Podcast appearances and mentions of Brian To'o

This episode focuses on underpriced players for NRL SuperCoach 2026, breaking down which players appear to be priced below their potential and could be set for big seasons. We look at why these players are underpriced, what has changed in their role or situation, and where the upside sits.Not every cheap price leads to a breakout. We discuss which underpriced players have genuine reasons to improve, where the risk still lies, and how to approach buying into value without chasing points from last year. This episode is about identifying upside early and understanding when the price is actually wrong.This episode is part of The Seven Tackle Set, the NRL SuperCoach podcast from SuperCoach Insight, formerly Insight Fantasy Sports.*Recorded before scoring changes*Check out the other shows from the pre-season: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL1cFHlQFzCbxZL8bSACsca6S5ty-6Y11A&si=BT0gM1j82wbB2xbOJoin our FREE discord here: https://discord.gg/6fDXWnBHMCGet your FREE consult with Ryan from Astute Newstead: https://tally.so/r/n005AQHostsSC BrainInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/braintalksball/Twitter: https://x.com/BrainTalksBallSC WhispererInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/scwhisperer/Twitter: https://x.com/SCWhispererSC MattrixInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/sc_mattrix/Twitter: https://x.com/SC_MattrixSeven Tackle SetInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/seventacklesetnrl/Twitter: https://x.com/7TackleSetNRLPatreonIf you want the full experience and actual weekly edges, our Patreon is where everything lives.Exclusive podcasts and articles, weekly team reveals and trades, subscriber Q&A, consensus position rankings, premium Discord access, and direct 1-1 access to the hosts.Join here: https://www.patreon.com/12428569/joinChapters00:00 9 Underpriced Guns for 202600:10 Welcome + SuperCoach Sister joins00:26 The 10K run that broke the Whisperer03:14 Brian To'o under 600k?!05:46 Haumole POD play with Fogarty08:26 Taylan May's hidden discount10:54 Keaon Koloamatangi bounce-back case13:37 Jerome Hughes still elite value?16:39 Jye Gray fullback gamble20:35 Kalyn Ponga at 600k — buy or trap?23:22 Isaiah Papali'i edge role unlock25:48 Sam Walker's ceiling with DCE31:07 Final verdict + wrap-upFind our socials, sponsors, all our shows, join our community and become a subscriber here: https://linktr.ee/InsightFantasySports Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, AmanTalks joins the show to reveal his team for NRL SuperCoach 2026, walking through a balanced, well-thought-out build focused on structure, role security, and smart salary cap use. We break down how his approach differs from the hosts, where he prioritises safety, and where he's still willing to take calculated risks.This team isn't built around extremes. Instead, it leans into balance, flexibility, and making solid decisions across every position. We discuss the reasoning behind his selections, what he's most confident in, and which parts of the team are most likely to evolve as the season approaches.This episode is part of The Seven Tackle Set, the NRL SuperCoach podcast from SuperCoach Insight, formerly Insight Fantasy Sports.Check out the other shows from the pre-season: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL1cFHlQFzCbxZL8bSACsca6S5ty-6Y11A&si=BT0gM1j82wbB2xbOJoin our FREE discord here: https://discord.gg/6fDXWnBHMCGet your FREE consult with Ryan from Astute Newstead: https://tally.so/r/n005AQHostsSC BrainInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/braintalksball/Twitter: https://x.com/BrainTalksBallSC WhispererInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/scwhisperer/Twitter: https://x.com/SCWhispererSC MattrixInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/sc_mattrix/Twitter: https://x.com/SC_MattrixSeven Tackle SetInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/seventacklesetnrl/Twitter: https://x.com/7TackleSetNRLPatreonIf you want the full experience and actual weekly edges, our Patreon is where everything lives.Exclusive podcasts and articles, weekly team reveals and trades, subscriber Q&A, consensus position rankings, premium Discord access, and direct 1-1 access to the hosts.Join here: https://www.patreon.com/12428569/joinChapters00:00 Guest Team Reveal: Aman Talks Joins 7 Tackle Set00:55 “We haven't seen our partners in 3 weeks…” Preseason grind chat02:47 League code, prizes and Patreon plug, then straight into Aman's squad03:16 Hooker build debate: Marnie + Cheese vs Harry Grant safety06:57 Front row structure: Haas locked, Hopgood love, and the “Miles Martin nuff” play09:12 Captaincy logic: why Haas is the ultimate safety blanket10:45 Tino in 2RF: ownership shock + why Aman wants one “gun” back row12:42 David Fifita at 485k: “don't die on the hill” and why everyone starts him15:33 The big omission: No Cleary, so is Moses the early season play?19:46 5/8 is a mess: Munster set-and-forget reasoning22:42 Centres deep dive: Karaz hype, fading Herbie, and why budget matters26:52 Latrell at centre: the “triggering to own” factor + why you still start him29:08 Brian To'o bounce-back case: floor, value, and Panthers motivation31:44 Fullbacks get spicy: Drinky vs the halves concern + Vegas psychology34:16 Jayden Campbell (Keeney) feels like the easiest click of the preseason35:28 Turbo POD debate: price, Round 3 bye, and the ultimate mental health test39:05 Early byes problem: does it actually matter with Flex dropping worst score?41:20 Teddy temptation: safety blanket fullback and the Roosters fan dilemma44:10 Storytime: the infamous “Turbo captain” disaster from last season45:44 Wrap-up: cheapies chaos, trial teams incoming, where to find Aman TalksFind our socials, sponsors, all our shows, join our community and become a subscriber here: https://linktr.ee/InsightFantasySports Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Setting up an IC-DISC the right way can mean the difference between maximizing tax savings and having issues down the road. In this episode of The IC-DISC Show, I sit down with Brian Schwam, IC-DISC specialist and tax attorney, to walk through the complete IC-DISC setup and compliance process from start to finish. This conversation was inspired by a CPA request for a comprehensive guide covering every step of the IC-DISC journey. Brian breaks down the entire process chronologically, from the initial consultation to determine if a business qualifies, through the critical formation steps that can make or break your IC-DISC. We cover proper capitalization requirements, the infamous 90-day election window, why non-interest bearing bank accounts matter, and the draconian 60-day payment rule that catches many businesses off guard. He explains the difference between simple and transaction-by-transaction calculations, sharing an example where detailed analysis increased a client's commission from $4 million to $17 million on $100 million in export sales. Whether you're a CPA learning about IC-DISC for the first time or a business owner considering this strategy, Brian's systematic approach demonstrates why working with a true specialist matters when navigating these complex regulations.     SHOW HIGHLIGHTS A detailed transaction-by-transaction calculation increased one client's IC-DISC commission from $4 million to $17 million on the same $100 million in export sales. Missing the 90-day election filing window requires a private letter ruling costing $35,000-$40,000 to fix, making it cheaper to just set up a new IC-DISC. The 60-day payment rule requires paying at least 50% of your estimated commission in cash or promissory note within 60 days of year-end to avoid disqualification. Setting up an IC-DISC with no par value stock is a fatal error that will cause the IRS to reject your election, regardless of everything else done correctly. A non-interest bearing bank account is essential because even $1.50 of interest income can disqualify your IC-DISC if no commission is paid that year. Export sales typically need to reach $3-5 million before an IC-DISC makes economic sense, though exceptions exist for businesses with exceptionally high profit margins.   Contact Details LinkedIn - Brian Schwam LINKSShow Notes Be a Guest About IC-DISC Alliance Brian SchwamAbout Brian TRANSCRIPT (AI transcript provided as supporting material and may contain errors) Dave: Good morning, Brian. Welcome to the podcast. Brian Hey, good morning David. Good to be here. Dave: So I, I now refer to you as the Bob Hope of the podcast because I believe that Bob Hope holds the record for the most appearances on the Johnny Carson Show. So that's why you're like the Bob Hope of the podcast. You have more appearances than anyone else with today's appearance. Brian That's good company to be in if you're of a certain, if you're of a certain age. Dave: Yeah. And I'm not even sure you and I are quite old enough to even be of that certain age. Brian I probably never saw him on Johnny Carson. Dave: Yeah, me too. So this is an episode that was requested by a CPA of one of our clients who was retiring and he had a new. Partner taken over and he said, Hey Dave, can you send over a link to the episode that just goes through all the details of the IC disc from start to finish? And I'm like, well, we don't have that episode, but it's a great idea. So that's what's behind this. So let's start at the very beginning. Somebody calls you up and says, Hey Brian, I need an IC disc, or I want an IC disc. What's the very first step? Brian Very first step for me is to say why. Dave: Okay, Brian tell me about your business. Dave: Okay. Brian You know, do you have qualified export receipts? Do you have qualified export property? That those are very complex areas. And some people might think they do when they don't, and others might think they don't when they do. Dave: Okay. Brian And more likely than not, they heard about IC disc from. Somebody they met at a, you know, business leader meeting or something and somebody said, oh, hey, I have an IC disc. You should have one. Dave: Okay. Brian And not everybody can utilize one, but there's many out there that can utilize 'em that do not. Dave: Okay. And do you charge anything for that consultation? Brian No, because to me it's just a fact finding. Dave: Okay. So step one, figure out if their fact pattern warrants having an IC disc. Brian Right? Right. Well, it's, it's actually, that's one step. If you deter, if we determine that yes, an IC disc makes sense because they do have qualified export property, they do have qualified export receipts, then we have to talk about volumes. Because, you know, if you have 500,000 of export sales, most like more likely than not. Disc isn't gonna make sense. Dave: Economic sense when Brian you factor Right. Economic, the Dave: costs Brian not right. There's not enough benefit to offset the cost at that, at that level, most likely. Of course. It [depends on what, what it is they're selling. Dave: Sure. Do you have a rule of thumb you typically use? Is it like three or 5 million where it typically makes sense or every case Brian For most, for most businesses, that's sort of the range that where it starts to make sense, but there are always exceptions to that. Dave: Sure. Brian So like I had a client that had, you know, 600,000 of export sales, but their bottom line profit was 80%. Dave: Okay. Brian So in that instance, hey, it made sense, but for most companies that have 600,000 of export sales, it, it probably doesn't make sense. Dave: Okay. So let's say they have 5 million of exports, good margins, looks like it makes economic sense. What's the next step then? Brian Well then we talk about what is the tax structure of that exporting company? Is it a flow through entity? Is it a C Corp? And how is it owned? Sometimes [00:04:00] it's owned by a foreign company that makes things way more complicated. Okay. It's owned by a combination of different shareholders, some of which are individuals, some of which are corporations. So that can be complicated. And sometimes it's just a, it's just a pass through entity that's owned by, you know, let's say it's an S corporation that's owned by a family owned. Dave: Sure. Brian You know, so you, you can have a lot of different fact patterns and that will dictate a lot of things with, with respect. Dave: Okay. Brian To how the disc is organized. Dave: Might that also be the time? You inquire as to whether multiple discs might make sense for their structure, or do you typically just focus on kind of getting the initial disc in place and then exploring that over time? Brian Probably the latter. Dave: Yeah. Brian Initially I, you know, the goal is, you know, do you have enough activity? Do you have the right kind of activity? What kind of benefit is it that you think you can, we can get for you? And then, okay, if the answer to all those are in the positive, then it's like, okay, how should this disc be owned based on what we're trying to achieve and where should it be set up? Because that also can have a lot of negative surprises if you set it up in the wrong place. Dave: Yeah. So let's say and I think there's some rules of thumb like if if the. Exporting company is a C corp, you typically don't want the C Corp to own the disc, is that correct? Brian That is, that is correct. And that's because a C corporation pays tax on a dividend. It receives from the IC dis, so effectively there's no benefit. Dave: Okay. So with a C corp, typically it would be the individuals, individual or [individuals that Brian are Oh, the, the shareholders typically, Dave: yeah. Brian You know, possibly a management group could be involved as well, but typically we're talking about the shareholders of the C corporation. Dave: Yeah. And the shareholders of the disc do not necessarily have to mirror the shareholders of the C corp. Right. Brian That is sort of up in the air. I, I prefer that to be the case, but it doesn't have to be the case. Dave: Yeah, like in a simple example, census C Corp owned by one person and when they set it up, they wanna add a couple key employees to it. Brian Yeah. That, that, that's probably fine. You know, there's some old revenue rulings out there from the early 1980s that have a bad fact pattern, which the IRS held that the structure created gift tax issues, but that was like a mom and a dad and a son and a daughter, and mom and dad set up a disc and then gave the stock to the son and the daughter. And, and so that, that's, I see that's a bad fact pattern. What you described is a completely different fact pattern. There's no donative intent in that fact Dave: pattern. Yeah. Okay. In Brian fact, that I have a client that started out where the disc and the C Corp was. It did have mirror ownership, but over time, that has changed dramatically. But still, there's no donor of intent because we have all these unrelated families that own shares in the company in this quote company. And when there have been redemption opportunities over the years, they have the choice redeemed, the disc shares redeemed. The, the C corp shares redeemed them both. So some of like kept their dis shares, but gotten rid of the C Corp shares and vice versa. But really without the donative intent, plus some court case you know, precedent, I, I'm not [00:08:00] so concerned about that issue. Dave: Okay. Now let's switch gears and let's say it's a flow through an S-Corp partnership et cetera. Do you typically want the individuals to own it in that situation? Say that the company has three shareholders, would you just make them the three owners of the disc? More often than not, no. Okay. And why is that? Brian Because it, you get the same benefit by making the disc a subsidiary of the S corporation without some of the extra complexity associated with having the disc be owned by the shareholders. Now that, that's, that's preferred, but there are also situations where that doesn't make sense. Dave: Okay. Brian So let's say the, the S corporation is in California and the shareholder lives in Texas, or Florida. Or Nevada. Dave: Okay. Brian So they might want that dividend income flowing directly to them so that there's [00:09:00] no state Oh. So that there's no state income tax on the dividend. Dave: Sure, sure. Brian Okay. Okay. Yeah. So again, it's just another fact you need to uncover in the process of trying to figure all this out. Dave: Okay, so you've met with the client, you've figured out a disc makes sense, you've dug further you figured out the ownership structure of the disc. That makes sense. So then I guess you have to figure out where to incorporate, huh? Brian Yeah. And that again, there are good states and bad states. Dave: Okay. Brian Some states will tax an IC dis as a regular C corporation, you wanna avoid those states. Some states don't have an income tax at all, and those are good states to deal with. Dave: Okay. Brian And the three, you know, I'd say there's three states that are predominantly viewed as positive, and that would be Delaware, Texas, and Nevada. Okay. They're all fairly similar. For filing. And, and none of them have a corporate income tax on the dis so that's, that's all good in terms of not adding additional costs to the, the structure. Dave: Okay. So I'm in Texas and thus you, it seems like most of my clients end up incorporating in Texas. Do you just so here we are January 8th. We're recording this of 2026. So do you just do you just get around to doing it anytime before the end of the year and then you could use the disc the whole year? Is that how it works? Brian It's not how it works. It's generally a prospective opportunity. So you wanna get that entity formed as quickly as possible. Dave: Okay. Yeah. I've had people, I've heard [00:11:00] people say that if you don't do it on January 1st, you just have to wait till the next year. Brian No. That, well, that's certainly not true. And from any date forward that you set it up, you can certainly get benefits or shipments. Okay. That they, but one other item that I forgot to mention earlier, they also like to ask if the, if the related supplier entity, which is the exporter, if they're an accrual based company or a cash basis, Dave: ah, Brian that's an, that's an incredibly important issue Dave: Sure. Brian Dealt with. That's why. Dave: Okay. Brian Because the disc is an accrual base taxpayer by default. Dave: Yeah. Okay, we'll get into that when we get further around the, Brian okay. Dave: I think about when I was a kid, there was a, there was a Saturday morning TV series I think called schoolhouse Rock. And one of the episodes was how, how a bill becomes a Law [00:12:00] And there's the whole steps, the Brian episode, everybody remembers. Dave: Yep. Yep. So everybody our age at least. Okay, so you've got the disc set up and say you do it in Texas and let's say they make the decision January 8th, takes a few days to, you know, just kind of get stuff, you know, information from the client set up. And let's say you get it set up January 15th, so then they're good to go, huh? They can just start using that disc and away we go. Anything else? Ha. That has to be done Or is it, is it that some Brian on the, on the surface, yes, that's true. Dave: Okay. Brian But beneath the surface, there's other things that have to take place. Dave: Okay. What's the next thing that has to happen after you've formed the disc? Brian Well, you have a, there's a 90 day window to file a disc collection with the IRS. That's probably the most critical thing that has to happen. You have to file an actual paper form with the IRS to elect disc status for the company, because the company, when you set it up, it's just a corporation. Without that election, it's not a disc. Dave: And that election, is this the famous form 48, 76 dash a, is that said election, Brian famous or infamous in some cases, Dave: yes. Yeah. Okay. So you have to, so you just well, you just go to the IRS website. Download the form, send it in, bing, bam. Boom. You're done. You're good to go. Brian Not exactly. Dave: Okay. That's the Brian first Dave: step. Brian Skip. That's the first step. But the I mean, first of all, when you're setting up the disc, you have to make sure you incorporate it properly. Dave: Okay. Brian I kind of glossed over that. Dave: And what are some of the elements of proper incorporation? Brian Well, for example, when you go to a, the Texas website or any other secretary of State website to organize the company, because it can be done all online, [00:14:00] like the default is always, you know, no par value stock, right. Brian If you just select the default, you are going to have a problem because Okay. Dis rules require, you know, par or stated value of $2,500 on the, issued an issued an outstanding stock of, of the disk. So I had a client that came to me years ago. They had set up a company in, well, they used Wyoming, which is also possible to use, and it's not a bad jurisdiction. And they had, he had his quote unquote friend that who was an attorney, set it up for him. And there were some issues with the DISC collection and it went back and forth and then ultimately took a look at the articles of incorporation and it had, you know, $1 power stock, 1000 shares. Dave: Ah, that's a problem. Brian That's, [00:15:00] yeah. So no matter what happened with the disc election and the back and forth with the IRS, the disc election was ultimately never approved because the entity didn't meet the requirement. Having enough outstanding capital stock. So you have to have one and it can only have one class of shares. So there are, you know, there are some hoops you have to jump through in terms of not doing things incorrectly or doing things correctly. So you have to make sure there's one class of stock, $2,500 par value. There can't be foreign sales corporation in the same patrol group, which years ago was a big deal, but now it's not really a big deal because those have been gone for many years and almost nobody has one left. Not, not really an issue there. And what, you know, those are the formation matters that, that mattered, that are important to make sure you, you meet when you form the entity. Okay? If it's formed wrong, right from the get go, you have a problem. If [00:16:00] it's formed correctly, then the next step is yes, file a disc election. Dave: And, but before you file the disc election, there's a step we're missing, right? Doesn't the DISC election require. To put the corresponding EIN for the distance. Oh yes. I mean, I just assumed we, yeah, you obviously you have to apply for an ID number for the new entity that does not come automatically with the incorporation. Brian 'cause that's done with the state as opposed with the IRS yes. Dave: Yeah. And that's become more challenging. It used to be pretty easy to get an EIN you could apply under a corporate name or Brian yeah. But there, there's a, you know, there is an online portal with the IRS to get an EIN for a domestic company. So it's not, it's not Dave: terrible. Yeah. Brian It's not terrible. Dave: Yeah. So you have the EIN that you need for the 48 76 ae. Brian Right. Dave: You have you have 90 days, Brian you have the proper capitalization. Dave: Yeah. Brian You figured out who's gonna own the disc because the, the disc collection is. Signed, you know, it's not just made by the disc entity. It's made by the disc entity, then consented to by the shareholder. So you have to make sure that all that takes place. I can't tell you the number of times where somebody filled out part one, the disc signed it, and then the shareholder forgot the consent to it. And if you don't do the 48 76 dash eight correctly, you get it filed timely. It's an extremely expensive fix to try and get that Dave: rectified. Brian Generally, you have to try to get a private letter ruling, which will grant an extension of time to file the late disc collection. Dave: Okay. Brian And that's that's an expensive process. It's a 25 to $30,000 exercise to [00:18:00] file the private letter, really. Plus you have to pay a user fee to the IRS of 10,000, 11,000. Dave: Wow. Yeah. It seems that seems inconvenient at, at best. Brian And for most companies, they're better off just setting up a second dose Dave: Sure. Brian As opposed Dave: to process, Brian because how much volume there is. Dave: Yeah. Yeah. And I understand the IRS itself refers to these as a, a paper entity. So I guess since it's a paper entity, that's it. No need to fuss around with a bank account or actually have to capitalize it with actual money is there. Brian It's, it's recommended, but you're right, it's not required. There's no requirement in the disk rules to set up a bank account. Dave: Okay. Brian So there it could simply have. A receivable receiv for the capital stock. And that can be, its working capital doesn't have to have a bank account, but that's sort of a misnomer that people think it must have a bank account. Okay. In the original regulations, that was a requirement, but when the regulations are finalized, the requirement was removed. Dave: Okay. But practically speaking, it you probably wanna have a bank account. Brian Yes. Practically speaking, it makes all the sense in the world to have a bank account, a non-interest bearing bank account. Dave: And why is the non-interest bearing important? Brian Well, it, it has to do with one of the annual requirements of a disc. That 95% of its receipts have to be qualified export assets. I'm sorry, receipts. And so let's say in a year the company decides. You can't always decide not to use the DIS even though you've got it in place. So let's say the company says, well we're not gonna use the, this year we had a loss. In our business there's no using. Dave: Okay. Brian We say, okay, and then the DIS bank account earned a dollar 50 of interest income. Dave: Okay, Brian well 100% of the receipts are now not qualified receipts. Okay. Income and no other revenue. If there was a non-interest bearing bank account, it would just have no receipts and then it would be fine. But the earning, the dollar 50 of interest would disqualify that. Dave: Okay. So non-interest bearing account and then I guess the dollar amount in the bank account, what you start with, $2,500 initially. Brian Yeah, pretty much keep it there forever. Dave: But, but it doesn't matter if you end up, oh, if you're a little lazy and you forget to distribute all the money and you end up with 50 grand at the end of the year, that, that's not a problem, is it? Brian It is. Dave: It is. Everything's a problem Brian with you, Brian, because everything, 'cause the, these rules are draconian and everything can become a problem. So a commission dis anyway, a comm, [00:21:00] you know, a paper entity commission dis doesn't need $50,000 of working capital. And the IRS would hold that, that that's not a qualified export out. Like having too much working capital in DIS will cause it to fail. The other test, which is the 95 qualified export asset test 2,500, you know, an amount of cash equal to the capital stock is fine. Dave: Sure. Brian Amounts above that start to, you know, raise questions as to whether. That's reasonable working capital or not? Given that the entity's a paper entity, it doesn't really have any expenses. Maybe some bank fees. That would be about it. In most cases, it really doesn't need cash sitting. Dave: Yeah. Yeah. So maybe 3000, 3,500 to account for some bank fees or, Brian yeah, at most, yeah, we start getting about 5,000. It really starts to [00:22:00] look questionable. Dave: Okay. Oh, I just realized, I think in the initial assessment there was a step we forgot and that's, do they want to make it a buy sell disc or a commission disc? What percentage of your clients are commission discs? Mine a hundred percent. That's Brian 99%. Dave: Yeah. So we're just stepping ahead assuming that it would be a commission disc, Brian right. I mean, the only time you would really have a buy sell disc. 'cause if you have a business where. They're buying inventory from unrelated parties. And all the inventory is manufactured in the US and all of it is export. Dave: Yeah. Brian Okay. That, that, that I do have, like I said, two clients that have adopted that structure. One was commissioned disc with an S-corp and they converted, they merged the S-corp into the disc and just became an operating disc. You know, and that's a little different than a buy sell disc. I mean, an operating disc. People think of buy, sell dis an operating disc for the same thing. They're really not. I mean, 'cause you could have a, the equivalent of a commission disc, but have it be by sell where it could buy product from its related exporter and then export it. Dave: Okay. Brian It's possible that, that, that tho that fact pattern, I don't have any clients in. Dave: Okay. Brian It's possible. Dave: Okay. So we've got the election filed and then at some point the IRS will send the taxpayer letter approving the election, right? Brian Correct. That is, that was true. Dave: And then so we've got the, the B and usually it makes more sense to have the disc bank account at the same bank as the operating company, right? Brian It typically does, Dave: yes. Yeah. And we'll get into that when we get further into the operation of the disc. Okay. So it's all set up. And elections filed, election approved. So now certainly we're done with incorporation and government governance matters, right? Brian No. No, Dave: not yet. Brian Not yet. Not yet. Okay. We still have to make sure there's a a call, a related supplier agreement or disc commission supplier agreement in place between the, the exporting entity or entities and the disc itself. This document is, it's not, again, it's not required in the regulations, but it is recommended. It gives the related supplier a lot of flexibility in how it uses the disc and if it uses the disc and it gives it unilateral powers to decide not to use the disc. It also lays out the, you know, sort of boil legal boilerplate language about an inter intercompany agreement between the two business. Dave: So you could just go to chat GPT and have them spool up a one page sales agent agreement. Is that right? Brian Maybe. I don't know. I haven't tried that 'cause I don't wanna teach chat GPT how to, how to do that, but because every time you ask it a question, you teach it, right? Dave: Sure. Brian General, no, it's a pretty specific agreement and it has very specific provisions in it. Provisions and so somebody that knows what they're doing really needs to draft them. Dave: Okay. Okay. So this is kind of pointing away from just having your general corporate attorney who's never heard of a disc, do all that quote paperwork. Brian Yeah. I never recommend. I always recommend that a specialist do it, namely myself take care of it. Dave: Okay. Yeah. 'cause you are, in addition to having an accounting background, you're also a tax attorney, correct? Brian Correct. Dave: Correct. Okay. Brian Yeah. And you know, some of the documents that need to be created, yeah. That can be done by a general corporate attorney like bylaws and those as well and or other organizational documents that aren't disc specific can only be done by any attorney. But but if, but really it doesn't make sense to split that work up amongst different attorneys. Dave: Okay. Sure. Brian It all sort of be done by the same party to make sure that it's, that everything gets taken here. Dave: Okay. Brian And timely because there's a 90 day window to get this, in my opinion, to get this all done. Dave: Yeah, to co to coincide with the election filing. Brian Right. Because typically I don't provide any of the documents, including the election, to the, to the client until all these things are done. Dave: Yeah. Oh, I see. Sure, sure. Because then there's, Brian you know, they have to sign the disc election and there's all these other documents they need to sign and put in a minute book. And so rather than piecemeal it, we just give it to them all at once. Dave: Okay. So they've got their binder with all their signed documents or a signed copy of the 48 76 A that was filed a copy of the approval from the IRS. So now finally, are we ready to get started using our disc? Is there. Brian Collection the I. Yeah. As you've probably seen in the news, things are changing at the postal service as far as postmarks and what they can be relied on as when something was considered filed. So they're not promising the postmark things that they, you drop them in the mail anymore. Dave: Oh, really? Okay. I hadn't heard that. Brian Yeah. So it's recommended to go, like, walk it to a counter and have it hands stamped with [00:28:00] a postmark. Yeah. But more importantly, and unfortunately not everybody listens to this, send the form certified mail return receipt requested. 'cause many times document is sent to Kansas City and they lose track. Oh, we never got your dis election. We can't process your dis return, whatever. And then there's proof that it was sent and then they have to, you know, find it basically. Dave: Okay. Or Brian at least accept it, maybe even if they never find. Dave: Yeah. Brian But there's one other thing about the disc and that we didn't talk about and, and I'm reminded of it because something you asked me in passing last week, which is something about the year end of the disc, the year end of the disc must coincide with its principal shareholder. So if I have a C corp that's a fiscal year, but the owners of the disc aren't gonna be [00:29:00] individuals, that disc will be a calendar year disc. Dave: Sure. Brian Not be a fiscal year company. And you know, if. It's owned by, let's say an S corp that has a fiscal year, then the disc will have a fiscal year. It, it must have the same year as its principalship. Dave: Okay. Yeah. Good. Thanks for the reminder of that. Brian And sometimes the disc collection gets filled out incorrectly. Somebody assumes one thing and, and then when a return is filed, the IRS, they're like, they, they dunno what to do. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Alright. Now finally, do we have a little bouncing baby disc to be delivered to its proud parents? I think so. Dave: Okay. Okay. Okay. Brian And that's usually, it's usually about three to five months after it was formed. Dave: Okay. Brian Is when it started eating solids. Dave: Okay. Alright, so now we've got the disc set up and 9:45 AM I'm, I'm sorry, I keep touching my watch and it says the time, apparently it's time to just take off my watch. Okay. So now, so let's just say that they have not yet set up the bank account. They've done everything else, and now it's time to set up the bank account so they, you know, call their local banker. They get it set up at the same bank, so it can be on the same online banking platform. And then they fund it. And does it matter where the funding comes, comes from for that bank account? Can they just like say the company. I mean, can just anybody fund it? Say there's three shareholders, can just one shareholder write a check for $2,500 to fund it? Or how does that all look? Brian Well, I mean, there, there will be a subscription agreement that shows how much each shareholder owes for their shares, and each shareholder should pay for them. Okay. Can't just be one. Dave: Okay. So we have the bank account set up, we're ready to go. And so now we're at the end of the year, or approaching the end of the year. Let's say we're in November of 2026. Anything we need to do before the end of the year Brian for an accrual based taxpayer? No. Okay. There's nothing paid to do, but before the end of the year. Dave: And what about for a cash basis? Brian For a cash basis, taxpayer, if we want a deduction in 2026. We need to pay the DIS in 2026, so Dave: we Brian would need to gather information in order to estimate a DIS commission for 2026 before the end of the year. Dave: Okay. So cash basis, that's what we need to do by the end of the year. Accrual basis. Basis, no. Do I need to do [00:32:00] anything by the end of the year? Brian You don't need to. You have an option to, if you'd like to, if you wanna have an idea of what the disc commission might be, or you actually wanna pay it before the end of the year, but there's no requirement. Dave: Yeah. And if you don't, and if you don't pay it by the end of the year, you get a deferral benefit Brian possibly. Dave: Yeah so say, say you did a hundred million of exports and your commission was $20 million. You just get to defer that whole thing till the next year, right? Brian No, Dave: no. Brian, all you say is No. Every good idea have you just say No. Brian It could defer 10% of it to the next year because only the income related to 10 million of export sales can be deferred, and it'd be a little less than 10% because the disc wasn't there the whole year. So we'd have to prorate that 10 million for the number of days the disc existed. And then some sliver can be deferred, but the rest of it is gonna be taxed to the shareholders as a deemed dividend Dave: in the current year. In the Brian current. Dave: Okay. Brian Then not taxed when physically distributed in the following. Dave: Okay, so we have an accrual tax payer. We get into the to 2027, and let's say they're extending their corporate return and they're planning to file that in August of 27. So we're done. We don't have anything else to do before August. Right? Brian That's not true either. Dave: Brian, Brian you're Dave: killing me. Brian Yeah, well, it, I mean, it depends. If nothing was done before the end of the year, then something needs to be done within the first 60 days after the accrual base taxpayer. Or, you know, let's say the cash base taxpayer says, I don't [00:34:00] care if I get my deduction next year, so I'm not gonna pay anything this year. Something needs to be paid at this within 60 days of the end of the year. Dave: So is this one of those things like the sales agent agreement, that that's just recommended? Brian No, this is required. Dave: Required. Okay. Brian Yeah. This is required. This is, this is one of the hot buttons the IRS will try to use to disqualify your disc. Dave: Okay. Brian So the disc accrues a receivable at the end of the year, even though it doesn't know the amount at the end of the year for all, for, for disc purposes and books an an accrual for the income at the end of the year. That accrual or the receivable is only a qualified export asset if, if the payment rules around that receivable or satisfy. Dave: Okay. Okay. Brian One Dave: rule Rules. Rules. There's always rules. Brian Yeah. It's very draconian. You have a 60 day rule and a 90 day rule. 60 day rule says you must pay a reasonable estimate of the disc commission to the disc within 60 days of the end of the year in cash or. It could be cash, it could be a note. Dave: And reasonable is just any old amount. You just put your finger in the air and ah, I think a hundred dollars is reasonable. Brian Again, that's not the case. There is a safe harbor for what is reasonable, and that safe harbor is f at least 50% of the final commission amount that you Dave: determine. But how do you know that in February Brian you have, Dave: if you're not preparing the corporate, Brian you have to try to compute an estimate before the end of FE Dave: and you have to nail it exactly at 50%. So if you think the commission's gonna be $1,217,412, you need to pay exactly 50% of that, Brian at least. [00:36:00] Dave: Oh, at least. So you could pay more. At Brian least you could pay more. And we always recommend maybe paying 75 to 80%. Dave: Okay. Brian Because if you pay whatever you pay. That amount is gonna be your limit. So if you thought it was gonna be a million and you paid 500,000 and it turns out to be 1,000,500, too bad. So sad, you only paid 500,000, you're capped at a million. Dave: Okay? I mean, that's the safe harbor. I suppose there might be circumstances where, where one could argue that they maybe the first year of the disc, and you know, they, they, Brian you can argue it, you can try to argue it, but there's no guarantee that the IS will accept any of the arguments. And the private letter rulings that exist from the 1970s would imply that they, they're really not going to accept just about any rationale for being reasonable other than that 50% bright [00:37:00] line safe harbor. Dave: Okay so you make the payment, Brian make that payment, and. Dave: Can you just book a journal entry? Do you, do you actually have to really move the money? It sounds like a hassle. Brian I mean, in, in general you have to, you have to either create a note or move cash. Dave: Okay. Brian Okay. Dave: But that might be a lot of money though. Like what if, what if it's like $2 million and million? The company only has a million dollars in the bank. Brian They could use the same capital multiple times. Dave: Oh, okay. Brian And roundtrip the money as many times as they need to, or like I said, use the, use the promissory note. Dave: Okay. Brian Short term promissory note to satisfy that requirement because it does say cash or property. Dave: Okay. So we get through February, we've made our, our 60 day payment. We've, we've, you know, sh sh we've, we, instead of doing 50%, we did about 80% of what we thought it was gonna be to give us some cushion, and now we can go take a vacation till the till the corporate returns ready. Brian Yeah. I, I, I think so. Dave: Okay. Brian I think so. Dave: Okay. So it's time to now. So it's time. Now, if they extend that corporate return, I guess they're gonna have to extend the disc return as well. Brian Well, the disc return is due September 15th as a matter of course. Dave: Oh, Brian are handy. There are no extensions. So really as far as the disc and its compliance goes, once you make that 60 day payment, there's really not much you can or should do or are able to do until the related entities tax return. Prepared. [00:39:00] So a lot of times they'll say, well, that's not gonna be done till September 15th, and we have to have a discussion about how that doesn't work because the disc return has to be done by September 15th, but in order to do the disc return, you need to basically a completed within it supplier returns. So then we have to work backwards from September 15th to figure out like when's the latest they can have that, that other return done in order Dave: to Brian get the disc return done. Now that's relatively easy in the past through context because all those pass through returns are also due September 15th on extension. Dave: Sure. Brian Whereas a C corporation, it's not so easy because the extended due date for a C corporation, if it's a calendar year is October 15th. So it may be that you have to file a disc return with a made up number on time and then amend it after. Okay. After September 15th. I've done that a number of times. Dave: Okay. So that makes sense. Brian Because as is good as CPAs are, they're deadline driven. So if a return is due October 15th, they're unlikely to have it done by the end of August. Dave: Yeah. Okay. So it's time to file the disc return. I assume the CPA firm probably has that disc return and their standard tax software with all the other forms. So you just have the CPA go ahead and prepare the disc return. I've looked at it, it's a short return. It's like 10 pages long. So you just go ahead and have the CPA prepare the disc return, then bing, bam, boom, you're done. Brian Could do that. Dave: Okay. Is there a drawback to doing that? Brian Yeah, it would probably be wrong. Dave: Okay. Why do you say that? Now, remember [Brian, we have a lot of CPAs who we have very good relationships with that we share clients, you know, saying that they're probably gonna do it wrong. I mean, heck, I don't really wanna annoy all my great CPAs we work with Brian Well, okay, but it, well, it's just a fact. It'll probably okay Dave: be Brian wrong because they might see one or two or three a year. They, they think they know what all the different terms on the district return mean, but they're not as familiar with that as they are with a S Corp return or a partnership return, or 1120. So they do what they think is right, and it may be right, it may not be right. So again, I, in my opinion, you want a specialist preparing the district return. Dave: Okay. Brian Okay. Because we know exactly how it's supposed to be filled out. And then if, if the calculation is done on a transaction by transaction [00:42:00] basis, there's this schedule P that gets attached to the return. Well, if you don't do a T by T, there's one Schedule P. If you do a T by T, there could be thousands of them. So I don't think CPAs and their software are equipped to complete thousands of schedule Ps and attach Dave: Yeah. Brian To the district. Dave: No, good point. And you're, you're getting your your enthusiasm to get to T by t had me, you got a little ahead of me. 'cause I was gonna ask, so client says, Hey, we have a desk. Our accounting department's busy. What's just the bare minimum of information we need to send you? What's the bare minimum? Brian Bare minimum would be qualified export sales. Dave: They just need to send you a number. Brian Yes. Dave: Then you take that number and how hard can it be? Right. Just take the, Brian it's not, it's not necessarily that hard at that point. Dave: Yeah. But say the profit on those sales [00:43:00] is the average profit of the company and taxable profit. And you compute the disc commission, you go through the Schedule P and compute the disc commission and pick the higher of the two numbers that you, that you compute. So you would just be like the final draft, corporate return and that total export number, you know, dollar amount for the year. And, and that's really all you need to, to do. That's Brian the bare bone. That's the bare bones, yeah. Dave: Okay. And that's what some people would call the standard calculation or a simple calculation, Brian I'd call it simple. Yeah. Dave: Okay. And that's also known as the 4% 50% calculation in some circles. Right. How does that work? Brian Well, it's also known as the safe harbor calculation in certain circles as well. Back to that, Dave: back to that safe harbor again. Brian Yeah. But that's actually not a safe harbor, so that's why I bring that up. Dave: Okay, well Brian that's the safe harbor calculation. I'm like, no, it's not. It's just the [00:44:00] calculation. There's nothing safe harbor about Dave: it. Okay. Brian Okay. It's just the rules that are found in the code and regs for computing and disc commission, and they're the two predominant methods. 4% of sales and the 50% of net profit, Dave: you just cherry pick whichever one works better. Brian Yeah, but the 4% method has limitations. So Dave: more limitations probably. Why? Why can't this just be simple? You said it was the simple calculation and now you're already telling me there's inherent complexity. Brian Even if it's simple, it's not totally simple. Dave: Okay. Okay, Brian so the, and I've seen this done wrong. Millions, well, not millions, hundreds of times, and I can say it is hundreds of times. Client computes the 4% method just by choosing 4% of sales. They don't look at what their net income is on the, on the [00:45:00] activity. They just say, oh, I'm allowed to use 4% of sales. The limit there is you cannot create a loss. There's something called the no loss rules. You can't create a loss with a disc commission if one doesn't already exist. So if the profit on, say, on the sales are 2% of sales, you can't take 4% of sales. You're limited to 2% of sales. And if, for example, you have a loss of the company, you're limited to zero. But I've seen situations where that's completely ignored. Dave: Okay? Brian Properly computed this commission of 4% of sales, but it should have been something less or possibly zero. Dave: Okay? So more complexity, but the good news, that's the extent of the complexity. One, schedule P, 4%, 50%, you know, make sure you, you don't create a loss. Now we're, we're all done. Pop. You [00:46:00] know what, what? Dusted and dusted and delivered we're, we're good to go. They've maximized their dis commission, right? And we're all done. They have a nice 10 page return to send to the IRS. Which by the way, can they file that electronically, that return? Brian Fortunately, there are no provisions for electronic filing of the disc return. It must be, Dave: what is this, the 1970s or something? Brian Pretty much Dave: Okay Brian with, with regard to the disc? Yeah. And, and some other forms. Yeah. But the, the, the benefit of that, here, I'll give you a benefit. The benefit of the fact that you must file a paper return is they can have an electronic signature on it. Okay. It doesn't have to have a wet signature. Dave: Okay? Okay. Brian So you could theoretically, for example, send your client the return using DocuSign, have them sign it. You print it, you file it for, Dave: okay. Okay. But, but now we're finally done. It's signed, it's done. And they say, boy, thank you very much, Brian. You've done, your team did a great job, and boy, I really appreciate, you know, we had 10 million of exports. We have all kinds of variability in our profit margins. And, but thank you very much. You, you created the amazing $400,000 or you calculated the 400,000 disc commission. Thank you very much. I couldn't imagine you went above and beyond. I couldn't imagine you could have done anything more. And then what do you say? Do you graciously say, oh, you're welcome. It was our pleasure. Brian I would graciously say, you know, we, we've just computed your minimum disc commission. Dave: Okay, Brian not your maximum. Because you have Dave: vast, lemme guess. Lemme guess. There's more complexity coming. Brian More complexity, which relies on more data being. Pulled from the client's [00:48:00] records to, to allow for a calculation of the DISC commission at a more detailed level, ideally at a line item by invoice level, Dave: line item. That sounds like a lot of work. Brian It can be. Can be a Dave: lot. What if the client says, our accounting department's busy? Sounds like we're gonna have to spend weeks gathering all this data for you. Eh, it's just, we're too busy, it's not worth it. What do you say then? Brian I gu I almost can guarantee you it will be worth it. Okay. Because looking at the detail is likely to cause at Disconnect commission to be anywhere from 50 to three, 400% higher than what it otherwise would've been. Now, unfortunately, in that first year, since you've already filed with a certain number, you're limited to two times what you paid in that 60 day window. But going forward. You know, there's no limit. Dave: Okay. Brian Whatever we compute can be your disc commission. So different industries have different amount of variability and t and transaction by transaction calculations have different impacts depending upon the industry, the profitability of the business, how many products they have, who they sell to. But it can vary. But I'll give you an example of one that we worked on recently where company had a hundred million of export sales. They took 4% of sales, and they've been taking 4% of sales year after year, after year, after year, after year, Dave: okay. Brian They brought us in like three weeks before the district return. Dave: Okay. Brian And we went through the calculations and we actually calculated 17 million Dave: as opposed to 4 million. Brian As opposed to four. Dave: [00:50:00] Yikes. That's a big difference. Brian It's a huge difference. And fortunately they were, you know, well, I mean they were very pleased with the result. And so now on a going forward basis, we're not doing 4% of sales. Dave: Okay? But you still have this. But if they were able to get a $17 million commission, then that means their corporate taxable income must have been at least 17 million. 'cause didn't I hear you say the disc commission cannot cause a loss. Brian It cannot cause a loss at the level at which you're computing the commission. So there's no, you're killing me, Brian. Just more complexity. Yeah. Well, it's very complex area. There's, there's no overall no loss rule. Like if you, you can, as long as you're meeting the rules as they're written, you can cause your entity to go into a loss position. Now, this particular instance, it did not do that, but [00:51:00] you could do that. Dave: Okay. And then if you get into a loss position, there are other non disc complexities that come into play that impact whether you want to maximize the loss in that entity or you want to target a particular loss in that entity. And that's not something that we get involved with, but we're certainly sensitive to it. Sure. Sure. And so you're saying for this client, even though I've heard some people say you've got the simple calc and then the hard calc. And so you'd wonder why would anyone do the hard calc? Well, it's because their commission went from 4 million to 17 million, which saved them hundreds of thousands of dollars. You created hundreds or millions of dollars with additional tax savings. Brian Right, right. Dave: Okay. Brian And by the way, after the first conversation we had with them, they said, oh [00:52:00] yeah, this is not something we can do. The accounting department said, this is not something we can do. Then the owner said, this is something you're gonna, Dave: it's funny how that, how that works. Okay. And then I'm guessing this extra work. You, you're probably gonna have to create another schedule P or two. So now the disc return, it's gonna be 10 pages. It's what? 20 pages? Is that kind of a typical page count? Brian No, it could be Dave: no. Brian Thousands of pages. Dave: Thousands. I mean, Brian, a ream of paper is 500. So thousands would be reams of paper. Brian Yes. I've had some returns that have like 15 binders of paper. Dave: Yikes. Brian Yeah. Just goes in a big box and I'm sure the IRS types, all those schedule Ps into their, Dave: I'm sure they do. Okay. So the return gets filed, so the return's ready. You take that box, you just slap a you print off a postal label online, drop it off at the post office. And you're done, right? You just give it to carrier, Brian understand, Dave: carrier, carrier your house or whatever. Brian Well, you can send it via FedEx. You can send it via UPS. And actually, in some ways, I think that might be better these days than the postal service. Dave: And why do you have to do that? Can you just slap, I mean, if you have your 15 binders, couldn't you just put a hundred stamps, you know, on the, the box and ship it in because they'll get it, right? I mean, it's not like they're gonna lose it or anything. Brian They might, they could very well lose it. And you definitely want proof of delivery and you want proof of mailing. So again, it's a certified mail if you're using the postal service or if you're using a private carrier like FedEx, you know, you get all that documentation about when it was shipped and when it was delivered.[00:54:00] Dave: Okay, well now at least we're finally done. Right? You ship it off. The CPA pulls the numbers from the disc return, puts it on the corporate and shareholder returns. Now we're done. It's gone to the IRS. We never have to think about it again. Right. Brian I'm not sure if that's a trick question or not, but in some ways that could be true, Dave: right? Yeah. But it, but I guess you could get audited, right? Brian Could get audited by an agent who has no idea what they're doing, which is typically the case. Dave: So that's why you want your CPA defending you in that case. 'cause then it's like the blind leading the blind. Brian No, I think it's better if someone with site is involved. So again, the specialist who did the disc work should represent the taxpayer or be involved with the representation of taxpayer in the case of the audit. Dave: Okay. Brian And the should be involved. Because really what's under, what's really in question is the [00:55:00] deduction on that entity's tax return. The dis itself doesn't pay tax. So they rarely audit a dis quote. Dave: Okay? So if I break it down, you to do it really right? You need a specialist to guide you on the initial structure of the disc. You need another specialist to set up the, the disc. You need another specialist to do all the paperwork, make sure the document's correct another specialist to prepare the return, and then another specialist to defend you. So is that about right? So do you need like five different people to make sure everything's done right? Brian? Isn't there some way that you could just have one person that could just do it all for you and be done with it? Brian Well, of course. Dave: Okay. Finally, finally, I get a simple answer, Brian right? So if you, if you engage a disc specialist, that [specialist should be able to do all that. Dave: Okay? Brian Okay. Now, not every disc specialist is created equally. Dave: Sure. Brian You know, I brought up during our conversation that there are some non disc things that can also add complexity to the situation. Not every disc specialist will be sensitive to those things. Not every disc specialist will understand those things. So the benefits that like our organization brings is that. Least myself in particular, I didn't always just do IC disc work. I, I, I have a well-rounded knowledge of all of the, of the tax world. And so I am sensitive to non disc things. You know, for example, you know, another example, oh, a company has a lot of export sales. You would think it's a no brainer. They should have a dis, they should use the dis. They should, they, they should want to convert that ordinary income to qualified dividend [00:57:00] income. Well, what if the S-corp is owned by an ebit? What if there are passive shareholders? All of those things impact whether the disc commission actually helps or hurts their tax situation. And I would get, I would venture a guess that, you know, if you went out and Googled, you know, I see this specialist, you would find a handful. At most that understand all that stuff and how all it all interplays together as opposed to the multitude of those that won't understand any of it. Dave: Okay. Brian So I think a, a disc specialist that is sensitive to all the other tax rules is, is definitely something that is valuable. Dave: And you probably want someone with some experience who's done maybe, you know, what a dozen disc returns in their career, maybe 50 if they're really good. Like how many, how many have we done organization wide? Probably Brian probably 10,000. Dave: 10,000? Well, that's a lot more than 50. Brian Yes. Over the years it's probably close to that number. And we've probably claimed billions of dollars of just deductions and saved clients, hundreds of millions of dollars of tax. And, and I'm proud to say that every dollar we've ever claimed we've. Okay. Dave: So Brian I've never had an adjustment from the IRS. Dave: Well, that sounds like a, a good a good record. So bottom line, Brian that's, that's the best you can come up with a good record. I'd say it's Dave: well, I didn't wanna say a perfect record. I didn't want to jinxy. Brian No, but it's, it's, it's, it's pretty outstanding record. Dave: Yeah. It's a, it's an impressive record Brian because there are also just providers out there that say, well, you know, Dave: it's the Wild West. Brian The wild west, the IRS doesn't really understand it, so let's be as aggressive as possible. And, and that's not the way we approach it. Dave: Yeah. Wow. Well, this has been this has been a lot. So really it's that simple. So the person who wants to just do all this themselves, we've laid out the whole playbook for them. Brian Yeah. The only simple thing they have to do is call us. Dave: There you go. That is it. Yeah. And, and oh, the other thing, not only are you the Bob, hope you now have moved from number two to number one for the most experienced icy disc guy. I know now that Neil Block is retired. Brian Well, that's, I don't know if that's a plus or not. Whether I'll take it just means I've been doing it a long time myself. So Dave: yeah, Neil was, I think my second, first or second guess. And and I was just happy. 'cause his billing rate back then was like $1,500 an hour. I was just glad I didn't get a bill a month later for him being on the podcast. But he, [01:00:00] he did it for exactly 50 years at one firm, baker and McKinsey in Chicago. He had one office, one phone number, like the whole 50 years. Brian Yeah. That's, Dave: that is something you don't see much anymore. Brian Definitely not, no. It's, but it's very, that's. That's very cool. And Neil is a very, you know, is a very intelligent savvy guy. Dave: Yeah, that is for sure. Well, Brian, anything else that we didn't cover that you can think of? Brian I can't think of anything. I think we covered a, a great deal here. Dave: Okay. Brian Can't think. Dave: Well, I, I'll let Brian we omitted. Dave: Well, great. Well, hey, thank you so much for your time. Really appreciate it. And I'll let you get back to your, your exploration of your yard there. Brian Yeah. I feel like, it's funny I shrunk the kids. Dave: I know. Well, hey, well, well again, thanks again, Brian. We all appreciate your time. Brian You're welcome. Have a good day. Dave: You too.

