#32: Billy Oppenheimer - Being Ryan Holiday's Research Assistant

All right, welcome to another episode of Cyber Patterns. Today we have Billy Oppenheimer on. He is a research assistant, writing assistant for Ryan Holiday, the creator of Daily Stoic, bestselling author. This guy's wrote like 10 books and Billy has been there for 4 years after sending him a cold email. This is one of the coolest conversations I've had in a long time and the convo kept going for half hour after the podcast was done and we've been texting back and forth sharing ideas. Sharing articles and so forth. So really just the joy of the internet. Billy is a true digital apprentice and now real life apprentice. He works with Ryan. So hope you enjoy this conversation. All right. So after, after Philly, I was reading your about page. What'd you do after Philly? I saw you were traveling in like Australia and stuff, or what?

Mm-hmm. Well, so that was after college. So I went to Lehigh University for college. I played lacrosse there, studied English and economics. Didn't really know what I wanted to do. And then I had a— I interned in New York the summer going into senior year and got that job through a fellow Lehigh lacrosse alumni guy and really liked, really liked that summer, really liked the job. Got an offer to take that as a full-time gig after college. And that was sort of my plan. I was gonna, I was excited about it. I was, All my friends from high school and college were going into New York City after post-grad into the finance world, real estate, sort of the classic New York City jobs after school. And I'm trying to remember the timeline here. Late that summer, I was winding down the internship, getting ready for senior year. And I was visiting my parents who now live in Cape May, New Jersey. I was sitting on the beach with my dad and we were just like talking about post-grad stuff and the plans for taking this job and how I had a great, great summer there. And so I was all in on it. And then we're at some point in the conversation, I was just like, maybe I'll go, maybe I'll like put this on hold and I'll go to Australia and coach lacrosse and travel a little bit. And then, um, and as I said it, I was like, oh boy, I don't know if I should have said that because my dad's— I didn't know how he was going to take it. Um, but he was like, man, I wish your brothers would have done something like that. I fully support it. Like, I think that would be an awesome experience for you. And then I was like, well, I don't even know if they play lacrosse in Australia, so I gotta like look into that as well. Um, and then I like jumped online and did some Googling and found like a club lacrosse team over there, sent an email and they got back to me like, yeah, we love having Americans come over here and like play with, with our top team and then coach the younger guys. Um, we'll put you up, we'll get you a car, a job, and you'll be good to go. So I just like booked it. I was like, I'm in. And, um, so I ended up going to Perth in Western Australia for I was supposed to go for the 3 months of the season, and then I just fell in love with, with Perth, with, with the people that I was playing and coaching with. So I ended up staying like almost a year. And then, um, one of my friends from high school had, had a college roommate who was doing essentially what I was doing but on the east coast of Australia, and he, he put us in touch. And we were trying to like figure out a time to, to visit one another on, on both coasts. And then that guy was like, actually, I'm thinking about like getting a van and doing a trip along the whole East Coast of Australia. Like, what do you think? I was like, yeah, I'm down. Let's do it. So I flew over and met him and he had another buddy from Pittsburgh who quit his job and flew out to Australia. And the three of us got this van and just lived in it for almost two months. And then by the end of that, I was like, I feel pretty good about what I've sort of seen and done in Australia. I think, I think I'm ready to go back. And I always had this thought of, um, ski instructing. I grew up a big skier, but I had to sort of put that aside throughout college to focus on sports. But, um, so then my next move was to go to Colorado. I got a job ski instructing, um, really fell in love with that lifestyle as well. And then I learned that like a lot of the guys that ski instruct sort of chase winter and they go down to the Southern Hemisphere, um, to like New Zealand or Australia and then teach there and then come back to Colorado. So I was doing that for a little bit. I was going back and forth, um, and just sort of like ski bumming it, doing the chasing winter. And it was, uh, it was a cool experience. But yeah, that's, that's sort of the The travel bug bit me for sure. And I was just fit for a little bit there.

No, that's really cool, man. I did some traveling in between college as well. All over the place, Europe, France, Middle East a bit. It just opens up the world, lets you like see what's out there. And so your uncle kind of introduced you to Ryan Holiday and that's how it happened. Yep.

