Why Did OpenAI Spend $100M to Buy a Podcast?

0:00 our friends at TBPN.

0:01 So, the story is TBPN, which is a tech live show, uh,

0:07 just got acquired by OpenAI, the makers of Chad GPT,

0:10 for an undisclosed sum of money.

0:13 People rumor it to be 100 million, maybe 200 million,

0:16 which is bananas for not just any product that's 12, 18 months old,

0:22 but specifically a podcast or a show, specifically one that doesn't even get

0:28 that much viewership for its actual flagship show.

0:31 And John and Jordy are awesome.

0:34 I'm super happy for them.

0:35 Uh, but we haven't had a chance to talk about that.

0:37 So, what was your what was your reaction?

0:39 Where were you and what was your reaction when you heard this?

0:41 Where was I?

0:42 Is that like 911?

0:43 I don't remember where I was.

0:44 But uh I think my reaction is amazing deal for them.

0:48 I would have taken that nine out of 10 10 out of 10 times.

0:52 If it's anything north of 100 million, take that all day.

0:56 Um and my second reaction is they're going to win even

1:00 bigger in two years when the board of directors of OpenAI says,

1:05 "Guys, we got to get we got to buckle our belts and and get profitable.

1:09 We got to look at why do we own all these things?

1:12 Whose idea was it to buy a media company?

1:14 Can we please just say that we're going to sell it back to them?

1:16 Just give it to them and we'll own 5%.

1:20 And they're going to own it again.

1:22 Okay, so that's the prediction.

1:23 Not only was this an incredible first deal,

1:25 but there's going to be a bar stool style second deal on the other side of this.

1:29 It was really dumb.

1:30 I think it's really dumb for OpenAI.

1:32 I think that HubSpot bought a media company, my media company.

1:35 And it makes sense because they were using it to sell $20,000 a year software.

1:39 And there's a direct attribution.

1:40 When HubSpot bought the Hustle,

1:42 we had 90 I think or HubSpot had 90,000 users, I think, something like that.

1:46 Now they have 200,000 users, something like that.

1:49 I don't know for just look it up.

1:50 And there's direct attribution of where they get their customers.

1:53 And they could say, we got this much revenue from this customers.

1:56 It came from this podcast, this news or whatever, this thing, this thing.

1:59 With OpenAI, they already have a billion users.

2:00 I don't understand like how there's like any growth related

2:04 to this other than it's just a cool thing to own.

2:08 Yeah, I do think it was it's very interesting, right?

2:11 Because they didn't really release any rationale for it.

2:13 there is no rationale other than it's cool

2:17 and you know after a couple weeks you're like I guess if

2:19 there was a rationale they would say it right and I think

2:21 the the closest thing that they mentioned was um I guess back

2:25 in the day Apple bought this ad agency and um it was like

2:29 yeah bringing that in-house was like transformative for our marketing and we

2:32 think that like having John and Jordy and TBPN inhouse is going

2:38 to but it's not trans they're also saying they're speaking out of both

2:41 sides of the mouth right because they're They have full editorial control.

2:44 We're not going to exert our influence over it.

2:47 It's not going to become a propaganda tool for us.

2:49 Like, we're not going to use it,

2:51 but we just paid $200 million for it or $100 million for it.

2:54 So, so which one is it?

2:56 Do you think it was a good It's There's no debate.

2:58 It was awesome for these two guys, right?

3:01 Yeah.

3:02 In incredible, epic for for the TBN guys, for sure.

3:06 Do you think this is a smart move for OpenAI?

3:08 Let me make the case because I think on the surface it's like what?

3:12 It's a head scratcher, right?

3:14 You know, for example,

3:14 Chat GPT has something like 900 million monthly active users.

3:20 TBPN might have 90,000, you know, viewers,

3:25 including, you know, across their on their show.

3:27 And then maybe if you include clips, it's like a million people see a clip.

3:31 I don't know.

3:32 It's not going to move the needle for

3:33 maybe like um getting an executive to buy Open AI is a 200 $200 million deal.

3:39 Get I mean you'd have to get a lot of but again who's already not

3:43 I don't know like buying uh like it's not like

3:47 an awareness play like normally it's like media has attention

3:51 and you have lucrative product so you use media to get

3:54 your lucrative product into more people to have more attention.

3:58 In this case, Chad GPT has so much attention.

4:00 I'm not sure what you get out of that.

4:01 But I think, you know,

4:02 here's the case because I think we should you should assume

4:05 that these very smart people don't do very dumb things as a default.

