Behind the Podcast: Advice on Travel and Writing

Sa. He wrote a book called the Mosquito coast, which you probably heard of. It was made into a movie and not going to be an Apple TV series. And he was. He lives in two places right now, existentially. He lives in Massachusetts and Hawaii. And I interviewed him while he was in Hawaii. He lives on the North Shore of Hawaii, if you're familiar with the Waimea Bay Pupukea pipeline, that area, Jamie o' Brien territory. John. John Florence territory. He lives on the mountain above that. And we discussed, obviously, his writing. We discussed his life in Hawaii, which he adores, and we discussed one of his, I think, most moving books. He spent a year traveling the US Mexico border, driving by himself. And fairly recently, because what motivated him to write that book was the fact that Donald Trump was saying that Mexicans are rapists and murderers and criminals and they're sending us our worst. And so he just, he recoiled from that sentiment and he wrote a book about traveling the Mexican U.S. border for a year to humanize what's going on there. So, yeah, and I will tell you that I learned how he writes. He writes in longhand, sitting on a beach chair. On the beach. So he writes it in longhand and then he types it in. Not on the typewriter, on a word processor. And so of course, I sent him a remarkable tablet. So maybe that'll bring him up, bring up to more speed. I also learned he's a he. He uses a bike all the time. He has an old specialized bike. And so do I, except mine's not old. But anyway, so that was funny, too. And somebody keeps calling me. I decline that call. Okay. So, yeah, if you're interested in travel writing, Hawaii, just insights into a great, great travel writer, Paul Thoreau. He, he's live today. And I also learned through, through the miracle of search engine optimization, which I can't tell you I had anything to do with, I learned. I don't know if it's going to be true of Paul because his episode just came out three and a half hours ago. But if you type any of my guest name plus the word remarkable, you in the first page of results, you will see the Remarkable People podcast. So if you, for example, if you type Jane Goodall plus remarkable, you'll be shown her podcast at Remarkable People. And I wish I could tell you I planned that, but no, I didn't. And speaking of Jane Goodall, I just got off a call. I was on Clubhouse with Jane for about 45 minutes. So we did a live interview of Jane Goodall from her home in the UK talking about Africa, talking about the leakies, talking about chimpanzees, talking about what people can do going forward to make the world a better place. So, so it's been a, it's been a power packed morning already. So I went surfing in the morning and then I interviewed Jane Goodall and now I'm here with you. And after that I'm going to do a virtual keynote and then after that for Paul, I'm going to be on a bookstore live cast with Paul Turro at 5:30 Pacific Time. So it's a busy day today and I, I need, I need to make this keynote speech pretty soon. So this is going to be an abbreviated episode of Live Remarkable People Wednesday morning chat. So if you got any questions, send them now. And by the way, I have, I have created something with a company called Subtext. It's kind of like Community, if you're familiar with that. So I have a mailing database of about 20,000 people. I use Mailchimp for that and every, every Wednesday they get a notification that there's a new episode. But I think that texting is more engaging. So using a company called Subtext. And if you want to join, there's that number, 831-609-0628. So if, if you want to join my quote unquote extreme extended ohana, send a text message to that and this is texting me and you. Now when I send the text to this group, it's obviously one to many, but if you respond it's one to one. And then if I respond to you, it's one to one. So it's not like all the people are going to see all our communication. But I think this is a better way to gauge an audience. Gary V. Has used something like this to great success. So you know, whatever Gary Vee does, I copy. So he uses Community, I use subtext. 831-609-0628. In a perfect world, all 20,000 people who are on Mailchimp would convert to subtext because I think subtexting is more intimate than email. But anyway, I'll get you either way, so that's that. So got any questions for me? Jeff. Just tried the Jane Goodall Remarkable search and once again, guy is correct, I think. Let me tell you something. So here, Bob, you can try another one, let's say, let's see, try Christy Yamaguchi and Remarkable and see if it finds her podcast. Her, her episode of my podcast. That would be fascinating. SEO in action, baby. Daniela, did you Record the Clubhouse interview. I wasn't able to attend due to prior commitment. Well, Daniela, of course we recorded the Clubhouse interview. So let's think about how we should deploy that. I guess we will just put the. Put the recording, a link to the recording on social media. Right, Jeff? So we'll figure it out. But yes, it will be available, assuming that that doesn't violate anybody's terms of service. But even if it does, what are they going to do? Throw me off Clubhouse? Okay, David Stevens. Love the texting idea. Prepared to get overwhelmed, but I'll try it. Okay. Hey, another thing you can do which I'm just having a ball with, is Cameo. So Cameo, for those of you who don't know what it is, because two weeks ago I didn't know either. So. So Cameo, you go to Cameo and you can ask these people to do shout outs, video shout