Yeah. Between when I would go like New Zealand to Colorado, in between those two seasons, I would come home and it was always around like Thanksgiving time. So I was home for Thanksgiving one year and yeah, my Uncle Bill at Thanksgiving, and I think it was 2017 or 2018, he had recommended Ryan's book, Perennial Seller. Because shortly before then I had started writing online and he was like one of my first readers, one of my biggest fans. And he's like, in our family, is a voracious reader. That's, he's like sort of notoriously like a very bookish, very smart, a really good writer. So for him to like, one, just read what I was writing and say that he enjoyed it was pretty cool. And then He was like, "You should really think about taking this seriously. And if you do, you should read this book, Perennial Seller. It's kind of a roadmap for how to make it in any creative endeavor." So I bought that book. I read it on a flight back to Colorado. I was like, "Dan, this was—" It was similar to the style of writing I was naturally found myself leaning towards. So I was really attracted to like the style of writing. And then I looked up Ryan after reading it just to see like what else he had written and just ordered like everything he had. I think he had 6 books at that point. So I ordered those and just, yeah, I just went down the rabbit hole of his work and then learned about his trajectory of like working for Robert Greene. So I was like, oh, I guess like if you want to do this thing, that would be the way to do it, is like go work for someone that is experienced and sort of learn from them. And that's, yeah, I just like, I think late 2018, I just sent him a cold email just to sort of thank him for his work. And I was like, if you, you know, I can tell there's tons of research that go go into your books and if you ever need help, like with that kind of thing, I'll do it for free. Like your books sent me down the rabbit hole anyways. So to have that, have like my reading list be channeled by you would be payment enough. So that's where, how that relationship started.

Dude, that's amazing. So genuine. The internet's beautiful like that. Just like I remember first cold email getting responses from You know, I think the first, like, you know, major person that I got a response from was the Morning Brew CEO, Alex Lieberman. And he just like responded in 10 minutes. I was like, what, what just happened? Yeah. Yeah. And it's cool.

It's been, I've been surprised by how responsive, like the people I look up to are. And it's sort of like, now it makes sense to me. Like everyone likes to hear that their work is landing with someone. And if you, you know, if you send like a genuine note, I wasn't really asking for anything from Ryan. I wasn't like, it was just like, hey man, I really like it. I dropped a quote from a philosophy professor in high school and then like left it at that. And his reply was like, that's a good line from your professor. I might need some help, be in touch. And that was it. And it just like, you get the ball rolling that way. But, but yeah, it's cool to see that. Um, the people that you think are, are inaccessible actually are, are quite responsive.

Yeah, for real. I've been a fan of Ryan, I guess, for, uh, 3 to 5 years, some, somewhere in that, in that I read Perennial Bestseller, read, um, a few of the Stoke Works and, and all that stuff. And just, uh, this man is from the outside, just seems like a machine and, uh, very impressive, like his work ethic and mentality and just who he is and just an expert marketer and just like very tactic— tactical, is that the word? And yeah, so I guess a few of the things, questions. So the note card system, I feel like that's one of the things he's like very well known for. Is— does he not do it digital at all? Is it all—

everything? So everything— there's a fire, man. I know. Well, he does. He's, he started to, um, he'll scan them. He'll have an assistant scan them from like, you know, every now and again when, when a couple more hundred or thousand pile up, he'll get them scanned. So he has them, he has them like in, in the event that something happens like that. But yeah, he does it all. And I've adapted his system, but it's all physical note cards. And if you go, if you go to his office, He's got a bookshop. I'm in Austin now. I live in Austin, Texas now, but I'm like 30 minutes from his shop in Bastrop, Texas. And he's got— we've got offices upstairs there and he's got one room where he just has like a standing desk and it just always has like note cards lined when he's like mapping out whatever he's working on. But yeah, it's all— and there's just boxes of those Cropper Hoppers he uses to store the note cards are all over the place. But yeah, it's all physical. Got you.

And I love the idea of like products of process, you know? Oh yeah. That's what it is, man. Like it's just a process. That's because, you know, I release an article once a week, sometimes twice a week, and people, you know, it's a lot, a new idea, a new strategy. And it's just like, how do you do that? You know? And it's like, I constantly, for me, I use Notion. And I have ideas and I just work on it every day and that's all it is. Just a little bit every day.

Yeah. It's been one of the cool things about working for Ryan is like, it's totally demystified how, how it happens. And it's sort of, it's more, it's more blue collar than white collar, you know, it's more like you put your boots on and you go to work. It's not like it's, it's nothing fancy. It's nothing like magical. It's just. He puts the work in and the work comes out the other side of it. So that's— I think prior to the experience of seeing him do it, I would have been like, you sort of have to wait for inspiration, you got to like capture, you know what I mean? But it is, it's just like that man is always in a book, he's always making note cards, and then the work is just like a byproduct of that.