The 2026 season features arguably the greatest collection of mid-rangers in SuperCoach history.From the ever popular David Fifita to Reed Mahoney's new lease of life in Townsville, we've got you covered.Join Tom Sangster, Wilson Smith and Jett Hatton as they assess the merits of the most popular mids - and reveal a few cheeky PODs.All the latest SuperCoach news and articles: linktr.ee/supercoachnrlChapters: 0.00 - Intro 1:30 - Latest News 6:08 - Cameron Murray 6:52 - Hamish Stewart 7:49 - David Fifita 8:27 - Sua Fa'alogo 9:49 - Keano Kini 10:28 - Leka Halasima 12:27 - Reed Mahoney 14:39 - Trey Mooney 16:34 - Mitchell Moses 17:34 - Brian To'o 19:36 - Cody Walker 21:40 - J'maine Hopgood 23:23 - Tom Flegler 25:33 - Jermaine McEwen 26:48 - Sandon Smith 29:03 - Selwyn Cobbo 31:09 - Toby Couchman 32:15 - Campbell Graham 33:28 - Sam Stonestreet 35:00 - Top PODSHosts: Tom Sangster: @TomSangsterSC /XWilson Smith: @wilson_smith93 /XJett Hatton: @KnowsJett /XSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hello ballrs, we're back for NRL SuperCoach 2026! Jono (team name to be revealed) is taking the helm as host this year, but he's still joined by Matt and late call-up Dan for our season opener. The boys give the top 5 must haves and talk team build strategy to get us started and Matt gives a teaser of the ballr.live tools on the way. Chapters(00:00) Introduction to the ballr NRL 2026 podcast season(02:00) ballr.live new tools teaser(06:09) Jono's must-haves: Keano Kini, David Fifita, Nathan Cleary, Brian To'o, Harry Grant(18:56) Harry Grant in for a bounce back?(21:51) Locked and loaded: Matt's must-haves(23:38) Ativalu Lisati: Is his role a slam dunk?(25:54) Trey Mooney: The SuperCoach machine(29:09) Valentine Holmes' potential(32:38) Tom Trbojevic: The case for and against(35:28) Dylan Brown: What if he doesn't get 5/8 dual?(40:39) Dan's top picks: Isaah Yeo, Payne Haas, KL Iro, Jonah Pezet, Latrell Mitchell(50:02) Popular picks with question marks: Brandon Smith, Ethan Sanders(57:43) ballr blueprint: 2026 team build philosophy(01:02:54) Wrap upWhile we're building up to our new releases, you can ask anything you need to know to help your team build in our Discord. Our contributors and community are always happy to help. Join now at https://ballr.live/discordFollow us on our social media channels for more.TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@ballr.sports.1X: https://x.com/ballrNRLInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/ballr_nrlFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/ballrNRLYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ballr.sports

Centre/Wing is once again the hardest position to get right in NRL SuperCoach. We break down the CTW pool for the 2026 season, looking at the reliable guns, the mid-range options that could shape early structure, and the cheapies that might offer value or burn you fast. Job security, roles, base vs upside, and draw all come into play as we try to separate genuine picks from classic CTW traps.This episode is part of The Seven Tackle Set, the NRL SuperCoach podcast from the Insight Fantasy Sports network.HostsSC BrainInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/braintalksball/Twitter: https://x.com/BrainTalksBallSC WhispererInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/scwhisperer/Twitter: https://x.com/SCWhispererSC MattrixInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/sc_mattrix/Twitter: https://x.com/SC_MattrixSeven Tackle SetInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/seventacklesetnrl/Twitter: https://x.com/7TackleSetNRLPatreonIf you want the full experience and actual weekly edges, our Patreon is where everything lives.Exclusive podcasts and articles, weekly team reveals and trades, subscriber Q&A, consensus position rankings, premium Discord access, and direct 1-1 access to the hosts.Join here: https://www.patreon.com/12428569/joinChapters0:00 CTW: The position that makes seasons!3:08 Why Base + Power is important4:23 Mark Nawaqanitawase: The high flyer7:13 Jacob Kiraz: The BP Beast9:41 KL Iro: Can he replicate 2025?11:44 Casey McLean can continue to improve!14:48 Get more from us with a Patreon Subscription15:38 Brian To'o: Can he bounce back?18:08 Sam Stonestreet: Doesn't need to be Ronnie20:31 Savelio Tamale: No 2nd Year Syndrome here!22:59 Dom Young: Are we over the -15 yet?25:55 Siale Faeamani: A cheapie from the clouds28:53 Heamasi Makasini: Future of the Tigers backline31:49 Herbie Farnworth: Can you fade?35:47 Campbell Graham: Is the Souths right edge doomed?39:04 Safest CTW39:27 Highest upside CTW40:02 Best Mid-Priced CTW40:27 Cheapie to make the most cash41:29 CTW you're terrified to fade42:17 CTW you refuse to startFind our socials, sponsors, all our shows, join our community and become a subscriber here: https://linktr.ee/InsightFantasySports Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

