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Episode 32 – Ken Connor Interview Welcome to Anchored by Truth brought to you by Crystal Sea Books. In John 14:6, Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life.” The goal of Anchored by Truth is to encourage everyone to grow in the Christian faith by anchoring themselves to the secure truth found in the inspired, inerrant, and infallible word of God. Script Notes: (dramatic opening music)(music under voice over) O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth! You have set your glory above the heavens. Out of the mouth of babies and infants, you have established strength because of your foes, to still the enemy and the avenger. When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what is man that you are mindful of him, and the son of man that you care for him? Yet you have made him a little lower than the heavenly beings and crowned him with glory and honor. You have given him dominion over the works of your hands; you have put all things under his feet, The Book of Psalms, chapter 8, verses 1 through 6. English Standard Version For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, “The righteous shall live by faith.” For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. The Book of Romans, chapter 1, verses 16 through 20. English Standard Version ******** VK: Hello! Welcome to another episode of Anchored by Truth brought to you by Crystal Sea Books. I’m Victoria K in the studio today with Ken Connor, noted attorney, author, activist, and former Chairman of the Family Research Council and the Center for a Just Society. Before we begin our interview though we’d like to take a few minutes to meditate on one of God’s most important attributes – His holiness. We’re going to do that by using a devotional extract from RD Fierro’s book on prayer entitled Purposeful Prayers. This happens to be day number 3 from the 30 day devotional study. ----------- Purposeful Prayers Devotion, Day Number 3, Holiness VK: Well, I think meditating on God’s holiness sets the stage pretty well for days discussion. By way of a slightly longer introduction of Ken, listeners should know that Ken has practiced law for over 40 years and has been at the forefront of some of the most important issues confronting our nation and culture pretty much throughout that time. Governor Bush asked Ken to represent Terry Schiavo in her family’s fight to keep Terry alive. Furthermore, as a former president of Florida Right to Life and two national organizations involved in major cultural issues Ken has unique insights on the challenges facing Christians in America and in our day and time. Also, though he’s too modest to tell anyone Ken was good friends with some of the most important Christian leaders in the last half century including Chuck Colson and RC Sproul among others. Ken, Thanks for being here today to share some of your unique insights. Ken: Thanks for inviting me. It’s always a pleasure to be back in Tallahassee. VK: Ken you’ve been at the forefront of many of the social and cultural issues confronting Christianity in America for the last … well, several years? Ken: Decades actually. VK: Well, long enough for you to not only have been prominent in many of issues at the national level but also long enough for you to form some thought about the major issues facing a culture that many think is abandoning its Judeo-Christian origin. Would you mind sharing a few of your thoughts about where we are today as a nation and as the church within the nation. Question List: 1. You were the first person I remember talking about the dangers posed judicial activism. Do you still see that as a problem in America? Has it improved in the 30 years since you first began talking about it? Or gotten worse? 2. You were also one of the first people to talk about the fact that the life issues included more issues than just abortion. Could you expand a little bit on what you meant and where you see those issues standing today? 3. One of the reasons RD founded Crystal Sea Books was to be a part of reclaiming the arts and entertainment parts of culture for the cause of Christ. He admired the influence that great Christian fiction writers like CS Lewis and JRR Tolkien had on the broader culture through their brilliant fiction and allegory. What do you think about that as a vision? Do you share RD’s concerns? 4. What do you think are some of the most important discussions going on within the broader culture as they affect the church? 5. You were asked to represent Terry Schiavo. Tell us about that. What were the issues involved? What did you learn from that? 6. At one point you decided to run for the Governor of Florida. Tell us something about that. Why did you decide to run? How did the race affect your life and family? Would you recommend seeking public office to other Christians? 7. You have said that it was reading the works of Francis Schaeffer that animated you to become involved in public policy and life. What was it that you read and how did it influence you? VK: Today for our closing prayer how about if we pray that everyone would come to a saving knowledge of the God of the Bible who is our one sure anchor to truth. ---- Prayer for the spiritually lost, radio version. VK: We hope you’ll be with us next time when we’ll continue our discussion with Ken. And we hope you’ll take some time to encourage some friends to tune in too, or listen to the podcast version of this show. If you’d like to hear more, try out crystalseabooks.com where “We’re not famous but our Boss is!” (Bible Quotes from the English Standard Version) The Book of Psalms, chapter 8, verses 1 through 6. English Standard Version The Book of Romans, chapter 1, verses 16 through 20. English Standard Version

Ken Magma Marshall is Chief Growth Officer and Managing Partner at RevenueZen, an agency focused on helping high-growth-oriented B2B, SaaS, and professional service brands generate more demand and leads through SEO, content, and LinkedIn . . . to get real leads that actually convert. Ken started his agency four-and-a-half years ago. His first milestone was developing a successful, process that worked and that he could pass onto another person with his SOPS and get the same results. Instead of waiting for clients to request particular services like keyword research or gap analysis, Ken could tell a client, “In the first 90 days, we're going to do these two things that will lead to X outcome based on the research and analytics from my previous clients.” The second one, he says, came about when the repeatable system evolved to the point where he no longer had to tweak the system himself to continue to get targeted outcomes.  About six months ago, Ken's agency reached its third milestone, when it was aqui-hired by RevenueZen. RevenueZen, with a traditional focus on lead gen, appointment setting, and LinkedIn, got Ken's agency's assets, his knowledge of inbound technology, his presence on the executive team, and his agency's book of business. Complementary strengths have proved win-win. ReveueZen's clients are typically established professional, mid-market service companies that have good revenues . . . but may or may not be profitable. All but three B2C “outliers” are B2B technology companies, with 60-70% in SaaS (software as a service). Most of these companies have marketing teams, but are not problem- or solution-aware with respect to RevenueZen's methodologies, don't know what kind of solution they need, or don't know the right provider.  What do they know? They want results. Ken says it is imperative for the agency to qualify its potential clients through the discovery process – if clients don't understand customer lifetime values /average lead values, they are likely to have unrealistic expectations of the value of conversion or question whether they will get a positive return on spend.  Ken will be moderating a HubSpot's Inbound2021 session, “Long Live Forms, All Hail Chatbots: The Epic Debate of Booking Demos.” In answer any participants' subjective blanket assertions, such as a statement that “Chatbots are the future,” Ken will be asking such probing questions as: “For whom are chatbots correct?” What other marketing stack does the company use?” “How will the company measure effectiveness?” The objective is to dig to a deeper level . . . to determine which use cases are appropriate, who they're appropriate for, at what level of business maturity, etc. This year's online HubSpot Inbound conference is scheduled for October 12-14. Ken is intrigued by some of the newer technologies: Lead-qualifying software that captures online prospects' form data, qualifies leads programmatically in real time, filters their information to match rep data, and immediately either notifies the appropriate sales rep or establishes a live video chat. Conversion.AI software that generates scripts based on user inputs and expectations “learned” over time. Alex Boyd (RevenueZen founder and CEO) and Kenneth David Warren Marshall II (a.k.a. Ken Magma Marshall), can be reached on LinkedIn or on the agency's website at: revenuezen.com. ROB: Welcome to the Marketing Agency Leadership Podcast. I'm your host, Rob Kischuk, and it is that time of year once again. It is almost time for the Inbound Conference. Much like last year, it will be virtual, but what that means is this is the time of the year where this podcast gets a little bit more salesy, but in a good way. It's just a different flavor of the agency services world that we like to cover. I am joined today by Ken Magma Marshall, CGO and Managing Partner at RevenueZen based in Portland, Oregon, though he himself has newly moved to Brooklyn. Welcome to the podcast, Ken. KEN: Thanks for having me, Rob. Really excited to dive on it. ROB: Excellent to have you here. Why don't you start off by telling us about RevenueZen and the agency's superpowers, what you're known for, where you succeed well for clients? KEN: There's the 10,000-foot view elevator pitch, which is that we aim to help high-growth-oriented B2B, SaaS, and professional service brands to generate more demand and leads through SEO, content, and LinkedIn. Or in layman's terms, we help our clients get real leads that actually convert. Really, the company itself is the story of RevenueZen before Ken and then my agency. I actually started an agency four and a half years ago, and about six months ago, RevenueZen acquired it. So now, whereas they were focused on lead gen, appointment setting, LinkedIn only, I brought the inbound methodology with me. So now we've got a hybrid and best of both worlds. ROB: Is that maybe also where some of the SEO flavor came in? I would say it's a little bit atypical for HubSpot agencies in the whole ecosystem, lead gen agencies, to know SEO as well as you're articulating. KEN: That's exactly right, and that's why we utilize the terms “demand gen” and “lead gen” very intentionally, because with SEO agencies you get the whole “These are our deliverables and our clicks and our keyword increases.” We're former salespeople. Three of our executives out of four were cold calling back in the day, so we understand how to map that search intent into pipeline, how things are going to go from each perspective that actually leads to those people converting, not just being users and clicks and searches. So full funnel knowledge helps inform the strategy. ROB: I'm going to pull on a thread that you mentioned in there. You mentioned being acquired. What does it look like to be acquired, and how does that happen? KEN: That's a fun conversation. If I were a startup in Palo Alto and I was a kid in college, that might look like somebody buying me for a certain undisclosed amount of money. But for me, it was more about joining a team that was a little bit established. My run rate at my old company I think was around 600,000 ARR. When RevenueZen acquired me, it was basically acqui-hire situation – they get all of my assets, my knowledge, me on the executive team, and all of my book of business. But the strength of it and really the allure for me, or I wouldn't have done it, is that they understood these lead gen methodologies and channels and had these systems that we didn't that strongly complement the inbound engine that I taught myself and learned how to build over the years. It was really that complementary partnership with a slightly mature agency where I could really hone in those growth focuses and new innovation initiatives. Because I'm a mad scientist at the end of the day, Rob. That's what I love to do. [laughs] ROB: Not to project too much of this onto you in particular, but in general, there's a certain amount of confidence and ego that flows into starting a business, starting an agency, and then layer on top of that the degree of confidence and resilience required coming from a sales background. How do you navigate that into – there is a mutual admission of need and benefit. You have to get past the outer defenses to even have the conversation of “Hey, maybe we should get together,” and number two, “How does that look so we can all feel like we have the right seat at the table when we're together?” KEN: Absolutely. My ego, to use an analogy, went into the boxing ring and did not come out on top for the first few fights. I had to sit down with my wife, my friends, family members, and we really chewed on it. I even chewed on it with the CEO of the company. Now I'm the CGO. We lived in the same apartment building. What it came down to was really just that I understood that he has a finance/sales – he worked at a revenue-based software company, very high growth. He has a ground level understanding of what it takes to scale, whereas, like I mentioned, my strength is in customer success and product development. I'm really gangster when it comes to those two things. So I had to look at it and say, he knew that if he could just bolt on these assets that have taken me six years to create, and I knew that with his ability to understand scale and the other two executives taking on those things that I don't do well – I hate this word because it's overused, but we could create some real synergy and grow a lot more quickly. It just came down to that: being able to do what I love and a little bit more stability. ROB: Especially early on, we all want a little bit more stability. Maybe not too much, but definitely more than that early entrepreneurial journey. KEN: Exactly. ROB: Paint a picture, Ken, of what a typical customer looks like, a typical client for RevenueZen. Is it B2B? What's the mix and focus there, and maybe the size as well? KEN: At this point it's all B2B except for three companies. Upwork is one of our clients; Nalgene is one of our clients. But they're the weird B2C outlier as far as consumer goods go, Upwork being this monster that it is. But most of them, 60-70% are B2B SaaS companies. These are technology companies. They have Series A, usually, investment. They've got a marketing team, but the marketing team are not problem- or solution-aware with our methodologies. They just know that they need to turn those levers because their investors or the CEO or whoever is talking to the, VP of Demand Gen or Marketing, and they just want results. They have money to do it, but they typically don't have the knowledge of what kind of solution they need or the right provider. So we can attach ourselves on as the Chief of Digital or an ad hoc CMO and guide them not only in knowledge-gathering, but lay the strategy out and then literally bolt on our team to execute it for them. Really, it's those kind of companies who are more mid-market. They're already established professional service companies, but as far as the SaaS companies, they have a go-to-market somewhat defined; they understand product-market fit. They might not be profitable, but they have good revenues. They really just need somebody to come in, tell them what to do, and have the army to do it for them. ROB: Do they typically have an understanding – you said product-market fit, but they might have a general understanding of customer lifetime value so they can measure you that way? KEN: Yes. Actually, when I'm qualifying them, and same with our CEO, we actually still do all of the sales. At my old company I sold every deal, and now it's just us two closing every deal. But when we ask them about CLV or even their average lead values if they have lead storing and they understand the value of a lead, that's actually done in the discovery process to qualify them as well. Because if they don't understand those values, they'll have unrealistic expectations when we start getting those conversions as to how much they're worth or if it's even going to return on their spend with us. Yeah, that's pretty imperative. ROB: I would imagine once you have provided a lead, that's an MQL (marketing qualified lead). Then there's that sales qualifying that happens after that. Is that typically on the client side? Is there an element of going further down the funnel that you get involved in? Where does that boundary start to happen? KEN: Yeah, we do lean more heavily on inbound these days. I would say it's about a 70/30 split as well. But the furthest we'll get is when we are doing let's say an inbound/outbound hybrid LinkedIn content marketing and outbound service – happy for you to go on the website and check out if you guys want to – the furthest we'll get is setting those appointments with them and then letting them take over. It's part MQL or SQL depending on how they define it, but it's appointment setting as far as how far we go. ROB: Which still can be, with the proper – it sounds like potentially a real blessing for a sales rep. You're hanging out and stuff shows up on your calendar, and it's people who seem interested in buying your software. That's a good way to wake up in the morning.  KEN: Right. That's why we love inbound. Not that outbound doesn't have its place, and in fact, for a lot of startups it does in the beginning. There's urgency. But that's why we love it, because these people are coming to you saying, “You've built my trust, you've educated me, I've compared solutions and then learned about your solution, all on your site. All you need to do is not give me a reason to put my credit card down.” ROB: Very interesting. You mentioned a little bit about the merger, but if we go a little bit further back, what led you to start your own business in the first place? And you got it pretty far along. That level of bookings is more than just typically one person in their closet. What led you to get started on the journey? KEN: Not that amazing, but I'm pretty proud of it. For me, I think I'm the cliché entrepreneur without any background in it. Nobody in my family, none of my friends. But I was that kid with the lawnmower, I had lemonade stands. I used to take my neighbors' trash and put it on my parents' lawn and sell it at a yard sale. I always knew I was interested in making money and seeing what I could do, but I didn't really have the background, or I would say some of the mentorship, to know that's what it was called and how to start a company. I went to school thinking that I would be a salesperson. I was personable, I understood psychology to a certain degree. Right around my junior year, I believe, I asked a counselor, “What should I be doing? I don't really like this sales thing” when I saw my first sales job that I could get. She's like, “You seem like one of those kids who should go check out that digital marketing thing.” That really was the spark, when I started to understand if I can reverse-engineer this thing called an algorithm, nobody knows what that is. I asked a bunch of people, I asked business owners – that's actually how I got my first client – and they had no clue. So that was my first lightbulb moment: I could start a business doing this. However, I've always been geared towards being an entrepreneur, and I always knew I would. That's why I quit my last agency after only being there for about two years total between both of them. ROB: As you got into the starting and progressing the business journey, were there any key inflection points? Obviously, the merger itself is a key point of validation. But before that day, there had to have been some key inflection points in the business, some points where it really seemed to be materially different than just rubbing two sticks together, making some phone calls and getting some clients. What were some of those moments in the growth of the business that were memorable? KEN: Obviously, I still have the first dollar I ever made. Still have that first check. That's the big one. That's the pure validation of “Somebody's willing to pay me money for this thing.” But apart from that, I think the first milestone that sticks out was going from freelancer to having a repeatable process that worked and involving another human being. That was the first big thing for me. I was on Upwork – like I said, they're now our client, so it went full circle. But I remember doing these projects, and I'm like, instead of people telling me what they want me to do, like keyword research or a gap analysis, I'll just say “In the first 90 days, we're going to do these two things that will lead to X outcome based on the research and analytics from my previous clients.” So I had this system that was starting to form. I could give it to another person with my SOPs and then they could do it, so it's now an actual business. That was the first one that was really exciting. The second one, I would say, is when I evolved from doing the work. I had downloaded this repeatable system to a point where I didn't have to actually implement the changes or the recommendations myself for us to still get those desirable outcomes. That required a coach, who was not cheap [laughs], and a lot of hours and mistakes. But we finally got it dialed. Other than the merger, that was one of the most exciting. And then your first six-figure year is always exciting too, as far as validation. ROB: I think people often underestimate the value of what they can do in terms of documenting a process, having people execute on it. The good part is you mostly don't have to think about it. I think the risk after that, however, is that that process gets stale. How do you go about ensuring that a process you've understood and documented can then be also maintained as the landscape changes over 3, 6, 12 months, etc.?  