Kind: captions
Language: en
so I was trying to figure out how to do
photo realistic AI photos and it was
stabil diffusion by itself is not doing
that well like the faces look all
mangled y um and it doesn't have enough
resolution or something to to do that
well so but I started seeing these these
um base models These Fine tun models and
people were training on porn and I would
try them and they would be very
photorealistic they would have bodies
that actually made sense like body uh
Anatomy um but if you look at the
photorealistic models that people use
now still there's still core porn there
like of naked people so I need to prompt
out the nak and everybody needs to do
this with AI startups with imaging you
need to prompt out the naked stuff you
have to keep reminding the model you
need to put clothes on yeah don't put
naked because it's very risky I have
Google Vision that checks every photo
before it's shown to the user to like
check detor oh nfw detector because you
get the journalists get very
angry the following is a conversation
with Peter levels also known on X as
levels IO he is a self-taught developer
and entrepreneur who designed programmed
shipped and ran over 40 startups many of
which are hugely successful in most
cases he did it all by himself while
living the digital Nomad life in over 40
countries and over 150 cities
programming on a laptop while chilling
on a couch using vanilla HTML jQuery PHP
and SQL light he builds and ships
quickly and improves on the fly all in
the open documenting his work both his
successes and failures with a raw
honesty of a true Indie hacker Peter is
an inspiration to a huge number of
developers and entrepreneurs who love
creating cool things in the world that
are hopefully useful for people this was
an honor and a pleasure for me this is
Alex Freedman podcast to support it
please check out our sponsors in the
description and now dear friends here's
Peter
levels you've launched a lot of
companies and built a lot of products as
you say most failed but some succeeded
what's your philosophy behind building
the startups that you did I think my
philosophy is very different than most
people in startups because most people
in startups they they build a company
and they raise money right and they hire
people and then they build a product and
they find something that makes money and
I don't really raise money I don't use
VC funding I do everything myself I'm
designer I'm the developer I make
everything I make the logo so for me I'm
much more Scrappy and and because I
don't have funding like I need to I need
to go fast I need to make things fast uh
to see if an ID works right I have an
IDE in my mind and I build it build it
like a mro mini startup um and I launch
it very quickly like within you know two
weeks or something of building it and I
check if there's demand if people
actually sign up and not just sign up
but if people actually pay money right
like they need to take out their credit
cards pay me money and then I can can
see if the idea is validated and most
ideas don't work like as you say most
feel so there's this rapid iterative
phase where you just build a prototype
that works launch it yeah see if people
like it improving it really really
quickly to see if people like it a
little bit more enough to pay and all
that that that whole rapid process is
how you think of I think it's it's like
it's very rapid and it's like um if I
compare to for example Google you know
like our big tech companies especially
Google right now is kind of struggling
like they made like Transformers they
made all they invented all the AI stuff
years ago and they never really shipped
like they could have shipped jet gbt for
example I think I heard in 2019 and they
never shipped it because they were so
stuck in bureaucracy but they had
everything they had the data they had
the tech they had the engineers and they
could Didn't Do It um and it's because
these big organizations it's it it can
make you very slow so being alone by
myself on my laptop like you know in my
underwear in a hotel room or something I
can ship very fast and I don't need to
like I don't need to ask like legal for
like oh can you vouch for this you know
I can just go and ship you always code
in your underwear the your profile
picture you're like slouching a couch
and your underwear chilling a laptop no
no but it's I do wear like shorts a lot
and I I usually just wear shorts and no
T-shirt cuz I'm always too hot like I'm
always overheating thank you for showing
up not just in your underwear but
wearing shorts I know you know I still
wearing this for you but thank you um
thank you for dressing up I think it's
cuz I since I go to the gym I'm always
too hot what's your favorite EX in the
gym man over press over press like like
shoulder press yeah okay but it feels
good cuz you're doing like you do you
win cuz when you what is it I do 60
kilos so it's like 120 lbs or something
like it's it's it's my only thing I can
do well you know in the gym and you
stand like this and you're like I did it
you know like a winner pose yeah Victory
pose uh I do bench press squads
deadlift hence the uh the mug yeah
talking to my therapist it's a deadlift
yeah because it acts like therapy for me
you know yeah yeah it is which is
controversial to say like if I say this
on Twitter people get angry physical
hardship is a kind of therapy yeah I
just rewatched uh Happy People year in
the tiger that Warner Herzog film where
they
document people that are doing trapping
they're essentially just working for
survival in the wilderness year round
yeah and there's a deep happiness to
their way of life because they're so
busy in it in nature yeah 100% like
there's something about that physical
physical yeah toil yeah my dad taught me
that my dad always do does like
Construction in the house like he's
always re renovating the house he breaks
through one room and then he goes to the
next room and he's just going in a
circle around the house for like the
last 40 years so but so he's always
doing construction the house and it's
his Hobby and he like he taught me when
when I'm depressed or something um he
says like get a big like what do you
call like a big uh mountain of sand or
