00:12:00 · Aditya Agarwal, Mark Jacobstein
[00:12:00] S1: I will give you a bunch of credit. You saw that shit a lot earlier than most people. And you know, I live, me and Mark, and we live in a world where a lot of people like to make predictions, but I think you saw that way earlier than most. And it's obviously accelerated even in the last two or three years. So props on that. A lot of people think, yeah, that's props. [00:12:24] S2: And actually it's related to a question that I had. In general, you've seen trends before people. So you were talking about job displacement and what it was going to mean before anybody else and UBI before anybody else, and then it was actually Sam who came along soon thereafter and and I think I think probably largely inspired by you. You're also like the first democrat to talk about, you know, the problems of cancel culture and folks being overly woke and problems with two party systems and the need for things like ranked choice voting, you've always been, I think, out ahead and a provocateur. I mean, now, you know, talking about addiction to mobile phones and the fact that we all need to be spending more time IRL, which I think is absolutely true and incredibly important. So talk to me about like the systems that help you to do this. I mean, you're obviously very sharp. There's lots of smart people who don't see the future so well. So I'm curious about like, is there a thing that helps you to do that? Is there is there a reason you think that that's been sort of part of your DNA?
00:12:24 · Mark Jacobstein, Andrew Yang, Aditya Agarwal
[00:12:24] S2: And actually it's related to a question that I had. In general, you've seen trends before people. So you were talking about job displacement and what it was going to mean before anybody else and UBI before anybody else, and then it was actually Sam who came along soon thereafter and and I think I think probably largely inspired by you. You're also like the first democrat to talk about, you know, the problems of cancel culture and folks being overly woke and problems with two party systems and the need for things like ranked choice voting, you've always been, I think, out ahead and a provocateur. I mean, now, you know, talking about addiction to mobile phones and the fact that we all need to be spending more time IRL, which I think is absolutely true and incredibly important. So talk to me about like the systems that help you to do this. I mean, you're obviously very sharp. There's lots of smart people who don't see the future so well. So I'm curious about like, is there a thing that helps you to do that? Is there is there a reason you think that that's been sort of part of your DNA? [00:13:21] S0: I think the main gift I have is that I don't socialize well. By that, what I mean is if you stick me with a bunch of people that all went to fancy schools and like, because, know, Mark, I know where you went. Don't know, but I assume it was pretty fancy. Not as, not as [00:13:42] S1: fancy as Mark, you know, I went to Carnegie Fancy ish. [00:13:48] S2: It's pretty fancy.
00:13:48 · Mark Jacobstein, Andrew Yang, Aditya Agarwal
[00:13:48] S2: It's pretty fancy. [00:13:50] S0: Yeah. It's like, I am around these people and I just think to myself, like, you know, these people are a slice of a slice of a slice very often. And like, I don't think it defines reality. That's And the main so then when I try and figure out what defines reality, I just look for numbers and I'm like, okay, this is the closest thing I can find to it. And then I try and follow those. I took a test a little while ago trying to identify my political alignment by personality, and I came up completely neutral. Like, was, you know, I'm just pretty much... [00:14:30] S2: You can feel that in in I think in very in very good ways. [00:14:33] S1: In that case, Andrew, you strike me as one of the people who maybe I've met who has the highest score on agency. Because most people have all these provocative ideas, but they don't act upon it. They just have theories. But you actually have the remarkable tendency to go and actually do something about it. And you've done this multiple times. That's very rare, even in Silicon Valley, which I think is probably the best crucible for high agency in the world, in my opinion. But you having done so in multiple domains, that's very rare. Yeah. [00:15:04] S0: Well, thank you. I mean, certainly see Silicon Valley as the crucible. And when I spend time there, I get invigorated. I feel like, oh yeah, these are people who are doing things. I just think I've picked different domains that a smart person would avoid, like the plague, like politics.
00:15:04 · Andrew Yang, Mark Jacobstein, Mark Jacobstein
[00:15:04] S0: Well, thank you. I mean, certainly see Silicon Valley as the crucible. And when I spend time there, I get invigorated. I feel like, oh yeah, these are people who are doing things. I just think I've picked different domains that a smart person would avoid, like the plague, like politics. [00:15:24] S2: It's a tough lifestyle. I still give, you know, your wife a lot of credit for sort of letting you go do that, I I gotta say. [00:15:30] S0: Yeah. I mean, I I visited Iowa 25 times and Italy zero times in my life. So [00:15:37] S3: I know. That's a problem.
00:15:37 · Mark Jacobstein, Andrew Yang
[00:15:37] S3: I know. That's a problem. [00:15:39] S0: And some distinct travel itineraries. But I felt, by the way, you'll appreciate this, Aditya, from that comment. If someone starts a business and you ask them how much time are you going to put into this? They'll be like, I have no idea, but it's probably at least a minimum of five years because companies take a while. And so when I decided to run for president, I said, I just need to do everything perfectly in my power for realistically was only like two years and three months. I declared in February 2018, and also not being diluted, I thought it was probably going to end before the end of the nomination process. So I was like, okay, I just need to be awesome and nearly superhuman for two years. Which if you were to say to an entrepreneur, can you do that? They'd be like, I can do two years. I can do two years of just about anything, you know? Whereas starting a company like I am doing now with Noble Mobile, it's like, if you said, Hey, I'm gonna do this for two years, you're a fucking terrible entrepreneur because you're like, What the fuck are gonna get done in two years? So in a way, I tried to frame it as like running for president was actually easier than some other
00:16:58 · Mark Jacobstein
[00:16:58] S2: undertakings. And more highly leveraged. I mean, is one of these things, you live in Silicon Valley for long enough and we like to think we're sort of the center of the universe and the companies that we build are going to change the most impactful thing you can do in human society. And I don't wanna underestimate the importance of technological advancement, but president of The United States runs a pretty... Has a pretty big budget and a pretty big finger on the lever as we know for good or for bad. And so I I do think it's it's interesting. Sometimes you get people from DC out here and they're like, you know, people in Silicon Valley are kind of full of themselves. I think it's a it's a useful perspective and reminder every once in a while.