KEN: I think I'm going to answer that in two parts. When I was still general managing the other company, I am so obsessed with strategy; I'm a technician, I'm a strategist by trade. I'm not a banker, I'm not a programmer. So it was always easy for me to have that layer of QA and innovation just because I was reading this stuff every day. I remember – shout out to Rand – after one Moz Local, going to a wine bar and having a bottle of wine and getting to chop it up. But I always found that very easy because I loved that stuff and was interested in it. But now that I'm with this bigger organization and there's four executives, our COO might say, “Here's how we can squeeze out this operational efficiency.” The CEO is like, “Here's how we hedge against risk.” I'm sitting here – and I think that's why it's such a blessing to be in my position – as the Chief Growth Officer, all I think about all day long is how we can ink out that efficiency for the team, make our client have less friction but also stay on top of effectiveness and industry trends. So for me, the answer is simple. It's my job, and that hasn't changed at three companies. [laughs] ROB: That's a critical job, for sure. I would be remiss not to mention the reason this is an Inbound episode is because you are, in fact, moderating a session for Inbound. The session you're moderating is “Long Live Forms, All Hail Chatbots: The Epic Debate of Booking Demos.” Inbound is in October this year. I think it's usually Labor Day week, if I'm not mistaken, but things change in a pandemic. Tell us about that session, what you think you're going to talk about, and especially how you're thinking about moderating that session. KEN: I'll talk about the moderation aspect, because it speaks to who I am as a person and my temperament. Whenever folks get into very sensational language or subjective language, I like to systematically remove that and dive into the concrete, the nuance of what they're talking about and why it's effective. For instance, if somebody says “All hail chatbots, chatbots are the future,” I'm not going to give them a response. My first instinct is to give them a question of, for whom are chatbots correct? And what other marketing stack do they use? And how are they going to measure their effectiveness? That's how I'm planning on moderating things, by having these specific questions to get to the bottom of what use cases are each appropriate, who they're appropriate for, at what level of business maturity, etc. I want to make both people frustrated to get the most out of them. [laughs] I haven't talked to them about that, but now they've heard. That's my style of moderation. That's how I talk and that's how I do business. As far as forms versus chatbots, I go back to when I talk to clients who might come in for inbound, and we convince them they need to do an outbound hybrid on LinkedIn. Or they come in for only appointment setting and they want 10 SDRs tomorrow. I'm like, “You're so niche, and there's this clear keyword opportunity that you can own these terms and have a better ROI. Why are you hung up on that?” There's no right or wrong answer. I've actually used chatbots effectively, and I think forms and demos are perfectly appropriate, especially for a self-serve model. So chatbots have their place, forms have their place, but let's dive into the nuances of it to parse that out. That's my philosophy. ROB: There's a certain attention to that at any sort of conference. I know HubSpot goes to pretty good lengths to make Inbound not all about them, but it is to an extent still about them, and they will hop up there and talk about what they're doing, and they'll certainly talk about it in terms of their agencies, their clients, and the customers they're looking to acquire. They are very visionary in terms of looking outwards, but inevitably, they're also going to unveil some new toys, some new shiny objects, and it will be easy for that to be the topic of the next year, the chatbots – you name it, really. KEN: Yep. ROB: What are you hearing from the ecosystem? Is there anything, whether it's on the agenda at Inbound or bubbling up through the product roadmap, and even outside of HubSpot in the broader lead gen space, what do you see coming that's important? Certainly that isn't a shiny object, because the shiny objects are in service of an objective, as you highlight. KEN: While we're on this topic of qualifying leads and once something's in the pipeline, helping sales ops with their objectives and making their lives easier and helping them be more effective – and shout out to Chili Piper. I'm actually very intrigued by these softwares that are, once somebody fills out a form, qualifying them programmatically, and then based on that response, immediately notifying the correct rep. I've even seen softwares that will allow somebody to live video chat right after they've gotten qualified on the form. Those kinds of technologies that remove friction – and again, chatbots can do this, forms can do this; you can integrate both with these other softwares that I'm describing like Chili Piper – those are the things that I'm interested in. Sales ops is, I think – you see these crazy valued companies. I think that's the future of this stuff. Taking the friction from that person who's a user that might be a lead, quickly and programmatically qualifying them, and then diverting them to the correct part of your sales process or person or folks on your sales team and reducing that friction. I think that's where a lot of opportunities get lost. It's the classic somebody taking 72 hours to follow up with a lead that's inbound. Why? And the same thing as sending the templated email. That's also played out. People don't want that. They need a hybrid of both. That's what I'm excited about and what I'm hearing and seeing. ROB: That's really, really interesting. You may know their product a lot, you may know it a little, but when I speak of shiny objects, one of those shiny objects out in the world is AI and machine learning, but it also seems like this area where Chili Piper is playing could perhaps be a legitimate application. Are they looking at the history of the rep, the history of accounts, the history of places where they've been effective? Is that part of the routing of how they're getting the right reps to the right leads? KEN: Yeah, the cool thing is that they plug directly into the CRM. HubSpot, let's say you have a rep assigned to certain accounts based on – native to HubSpot, within HubSpot, let's say if the person comes in and they typed in “SEO” for their focus, or it includes in the form XYZ terms, then they can automatically say, “This person is qualified as a mid-market opportunity who has X, Y, and Z criteria. Give them to the rep based on our different filters that we've created within the CRM.” And then pushing it to the email address of times that are open for that rep in an automated fashion. We're talking about logging into something, back and forth emails, a form for somebody that might not be qualified – all these components are broken down into very seamless automation. That is what I think the uniqueness of their platform is. Those kinds of automations. There's lots of platforms that do one-off of each of those thing, but it's the fact that it's seamless and it directly integrates with the CRM. That's where I think the benefit is. ROB: It's almost a way to see how the things that they've announced over time, the tools that get rolled out over time, how it's accretive and how it starts to come together. Something like scheduling has been in some CRMs for a while. I recently logged into a CRM of one of our clients, and I was in there because they emailed me. I looked it up and they have our number of employees and our revenue. I'm like, man, I don't think I've seen that in someone else's CRM before. How'd they get that? Because we're a vendor. They're not going to go in and enter that data on us. That was entered for them. KEN: Exactly. ROB: You combine that with – you have some rules engines, you have some AI. It all comes together in a pretty meaningful way. KEN: I was going to say, that's so spot on. It's that accumulative knowledge put together in a way that's seamless that's the benefit. As you mentioned, calendar scheduling tools, integrations with CRMs, those have been around for a while. Even certain routing has been around for a while around automation of sending certain things out based on criteria. But the strength is really in the nuances of those experiences, like when somebody fills out a form, prequalifying them based on their responses in real time. How many different form softwares haven't taken advantage of that very simple opportunity that saves the sales folks so much time? Me and Alex, we're still selling. Every 30-minute call that we do is a pretty big part of our day as executives. So if we can, without even thinking about it, take care of that, have them go through and get that messaging out that they need within a really short period of time, we dramatically increase the chance that that lead will close without lifting a finger. ROB: It's really interesting. It's really meaningful. I think something that's also underestimated – in a lot of our processes that we document out, we put a lot of emphasis on humanizing the language of templates. I don't know if anybody's doing some good work around that. That is the hardest thing to do, but I daresay it might be one of the most important things to do: to write templates that don't sound like templates. KEN: Yep. ROB: I need tools for that, I think. KEN: We have lots of SOPs that we've attempted to do, and thank goodness that every software, even Gmail, allows you to do templates that you can drag and drop and place. But I've also been toying around with Conversion.AI to write these scripts based on inputs that we give it, but over time it obviously learns what we're expecting. That has been a bit of a game-changer in terms of templates as far as email follow-ups and responses with prospects. Or even in our SEO work, making sure that we can do optimizations at scale without having to burn out the strategists or charge these companies an ungodly amount of money. I am very fascinated by continuing to tweak and make automation work for us, and machine learning but without losing that component of human that all of us still look for. ROB: Super sensible. Ken, when we zoom back a little bit, across your founding journey, across your merging in with RevenueZen, what are some lessons you have learned on that journey that you might go back in time and tell yourself, if you had a chance to do them differently? KEN: What a question. Something I chew on regularly. I think the first would be that – Alex, our current CEO, my good buddy, has hammered home a lot that you can create a line of best fit, of effectiveness, efficiency, and productivity. I was so focused on the effectiveness, being 99.9% effective, that I forgot about that aspect of “I'm only ever going to be able to help X amount of people, and I actually can't help them that well because I'm personally burnt out from doing too much work.” I think that's a trap that creatives and agencies often get into, which is that we're so heads down on the custom, we forget about the scale and making it efficient enough to come down at a price point that's affordable to a broader market. So that's thing #1. Again, took a coach and a lot of money and a few years to learn that. The second thing I would say is when I go on a discovery call and I set the tone with the prospect, I tell them, “This is to make sure we're a good fit.” Salespeople have been saying that for years. Used car salesmen say that. But we've taken that in as a value of the company. I am so quick to disqualify in our CRM, in the pre-opportunity stage. That just saves headache for the strategists, it increases the lifetime value of our clients with us, and it's just better for our reputation. Good fits, good case studies. So that's the second thing: disqualifying them. I would say the third thing is the benefit of really good partners who complement your skillsets. As a solopreneur in the beginning, I think I had to learn a lot of hard lessons myself and chew on a lot of hard things without the aid of somebody. Whether it's a mentor or a co-founder or a really good book, just being insatiable about learning and getting help from others, external help, is invaluable. You literally cannot calculate the time and headache that it'll save you. ROB: Disqualifying almost seems like a subset of an SOP. What I mean by that is if you have to look at every lead that comes in and you have to think about all of their constraints and you have to say, “This person's in a closet by themselves and they haven't built a product yet, and they have $1,000 a month that they want to spend on inbound; what can we do for them?”, you'll kind of lose your mind trying to fit yourself to that opportunity, versus understanding when to say no, and maybe even sometimes “Here's someone else that would be a good fit for you to work with” and focusing on the things you do know how to solve. It keeps you from overthinking and getting paralyzed by choice, really. KEN: Ain't that the truth. Preach. Part of that, not only will we say this business/person is not a good fit, but what could we give them or how could we use the network effect to create value and have them go give a referral? So we do have templates of like “You're not a good fit, but here's some standard resources and here's a good one of our vendors as far as our partner program that we partner with.” That's exactly right. A good ICP defined, having that defined will save you a ton of headache and make your marketing better. ROB: As we round the corner, Ken, I can't help but highlight – you've mentioned a couple of times working with a coach and paying some real money for it. I know what that's like. How did you go about finding a coach that worked well for you, and to an extent justifying the cost? KEN: I'll start with justifying the cost. For me, I audit my time, and I audited my time in terms of how much dollars it was likely to bring in based on the activities. I started to hit this ceiling. Like, “There are all these operational inefficiencies that are holding me back, and I don't actually know how to solve them. The problem of why this is a bad thing, I have no clue. I guess I could learn about this or go get an MBA, but I'd rather just expedite that by paying somebody.” The ROI for me I knew would come because I knew I had a good system. I trusted in my “product” back then. But as far as knowing who was the right person, I always tell people to look for somebody who's done it multiple times but isn't so far ahead of you that they can no longer relate. I wouldn't want Jeff Bezos as a coach, even though he's clearly taken over the world. So this guy was a former founder three times over, but currently just wanted to give back. I mean, he charged money, but really it wasn't that much compared to the market and his expertise. I did a little bit of research. I got a beer with him. Those two components – he's done it before, I can sit down and have a conversation, and he's not too far ahead of me in my industry in the service business to be checked out and just in it for the money. I think if you look at it from that perspective, it's often worth it. That's what I would say. ROB: That's a great point also. Price is significant, but it's not always an indicator of quality. When I was interviewing coaches, I talked to – might be a wonderful guy, but he was a coach in a box. He literally had a box with a coaching methodology, and I think he was doing a career change. He was actually more expensive than the guy I ended up working with, who coaches execs of SalesLoft kind of legitimacy. SalesLoft probably pays him a lot more in total. But the credibility did not always correlate with price, is my point there. KEN: Hundred percent. ROB: Ken, when people want to catch up with you, connect with you and with RevenueZen, other than online for Inbound in October, where should they go to find you? KEN: You can check out either my or Alex's LinkedIn. Alex Boyd and Kenneth David Warren Marshall II, a.k.a. Ken Magma Marshall, on LinkedIn. RevenueZen, we're building a new website, so if you go to revenuezen.com any time in the next quarter, we'll have a lot of goodies in our Resource Center. That's always a great place to start. I'll say it now and I'll say it until the day we sell this thing or we keep doing it off into the future: I am always geeked to jump on a call with somebody who isn't our ICP to have a strategy conversation. It's not a sales pitch. It's me in real time, fixing stuff on your site and your pipeline and your methodology. I could do this just with my brain because I've been doing it for a while. So it's always good to get in touch, regardless of if you think you have the money or need SEO. I'll give you something to walk away with every time. ROB: That sounds like a YouTube channel. You let Ken give you help for free and you just agree it's going to be on YouTube in real time. KEN: I used to do that. That's how I used to prospect. That's how I got my first few clients. I would do a real-time, off the top of the dome analysis of their site and fix three to four things. I'd give it to the developers, not even the marketing contact, and the developers would be like, “You increased our page speed by like 60%. How did you do that? Aren't you an SEO provider?” I'm like, “Exactly.” [laughs] ROB: Excellent. Thank you, Ken. Hopefully we can meet up in the skin at Inbound some year when it's back in person. I wish you and the RevenueZen team all the best. Thank you for coming on and sharing. KEN: I would love that, Rob, and you're welcome to come to Brooklyn any time for a beer. Cheers. ROB: Brooklyn's awesome. Cheers. Thank you for listening. The Marketing Agency Leadership Podcast is presented by Converge. Converge helps digital marketing agencies and brands automate their reporting so they can be more profitable, accurate, and responsive. To learn more about how Converge can automate your marketing reporting, email info@convergehq.com, or visit us on the web at convergehq.com.