4:09 Uh you should try to figure out what they what they're telling themselves.

4:11 So, okay, let's spitball real quick.

4:14 Even if it's $100 million, what is that?

4:17 What is a hundred million out of 800 billion divided by 800 billion, right?

4:24 cuz that's the percent of the company they gave up,

4:26 assuming it's a like mostly stock deal.

4:28 But that's not how a a disciplined company thinks.

4:31 I would think they Well, let's start with this.

4:32 Like cuz cuz you might say if I was to give up

4:35 0.001% 01% of my stock to a uniquely talented group of guys

4:44 who understand media and marketing and communication and like the modern media

4:48 playbook and just having them in our office and having them be,

4:52 you know, working on our comms or strategically guiding us.

4:57 Is that is that going to make our company 0.01 whatever, right?

5:00 I don't know the math.

5:01 0.01% more valuable

5:03 for sure.

5:04 Maybe just one ad campaign for sure maybe could pay for that.

5:07 Yes.

5:09 One uh insight into how we should be doing our comms differently.

5:12 One insight into how we should be positioning

5:14 ourselves because right now it's kind of crazy.

5:17 America hates AI.

5:19 Like I don't know if you've seen this.

5:20 Sam Alman has had two like attack like assassination attacks.

5:25 They don't just hate AI.

5:26 I think they specifically hate him.

5:27 I think I think a yes hate AI and b he's

5:30 and then he's the face he's the hatable face of AI for for for whatever reason

5:34 like he somebody went drove by his house

5:37 and threw a Molotov cocktail like a week ago and then went to the office

5:41 and then they no then they drove by and shot like

5:43 a bullet at his house also in like two days later and so

5:47 but the same guy the same guy who threw a Molotov cocktail they arrested him

5:50 at the open AI office cuz he was trying to do the same thing there

5:53 he was there too oh my god that's insane so literally like you Uh obviously

5:58 there's a public perception uh obviously there's like

6:00 a a public brand issue here with like

6:03 why is AI so deeply unpopular like I've I've seen some

6:06 charts where it's like it's more unpopular than Trump you know

6:09 it's like wow this is like it's not like it's not

6:11 like a it's extremely polarizing you know um uh for AI so

6:16 people don't like AI they don't like uh what's going

6:18 on with that I'm not sure exactly why it might be because

6:20 of fear of job loss data centers being built in my backyard

6:24 it's too powerful the government's watching us like what is it?

6:27 Well, it's that, but also like I I I'm on this weird feed

6:32 where I'm I think I clicked one of them and now I'm getting more.

6:34 There's so many people who are doing these breakdown

6:36 videos where they're like, I work so hard.

6:38 I uh work 60 hours a week.

6:41 I don't have my parents to support me and yet I

6:43 still barely have enough money every single month to pay rent.

6:47 I'm so angry that I'm I've been struggling for eight years.

6:50 I went to college.

6:51 I did what I thought I was supposed to do and yet I'm still struggling.

6:54 And I feel like I'm always one paycheck away, which is a totally fair sentiment.

6:59 I 100%.

7:00 So you say if my baseline state is a deep state of dissatisfaction,

7:05 like I'm already I've already without AI, right?

7:09 And now you're telling me I can't get a job.

7:11 You're telling me that I'm not going to have a job

7:14 and that my energy prices are going to go up.

7:16 My my electricity costs are going to go

7:18 up because they're building this like megawatt data center.

7:20 And then I hear that they're raising billions and billions of dollars

7:22 and individual people are getting paid hund00 million to go do this and that.

7:27 That's what you think is the the kind of the main

7:29 All after I've spent a decade doing what I thought I was told I had to do.

7:34 It's okay to get debt to go to this college because it's going to be worth it.

7:37 I'm going to get a good lawyer or accounting job

7:40 that pays me enough to just live amazing life in a vicinity

7:43 of a city that I want to live in and yet

7:46 I can't have kids so I can't afford them.

7:47 I'm single because a lot of them are single now

7:50 and I'm still struggling even though I'm putting the effort in.

7:52 Why?

7:52 Why is this broken?

7:53 That's the sentiment.

7:54 And then why the hate of Sam and Chhatty?

7:58 Is it just the winners's curse?

8:00 You hate the Yankees.

8:01 You hate Duke cuz they're winning.

8:02 Is that why?

8:02 Or is there something else to it?

8:04 And also I think people when they see him talk,

8:06 one of the big sins that anyone who's

8:07 a public figure can make is being inauthentic.