something from construction just get a
shovel and uh bring it to the other side
and just you know do like physical labor
do like hard work and do something like
get set a goal do something and I I kind
of did that with startups too yeah
construction is not about the
destination man it's about the journey
yeah yeah sometimes I wonder people who
are always remodeling their house is it
really about the remodeling or is it's
not is it about the project Journey the
puzzle of it no he doesn't care about
the results well he shows me he's like
it's amazing I'm like yeah it's amazing
but um then he wants to go to the next
room you know but I think it's very
metaphorical for work cuz I also I never
stop work I go to the next website or I
make a new one right or I make a new
startup so I'm always like like give you
something to wake up in the morning and
like you know have coffee and then uh
kiss your girlfriend and then you have
like a goal not today I'm going to fix
this feature or today I'm going to fix
this bog or something I'm going to do
something you have something to wake up
to you know and I think um maybe
especially as a man also women but you
need you need a hard work you know you
need like an Endeavor I think how much
of the building that you do is about
money how much is it about just a deep
internal happiness it's about fun cuz I
was cuz I was doing it when I didn't
make money right that's the point so I
was always coding I was always I was
making music I made electronic music
drama based music like 20 years ago and
I was always making stuff so I think a
creative expression is like a meaningful
work that's so important it's so fun
it's so fun to have like a daily
challenge where you try figure stuff out
but but the interesting thing is you
built a lot of successful products and
you never really wanted to take it to
that level where you scale real big
andell it to aan something like this
yeah the problem is I don't dictate that
right like if more people start using IF
Millions people s start using it and it
becomes big um I'm not going to say oh
stop signing up to my website and pay me
money but I never raised funding for it
and I think because I don't like this
the stressful life that comes with it
like I have a lot of um founder friends
and they tell me secretly like with
hundreds of millions of dollars in
funding and stuff and they they tell me
like next time if I'm going to do it I'm
going to do it like you
because it's more it's more fun it's
more Indie it's more chill it's more
creative they don't like this they don't
like to be manager right you become like
a CEO you become a manager and um I
think a lot of people that start
startups when they become a CEO they
don't like that job actually but they
can't really exit it you know but they
like to do the ground work the coding so
I think that keeps you happy like doing
something creative yeah it's interesting
how people are pulled towards that to
scale to go really big and you don't
have that honest reflection with
yourself like what actually makes you
happy because for a lot of great
Engineers what makes them happy is the
building the the quote unquote
individual contributor like where you're
actually still coding or you're actually
still building and they let go of that
and then they become unhappy um but some
of that is the sacrifice needed to have
a impact of scale if you truly believe
in a thing you're doing but like look at
Elon he's doing things million times
bigger than me right and
um would I want to do that I don't know
you can really choose these things right
but I really respect that I think elon's
very different from VC Founders right VC
start it's like software there's a lot
of bullshit in this world I think
there's a lot of like dodgy Finance
stuff happening there I think um and I
never have like concrete evidence about
it but your gut tells you something's
going on with like companies getting
sold to friends and VCS and then they do
reciprocity and this Shady Financial
dealings with Elon does not he's just
raising money from investors and he's
actually building stuff with he needs
the money to build stuff you know hard
Hardware stuff um and that I really
respect you said that there's been a few
low points in your life you've been
depressed and the building is one of the
ways you you get out of that but can you
talk to that can you take me to that
place to that time when you were in at a
low point so I was in Holland and I
graduated University and I didn't want
to like get a normal job and I was
making some money with YouTube because I
had this music career and I uploaded my
music to YouTube and YouTube started
paying me like uh with AdSense like
$22,000 a month $2,000 up and all my
friends got like normal jobs and we
stopped hanging out cuz people would
like in University hang out you know you
chill each other's houses uh you go
party but when people get jobs they only
party like in the weekend and they don't
hang anymore in the week because you
need to be at the office and I was like
this is not for me I want to do
something else and I was starting
getting this like I think it's like
Saturn return this you know when you're
turn 27 it's like some concept where
Saturn returns to the same place in the
orbit that it was when you're born I'm
learning some it's some astrology thing
you know so many truly special artists
died when they were 27 exactly sum of 27
man and it was for me like I started
going crazy because I didn't really see
like my future in Holland buying a house
going living in the suburbs and stuff so
it flew out I went to Asia started
digital nomading and did that for a year
and then that made me feel even worse
you know CU I was like Alone um in hotel
rooms like looking at the ceiling like
what am I doing with my life like this
is uh like I was working on startups and
stuff and YouTube but it's like what is
the future here you know like uh is this
is this something while my friends in
Holland were doing really well and with
a normal life you know um so it was
getting very depressed and like I'm like
an outcast you know and my money was was
shrinking I wasn't making money anymore
lot making $500 a month or something and
I was you know looking at the ceiling