In this episode, Ken reveals why you should a Copyright for your invention. A Copyright may be the perfect form of IP protection for your invention. Copyrights last for the inventor's (author's) lifetime plus 70 years. Therefore, Ken recommends you consider this protection option when possible. Learn more about the value of copyright protect in this episode. Taken from his book, The Simple Plan - The Six Easy Steps to Make Millions From Your Ideas, Ken provides highlights of the GMAR provision of all successful license agreements. www.kenjohnsonspeaks.com www.successfulinventing.com A Message from Ken - Thanks for listening to my podcast, I'm always happy to help fellow inventors. Let me know how I can help you. Meanwhile, check out my book. You will learn a great deal from it as it will likely answer many of your questions. Regards, Ken

Tad Stevens impresses me as a marketing strategy guru, He is fantastic at online advertising! He is a SCORE Mentor. He puts his money, where his mouth is with an incredible money back guarantee. He does exceptional high-ticket funnels in 15 days. Help me welcome Tad, it is great to have you with us today. Ken: So, Tad, everyone wants an amazing life but not everyone gets there, what do you think it takes to get to an amazing life? Tad: That is an interesting question because just a while back I was trying to answer that in a way that honestly, I could deliver to my audience that made sense and had a catchy acronym. I never got it to the catchy acronym but I came up with “FEAD” That stands for focus, empathy, articulation, and decisiveness. What I've seen in my coaching, my mentoring over the last several years and with me. Is if those four things aren't in alignment, then you generally don't get there. Most of the people that are doing those four aren't thinking about it. They are not consciously thinking, I got to be focused today, they just know. I got to be focused and I got a care about the people that I am selling to so I really understand what their needs are so I can provide that solution. Then I got to be able to articulate it. If I can't articulate my offer no one will take me up on it because they don't know what I offer. Then I have to be decisive. I have to make moves right or wrong. I got to move. Ken: It is so easy to get caught up in what's new and glamorous right I mean there is all over the place. Tad: Shiny Object syndrome is alive and well. Ken: So, Tad what skills or talents do you have that most people don't know about? Tad: I made a lot of mistakes, one of my favorite quotes is and I'll probably butcher it but it goes something to the effect of: I have no special talents or innate talents, I'm just passionately curious. What I have found in my interviews on my podcast on my show. Cuz, I ask people a similar question. I found that people that are successful by their definition have passion for what they are doing. It is what gets them out of bed in the morning. It's not the money, the money is important, but it's what they are doing. They really like it. In fact, I was talking to a guy yesterday who has a $100,000 coaching program. It takes a year, you sign up, he offers progress payments but it's 100 Grand. That is a niche audience and he was talking to one of his clients and they were asking how much coaching he did online” He said I'm coaching through zoom most of the day, they said “oh man, how can you do that?” The client asked a question which identified that he didn't understand. What the coach was doing and what we were doing would have been work to the client. He didn't know that it was passion and what the coach loves. Ken: Thanks for all that information, where can our listeners go to find you? Tad: They can find my podcast Micro Success Secrets or search any of the major networks and we pop right up. They can also go to our website. Please subscribe to this podcast and leave a rating and review, to help others find this podcast. Also join the Facebook group. Here is the spot to click and set up a time so we can discuss how you can use these tools and others to get your amazing life! --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/youramazinglife/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/youramazinglife/support

In this episode, Ken reveals why you should develop a Trademark (TM) for your invention. A well thought out TM can make a HUGE difference in the amount of royalties you will receive and the length of time you will receive them. Taken from his book, The Simple Plan - The Six Easy Steps to Make Millions From Your Ideas, Ken provides highlights of the GMAR provision of all successful license agreements. www.kenjohnsonspeaks.com www.successfulinventing.com A Message from Ken - Thanks for listening to my podcast, I'm always happy to help fellow inventors. Let me know how I can help you. Meanwhile, check out my book. You will learn a great deal from it as it will likely answer many of your questions. Regards, Ken

In this episode, Ken reveals why you must stop procrastinating and "get it done"! Taken from his book, The Simple Plan - The Six Easy Steps to Make Millions From Your Ideas, Ken provides highlights of the GMAR provision of all successful license agreements. www.kenjohnsonspeaks.com www.successfulinventing.com A Message from Ken - Thanks for listening to my podcast, I'm always happy to help fellow inventors. Let me know how I can help you. Meanwhile, check out my book. You will learn a great deal from it as it will likely answer many of your questions. Regards, Ken

Today, we have a guest who's democratizing access to private investing. Ken Nguyen is the co-founder and CEO of Republic, a multi-asset investment platform for private markets. Ken is a pioneer in the private markets investing world and a serial operator who knows how to build businesses. He's helped grow Republic to hundreds of millions of dollars in gross transaction volume over the past three years after Republic spun out of AngelList. After Ken was an instrumental part of building the investment and regulatory infrastructure at AngelList, as their General Counsel, Ken founded Republic to create a leading equity crowdfunding platform for both nonaccredited and accredited investors. While their incredible progress on the retail crowdfunding side is remarkable, Republic's platform and vision is so much more than simply a retail crowdfunding platform. They also have an accredited investor platform and they enable investors to invest into everything from real estate to e-sports and gaming financing to small businesses. Republic has done the hard things first. They built the investment infrastructure for private markets. And they combine that with a Robinhood-like investing experience for private markets, for both retail and high net worth investors alike. They've also been innovative in how they engage consumers by creating a Republic Note, a security token that has created network effects on their platform for users.It's been really fun to watch this team execute at a blistering pace from the time that they started out with the idea of enabling investors to invest in startups at twenty dollar minimums, to building out a comprehensive private markets investment platform. Ken has been instrumental in that success with his infectious energy tireless work ethic and drive to create democratized access to investing for people around the world.This was such a fascinating conversation. We talked about Ken's drive for starting an investment platform that could enable everyone to participate in wealth creation in private markets, how investing and owning equity is part of the American Dream, how Republic has unlocked access to private markets for all investors, “Lean back vs lean forward” framework applied to investing (h/t Rishi Garg of Mayfield Fund for the “lean back vs lean forward” framework), and how community is such a big driver of Republic's growth and success as a business.I hope you enjoy.TranscriptNote: This Transcript was created by an AI software package. It is not an exact translation of every word in the podcast.Michael: [00:02:30] Ken, welcome to the Alt Goes Mainstream podcast. Ken: Michael, thank you so much for having me. It's such a pleasure to be here. Michael: Oh, it's great to see you. I love that background of New York. Ken: I am in New York. So, art mimics real life or the other way around. THE FOUNDERS STORYMichael: [00:02:46] Well, you've had a busy year, so congrats on everything. But before getting into Republic and all the things that you're doing, I'd love to hear your story. I mean, you've had such an incredible story of how you've gotten to Republic. So what is that story? Ken: [00:03:01] Yeah. Thank you, Michael. I definitely have a bit of an unusual founder story.My family immigrated from Vietnam to the Bay Area in California. And so growing up in the late nineties, early 2000's, you hear these stories of companies going IPO and tech and Google and Facebook. But just because you were smack in the middle of Silicon Valley, it doesn't mean that I or my family had anything to do with it.We definitely weren't accredited, but that fascination early on, I think, ended up, staying with me. I ended up going to law school. Started out as a litigation attorney in New York and went into finance. And along the way, I think the story, the headline news that caught my attention the most was always tech companies. You know, you hear more and more of Facebook and then Airbnb. I had the opportunity to go back to the Bay Area and academia. I spent two years as a Teaching Fellow at Stanford and studying corporate governance. But Stanford happens to be also a tech hub. And so more and more, the different stages in my life just inserted me more and closer into the tech ecosystem and then I had an opportunity to join AngelList when they first launched their first syndication product. So I joined. I think the first non-engineer hired as the General Counsel back in 2013, 2014. Part of that work led to a change in the law, which is regulation crowdfunding in 2016. And I'm sure we're going to go into it. But in short, between the Great Depression in the 1930s, all the way to 2016, you had to be a millionaire to invest privately. In 2016, all of that changed. It's like opening up the flood gates. And that's when the team and I set out to found and launch Republic. DEMOCRATIZING ACCESS TO INVESTINGMichael: [00:05:04] That's fascinating. And it seems like you really have a variety of experiences. Everything from the kind of legal and regulatory side to working in startups, to working in private companies. Was there really a specific moment in your life that has driven you to make it your mission to democratize access to investing? Ken: [00:05:25] I think there were three moments. Thinking back, probably the first moment was when my oldest brother who was 15 years older than I am and was already very established by the time I graduated college and he was an accredited investor – the first one in the family to be accredited.And he was like, Hey Ken, do you know how I can invest in this company called Facebook. And I was probably one of the earlier users, one of the earliest users of Facebook. And I'm like, great question. I'm an Associate at a law firm and I have no idea how you can do that. I asked around - no one knew how. Right in the middle of New York City, every law firm partner is a multi-millionaire and they're like, yeah, this is Silicon Valley stuff.So I think that piqued my curiosity, but also I had a desire to be like, Hey, I want to be in. I use this product. I really like it. And wanting me as a stakeholder to be a shareholder. So, I would say that that was the first moment.The second one was when, after two years of spending my time at AngelList, I realized that the accredited only model could only go so far. AngelList did open up the venture ecosystem to a lot more people, but you still have to be in the know, have to be accredited. And, I think that moment when AngelList shifted their attention to focus more on upstream institutional family offices, that's when I was like, wait, there is this law that's going to be effective very soon. And this is exactly what I, as a teenager growing up in Silicon Valley, wish that it was the case that I could get in. So, I think those two moments, rather than three in combination, probably culminated in the idea and the passion for retail investing. Michael: [00:07:31] Well, you're bringing up a really interesting point, right. And it's been during a time where value creation in private markets has far outpaced value creation in public markets. And yet, so many people really up until the past few years with what you're doing with Republic and others have done opening up access to private companies, is enabling people to access some of this value creation. How do you think about that and why is it important for people to be equity owners in things. Ken: [00:08:00] Well, investing has traditionally been dominated by large financial institutions and ultra-wealthy investors at the earlier stages. Right? And so, when a company matures from inception to raising more and more capital to the point of going IPO, much of the wealth generation, much of the upside is captured during those private stages.And that world - private investing - traditionally has been dominated, if not exclusively, the purview of the ultra-wealthy leaving the vast majority of everyone else on the outside, looking in, and really limiting the diversity of ideas and founders that I think can shape our future generations.So, being able to invest or allowing and encouraging and enabling people to invest earlier, I think that aligns passion with profit. It aligns power with profit. And I think particularly the next generations – Millennials and Gen Z - that's what they're looking for. By the time a company is listed on the NASDAQ, your ten dollars, your hundred dollars, your thousand dollars matter almost nothing to the company. But, when a company is still growing with 10,000 investors or customers, and not a million or a billion, that thousand dollars of investment, of purchases that you make, matters a great deal. So, I think enabling people to align their passion with the desire to generate profit is at the heart of the retail revolution that we see.Michael: [00:09:49] Passion and profit, power and profit. I love that. I love that way of describing this and I think we are seeing this groundswell of interest into private assets or investments where people feel they have some level of kind of interest or passion for them to your point. THE WHAT AND WHY OF REPUBLIC?Michael: [00:10:00] What you're really getting at is equity, right? People are now able to have a share in something that they might not have had a share in before. And that's kind of the underpinnings of Republic and it's really open to everybody. So, what is Republic and what's the vision for the business?Ken: [00:10:24] It's funny that you mentioned, or that you pick up on, how we describe what we do in between power and profit and passion. Our tagline is profits to the people. And what we are is that we are hopefully the leading, or one day the leading, investment platform that empowers people to invest in the future that they believe in. Invest in startups, in real estate, in crypto, in music, in sports, and yes, one day, even public companies. If you are very passionate about Apple and Nike, we want you to be able to do that on Republic one day, as well. Right now, we are focusing on the more rarefied, the more difficult ones, which is early-stage private investing. But yes, our goal is enabling, powering people and catalyzing profits to the people. Michael: [00:11:26] And why offer this comprehensive platform across private markets, across various assets, rather than just a single asset and private markets.Ken: [00:11:36] That's a great question. When the decision of building a business ultimately, a founder or a team has to ask, what is the ultimate goal? Why are we doing what we are doing rather than just the profit or how we are generating revenue? So, if the goal is just to generate revenue and build the easiest business model, focus is easier than distraction from a diversified suite of products.But Michael, our goal is, as I mentioned, to be the go-to investment platform where people can go and invest in whatever they're passionate about. So, how can you roll out any platform with that mission and interest. Enabling healthcare or sustainable companies, they're powerful missions to love, but many people are more passionate about blockchain technology.I'm certain that many of the older generations, in particular, are more passionate about real estate. So, we want to make sure that people can come to Republic and find and match their passion with potentially profitable investment opportunities that speak to them. Because of that, we have no choice. Our mission requires a multi-asset, diversified suite of products so that we can, hopefully, one day have billions and billions of people coming to cast their votes with their investment and their dollars. Michael: [00:13:16] So, you talk about something which is really interesting and a strategic decision to some extent, which is, you want all sorts of people to be able to access different assets based on what they're interested in and passionate about wanting to invest in, and see returns potentially in.When you think about that, how have you thought about constructing the platform in the context of, should this be completely self-directed where investors get to really choose what they want? Or should it be more structured? Because there's a real question, a philosophical question, in the Alt Space of whether or not investors should just access structured products. So, products that are manufactured by these platforms and diversified in and of themselves. And then investors just get exposure to a broad space or completely self-directed where somebody goes onto Republic and can invest in any startup they want to. So how do you think about that balance of self-directed, kind of choose your own adventure, versus a more structured or curated way of building investment products in the platform?Ken: [00:14:19] Mike, when it comes to structuring investment product, rather than types of products or types of industries to offer, we also want to provide a range of options for people, because I think investing, the new world of investing, has three main elements. So, passion is one and experience has to be another one and the third one is convenience. Now everyone's time and attention span is so limited. So those three things are taken into consideration. We all know that hardly anyone is passionate about mutual funds. If you put ten dollars into a mutual fund, you're not thrilled about it. You know that it's going to generate consistent returns over time. So, for those whose interest is low on passion and want upside exposure to a certain asset class, we definitely, we currently, and will build products that enable them to do so in a simple, maybe in a diversified basis. But for some people like myself, getting to know a company, getting to know a technology, getting to know a founder, is much of the value and the fun of private investing. And so, that ability to invest directly and have a conversation with that company, with that team, I think that probably still is going to be the dominant part of Republic as an investment platform for the foreseeable future. But we also will have structured products as you describe, as we continue to grow. LEANING BACK, LEANING FORWARD, AND LEANING DOWNMichael: [00:16:25] What you're getting at is something so fascinating, which I'm going to give credit to Rishi Garg, who's a partner at Mayfield, who was talking about this with me in the context of consumer social apps, like Clubhouse and things like that.He made the contrast between lean back and lean forward apps. Where lean back is totally passive, totally unengaged, but you can do it and maybe benefit from it. But lean forward is like an app where you actually have to spend time engaging on maybe it's Twitter, maybe it's even in-person.I think there's actually a real interesting analogy there in the context of what you just said in investing. So how do you think about that kind of lean back versus lean forward mentality when it comes to private market investing? Ken: [00:17:07] I love it, Mike, with that analogy. I have not heard that before except for I think Sheryl Sandberg's book called Lean In but in an entirely different context. One is about being more proactive, more intentional. And I think obviously intention and proactivity - another way of describing it is passion, right? So, when people want to do something that they really care about, it's leaning forward and caring about maybe, you know, social issues. It may have nothing to do with the core reason why you invest, which is always return on capital. But if you can add on other things that speak to you, that makes you more intentional and proactive, that's leaning forward. Leaning backward is for, you know, let's say you are a retired lawyer or that you're a Goldman MD. And you're like, hey, I just want to have exposure to this asset class known as crypto. I don't understand it yet. I think it's a little crazy. So, I want to have some exposure into it. So, can I just basically invest in some major pieces with a small amount and lean back? I would add a new category which is lean down. There again, you don't have to do anything. And, you know, we are thinking, not thinking, we have already integrated, but we'll definitely even push that product even more - retirement funds, illiquid. Currently, everyone, most people, have tens of thousands of dollars, most professionals, in their IRA deployed in some random mutual fund. So that's our lean down approach, which is you can use money, not from your checking account, not from your savings account, that you can't touch for another 30 years. Leave 5% of that or 2% of that and through Autopilot, diversify into real estate, crypto, female founders, whatever it may be, but you can just lean back and let it generate a return. So, between lean forward, lean back and lean down, we hope to capture them all over time. Michael: [00:19:28] No, that's a really interesting point on the IRA assets because the self-directed IRAs are really a great fit for longer-dated assets, private equity, startups, which may take seven to 10 years to mature or have a liquidity event, so that seems to match really well with the timeframe of an IRA. I do want to touch on one thing that you said around the lean forward part of really getting involved and engaging with the companies, the investments that people make. You've done some really interesting consumer things with Republic, in terms of having people create profiles, sharing with companies where people can help. Talk about how and why you've done that and how the creation of community is maybe different than how we've been experiencing investing in the past. Ken: [00:20:19] I would observe two trends, two technological and social trends in the past four or five years that I think have influenced our product ideation and creation. One trend is the digital community adoption. You even see Facebook now driving or focusing a lot more on Facebook groups. That's how people interact now. Clubhouse is a fantastic example of - we are just at the early days of - new iterations of communities. So that trend - humans by nature will work as community, social creatures, but technology has enabled the formation and the sharing of information in a way that wasn't possible just a half a decade ago.The second trend is the intentionality of generation after generation that Millennial moreso than the generation ahead, in Gen Z even moreso, on wanting impact on and caring about the consequences of their actions to the larger society. My parent's generation, as an example, when they were in their twenties or thirties, recycling wasn't a thing. Buying products that would help the world to be greener was not in anyone's psyche.So over time, in the Seventies and Eighties, people started seeing the impact of what they buy - their purchasing power. And I think when it got to our generation, and now the newer generation, is the shifting of everything that you do, even the clothes that you buy, but more than that, investment, even in public companies, I think the need for, or how much people care about the consequences, the social consequences of their activities are definitely amplifying over time. And that's a great thing. It's really amazing.So the two of the trends in combination, I think led us to focus a lot on building products that have community potential and that can enable people to learn not from a single source of truth, not from a long newsletter or blog that we send out about the value of the Black Swan Theory or the Black-Scholes Model or Black Swan events, but about normal everyday folks sharing maybe even 20 video clips on Twitter and TicTok explaining why they're passionate or why they think an investment opportunity is good for them and learning from that.So I think those two trends definitely dictate or play a heavy role in our product and ideation process.FUNDING ON REPUBLICMichael: [00:23:21] And are companies that come to your platform to raise from the community of Republic investors - Are they finding this valuable or is that one reason why they're actually coming to the platform to raise capital?Ken: [00:23:32] That's a very interesting question, Michael. It goes to the question, it relates to another question that I often get - Are people looking to community funding, retail funding as the last resort and you can't get VC capital. Then you come to us. And that question is related to yours in this way.Any company that is consumer-focused, obviously wants to engage their customer, even more. If you can get a customer who loved you so much to part ways with their $50 that he won't see anything back for a while, why would that be a bad signal ever for any institutional investor or sophisticated investor?That's an excellent signal. So, the type of companies that I think in the early phase of the retail revolution definitely lean heavily on B to C. These are consumer-focused companies and because of that, the customers, their consumers, matter a great deal. So, Republic managed to attract not only companies that have large customer bases, but we get rave reviews for the product and how easy it is to use.And, hopefully, we're going to grow it and maintain that reputation. But I think that's a key part. Republic has two sets of customers - founders, but also investors on our platform. Companies are not going to be happy unless their customers are having an amazing experience on our platform and because of that we focus on building products that seem to be targeting or emphasizing engagement and education or an interaction, just to give everyone a very good inclusive experience. But Michael, if I may make an observation about what you said earlier about how, if you are a shareholder of Apple or Starbucks, that statistics show that you are more likely to buy Apple over Samsung or Starbucks over Pete's coffee.And I think it is so true, but it's even more true when you're an early investor. Let's say there's a small coffee shop owned by a couple down the block from everyone. And it's down the block from where we live. And you're able to invest a hundred dollars into that couple's coffee shop business.And whenever you go back there, you have a little table for investors. I imagine whether you are a student or retiree, whether you're a lawyer or a carpenter, when you go and buy that cup of coffee or a glass of water and hang out with your friend, you're naturally going