SuperCoach has launched for 2026 which means SuperCoaches are looking for the best-of-the-best to fill their sides. But not all guns are created equal. Join Tom Sangster, Wilson Smith and Jett Hatton as they assess the merits of the most popular keepers of the season - and reveal a few cheeky PODs. All the latest SuperCoach news and articles: linktr.ee/supercoachnrl 0.00 - Intro 2:05 - Top 2 Guns 5:34 - Subscribe to Code Sports 6:22 - Payne Haas 8:03 - Latrell Mitchell 9:33 - Mitchell Moses 10:59 - Kalyn Ponga 12:48 - Cameron Murray 14:10 - Brian To’o 15:24 - Jacob Kiraz 16:43 - Herbie Farnworth 17:43 - Reece Walsh 18:47 - Terrell May 19:38 - Nathan Cleary 21:12 - Tino Fa'asuamaleaui 22:11 - Tom Trbojevic 23:31 - Cameron Munster 24:22 - James Tedesco 25:33 Angus Crichton & Mark Nawaqanitawase 27:27 - Gun POD of the Year 33:36 - SuperCoach Questions Hosts: Tom Sangster: @TomSangsterSC /X Wilson Smith: @wilson_smith93 /X Jett Hatton: @KnowsJett /XSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Solo pod back: Did Dezi Freeman assassinate Charlie Kirk? Started playing Pokemon again. The game is easier now that I am 30. Met a rogue one at the library. Saw anti-immigration protesters being heaps polite to an Asian woman? 19 year old blokes seem to do heaps of rack these days??? Greg betrays me. Brian To'o accidentally misspells Nathan Cleary's name as 'Fowler Smasher.' Pretty unlucky. Brandon Smith and Victor Radley drug scandal. Super unlucky. Listener shout outs including Reece Walsh, Diego Lopes, domestic cricket (lol), Conor McGregor, Mr Beast and some other American pelicans. New Episode every Thursday! Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCJscnfTTW_-aO5D81Xi22yw? Facebook: www.facebook.com/billydarcy1 Instagram: www.instagram.com/billy.darcy Music: 'In the Clouds' by RENNANSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Finals footy is here and the storylines are endless. Are the Broncos actually a better side without Adam Reynolds steering them around? Did the Sharks get lucky with Nicho Hynes dodging suspension? We break down every matchup in Week 1 of the NRL Finals with game-by-game analysis, key stats and our tips. Plus, Jimmy names his horses to follow for the Spring Carnival and we play Start, Bench, Cut with three of the best wingers in the comp — Xavier Coates, Brian To'o and Mark Nawaqanitawase.EXCLUSIVE TIPS ON UNIBET (18+)SPORTS: http://bit.ly/46pFLURRACING: http://bit.ly/4gehtAFCAST STOREBuy CAST Merch: https://thecastpatrol.com.au00:00 Intro 01:51 Are The Broncos A Better Team With Ben Hunt At 7? 05:19 Nicho Hynes Escapes Ban07:06 NRL Week 1 Finals Preview 38:20 Spring Racing - Horses To Follow 42:49 Start / Bench / CutFollow us @TheCastPatrol on all social media platforms to keep up to date with all things CAST and more. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this deeply personal episode, Dr. Ashley Joves is joined by her husband, Dr. Brian Joves, just six days after his surgery for oral squamous cell carcinoma. Together, they share the emotional rollercoaster of the past month—from Ashley's gut instinct and relentless advocacy to the medical whirlwind that followed.Brian bravely walks listeners through his diagnosis, surgery, and the critical importance of early detection, while Ashley reflects on the weight of being a caregiver, mother, and dental professional during the most frightening chapter of their lives.This is more than a cancer story. It's a lesson in listening to your instincts, advocating fiercely, loving deeply, and the strength of community when everything feels uncertain.What You'll Learn in This Episode:How a dentist's eye and a wife's intuition saved a lifeThe emotional toll and resilience required during a health crisisWhy oral cancer screenings matter—every patient, every timeHow vulnerability can deepen connection and unlock purposeThe importance of being your own advocate in a system that doesn't always move fast enoughThe value of community in medicine and entrepreneurshipNotable Quotes:"You have to be your own advocate. I don't care who you are or how you think the system works—sometimes it doesn't work for you." – Dr. Ashley Joves"You can do all the right things… and still get cancer. That's why we have to screen. Every patient. Every time." – Dr. Brian Joves"Fear is not a stop sign—it's an invitation to act." – Dr. Ashley JovesA Personal Note from Ashley & Brian:To our incredible community—thank you. Your messages, prayers, and support have carried us through the hardest month of our lives. We hope this episode empowers you to listen to your gut, screen with intention, and hold your loved ones close.

Hello ballrs, it's NRL SuperCoach Round 23 and that means head-to-head finals and we've got you covered. Jono has the reins as host, but 25th-placed Matt is in tow with very good friend of the SuperCoach community, Brien Seeney aka NRL Physio. Strategy, trading, top picks and their projections Round 23-26, injury analysis - this one has it all.Chapters(00:00) Introduction to the SC ballrs podcast(10:04) NRL SuperCoach Round 23 biggest questions(12:47) Herbie Farnworth to who? CTW deep dive(17:56) Lower ownership CTW Pt 1: Dane Gagai, Stephen Crichton, Bradman Best, Roger Tuivasa-Sheck, Josh Addo-Carr(32:49) CTW PODs Pt 2: Beau Fermor, Brian To'o, Braidon Burns, AJ Brimson(41:11) Trade trends: Jayden Campbell(42:44) BONUS Captain Chat(44:57) Fullback chat: Tom Trbojevic & Latrell Mitchell(48:14) SuperCoach red flags: Connor Watson, Hudson Young, Tom Starling, Viliame Kikau(52:12) Trade at FRF or take an AE?(53:27) ballr blueprint: Head-to-head finals strategy(55:25) h2h trading: finals Week 1(58:20) h2h finals strength of schedule(01:03:13) Injury and resting considerations(01:07:02) Dark Arts of NRL SuperCoach: h2h mind gamesRemember to hit up http://ballr.live, where you can enjoy lightning fast SuperCoach live score updates during games in a fast, mobile-friendly format and exclusive ballr projections.You can dig even deeper with the Player Statistics tools on ballr.live - all you have to do is be logged in and navigate to the Player Statistics page via the menu at the top-left of screen to access FREE data including every breakeven, ballr projections, exclusive base + power metrics for every player, captain choice breakdowns and more PLUS it's all customisable.You can also keep up with the best bits of all of our podcasts and more content on our social media channels:TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@scballrsX: https://x.com/SCballrsInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/scballrs/Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/scballrsDrop us your questions (via the above social channels) for this week's Q&A podcast dropping Thursday morning and keep an eye out for the Thursday night Watch Along each week and then the Sunday Snap with Jono and Tubes every Sunday to wrap up the round.

Hello ballrs, the hits just keep coming for trade-starved SuperCoaches, but the SC ballrs experts are here to help make sure your last moves are the right ones. It was green arrows for Matt (27th), CMac (top 1k) and Tubes (ballr of the week) last week, so they're up and about... or at least as much as they can be after Chad Townsend announced his retirement.Chapters(00:00) This is just a tribute....(00:28) NRL SuperCoach Round 21 Recap(06:02) Supercoach Finals Excitement(08:43) ballr blueprint: Trade management h2h vs overall(17:23) Exploring Jahrome Hughes trade options(19:36) Fullback analysis: Dylan Edwards, Reece Walsh, Tom Trbojevic, Ryan Papenhuyzen(30:52) CTW: Jacob Kiraz fullback move, Jethro Rinakama, Ronaldo Mulitalo, Brian To'o, Josiah Karapani, Nick Meaney(39:54) 5/8 & HFB: Jayden Campbell, Tom Dearden, Tyran Wishart(44:50) 2RF: Briton Nikora, Hudson Young, Isaah Yeo, Viliame Kikau, Leka Halasima(55:37) FRF: Joseph Tapine, Addin Fonua-Blake, Patrick Carrigan(57:39) Hooker: Blayke Brailey v Harry Grant(59:56) PODs of the Week: Stephen Crichton + moreWith ballr.live, you can enjoy lightning fast SuperCoach live score updates during games in a fast, mobile-friendly format and exclusive ballr projections.You can dig even deeper with the Player Statistics tools on ballr.live - all you have to do is be logged in and navigate to the Player Statistics page via the menu at the top-left of screen to access FREE data including every breakeven, ballr projections, exclusive base + power metrics for every player, captain choice breakdowns and more PLUS it's all customisable.You can also keep up with the best bits of all of our podcasts and more content on our social media channels: TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@scballrsX: https://x.com/SCballrsInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/scballrs/Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/scballrsDrop us your questions (via the above social channels) for this week's Q&A podcast dropping Thursday lunchtime, join in the Watch Along for Thursday night football and keep an eye out for the Sunday Snap with Jono and Tubes every Sunday to wrap up the round.

Hello ballrs, it's time for the Run-Home. Whether you're rating yourself for the ballr $7000 Run-Home Challenge or wanting to charge in the upper echelons, we're here to help. Jono has taken the reins this week and given a fired-up 6th-placed Matt the VC, and they're joined by a new face in Fenno, coach of the 48th-placed Let Holmes Cook.Don't forget – the Run-Home Challenge closes when lockout lifts on Monday, July 21 after the round. Your SuperCoach NRL scores from Round 20-27 inclusive are collated to find our winners, with prizes down to 10th. Enter only via https://ballr.live FREE to be eligible. Full T&Cs at https://ballr.live.Chapters(00:00) Introduction(02:56) ballr $7k Run-Home Challenge reminder(07:51) ballr blueprint: Run Home captaincy rethink(16:29) Fullback: Dylan Edwards v Latrell Mitchell, Ryan Papenhuyzen plan?(24:10) CTW: Zac Lomax, Valentine Holmes, Brian To'o, Dane Gagai, Nick Meaney + more(39:28) 5/8 & HFB: Tanah Boyd, Kaeo Weekes, Jayden Campbell, Adam Doueihi, Lachlan Galvin, Cameron Munster, Blaize Talagi(50:54) 2RF: Hudson Young, Angus Crichton, Briton Nikora, Beau Fermor, Erin Clark, Tino Fa'asumaleaui, Jeremiah Nanai(58:44) FRF: What to do with Joe Tapine, Addin Fonua-Blake(59:52) Hooker: Connor Watson concerns, Harry Grant, too late for Blake Brailey?(01:06:29) Captain chat NRL Round 20(01:09:28) PODs of the WeekAt http://ballr.live, you can enjoy lightning fast SuperCoach live score updates during games in a fast, mobile-friendly format and exclusive ballr projections.You can dig even deeper with the Player Statistics tools on ballr.live - all you have to do is be logged in and navigate to the Player Statistics page via the menu at the top-left of screen to access FREE data including every breakeven, ballr projections, exclusive base + power metrics for every player, captain choice breakdowns and more PLUS it's all customisable.You can also keep up with the best bits of all of our podcasts and more content on our social media channels:TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@scballrsX: https://x.com/SCballrsInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/scballrs/Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/scballrsDrop us your questions (via the above social channels) for this week's Q&A podcast dropping Thursday lunchtime and keep an eye out for the Watch Along on Thursday night and the Sunday Snap with Jono and Tubes every Sunday to wrap up the round.

James Graham & Brandon Smith are back for another edition of Jam & Cheese show. The boys look back at the round of footy, with Jimmy admitted he is confused by the Lachlan Galvin axing. Plus, Cheese reckons he knows who is the next Kangaroos coach, NRL TV rights deal, we get an update on Cheese's latest injury, plus we ask if Brian To'o already a top 3 winger all-time? Email: thebyeround@gmail.com Ladbrokes: https://www.ladbrokes.com.au/ Hyundai: https://www.hyundai.com/au/ Become A Bye Round Classic VIP: https://classicsports.com.au/pages/thebyeround Follow The Bye Round On: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thebyeround/?hl=enTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@thebyeround?lang=enYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@thebyeroundListen On Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4UkvzTvKsY2shwMsbDiaga 0:00 Cheese Injury Update 4:06 Jimmy’s Emotional Week 9:25 Dragons Reunion Dramas 18:49 Cheese Playing For Cook Islands? 21:48 NRL TV Rights Deal 23:48 Kangaroos Still Don’t Have A Coach 31:34 Coaching Merry-Go-Round 38:30 Lachlan Galvin Dropped 52:09 Nico Hynes & Toby Rudolf’s BIG Moments 57:90 Roosters Win Over Dragons 59:25 Wahs Thump The Tigers 1:02:42 Instant Classic: Panthers Win Battle Of The West 1:06:31 Is Brian To’o A Top 3 All-Time WingerSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The biggest news out of Origin Game 3 plus the future of Wests Tigers big names! 00:00 Payne Haas and Brian To'o have been cleared for Origin 3 01:30 Billy Slater confirms Munster will play in Origin 03:10 Wests Tigers contract situation 06:45 Jahream Bula Contract situation 10:35 New Titans owners Listen to The Run Home with Joel and Fletch live every weekday: 3pm AEST on SEN 1170 AM Sydney and SEN 693 AM Brisbane Listen Online: https://www.sen.com.au/listen   Subscribe to The Run Home YouTube Channel ⁠https://www.youtube.com/@JoelandFletchSEN⁠   Follow us on Social Media! TikTok⁠ https://www.tiktok.com/@joelfletchsen⁠ Instagram:⁠ https://www.instagram.com/joelfletchsen⁠ X:      ⁠https://x.com/joelfletchsen⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles confirms Australians in Israel and Iran are safe for now, Thousands of U-S protesters join rallies against immigration raids this weekend, New South Wales winger Brian To'o will play for the Blues in State of Origin II.

Tras unos primeros compases difíciles, en los que se produjo una refriega a los dos minutos de juego, los Blues se pusieron con una ventaja de 14-0 gracias a dos ‘tries' de Zac Lomax y uno de Brian To'o en el espacio de 10 minutos.

Fitzy found out about a man who broadcasted for 8 days straight and watched his life slowly unravel after completing that world record event. We cover it all today, TVNZ Breakfast were caught up in a prank involving serial killers, an Aussie gambler took down an American Casino and the return of What Are The Chances! And all throughout the podcast we will be checking in on Wippa (in honour of Brian To'o's pre-match meal) decided to complete the Plate of Origin which includes 2 x Bacon & Egg Rolls, 6 x Coke Zeros, A bowl of chips and a caramel latte, DO IT FOR THE BLUES, WIPPA!See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Game I of the Origin series opener wasn't without debate and controversy after Blues winger Brian To'o was sent to the sin bin for a professional foul late in the first half.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Deep from within enemy territory, Brad 'Freddy' Fittler has called us to talk the first State of Origin match up in Brisbane. Braving injury from muffins thrown at him from the loyal Maroons fans, he gives us a preview of the game, while also having a take on Wippa's sleeping arrangement with his wife and Brian To'o's pre-match meal...See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

State of Origin selections are just around the corner and SuperCoaches are hoping to cash in.In particular, one of Zac Lomax and Brian To'o is on the verge of losing a spot for NSW and SuperCoaches are ready to pounce. Join SuperCoach Editor Tom Sangster and Jett Hatton.All the latest SuperCoach news and articles: linktr.ee/supercoachnrl Hosts: Tom Sangster: @TomSangsterSC /XJett Hatton: @KnowsJett /XProduced by Frank Ienco.Recorded 10am Wednesday May 14, 2025.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Chapters00:00-10:24 Introduction: Moving on from SuperCoach carnage10:25-14:42 Ballr Blueprint: Handling the wet weekend ahead14:43-20:15 Ballr Blueprint: Be wary of overrating breakevens20:16-31:11 Fullback: Ryan Papenhuyzen, Clint Gutherson, selling Ponga, Turbo time31:12-42:22 Fullback Roulette: More merit than ever?42:23-50:39 CTW: Christian Tuipolotu, Kayal Iro, Starford To'a, Brian To'o, Paul Alamoti50:40-56:48 5/8: Luke Metcalf, Jayden Campbell, Lachlan Galvin, Adam Doueihi56:49-57:36 HFB: Isaiya Katoa, Jamie Humphreys57:37-01:01:46 Nathan Cleary: A viable sell?01:01:47-01:09:37 2RF: Matty Nicholson, Beau Fermor01:09:38-01:17:15 FRF: Payne Haas, Hamish Stewart01:17:16-01:20:30 Hooker: Tom Starling, Harry Grant01:20:31-01:22:00 Captains: Haas a lock in the wet?01:22:01-1:26:57 PODs of the WeekSuperCoaches were brought back down to earth with a thud in Round 3, with injuries and sub-par performances hitting particularly hard. The race is on to make amends and try to make bank as quickly as possible, so this week Matt (946th), Tubes (36,522nd) and coming off the bench the SC ballrs clubhouse leader C Mac (367th) tackle strategy around breakevens and the impact the wet weather threatening all venues in Round 4 could have.Make sure you get involved in the SC ballrs community, first by joining our unlimited league with league code 730444. The next step is to follow us on our social media channels for plenty more content so you can join the conversation and pose questions to our experts. Then go to http://ballr.promo to get on our mailing list, because there's some exciting tools coming to help you up your SuperCoach game.TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@scballrsX: https://x.com/SCballrsInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/scballrs/Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/scballrsGood luck this weekend!