thinking like now I'm like 27 I'm a
loser and that's the moment when I
started building like startups and it
was because my dad said like if you're
depressed you need to you know get sand
get a shovel start shoveling doing
something you can't just sit still which
is kind of like a interesting way to
deal with depression you know like it's
not like oh let's talk about it it's
more like let's go do something and um
and I started doing a project called 12
startups in 12 months where every month
I would make something like a project
and I would launch it with stripe so
people could pay for it so the basic
format is try to build a thing put it
online and put stripe to where you can
pay money for it yeah add a stripe check
I'm not sponsored by stripe but add a
stripe checkout button is that still
like the the easiest way to just like
pay for stuff stripe 100% like I think
so yeah it's a cool company they just
made it so easy you can just click and
yeah and they're really nice like the
CEO Patrick is really nice behind the
scenes it must be difficult to like
actually make that happen cuz that used
to be a huge problem like just Merchant
just just adding a thing a button where
you can like pay for a thing dude it's
dude I know this because when I was when
I 9 years old I was making websites also
and I tried to open a merchant account
there was like before tribe you would
have like um I think it was called World
pay so I had to like fill out all these
forms and then I had to F them to
America from Holland with my dad's facts
um and my dad had to it wasn't my dad's
name and he to sign for this and he
started reading these terms and
conditions which was like he's liable
for like 100 million in Damages and he's
like I don't want to sign this I'm like
Dad come on I need a merchant account I
need to make money on the internet you
know and he signed it and we sent we fax
it to America and I had a merchant
account but then never nobody paid for
anything so that was the problem you
know yeah but it's much easier now you
can sign up you add some codes and um
yeah so 12 startups in 12 months yeah so
what how do you what startup number one
what what was that what like what what
were you feeling what were you sitting
behind the computer like how much do you
actually know about building stuff at
that point I could I could code a little
bit because I did the YouTube channel
and I made a website for I would make
websit for like the YouTube channel it
was called panda mix show and it was
like these electronic music mixes like
dubstep or dral base or Tech in our
house I saw one of them had like flash
were you using flash yeah my album my CD
album was using flash yeah yeah I sold
my CD yeah kids flash was Flash was
software this is like the the break like
Grandpa you know but flash was cool yeah
and there was what's it called boy I
should remember this action script
there's some kind of programming
language scpt yeah yeah script in flash
back then that was the JavaScript you
know the JavaScript yeah and I I thought
that's going to that's supposed to be
the dynamic thing that takes over the
internet I invested so many hours in
learning Steve Jobs killer Steve Job
said flesh sucks stop using it every was
like okay that guy was right though
right yeah I I don't know yeah well it
was it was a closed platform I think and
Clos but it's ironic cuz Apple you know
they're not very open right but back
then Steve was like this is closed we
should not use it and it's as security
problems I think which sounded like a
copout like I just wanted to say that to
make it look kind of bad um but flash
was cool yeah yeah it was cool for a
time yeah H listen animated gifts were
cool for a time too yeah they came back
in a different way yeah as a meme though
I mean like I I remember when gifts were
actually cool not ironically cool like
there's like on the internet you would
have like a Dancing Rabbit or something
like this and that was really exciting
no you had like the you know Lex
homepage you Le everything was centered
yeah and you had like Peter's homepage
and then the on construction yeah GIF
which was like a guy like with a helmet
and the lights banners uh yeah that's
how before like Google AdSense you would
have like banners for advertising it was
amazing yeah and and a lot of links to
porn I think yeah where the Merion
accounts people would use for people
would make money a lot only money made
on internet was like porn or a lot of it
yeah it was it was a dark place it's
still a dark place yeah and but there's
Beauty in the darkness anyway so you
were uh you did some basic HTML yeah
yeah but I had to learn the actual like
coding so I uh this was good it was a
good good idea to like every monom lunch
a startup so I could uh learn to code
learn basic stuff and but it was still
very Scrappy because I didn't have time
to which was on purpose like didn't have
time to spend a lot of um I had a month
to do something so I couldn't spend more
than a month and I was pretty strict
about that um and I published it as a
blog post so people I think I put it on
Hacker News and people would check like
kind of like oh did you actually you
know I felt like accountability because
I put it public that I actually had to
do it do you remember the first one you
did I think it was playing my inbox cuz
back then my friends we would send we
would send like cool was before Spotify
we would send like uh 2014 we would send
music to each other like YouTube links
uh like this is a cool song this is a
cool song and it was the these giant
email trads on Gmail and they were like
unnavigable so I made an app that would
log into your Gmail get them emails and
find ons of YouTube links and then make
like kind like a gallery of your your
songs like essentially Spotify and my
friends loved it was it scraping it like
what was no it uses like poop like pop
or IMAP you know it would actually check
your email so that like privacy concerns
because it would get all your emails to
find YouTube links but then I would I
wouldn't save anything um but that was
fun it was like and that that first
project already would get like pressed
like it went on think like um some tech
media and stuff and I was like that's
