The Exchanges

Q Because if you own your own bookstore, that means that, and you sell 20,000 copies, do they not count all 20,000 in the rankings?

A Yeah. So, I mean, just generally, if you sold 20,000 copies of a book through one bookstore, they would find that to be suspicious, uh, or, or unrepresentative. And there's a chance it could get tossed. If you ever look at the, at the bestseller list and you see like a little, they call it a dagger. It's like a little cross next to certain books. That means that there was a lot of bulk purchases, um, or like suspicious activity. So there could be that. Um, but, uh, The, the Wall Street Journal or BookScan, which is owned by Nielsen, just flat out told me they just don't include, uh, sales from, uh, stores owned by the author anymore, uh, which doesn't strike me as that being a big enough category to have a rule about. But, um, I guess it, it, there's the potential for fraud. Like, I guess, theoretically, I could have just, you know, inflated the numbers or something. So, so there's a chance it could get tossed, but As I have gone on as an author, I've cared, once you get it once, I feel like you have it, and then you also realize, like, kind of how meaningless things are. Uh, so I care a lot less about sort of the status, uh, or the recognition of sales, and I care a lot more about, you know, did I sell as many copies as possible? Uh, to as many people as possible, right? Um, because the whole point of writing a book is for people to read it.

AI assessment note: “they just don't include, uh, sales from, uh, stores owned by the author”

Q Yeah. Just like all this crazy stuff. What, um, what was it like, uh, getting to know that guy? I mean, he, he's one of those guys where like, I actually don't think there is, I don't know him, but where there actually is no balance and he is just really quirky.

A Well, I think, uh, it's, it's both, it's both very understandable and then very inexplicable, right? Like if you had made billions of dollars and you were very powerful, I don't think you would like to be picked on, right? Like I think people were like, why would he do this? And it's like, well, this, this bully came along and humiliated him in his eyes. Like, I, I don't, Like, not being a gay man, I, I can't really fully understand what, what the reaction would be to being outed, and, and, and the, a number of people that I, that I interviewed for the book who were gay, like, they didn't even understand. So, like, let's just, let's just stipulate that his explanation of his experience was that this was humiliating, and he, uh, found it to be very frustrating. Uh, I think when you're at that level, one of the feelings that you don't sit, that doesn't sit well with you is impotence. Right? Like, so when people were like, Peter, there's just nothing you can do about it. He was like, then what the fuck is the point of everything I've done? Right? And so, so in that sense, I think it's very understandable. I think that the problem is if you're the kind of person who it's like, I'm going to spend 10 years Uh, chasing down this media outlet when everyone is telling me not to do that. You're also the kind of person who can get sucked into other things that I think are going to pay off…

AI assessment note: “it's both very understandable and then very inexplicable”

Q you watch a sports talk show on ESPN, they don't necessarily think that LeBron James is better than Michael Jordan, but they know if they say it, It gets clipped and it gets shared. And so there's like this, yeah, I, I do, I, I perform versus like, do you think that the belief has come from somewhere or the motive might be driving them to extreme, you know, radicalize?

A I think it's both those things. So I think number one, uh, all these people are, are very smart, right? And so if you've built your whole career being smart and being a contrarian, it can put you in an uncomfortable position where you're like rejecting things that make sense because that's instinctively where you go. Like, this is what happened with, with, with Dove at American Apparel. His whole career, everything he did was fucking insane. I'm going to start a USA apparel company. I'm not going to use professional models. I'm going to pay a living wage. None of that makes any sense. That was the, all those individually are very bad ideas, but he somehow built a billion dollar company out of it. So then when people were like, you need to hire a professional operator, uh, inside, you know, you need to hire a real CFO and a real CMO and all this stuff. He was like, no, Right? So we just got used to rejecting everyone's advice, and it, it led to this downward spiral. So I think that there's a little bit of that. I think there is, um, I think there is this sort of as people, uh, become like, I think there's, you know, what audience capture is where you sort of get used to telling the audience what they want to hear. And so the algorithm is very seductive. It tends to reward like obviously controversial things. It rewards, uh, you know, uh, polarizing things. And so I think what ha…

AI assessment note: “I think it's both those things. So I think number one,”

Q I'm going to, I'm going to ask you about the mint in a second, because I have another mint that I think you're going to get a kick out of, but do, uh, can you reveal how many of those coins you sell a year or do not talk about that?