Due to overwhelming demand (>15x applications:slots), we are closing CFPs for AI Engineer Summit NYC today. Last call! Thanks, we'll be reaching out to all shortly!The world's top AI blogger and friend of every pod, Simon Willison, dropped a monster 2024 recap: Things we learned about LLMs in 2024. Brian of the excellent TechMeme Ride Home pinged us for a connection and a special crossover episode, our first in 2025. The target audience for this podcast is a tech-literate, but non-technical one. You can see Simon's notes for AI Engineers in his World's Fair Keynote.Timestamp* 00:00 Introduction and Guest Welcome* 01:06 State of AI in 2025* 01:43 Advancements in AI Models* 03:59 Cost Efficiency in AI* 06:16 Challenges and Competition in AI* 17:15 AI Agents and Their Limitations* 26:12 Multimodal AI and Future Prospects* 35:29 Exploring Video Avatar Companies* 36:24 AI Influencers and Their Future* 37:12 Simplifying Content Creation with AI* 38:30 The Importance of Credibility in AI* 41:36 The Future of LLM User Interfaces* 48:58 Local LLMs: A Growing Interest* 01:07:22 AI Wearables: The Next Big Thing* 01:10:16 Wrapping Up and Final ThoughtsTranscript[00:00:00] Introduction and Guest Welcome[00:00:00] Brian: Welcome to the first bonus episode of the Tech Meme Write Home for the year 2025. I'm your host as always, Brian McCullough. Listeners to the pod over the last year know that I have made a habit of quoting from Simon Willison when new stuff happens in AI from his blog. Simon has been, become a go to for many folks in terms of, you know, Analyzing things, criticizing things in the AI space.[00:00:33] Brian: I've wanted to talk to you for a long time, Simon. So thank you for coming on the show. No, it's a privilege to be here. And the person that made this connection happen is our friend Swyx, who has been on the show back, even going back to the, the Twitter Spaces days but also an AI guru in, in their own right Swyx, thanks for coming on the show also.[00:00:54] swyx (2): Thanks. I'm happy to be on and have been a regular listener, so just happy to [00:01:00] contribute as well.[00:01:00] Brian: And a good friend of the pod, as they say. Alright, let's go right into it.[00:01:06] State of AI in 2025[00:01:06] Brian: Simon, I'm going to do the most unfair, broad question first, so let's get it out of the way. The year 2025. Broadly, what is the state of AI as we begin this year?[00:01:20] Brian: Whatever you want to say, I don't want to lead the witness.[00:01:22] Simon: Wow. So many things, right? I mean, the big thing is everything's got really good and fast and cheap. Like, that was the trend throughout all of 2024. The good models got so much cheaper, they got so much faster, they got multimodal, right? The image stuff isn't even a surprise anymore.[00:01:39] Simon: They're growing video, all of that kind of stuff. So that's all really exciting.[00:01:43] Advancements in AI Models[00:01:43] Simon: At the same time, they didn't get massively better than GPT 4, which was a bit of a surprise. So that's sort of one of the open questions is, are we going to see huge, but I kind of feel like that's a bit of a distraction because GPT 4, but way cheaper, much larger context lengths, and it [00:02:00] can do multimodal.[00:02:01] Simon: is better, right? That's a better model, even if it's not.[00:02:05] Brian: What people were expecting or hoping, maybe not expecting is not the right word, but hoping that we would see another step change, right? Right. From like GPT 2 to 3 to 4, we were expecting or hoping that maybe we were going to see the next evolution in that sort of, yeah.[00:02:21] Brian: We[00:02:21] Simon: did see that, but not in the way we expected. We thought the model was just going to get smarter, and instead we got. Massive drops in, drops in price. We got all of these new capabilities. You can talk to the things now, right? They can do simulated audio input, all of that kind of stuff. And so it's kind of, it's interesting to me that the models improved in all of these ways we weren't necessarily expecting.[00:02:43] Simon: I didn't know it would be able to do an impersonation of Santa Claus, like a, you know, Talked to it through my phone and show it what I was seeing by the end of 2024. But yeah, we didn't get that GPT 5 step. And that's one of the big open questions is, is that actually just around the corner and we'll have a bunch of GPT 5 class models drop in the [00:03:00] next few months?[00:03:00] Simon: Or is there a limit?[00:03:03] Brian: If you were a betting man and wanted to put money on it, do you expect to see a phase change, step change in 2025?[00:03:11] Simon: I don't particularly for that, like, the models, but smarter. I think all of the trends we're seeing right now are going to keep on going, especially the inference time compute, right?[00:03:21] Simon: The trick that O1 and O3 are doing, which means that you can solve harder problems, but they cost more and it churns away for longer. I think that's going to happen because that's already proven to work. I don't know. I don't know. Maybe there will be a step change to a GPT 5 level, but honestly, I'd be completely happy if we got what we've got right now.[00:03:41] Simon: But cheaper and faster and more capabilities and longer contexts and so forth. That would be thrilling to me.[00:03:46] Brian: Digging into what you've just said one of the things that, by the way, I hope to link in the show notes to Simon's year end post about what, what things we learned about LLMs in 2024. Look for that in the show notes.[00:03:59] Cost Efficiency in AI[00:03:59] Brian: One of the things that you [00:04:00] did say that you alluded to even right there was that in the last year, you felt like the GPT 4 barrier was broken, like IE. Other models, even open source ones are now regularly matching sort of the state of the art.[00:04:13] Simon: Well, it's interesting, right? So the GPT 4 barrier was a year ago, the best available model was OpenAI's GPT 4 and nobody else had even come close to it.[00:04:22] Simon: And they'd been at the, in the lead for like nine months, right? That thing came out in what, February, March of, of 2023. And for the rest of 2023, nobody else came close. And so at the start of last year, like a year ago, the big question was, Why has nobody beaten them yet? Like, what do they know that the rest of the industry doesn't know?[00:04:40] Simon: And today, that I've counted 18 organizations other than GPT 4 who've put out a model which clearly beats that GPT 4 from a year ago thing. Like, maybe they're not better than GPT 4. 0, but that's, that, that, that barrier got completely smashed. And yeah, a few of those I've run on my laptop, which is wild to me.[00:04:59] Simon: Like, [00:05:00] it was very, very wild. It felt very clear to me a year ago that if you want GPT 4, you need a rack of 40, 000 GPUs just to run the thing. And that turned out not to be true. Like the, the, this is that big trend from last year of the models getting more efficient, cheaper to run, just as capable with smaller weights and so forth.[00:05:20] Simon: And I ran another GPT 4 model on my laptop this morning, right? Microsoft 5. 4 just came out. And that, if you look at the benchmarks, it's definitely, it's up there with GPT 4. 0. It's probably not as good when you actually get into the vibes of the thing, but it, it runs on my, it's a 14 gigabyte download and I can run it on a MacBook Pro.[00:05:38] Simon: Like who saw that coming? The most exciting, like the close of the year on Christmas day, just a few weeks ago, was when DeepSeek dropped their DeepSeek v3 model on Hugging Face without even a readme file. It was just like a giant binary blob that I can't run on my laptop. It's too big. But in all of the benchmarks, it's now by far the best available [00:06:00] open, open weights model.[00:06:01] Simon: Like it's, it's, it's beating the, the metalamas and so forth. And that was trained for five and a half million dollars, which is a tenth of the price that people thought it costs to train these things. So everything's trending smaller and faster and more efficient.[00:06:15] Brian: Well, okay.[00:06:16] Challenges and Competition in AI[00:06:16] Brian: I, I kind of was going to get to that later, but let's, let's combine this with what I was going to ask you next, which is, you know, you're talking, you know, Also in the piece about the LLM prices crashing, which I've even seen in projects that I'm working on, but explain Explain that to a general audience, because we hear all the time that LLMs are eye wateringly expensive to run, but what we're suggesting, and we'll come back to the cheap Chinese LLM, but first of all, for the end user, what you're suggesting is that we're starting to see the cost come down sort of in the traditional technology way of Of costs coming down over time,[00:06:49] Simon: yes, but very aggressively.[00:06:51] Simon: I mean, my favorite thing, the example here is if you look at GPT-3, so open AI's g, PT three, which was the best, a developed model in [00:07:00] 2022 and through most of 20 2023. That, the models that we have today, the OpenAI models are a hundred times cheaper. So there was a 100x drop in price for OpenAI from their best available model, like two and a half years ago to today.[00:07:13] Simon: And[00:07:14] Brian: just to be clear, not to train the model, but for the use of tokens and things. Exactly,[00:07:20] Simon: for running prompts through them. And then When you look at the, the really, the top tier model providers right now, I think, are OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, and Meta. And there are a bunch of others that I could list there as well.[00:07:32] Simon: Mistral are very good. The, the DeepSeq and Quen models have got great. There's a whole bunch of providers serving really good models. But even if you just look at the sort of big brand name providers, they all offer models now that are A fraction of the price of the, the, of the models we were using last year.[00:07:49] Simon: I think I've got some numbers that I threw into my blog entry here. Yeah. Like Gemini 1. 5 flash, that's Google's fast high quality model is [00:08:00] how much is that? It's 0. 075 dollars per million tokens. Like these numbers are getting, So we just do cents per million now,[00:08:09] swyx (2): cents per million,[00:08:10] Simon: cents per million makes, makes a lot more sense.[00:08:12] Simon: Yeah they have one model 1. 5 flash 8B, the absolute cheapest of the Google models, is 27 times cheaper than GPT 3. 5 turbo was a year ago. That's it. And GPT 3. 5 turbo, that was the cheap model, right? Now we've got something 27 times cheaper, and the Google, this Google one can do image recognition, it can do million token context, all of those tricks.[00:08:36] Simon: But it's, it's, it's very, it's, it really is startling how inexpensive some of this stuff has got.[00:08:41] Brian: Now, are we assuming that this, that happening is directly the result of competition? Because again, you know, OpenAI, and probably they're doing this for their own almost political reasons, strategic reasons, keeps saying, we're losing money on everything, even the 200.[00:08:56] Brian: So they probably wouldn't, the prices wouldn't be [00:09:00] coming down if there wasn't intense competition in this space.[00:09:04] Simon: The competition is absolutely part of it, but I have it on good authority from sources I trust that Google Gemini is not operating at a loss. Like, the amount of electricity to run a prompt is less than they charge you.[00:09:16] Simon: And the same thing for Amazon Nova. Like, somebody found an Amazon executive and got them to say, Yeah, we're not losing money on this. I don't know about Anthropic and OpenAI, but clearly that demonstrates it is possible to run these things at these ludicrously low prices and still not be running at a loss if you discount the Army of PhDs and the, the training costs and all of that kind of stuff.[00:09:36] Brian: One, one more for me before I let Swyx jump in here. To, to come back to DeepSeek and this idea that you could train, you know, a cutting edge model for 6 million. I, I was saying on the show, like six months ago, that if we are getting to the point where each new model It would cost a billion, ten billion, a hundred billion to train that.[00:09:54] Brian: At some point it would almost, only nation states would be able to train the new models. Do you [00:10:00] expect what DeepSeek and maybe others are proving to sort of blow that up? Or is there like some sort of a parallel track here that maybe I'm not technically, I don't have the mouse to understand the difference.[00:10:11] Brian: Is the model, are the models going to go, you know, Up to a hundred billion dollars or can we get them down? Sort of like DeepSeek has proven[00:10:18] Simon: so I'm the wrong person to answer that because I don't work in the lab training these models. So I can give you my completely uninformed opinion, which is, I felt like the DeepSeek thing.[00:10:27] Simon: That was a bomb shell. That was an absolute bombshell when they came out and said, Hey, look, we've trained. One of the best available models and it cost us six, five and a half million dollars to do it. I feel, and they, the reason, one of the reasons it's so efficient is that we put all of these export controls in to stop Chinese companies from giant buying GPUs.[00:10:44] Simon: So they've, were forced to be, go as efficient as possible. And yet the fact that they've demonstrated that that's possible to do. I think it does completely tear apart this, this, this mental model we had before that yeah, the training runs just keep on getting more and more expensive and the number of [00:11:00] organizations that can afford to run these training runs keeps on shrinking.[00:11:03] Simon: That, that's been blown out of the water. So yeah, that's, again, this was our Christmas gift. This was the thing they dropped on Christmas day. Yeah, it makes me really optimistic that we can, there are, It feels like there was so much low hanging fruit in terms of the efficiency of both inference and training and we spent a whole bunch of last year exploring that and getting results from it.[00:11:22] Simon: I think there's probably a lot left. I think there's probably, well, I would not be surprised to see even better models trained spending even less money over the next six months.[00:11:31] swyx (2): Yeah. So I, I think there's a unspoken angle here on what exactly the Chinese labs are trying to do because DeepSea made a lot of noise.[00:11:41] swyx (2): so much for joining us for around the fact that they train their model for six million dollars and nobody quite quite believes them. Like it's very, very rare for a lab to trumpet the fact that they're doing it for so cheap. They're not trying to get anyone to buy them. So why [00:12:00] are they doing this? They make it very, very obvious.[00:12:05] swyx (2): Deepseek is about 150 employees. It's an order of magnitude smaller than at least Anthropic and maybe, maybe more so for OpenAI. And so what's, what's the end game here? Are they, are they just trying to show that the Chinese are better than us?[00:12:21] Simon: So Deepseek, it's the arm of a hedge, it's a, it's a quant fund, right?[00:12:25] Simon: It's an algorithmic quant trading thing. So I, I, I would love to get more insight into how that organization works. My assumption from what I've seen is it looks like they're basically just flexing. They're like, hey, look at how utterly brilliant we are with this amazing thing that we've done. And it's, it's working, right?[00:12:43] Simon: They but, and so is that it? Are they, is this just their kind of like, this is, this is why our company is so amazing. Look at this thing that we've done, or? I don't know. I'd, I'd love to get Some insight from, from within that industry as to, as to how that's all playing out.[00:12:57] swyx (2): The, the prevailing theory among the Local Llama [00:13:00] crew and the Twitter crew that I indexed for my newsletter is that there is some amount of copying going on.[00:13:06] swyx (2): It's like Sam Altman you know, tweet, tweeting about how they're being copied. And then also there's this, there, there are other sort of opening eye employees that have said, Stuff that is similar that DeepSeek's rate of progress is how U. S. intelligence estimates the number of foreign spies embedded in top labs.[00:13:22] swyx (2): Because a lot of these ideas do spread around, but they surprisingly have a very high density of them in the DeepSeek v3 technical report. So it's, it's interesting. We don't know how much, how many, how much tokens. I think that, you know, people have run analysis on how often DeepSeek thinks it is cloud or thinks it is opening GPC 4.[00:13:40] swyx (2): Thanks for watching! And we don't, we don't know. We don't know. I think for me, like, yeah, we'll, we'll, we basically will never know as, as external commentators. I think what's interesting is how, where does this go? Is there a logical floor or bottom by my estimations for the same amount of ELO started last year to the end of last year cost went down by a thousand X for the [00:14:00] GPT, for, for GPT 4 intelligence.[00:14:02] swyx (2): Would, do they go down a thousand X this year?[00:14:04] Simon: That's a fascinating question. Yeah.[00:14:06] swyx (2): Is there a Moore's law going on, or did we just get a one off benefit last year for some weird reason?[00:14:14] Simon: My uninformed hunch is low hanging fruit. I feel like up until a year ago, people haven't been focusing on efficiency at all. You know, it was all about, what can we get these weird shaped things to do?[00:14:24] Simon: And now once we've sort of hit that, okay, we know that we can get them to do what GPT 4 can do, When thousands of researchers around the world all focus on, okay, how do we make this more efficient? What are the most important, like, how do we strip out all of the weights that have stuff in that doesn't really matter?[00:14:39] Simon: All of that kind of thing. So yeah, maybe that was it. Maybe 2024 was a freak year of all of the low hanging fruit coming out at once. And we'll actually see a reduction in the, in that rate of improvement in terms of efficiency. I wonder, I mean, I think we'll know for sure in about three months time if that trend's going to continue or not.[00:14:58] swyx (2): I agree. You know, I [00:15:00] think the other thing that you mentioned that DeepSeq v3 was the gift that was given from DeepSeq over Christmas, but I feel like the other thing that might be underrated was DeepSeq R1,[00:15:11] Speaker 4: which is[00:15:13] swyx (2): a reasoning model you can run on your laptop. And I think that's something that a lot of people are looking ahead to this year.[00:15:18] swyx (2): Oh, did they[00:15:18] Simon: release the weights for that one?[00:15:20] swyx (2): Yeah.[00:15:21] Simon: Oh my goodness, I missed that. I've been playing with the quen. So the other great, the other big Chinese AI app is Alibaba's quen. Actually, yeah, I, sorry, R1 is an API available. Yeah. Exactly. When that's really cool. So Alibaba's Quen have released two reasoning models that I've run on my laptop.[00:15:38] Simon: Now there was, the first one was Q, Q, WQ. And then the second one was QVQ because the second one's a vision model. So you can like give it vision puzzles and a prompt that these things, they are so much fun to run. Because they think out loud. It's like the OpenAR 01 sort of hides its thinking process. The Query ones don't.[00:15:59] Simon: They just, they [00:16:00] just churn away. And so you'll give it a problem and it will output literally dozens of paragraphs of text about how it's thinking. My favorite thing that happened with QWQ is I asked it to draw me a pelican on a bicycle in SVG. That's like my standard stupid prompt. And for some reason it thought in Chinese.[00:16:18] Simon: It spat out a whole bunch of like Chinese text onto my terminal on my laptop, and then at the end it gave me quite a good sort of artistic pelican on a bicycle. And I ran it all through Google Translate, and yeah, it was like, it was contemplating the nature of SVG files as a starting point. And the fact that my laptop can think in Chinese now is so delightful.[00:16:40] Simon: It's so much fun watching you do that.[00:16:43] swyx (2): Yeah, I think Andrej Karpathy was saying, you know, we, we know that we have achieved proper reasoning inside of these models when they stop thinking in English, and perhaps the best form of thought is in Chinese. But yeah, for listeners who don't know Simon's blog he always, whenever a new model comes out, you, I don't know how you do it, but [00:17:00] you're always the first to run Pelican Bench on these models.[00:17:02] swyx (2): I just did it for 5.[00:17:05] Simon: Yeah.[00:17:07] swyx (2): So I really appreciate that. You should check it out. These are not theoretical. Simon's blog actually shows them.[00:17:12] Brian: Let me put on the investor hat for a second.[00:17:15] AI Agents and Their Limitations[00:17:15] Brian: Because from the investor side of things, a lot of the, the VCs that I know are really hot on agents, and this is the year of agents, but last year was supposed to be the year of agents as well. Lots of money flowing towards, And Gentic startups.[00:17:32] Brian: But in in your piece that again, we're hopefully going to have linked in the show notes, you sort of suggest there's a fundamental flaw in AI agents as they exist right now. Let me let me quote you. And then I'd love to dive into this. You said, I remain skeptical as to their ability based once again, on the Challenge of gullibility.[00:17:49] Brian: LLMs believe anything you tell them, any systems that attempt to make meaningful decisions on your behalf, will run into the same roadblock. How good is a travel agent, or a digital assistant, or even a research tool, if it [00:18:00] can't distinguish truth from fiction? So, essentially, what you're suggesting is that the state of the art now that allows agents is still, it's still that sort of 90 percent problem, the edge problem, getting to the Or, or, or is there a deeper flaw?[00:18:14] Brian: What are you, what are you saying there?[00:18:16] Simon: So this is the fundamental challenge here and honestly my frustration with agents is mainly around definitions Like any if you ask anyone who says they're working on agents to define agents You will get a subtly different definition from each person But everyone always assumes that their definition is the one true one that everyone else understands So I feel like a lot of these agent conversations, people talking past each other because one person's talking about the, the sort of travel agent idea of something that books things on your behalf.[00:18:41] Simon: Somebody else is talking about LLMs with tools running in a loop with a cron job somewhere and all of these different things. You, you ask academics and they'll laugh at you because they've been debating what agents mean for over 30 years at this point. It's like this, this long running, almost sort of an in joke in that community.[00:18:57] Simon: But if we assume that for this purpose of this conversation, an [00:19:00] agent is something that, Which you can give a job and it goes off and it does that thing for you like, like booking travel or things like that. The fundamental challenge is, it's the reliability thing, which comes from this gullibility problem.[00:19:12] Simon: And a lot of my, my interest in this originally came from when I was thinking about prompt injections as a source of this form of attack against LLM systems where you deliberately lay traps out there for this LLM to stumble across,[00:19:24] Brian: and which I should say you have been banging this drum that no one's gotten any far, at least on solving this, that I'm aware of, right.[00:19:31] Brian: Like that's still an open problem. The two years.[00:19:33] Simon: Yeah. Right. We've been talking about this problem and like, a great illustration of this was Claude so Anthropic released Claude computer use a few months ago. Fantastic demo. You could fire up a Docker container and you could literally tell it to do something and watch it open a web browser and navigate to a webpage and click around and so forth.[00:19:51] Simon: Really, really, really interesting and fun to play with. And then, um. One of the first demos somebody tried was, what if you give it a web page that says download and run this [00:20:00] executable, and it did, and the executable was malware that added it to a botnet. So the, the very first most obvious dumb trick that you could play on this thing just worked, right?[00:20:10] Simon: So that's obviously a really big problem. If I'm going to send something out to book travel on my behalf, I mean, it's hard enough for me to figure out which airlines are trying to scam me and which ones aren't. Do I really trust a language model that believes the literal truth of anything that's presented to it to go out and do those things?[00:20:29] swyx (2): Yeah I definitely think there's, it's interesting to see Anthropic doing this because they used to be the safety arm of OpenAI that split out and said, you know, we're worried about letting this thing out in the wild and here they are enabling computer use for agents. Thanks. The, it feels like things have merged.[00:20:49] swyx (2): You know, I'm, I'm also fairly skeptical about, you know, this always being the, the year of Linux on the desktop. And this is the equivalent of this being the year of agents that people [00:21:00] are not predicting so much as wishfully thinking and hoping and praying for their companies and agents to work.[00:21:05] swyx (2): But I, I feel like things are. Coming along a little bit. It's to me, it's kind of like self driving. I remember in 2014 saying that self driving was just around the corner. And I mean, it kind of is, you know, like in, in, in the Bay area. You[00:21:17] Simon: get in a Waymo and you're like, Oh, this works. Yeah, but it's a slow[00:21:21] swyx (2): cook.[00:21:21] swyx (2): It's a slow cook over the next 10 years. We're going to hammer out these things and the cynical people can just point to all the flaws, but like, there are measurable or concrete progress steps that are being made by these builders.[00:21:33] Simon: There is one form of agent that I believe in. I believe, mostly believe in the research assistant form of agents.[00:21:39] Simon: The thing where you've got a difficult problem and, and I've got like, I'm, I'm on the beta for the, the Google Gemini 1. 5 pro with deep research. I think it's called like these names, these names. Right. But. I've been using that. It's good, right? You can give it a difficult problem and it tells you, okay, I'm going to look at 56 different websites [00:22:00] and it goes away and it dumps everything to its context and it comes up with a report for you.[00:22:04] Simon: And it's not, it won't work against adversarial websites, right? If there are websites with deliberate lies in them, it might well get caught out. Most things don't have that as a problem. And so I've had some answers from that which were genuinely really valuable to me. And that feels to me like, I can see how given existing LLM tech, especially with Google Gemini with its like million token contacts and Google with their crawl of the entire web and their, they've got like search, they've got search and cache, they've got a cache of every page and so forth.[00:22:35] Simon: That makes sense to me. And that what they've got right now, I don't think it's, it's not as good as it can be, obviously, but it's, it's, it's, it's a real useful thing, which they're going to start rolling out. So, you know, Perplexity have been building the same thing for a couple of years. That, that I believe in.[00:22:50] Simon: You know, if you tell me that you're going to have an agent that's a research assistant agent, great. The coding agents I mean, chat gpt code interpreter, Nearly two years [00:23:00] ago, that thing started writing Python code, executing the code, getting errors, rewriting it to fix the errors. That pattern obviously works.[00:23:07] Simon: That works really, really well. So, yeah, coding agents that do that sort of error message loop thing, those are proven to work. And they're going to keep on getting better, and that's going to be great. The research assistant agents are just beginning to get there. The things I'm critical of are the ones where you trust, you trust this thing to go out and act autonomously on your behalf, and make decisions on your behalf, especially involving spending money, like that.[00:23:31] Simon: I don't see that working for a very long time. That feels to me like an AGI level problem.[00:23:37] swyx (2): It's it's funny because I think Stripe actually released an agent toolkit which is one of the, the things I featured that is trying to enable these agents each to have a wallet that they can go and spend and have, basically, it's a virtual card.[00:23:49] swyx (2): It's not that, not that difficult with modern infrastructure. can[00:23:51] Simon: stick a 50 cap on it, then at least it's an honor. Can't lose more than 50.[00:23:56] Brian: You know I don't, I don't know if either of you know Rafat Ali [00:24:00] he runs Skift, which is a, a travel news vertical. And he, he, he constantly laughs at the fact that every agent thing is, we're gonna get rid of booking a, a plane flight for you, you know?[00:24:11] Brian: And, and I would point out that, like, historically, when the web started, the first thing everyone talked about is, You can go online and book a trip, right? So it's funny for each generation of like technological advance. The thing they always want to kill is the travel agent. And now they want to kill the webpage travel agent.[00:24:29] Simon: Like it's like I use Google flight search. It's great, right? If you gave me an agent to do that for me, it would save me, I mean, maybe 15 seconds of typing in my things, but I still want to see what my options are and go, yeah, I'm not flying on that airline, no matter how cheap they are.[00:24:44] swyx (2): Yeah. For listeners, go ahead.[00:24:47] swyx (2): For listeners, I think, you know, I think both of you are pretty positive on NotebookLM. And you know, we, we actually interviewed the NotebookLM creators, and there are actually two internal agents going on internally. The reason it takes so long is because they're running an agent loop [00:25:00] inside that is fairly autonomous, which is kind of interesting.[00:25:01] swyx (2): For one,[00:25:02] Simon: for a definition of agent loop, if you picked that particularly well. For one definition. And you're talking about the podcast side of this, right?[00:25:07] swyx (2): Yeah, the podcast side of things. They have a there's, there's going to be a new version coming out that, that we'll be featuring at our, at our conference.[00:25:14] Simon: That one's fascinating to me. Like NotebookLM, I think it's two products, right? On the one hand, it's actually a very good rag product, right? You dump a bunch of things in, you can run searches, that, that, it does a good job of. And then, and then they added the, the podcast thing. It's a bit of a, it's a total gimmick, right?[00:25:30] Simon: But that gimmick got them attention, because they had a great product that nobody paid any attention to at all. And then you add the unfeasibly good voice synthesis of the podcast. Like, it's just, it's, it's, it's the lesson.[00:25:43] Brian: It's the lesson of mid journey and stuff like that. If you can create something that people can post on socials, you don't have to lift a finger again to do any marketing for what you're doing.[00:25:53] Brian: Let me dig into Notebook LLM just for a second as a podcaster. As a [00:26:00] gimmick, it makes sense, and then obviously, you know, you dig into it, it sort of has problems around the edges. It's like, it does the thing that all sort of LLMs kind of do, where it's like, oh, we want to Wrap up with a conclusion.[00:26:12] Multimodal AI and Future Prospects[00:26:12] Brian: I always call that like the the eighth grade book report paper problem where it has to have an intro and then, you know But that's sort of a thing where because I think you spoke about this again in your piece at the year end About how things are going multimodal and how things are that you didn't expect like, you know vision and especially audio I think So that's another thing where, at least over the last year, there's been progress made that maybe you, you didn't think was coming as quick as it came.