to go to that coffee shop, right? The same with an early investor in a beer brand, in a vodka brand, in anything that, that we consume.So that psychological alignment is a remarkably powerful value. That's why a lot of companies look at retail fundraising, not for money, not for a source of capital as the primary motive, but as a marketing and engagement force. Michael: [00:27:04] You've now built the infrastructure to enable people to invest into startups, crypto tokens, real estate, even venture funds. So, talk us through both of those things. So, one, quality control and curation, which is key to any marketplace, and then two, the infrastructure that underpins that. Ken: [00:27:23] We are an investment platform, first and foremost, and return on capital is ultimately our customer's number one objective. They can add passion and impact to their investment decisions, but if they don't make money in the long run, we are going to have zero customers. So, because of that we focus heavily on curating what we believe to be credible, high-quality investment products, but venture by one area of return, is just one type.A coffee shop in the example that I just gave you earlier is unlikely to ever be acquired or raise venture financing and go public, but it very likely can generate robust revenue. And, if you enable customers to invest under the form of revenue sharing, out of one hundred dollars the coffee shop generates, it passes back ten dollars to early investors. It is very aligned and still can be a very attractive, compelling investment product, for many. Real estate in the same way. You are never going to see a 10X return, rarely ever. And you very rarely see a one hundred percent loss. In an early-stage tech company, doesn't matter if it's YC or backed by Sequoia, if you invest in one deal in the seed stage, the probability of losing all of your money - doesn't matter if it's on Republic or anywhere else - is exceedingly high. So, all of these things we have to deliver in terms of information, but we want to make sure that what we bring on and curate and present to our community are credible and are, in our best judgment, of high quality. In the long run, I very much believe that there's a thesis as to what we do here, which is the crowd of retail investors. You will have case studies I think in a few years out that show that companies, backed by the retail investor in the earliest of stages that were outside of the venture lens, just in tech, may be just as competitive in terms of viability and how robust of an investment opportunity they are. So, this is a notion of wisdom of the crowd. And I just want to focus in on tech as a vertical first, because that's still the main dominant vertical on Republic.There's a narrative here that you only want to onboard companies that are either already backed by VC or that are venture backable, because those are deemed to be of high quality. There's definitely truth to that. A company backed by you, Michael, or by Alfred Lin at Sequoia is more likely going to succeed. But what about the founders and companies that don't have access to you, don't have access to Alfred Lin. And statistics very much show that mostly female, older, or founders who aren't in Silicon Valley or the two coasts, have very little access to venture capital. So, we do present investment opportunities that we find to be credible and hope that if they speak to a larger retail public, that they may get the capital they need to grow and grow to be of a stage where they can be appealing to you and to Alfred.So we view venture retail investing as additive, contributive in the long run to the ecosystem rather than being competitive, so to speak. It's a long-winded way of answering your question, Michael, but we value very much on traditional indications of quality, as well as testing out models that can speak to people's passion, even if they fall outside of the traditional VC lens of credibility. Michael: [00:31:42] Well, you're hitting on something that I think is so important, which is that early-stage investing, in many respects, is about finding outliers. But in some cases, finding outliers means going outside of the mainstream or what's more traditional or even going outside of different networks.We've talked about community in one sense, which is having people and investors, consumers support companies. But you've also built community around creating a diverse set of people who can help you find the right companies, funds, and assets to put on your platform that may be overlooked by others. So, I'd love to talk about community in that respect because that's something that's so core to what you're doing and so different from what many others have done.Ken: [00:32:29] The notion of inclusion and access I think has to be looked at under both lenses, which is the founder's access to capital, customers, and businesses. You know, it's a crazy statistic, but even when it comes to business loans by the government, apparently female founders representing fifty percent, give or take, of all small businesses comprise less than fifteen percent of small business loans, which are supposed to be pretty much, if you have revenue, you get the loan. So, this lack of information and access permeates all throughout the different forms of capital sources and businesses. But then you also have the customer, the investor base on the lack of opportunities. You know, it's funny, but we noticed, and we hope, that as Republic continues to grow, that we make it easy and comfortable for that high school student, perhaps in Detroit, whose parents are not sophisticated investors, but in a classroom, instead of Fidelity or Apple donating computers, maybe they donate a thousand dollars in grants to the entire high school class.And each student gets a chance to invest ten dollars for fun on a platform like Republic as financial education. I imagine if you do that, even with any sense of life skill, you're going to have a whole new generation that are much more financially sophisticated. Certainly would be more than me. My niece and nephew now are more financially sophisticated than me when I was in college or law school even.And I think that financial equity is very much a solution to social inequities, the many inequities that we see. So, our focus on access and inclusion applies on both sides of our customer base. Michael: [00:34:30] I love that - financial equity is a solution to social inequity. I mean, that really gets to what you're saying here, which is that talent may be evenly distributed, but the opportunity is not so you have to help find that - help people find those opportunities. So, what have you done in terms of building out this community of venture partners and this network of people who've helped you find investments in different places where others may not have been able to look? Ken: [00:35:00] Michael, I can't really take credit on my own because I've been - one of the most fortunate thing about my journey building Republic has been able to convince such a committed, talented, and most importantly, diverse team of colleagues to join. So, my colleague, Cheryl Campos, who heads Venture Growth and Venture Partnerships for Republic, through her work she has launched a Venture Program and now does a Venture Fellow Program for those still in MBA programs.And soon she will do a Venture Associates Program that's meant to go even deeper to undergrad. But the notion here is that in order to attract diverse founders, and to improve access inclusion in the space, you also have to incubate and support diverse venture capitalists as well. And I think that, as when I first started out at a law firm, I may have been the only Asian American law associate in a class of approximately 60. Now, across the board, some 15 years later, it's much more diverse.And I think that with the proliferation of venture capital as a business model, you now have diverse talent in venture as a percentage, much higher than what you saw 10 years ago. So, the Venture Partner Program is to build a community to support, and to also get them to help evangelize for what we are building because the notion of access and inclusion certainly applies to venture as well.I would not be able to do that myself because I'm just one voice, one lens and one experience. And I think that to build a community, you need people with the same mission, but all different backgrounds so that we all can communicate and understand and a different lens and get more to join the mission and the journey.THE REGULATORY ENVIRONMENTMichael: [00:37:12] Interesting. Interesting. And then to some extent, the regulatory environment, which you've actually been leading the charge on - you've been in DC, helping legislators, regulators figure this out. What's been going on from a regulatory perspective that's enabled you to unlock access to private markets to retail non-accredited investors? Ken: [00:37:36] Well, since the great depression in the 1930s, in the infinite wisdom of Congress, someone decided, hey, if you're not a millionaire, you should not invest privately because it's too high risk.I mean, it makes no sense. It stopped making sense a long while ago. In 2010, for example, private investing was legal for most people. Gambling wasn't but buying lottery tickets was highly promoted. So, it obviously is not making sense. But I think that people are truly waking up to the power of that false narrative - this is the example of the Reddit and Game Stop saga that we saw very recently. It used to be that people thought that the public markets were much more low risk or safer for the individual retail investor and it's decidedly not so. Market timing, insider trading, and predatory behavior can result in very, very risky and just pitfalls that you don't see in the private markets. So, I think both in Congress as well as at the SEC regulatory level, people understand that, people see that, and they are taking a close look.And there's no question in my mind, that you're going to see more and more easing of the rules and regulations around allowing retail investors to invest in more asset classes. At the end of the day, you have to make sure, and that's the goal and the rule, and the reason why the SEC exists is to protect investors, first and foremost, but what it means to do so, and how to do so, changes with time. Technology and society change faster than the law, just by the construct of it.But there's no question that laws and regulations will follow. They have been following and I have no doubt that they will continue to follow. So, you are going to see this retail revolution, is really driven in part by a more relaxed regulatory framework around investing. THE REPUBLIC NOTE TOKENMichael: [00:39:51] Well, so retail revolution - I want to extend that point that you're talking about. So, one part of that is fractionalization of assets, which you are in part, along with some others in the Alts Space, kind of a pioneer on, and it's really unlocking opportunities in all sorts of alternative assets. You've done this in a few different ways, but one way you've kind of extended this even further is with the Republic Note. So tell us about this Note, because it's really an innovation in private capital markets. Ken: [00:40:23] Michael, if I may first share a view about blockchain or distributed ledger technology and how it relates to FinTech and to Republic and how it is so core, instrumental to our mission of global adoption of private investing.My ultimate goal, and I think right now we have a community of over a million members, it's not a success until we have a community of like a billion members, but I think it would make me happy, and I definitely would smile when my distant cousin in a small village in Vietnam can invest five dollars into a startup or some investment products on Republic. Currently, that is not possible. To make that investment cross-border, the fee is like 30 bucks and they don't have bank accounts. And most banks in Vietnam don't synch so easily with JP Morgan and Bank of America. Now Vietnam happens to be a very crypto friendly country. Surprisingly, enough people, even in small villages do own a fraction of Bitcoin or Ether. So, the ability to enable global participation at a tiny scale, five dollars may not be a lot for a college student in the US at Columbia or at the University of Michigan, but it's a lot of money for a single mom, middle-class woman living in Hanoi, Vietnam even today. Right? So, how do we enable more investment, more activities, more transactions at scale globally? You cannot do that without blockchain, without this technology. And it has already enabled, to accept investment globally at a far smaller minimum amount than we did before.So the ability to factionalize and automate, factionalize any assets to tiny, tiny pieces, therefore lowering the minimum amount and the ability to automate and streamline the process of confirmation payment settlements are key parts of FinTech and retail adoption. The Republic Note Token, we do have our own token as you mentioned, this currently is the only, as far as I know, revenue sharing digital token in the US and it happens to be available to our entire community.So, the theory behind that, Michael, is that we want it so that even people with just a dollar can somehow share in Republic's success, as we are still a very private company. We have a million members plus. If they want, or they used to be able to, buy or earn some tokens, some Republic Note Tokens. And, as we continue to grow, they're going to earn a little bit of payout potential and dividends.So the goal, the ultimate goal, is this: In the year 2030 or 2028, a company that had raised on Republic in 2017 and now is as large as Uber or Coinbase is going public. And this is the headline news across the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal about company ABC's IPO. You know what Uber did then? About a thousand early investors had a big smile on their faces and about 200,000 Uber users and drivers had a big frown because they got nothing – it was not relevant. We hope that when company ABC that raised on Republic a few years ago, and in eight years goes IPO, that you can have, not only the early investors in that company but 5,000 investors in that company, being very happy, but every Noteholder, hopefully, at that point a hundred million. They may get five dollars back. It's not going to make anyone rich. They may get three dollars per Note, but for once they feel like a part of the story on that front page, in that newspaper. And I think that's what people ultimately want and care about. Money and making profit and investing is not just making money for money's sake. It's about buying happiness and security. And you know what, being a part of something, feeling like you matter in a larger society. Two dollars payback, but yes, you are a part of this narrative. I think that part of our mission of what we are building is that we hope to contribute a little bit to a societal sense of fairness and hopefully, more societal stability, especially compared to the year that we just went through in 2020 and earlier this year.Michael: [00:45:29] And it also sounds like they get access to everything that's on the Republic platform. So, they're getting this diversified access to private markets, which as you continue to build that flywheel of private companies of crypto assets, of real estate projects, of video game financing projects, they're going to get access to everything. Ken: [00:45:46] Yes. I'll give another shot at defining the Republic Note Token a little bit more succinctly. So, the Note is a revenue-sharing digital token. We can share a portion of that upside back to the token holders. So, in many ways, it's like a perpetual bet into this growing basket of companies. And even if a thousand companies fail, if one company succeeds, a little bit will go back to each and every single token. And that's what I meant earlier by saying that we hope that by doing that, and if we truly made sure and become the go-to platform for every and any company that looked to raise and grow, that the Noteholders have broad exposure and would be linked to the success of literally tens of thousands of companies and more down the road.Michael: [00:46:58] That's really cool. Because it just gives people access to all sorts of assets in the private markets that some of which may be very successful, others which may not work out as well. But by having diversified access, then they can benefit from everything on the platform, which I think is such an interesting innovation. Ken: [00:47:18] Michael, it just occurred to me that the Note Token may be the ultimate example of the lie down and lie back example. Michael: [00:47:25] Yes it is. Ken: [00:47:27] You can earn the Notes if you don't want to buy the Note and then have broad exposure to the entire ecosystem and be part of this story without having to do anything. Michael: [00:47:38] Yes, that's fascinating. So that maybe that is the right definition of the lie down part of the lean back-lie down lean-forward, and you can participate in any of those ways. If you want, to your point, to get engaged in and help some of these companies on the Republic platform, you may be able to earn tokens for that.Ken: [00:47:56] I am going to have to give credit to you when we file that lie down-lean back investing trademark application as a description of Republic.Michael: [00:48:06] Oh no. Give credit to Rishi. He was the one who shared that with me. But yes, I'm sure he'll appreciate that as somebody who's worked at Twitter and Square, so he's seen it, he's seen things from kind of the financial services perspective and the consumer social perspective. But, no, that's fascinating. THE ROUND ANNOUNCEMENTMichael: [00:48:22] I think we have to touch on some of the big news that just broke. So, you raised a substantial round to grow your business. People are very excited about what's going on with Republic. Why did you decide to raise capital and what are you going to do with this additional capital?Ken: [00:48:40] Okay. Thank you so much, Michael. It's been four-plus years. And part of the reason why we raised this financing round was to show to the world, and ourselves, that what we are building now is of institutional-grade - is no longer like a fringe, quirky business model. So, we're first of all, so honored and Broadhaven, of course, has been an early supporter and we're delighted to be a portfolio company of Broadhaven, but Galaxy Digital, Nomura, and Naspers are in the round together with Motley Fool Ventures.So these are traditional brands. Nomura, it doesn't get more traditional and institutional than that. Naspers is one of the largest, I think they go by Prosus now, is one of the largest venture firms in the world, and they've never backed a crypto project before. The Republic Note Token is Naspers' very first crypto investment.So, all of these institutional investors involvement, I think not only validates what we do at Republic, but also the industry. That is the retail industry, the blockchain industry as an ecosystem, and this notion of the future of why adoption of retail investing is a model.Michael: [00:50:08] That's fascinating to see the traditional financial services worlds blending with the next gen version of financial services, which is the democratization of access. But that's both in terms of traditional company equity and also the crypto world and the DeFi world, which it seems like you're really with your investor base, but also with what you're building kind of the blending of all of those things as you institutionalize and bring more institutions onto the platform like a Nomura which is fascinating.Finale: Favorite InvestmentMICHAEL: [00:50:39] So to wrap up, I always ask everyone what is their favorite or best investment idea? Ken: [00:50:47] I'm going to share my investment idea that I came up with when I was in college, no first year of law school. I don't think I was of an age to invest in college. Once a week, my recommendation now to my sibling's kids, my nieces and nephews, is that vice that you spend money on once a week, or at least once a month, just cut back on that vice, that one vice. Use that dollar to invest. Buy stock, public stock back then, and now invest in whatever it is that you care about. But be consistent. So, don't one day put it in shoes on StockX and on another day put it in wine. Just pick one thing and be consistent with it. Literally, one cocktail in Manhattan is like eighteen dollars, in a college town maybe like six dollars. These things add up. And if you do that, it's going to be a really fun learning experience. In my case, I can't tell you what I've been reliably putting my money in, but it has done very well for me over the years, but I'm old. MICHAEL: [00:51:59] Well, no, I mean, I think what you're getting at is something really fascinating, which is, and it's ironic that you're drinking a Starbucks right now while we're having this interview. But basically if people, and I saw a statistic on this the other day, that if people had the three or four dollars they're spending a day on coffee, if they had put some of that money into crypto or Bitcoin, or it could be in startups or the Republic Note Token, that capital has the chance to appreciate in a way that those three, four dollars spent on a Starbucks coffee every day may not. So, I think that that's fantastic, fantastic advice. Even as you drink your Starbucks. Ken: [00:52:37] Michael, you asked me a question that you ask everyone. What is their investment idea? May I ask you a question that I've been meaning to ask people that I know, but I have yet to, which is, I think the future is no longer about investing in a given range of options, but the question is what would you want to invest in that you currently are not able to. Because that desire for people to want to invest in new things, I think necessarily will make that happen.So, I would love to hear what is one thing that you have not been able to invest in. For any reason that you really want. MICHAEL: [00:53:22] That's a great question. You know, I think it's actually starting to become true already with some of the infrastructure that's being built. We're just starting to see the early days of this. But I think so many people in the world love sports, me included. I played soccer. I collected football cards, basketball cards, growing up as a kid. And I think the ability to marry - exactly what you said - passion with the ability to invest, is so powerful. Right? And there's so much to learn. For people who've never learned or understood investing in a more traditional sense, because maybe they find it really boring or hard to and inaccessible to learn about stocks. They may be able to do that with something like sports cards if they love LeBron James and they could learn all about LeBron James. So, I think we're starting to see this. Some of the infrastructure is being built in the sports card space, where people are now able to invest in sports cards in either fractional ways or in more, or in larger ways and invest into cards.But I think, I would love to see that happen because, for me, I love sports, but the ability to marry that and combine that with investing, I think is just the kind of perfect collision of those two things. So, it's not something that's not totally possible. It is starting to become possible, but I'm super excited to see that become more of a reality and financialize itself as an asset.Ken: [00:54:52] Michael, I promise you, I will do my very best to bring sports investing to Republic within this year. MICHAEL: [00:54:59] Well, the other one is, is not just cards, but sports teams, as well. I think talk about the kind of combination of community and fandom with the ability to invest in something. And I mean, sports teams are, whether it's English, you know, English football teams, and it doesn't have to be the Premiership teams, it could be the local town teams where people grow up as fans and they love those teams with a passion. They pass that down to their kids and their kids' kids. Imagine if they had the ability to invest in that as well, not just be a spectator on the sidelines, but have the chance to be in the game with the team and the owners and the players.I think that would actually be a really, really cool thesis. Cards are a financial asset or representation of players, but sports teams themselves are proving to be potential good investments as well. I mean, you look at the value of MLS teams have gone up massively. I think we'll see the same in women's soccer with the NWSL.So, that's actually one where if the Republic platform could give the crowd and fans the ability to invest into sports teams, I think that would be super cool as well. Ken: [00:56:10] Maybe we give every investor an NFT that is issued by the sports team. If they hold onto the investment they have that NFT. If they sell the investment the NFT goes with it.  Michael: [00:56:25] All the leagues are going to have to contact you because I think there's absolutely something here that they should be thinking about.Ken: [00:56:32] Send it my way. But yeah, anything that anyone is a distinct holder in - fan of a sports team or a fan of a movie, I think they definitely should, and hopefully one day you can become a shareholder or stakeholder.Michael: [00:56:52] That's a great way to end this podcast because I think you've touched on community, you've touched on passion, you've touched on profit, and it's just also so exciting to see, having known you for the past four years and seeing you when you were just starting out Republic, just to see you build this business into something that really is based on the passion that is associated with investing, the community that's associated with investing.I mean, you're truly democratizing access to financial services, which is such an important piece of what the next wave of financial services looks like. Ken: [00:57:24] Thank you so much, Michael. And thank you for all your encouragement and support along the way, even during days and months, that that was so new and early and no one believed in us just yet and you did. Michael: [00:57:37] Hey, the one thing I've learned is never doubt Ken Nguyen. So …Ken: Thank you, sir. Michael: Awesome. Well, thanks for having you on the Alt Goes Mainstream podcast. Ken: Thanks for having me.Michael: [01:08:34] Thanks for listening to this episode of Alt Goes Mainstream. I hope you enjoyed it. You can find more episodes of the podcast at any of your favorite podcast sites. And you can read more about Alts on my Substack AltGoesMainstream.substack.com and follow me on Twitter at @MichaelSidgmore and @GoesAlt[01:08:52] Thanks a lot. Have a great day. Republic Disclaimer: With regard to any reference to an issuer reference in this notice that is gauging interest in a potential securities offering pursuant to the Regulation A exemption from the registration requirements of the Securities Act, including opportunities to “reserve” securities as indications of interest in the potential offering, please note that pursuant to SEC Rule 252 (i) no money or other consideration is being solicited thereby, and if sent in response, will not be accepted, (ii) no sales will be made or commitments to purchase accepted until the offering statement for the potential offering is qualified by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, (iii) any such offer may be withdrawn or revoked, without obligation or commitment of any kind, at any time before notice of its acceptance is given after the qualification date, and (iv) an indication of interest is non-binding and involves no obligation or commitment of any kind.  

