, specific brands that are taking this on, but I was like,

32:35 "Huh, that that's $15,000.

32:38 Don't know where it came from, but there's something there."

32:41 That's like if I'm if I'm FJerry, you know, that like Instagram account,

32:44 and they have these like they built a kind of like a little media empire.

32:47 They have a bunch of other accounts, but they also have products they make.

32:49 Like they made that that card game.

32:50 I think they they make some products.

32:52 Now, if I was if I was one of those accounts, I would be jumping on this.

32:56 I would basically say, "All right, it's already viral.

32:58 It's me worthy.

32:59 It's it's remarkable.

33:01 People are going to talk about this.

33:02 So, how do I make, you know,

33:03 like the best breakup cake delivery service or like um you know, like

33:09 uh the the revenge body kit?" And it's like, you know,

33:11 we send you this like the 7-day detox um

33:14 where you we send you like a healing crystal,

33:16 we send you like a ju juice cleanse and whatever else to like, you know,

33:20 get that person out of your out of your life,

33:22 you know, get the bad juju, you know, away.

33:24 And I'd be like, you know, this is called Bad Guju or whatever.

33:26 And I would just try to create like a viral product through that.

33:29 Um because I think it's on brand and I think it has

33:33 like enough demand where there's you could see this doing, you know,

33:36 2 to10 million a year all organically just because the product is so viral.

33:42 You know, it's probably not going to be enormous,

33:44 but there's a there's enough of a niche there,

33:45 especially if you're one of these accounts because you already got distribution.

33:48 Um or you're somebody who goes

33:49 to those accounts and partners with them and says,

33:51 "Hey, I got the right product for you guys.

33:53 let's do, you know, some kind of profit share and uh I'll run

33:56 this business and you guys just help me promote this like, you know,

33:59 uh whatever, like the breakup vodka and it's like, you know,

34:02 this is the breakup vodka kit or whatever, you know, whatever the thing is.

34:06 Yeah.

34:06 I mean, I'm imagining, you know, all the tropes of someone gets broken up

34:10 with and then they become super fit and like they get a PhD and they just become

34:14 like the best version of themselves after the breakup.

34:16 Doesn't always happen, but you could imagine something like that.

34:19 Or something that's even less work.

34:20 It's like what's those what are those like voodoo dolls where you like

34:23 poke it and you're like you know you're sending like ill will towards them.

34:26 You could just like upload a photo of your person and we print you a doll

34:29 that looks you know like close enough like them and like you can do that.

34:35 That reminds me of Did you see that startup empty?

34:37 It was fake.

34:38 Did you Did you hear about this?

34:40 It it's I think it was you know it had

34:42 the silly spelling to It was like EMPTI or something

34:45 and it was a fake startup that people thought

34:48 was real and basically they sent people these empty boxes.

34:52 Um, and the whole idea was like look we send

34:54 you these empty boxes and there's some like motiv motivational quote

34:58 from Buddha in it and it's like you know rid

35:01 yourself of all the things you don't need in your life.

35:04 And the idea is that people are supposed to take all their junk,

35:06 put it in these boxes and send it to this company

35:08 for free but they pay this company to send them these boxes.

35:12 Um, but it was a fake startup and all these people are writing about it.

35:14 They're like, "Oh, this is so smart." Like,

35:16 "What a cool company." And it was just Yeah, exactly.

35:19 It was a joke.

35:20 But yeah, actually, you could do that with this, too.

35:22 You could send them the breakup box.

35:23 It's like, "Put all their crap in this.

35:25 All their crap they've left in your house that reminds you of them.

35:27 Put it in this.

35:28 Send it to us and we will send you a video of us like burning this box

35:31 in this like epic way and like you get to have that at the end." That's,

35:34 you know, those are the types of of ideas you could do with this.

35:38 Nice.

35:38 So you were right before we started recording you were starting to tell

35:41 me you go here's my theory of why people like this podcast.

35:44 So what is your theory?

35:46 Okay so there are many reasons to love my first million.

35:50 I think there's something that you guys have done,

35:52 especially recently, when you and Sam just go back and forth,

35:55 and you tell a really funny joke,

35:57 and then Sam just starts laughing hysterically,

36:00 like in a contagious way that uh most

36:03 people would hold back, maybe on a podcast,

36:05 but it's it's literally, as people say, like you're in the room with him.

36:08 And it reminded me of this subreddit

36:10 I found recently called r/contagious laughter.

36:13 4.5 million people subscribe to this and it's one of I think the top

36:17 hundred subreddits out there and it's literally just a feed of people laughing

36:22 and there's there's dozens of posts every day and I I was just as I went

36:26 down it I was like there's got to be a post of Sam and Sean posted here.

36:31 Well, okay, let me tell you a couple interesting things about this.

36:33 First, I think this must I think this subreddit must be

36:36 kind of like almost like new or growing faster recently, right?

36:40 because I hadn't heard of this subreddit before and I

36:42 kind of keep an eye on on the top.

36:45 Maybe I just missed it, but I've also seen this trend on TikTok.

36:48 I don't know if you've seen it.

36:49 Somebody would be like,

36:49 "I'm a clinical psychologist and I can make you happier in the next 10 seconds.

36:54 Repeat after me.

36:55 Ha." And there's like a duet.

36:56 So that guy's like, "Ha." She's like, "Haha haha haha." And you're just like,

37:01 "Okay, I see where this is going." And then she just gets like,

37:03 "Haha." And like by the end both people are

37:06 just cracking up like cuz it's like 10 deep.

37:09 and uh you can't help yourself like the body will

37:12 just start like genuinely laughing just from making the sound.

37:14 Like it goes both ways.

37:15 It's not like something funny happens.

37:17 Therefore, I break out laughing.

37:19 Totally.

37:19 One of the funniest moments on My First Million was your Orlando Bloom story,

37:23 which I think if I just heard you telling it by yourself, I'd be like, "Yeah,

37:27 that's pretty funny." But Sam's laughter layered onto that where

37:30 he was you could just tell he was dying

37:32 as you were telling that story just made it honestly

37:34 top five moments on my first million history for me.

37:37 But that's why I think this subreddit is so great.

37:40 Even in their rules or their like community guidelines,

37:43 you know how someone posts something and there's typically a bot that says,

37:46 "Hey, report this if x, y, and zed." On that subreddit, it's like,

37:50 "Report this if you're laughing at a joke

37:53 or some sort of incident." And not the laughter specifically.

37:56 They're like, "We only want you to be on here

37:58 to hear other people laughing." So, I don't know.

38:00 I just thought that was like a fun a fun thing

38:03 and reminded me of why I think some people love my first million.

38:07 It's just so authentic.

38:08 That's just Sam being Sam and you're like, "Whoa, okay.

38:12 I just get to be that." Uh, that's awesome.

38:15 That is awesome.