[00:26:43] Simon: I don't know. I mean, a year ago, we had one really good vision model. We had GPT 4 vision, was, was, was very impressive. And Google Gemini had just dropped Gemini 1. 0, which had vision, but nobody had really played with it yet. Like Google hadn't. People weren't taking Gemini [00:27:00] seriously at that point. I feel like it was 1.[00:27:02] Simon: 5 Pro when it became apparent that actually they were, they, they got over their hump and they were building really good models. And yeah, and they, to be honest, the video models are mostly still using the same trick. The thing where you divide the video up into one image per second and you dump that all into the context.[00:27:16] Simon: So maybe it shouldn't have been so surprising to us that long context models plus vision meant that the video was, was starting to be solved. Of course, it didn't. Not being, you, what you really want with videos, you want to be able to do the audio and the images at the same time. And I think the models are beginning to do that now.[00:27:33] Simon: Like, originally, Gemini 1. 5 Pro originally ignored the audio. It just did the, the, like, one frame per second video trick. As far as I can tell, the most recent ones are actually doing pure multimodal. But the things that opens up are just extraordinary. Like, the the ChatGPT iPhone app feature that they shipped as one of their 12 days of, of OpenAI, I really can be having a conversation and just turn on my video camera and go, Hey, what kind of tree is [00:28:00] this?[00:28:00] Simon: And so forth. And it works. And for all I know, that's just snapping a like picture once a second and feeding it into the model. The, the, the things that you can do with that as an end user are extraordinary. Like that, that to me, I don't think most people have cottoned onto the fact that you can now stream video directly into a model because it, it's only a few weeks old.[00:28:22] Simon: Wow. That's a, that's a, that's a, that's Big boost in terms of what kinds of things you can do with this stuff. Yeah. For[00:28:30] swyx (2): people who are not that close I think Gemini Flashes free tier allows you to do something like capture a photo, one photo every second or a minute and leave it on 24, seven, and you can prompt it to do whatever.[00:28:45] swyx (2): And so you can effectively have your own camera app or monitoring app that that you just prompt and it detects where it changes. It detects for, you know, alerts or anything like that, or describes your day. You know, and, and, and the fact that this is free I think [00:29:00] it's also leads into the previous point of it being the prices haven't come down a lot.[00:29:05] Simon: And even if you're paying for this stuff, like a thing that I put in my blog entry is I ran a calculation on what it would cost to process 68, 000 photographs in my photo collection, and for each one just generate a caption, and using Gemini 1. 5 Flash 8B, it would cost me 1. 68 to process 68, 000 images, which is, I mean, that, that doesn't make sense.[00:29:28] Simon: None of that makes sense. Like it's, it's a, for one four hundredth of a cent per image to generate captions now. So you can see why feeding in a day's worth of video just isn't even very expensive to process.[00:29:40] swyx (2): Yeah, I'll tell you what is expensive. It's the other direction. So we're here, we're talking about consuming video.[00:29:46] swyx (2): And this year, we also had a lot of progress, like probably one of the most excited, excited, anticipated launches of the year was Sora. We actually got Sora. And less exciting.[00:29:55] Simon: We did, and then VO2, Google's Sora, came out like three [00:30:00] days later and upstaged it. Like, Sora was exciting until VO2 landed, which was just better.[00:30:05] swyx (2): In general, I feel the media, or the social media, has been very unfair to Sora. Because what was released to the world, generally available, was Sora Lite. It's the distilled version of Sora, right? So you're, I did not[00:30:16] Simon: realize that you're absolutely comparing[00:30:18] swyx (2): the, the most cherry picked version of VO two, the one that they published on the marketing page to the, the most embarrassing version of the soa.[00:30:25] swyx (2): So of course it's gonna look bad, so, well, I got[00:30:27] Simon: access to the VO two I'm in the VO two beta and I've been poking around with it and. Getting it to generate pelicans on bicycles and stuff. I would absolutely[00:30:34] swyx (2): believe that[00:30:35] Simon: VL2 is actually better. Is Sora, so is full fat Sora coming soon? Do you know, when, when do we get to play with that one?[00:30:42] Simon: No one's[00:30:43] swyx (2): mentioned anything. I think basically the strategy is let people play around with Sora Lite and get info there. But the, the, keep developing Sora with the Hollywood studios. That's what they actually care about. Gotcha. Like the rest of us. Don't really know what to do with the video anyway. Right.[00:30:59] Simon: I mean, [00:31:00] that's my thing is I realized that for generative images and images and video like images We've had for a few years and I don't feel like they've broken out into the talented artist community yet Like lots of people are having fun with them and doing and producing stuff. That's kind of cool to look at but what I want you know that that movie everything everywhere all at once, right?[00:31:20] Simon: One, one ton of Oscars, utterly amazing film. The VFX team for that were five people, some of whom were watching YouTube videos to figure out what to do. My big question for, for Sora and and and Midjourney and stuff, what happens when a creative team like that starts using these tools? I want the creative geniuses behind everything, everywhere all at once.[00:31:40] Simon: What are they going to be able to do with this stuff in like a few years time? Because that's really exciting to me. That's where you take artists who are at the very peak of their game. Give them these new capabilities and see, see what they can do with them.[00:31:52] swyx (2): I should, I know a little bit here. So it should mention that, that team actually used RunwayML.[00:31:57] swyx (2): So there was, there was,[00:31:57] Simon: yeah.[00:31:59] swyx (2): I don't know how [00:32:00] much I don't. So, you know, it's possible to overstate this, but there are people integrating it. Generated video within their workflow, even pre SORA. Right, because[00:32:09] Brian: it's not, it's not the thing where it's like, okay, tomorrow we'll be able to do a full two hour movie that you prompt with three sentences.[00:32:15] Brian: It is like, for the very first part of, of, you know video effects in film, it's like, if you can get that three second clip, if you can get that 20 second thing that they did in the matrix that blew everyone's minds and took a million dollars or whatever to do, like, it's the, it's the little bits and pieces that they can fill in now that it's probably already there.[00:32:34] swyx (2): Yeah, it's like, I think actually having a layered view of what assets people need and letting AI fill in the low value assets. Right, like the background video, the background music and, you know, sometimes the sound effects. That, that maybe, maybe more palatable maybe also changes the, the way that you evaluate the stuff that's coming out.[00:32:57] swyx (2): Because people tend to, in social media, try to [00:33:00] emphasize foreground stuff, main character stuff. So you really care about consistency, and you, you really are bothered when, like, for example, Sorad. Botch's image generation of a gymnast doing flips, which is horrible. It's horrible. But for background crowds, like, who cares?[00:33:18] Brian: And by the way, again, I was, I was a film major way, way back in the day, like, that's how it started. Like things like Braveheart, where they filmed 10 people on a field, and then the computer could turn it into 1000 people on a field. Like, that's always been the way it's around the margins and in the background that first comes in.[00:33:36] Brian: The[00:33:36] Simon: Lord of the Rings movies were over 20 years ago. Although they have those giant battle sequences, which were very early, like, I mean, you could almost call it a generative AI approach, right? They were using very sophisticated, like, algorithms to model out those different battles and all of that kind of stuff.[00:33:52] Simon: Yeah, I know very little. I know basically nothing about film production, so I try not to commentate on it. But I am fascinated to [00:34:00] see what happens when, when these tools start being used by the real, the people at the top of their game.[00:34:05] swyx (2): I would say like there's a cultural war that is more that being fought here than a technology war.[00:34:11] swyx (2): Most of the Hollywood people are against any form of AI anyway, so they're busy Fighting that battle instead of thinking about how to adopt it and it's, it's very fringe. I participated here in San Francisco, one generative AI video creative hackathon where the AI positive artists actually met with technologists like myself and then we collaborated together to build short films and that was really nice and I think, you know, I'll be hosting some of those in my events going forward.[00:34:38] swyx (2): One thing that I think like I want to leave it. Give people a sense of it's like this is a recap of last year But then sometimes it's useful to walk away as well with like what can we expect in the future? I don't know if you got anything. I would also call out that the Chinese models here have made a lot of progress Hyde Law and Kling and God knows who like who else in the video arena [00:35:00] Also making a lot of progress like surprising him like I think maybe actually Chinese China is surprisingly ahead with regards to Open8 at least, but also just like specific forms of video generation.[00:35:12] Simon: Wouldn't it be interesting if a film industry sprung up in a country that we don't normally think of having a really strong film industry that was using these tools? Like, that would be a fascinating sort of angle on this. Mm hmm. Mm hmm.[00:35:25] swyx (2): Agreed. I, I, I Oh, sorry. Go ahead.[00:35:29] Exploring Video Avatar Companies[00:35:29] swyx (2): Just for people's Just to put it on people's radar as well, Hey Jen, there's like there's a category of video avatar companies that don't specifically, don't specialize in general video.[00:35:41] swyx (2): They only do talking heads, let's just say. And HeyGen sings very well.[00:35:45] Brian: Swyx, you know that that's what I've been using, right? Like, have, have I, yeah, right. So, if you see some of my recent YouTube videos and things like that, where, because the beauty part of the HeyGen thing is, I, I, I don't want to use the robot voice, so [00:36:00] I record the mp3 file for my computer, And then I put that into HeyGen with the avatar that I've trained it on, and all it does is the lip sync.[00:36:09] Brian: So it looks, it's not 100 percent uncanny valley beatable, but it's good enough that if you weren't looking for it, it's just me sitting there doing one of my clips from the show. And, yeah, so, by the way, HeyGen. Shout out to them.[00:36:24] AI Influencers and Their Future[00:36:24] swyx (2): So I would, you know, in terms of like the look ahead going, like, looking, reviewing 2024, looking at trends for 2025, I would, they basically call this out.[00:36:33] swyx (2): Meta tried to introduce AI influencers and failed horribly because they were just bad at it. But at some point that there will be more and more basically AI influencers Not in a way that Simon is but in a way that they are not human.[00:36:50] Simon: Like the few of those that have done well, I always feel like they're doing well because it's a gimmick, right?[00:36:54] Simon: It's a it's it's novel and fun to like Like that, the AI Seinfeld thing [00:37:00] from last year, the Twitch stream, you know, like those, if you're the only one or one of just a few doing that, you'll get, you'll attract an audience because it's an interesting new thing. But I just, I don't know if that's going to be sustainable longer term or not.[00:37:11] Simon: Like,[00:37:12] Simplifying Content Creation with AI[00:37:12] Brian: I'm going to tell you, Because I've had discussions, I can't name the companies or whatever, but, so think about the workflow for this, like, now we all know that on TikTok and Instagram, like, holding up a phone to your face, and doing like, in my car video, or walking, a walk and talk, you know, that's, that's very common, but also, if you want to do a professional sort of talking head video, you still have to sit in front of a camera, you still have to do the lighting, you still have to do the video editing, versus, if you can just record, what I'm saying right now, the last 30 seconds, If you clip that out as an mp3 and you have a good enough avatar, then you can put that avatar in front of Times Square, on a beach, or whatever.[00:37:50] Brian: So, like, again for creators, the reason I think Simon, we're on the verge of something, it, it just, it's not going to, I think it's not, oh, we're going to have [00:38:00] AI avatars take over, it'll be one of those things where it takes another piece of the workflow out and simplifies it. I'm all[00:38:07] Simon: for that. I, I always love this stuff.[00:38:08] Simon: I like tools. Tools that help human beings do more. Do more ambitious things. I'm always in favor of, like, that, that, that's what excites me about this entire field.[00:38:17] swyx (2): Yeah. We're, we're looking into basically creating one for my podcast. We have this guy Charlie, he's Australian. He's, he's not real, but he pre, he opens every show and we are gonna have him present all the shorts.[00:38:29] Simon: Yeah, go ahead.[00:38:30] The Importance of Credibility in AI[00:38:30] Simon: The thing that I keep coming back to is this idea of credibility like in a world that is full of like AI generated everything and so forth It becomes even more important that people find the sources of information that they trust and find people and find Sources that are credible and I feel like that's the one thing that LLMs and AI can never have is credibility, right?[00:38:49] Simon: ChatGPT can never stake its reputation on telling you something useful and interesting because That means nothing, right? It's a matrix multiplication. It depends on who prompted it and so forth. So [00:39:00] I'm always, and this is when I'm blogging as well, I'm always looking for, okay, who are the reliable people who will tell me useful, interesting information who aren't just going to tell me whatever somebody's paying them to tell, tell them, who aren't going to, like, type a one sentence prompt into an LLM and spit out an essay and stick it online.[00:39:16] Simon: And that, that to me, Like, earning that credibility is really important. That's why a lot of my ethics around the way that I publish are based on the idea that I want people to trust me. I want to do things that, that gain credibility in people's eyes so they will come to me for information as a trustworthy source.[00:39:32] Simon: And it's the same for the sources that I'm, I'm consulting as well. So that's something I've, I've been thinking a lot about that sort of credibility focus on this thing for a while now.[00:39:40] swyx (2): Yeah, you can layer or structure credibility or decompose it like so one thing I would put in front of you I'm not saying that you should Agree with this or accept this at all is that you can use AI to generate different Variations and then and you pick you as the final sort of last mile person that you pick The last output and [00:40:00] you put your stamp of credibility behind that like that everything's human reviewed instead of human origin[00:40:04] Simon: Yeah, if you publish something you need to be able to put it on the ground Publishing it.[00:40:08] Simon: You need to say, I will put my name to this. I will attach my credibility to this thing. And if you're willing to do that, then, then that's great.[00:40:16] swyx (2): For creators, this is huge because there's a fundamental asymmetry between starting with a blank slate versus choosing from five different variations.[00:40:23] Brian: Right.[00:40:24] Brian: And also the key thing that you just said is like, if everything that I do, if all of the words were generated by an LLM, if the voice is generated by an LLM. If the video is also generated by the LLM, then I haven't done anything, right? But if, if one or two of those, you take a shortcut, but it's still, I'm willing to sign off on it.[00:40:47] Brian: Like, I feel like that's where I feel like people are coming around to like, this is maybe acceptable, sort of.[00:40:53] Simon: This is where I've been pushing the definition. I love the term slop. Where I've been pushing the definition of slop as AI generated [00:41:00] content that is both unrequested and unreviewed and the unreviewed thing is really important like that's the thing that elevates something from slop to not slop is if A human being has reviewed it and said, you know what, this is actually worth other people's time.[00:41:12] Simon: And again, I'm willing to attach my credibility to it and say, hey, this is worthwhile.[00:41:16] Brian: It's, it's, it's the cura curational, curatorial and editorial part of it that no matter what the tools are to do shortcuts, to do, as, as Swyx is saying choose between different edits or different cuts, but in the end, if there's a curatorial mind, Or editorial mind behind it.[00:41:32] Brian: Let me I want to wedge this in before we start to close.[00:41:36] The Future of LLM User Interfaces[00:41:36] Brian: One of the things coming back to your year end piece that has been a something that I've been banging the drum about is when you're talking about LLMs. Getting harder to use. You said most users are thrown in at the deep end.[00:41:48] Brian: The default LLM chat UI is like taking brand new computer users, dropping them into a Linux terminal and expecting them to figure it all out. I mean, it's, it's literally going back to the command line. The command line was defeated [00:42:00] by the GUI interface. And this is what I've been banging the drum about is like, this cannot be.[00:42:05] Brian: The user interface, what we have now cannot be the end result. Do you see any hints or seeds of a GUI moment for LLM interfaces?[00:42:17] Simon: I mean, it has to happen. It absolutely has to happen. The the, the, the, the usability of these things is turning into a bit of a crisis. And we are at least seeing some really interesting innovation in little directions.[00:42:28] Simon: Just like OpenAI's chat GPT canvas thing that they just launched. That is at least. Going a little bit more interesting than just chat, chats and responses. You know, you can, they're exploring that space where you're collaborating with an LLM. You're both working in the, on the same document. That makes a lot of sense to me.[00:42:44] Simon: Like that, that feels really smart. The one of the best things is still who was it who did the, the UI where you could, they had a drawing UI where you draw an interface and click a button. TL draw would then make it real thing. That was spectacular, [00:43:00] absolutely spectacular, like, alternative vision of how you'd interact with these models.[00:43:05] Simon: Because yeah, the and that's, you know, so I feel like there is so much scope for innovation there and it is beginning to happen. Like, like, I, I feel like most people do understand that we need to do better in terms of interfaces that both help explain what's going on and give people better tools for working with models.[00:43:23] Simon: I was going to say, I want to[00:43:25] Brian: dig a little deeper into this because think of the conceptual idea behind the GUI, which is instead of typing into a command line open word. exe, it's, you, you click an icon, right? So that's abstracting away sort of the, again, the programming stuff that like, you know, it's, it's a, a, a child can tap on an iPad and, and make a program open, right?[00:43:47] Brian: The problem it seems to me right now with how we're interacting with LLMs is it's sort of like you know a dumb robot where it's like you poke it and it goes over here, but no, I want it, I want to go over here so you poke it this way and you can't get it exactly [00:44:00] right, like, what can we abstract away from the From the current, what's going on that, that makes it more fine tuned and easier to get more precise.[00:44:12] Brian: You see what I'm saying?[00:44:13] Simon: Yes. And the this is the other trend that I've been following from the last year, which I think is super interesting. It's the, the prompt driven UI development thing. Basically, this is the pattern where Claude Artifacts was the first thing to do this really well. You type in a prompt and it goes, Oh, I should answer that by writing a custom HTML and JavaScript application for you that does a certain thing.[00:44:35] Simon: And when you think about that take and since then it turns out This is easy, right? Every decent LLM can produce HTML and JavaScript that does something useful. So we've actually got this alternative way of interacting where they can respond to your prompt with an interactive custom interface that you can work with.[00:44:54] Simon: People haven't quite wired those back up again. Like, ideally, I'd want the LLM ask me a [00:45:00] question where it builds me a custom little UI, For that question, and then it gets to see how I interacted with that. I don't know why, but that's like just such a small step from where we are right now. But that feels like such an obvious next step.[00:45:12] Simon: Like an LLM, why should it, why should you just be communicating with, with text when it can build interfaces on the fly that let you select a point on a map or or move like sliders up and down. It's gonna create knobs and dials. I keep saying knobs and dials. right. We can do that. And the LLMs can build, and Claude artifacts will build you a knobs and dials interface.[00:45:34] Simon: But at the moment they haven't closed the loop. When you twiddle those knobs, Claude doesn't see what you were doing. They're going to close that loop. I'm, I'm shocked that they haven't done it yet. So yeah, I think there's so much scope for innovation and there's so much scope for doing interesting stuff with that model where the LLM, anything you can represent in SVG, which is almost everything, can now be part of that ongoing conversation.[00:45:59] swyx (2): Yeah, [00:46:00] I would say the best executed version of this I've seen so far is Bolt where you can literally type in, make a Spotify clone, make an Airbnb clone, and it actually just does that for you zero shot with a nice design.[00:46:14] Simon: There's a benchmark for that now. The LMRena people now have a benchmark that is zero shot app, app generation, because all of the models can do it.[00:46:22] Simon: Like it's, it's, I've started figuring out. I'm building my own version of this for my own project, because I think within six months. I think it'll just be an expected feature. Like if you have a web application, why don't you have a thing where, oh, look, the, you can add a custom, like, so for my dataset data exploration project, I want you to be able to do things like conjure up a dashboard, just via a prompt.[00:46:43] Simon: You say, oh, I need a pie chart and a bar chart and put them next to each other, and then have a form where submitting the form inserts a row into my database table. And this is all suddenly feasible. It's, it's, it's not even particularly difficult to do, which is great. Utterly bizarre that these things are now easy.[00:47:00][00:47:00] swyx (2): I think for a general audience, that is what I would highlight, that software creation is becoming easier and easier. Gemini is now available in Gmail and Google Sheets. I don't write my own Google Sheets formulas anymore, I just tell Gemini to do it. And so I think those are, I almost wanted to basically somewhat disagree with, with your assertion that LMS got harder to use.[00:47:22] swyx (2): Like, yes, we, we expose more capabilities, but they're, they're in minor forms, like using canvas, like web search in, in in chat GPT and like Gemini being in, in Excel sheets or in Google sheets, like, yeah, we're getting, no,[00:47:37] Simon: no, no, no. Those are the things that make it harder, because the problem is that for each of those features, they're amazing.[00:47:43] Simon: If you understand the edges of the feature, if you're like, okay, so in Google, Gemini, Excel formulas, I can get it to do a certain amount of things, but I can't get it to go and read a web. You probably can't get it to read a webpage, right? But you know, there are, there are things that it can do and things that it can't do, which are completely undocumented.[00:47:58] Simon: If you ask it what it [00:48:00] can and can't do, they're terrible at answering questions about that. So like my favorite example is Claude artifacts. You can't build a Claude artifact that can hit an API somewhere else. Because the cause headers on that iframe prevents accessing anything outside of CDNJS. So, good luck learning cause headers as an end user in order to understand why Like, I've seen people saying, oh, this is rubbish.[00:48:26] Simon: I tried building an artifact that would run a prompt and it couldn't because Claude didn't expose an API with cause headers that all of this stuff is so weird and complicated. And yeah, like that, that, the more that with the more tools we add, the more expertise you need to really, To understand the full scope of what you can do.[00:48:44] Simon: And so it's, it's, I wouldn't say it's, it's, it's, it's like, the question really comes down to what does it take to understand the full extent of what's possible? And honestly, that, that's just getting more and more involved over time.[00:48:58] Local LLMs: A Growing Interest[00:48:58] swyx (2): I have one more topic that I, I [00:49:00] think you, you're kind of a champion of and we've touched on it a little bit, which is local LLMs.[00:49:05] swyx (2): And running AI applications on your desktop, I feel like you are an early adopter of many, many things.[00:49:12] Simon: I had an interesting experience with that over the past year. Six months ago, I almost completely lost interest. And the reason is that six months ago, the best local models you could run, There was no point in using them at all, because the best hosted models were so much better.[00:49:26] Simon: Like, there was no point at which I'd choose to run a model on my laptop if I had API access to Cloud 3. 5 SONNET. They just, they weren't even comparable. And that changed, basically, in the past three months, as the local models had this step changing capability, where now I can run some of these local models, and they're not as good as Cloud 3.[00:49:45] Simon: 5 SONNET, but they're not so far away that It's not worth me even using them. The other, the, the, the, the continuing problem is I've only got 64 gigabytes of RAM, and if you run, like, LLAMA370B, it's not going to work. Most of my RAM is gone. So now I have to shut down my Firefox tabs [00:50:00] and, and my Chrome and my VS Code windows in order to run it.[00:50:03] Simon: But it's got me interested again. Like, like the, the efficiency improvements are such that now, if you were to like stick me on a desert island with my laptop, I'd be very productive using those local models. And that's, that's pretty exciting. And if those trends continue, and also, like, I think my next laptop, if when I buy one is going to have twice the amount of RAM, At which point, maybe I can run the, almost the top tier, like open weights models and still be able to use it as a computer as well.[00:50:32] Simon: NVIDIA just announced their 3, 000 128 gigabyte monstrosity. That's pretty good price. You know, that's that's, if you're going to buy it,[00:50:42] swyx (2): custom OS and all.[00:50:46] Simon: If I get a job, if I, if, if, if I have enough of an income that I can justify blowing $3,000 on it, then yes.[00:50:52] swyx (2): Okay, let's do a GoFundMe to get Simon one it.[00:50:54] swyx (2): Come on. You know, you can get a job anytime you want. Is this, this is just purely discretionary .[00:50:59] Simon: I want, [00:51:00] I want a job that pays me to do exactly what I'm doing already and doesn't tell me what else to do. That's, thats the challenge.[00:51:06] swyx (2): I think Ethan Molik does pretty well. Whatever, whatever it is he's doing.[00:51:11] swyx (2): But yeah, basically I was trying to bring in also, you know, not just local models, but Apple intelligence is on every Mac machine. You're, you're, you seem skeptical. It's rubbish.[00:51:21] Simon: Apple intelligence is so bad. It's like, it does one thing well.[00:51:25] swyx (2): Oh yeah, what's that? It summarizes notifications. And sometimes it's humorous.[00:51:29] Brian: Are you sure it does that well? And also, by the way, the other, again, from a sort of a normie point of view. There's no indication from Apple of when to use it. Like, everybody upgrades their thing and it's like, okay, now you have Apple Intelligence, and you never know when to use it ever again.[00:51:47] swyx (2): Oh, yeah, you consult the Apple docs, which is MKBHD.[00:51:49] swyx (2): The[00:51:51] Simon: one thing, the one thing I'll say about Apple Intelligence is, One of the reasons it's so disappointing is that the models are just weak, but now, like, Llama 3b [00:52:00] is Such a good model in a 2 gigabyte file I think give Apple six months and hopefully they'll catch up to the state of the art on the small models And then maybe it'll start being a lot more interesting.[00:52:10] swyx (2): Yeah. Anyway, I like This was year one And and you know just like our first year of iPhone maybe maybe not that much of a hit and then year three They had the App Store so Hey I would say give it some time, and you know, I think Chrome also shipping Gemini Nano I think this year in Chrome, which means that every app, every web app will have for free access to a local model that just ships in the browser, which is kind of interesting.[00:52:38] swyx (2): And then I, I think I also wanted to just open the floor for any, like, you know, any of us what are the apps that, you know, AI applications that we've adopted that have, that we really recommend because these are all, you know, apps that are running on our browser that like, or apps that are running locally that we should be, that, that other people should be trying.[00:52:55] swyx (2): Right? Like, I, I feel like that's, that's one always one thing that is helpful at the start of the [00:53:00] year.[00:53:00] Simon: Okay. So for running local models. My top picks, firstly, on the iPhone, there's this thing called MLC Chat, which works, and it's easy to install, and it runs Llama 3B, and it's so much fun. Like, it's not necessarily a capable enough novel that I use it for real things, but my party trick right now is I get my phone to write a Netflix Christmas movie plot outline where, like, a bunch of Jeweller falls in love with the King of Sweden or whatever.[00:53:25] Simon: And it does a good job and it comes up with pun names for the movies. And that's, that's deeply entertaining. On my laptop, most recently, I've been getting heavy into, into Olama because the Olama team are very, very good at finding the good models and patching them up and making them work well. It gives you an API.[00:53:42] Simon: My little LLM command line tool that has a plugin that talks to Olama, which works really well. So that's my, my Olama is. I think the easiest on ramp to to running models locally, if you want a nice user interface, LMStudio is, I think, the best user interface [00:54:00] thing at that. It's not open source. It's good.[00:54:02] Simon: It's worth playing with. The other one that I've been trying with recently, there's a thing called, what's it called? Open web UI or something. Yeah. The UI is fantastic. It, if you've got Olama running and you fire this thing up, it spots Olama and it gives you an interface onto your Olama models. And t