outs for you. Wishing you happy birthday, good luck, congratulations on the new job, you know, congratulations on the product launch. And so you can pick from all of these people and I'm one of them. So you go to Cameo and you say, okay, Guy Kawasaki, you know, wish my husband happy birthday. And believe it or not, for 50 bucks, I create a custom video for you. So, yeah, and I. I really didn't think people would do it, but my God, lots of people do that. So, yeah, if you want to personalize Guy Kawasaki, shout out. Come on down. Cameo. C A M E O. Let's see. So what else? What else? What other comments we got? Ask your questions because I have about 20 more minutes I can be here and I. And then I gotta go give a keynote speech. So see what else happened this week. Jane Goodall was just brilliant. Oh, Chef, that just flashed by. What did it say? I like writing in longhand. For the first drafts of most items, I do the first editing. Pass. When I create the first digital draft. Writing on paper on even a large digital tablet in cursive is very enjoyable experience. I completely, utterly agree. LinkedIn user. So LinkedIn user with this being open and transparent, the Remarkable tablet company is a sponsor of the Remarkable People podcast. What a concept. I wish I could tell you I planned that. Not true. That's also just good circumstances. But the Remarkable tablet is remarkably good for doing what you just describe. And let me tell you why. First of all, it's more or less a single purpose device. It's for taking notes and for making notes. It is not for checking social media, email, surfing the web, all that kind of stuff. It's really for note taking. So you know, to some people, that's good news, helps you focus. To some people, that's bad news. They want a multipurpose tablet. If that's the case, go get an iPad. So that's one good reason. Focus. Second good reason is the pencil. The pencil writing on the remarkable tablet screen is remarkably like a pencil. It really feels like an analog pencil, much better than the iPad pencil. So that's the second reason the feel. The third reason is that the iPad, the remarkable pencil, doesn't need to be charged. Because I don't know about you, but whenever I had an iPad with a pencil, the pencil would never be charged and I could just never use it. But the remarkable tablet pencil doesn't need to be charged. And then a reason 3A is, is that the remarkable tablet pencil, which is like this, you basically flip it around and you can erase with the other end of it. And I don't know how they do that. That is freaking magic because this pencil is not charged. So you write it like that, you turn it around and you erase. Hallelujah. And this is what it looks like. Well, lots of glare here. So that's what it looks like. So, anyway, what else? Not a lot of questions today. That's good, because this is just Coinbase goes IPO today. Any thoughts? Sheena? I will tell you something. I do not understand crypto cyber currency at all. To me, it is pure 100% speculation. And so I don't see the underlying value. I don't see why people do it. I would never want to get paid in cyber cryptocurrency because, you know, when I get paid, I want to know on Monday, when I get paid, that on Tuesday it's going to be worth about the same thing. I don't want to know that on Tuesday it's worth 50% because Elon Musk said, don't buy this kind of cryptocurrency. I also, I guess it would be okay, but I also don't want to know that it's worth 50% more on Wednesday because Elon Musk said he likes that cyber currency. So I just don't get why people would speculate in that. And it is pure speculation. It. There's no, you know, if you buy a share of Apple, you're getting a piece of the action. You're getting, you know, iPads and iPhones and Macintosh and, you know, all that kind of stuff. I don't understand it. It's just above my pay grade. You know, maybe 10 years from now, people say, God, you are so freaking stupid. You just completely missed that. But I do not see that now. I just total 100% speculation. So there you go. I'm stuck in the. Stuck in the 2000s. Your older keynote with nine to 10 principles you believe in. Sorry, it's been a while since I watched it. Do you have any updates on that speech? If so, where would I find it? Search terms. It was such an inspiring talk, David. Man, I got to tell you that all my keynotes have nine or 10 points, so you're gonna have to help me narrow it down. I have about six keynotes that I give regularly. You may be referring to the Art of Innovation, and there is a. It's not the most current, but it's, you know, pretty current. It's called the Art of Innovation, and it was at TEDx Berkeley. So if you search TEDx Berkeley, you'll find that speech. And I think it's been viewed about 2 million times right now. So, you know, I'm not exactly Ijustine, but I get my views too, so that's where I would look. Basically, I will tell you that every speech that I give, almost everyone gets online. A lot of speakers have this attitude that, you know, they have to carefully control what a host organization can do with the speech, and they. They try to protect it and not let people upload and all that. And I have completely the opposite attitude. I don't care if I speak for you, record it, do anything you want with it. I don't care. So, yeah, what else? Mind blown. Checking it out. Remarkable. Oh, the tablet. Okay, you go. I'm checking out. Remarkable. Sounds like a perfect single use. It is kind of perfect single use. And you know what? Another advantage vis a vis an iPad is that an iPad lasts maybe