cool like it didn't make money there was
no payment button but it was uh it was
actually people using it I think tens of
thousands of people used it that's a
great idea I wonder why like why why
don't we have that why don't we have
things that access Gmail and extract
some useful aggregate information yeah
you could tell GMA like don't give me
all emails just give me the ones with
YouTube links you know or something like
that yeah I mean there is a whole
ecosystem of like apps you can build on
top of the Google but people don't never
do this I've seen a few like Boomerang
there's a few apps that are like good
but just I wonder what maybe it's not
easy to make money I think it's hard to
get people to pay for these like
extensions and plugins you know cuz it's
not like a real app so it's not like
people don't value it people value oh
this a plugin should be free you know
when I want to use a plugin in Google
Sheets or something I'm not going to pay
for it like it should be free which is
but if you go to a website and you
actually okay I need this product I'm G
to pay for this because it's a real
product so even though it's the same
code in the back it's a plugin you know
yeah I mean you can do it through like
extensions like Chrome extensions
through from the browser side yeah but
who pays for Chrome extensions right
like barely anybody so nobody uh that's
not a good place to make money probably
yeah that sucks like chromic extension
should be a extension for your startup
you know you have a product yeah oh we
also have a Chrome extension you know I
wish the Chrome extension would be the
product I wish Chrome would support that
like where you could pay for it easily
cuz like imagine I can imagine a lot of
products that would just live as
extensions like improvements for social
media like it's like gpts you know gpts
yeah like these CH gpts they they going
to charge money for it now and you get a
ref ref share I think from an open AI I
made a lot of them also why we'll we'll
talk about it so let's rewind back it's
a pretty cool idea to do 12 startup in
12 months what what's it take to build a
thing in in in 30 days like at that time
how hard was
that I think the hard part is like
figuring out what you shouldn't add
right what you shouldn't build because
you don't have time so you need to build
a landing page well you need to make the
you know you need to build the product
actually because it need to be something
they pay for um do you need to build a
login system like maybe no you know like
maybe you can build some Scrappy login
system like for fot you sign up you pay
strap checkout and you get a login link
and when I started it was only a login
link with a hash and that's just a
static link so it's very easy to log in
yeah it's not so safe you know what if
you leak the link and now I have real
Google login but that took like a year
so keeping it very Scrappy is very
important to because you don't have time
you know you need to focus on um what
you can build fast uh so money stripe uh
build a product build a landing page um
you need to think about how are people
going to find this so are you going to
put it on Reddit or something how are
you going to put it on Reddit without
being looked at as a spammer right like
um if you say hey this is my new startup
you should use it no nobody's it gets
deleted you know M um maybe if you find
a problem that a lot of people on Reddit
already have on subreddit you know like
and you solve that problem say sub
people I made this thing that might
solve your problem and maybe it's free
for now you know like uh that could work
you know but you need to be very you
know um narrow it down what you're
building time is limited yeah actually
can we go back to the you laying in a
room feeling like a loser yeah I still
feel like a loser sometimes what's what
can you can you speak to that feeling to
that place of just like feeling like a
loser and cuz I think a lot of people in
this world are laying in a room right
now listening to this and feeling like a
loser okay so I think it's normal if
you're young that you feel like a loser
first of all especially when you're 27
yes yeah especially there's like a peak
yeah yeah think a peak and so I would
not kill yourself it's very important
just get through it you know but uh
because you have nothing you have
probably no money you have no business
you have no job you have you like Jeremy
Peterson said this I saw it somewhere
like the reason people are depressed
because they have nothing they don't
have a girlfriend they don't have a or
boyfriend they don't have a you need
stuff you need like or a family you need
things around you you need to build a
life for yourself if you don't build a
life for yourself you'll be depressed so
if you're alone in Asia in a hostel
looking at the ceiling and you don't
have any money coming in you don't have
a girlfriend you don't of course you're
depressed press is logic but back then
if you're in a moment you think this is
not logic there's something wrong with
me you know yeah um and and also I think
I started going I started getting like
anxiety and I think I started going a
little bit crazy where I think travel
can make you insane and I know this
because I know that there's like digital
Nomad that they kill themselves and I
don't I haven't checked like this the
comparison with like Baseline people
like suicide rate but I have a hunch um
especially in the beginning when it was
a very new thing like 10 years ago that
it can be very ecologically taxing and
you're alone a lot back then when you
travel alone there was no other digital
Nance back then a lot so you're in a
strange culture you look different than
everybody like you're in I was in Asia
like you everybody's really nice in
Thailand but you're not part of the
culture you're traveling around you're
hopping from City to City you don't have
a home anymore MH you feel this rooted
and you're constantly in the outcast in
in that you're different from everybody
else yes exactly but people treat like
Thailand people are so nice but you
still feel like Outcast and and then I
think the the digital n i met then were
all kind of like it was like shady
business you know but they were like