Artificial Intelligence makes a lot of people nervous. That's understandable. Today we sit down with Ken Fujiwara of Hacarus to discuss why that is, and what this startup is doing to fix it. As in so many other fields, when comparing AI in Japan and the West, we find that the technology is fundamentally the same, but the social attitudes and business strategies are very different. Ken is a serial entrepreneur, but running an AI startup was never part of his original plan. He had bigger goals in mind, and we talk about how he plans to pivot back to them someday. We also discuss Kyoto's booming startup ecosystem and why one CEO has publically stated he wants to destroy it. It's a great conversation, and I think you'll enjoy it. Show Notes The problem with Deep Learning and how Hacarus is unique The importance of founder's hidden failures Why Ken left Sony to start a startup How to know when you need to pivot Why pivoting is hard in Japan The integrator business model and why it works in Japan Pivoting a startup to back to your dreams The importance of explainable AI Why you need to know about Kyoto startups Why one company wants to destroy Kyoto's startup ecosystem The reason you see so many interesting IoT startups coming out of Japan now Links from the Founder Everything you ever wanted to know about Hacarus Follow them on Facebook Connect on LinkedIn Get in touch by email: inquiry@hacarus.com Transcript Welcome to Disrupting Japan, straight talk from Japan's most successful entrepreneurs. I'm Tim Romero and thanks for joining me. As you can imagine, I get asked a lot about how the Japanese startup ecosystem is different from others and I love that question. The problem is that people usually aren't really happy with my answers. It seems that everyone wants to hear stories about anime or strange gadgets, or cool trends in gaming, and yeah, there's plenty of that in Japan too, but the things that are really unique and interesting like evocative machines and the integrator model, and the role enterprise has to play in supporting startups, those things take a lot of time to explain to anyone who doesn't already understand Japan, at least a little bit, but they're important.  Today, we sit down with Ken Fujiwara of Hacarus and we're going to look at how Hacarus is using the integrator model to jointly develop AI products with large enterprises. Ken also explains how he had to pivot Hacarus away from his original vision and how he might be able to pivot back to it in the future. We talk about the challenges of pivoting and staying true to your mission, cover a few very good reasons why people don't trust AI, and we talk about one CEO who has made it his mission to destroy a startup ecosystem. Oh, and near the end of the show, we have a really interesting discussion about the startup ecosystem in Kyoto. There really are some amazing things going on in Kansai, but you know, Ken tells that story much better than I can, so let's get right to the interview. Interview Tim: So, I'm sitting here with Ken Fujiwara of Hacarus, and thanks for sitting down with me today. Ken: Thanks for having me. Tim: Hacarus is a collection of AI platforms that's targeted both at medical and industrial use but you can probably explain this a lot better than I can, so what exactly does Hacarus do? Ken: Alright, so Hacarus is basically AI startups and provide AI desk applications for medical, such as AI-enabled diagnosis solutions and for manufacturing industry, we provide digital inspection services, and one of the core differences of our company is that we don't use a mainstream AI technology called deep learning. We use something else. Tim: I've noticed that, so you've talked a lot about your ability to create AI models based on very small data sets. How does that work? I mean, what exactly are you guys doing, if you don't mind me asking what the "secret sauc...

An Untold Love Story (Part 1) - Ken and Joni TadaAn Untold Love Story (Part 2) - Ken and Joni TadaFamilyLife Today® Radio Transcript  References to conferences, resources, or other special promotions may be obsolete. Sufficient Grace Guests:                      Ken and Joni Tada              From the series:       An Untold Love Story (Day 2 of 2)  Bob:  Joni Eareckson Tada remembers a time in her marriage to her husband Ken when both of them were starting to drift farther and farther apart. Joni:  I was fearful that I was making Ken depressed. My disability was depressing my husband. So, I would be very careful to take care of as many routines as I could possibly do before he came home from school so that I would not have to walk on eggshells and ask him to do anything for me because I knew that asking too much of Ken would plummet him into depression. For a long time, it was this strange tap dance that we both played. Bob:  This is FamilyLife Today for Friday, May 3rd. Our host is the President of FamilyLife®, Dennis Rainey, and I'm Bob Lepine. We'll hear today what Joni and Ken Tada did when they realized they were drifting apart in marriage. Stay with us. And welcome to FamilyLife Today. Thanks for joining us. I've been thinking about—I have a son who just proposed to his girlfriend. They're going to get married soon. I was thinking, “If I could sit them down with anybody, for a little premarital counseling—the couple that could give them the benefits of great experience and theological understanding— Dennis:  You really had thought of me. Bob:  Ah-h-h. You were on the list. [Laughter] Dennis:  I'm kidding you. I know who's in the studio, Bob. Bob:  You were underneath our guests today. Dennis:  Way underneath the guests. Bob:  I just thought, “Would it be okay if we got some premarital counseling for John and Katie from our guests?” Just let them—they've written this book. Tell them about the book that they've written. Dennis:  Well, this book is called Joni and Ken: An Untold Love Story. So they need to hear a love story—one that's gone 30 years, plus. Bob:  And that has gone through some rocky times. Dennis:  Some? Bob:  Yes. Joni:  A few. Dennis:  A few, no doubt about it. Bob:  I just thought, “I wonder what counsel they would give to a couple, just getting started, on the frontend of the journey?” Dennis:  Well, let's ask them. Ken and Joni Eareckson Tada join us again on FamilyLife Today. Ken, Joni, welcome back. Joni:  Absolutely. It's good to be back. Ken:  Thanks. Dennis:  I know Ken would like to teach your son how to fly— Joni:  Fly fish. Dennis: —fly fish. I don't know if Ken ties the flies. Ken:  Yes, but— Bob:  Would that help his marriage if he learned how to fly fish? Ken:  It could, but don't do it the first year. [Laughter] Joni:  But you know what I had Ken's best man tell me on our wedding day? He drew me aside and whispered in my ear, “Let your husband keep his dreams.” I didn't know what he meant, at the time; but of course, this whole fly fishing thing—about which we joke—it's really important, I think, for guys to have that space—to have those times of connection with other men.  Ken:  And Joni's been my biggest supporter, during that—the whole time—not that I abuse it—but she knows that I need to have time with guys. Joni:  Oh, yes! You know how you abuse it; don't you? Ken:  How? Joni:  We're driving down the freeway and he'll say: “Hey, there's a Jaguar that just drove by. Joni, can I have a Jaguar?” “No! Of course, not!” Then, of course, that sets me up for—“Oh, then, you'll give me the fishing reel.” [Laughter] Okay. I know what you're up to! Ken:  It took 30 years—but you start high and you aim lower [Laughter]—and asking for a brand-new Jaguar convertible—obviously, I'm not going that direction—but a new fly rod—that would be kind of cool! Dennis:  Yes, there you go. Let's go back to Bob's question here. Let's put it on the line, here. Let's go back to your honeymoon to talk about some of the most important lessons you started out your marriage learning. Ken:  Well, the one lesson we learned is—I think Joni and I have said before—but we had friends who told us to go out and experiment. We decided, “No.”— Dennis:  Move in with each other. Joni:  Pretty much. Ken:  Well, for the weekend. Joni:  Just to try it out for the weekend—for a couple of weekends. Dennis:  And the reason is— Ken:  Because you know, with a disability, it was a little bit different than perhaps with an able-bodied person. Joni:  Expediency. Ken:  And just to see whether or not it would fit. Joni: If this was going to work. Bob:  See, I hear that story. I just imagine, in my head, you guys going off for a weekend and then you going, “Oh, I guess it's not going to work.”  “What? Hello!” Ken:  Where's the commitment? Bob:  Yes. How do you break that news to somebody, “I'm out of here because this part doesn't work.” Well guess what? You may have seasons where that part of your relationship doesn't work— Ken:  Exactly. Joni:  Exactly. Bob: —and you'd better figure out how to love one another in the midst of those seasons! Joni:  Absolutely, which is why—even before we got engaged and even during our engagement—there was no experimenting. There was no testing: “Let's try this out. How's this going to fly?” We went into our marriage, with our conscience tender and intact, with no violation of our convictions. As Ken has often said, “Of course, it made our honeymoon a little like handicap-awareness week; [Laughter] but that was okay.” Dennis:  Well, let's talk about that for a second—what that was like—because you write about it in your book. I wouldn't ask this question if you hadn't put this in print; alright? Ken:  Oh, there's nothing we wouldn't discuss. I think we're pretty well open with everything. Joni:  I put it delicately in print, though, Dennis—as delicately as I could. Bob:  And we can stay delicate right here. [Laughter] Dennis:  That's the truth, but you're a quadriplegic—for those who don't know your story. You had an accident when you were 17 years old. You had a great fear, going into this marriage, that he was going to find out what it meant to care for someone who was so helpless. Joni:  Okay, well let's talk about the brass tacks. Ken and I went off on our honeymoon. We took two friends—two girlfriends of mine—who stayed at a different hotel, down the beach—but they would come up during the mornings and evenings and kind of like educate Ken on my routines—not to throw everything at him at once—but just to kind of get his feet wet: “This is what it means for Joni to get up in the morning: bed, bath, exercising her legs, and then those toileting routines.” Well, I had to do a particular toileting routine in the evening. I don't know how to say this. Ken had to help carry me to the bathroom. I didn't make it. When that happened—it's funny—I choke up, talking about it now, 30 years later. Yet, it's so long ago and far away—but I was the young girl. I wanted everything to be perfect. I wanted my husband to have great illusions of me and: “This is going to be wonderful! Everything is so romantic!”   Yet, I remember that first night—lying in bed after the lights were out and all was quiet. I fought back the tears: “Oh, God! This man—You are going to have to give him grace. You're just going to have to. You have to give him grace because I don't know that even I have the grace. But help him through this, Lord. You can do this! Help him through this!”  It was a desperate cry of a very young bride, but I'm so glad God answered because things did not get easier in our ensuing life together. There were even greater challenges; but at every turn, I saw God's grace show up in my husband's life. That was huge, and that's growth. Dennis:  There are times, in every marriage, after the honeymoon—in fact, there are seasons that occur where you move into a bit of a valley. Obviously, your marriage started in one and has continued on in one—but you move into something where there is—you describe in your book as “negotiated spaces” and “demilitarized zones” in your relationship. You guys had a plateau. You kind of had the “Cease fire”— Joni:  Yes. Ken:  I think it was those middle years, where Joni was going to the ministry and I was teaching high school. Basically, we were living together but separate lives— parallel lives. Not that our marriage was bad—it's just I was occupied with what I was doing, as a high school teacher; and Joni was occupied in the ministry. We would travel during the summer. So, there were a lot of connections; but during those school days, I don't think we spent the kind of time that— Dennis:  You were teaching at the time. Ken:  I was teaching high school, yes. Joni:  And I was fearful that I was making Ken depressed. My disability was depressing my husband. So, I would be very careful to take care of as many routines as I could possibly do before he came home from school so that I would not have to walk on eggshells and ask him to do anything for me that might encroach on his emotions because I knew that asking too much of Ken would plummet him into depression.  For a long time, it was this strange tap dance that we both played—where we had to negotiate these spaces. But through it all—through it all—we both recognized we were doing this, and we didn't want to live this way. So, we prayed—prayed together and prayed separately— that God would help move us beyond this emotional fog that we were in to help us see the possibilities, in our marriage, that were ahead, on the horizon. Ken:  I think the other thing that happened during that time, Joni was—especially, this was earlier in our marriage—but because of your notoriety—people would recognize you when we were in public. One of the things that was really hard—that we look back on it now—was we'd go to church. There'd be a line of people, half an hour long, who would want to speak to you.  I was finding my—if I had a self-image problem, it was healed when I went to school because: “That was my classroom. Those were my students.” When I was in Burbank, those were people who recognized me—not that I needed it—but it was just that self-assurance, that affirmation that I was getting through what I was doing—that I think there was a balance there. Joni:  But to help move my husband past that: “Let's go to a different church. Let's get out of this big church. Let's go to some small, little church.” So, we started going to a small, very little church, just a few miles from our house. We stopped going to the big mega church, where everybody knew me, just trying to find ways, as a wife, to make it easier and finding that those negotiated spaces became smaller and smaller—to the point where we both were in it together. We weren't adversarial; we weren't on parallel tracks anymore. We were on the same track. It took a while to get there, but we did. Bob:  Did you feel invisible for a long period of time? Ken:  Boy, that's a great description of exactly what I was feeling. I mean, people would—we would stand in a crowd. I would stand next to Joni, and nobody would want to talk to me. Bob:  Yes. Ken:  But Joni has been so good about bringing me into the conversation. She would stop them and say: “I want to introduce you to my husband. He's standing right here.” She realized that, from that standpoint, that I needed that—at least, in those early years—that we were a couple. I think, over the years, it's gotten to the point where there are more people that recognize us as a couple. It hasn't been an issue. It actually has been kind of a benefit—that I think, for the both us—that we are recognized in a ministry for couples. Joni:  In those early years, when you were struggling with your self-image, those were the same times I was struggling with my self-image. I would hear him on the phone with all his buddies, talking about all kinds of things that he wouldn't talk about with me. I'd hear him hang up the phone, saying, “Love ya, Buddy.” It was like, “Ahh! Gee, I don't hear that tone of voice with me.” I remember being so— Dennis:  Now, wait a second— Joni:  No. I felt— Dennis:  —the Joni Eareckson Tada could have a pity party; really? Joni:  Oh, my goodness! In the early years of my marriage, when I would hear him on the phone with Jan or Pete, I'd be so jealous of his tone of voice with his guy friends. But okay, later on in the marriage, as we're praying—as I'm seeking God, “How can I get my husband out of depression?” Boing! This light bulb went off in my head. I realized he needs his guy friends. “Don't be jealous of them, Joni—” Bob:  Yes. Joni:  —“Put him in their camp.” So, I began encouraging Ken: “You know, your buddy Jan has been asking you to go fly fishing. Please, really, why don't you go fly fishing? Get away from the tuna boats—you gaff tuna, blood on the decks—guys with big bellies and cans of beer, cursing, and profanity—get away from that. Go fly fishing. It's more refined. You're going to enjoy it.”  I was the one who kind of pushed him—not so much because I wanted to get him away from the tuna boats—but I knew, that if he was with his Christian guy friends, that it would be invigorating—that he would get a validation, as a man, from other men that would help him and help our marriage. I think that was one of the best moves I made to help you up and out of your depression. Ken:  Joni was the instrumental tool for getting me into fly fishing. I really didn't, at the time, want to go fly fishing. I didn't want another sport; but she said, “No, you ought to go.” More than the fly fishing, I have a friend—we have a ministry to men. We use fly fishing as kind of like— Bob:  The bait. Ken:  —the bait; exactly. It gives guys a chance to get their hearts back. Bob:  Yes. Ken:  We talk about all kinds of things. We use John Eldredge's book, Wild at Heart, but— Joni:  But you got your heart back. Ken:  —but I got my heart back. Joni is a big supporter of what I do there, but one of the things that happened was—a little exercise that we had was go out and try to hear what God had to say to us. The first time I did this, I didn't hear a thing. Two years later—I can tell you exactly where I was—on a fly fishing trip. A gentleman said, “Take this afternoon and go out and try to hear God's voice.” That afternoon, I heard God say to me—not in an audible voice—but I heard Him say, “Joni is the most important gift I've given you. You take care of her.” Dennis:  And in your book, you talk about when he came back from that trip. You saw it in his eyes.  Joni:  Oh, my goodness! He stood in the bedroom and said, “Joni, you're never going to believe what God said to me.” He shoved his hands in his pockets. rocked back and forth on his heels, and said, “God said that you're the most precious gift, and I'm to take care of you, and I'm going to do it.” It was like a breath of fresh air had just blown through our bedroom. It was like the fog of depression is lifting—I can see the sun, the clouds. There's hope. My husband likes me! He wants to take care of me, for the sake of Christ. I began to see all my prayers answered or, at least, beginning to get answers.  