a day, but remarkable last two or three weeks on a charge. Now it's monochrome. So that's one thing. But arguably monochrome. If you're just taking notes, monochrome is okay because you're not looking at colorful web pages and all that other crap. So, yeah, remarkable. What else? So much ad post every. What's your tip to stay relevant and creative? Should we always be inspiring? Well, I mean, always is a tough thing. Coy. Always being inspiring is not a trivial task. But I think, like, my attitude with social media is that I call it the Wikipedia or the NPR model. So Wikipedia raises tens of millions of dollars from donations, and so does npr. Now, you know what? Other organizations can ask their users to send money and get tens of millions of dollars? NPR and Wikipedia. And why is that. And it's because they add value. So I think that people who are inherently good, and most people are inherently good, they feel like Wikipedia and NPR provide a good service, so they feel a moral obligation to somehow reciprocate. And in this case, reciprocation means send money. So I think that is a very good test for everything you do, the Wikipedia NPR test, which is is it so good that people feel a need to reciprocate morally and will pay for it? And if you apply that test to everything you do, you'll be doing fine in life. What else. Will you sing, Barbara? Will you sing on the Cameo too? Well, there may be a singing cameo price, but 49 well, first of all, I would question your judgment if you want me to sing because I have a few talents, but that is not one of them. So, yeah, there's my favorite song is Get a mask, Get a mask, get your head out of your ass. But that's a different thing. What else? How did you learn to surf? Lessons or friends? West coast or Hawaii? Gerald Most of the time I'm surfing in Santa Cruz. I did this morning. I have taken lessons in Santa Cruz and in Hawaii, but I only go to Hawaii pre pandemic anyway, maybe two weeks a year. Whereas in Santa Cruz I surf literally almost every day, many days, twice. And I will tell you, I started surfing at 60. That is 55 years too late. And surfing is the most difficult thing I have tried to learn. I took up hockey at 44 and surfing at 60. I thought hockey was hard, but surfing is harder because with hockey, more or less, you know, the ice is smooth, you know, you know what's going to happen. There's a lot less variables in hockey, but with surfing it's such, it's like if you're, if you start when you're old, surfing is intellectually very difficult because you have to worry about obviously your body, your position on the board, the length of the board, the volume of the board, the shape of the board. You got to worry about all that. Then you have to worry about the wind, you have to worry about the tide, you have to worry about the wave, the size of the wave, the direction of the wave, the speed of the wave. And then you have to worry about other people on the wave. And then you have to worry about people who might get on the wave if you're already on it. So there's so many variables in surfing. It, it is mind boggling, which is kind of why I love it. So, yeah, that's my Diatribe on surfing. What else? Don't forget remarkable people. Paul Thoreau today, if you're interested in travel, he's the man. Do you think our current education system is adequately preparing our youth for future at the technological as well as humanitarian level to be the best leaders? What can we do better? I don't think we're even close to adequately preparing. I think that, you know, to me, there's just some things that just. I don't understand. You know, if you compare the education budget to the defense budget, like, how do you figure that? If you look at what an investment banker gets paid compared to what a teacher gets paid, how do you square that in your mind? I. It's not possible. And I think that a lot of educators are by far the purest form of evangelism, but I think a lot of it is the methodology is hundreds of years old. That hasn't really been looked at. That there's a lot of resistance to change in education, primarily from old white males. I interviewed someone named Joe Bowler, B O A L E R. She is revolutionizing the teaching of math, professor at Stanford. So that'll be out in a couple weeks or more. I can't remember. So, yeah, I think there's so much. And believe it or not, I think the pandemic is going to have a good effect on education because it's going to force people to rethink a lot about education. And for all the pain and suffering and death and negativity of the pandemic, it'll also force some change, which I think will ultimately be extremely positive. So, yeah, what else? What do you think? Facebook's new regulations for advertising. I must say, I'm not completely sure what you're referring to, so I don't know what new regulations there are, so. All right. Any More thoughts on 2.0 the artist? Start revision. Oh, God. You know, Ron, I'm so into podcasting and I'm so into Canva and I'm so into surfing, I just don't have the bandwidth to rewrite that book. Not yet. You know, that book has never been in paperback. It's because I told the publisher that this is the de facto standard for anybody starting a startup. And if they're gonna complain that it's 20 bucks instead of 10 bucks, they're not gonna succeed anyway. So keep the book at 20 bucks. It's not. If the 10 bucks makes a difference, they're not gonna succeed anyway. What else? As they say for mathematicians, young men should prove theorems and old Men should write books. I like that. That is very good. That is very. That