Panthers forward Liam Henry joined Sean and Philpy on rehabbing his shoulder, the Panthers Rookie of the year, Brain To'o's pre-game meal and his work with Little Wings To find out more at littlewings.org.au FACEBOOK - SEARCH LITTLE WINGS INSTAGRAM @littlewingsaustralia 00:00 Liam Henry on the Summer Run Home 00:45 Winning Rookie of the year for 2024 01:30 How has preseason training been so far 02:00 How much time off has he had? 02:20 Had an operation on his shoulder in the preseason 02:45 How is the beach out at Penrith? 03:45 Has a teammate ever been rolled out to take a player out for dinner 04:30 His work with Little Wings 07:00 Brian To'o's pregame meal 08:30 Blaize Talagi joining the club 09:15 Who is looking shredded this offseason? 10:00 Players knocking on the door of first grade at Penrith 11:00 Excited for the Las Vegas 11:30 Best Pub in Blayney 12:15 Who is most excited for Vegas? Listen to The Run Home with Joel and Fletch live every weekday: 3pm AEDT on SEN 1170 AM Sydney 2pm AEST on SEN 693 AM Brisbane Listen Online: https://www.sen.com.au/listen   Subscribe to The Run Home YouTube Channel https://www.youtube.com/@JoelandFletchSEN   Follow us on Social Media! TikTok https://www.tiktok.com/@joelfletchsen Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/joelfletchsen X:            https://x.com/joelfletchsen Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