And now—even back then—when his buddies call the house, and I get them on the phone, before I hand it over to Ken: “Jan, God bless you. Sir, I don't know what you're doing in my husband's life. Keep it up. I know you're memorizing Scripture. I know you're doing some new Jerry Bridges Bible study together on the phone. Keep it up! I love it. You're going in the right direction.” I'm thanking Pete, I'm thanking Chris, and I'm thanking Jan—all these guys—that I used to be jealous of—they're the best because they help my husband be the man that he can be. Dennis:  And that story occurred—what I want our listeners to hear—21 years into your marriage.  Bob:  And the next time you go out with Pete, and Jan, and Chris, we've got a resource for you to take with you—a Bible study for guys called Stepping Up™, based on Dennis's book by that title. It's a video resource, and it'll spark some great discussion with you and the guys. Okay? Ken:  Great. Thank you, Bob. Dennis:  One last story. Joni, this one's for you. You battled cancer. You went through chemotherapy. In the process of going through that, fell prey to pneumonia. You had a moment, in the midst of that, that was pretty grim. You had your own encounter when God spoke to you. Would you share with our listeners that story? I think that is incredibly powerful. Joni:  Well, as a quadriplegic, I'm susceptible to things like pneumonia. I have extremely limited lung capacity. I had to be in the hospital for nine or ten days. My husband, bless his heart, made a little cot, out of a couple of plastic chairs. He slept by my bedside. Instead of me having to be intubated, Ken got up every night—would cough me—pound on my chest. One night, I was so exhausted. I had so flattened out, emotionally. I was crying out to God. I had no physical ability. My lungs were gurgling. I could hardly breathe. I felt like I was drowning. I just didn't want to have to get my husband up another time. I remember saying, “Lord Jesus, I need You. I need to see You tonight. I just need to feel Your touch. I need to feel Your hand on my head. I need You!”  I fell into a sleep. Then, when I woke up, with the gurgling and needed to be coughed again, Ken came over to my hospital bedside. As he began to lift me up, I looked at him, wide-eyed, and I said, “You're Him! Oh my goodness, you're Him!” Jesus visited me, that night, through my husband. I felt his hand on my forehead, and it was the touch of Jesus. I felt him push on my abdomen, and it was the strength of Jesus. I felt him pound on my back to give me air, and it was Jesus, the Breath of Life. Everything about my husband was Jesus. I said to Ken, “You're Him! Jesus showed up and you're Him!” It was such a beautiful revelation of how God can answer prayer—the prayers that are desperate and show up best through them. That was a beautiful moment. You know, we've talked a lot about cancer. We've talked a lot about quadriplegia. I'm going to confess to you those things are a cinch compared to the daily grind of pain that I deal with. Through my PET scans—a couple more years, maybe—I'll be declared cancer-free. Things are looking hopeful. My quadriplegia—I kind of know that route. But boy, the daily grind of pain is so hard. My husband, a couple of weeks ago, did a beautiful thing. Before he saw me head out the door, he could see the look in my eyes that I was going to have a very painful day. He said: “Wait a minute. Wait a minute.” He quick ran and got a stick-um, and etched on it a big “C”, and put it over my heart—slapped it right over my heart. He said: “There you go, Joni. You've got courage, and you're going to rise to that challenge.”  I think what I love best about my husband is that he can find the infinitesimally small Christ-like characteristics in my life—he can find them, pick them out, and affirm them. He can water them and nurture them with actions such as he did with that stick-um on my chest. He believes that I can be courageous. I don't want to disappoint my wonderful husband. I want to be courageous, in Christ, for his sake and for the sake of the Gospel. That is, honestly, how I get through the toughest days of my pain. Dennis:  You both are courageous. Recently, I did a little Bible study in Joshua 1—three places where courage comes from: God's mission, being obedient to God's Word, and third, practicing His presence. As I'm watching your lives, as a couple, you're on mission. You're on task, as a couple. You're about the glory of God and running the race to finish it well. Secondly, you've both been obedient. You've kept your covenant. You're not only still married—you love each other. And third, you're practicing the presence of God, whether it be fly fishing or whether it be flat on your bed, in a hospital room, battling pneumonia. You're experiencing the presence of God, and you're bringing a lot of hope to a lot of people. May God's favor be upon this book and you guys, as you go forward. Joni:  Thank you, Dennis. Ken:  Thank you, Dennis and Bob. Bob:  We love you guys and hope folks will get a copy of your book. It's called Joni and Ken: An Untold Love Story. Thirty years of marriage—as you guys peel back the veneer and show us what real marriage is all about. I hope listeners will go online at FamilyLifeToday.com to order a copy. Again, the website is FamilyLifeToday.com. Or you can call to request a copy of the book, Joni and Ken: An Untold Love Story. Call 1-800-358-6329; that's 1-800-“F” as in family, “L” as in life, and then, the word, “TODAY”. Don't forget the title of the book—Joni and Ken: An Untold Love Story. We'd love to get a copy to you. Now, I know most of you are excited that summer is almost here—got graduations happening this month and all kinds of activities during the month of May—and then, it's summertime, just around the corner. I love summertime, too. I love vacations. I love the break you get. I love the warmer weather. But for a ministry, like FamilyLife Today, summer can be a challenging time because a lot of listeners get out of the normal pattern of listening and out of the normal pattern of helping to support the radio program. Donations to the ministry fall off a little bit during the summer. We had some friends, of the ministry, who came to us, knowing that that happens every summer. They said, “We'd like to help you guys build a little surplus—a cushion before June, and July, and August hit.” They have put together a matching-gift fund of $576,000. They have said, “We'll match every donation you receive, between now and the end of May, dollar for dollar, until that fund is gone.”  We appreciate their generosity; but obviously, the only way we can take advantage of their generosity is if listeners, like you, will go to FamilyLifeToday.com, click the button that says, “I CARE”, and make an online donation. Or call 1-800-FL-TODAY. Make a donation over the phone. When you do that, your donation will be matched, dollar for dollar, with funds from the matching-gift fund. You will help us get ready for the summer months ahead. So, can we ask you to do that? Go to FamilyLifeToday.com. Click the button that says, “I CARE”, and make a donation; or call 1-800-FL-TODAY. Make a donation over the phone. We appreciate your support, and we are always happy to hear from you. And we hope you have a great weekend. Hope you and your family are able to worship together this weekend. I hope you can join us back on Monday when we're going to talk with Laura Petherbridge about some of the challenges that step-moms face. Ron Deal will be here with us, as well. I hope it works out for you to be here. I want to thank our engineer today, Keith Lynch, and our entire broadcast production team. On behalf of our host, Dennis Rainey, I'm Bob Lepine. Have a great weekend. We will see you back Monday for another edition of FamilyLife Today.  FamilyLife Today is a production of FamilyLife of Little Rock, Arkansas. Help for today. Hope for tomorrow. We are so happy to provide these transcripts to you. However, there is a cost to produce them for our website. If you've benefited from the broadcast transcripts, would you consider donating today to help defray the costs?  Copyright © 2013 FamilyLife. All rights reserved.www.FamilyLife.com    

Craig is in the WGAN Morning News with Ken and Matt. This morning,  we touched on a whole bunch of topics in the news. We discussed whether we should trust Google.  We talked about Autonomous vehicles and the societal implications and I talked about two-factor authentication and how you can protect yourself from sim-jacking. These and more tech tips, news, and updates visit - CraigPeterson.com --- Related Articles: You Need Two-Factor Authentication Even If Google Screwed It Up?   Autonomous Cars — Are they ready for Prime Time? Why Are We Still Trusting Google?    --- Transcript: Below is a rush transcript of this segment, it might contain errors. Airing date: 06/12/2019 Can You Trust Google?, Security Summer, Autonomous Cars, Two-Factor Authentication --- Craig Good morning, everybody. Craig Peterson here. I heard "Big Papi" took his first steps in the hospital today. So, that's good. It brings back thoughts of everyone that has family and friends in the hospital that aren't celebrities and people that are injured. My thoughts and prayers go out to everybody every day. It's just a reminder of how fragile things can be in this life. This morning I was on with our friends Ken and Matt up at WGAN. And as usual, we spoke about a few different things. We had quite a little conversation about trusting Google, should you trust them? Can you trust them? There was a surprising revelation that came out, in fact, just last week about them, and what they've been doing, during the previous 14 years, a significant security problem. We had a chat about two-factor authentication, and I gave them workaround, a way to make it safe, even if you have to use text messages SMS for two-factor authentication because that's not secure. But there is a reliable way to do it. We talked about a little bit more of course about autonomous cars which are all in the news again, and what's the safety factor there? How far away are we? I took a couple of different angles than I made with Jim Polito on that discussion today, as well. So here we go. Also, don't forget, we've got our security summer, starting up in July, I will start sending out some emails next week, things have been crazy around here. As you can imagine, with all of the companies now getting hacked, and the losing money coming to me, and you know, everyone in the security business, which, of course, is way understaffed. And shout out to those of you who are trying to get into security, I got another email this last week from someone that was starting into a security career, and he's in his 50s. So there's something to be learned there, I want to encourage everybody. Remember the adage, "You can teach an old dog new tricks." It's a terrible saying. But you can learn a lot of this stuff, you really can. And there's a lot of people out there who have been trying to convince you that you can't do that, really all you need is their little bit of anti-virus software, or whatever it is, you know, they're selling that to you. Because that's all, they have. That's all they know. Well, they're not doing you any favors. They are trying to mess with you. You can learn this stuff. That's what the security summer going to be about this year, and I'm going to be teaching this some free classes. You know, I get paid for doing this too. And if you want more in depth, then you're probably going to want to sign up for one of my courses. But I want to get this information to everybody. Because if you know me well enough, you know, I got hacked. That was 30 years ago, about now, a long time ago. And it scared the daylights out of me. And I started to learn about this and trying to figure it out. It's taken me years, decades, to get to the point where I'm at now. And I am excited to share a lot of this with you. Just watch for my security summer. If you want to find out more, email me at Craig Peterson dot com, ask any questions that you might have. And I'll make sure you know, when I'm starting this whole little program up, because I want you to be aware of all of the major points here, right, I'm not trying to turn into security experts, that takes quite a bit of work. However, I do want you to be familiar with all of the problems. All the talk about hacks that have happened, how it happened, what should have been done by those companies give you an idea, but as well as what you can do to protect yourself a few tips on how to protect yourself, it's going to be kind of a busy summer. And if you sign up, and you'll be able to get a notification as to when these little courses are going to happen. And I'm going to leave them up for about a week or so you know because it does get stale. And I do need to revisit them. I don't want want to put them up blankly for the world to see forever. So keep an eye out. Email me at Craig Peterson dot com, and now we'll go to Ken and Matt. I want to encourage you guys, and you can learn this. There are the people that just been messing with you. You know the bottom line. Ken Craig Peterson, our tech guru joins us at 738 every Wednesday, and this is 738 on a Wednesday, which means you're talking to Craig Peterson. Craig. Welcome to the program, sir. Craig Hey, good morning. It is a Wednesday but is it every Wednesday? Today? Ken That's a good point. And you know what it is a lie in and of itself because I believe we did not talk to you last Wednesday. So it's most Wednesdays. Craig That's true. Yeah, I took a bit of vacation. I'm a motorcycle guy. And I have a motorcycle that is 32 years old. It's a 1987 BMW with 143,000 miles on it now. The only thing I had to do is replace the rear wheel on that bike. It's just been a phenomenal bike. So, I went up to like George in New York, and we rode around with some buddies for a week. And it was just fantastic. Ken Well, good. But that doesn't mean tech news stops. I hopped on your website, Craig Peterson dot com. To see what kind of top stories you had there and you have one topic here. Why are we still trusting Google? Can you answer that? Matt Great question. Well, they did say early in Google's history that they that their whole operating philosophy was Don't be evil, right. Are they evil? Now? Did you notice they took that off of their website? Right? Craig Yeah, exactly. I don't know why we're still trusting some of these different companies out there. They are selling all kinds of information about us. And, you know, that's not necessarily a bad thing when you get right down to it. Because, frankly, do you want to see car commercials all the time? Or would you rather see a car commercial when you are looking to buy a car, right? And, again, goes back, Matt, to what you've said many times, and that is if you're not paying for something, you might want to consider that you're the product and not the customer. And they have been doing all kinds of things. We're selling our data. But the other big problem that came out very recently, within the last couple of weeks is that in fact, Google has been storing our usernames and passwords for people that were using, basically their G Suite services. But it's been out there for 14 years in the clear. They're pretty good about security, although Android itself isn't the best out there. But now their G Suite customers are a little upset because of what's been out there. I was talking just yesterday with an employee who had been working at a company that was collecting personal information. They were collecting home addresses, phone numbers, and they were taking donations and were selling them. It was a great little company doing just all kinds of super things to raise funds for some good charitable organizations. It turns out they were using Google Forms to collect all this personal information about donors. You know, come on, guys, we cannot trust Google, we're using more and more of these online websites, software as a service. Think about Google Sheets, for instance, as well as Google Forms. And we're putting data in there that may end up getting exposed. We should not be doing that. Think twice about it. In our profession, we refer to this as shadow IT or shadow information technology. Historically, we had these big rooms, these big glass rooms with all of the computers in them. And we had true professionals that were running them, and making sure data was being kept safe, and information was not being stolen and leaked out. Now we've got the marketing department going out and creating contracts with companies that have online services, we have the same thing happening with sales and manufacturing and distribution and our purchasing managers are our data is not safe, and it's never been less secure. So be careful what you're putting out there, what you're given to Google what you're given to these other companies because frankly, it's a real problem. Matt Craig Peterson, our tech guru, joins us, most Wednesdays at this time to talk about the world of technology. And today is one of those days, Craig, while you're talking, I'm looking at a story on CBS This Morning about Uber's secret self-driving test facility for their self-driving autonomous cars. I know you had a story also about whether or not autonomous vehicles are ready for prime time. And I think it does beg the question, how prepared for prime time are these things? I know, it's a conversation I've had several times, and it seems like the older the person I'm talking to the more it freaks them out that there's no driver behind the wheel. I think it freaks everybody out. It just freaks out, you know, people in their 50s, 60s, and 70s a lot more than it does everybody else. But statistics, you know, are being what they are, you know, often they can be safer, then human behind the wheel. So what do you think? I mean, are they close to ready to take over the roads? Craig Well, I really like I mentioned this yesterday. I liked this story that came out in the Wall Street Journal a couple of weeks ago. And it said that autonomous vehicles, these self-driving cars are 90% ready and all we have left is 90% to go. In other words, yeah, there's a lot of things that look like we're ready to go and it might be just a few more years, and we'll have autonomous vehicles. In reality, it's probably going to be quite a while yet. And you talk about you know, older guys like Ken and myself who are over 30. And we're looking at some of these things. And we're concerned because we've seen failures before. Do you remember Cadillac v 864? Matt Back then, I wasn't much of a car person. Ken