there's a lot of truth to what you just said there. I absolutely agree. I absolutely agree. Or, yeah, old men should write books about the young people's theorems. I like that. Okay, let's see. Why does npr, public radio need government subsidies, yet Wikipedia doesn't? Huh? That's a good question. I. I don't know. Probably. I bet people. I. I bet most people use Wikipedia way more than they use public radio. So by definition, public radio is not a reference source, right? So Wikipedia, you would look up anything. You'd look up, you know, how to boil an egg, but you wouldn't go to NPR for how to boil an egg. So I think that Wikipedia has just. I don't know about infinite, but many times more practical use than npr. So I think that's the crucial difference. Like, if you said to me, guy, you could either have NPR or Wikipedia, guess what? I picked. So that's the difference, I think. Does the advanced age make you too much when you're learning to serve? I would say that that is a fair analysis. That when you're old, because you've been thinking and analyzing your whole life, that's how you approach problem solving. But when you're young, I think you haven't figured out analytics and figured out. Or at least it's instinctive. When. Whereas in old people, at least me, I have to think about, you know, which way is the wave coming? When do I pop up, which way do I paddle, where do I put my feet? I need to think all of that about all that. On the other hand, if you think about this, I bet when, when people, for example, do a live broadcast or they do a keynote speech, a lot of people have to really think about, you know, okay, so I need to not move too much when I make a speech, and I need to, like, keep my hands in front of me, and I need to make eye contact, and I need to project my voice, and I need to use the active voice, not the passive voice and all this kind of stuff. There's like hundreds of variables going on. You make a keynote speech, but I tell you, at my age, completely natural. At this point, I can just. I can. If you wanted a keynote speech five minutes from now, I could give it to you. So I guess you could make the case that if you had to pick, with the ability to be a good surfer, a good speaker, one is much more lucrative than the other. Let me tell you something. So, you know, I guess I Made that trade off. But I would give up if somebody said, okay, you, you have to, you're going to be not as good a speaker, but a much better surfer. I'd make that trade all day long. What else? What's your advice to start up in these Covid times? I think that bad times make good companies. So this Covid time may produce a lot of very good companies. It certainly quote unquote, isn't easy these days, although money is just pouring into startups, which I would never have predicted. But I think that if you're an entrepreneur, it's never a bad time to start a company. And if you're not an entrepreneur, it's never a good time to start a company. So if you think you're an entrepreneur and you're waiting for that perfect moment in time where you have a world class team with a patented technology that no one else can do in a growing market that has no competition, you'll never start. Because that just does not describe the real world. So. If you're compelled to start a company, whether it's pandemic or non pandemic, whether the economy is up or down, whether investment is up or down, you go. That's it. You just gotta believe. Some things need to be seen to be believed and something needs to be believed to be seen. Entrepreneurship is in the latter group. You need to believe it to see it. Okay, so what is your biggest regret as a writer? As a, if you had asked me what's my biggest regret, I can answer that. As a writer, I don't really have many regrets. As a writer, I have written 15 books or one book 15 times. I'm cool with that. I don't, I don't have a lot of regrets about my writing. If you ask my biggest regrets in life, you could say quitting Apple twice or turning down Yahoo or CEO position. That's about two and a half billion right there. But no, I don't have regrets about my writing. So I'm good. So listen, I gotta go. This is a short, short session today because I have to make a keynote speech and I need to get online and do the tech setup with that. So remember, my podcast is remarkablepeople.com today's guest is Paul Turro. Last week's guest was Brandy Chastain and. Or was it. Hey, let me look at. You know, you kind of lose track of my God, what happened here. It all kind of, it all kind of gets mashed into one in your brain here. See who was last week. Oh my God. I am so far off. Okay, so today is Paul Thoreau. Last week was Nikhil Kamath. Kamath. And he is a young billionaire in India who is the co founder of the largest stock brokerage firm in India. Total stoic and calm guy talking about how he built a billion dollar company. Previous to that, it was Brandy Chastain, the person who scored the penalty kick that beat China in the 1999 World Cup. So yeah, we've had a great run with the podcast. So podcast Remarkable people and Google Shortcut. Type in the the name of the guest like Brandy Chastain with the word remarkable and Google's gonna find you. The podcast, believe it or not, SEO Magic. And I think that's it for this week. Okay, so have a great week. Get your vaccine if you can, yesterday or today in California. Now, you can be 16 and older. Of course there's no appointments, but yeah, 16 and older. So get vaccinated. Until then, mask up, avoid social contact. All righty. Take care. Thank you. Have a great week. Bye.