North Queensland Cowboys, Queensland Maroons and Samoan star Murray Tualagi joined Elliott Lovejoy from The Rush Hour Queensland to talk all things international footy! He unpacks his decision to lock in his allegiance to Samoa after defecting from the Kangaroos and how that caused issues with Mal Meninga. He chats the best centre in the game and the influence of having Jarome Luai, Brian To'o & Stephen Crichton around him in national team camp.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

North Queensland Cowboys, Queensland Maroons and Samoan star Murray Tualagi joined Elliott Lovejoy from The Rush Hour Queensland to talk all things international footy! He unpacks his decision to lock in his allegiance to Samoa after defecting from the Kangaroos and how that caused issues with Mal Meninga. He chats the best centre in the game and the influence of having Jarome Luai, Brian To'o & Stephen Crichton around him in national team camp.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Eels new recruit Zac Lomax chats on his move to Parramatta and where he fits into his new side on the Run Home with Joel and Missile 00:00 New Parramata Eels Winger 00:15 Moving flats today to Eastern 00:45 How did he know he was making the Kangaroos squad 01:30 Having some time off in the offseason 02:30 Why was this the season to decide to move positions? 03:20 How much does he earns for a Kangaroo jersey? 04:40 Who did he tell first, his mum at the hairdressers 05:20 Thoughts on the likes of Brian To'o? 06:10 So happy for Liam Martin winning the Clive Churchill 06:30 Time for Liam Martin to get a haircut 07:00 Where does he want to play for the Eels? Listen to The Run Home with Joel and Fletch live every weekday: 3pm AEDT on SEN 1170 AM Sydney 2pm AEDT on SEN 693 AM Brisbane   Subscribe to The Run Home YouTube Channel https://www.youtube.com/@JoelandFletchSEN   Follow us on Social Media! TikTok:         https://www.tiktok.com/@joelfletchsen Instagram:     https://www.instagram.com/joelfletchsen X:             https://x.com/joelfletchsen Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Joel and Missile look at the PM XIII side announced by Anthony Albanese plus the future of the Kangaroo's squad with Mal Meninga 00:00 PM's XIII announced by Anthony Albonese 01:30 Inclusion of younger players 03:30 Mal Meninga on the future of Kalyn Ponga for the Kangaroos 05:30 Joel on Kalyn Ponga 08:15 Brian To'o game day breakfast every single game day Listen to The Run Home with Joel and Fletch live every weekday: 3pm AEST on SEN 1170 AM Sydney & SEN 693 AM Brisbane Catch the boys in video, live from the studios by heading to the Run Home with Joel and Fletch Youtube page. Hit subscribe and never miss a thing!  https://youtube.com/@joelandfletchsen?si=LJAudaWNKvrhGCUF Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Penrith Panthers star Brian To'o speaks to Mark Levy ahead of the NRL Grand Final this weekend. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Parramatta were meant to be assembling their version of Penrith's homegrown heroes. Instead, their blue-and-golden generation is being picked apart. Buzz, Mick and Mobbsy look at where the blame lies for the Eels' retention failures. They investigate why Brian To'o is unsettled at Penrith, debate whether the highest-paid players in each position are actually the best players, reveal their first ever player interviews and answer your listener questions. If you're enjoying this podcast, hit the follow or subscribe button wherever you're listening. Follow us on socials for more content: Instagram, Facebook and TikTokRead more on the Daily Telegraph websiteWatch full episodes on the Codes Sports YouTube channel.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Laine, Lachlan and Georgie are back as they cover the top NRL stories that have come out of Round 21,including a look back at some of their pre season predictions. Finally, the crew wraps it up with some previews for the Round 22 matchups. Rugby League World Cup (00:02:40) Tipping Recap (00:07:30) Best Performances and Standout Players (00:10:56) Underwhelming Teams and Players (00:13:40)NRL Weekend Storylines (00:18:17)Top 8 Predictions Recap (00:19:00) Dark Horse Team (00:23:13) Brian To'o Leaving Panthers?? (00:27:34) Round 22 Match Previews (00:36:10) Wests Tigers vs. Cowboys (00:36:55) Warriors vs Eels (00:41:46)Dolphins vs. Roosters (00:45:11)Titans vs. Broncos (00:48:41)Storm vs. Dragons (00:54:19)Sharks vs. Rabbitohs (00:57:31)Panthers vs. Knights (01:02:48)Bulldogs vs Raiders (01:07:49)Follow our socials:Twitter/X: https://twitter.com/mojosports_Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mojosportsnetwork/NRL Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mojosportsnrl/Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mojosportsnetwork/Our Website: https://www.mojosports.com.au/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