I did have a Mustang in 1960. Matt Do you remember the Corvair? Unsafe at any speed? Craig I do, and you know, Ralph Nader thing, we still have Nader dots on our tires. But that was an example back in the early 80s of Cadillac trying to make cars more efficient, the engines more efficient, and they had a V-8 engine. And what would happen is if you got onto the highway and you started driving, of course, at highway speeds, you're going down the road, you don't need as much horsepower to keep a vehicle going at a pace as you need to get the car starting at that speed. So they said okay, well, we're going to have the system that automatically shut down cylinders. So you'd be a V-8, and you'd be just roaring up and you getting on the highway and you're often running. Then it would cut back to six cylinders, even four cylinders. The concept was wonderful. But what ended up happening is that engine would say, as you're at a stop sign, oh my I need more horsepower, counteract the braking. Of course, They were not thinking about the brakes very well at the time. And then the car would lunge into the intersection so that you could get t-boned. Fast forward not very many years, and we had the Toyota with a sudden acceleration problem. That turned out to be a software error, where much the same thing was happening. A car would jump into the intersection. We're not going to get into all of the details behind it all. But I think with age comes from experience. And we've had some horrible experiences over the years with vehicles and some of this newer technology. So Matt, to answer your question, a lot is going on the autonomous vehicle space. In some cases, the cars are much, much safer, you look at millions of miles driven, compare human drivers to these autonomous vehicles, and the autonomous vehicles almost always win. But we also now have prejudices against the self-driving cars, social warriors are, you know, get on your horses here. Because there are people who when there's an autonomous vehicle on the road, or they think it's a ton of mess, they behave differently. Now they've been tested have been run, I don't know if you've seen any of these pictures with autonomous vehicles, where they took the driver's seat, and they made it quite a bit deeper, think of thicker padding on that seat. And they hid a driver inside the driver's position. You could not see them unless you looked exceptionally close. You could not see that there was a driver in the vehicle. Then the driver just drove around, caught down and of course, the cameras everywhere so they could see what the people's reactions were. People were going out of their way to mess with the car. They pedestrians were jumping in front of it. Vehicles were cutting it off, slamming on their brakes, doing everything they could to make it so that autonomous vehicle would get involved in an accident. I don't know. Maybe they're just trying to see what it would do. Of course, it wasn't an autonomous vehicle. There's a human driver in there. We, as a society, as people, are not ready for these yet. And frankly, I think the Wall Street Journal's right - We're 90% of the way there. And honestly, we have 90% of the way to go. Because there are so many things, we haven't even considered yet. Ken When he joins us, most Wednesdays at 738, to fill us in on tech news. We at the radio station. I don't want to be critical of our radio station. However, they started this two-factor authentication. So every time I get some on my email, they have to send me a text message with a code. I think this is a royal pain in the butt. I want you to tell me they shouldn't do that. Craig Okay, can they not do that. Ken Thanks so much. Thank you for joining us today. Craig I will leave it at that. Yeah, here's what's going to, first of all, there's a big problem with the way they're doing it. That is that there is something called SIMjacking or hijacking of your SIM card. So if they're sending you a text, that is very dangerous. What's been happening is that if you are a target, now they're not doing this in a broad fishing attempt. If you can are a target, and the criminals know they want to go after you, they can now take over your cell phone, and they will get the text. So it doesn't do a whole lot of good from that aspect. We use something called DUO. D-U-O, which is fantastic. For two factor authentication, we use something called Yubi keys, which are very good as well. If your company's requiring you to us a text message for authentication, there is a relatively safe way of doing it. And that is you can use something like Google Voice, assuming your Google account has not been hacked, right. But Google Voice, where there is no SIM card, there is no cell phone that SIM card to hijack. If you use this and it is what I do for places that have to have a text message sent for two-factor authentication. So if they have to send you a text message, it goes to Google Voice. I have my own little phone company, and I use that as well. That way the text message will come in via an app to your phone, you can check the app, and now you're reasonably safe. But yeah, in this day and age, you know two-factor authentication is something that that does make sense. We do have to draw a line, and that one does it make the most sense. I'd like it to authenticate you at most every four hours or once a day, particularly for emails, if you have to do it every time. It gets a little bit old, pretty darn fast. But you know it's the reality of today's world. Matt Craig Peterson, our tech guru, he joins us at this time every Wednesday to find out exactly what's happening in the world of technology. Craig, we only have a couple of minutes left. So lastly, I will ask you whether or not you judge everyone on social media? Are you part of the mob that rules everyone? Craig Oh man. I am not. I don't jump on anybody's back. I just had that happen to me with a significant hacking group. As you know, I run the national webinars for the FBI Infragard program. I'm pretty visible out there in the security world, right. I do lots of radio interviews and TV and stuff. I posted an article on my website and got jumped on by a small mob out there. We've got to be careful remember it's so easy to say something negative online. Our kids are getting bullied every day. Bullying seems to be quite a habit nowadays. I don't know what happened to free speech. We have these militant people out there these fascist like the Antifas. Total fascist don't want to hear what you have to say. And these internet mobs have become a real thing and a very negative thing. From my viewpoint. Anyways. Ken Good news as our tech guru joins us most Wednesdays at 738. Thank you, Mr. Peterson. We will talk to you next Wednesday. Craig Take care. Matt All right. Thanks a lot, Craig. We appreciate it.   --- More stories and tech updates at: www.craigpeterson.com Don't miss an episode from Craig. Subscribe and give us a rating: www.craigpeterson.com/itunes Follow me on Twitter for the latest in tech at: www.twitter.com/craigpeterson For questions, call or text: 855-385-5553  

The promise of renewable energy has always been alluring. Now that the technology has caught up to the promise, record amounts of wind and solar are coming onto the grid both in Japan and throughout the world.  But so far startups, especially Japanese startups, have been playing a very limited role in this transformation. But that's starting to change. Today we sit down with Ken Isono, founder and CEO of Shizen Energy, and we talk about what it takes to succeed as an energy startup in Japan, and since Shizen Energy is rapidly expanding globally, what it takes to succeed as a startup in the global energy markets. We talk about which renewables are working in Japan and which are not, what the real bottlenecks are, and more important, how we can fix them. It's a great conversation, and I think you'll enjoy it. Show Notes Why startups struggle in the energy market How solar plants get built in Japan How to find wind projects worth building The importance of going local in a global market Why the Japanese value land rights so highly A deep dive into solar, wind, hydro, and geothermal energy in Japan How Japanese communities are funding local renewable energy Why so many of Japan's startups come from Fukuoka How Japan can transform into a free-energy economy Links from the Founder Everything you wanted to know about Shizen Energy Shizen Energy on Facebook Shizen Energy retail green energy Friend Ken on Facebook Leave a comment Transcript Welcome to Disrupting Japan, straight talk from Japan’s most successful entrepreneurs. I’m Tim Romero and thanks for joining me. It’s surprising at first, for all of the potential disruption in the energy industry, for all of the potential profits that can be made by doing things better and more efficiently in the energy industry, we don’t see that many energy startups, and as it turns out, there are good reasons for this. Generating and storing electricity at scale require skills that can’t be supplanted by new technology and innovation. Furthermore, most energy projects are long-term, low-risk medium return projects that are just not attractive to venture capital. These projects require a different kind of financing. One notable exception, however, is Japan’s Shizen Energy who is bringing a lot of renewable energy onto the grid in Japan and around the world as well, and they’re doing it as a startup. In just a minute, we’ll sit down with Ken Isono, Shizen Energy’s founder and CEO. He’ll explain how his little startup has worked with local governments and fought the incumbents to bring enough renewable energy onto the grid that Shizen Energy is not so little anymore. We’ll talk about that growth, of course, and we also take a deep dive into the current state and the future prospects of the most important renewable energy technologies in Japan. But you know, Ken tells that story much better than I can, so let’s get right to the interview. [pro_ad_display_adzone id="1411"  info_text="Sponsored by"  font_color="grey"  ] Interview  Tim: So, I’m sitting here with Ken Isono of Shizen Energy, and thanks for sitting down with me. Ken: Thanks for the chance to speak. Tim: Now, Shizen Energy, you guys are a vertically integrated renewable energy company. You guys do generation, your financing, and the retail side as well. Ken: Yeah. Tim: That’s a lot for a startup to do. Ken: We started with solar but the three co-founders used to work in wind power generation company together for five years. Tim: What made you guys decide to leave that company and start your own project? Ken: So, actually, Shizen Energy, we found this company 2011, June, so three months after Fukushima accident. Before that, there was no demand from the market, from policy in renewables, but we knew that it’s going to change. Tim: At first you were focused on large scale solar projects? Was it just the financing,

Acousmatique Recordings - "Breathe in through tightly pursed lips" David Byrne - "What time is it? No time to look back" - True Stories [over Acousmatique Recordings] Acousmatique Recordings - "Breathe in through tightly pursed lips" Bea T'cha - "If you ask nicely" [over Acousmatique Recordings. Includes French monologue] Neil Amsterdam - "Neutral Strings #2" - Magic Kingdom WEDway Peoplemover Music Loop [over Bea T'cha, Acousmatique Recordings] George Bruns - "Monorail Song" - Magic Kingdom WEDway Peoplemover Music Loop [over other Magic Kingdom, Bea T'cha] Bea T'cha - "Evening of Light" [over other Bea T'cha, Neutral Strings #2] George Bruns - "Nation on Wheels" - Magic Kingdom WEDway Peoplemover Music Loop [with Bea T'cha, Acousmatique Recordings, other Magic Kingdom] Neil Amsterdam - "Industry in Motion #1" - Magic Kingdom WEDway Peoplemover Music Loop [with Bea T'cha, Acousmatique Recordings, other Magic Kingdom] Ken - "Intro / let go" [over Bea T'cha if you ask nicely and Nation on Wheels] Bea T'cha - "If you ask nicely" [Includes many unidentified sound sources] George Winston - "Tamarack Pines" [over Bea T'cha] Slowdive - "Brighter" [over George Winston, Bea T'cha] Ken - "It's uncomfortable (explanation/intro)" [over Slowdive, George Winston, Bea T'cha] Slowdive - "Brighter" [over George Winston, Bea T'cha] Chicago - "Remember the Feeling" - Chicago 17 [Piano loop over Bea T'cha, Slowdive, George Winston] Chicago - "Remember the Feeling" - Chicago 17 [with George Winston] Chicago - "Colour My World" [Intro looping, with Remember the Feeling and George Winston] Chicago - "Colour My World" [with other copy of Colour My World] Chicago - "Remember the Feeling" Brad Fiedel - "Come to Me" - Fright Night s.t. [With Remember the Feeling] Tax advice - "Track 15" [with Brad Fiedel, Remember the Feeling] Louis Armstrong - "We Have All the Time in the World" [with Brad Fiedel] Cowboy Junkies - "Cold Tea Blues" [with brad Fiedel, Louis Armstrong] Snap! - "The Power" [Loops, with Brad Fiedel, Louis Armstrong, Cowboy Junkies] Cowboy Junkies - "Cold Tea Blues" [with Snap!] Tiffany - "I Think We're Alone Now" [Loops, with Cowboy Junkies, Snap!] Tiffany - "I Think We're Alone Now" [Loops] Les Nesman - "Black Americans' contributions to US culture" - WKRP in Cincinnati, season 3 episode 12 [over Tiffany loops. Scratch an Allman Brother, and you have black] Tiffany - "I Think We're Alone Now" [Loops] Billy Corgan, Alex Jones - "The fascist war machine" [over Tiffany loops] Tiffany - "I Think We're Alone Now" Richard E. Grant - "People buy hydrogen bombs because they have an added new ingredient: Peace" - How to Get Ahead in Advertising [over Tiffany] Tiffany - "I Think We're Alone Now" Richard E. Grant - "Roads represent a fundamental right of man to have access to the good things in life" - How to Get Ahead in Advertising [over Tiffany. The right to smoke one's chosen brand would be denied] Tiffany - "I Think We're Alone Now" [Loops] Richard E. Grant - "Packaging would vanish from the face of the earth" - How to Get Ahead in Advertising [over Tiffany] Tiffany - "I Think We're Alone Now" Richard E. Grant - "I'm not a communist, you want to take everyone's car away" - How to Get Ahead in Advertising [over Tiffany] Tiffany - "I Think We're Alone Now" Pinback - "Anti-hu" [Loops, over Tiffany] Tame Impala - "Promo for Currents Collectors Edition" [over Pinback, Tiffany] Tame Impala - "Promo for Currents Collectors Edition" [over Tiffany] Acousmatique Recordings - "Breathe in through tightly pursed lips" [over Tame Impala, Tiffany] mathblaster - "Achromatic" [over Tame Impala] mathblaster - "Achromatic" Snap! - "The Power" [Loops, over mathblaster] Brad Fiedel - "Dream Window" - Fright Night s.t. [over Snap!, mathblaster] Tycho - "Awake" [over Snap!, mathblaster, Brad Fiedel] Tycho - "Awake" [over Snap!, mathblaster, Tiffany] Tycho - "Awake" [over Tiffany, Snap!] Tycho - "Awake" [over Snap!] Snap! - "The Power" [Loops, over Tycho] The Echelon Effect - "First Fall" [over Snap!, Tycho] Chicago - "Colour My World" [over Snap!, Tycho, The Echelon Effect] Acousmatique Recordings - "Breathe in through tightly pursed lips" [over The Echelon Effect] The Echelon Effect - "First Fall" [over Beat T'cha, Acousmatique Recordings] Acousmatique Recordings - "Breathe in through tightly pursed lips" [over The Echelon Effect] Stone Roses - "Elephant Stone" [loops, over The Echelon Effect and Acousmatique Recordings] Estiva - "Lifting Leaves" [over Stone Roses, The Echelon Effect, Acousmatique Recordings] Ken - "Everything has always been there" [over Estiva, Stone Roses, The Echelon Effect, Acousmatique Recordings (eventually just Estiva) It's all there - everything. Everything is always all there. And everything has always been there. Whether you're looking, whether you knew where to look... Everything has always been there. Everything has always been this way. It's been all these ways all at once. You can choose what you look at, what you focus on, what you see, what patterns you notice. All the things are always happening altogether, and you tune in, and you tune out, and you tune... and you see what you are, and you see what you see, and you see what you recognize. And you see what creates interference patterns, what seems discordant. And you don't notice other things. You don't notice them until they're pointed out. You don't notice them until you grow that part of yourself. You don't notice them because you don't have a name for them, your language doesn't have a way. You don't notice them because they conflict with what you've been taught, because you don't believe in them, because you've been taught to be afraid of them. You don't notice them because they're in opposition to everything you believe in. But they're still all there. They're still all around you. The thing you just learned about, it's always been there. That new change in yourself, it's always been there. Things that seem good, things that seem evil, things that attract you. It's always been there. Nothing has ever changed. Except your awareness, and your awareness is going to keep changing. It's going to keep arcing, and developing, and looping, all the way 'til the end. And the only thing that's changing in the world is everyone's awareness. All the matter, the matter, the bits, they're the same. It might be in a different order, but they're the same. So, you can change your awareness. You can notice the awareness of others. Change... you can change, you can change others' awareness. You can't change. You can't change. You can't change anything. And everything that's happening, everything that's going on right now, it's never going to end, it's never going to start. You can try to own it, you can try to make it. You can be frustrated with it, you can walk away from it, you can not look at it, but it's still going to be there. This is here. This is in the air, and you can tune into the frequency that it's vibrating at, and you can choose to resonate with it, or you can lock into different frequencies. You can turn down your consciousness. You can overdose on something. But it's still going to be here, because it's here. It's here now. You can never get away from your past. It's here now in the frequency. You can look away. Just keep looking away. Keep looking at things to help you look away. If you focus on this point, you don't have to see that one. Keep turning things up louder and louder. The hair follicles in your eardrums...everything can be used up. You can use it all up. Or you can make it as healthy as it can be. And you can responsibly choose which things you look at, and what you think about. You can realize that your attention is your own. You can think about the responsibilities you have to use it. And you can actually make everything better. And there goes the world, getting better and better, thanks to you. Thank you.] Estiva - "Lifting Leaves" [over