Vigilantes cuz it was a new thing and
like one guy was selling illegal drugs
was American guy was selling illegal
drugs via UPS to Americans you know on
this website they were like a lot of
drop shippers doing Shady stuff um
there's a lot of shady things going on
there and they were they didn't look
like very balanced people they didn't
look like people I wanted to hang with
you know so I also felt Outcast from
other foreigners in Thailand other
digital Nomads and I was like man I made
a big mistake and then I went back to
Holland and then I got even more
depressed you said digital Nomad what is
digital Nomad what is that way of life
what is the philosophy there and the
history of the movement I I struck upon
it on accident because I I was like I'm
going to graduate University and then
I'm going to I need to get out of here
I'll fly to Asia because I've been
before in Asia I studied in Korea in
2009 like study exchange I was like Asia
is easy Thailand's easy I'll just go
there figure things out and it's cheap
it's very cheap changai I would live
like for $150 per month rent for like a
private room pretty good so I struck on
this on next I was like okay there's
other people on laptops working on their
startup or working remotely back then
nobody worked remotely but they worked
on their their businesses right um and
they would you know live in like
Colombia or uh Thailand or Vietnam or
Bali they would live kind of like a more
cheap places and it looked like a very
adventurous life like you travel around
you build your business there's no
pressure from like your Home Society
right like you're American so you're you
get pressure from American soci telling
you kind of what to do like you need to
buy a house or you need to this stuff I
had this in Holland too and you can get
away from this pressure you can find
kind of feel like you're free you're
kind of there's nobody telling you what
to do but that's also why you start
feeling like you go crazy because you
are you are free you're dis attached
from anything and anybody um you're
disattached from your culture you're
disattached from the culture you're
probably in because you're staying very
short I think France kofka said I'm free
therefore for I'm lost man that's so
true yeah that's exactly the point and
yeah freedom is like it's the definition
of no constraints right like anything is
possible you can go anywhere and
everybody's like oh that must be super
nice you know like Freedom you must be
very happy and it's the opposite like I
don't think that makes you happy I think
constraints probably make you happy and
that's a big lesson I learned
then but what what were they making for
money what what so you're saying they
were doing Shady stuff at that time for
me you know because I was more like a
developer I wanted to make startups kind
of and and it was like um it was like
drugs being shipped to America like diet
pills and stuff like non FDA proofed
stuff you know and they would like there
was no like e they were like they would
would save beers they would laugh about
like all the dodgy shit kind of they're
doing you know ah that part of okay kind
of vibe you know like kind of sleazy
Ecom Vibe I'm not saying all Ecom is SLE
you know but right but you know this
Vibe it could be a Vibe and your your
Vibe was more buol shit that's ethical
you know the guys with sports cars in
Dubai these people you know yes Ecom
like oh bro you got a drop ship and
you'll make 100 million a month like
those people was this shit and I I was
like this is not my people yeah I don't
I mean there's nothing wrong with any of
those individual components judg but but
there's a
foundation that's not quite ethical I
what is that I don't know what that is
but yeah I get you no I like I don't
want to judge it was more I know that
for me it wasn't my world it wasn't my
subculture I want to make cool shit you
know but they also think their cool shit
is cool so you know uh but I wanted to
make like real like startups and that
was my thing I would read Hacker News
you know like why combinator and they
were making cool stuff so I wanted to
make cool stuff I mean that's a pretty
cool way of life just if you romanticize
it for a moment it's very romantic man
it's very it's colorful you know like if
I think about the memories I mean what
are some happy memories just like
working working cafes or working
in just the
freedom that that uh envelops you from
with that that way of life cuz anything
is possible you can just get up was
amazing like we would work like you
would I would make friends and we would
work until you know 6:00 a.m. in Bali
for example with like um with Andre my
best friend who who still my best friend
and we and other friends and we would
work until like the morning when the sun
came up because at night the co-working
space was silent you know there was
nobody else and I would wake up like 6
p.m. or 5:00 p.m. I would drive to the
cing space on a motorbike I would buy
like uh 30 hot lattes from a cafe how
many 30 cuz there was like there was
like six people coming or we didn't know
sometimes people would come in and did
you say
3030 yeah nice and we would drink like
four per person or something you know
uhhuh man it's B I don't know if they
were powerful lattes you know but they
were lattes and um we would put in
plastic bag and I would drive there and
all the coffee was like falling you know
everywhere and then we'd go into course
and have these coffees here and we'd
work all night we'd play like techno
music and everybody would just work on
their like this was literally like
business people they would work in their
startup and we would all try and make
something and then the Sun would come up
and the morning people the you know the
the yoga uh yoga girls and yoga guys
would come in you know after the yoga
class at 6 and they say hey good morning
and we're like we look like this you
know and we're like what's up how are
you doing and we didn't know how bad we
looked you know but it was very bad and
uh then we'd go home sleep in like a
hostel or a hotel and do the same thing
and again and again and again and it was
this lockin mode you know like
working um and that was very fun so it's
just a a bunch of you music blasting all
