Nov 15, 2025 · 27m · tbpn
Blue Origin Lands Rocket, Valve Drops Steam Machine, Cantor Group Surges | Diet TBPN
John Coogan · 15m spoken Jordi Hays · 7m spoken Commercial Actor (Daughter / Mother) · 5s spoken Commercial Actor (Charlie - Adult) · 4s spoken Commercial Actor (Charlie - Young) · 2s spoken
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gold bands on the timeline = statements, start to end. Hover to read, click to jump. CC turns on captions
John Coogan and Jordi Hays break down major milestones in aerospace, consumer hardware, venture capital, and artificial intelligence, offering insightful commentary on industry trends from Blue Origin's booster landing and Valve's hardware lineup to VC allocator culture and the ethics of AI grief tech.
How this conversation actually went
Every chapter scored 0–10 on four independent dynamics. Hover any point for the reasoning behind the score. The hosts hold 93.3% of the talking time here. How this is scored →
The hosts as informed peer 6.0 Guest teaching 1.0 Guest disagreement 1.0 The hosts pushing back 1.7
speaking balance: gold is the hosts, purple is the guest (3 minute bins)
Sharpest disagreement ▶ 21:24 Fastest sports object debate
Jordi pushes back on John's skepticism, insisting that the badminton shuttlecock is recorded as the fastest moving object in sports compared to other projectiles.
Hardest push from the hosts ▶ 18:43 Rejecting allocator categorizationJohn firmly shuts down Tyler's question about whether they are 'in the flow,' pointing out that the categorization only applies to capital allocators and dealmakers.
Biggest teaching moment ▶ 21:24 Shuttlecock speed triviaJordi educates John with the sports trivia fact that shuttlecocks travel faster than any other recorded sporting projectile, placing John in the 'truth zone.'
The host holds their own ▶ 23:12 Aerodynamic fan lift calculationsJohn cites F1 racing history on banned fan-downforce tech and calculates the near-megawatt rotor power required to lift a two-ton vehicle.
the scores for every segment, with the reasoning behind each
| Chapter | Topic | The hosts as informed peer | Guest teaching | Guest disagreement | The hosts pushing back | Why |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Blue Origin Lands New Glenn and Competes with SpaceX | 7 | 1 | 0 | 1 | John demonstrates significant technical and business domain knowledge comparing Blue Origin's monolithic architecture to SpaceX's modular Starship approach, as well as employee equity dynamics. | |
| Valve Announces Steam Machine and New Hardware Lineup | 5 | 0 | 0 | 0 | The hosts collaboratively analyze Valve's product positioning, hardware launch marketing strategy, and industrial design aesthetics. | |
| Michael Saylor Backlash and MicroStrategy Market Turmoil | 6 | 0 | 1 | 2 | John breaks down market reactions to MicroStrategy, Cantor Fitzgerald's crypto thesis, and pushes Jordi to clarify the underlying meaning of Sequoia's partnership PR statement. | |
| US and Switzerland Reach Comprehensive Tariff Deal | 6 | 1 | 1 | 3 | John analyzes LLM routing mechanics before thoroughly deconstructing and dismissing the 'in the flow' archetype framing applied to podcasters. | |
| Market Fear Gauges, Euphoria App, and AI Valuation Realities | 5 | 3 | 2 | 2 | The hosts discuss tech valuation assumptions and Gaussian splatting; Jordi challenges John on sports aerodynamics trivia regarding badminton shuttlecock speed. | |
| Tesla Roadster Flying Car Claims and Automotive Aerodynamics | 7 | 1 | 2 | 2 | John displays deep technical understanding of Formula 1 ground effect fan bans and the electrical/thermal power constraints of hovering a two-ton vehicle. |
Statements from this episode (18)
Coogan: Blue Origin is the second company ever to land a rocket booster
“It's only the second company in history to land a rocket booster after SpaceX.”
Coogan: Blue Origin employs over 10,000 people
“So over 10,000 people work there. 25 year project, as I mentioned, but the idea of hiring 10,000 people and rocket scientists”
Hays: Virgin Galactic trades at $3.61 with a $200M valuation
“Virgin Galactic is sitting at a two hundred million dollar valuation. In the public markets. I know that they SPAC. I thought that they had de-SPAC. It's sitting at, peaked at 1218 dollars a share in 2019, and it's now sitting at three dollars and 61.”
Coogan: SpaceX's Starship has four times the capability of New Glenn
“Starship is four times the capability of this New Glenn rocket that just landed.”
Coogan: SpaceX moved faster than Blue Origin by prioritizing modular components
“One of the reasons the Blue Origin moved a little bit slower than SpaceX is that they leaned a little bit harder on the exquisite system going really big, and Elon had this idea of, like, let's try and make a whole bunch of small things that we bundle together…”
Coogan: Valve's New VR Headset Will Cost Less Than $1,000 Index
“Valve is saying that it's going to be cheaper than the 1000 dollar Valve Index, which is their previous VR headset.”
Hays: Steam has won the hardware war, obsoleting Xbox and Apple VR
“Steam has won. There's no reason to get an Xbox. There's no reason to get an Apple VR headset. They all run on Linux. It's the ultimate computer.”
Coogan: MicroStrategy stock dropped 50% following a controversial published statement
“Obviously, people are dunking on this because the stock has traded down 50% since this was published.”
Cantor Fitzgerald is on track for over $2.5B revenue in 2025
“The firm is on track to post revenue in 2025 of upwards of 2.5 billion, an all-time high, and a jump of more than a quarter on last”
Hays: 2025 is Sequoia Capital's roughest communications year on record
“This has been probably the roughest year on record for Sequoia in terms of like comms, right?”
US and Switzerland Reach Deal to Cut Tariffs on Swiss Exports
“The United States and Switzerland said on Friday that they had reached an agreement to lower a punishing 39% tariff on Swiss goods, a change that will help to reduce the cost of exporting Swiss pharmaceuticals, gold, watches, and chocolate to the United States…”
Hays: Swiss Companies Committed $200B in US Investments by 2028
“There's going to be roughly two Swiss companies committed to making two hundred billion in investments in the United States by 2028.”
Coogan: GPT-5.1 Widens Model Routing for Variable Reasoning Time
“I saw some charts that showed that it's more that they're just pushing the model router further to the edges, so it can Reason for even longer if it needs to, and it can reason for even less time if it just can come up with the answer quickly, more quickly.”
Coogan: Chinese Badminton Livestreams Allow Viewers to Adjust Camera Angles
“Badminton is live streaming in China, and you can adjust whatever angle you want.”
Hays: The Shuttlecock Is the Fastest Recorded Moving Object in Sports
“Real one knows that the shuttlecock is the fastest moving object that's been recorded in sports.”
Coogan: Hovering a two-ton car requires megawatt power and drains batteries in minutes
“The question is if you reverse the fans for lift you need a lot more rotor area and near megawatt power to hover a two ton sedan. Even if you could supply it, the battery would give only a few minutes before thermal or energy limits intervene.”