The Echelon Effect] Tracey Chattaway - "Light the Night" [over Estiva, The Echelon Effect] Stone Roses - "Elephant Stone" [over The Echelon Effect, Tracey Chattaway] The Echelon Effect - "First Fall" [over Tracey Chattaway] Henrik Neilsen - "Outdoor Life #2" - Magic Kingdom WEDway Peoplemover Music Loop [over The Echelon Effect, Tracey Chattaway] The Echelon Effect - "First Fall" [over Tracey Chattaway] Ken's Last Ever Radio Extravaganza - "In Between Dates (choices all around you)" - Show #505, from Oct. 1, 2014 [Live on stage in Baltimore with Neil Diamond-America loops, and The Echelon Effect, Tracey Chattaway] Ken's Last Ever Radio Extravaganza - "In Between Dates (choices all around you)" - Show #505, from Oct. 1, 2014 [Live on stage in Baltimore with Neil Diamond-America loops, and The Echelon Effect] Ken's Last Ever Radio Extravaganza - "In Between Dates (choices all around you)" - Show #505, from Oct. 1, 2014 [Live on stage in Baltimore with Neil Diamond-America loops and other unnamed sample sources.] Neil Diamond - "America" - The Jazz Singer [Loops] Ken - "The housekeeper is going to put everything back where it belongs / Identification" [over Neil Diamond loops. They know you're going to take care of them] Ken - "I don't know why I..." [over Neil Diamond loops. Everything is always in its right place.] Ken - "Thanks" [over Neil Diamond loops] Neil Diamond - "America" - The Jazz Singer [Loops] Billy Bragg - "The Unwelcome Guest" [over Neil Diamond] Cowboy Junkies - "Brothers Under the Bridge" [over Neil Diamond, Billy Bragg (briefly)] Cowboy Junkies - "Brothers Under the Bridge" [Loop, over Neil Diamond loops] John Mellencamp - "Pink Houses" [more America, Over Cowboy Junkies, Neil Diamond] Cowboy Junkies - "Brothers Under the Bridge" [loop, with Neil Diamond loops] Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers - "American Girl" [Loops, with Cowboy Junkies and Neil Diamond] Schoolhouse Rock - "Preamble" - America Rock [with Tom Petty, Neil Diamond, Cowboy Junkies] Ken's Last Ever Radio Extravaganza - "The Great Communicator (Ronald Reagan)" - Show #317, from 6/8/2004 [with Vivaldi cello concerto (2004) and Tom Petty (2019). It's morning again in America. We can leave our children with an unrepayable massive debt.] Richard E. Grant - "They're entitled to important new ingredients" - How to Get Ahead in Advertising [with Ken's Last Ever Reagan, Tom Petty] Ken's Last Ever Radio Extravaganza - "The Great Communicator (Ronald Reagan)" - Show #317, from 6/8/2004 [with Vivaldi cello concerto (2004) and Tom Petty (2019)] Richard E. Grant - "They're going to get it bigger and brighter and better" - How to Get Ahead in Advertising [with Ken's Last Ever Reagan, Tom Petty] Ken's Last Ever Radio Extravaganza - "The Great Communicator (Ronald Reagan)" - Show #317, from 6/8/2004 [with Vivaldi cello concerto (2004) and Tom Petty (2019). Union busting] Cowboy Junkies - "Cold Tea Blues" [with Tom Petty] Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers - "American Girl" [No loops, with Cowboy Junkies] Cowboy Junkies - "Brothers Under the Bridge" [Loop, with Tom Petty] Chevrolet - "The American Look" - The American Look [With Cowboy Junkies Brothers loop, Tom Petty] Michael Crichton - "Decisions about life and death. Society isn't deciding. Society is leaving it up to us, the experts, the doctors" - Coma movie [with The American Look, Tom Petty, Cowboy Junkies Brothers] Michael Crichton - "A whole nation of sick people turning to us for help" - Coma movie [with Cowboy Junkies] George C. Scott - "Medical failure. People are sicker than ever" - The Hospital [with Cowboy Junkies] A real doctor - "Complications of lipsuction" - The Girl Next Door (documentary) [with Cowboy Junkies] Albert Brooks and James Spader - "You don't need a living will. Just make sure you don't have money for healthcare" - Critical Care [with Cowboy Junkies] Michael Crichton - "You probably think I'm beautiful, but I have lots of defects to fix" - Looker [with Cowboy Junkies] Ken - "You can take responsibility for your own healing, you can insist on being healthy from within" [with Cowboy Junkies loop] Ken - "Inching my way towards the door of this party. I appreciate that you invited me" [with Tom Petty, Cowboy Junkies, then just Cowboy Junkies] Ken - "We can move in together" [with Cowboy Junkies, and a dial tone] Cowboy Junkies - "Brothers Under the Bridge" [Loop] Neil Diamond - "America" [Loops, with Cowboy Junkies] INXS - "Mediate" - Kick [Loops, with Cowboy Junkies, Neil Diamond] Lemon Jelly - "Page One" [Loops, with INXS, Neil Diamond] INXS - "Mediate" [No loops, with Lemon Jelly] Billy Corgan, Alex Jones - "Was it a just purpose, they divide and conquer, wounded warriors" - Alex Jones Show 6/26/12 [with INXS, Lemon Jelly] Billy Corgan, Alex Jones - "GMO pesticides in their system, you can ask the questions" - Alex Jones Show 6/26/12 [with INXS] INXS - "Mediate" - Kick [Loops, 2 copies] David Byrne - "Since this mall opened, they'll go wherever the bargains are. They're wise to advertisers' claims" - True Stories [with INXS. The shopping mall has replaced the town center] War On Drugs - "Burning" - Lost in the Dream [Loops, with David Byrne, INXS] War On Drugs - "Burning" - Lost in the Dream [Loops] Ken - "You only have one chance to do it. We're full of hope, and we're giving up" [with War On Drugs] War On Drugs - "Burning" - Lost in the Dream [Loops] https://www.wfmu.org/playlists/shows/83624

Acousmatique Recordings - "Breathe in through tightly pursed lips" David Byrne - "What time is it? No time to look back" - True Stories [over Acousmatique Recordings] Acousmatique Recordings - "Breathe in through tightly pursed lips" Bea T'cha - "If you ask nicely" [over Acousmatique Recordings. Includes French monologue] Neil Amsterdam - "Neutral Strings #2" - Magic Kingdom WEDway Peoplemover Music Loop [over Bea T'cha, Acousmatique Recordings] George Bruns - "Monorail Song" - Magic Kingdom WEDway Peoplemover Music Loop [over other Magic Kingdom, Bea T'cha] Bea T'cha - "Evening of Light" [over other Bea T'cha, Neutral Strings #2] George Bruns - "Nation on Wheels" - Magic Kingdom WEDway Peoplemover Music Loop [with Bea T'cha, Acousmatique Recordings, other Magic Kingdom] Neil Amsterdam - "Industry in Motion #1" - Magic Kingdom WEDway Peoplemover Music Loop [with Bea T'cha, Acousmatique Recordings, other Magic Kingdom] Ken - "Intro / let go" [over Bea T'cha if you ask nicely and Nation on Wheels] Bea T'cha - "If you ask nicely" [Includes many unidentified sound sources] George Winston - "Tamarack Pines" [over Bea T'cha] Slowdive - "Brighter" [over George Winston, Bea T'cha] Ken - "It's uncomfortable (explanation/intro)" [over Slowdive, George Winston, Bea T'cha] Slowdive - "Brighter" [over George Winston, Bea T'cha] Chicago - "Remember the Feeling" - Chicago 17 [Piano loop over Bea T'cha, Slowdive, George Winston] Chicago - "Remember the Feeling" - Chicago 17 [with George Winston] Chicago - "Colour My World" [Intro looping, with Remember the Feeling and George Winston] Chicago - "Colour My World" [with other copy of Colour My World] Chicago - "Remember the Feeling" Brad Fiedel - "Come to Me" - Fright Night s.t. [With Remember the Feeling] Tax advice - "Track 15" [with Brad Fiedel, Remember the Feeling] Louis Armstrong - "We Have All the Time in the World" [with Brad Fiedel] Cowboy Junkies - "Cold Tea Blues" [with brad Fiedel, Louis Armstrong] Snap! - "The Power" [Loops, with Brad Fiedel, Louis Armstrong, Cowboy Junkies] Cowboy Junkies - "Cold Tea Blues" [with Snap!] Tiffany - "I Think We're Alone Now" [Loops, with Cowboy Junkies, Snap!] Tiffany - "I Think We're Alone Now" [Loops] Les Nesman - "Black Americans' contributions to US culture" - WKRP in Cincinnati, season 3 episode 12 [over Tiffany loops. Scratch an Allman Brother, and you have black] Tiffany - "I Think We're Alone Now" [Loops] Billy Corgan, Alex Jones - "The fascist war machine" [over Tiffany loops] Tiffany - "I Think We're Alone Now" Richard E. Grant - "People buy hydrogen bombs because they have an added new ingredient: Peace" - How to Get Ahead in Advertising [over Tiffany] Tiffany - "I Think We're Alone Now" Richard E. Grant - "Roads represent a fundamental right of man to have access to the good things in life" - How to Get Ahead in Advertising [over Tiffany. The right to smoke one's chosen brand would be denied] Tiffany - "I Think We're Alone Now" [Loops] Richard E. Grant - "Packaging would vanish from the face of the earth" - How to Get Ahead in Advertising [over Tiffany] Tiffany - "I Think We're Alone Now" Richard E. Grant - "I'm not a communist, you want to take everyone's car away" - How to Get Ahead in Advertising [over Tiffany] Tiffany - "I Think We're Alone Now" Pinback - "Anti-hu" [Loops, over Tiffany] Tame Impala - "Promo for Currents Collectors Edition" [over Pinback, Tiffany] Tame Impala - "Promo for Currents Collectors Edition" [over Tiffany] Acousmatique Recordings - "Breathe in through tightly pursed lips" [over Tame Impala, Tiffany] mathblaster - "Achromatic" [over Tame Impala] mathblaster - "Achromatic" Snap! - "The Power" [Loops, over mathblaster] Brad Fiedel - "Dream Window" - Fright Night s.t. [over Snap!, mathblaster] Tycho - "Awake" [over Snap!, mathblaster, Brad Fiedel] Tycho - "Awake" [over Snap!, mathblaster, Tiffany] Tycho - "Awake" [over Tiffany, Snap!] Tycho - "Awake" [over Snap!] Snap! - "The Power" [Loops, over Tycho] The Echelon Effect - "First Fall" [over Snap!, Tycho] Chicago - "Colour My World" [over Snap!, Tycho, The Echelon Effect] Acousmatique Recordings - "Breathe in through tightly pursed lips" [over The Echelon Effect] The Echelon Effect - "First Fall" [over Beat T'cha, Acousmatique Recordings] Acousmatique Recordings - "Breathe in through tightly pursed lips" [over The Echelon Effect] Stone Roses - "Elephant Stone" [loops, over The Echelon Effect and Acousmatique Recordings] Estiva - "Lifting Leaves" [over Stone Roses, The Echelon Effect, Acousmatique Recordings] Ken - "Everything has always been there" [over Estiva, Stone Roses, The Echelon Effect, Acousmatique Recordings (eventually just Estiva) It's all there - everything. Everything is always all there. And everything has always been there. Whether you're looking, whether you knew where to look... Everything has always been there. Everything has always been this way. It's been all these ways all at once. You can choose what you look at, what you focus on, what you see, what patterns you notice. All the things are always happening altogether, and you tune in, and you tune out, and you tune... and you see what you are, and you see what you see, and you see what you recognize. And you see what creates interference patterns, what seems discordant. And you don't notice other things. You don't notice them until they're pointed out. You don't notice them until you grow that part of yourself. You don't notice them because you don't have a name for them, your language doesn't have a way. You don't notice them because they conflict with what you've been taught, because you don't believe in them, because you've been taught to be afraid of them. You don't notice them because they're in opposition to everything you believe in. But they're still all there. They're still all around you. The thing you just learned about, it's always been there. That new change in yourself, it's always been there. Things that seem good, things that seem evil, things that attract you. It's always been there. Nothing has ever changed. Except your awareness, and your awareness is going to keep changing. It's going to keep arcing, and developing, and looping, all the way 'til the end. And the only thing that's changing in the world is everyone's awareness. All the matter, the matter, the bits, they're the same. It might be in a different order, but they're the same. So, you can change your awareness. You can notice the awareness of others. Change... you can change, you can change others' awareness. You can't change. You can't change. You can't change anything. And everything that's happening, everything that's going on right now, it's never going to end, it's never going to start. You can try to own it, you can try to make it. You can be frustrated with it, you can walk away from it, you can not look at it, but it's still going to be there. This is here. This is in the air, and you can tune into the frequency that it's vibrating at, and you can choose to resonate with it, or you can lock into different frequencies. You can turn down your consciousness. You can overdose on something. But it's still going to be here, because it's here. It's here now. You can never get away from your past. It's here now in the frequency. You can look away. Just keep looking away. Keep looking at things to help you look away. If you focus on this point, you don't have to see that one. Keep turning things up louder and louder. The hair follicles in your eardrums...everything can be used up. You can use it all up. Or you can make it as healthy as it can be. And you can responsibly choose which things you look at, and what you think about. You can realize that your attention is your own. You can think about the responsibilities you have to use it. And you can actually make everything better. And there goes the world, getting better and better, thanks to you. Thank you.] Estiva - "Lifting Leaves" [over The Echelon Effect] Tracey Chattaway - "Light the Night" [over Estiva, The Echelon Effect] Stone Roses - "Elephant Stone" [over The Echelon Effect, Tracey Chattaway] The Echelon Effect - "First Fall" [over Tracey Chattaway] Henrik Neilsen - "Outdoor Life #2" - Magic Kingdom WEDway Peoplemover Music Loop [over The Echelon Effect, Tracey Chattaway] The Echelon Effect - "First Fall" [over Tracey Chattaway] Ken's Last Ever Radio Extravaganza - "In Between Dates (choices all around you)" - Show #505, from Oct. 1, 2014 [Live on stage in Baltimore with Neil Diamond-America loops, and The Echelon Effect, Tracey Chattaway] Ken's Last Ever Radio Extravaganza - "In Between Dates (choices all around you)" - Show #505, from Oct. 1, 2014 [Live on stage in Baltimore with Neil Diamond-America loops, and The Echelon Effect] Ken's Last Ever Radio Extravaganza - "In Between Dates (choices all around you)" - Show #505, from Oct. 1, 2014 [Live on stage in Baltimore with Neil Diamond-America loops and other unnamed sample sources.] Neil Diamond - "America" - The Jazz Singer [Loops] Ken - "The housekeeper is going to put everything back where it belongs / Identification" [over Neil Diamond loops. They know you're going to take care of them] Ken - "I don't know why I..." [over Neil Diamond loops. Everything is always in its right place.] Ken - "Thanks" [over Neil Diamond loops] Neil Diamond - "America" - The Jazz Singer [Loops] Billy Bragg - "The Unwelcome Guest" [over Neil Diamond] Cowboy Junkies - "Brothers Under the Bridge" [over Neil Diamond, Billy Bragg (briefly)] Cowboy Junkies - "Brothers Under the Bridge" [Loop, over Neil Diamond loops] John Mellencamp - "Pink Houses" [more America, Over Cowboy Junkies, Neil Diamond] Cowboy Junkies - "Brothers Under the Bridge" [loop, with Neil Diamond loops] Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers - "American Girl" [Loops, with Cowboy Junkies and Neil Diamond] Schoolhouse Rock - "Preamble" - America Rock [with Tom Petty, Neil Diamond, Cowboy Junkies] Ken's Last Ever Radio Extravaganza - "The Great Communicator (Ronald Reagan)" - Show #317, from 6/8/2004 [with Vivaldi cello concerto (2004) and Tom Petty (2019). It's morning again in America. We can leave our children with an unrepayable massive debt.] Richard E. Grant - "They're entitled to important new ingredients" - How to Get Ahead in Advertising [with Ken's Last Ever Reagan, Tom Petty] Ken's Last Ever Radio Extravaganza - "The Great Communicator (Ronald Reagan)" - Show #317, from 6/8/2004 [with Vivaldi cello concerto (2004) and Tom Petty (2019)] Richard E. Grant - "They're going to get it bigger and brighter and better" - How to Get Ahead in Advertising [with Ken's Last Ever Reagan, Tom Petty] Ken's Last Ever Radio Extravaganza - "The Great Communicator (Ronald Reagan)" - Show #317, from 6/8/2004 [with Vivaldi cello concerto (2004) and Tom Petty (2019). Union busting] Cowboy Junkies - "Cold Tea Blues" [with Tom Petty] Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers - "American Girl" [No loops, with Cowboy Junkies] Cowboy Junkies - "Brothers Under the Bridge" [Loop, with Tom Petty] Chevrolet - "The American Look" - The American Look [With Cowboy Junkies Brothers loop, Tom Petty] Michael Crichton - "Decisions about life and death. Society isn't deciding. Society is leaving it up to us, the experts, the doctors" - Coma movie [with The American Look, Tom Petty, Cowboy Junkies Brothers] Michael Crichton - "A whole nation of sick people turning to us for help" - Coma movie [with Cowboy Junkies] George C. Scott - "Medical failure. People are sicker than ever" - The Hospital [with Cowboy Junkies] A real doctor - "Complications of lipsuction" - The Girl Next Door (documentary) [with Cowboy Junkies] Albert Brooks and James Spader - "You don't need a living will. Just make sure you don't have money for healthcare" - Critical Care [with Cowboy Junkies] Michael Crichton - "You probably think I'm beautiful, but I have lots of defects to fix" - Looker [with Cowboy Junkies] Ken - "You can take responsibility for your own healing, you can insist on being healthy from within" [with Cowboy Junkies loop] Ken - "Inching my way towards the door of this party. I appreciate that you invited me" [with Tom Petty, Cowboy Junkies, then just Cowboy Junkies] Ken - "We can move in together" [with Cowboy Junkies, and a dial tone] Cowboy Junkies - "Brothers Under the Bridge" [Loop] Neil Diamond - "America" [Loops, with Cowboy Junkies] INXS - "Mediate" - Kick [Loops, with Cowboy Junkies, Neil Diamond] Lemon Jelly - "Page One" [Loops, with INXS, Neil Diamond] INXS - "Mediate" [No loops, with Lemon Jelly] Billy Corgan, Alex Jones - "Was it a just purpose, they divide and conquer, wounded warriors" - Alex Jones Show 6/26/12 [with INXS, Lemon Jelly] Billy Corgan, Alex Jones - "GMO pesticides in their system, you can ask the questions" - Alex Jones Show 6/26/12 [with INXS] INXS - "Mediate" - Kick [Loops, 2 copies] David Byrne - "Since this mall opened, they'll go wherever the bargains are. They're wise to advertisers' claims" - True Stories [with INXS. The shopping mall has replaced the town center] War On Drugs - "Burning" - Lost in the Dream [Loops, with David Byrne, INXS] War On Drugs - "Burning" - Lost in the Dream [Loops] Ken - "You only have one chance to do it. We're full of hope, and we're giving up" [with War On Drugs] War On Drugs - "Burning" - Lost in the Dream [Loops] http://www.wfmu.org/playlists/shows/83624

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