There has been a switch in normal transmission this week with Joel Helmes taking on the hosting role for the Mid-week edition of the Wests Tigers Podcast. He is joined by Nick and Garry to discuss all the Latest News out of Concord and isn't there a lot of news and rumours this week? The show starts with a quick discussion surrounding last Friday's game against the Warriors in New Zealand, Garry and Joel give their one words for the game. There is a discussion around the Wests Tigers lack of physicality and the effect that has had on the team for the last few years. The boys take on all the latest rumours and news surrounding the club including Stefano leaving the club and the tantalising rumour about Brian To'o looking for the exit door at Penrith. Could Luai convince him to make the move to the Wests Tigers for season 2025 and what difference would he make to the side? Discussion then turns to Shane Richardson's appearance on Behind the Roar and his comments around signing players, roster turnover, needs for season 2025 and the Stadium policy. The team gives their predictions for tomorrow's game against the Cowboys at Leichhardt Oval. As always, the episode ends with Yioti's quiz, who will come out on top this week? If you are in for the Crocodile Roll join the Wests Tigers Podcast for this week's Mid-week Pod.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

James Graham is joined by Charlie White with the player market going bonkers! We breakdown what losing Talagi means for Parramatta, dig deep on To'o reportedly wanting out of Penrith, commend the Dragons on their recruitment drive & preview every game for round 22! Ladbrokes: https://ladbrokes.com/  Merch: https://thebyeround.com/   Better Help Special Offer: https://www.betterhelp.com/byeround  00:00 Jimmy's 12 Wins Theory 03:00 Rockbusters 06:30 Blaize Talagi Leaving The Eels 14:00 Brian To'o Wants Out?!? 25:00 The Dragons Recruitment Drive 29:00 Knights Halves Reshuffle 32:00 Round 22 PreviewSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Catch up on all the Rugby League news from NRL 360, Tuesday the 30th of July, with hosts Braith Anasta and Gorden Tallis. The NRL 360 panel are joined by Paul Crawley and Dean Ritchie to discuss whether Brian To'o is unhappy at Penrith, Broncos losing their power, and whether Wayne Bennett will get the best out of Cody Walker. For more of the show tune in on Fox League CH 502 or stream full episodes on KAYO.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Candice Warner joins us in the rotating chair this week... we speak with NSW Blues and Co Captain of the Penrith Panthers Isaah Yeo.  All the action from the winning Origin game on Wednesday night and big shout to Brian To'o best for best on ground for arriving back in Sydney with his footy Kit, boots and all from the game. What horrible things have you seen on a plane, after the Freemantle Dockers were froced to urintate in sinks on a charter fligth from Tasmania back to Perth last week.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Penrith prop Lindsay Smith is establishing himself as a regular first grade player and even had the confidence in his team's round 18 match to lay on a grubber kick assist for Brian To'o to score. He told Andrew Moore and the team that he's gaining as much knowledge as he can from the Panthers senior prop forwards James Fisher-Harris and Moses Leota as he looks to follow the path they have set. Smith also talked about the training ethos that has led to so much success for the club that means they train hard every days they can. 

As followers of Jesus, we have received the greatest gift we could ever imagine and have joy that cannot be taken from us. Yet, our world is broken and we still experience and witness suffering. So what do we do when we feel sad?This past Wednesday, June 26th, Brian To spoke on the emotion of sadness. He brought us through Psalm 88, which gives us permission to bring ourselves to God when we are sad. He knows our sadness and is present in it. You have permission to lament to God.

Cronulla lock Cam McInnes is still pinching himself about being in th New South Wales team for Game 1 of State of Origin. He told Andrew Moore and the team how special it was to get the call from the man who gave him his 1st Grade debut - Michael Maguire. He talked about the energy in the camp the trio of Brian To'o, Jarome Luai and Stephen Crichton bring and also how he's less focused on what he can do as an individual and more on what he can bring to the team.

This week on Dark Rhiino Security's Security Confidential podcast, Host Manoj Tandon talks to Brian Vallelunga. Brian is the Founder and CEO of Doppler, which is the first secrets management platform for developers. Doppler empowers tens of thousands of engineering and devops teams to seamlessly orchestrate, govern, and manage their secrets across environments at scale. Brian has been featured in Forbes 30 Under 30, worked at improving overall Safety at Uber, and has won multiple state level science fairs. 00:00 Introduction 00:18 Our Guest 01:03 Building a successful company 07:37 Falling in love with your own idea 11:20 Killing Bad Startups 20:53 What problem are you solving? 26:38 Closing the gap 30:25 The bigger the company, the worse their security is 37:20 Out of Business 6 months after Breach 41:26 Will Machine Learning and Quantum Computing play a role? 46:07 More about Brian ------------------------------------------------- To learn more about Brian visit https://www.linkedin.com/in/vallelungabrian/ To learn more about Dark Rhiino Security visit https://www.darkrhiinosecurity.com ------------------------------------------------ SOCIAL MEDIA: Stay connected with us on our social media pages where we'll give you snippets, alerts for new podcasts, and even behind the scenes of our studio! Instagram: @securityconfidential and @Darkrhiinosecurity Facebook: @Dark-Rhiino-Security-Inc Twitter: @darkrhiinosec LinkedIn: @dark-rhiino-security Youtube: @DarkRhiinoSecurity ​ ------------------------------------------------------------------

We're at NRL Fan Fest at Circular Quay joined by the Grand Final teams, Dell gives us his Team of The Year and we hear your horrific party injuries.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Penrith co-captain Isaah Yeo has revealed the simple message for the young Panthers who've done an exceptional job filling in when teammates are rested or out through injury. The defending champions secured a 40-14 win over the Titans on the Gold Coast on Saturday without Brian To'o and Scott Sorensen who were rested to overcome a couple of niggles. The likes of Zac Hosking, Tom Jenkins and Jack Cogger have been integral in Penrith stringing together eight consecutive wins and Yeo told The Continuous Call Team they've got a simple role in the superstar outfit. “We've got the same systems throughout all our grades,” Yeo said. “The expectation is when you come in, you do your job. “We're not asking them to do anything else or go above and beyond, we just want them to be reliable and stick to the systems and processes.”See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Penrith co-Captain Isaah Yeo feigned indignation about the way Andrew Moore and the team described his perfect kick that laid on a try from Brian To'o in their big win over the Roosters. However he admitted that kicking the ball was the last thing on his mind when he received it! He also said Penrith's best football is still in front of them and backed Dylan Edwards as a State of Origin player should a chance come his way.

Penrith co-Captain Isaah Yeo feigned indignation about the way Andrew Moore and the team described his perfect kick that laid on a try from Brian To'o in their big win over the Roosters. However he admitted that kicking the ball was the last thing on his mind when he received it! He also said Penrith's best football is still in front of them and backed Dylan Edwards as a State of Origin player should a chance come his way.

Brian To - an HSM volunteer - taught on one of our core identities as a Christian through Ephesians 4:32.

Brian started his career as a systems analyst for the United States Army then became a Senior Systems Analyst for the United States Airforce. From then on, Brian grew extensive experience with a background in managing risk, security, compliance, business continuity, and governance for SaaS providers. He is currently a Security Test Manager for Adobe. 00:00 Introduction 01:05 The Army or the Airforce? Is one better than the other? 01:40 Brians Background 03:07 Pivoting into a new role 07:14 Credentials: What is important to get? 12:17 Is cybersecurity about a mindset or skill? 13:12 Communicating the Mindset 19:00 Risk Assessment process 24:30 100% Compliance 31:00 Getting pushback 33:47 Risk Quantification 36:36 Third-party risk 47:39 News for Brian ---------------------------------------------------------------------- To learn more about Brian visit https://www.linkedin.com/in/briandavisit/ To learn more about Dark Rhino Security visit https://www.darkrhinosecurity.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------- SOCIAL MEDIA: Stay connected with us on our social media pages where we'll give you snippets, alerts for new podcasts, and even behind the scenes of our studio! Instagram: @securityconfidential and @OfficialDarkRhinoSecurity Facebook: @Dark-Rhino-Security-Inc Twitter: @darkrhinosec LinkedIn: @dark-rhino-security Youtube: @Dark Rhino Security ​

Episode SummaryWelcome to The Dr. Brian's Health Show, a weekly podcast where Dr. Brian Boxer Wachler uses his decades of experience in medicine and ability as an expert researcher to provide a light - hearted approach and share health trends popular on TikTok. In this episode, Dr. Brian welcomes Dr. Fayez Ajib back to the show to continue sharing fascinati ng stories from his time in emergency medicine. What is a Brazilian Butt Lift? What are the most common complications associated with Brazilian Butt Lifts? What brings Dr. Fayez joy from working in the ER? Find out in today's episode! If you're enjoying the show, we'd love it if you leave the show a Rating & Review at https://ratethispodcast.com/NoCap (RateThisPodcast.com/NoCap) Key Takeaways01:02 – Dr. Brian makes an exciting announcement about his upcoming book at https://www.influencedsocialmedia.com (https://www.influencedsocialmedia.com) and welcomes Dr. Fayez back to the show to discuss his experience in emergency medicine 02:35 – What's a Brazilian Butt Lift? 06:23 – Dr. Fayez speaks to the complications he has seen from botched Brazilian Butt Lifts done outside of the U.S. 09:20 – Life lessons Dr. Fayez has learned from his experience in emergency medicine 11:38 – Drugs, overdoses and ‘homie drop-offs' 16:24 – What brings Dr. Fayez joy from working in the ER 19:23 – Dr. Brian thanks Dr. Fayez for joining the show, teases next week's episode topic and encourages listeners to go buy his book, INFLUENCED Tweetable Quotes“I would trust you with my Brazilian Butt Lift, Brian. That actually would be a great slogan, ‘Brazilian Butt Lifts by Brian: BBL by B.'” (03:46) (Dr. Fayez) “I think the message here is that you have to also really reconsider if it's worth saving a few dollars or a few thousands dollars, which is nothing to sneeze at. But, when you're talking about an invasive surgery and your health, you really don't want to compromise. And, I'll advise patients that it's ok to save up for whatever you need to have done and come back when you're ready. And I think that's prudent advice.” (08:16) (Dr. Brian) “The ER teaches you a lot about life. And, more importa ntly, it teaches you about things to avoid in life.” (09:26) (Dr. Fayez) “I almost think it's an epidemic here in the United States of people just of all kinds of backgrounds. There's no demographic that's not touched by opioid overdosing, largely because of fentanyl tainting.” (13:53) (Dr. Brian) “To drive home the point - to be repetitive on purpose - even if someone says, ‘Oh, this is my prescription pill that my so - and - so has,' and it's really for them, if it's not your own prescription, please do not take it.” (16:09) (Dr. Brian) Resources MentionedDr. Brian's amazing new book on social media, INFLUENCED, featuring his incredible insights and experiences along with many of your favorite influencers. Endorsed by many influencers including Rob “Gronk” Gronkowski - https://www.influencedsocialmedia.com/ (https://www.influencedsocialmedia.com/) DM Dr. Brian your questions and we will respond back with answers - https://v.cameo.com/F5MH0Hglnmb (https://v.cameo.com/F5MH0Hglnmb) https://www.boxerwachler.com/ (Dr. Brian's Website) https://www.tiktok.com/@brianboxerwachlermd? (Dr. Brian's TikTok) https://www.instagram.com/drboxerwachler/ (Dr. Brian's Instagram) https://www.instagram.com/doctorfayez/?hl=en (Dr. Fayez's Instagram) Dr. Fayez's TikTok https://www.linkedin.com/in/fafayez/ (Dr. Fayez's LinkedIn) Please remember, Dr. Brian is a doctor, but he is not your doctor. He is here to provide general information, not medical advice, so you should always check with your doctor before relying on any information. Podcast Production & Marketing provided by FullCast Copyright. Advanced Vision Education, LLC See https://omnystudio.com/listener (omnystudio.com/listener) for privacy information.

Na lauina mai i le vaiaso nei le 'au a le Toa Samoa mo le Ipu o le Lalolagi i le lakapi liki, e aofia ai Brian To'o ma Jarome Luai o le Penrith Panthers.

一个好故事是有迹可循的，我分享了几十条更好地讲故事的方法，来自于 Steve Jobs、Brian To、Wes Kao、Sahil Bloom。以及《Storyworthy》等经典的讲故事的书籍。 链接 我提到的广告文案大师的书 Brian To 如何讲故事 林语堂：中国传奇 莺莺传 乔布斯如何讲故事 快乐三十分 070 我从《乔布斯传》学到了什么 Wes Kao 的 ELU Sahil Bloom 的讲故事原则 Sahil Bloom 最近接受采访的一期播客 Storyworthy 我的 blog 如何讲一个动人的故事 赞助 本期播客由「有知有行」赞助。 投资是除健康之外，每个人最应该关注的话题。我推荐使用「有知有行」app 来学习投资。它是一个免费应用，包含有成体系的投资入门知识、长期投资指南等，帮你迈出投资第一步。创始人孟岩是一位令我尊敬的财富知识分享者，他经常在播客「无人知晓」里和朋友一起分享投资、创业和成长的话题，强烈推荐

Can State of Origin be the pinnacle of our game and a Kangaroos selection at the same time? Carbs break down Brian To'o's choice to represent Samoa over Australia and what it could mean for the future of Rugby League.

Welcome Back to Bill Murphy's 10x Podcast. Our guest in this episode is Brian Chidester, award-winning, public sector marketing executive, and expert integrated messaging strategist. Brian is currently the Industry Vice President at Genesys, an Advisor to the G20 Global Smart Cities Alliance, and a member of the Forbes Technology Council.   Today, Brian shares with listeners the benefits of developing smart cities and explains how they promote sustainable practices that will address growing urbanization challenges that cities face. By leveraging the data that smart cities provide, stewards within a community can help make better decisions on behalf of the constituents.   As a supporter of smart city evolution, Brian shares examples to describe how process efficiency, edge computing, and curb management can help advocate for the future and advancements of smart cities.  Tune in today and learn about the possibilities smart cities are providing our communities. As a Chief Information Officer (CIO) and Business IT Leader here are some wins you will get by listening:  [5:00] Brian: To be a true advisor to sales leadership, you must have a deep understanding of the market and the reason behind what you are doing.   [5:30] Brian: Anyone working in the technology sector begins to realize that everything is interconnected.  [6:30] Brian: When looking at the government space, it pulls you into an experience. The experience can be a digital experience through your mobile device, tablet, or computer, but it also evolves into smart cities.  [7:30] Brain: A smart city is a framework, an idea, that is composed of information community technology (ICT).  [8:00] Brian: The idea behind smart cities is to develop and promote sustainable practices that help address growing and advancing urbanization challenges that cities face.   [8:30] Brian: A foundational piece of a smart city is cloud. Cloud-based IoT applications and sensors can receive, analyze, and manage data in real time to help improve the quality of life for citizens living in a city or connected community.  [9:00] Brian: The most important piece that comes from the cloud based IoT applications is the data. The data provides insights so that stewards within the community can make better decisions on behalf of the constituents.  [10:30] Brian: London pioneered the initial smart city.   [11:30] Brian: Smaller cities have the greatest innovation despite having a smaller budget because they do not have to go through policy roadblocks that stand in the way of bigger cities.   [12:30] Brian: For example, when it comes to trash removal, technology is not added to help get the trash out faster but to understand where the process slows down. Therefore, technology is used for process efficiency.   [13:00] Brain: In Buffalo, NY the city turned trash removal trucks into moving sensors by adding video cameras, leveraging AI (Artificial Intelligence), and using 5G capabilities to find potholes that need to be filled.   [13:30] Brain: Edge computing is the ability to process data at the point. An example of this is a sensor.   [15:00] Brian: Edge computing and 5G from an infrastructure perspective can allow quick reaction times to help the evolution of smart cities.  [15:30] Brian: The concerns surrounding 5G are the pockets of the broadband infrastructure. Smart cities can help with digital equity, but one of the biggest challenges is access to broadband.   [16:30] Brian: GDPR and the Europeans are ahead of the US when it comes to privacy practices and policies.   [18:30] Brian: Security of data is critical for protecting privacy. With new video footage capabilities such as speed cameras or security cameras, we must ensure this information does not fall into the wrong hands.   [20:00] Brain: Policy is always lagging behind technology. That is why the government tends to be late adopters of technology.  [22:30] Brain: There is a lot of value that data can bring to the citizen.   [23:30] Curb management is a big trend happening with smart cities because of curb real estate. The data surrounding curb management can help cities identify how to manage and optimize curb space to allow for curb demands.  An example of this is DoorDash pickups and drop offs.   [24:36] Brian: A big topic that's being looked at within smart cities is how to help address climate change. How can we lower the city's carbon footprint by leveraging smart devices?  [27:30] Brian: The City of Chattanooga is looking at how they can prevent car accidents and pedestrian deaths by having a sensor speak to a vehicle which then stops it when the car gets close to a crosswalk.   [28:00] Brian: When we think of smart cities, it's an ecosystem. It's not just about a device here and there. It's a framework and policies, but it is also a complete ecosystem that plays together.   [28:30] Brian: Look to the Googles and the Apples of the world that have next generation technology and understand what that is, where it's going, and how it can be enveloped properly into the smart city ecosystem.  [32:00] Brian: What does the future of smart cities look like? It starts with the data. Then, it's what the city's going to do on behalf of its citizens. It's not about technologies and sensors, but it's about how the cities can become smarter from the data that's ingested to be more prescriptive for their citizens.  [32:30] Brain: How will the metaverse impact smart cities and digital experiences for citizens? Both augmented reality and virtual reality are giving governments opportunities to be able to meet the next generation of citizens.  [36:30] Brian: The goal of smart cities is to provide citizens with the types of technology and the types of services that are needed within their area. You're not beholden to just what you've had in the past.   [40:00] Brian: It's not just about getting technology into the hands of the community. It's understanding how to best use and push the adoption of this technology and do it in a way that's going to drive the type of outcomes they are looking for.   Resources World Economic Forum  OpenText  G20 Global Smart City Alliance  The Program: Shot Spotter  Open Government Partnership  Kevin Kelly's “What Technology Wants”  Brian Chidester's Podcast “The Government Huddle”    Love this episode? Leave a Review  Share it on your LinkedIn feed.  If you have not already, please leave us a review on iTunes.    About Bill Murphy  Bill Murphy is a world-renowned IT Security Expert dedicated to your success as an IT business leader. Follow Bill on LinkedIn.  If you are interested in learning more about RedZone Technologies, and its security expertise, email us at info@redzonetech.net