through the night yeah more like like
indust not like see I for
me it's such an interesting thing
because the speed of the beat affects
how I feel about a thing So the faster
it is the more anxiety I feel but that
anxiety is channeled into productivity
but if it's a little too fast I start
the anxiety overpowers don't like drama
base music probably not no it's too fast
I mean for working I have to I have to
play with it it's like you can actually
like I can adjust my level of anxiety
this must be a better word than anxiety
it's like uh productive anxiety that I
like whatever that is it also depends
what kind of work you do right like if
you're writing you probably don't want
drama based music I think for codes like
industrial techno this kind of stuff
kind of fast it works well because you
really get like locked in and combined
with caffeine you know you go you go
deep you know and and I think you
balance on this edge of anxiety because
this caffeine is also hitting your
anxiety and you want to be on the edge
of anxiety with this techno running
sometimes it gets too much like stop the
Techno stop the music it's
like but uh but those are good memories
you know and also like travel memories
like you go from City to City yeah and
it feels like it's kind of like Jet Set
life like it's it's feels very beautiful
like you're you're seeing a lot of cool
cities and what was your favorite place
you remember you visited I think still
like uh Bangkok is the best place and
Bangkok and changai I think Thailand is
very special like I've been to the other
place like I've been to Vietnam and I've
been to South America and stuff I still
think Thailand wins in how nice people
are how easy of a life people have their
everything's cheap yeah good well bangok
is getting expensive now but changai is
still cheap I think when you're starting
out it's a great place man the air
quality sucks it's a big problem so um
and it's quite hot but that's a very
cool place um pros and cons I love
Brazil also my girlfriend is Brazilian
but I do love not just because of that
but I like Brazil brail uh the problem
still is the safety issue you know like
it's it's like in America like it's
localized it's hard for Europeans to
understand like safety's localized to
specific areas so if you go to the right
areas it's amazing Brazil is amazing if
you go to the wrong areas like you maybe
you die MH right yeah yeah I mean that's
true it's not true in Europe feel in
Europe is much more true more average
you're right you're right there it's
more averaged out yeah I like it when
there's strong neighborhoods when you're
like you cross a certain Street and
you're in in a dangerous part of town
man yeah it's I I I like it I like
there's certain cities in the United
States like that yeah I like that and
you're saying Europe is you don't feel
scared well I don't I like danger BJJ no
not even just that I think danger is
interesting so danger reveals something
about yourself about others also I like
the full range of humanity yeah so I
don't like the mellowed out aspects of
humanity I I have friends like theom
friends that are exactly like this like
they go to like the the kind of broken
areas you know like they like this
reality they like this authenticity more
they don't like luxury they don't like
oh yeah I hate luxury yeah it's very
European of you like wait was that
that's a whole another conversation so
you uh you uh quoted Freya Stark quote
to awaken quite alone in a strange town
is one of the most Pleasant Sensations
in the world yeah uh do you remember a
time you awoken in a strange town and
felt like that we're talking about small
towns or Big Towns or man anywhere I
think I wrote it in some blog post and
like it was a common thing when you
would wake up and this was like because
I have this website I started a website
about this D Nom like called Nomad
list.com and there was a community so it
was like 3, and other digital no man
because I was feeling lonely so I built
this website and I stopped feeling
lonely like I started make organizing
meetups and making friends and um and it
was very common that people would say
they would wake up and they would forget
where they are yeah like for the first
half minute and I had to look outside
like where am I which country which
sounds really like privileged but it's
more like funny like you literally don't
know where you are because you're so dis
rooted um but there's something man it's
like Anthony berdan you know there's
something pure about this kind
of vagab Bor travel thing you know like
it's behind me I think I don't like now
I travel with my girlfriend right it's
very different but it is romantic like
memories of this kind of like Vagabond
individualistic solo life but the thing
is didn't make me happy but it was very
cool but it didn't make me happy right
it made me anxious there's something
about it that made you anxious I don't
know I still feel like that it's a cool
feeling it's scary at first but then you
realize where you are and you and I
don't know it's like you'll awaken to
the possibilities of this place when you
feel like that it's like great and it's
even when you're doing some basic travel
I go to San Francisco or something El
yeah you have like the novelty effect
like you're in a new place like here
things are possible you know you you
you're you don't get bored yet
and and that's why people get addicted
to travel you know back to startups you
wrote a book on uh how to do this thing
and gave a great talk on it how to do
startups the book's called make
bootstrappers handbook yeah I was
wondering if you could go through some
of the steps it's idea build launch grow
monetize automate and exit there's a lot
of fascinating ideas in each one so idea
stage yeah how do you find a good idea
so I think you need to be able to spot
problems so for example you can go in
your daily life like when you wake up
and you're like what is stuff that I'm
really annoyed with that's like um in my
daily life that doesn't function well
and that's a problem that you can see
okay maybe that's something I can add
right code about you know code for and
it will make my life easier so I would
say make like a list of all these
problems you have and like idea to solve