A Uh, I don't want to say exactly how many, but like tens of thousands, uh, it's, uh, a lot of them and, and people like I'm giving a talk in, Marble falls, uh, next week. And like, they bought one for each of the attendees. So it also became, it's a really cool way to like, what I'm interested in is not like tchotchkes or like just random ass merchandise, but like what are Phyllis, what are physical manifestations of the ideas that I talk about that could actually provide value in some way. So like I have, I have this, this one on my desk, but then the other one, Uh, that I have this for my others. This is, this one says Tempus Fugit, which means time flies. This is like a parenting one. It's just a reminder that like to be present as a parent. So I, I kind of start with stuff that would be helpful to me. And then if, if it works for other people, it's good. I do think entrepreneurs tend to think about digital products first and not physical products that have good margins. And this, so that's been really cool.

AI assessment note: “I don't want to say exactly how many, but like tens of thousands”

Q the daily stoic is an email. Then you have the daily dad, another email, and then you have the books, which you have dozens of them or a dozen of them plus. And then you have, Uh, the podcast and then you have the YouTube channel and I'm like, how on earth are you? How are you outputting all of this stuff? It's always awesome. I love all your shit.

A Well, thank you. I mean, I, I think I actually like, I actually like doing it right. So there's, there's some people who they don't like doing it. And so to do it because you think it'll make money or it's what you have to do, um, that would be not a reason to do it. But like, I like this morning, I, I got up and I wrote. And yesterday when the book came out, I was excited not to come into the office to see how, you know, the, the discipline did, but like I had saved like a really good chapter, uh, for what is the sequel? Cause I'm doing this four book series. Like I was just fucking pumped to do that. Like that, that's really what gets me excited is doing the stuff. So I've always, I think I tend to have, uh, more energy to make stuff than there actually is, like, pipes to put stuff out. That's just, like, how it shook out. Um, and I, I agree, like, I, I, I agree with the sentiment re-Bob Dylan in that, that, like, quantity and quality don't have to be opposed to each other, and in fact, uh, the more you do, chances are you'll, you'll sort of Get something magical or important. I mean, like, I, I really admire people who are wired differently, and they sort of painstakingly, uh, put, uh, you know, put lots of years into something. Although, like, if you, um, you know, I bet if you asked Mark, uh, he would, and I, actually, I have asked him, but, like, following up a massive, m…

AI assessment note: “I actually like doing it... I tend to have, uh, more energy to make stuff”

Q And you have a manager who do you, are you hands on with that? Is it headache for you?

A Yeah, I try. I mean, I try to have it be as little a headache as possible. I have, uh, most of them are managed by yeah, property managers. Um, but, uh, but I like, it's not that I think the stuff that I do will go away, but I like the idea of like, like my decision to write trust me, I'm lying and not having to think about needing to sell it upfront. Um, there was a similar one when, after I wrote trust me, I'm lying, I was like, hey, you know, for my next book, I want to do this book about, um, ancient philosophy. And they were like, um, Are you, are you sure? You know, like that. So they gave me less than half. I got 75,000 dollars for the obstacle is the way, um, which is sold, you know, many, many times more copies than trust me, I'm lying. Um, and you know, obviously set up all, all these other things. Um, but when they came back with that offer, I was like, okay, sure, whatever. You know, it, it wasn't, I didn't have to think about whether I could live on 75,000 dollars for however long it took me to write the book because My life wasn't set up around medium. That's, that's really like when people hear a book advance, it can sound like a lot of money. Um, like even, you know, 200,000 dollars, right? Trust me, I'm lying. So.

AI assessment note: “most of them are managed by yeah, property managers”