8:10 And being inauthentic uh is what he screams because what he screams

8:14 is I'm just saying what you want me to what you want heard.

8:17 That's one of the reasons why people like Elon.

8:19 Even though he's an he's very authentic.

8:21 With Sam, it definitely feels you are just telling me what I want to hear.

8:25 That's the perception.

8:28 Yeah.

8:28 Which he admits to, by the way.

8:29 He says, "I'm horrible at confrontation,

8:31 and sometimes I'll just say things that I think you want me to hear." Yeah.

8:36 But I think he's saying it a slightly different way.

8:38 Um, I mean, I think Chad TPD is an amazing product.

8:41 Uh, I think that TB what the TBPN guys did,

8:44 what John and Jordy did, I think is um nothing short of incredible.

8:47 And that's putting aside this exit, if they had never exited,

8:50 we were saying this before, like I think what they built as just a brand

8:53 was awesome.

8:54 And the the fun they had, the brand they built,

8:57 the way they captured uh people's minds,

8:59 and I would say like the way they broke the right rules.

9:03 like what's the um what's that phrase

9:05 where it's like you know amateurs don't know the rules pros pros know the rules

9:09 and the masters know which when to break the rules.

9:11 If you look at a couple of the things they did it's kind of incredible.

9:14 So first they changed the uh the the playbook for for the podcast.

9:19 It was like nobody's watching the show.

9:22 We don't care.

9:23 We produced the show and the show's per

9:25 the functionality of the show was to produce clips.

9:27 So what everybody else was doing in the industry was let's post clips to promote

9:32 and the clips job is to promote the the real show, the long form show.

9:37 And I think they inverted that.

9:38 Um I they didn't say this.

9:40 I'm putting words in their mouth, but let me speculate for a second.

9:43 I believe what they found was that it's not that the clips

9:46 job the clips are there to promote the live show.

9:48 It's that the live show is there to produce

9:50 the clips and the clips is the product.

9:52 And we do this 4hour live stream as a farming

9:55 exercise to just farm 20 great clips a day.

9:59 And if we do 20 great clips a day and we're on your feed

10:02 where you're already browsing and where you're

10:03 hanging out and we give you 10 seconds,

10:05 15 seconds, 30 seconds, 40 seconds of entertainment,

10:08 of insight of a great sound bite.

10:10 Well, that we've done our job.

10:11 That's the show.

10:12 The show is this distributed thing, not one central long long form thing, right?

10:16 Like the way we and most podcasters think

10:18 of our show what we do is like the podcast listening

10:21 to the hourlong thing is the thing and we're going

10:24 to use social media to hopefully draw you into the main thing.

10:29 They did it the exact opposite way.

10:30 They're like we'll sit here for for 4 hours and talk.

10:33 The product is the you know that's the end

10:36 product uh that we're actually trying to create.

10:38 So I think that was great.

10:39 I think going all in on Twitter was

10:41 smart and interesting when nobody else was doing that.

10:43 I agree.

10:44 I think you know they Hey, for the record I I made a prediction uh 3 years ago.

10:49 Do you remember the prediction?

10:51 Yeah, you were like um every social media

10:53 platform has like their star creator somebody who was

10:57 born on the platform becomes super famous and super

10:59 you know successful and wealthy from the platform.

11:02 Instagram had it, YouTube had it, Vine had it, all the platform.

11:06 And you were like, Twitter, who is that on Twitter?

11:08 And we were like kind of we couldn't

11:10 think of who's who's that person, that Twitter star.

11:12 And your prediction was that there will be I don't know the exact prediction,

11:16 but it was something like

11:17 I said there there's an opportunity that somebody's going

11:20 to do it and they're going to, you know,

11:21 make a billion dollars doing this essentially.

11:23 Yeah.

11:23 So, and it wasn't totally wrong and it wasn't a brilliant prediction,

11:26 but it was just an observation, but that uh I still think it can happen.

11:29 I think that there's like, by the way, TP TBPN was tiny.

11:33 Even on Twitter, like it's only in a very niche of niche on Twitter.

11:38 I still think that there's that.

11:39 For example, I think that it's not in my world,

11:41 but like sports Twitter is awesome.

11:43 I think uh political Twitter Twitter is I I don't I don't like it,

11:47 but it's an awesome category to be in.

11:49 Like there's meme Twitter is awesome.

11:50 Yeah.

11:51 Yeah.

11:51 Like there's still like those those categories.