it and see which one is like viable you
can actually do something and then start
building it so that's that's a really
good place to start
become open to all the problems in your
life like actually start noticing them I
think that's actually not a trivial
thing to do to realize that some aspects
of your life could be done way way
better yeah cuz we kind of very quickly
get accustomed to discomforts exactly uh
like for example like door knobs yeah
like design of certain things like new
cream and door off well that when I know
how much uh incredible design work has
gone into it's really interesting doors
and door knobs just the Design of
Everyday Things forks and spoons it's
going to be hard to come up with a fork
that's better than the current Fork
designs yeah and the other aspect of it
is you're saying like in order to come
up with interesting ideas you got to try
to live a more interesting life yeah but
that's where travel comes in yeah
because when I started traveling I
started seeing stuff in other countries
that you didn't have in Europe for
example or America even like if you go
to Asia uh like dude especially 10 years
ago nobody knew about this like weads
all these apps that they already had
before we had them these everything apps
right like now elon's trying to make X
this everything app like WeChat the same
thing like in Indonesia or tand do you
have one app that you can order food
with you can order groceries you can
order massage uh you can order car
mechanic um anything you can think of is
in the app and that stuff for example
you you know that's called like
Arbitrage you can go to back to your
country and build that same app for your
country for example so you start seeing
um problems you start seeing solutions
that other countries already other
people already did in the rest of the
world and also traveling in general just
gives you more problems cuz travel is
uncomfortable you know um airports are
horrible airplanes are not comfortable
either there's a lot of problems you
start seeing just getting out of your
house you know but also you can I mean
in the digital world you can just go
into different communities and see what
can be improved by the in that yeah yeah
but what specifically is your process of
generating ideas do you like do idea
dumps like do you have a document where
you just keep writing yeah I used to
have like a because when I was when I
wasn't making money I was trying to like
make this list of ideas to see like so I
need to build I was thinking
statistically already like I need to
build all these things and one of these
will work out probably you know so I
need to have a lot of things to try um
and I did that right now I think like
because I already have money I can do
more things uh based on technology so
for example AI when I found out about
when stable diffusion came or C gbt and
stuff all this thing all these things
were
like I didn't start working with them
because I had a problem I had no
problems but I was very curious about
technology and I was like playing with
it and figuring out like first just
playing with it and then and then you
find something like okay this generates
St Fusion generates houses very
beautiful and Interiors you know so it's
less about problem solving it's more
about the possibilities of new things
you can create yeah but that's very
risky because that's the G is like a
solution trying to find a problem yeah
and usually it doesn't work and that's
very common with with startup FS I think
they they have Tech but actually people
don't need to Tech right can you
actually explain it'd be cool to talk
about some of the stuff you created can
you explain um this photo.com yeah yeah
so it's like fire your photographer the
idea is like you don't need a
photographer anymore you can train
yourself as AI model and you can take as
many photos you want anywhere in any
clothes uh with facial expressions like
happy or sad or poses uh all this stuff
so how does how does it work so this is
uh you send me a link to a gallery of
ones done on me which is so on the left
you have the prompts the Box yeah so you
can write like so model is your model
this Lex Freedman so you can write like
model as a blah blah blah whatever you
want y then press the button and it will
take photos take will take like photos
what are you using for the hosting for
the compute replicates okay replicate
decom they're very very goods okay it's
cool like this interface wise it's cool
that you're showing how long it's going
to take this is amazing so it's taking a
I'm presuming you just loaded in a few
pictures from the internet yeah so I
went to Google images St in Lex Freedman
I added like 10 or 20 images you can
open them in the gallery and you can use
your cursors to yeah so some don't look
like you so the hit or miss rate is like
I don't know say like 50/50 or something
but when I was watching your Tweet like
it's been getting better and better and
better it was very bad in beginning it
was so bad but still people sign up to
it you know
uh there's there's two luxes is great
it's getting more and more sexual it's
making me very uncomfortable man but
that's the problem with these models cuz
no we need to talk about this cuz the
models the fusion yeah so the
photorealistic models that are like fine
tuned they were all trained on porn in
the beginning and there was a guy called
Hassan so I was trying to figure out how
to do photo realistic AI photos and it
was stable diffusion by itself is not
doing that well like the faces look all
mangled yep
um and it doesn't have enough resolution
or something to to do that well so but I
started seeing these these um base
models these fine tune models and people
would train on porn and I would try them
and they would be very photo realistic
they would have bodies that actually
made sense like body uh Anatomy um but
if you look at the photorealistic models
that people use now still there's still
core of porn there like of naked people
so I need to prompt out the nak and
everybody needs to do this with AI
startups with imaging you need to prompt
out the naked stuff you need to put a
you know naked um you have to keep
reminding the model you need to put
clothes on yeah don't put naked because
it's very risky I have Google Vision
that checks every photo before it's
shown to the user to like check foror oh
nfw detector because you get the
journalists get very angry if they you
know you if you sex there was a
journalist I think that would got angry
that used this and was like oh it it
made me it showed like a nipple because
Google Vision didn't detect it so
there's like these kind of problems you
need to deal with you know that's what
I'm talking about this is with cats
but look at the cat face it's also kind
of mangled you know I'm I'm uh I'm a
little bit disturbed you can zoom in on
the cat if you want like like yeah this
is a very sad cat it doesn't have a nose
it doesn't have a nose but this man but
this is the problem with AI startups
because they all act like it's perfect
like this is groundbreaking and but it's
not perfect it's like really bad you
know half the time so if I wanted to
sort of update model as yeah so you
remove this stuff and you write
like whatever you want like in Thailand
or something or in Tokyo uh in Tokyo
yeah and then you can say like at night
with neon lights like you can add more
detail to make I'll go in Austin do you
think you'll know in Texas in Austin
Texas cowboy hats in Texas yeah as a as
a
cowboy as a cowboy it's going to go so
uh towards the porn Direction it's it's
man I hope not this is the end of my
career
or the beginning it depends we can send
you a push notification when your photos
are done all right
cool yeah let's see oh wow so this whole
interface you've built this is really
well done J cury so I still use J cury
the only one still after this day you're
not the only one the entire of the web
is PHP thep and jur yeah and SQL lights
you're just like one of the top
performers from a programming
perspective that are still like openly
talking about it but every everyone's
using PHP like if you look most of the
web is still probably PHP 70% it's
because of Wordpress right cuz the blogs
are that's true yeah um true I'm seeing
a Revival now people are getting sick of
Frameworks um like all the JavaScript
Frameworks are so like what do you
called like wieldy like they're so it
takes so much work to just maintain this
code and then it updates to a new
version you to change everything BEP
just stays the same and works yeah and
can you actually just speak to that
stack you you build all your websites
apps startups projects all of that with
mostly vanilla HTML yeah uh JavaScript
with J jQuery PHP and cool white so that
that's a really simple stack and you get
stuff done really fast that can you just
speak to the philosophy behind that I
think it's accidental because that's the
thing I I knew like I knew PHP I knew
HML um CSS you know because you make
websites and when my startup started
taken off I didn't have time to I
remember putting on my to-do list like
learn node.js cuz I it's important to
switch you know cuz this obviously is
much better language than PHP and I
never learned it I never did it uh
because the time I I these things were
growing like this and I was launching
more project and I never had time it's
like one day you know I'll I'll start
coding properly and I never got to it I
I sometimes wonder if I need to learn
that stuff it's still to-do atem for me
to really learn node.js or or flask or
these kind of react yeah react and it's
there it feels like a responsible
software engineer should know how to use
these but you can get stuff
done so fast with vanilla versions of
stuff yeah it's like software developers
if you want to get a job and there's
like you know people making stuff like
startups and if you want to be
entrepreneur probably you maybe
shouldn't I wonder if there's like I
really want to measure performance and
speed I think there's a deep wisdom in
that yeah I do think that Frameworks and
just constantly wanting to learn the new
thing this complicated way of software
engineering gets in the way I'm not sure
what to say about that because
definitely like you shouldn't build
everything from just vanilla JavaScript
or vanilla C for example C++ When You're
Building Systems engineering is like
there's a lot of benefits for a pointer
safety all that kind of stuff so I I
don't know but it just feels like you
can get so much more stuff done if you
don't care about how you do it man this
is my most controversial take I think
and maybe I'm wrong but I feel like
there's Frameworks now that raise money
they raise a lot of money like they
raise 50 million 100 million 300 million
dollars and the idea is that you need to
make the developers the new developers
like when you're 18 or 20 years old
right um get them to use this framework
and then add a platform to it like where
the framework can it's open source but
you probably should use the platform
which is paid to use it and the the cost
of the platforms to host it are a
thousand times higher than just hosting
it on a simple AWS server or VPS on
digital ocean right um so there's
obviously like a monetary incentive here
like we want to get a lot of developers
to use this technology and then we need
to charge them money because they're
going to use it in startups and then the
starts can pay for the bills um but what
that it kind of destroys the
the information out there about learning
to code because they you know they pay
YouTubers they pay influencers developer
influen is a big thing to like um and
same thing what happens with like uh
nutrition in Fitness or something same
thing happens in developing they pay
this influen to promote the stuff use it
make stuff with it make demo product
with it and then a lot of people like
wow uh use this and I started noticing
this because when I was ship my stuff
people would ask me what are you using I
I would say I just PHP JQ why does it
matter and people would start kind of
attacking me like why are you not using
this new technology this new framework
this new thing and I say I don't know
cuz this PHP thing works and I don't
really I'm optimizing for anything just
doing it just works and I never
understood like why uh like I understand
there's new technologies that are better
and it should be Improvement but I'm
very suspicious of money just like
lobbying there's m