Yeah, facts. Definitely facts. It's so interesting to see. I've worked with some big Twitter people as well, and it demystifies it when you just like, oh, these are normal people.

Everyone's got their system. Everyone's got like their Notion content engine or something. Ryan's is Notecards. I use Notecards, but everyone's got their thing dialed in, I feel like. Yeah.

And so I was reading your article, The Bus Ticket Collector. Oh yeah, I never heard that before, but it perfectly describes how I feel, like how my brain works. It's like I remember everything about crypto and like Web3, man, just everything. But I can't remember a single thing about biology or chemistry. It just like goes in one ear and out the other. And I've always been confused by that, but like I'm just, yeah, I guess fascinated and in that world, so it makes sense. But how is that kind of applied to your life? And I feel like Ryan's research is so everywhere, you know what I'm saying? A little bit from this, a little bit from that. How's that applied for you?

Yeah, I mean, for people that are listening and don't know the bus ticket theory, it's from Paul Graham. If you just Google bus ticket theory, his essay will pop up and I did a spin on it, but, and he uses the example of a bus ticket collector. Like if someone that's just obsessed with a thing, can remember like minute details about it. And like, and I think it shows up in every field, like the people that are best at it. And it's, I definitely observed this with Ryan, like from the outside looking in, he seems to be like, the question he always is asked is like, how do you get it all done? You know what I mean? And like, you seem to always be working But it doesn't, it's not work for him. You know, like it's the thing he wants to be doing. He's obsessed with the topic of stoicism. Like a couple of weeks ago, he was getting ready to go on a vacation with his family. And we had a meeting, like just trying to tie up loose ends before he left. And we had a girl that recently started working with us and she was like, my goal is to make it so you don't have to work on vacation. And Ryan's like, oh no, I'm like, I'm definitely gonna work on big— 'Cause it's not, he wants to wake up and think and write about stoicism. So I think it's like, that is his secret is he's just so obsessed with the thing that it doesn't, it's not work for him. So I think if you find that thing, it's like, that's, it's such a hack because like I like to do, make my note cards and my girlfriend would be like, can you stop working for a little bit? And it's like, it doesn't feel like I'm working. You know, it's like, it's a Sunday afternoon, but this is what I want to be thinking about and working on. So that's, that was my attraction to that Paul Graham essay. It was like, yeah, I've definitely been observing that in people. And I think he like perfectly describes what's going on there.

Yeah, facts. I'm in the same boat. Like my girlfriend will do the same thing and ask, um, you know, why am I working all the time? Or it's, for me it's just play. Like same with Twitter, like growing my Twitter and like freelancing and connecting with people. It just feels like I'm playing, like just hanging out with my friends online. Like that's all it feels like. And there happens to be money coming into my bank account and I'm, you know, writing and stuff and making money, but it's like, I just feel like I'm playing, man. And I love it. And so that was kind of my goal is to be able to do what I want to do every day, you know, and drink coffee with friends, walk my dog when I, when I need to and, or want to and do that stuff. I am curious what, what new writers or what new research have, have you found while working with Ryan? Anything notable?

I mean, I feel like every— so I was reading your piece about the digital apprenticeship. And the thing about like the best part of it is what is Greg will give you feedback in a, in a Google Doc. And I've been thinking a lot about how a job is sort of like, it's sort of like a hub and there's like all these different spokes that come off of that hub. And like money obviously is one of them, but, but there's like these other things of like What are you learning from the person you're working for? Where, what ideas are you exposed to? What ideas are you getting to work on? What people are you, are you getting to meet? And then there's just like all these different vectors on that hub that is a job. And one of the things for me is like, I feel like everything I've been exposed to in the last 3 or 4 years, I would, I couldn't have stumbled on by myself. Like I wouldn't have gone down those those various alleys. And it's just been a product of like what Ryan works on is basically what I get brought into. So I think anything I've read within the last 2 or 3 years is like Ryan exposed me to it, you know? And a lot of my favorite writers now are people I stumbled on in that process. So yeah, I think anyone I name will be like, It's been an exposure from this job, but let me think of— I'm a huge fan of Morgan Housel. I think he sort of does with finance what Ryan does with philosophy. The things he identifies in his reading and brings back and then ties to investing in finance, reminds me a lot of what Ryan does. So I pull up his— I think he writes on Collaborative Fund. He's got a blog on there, but I pull that up almost every day just to see if he's put anything out. I'm a huge fan of his stuff. Who else? He's the first one that comes to mind, honestly.

No, I got you. I'm a big fan of Paul Graham as well, and Morgan Housel is great. But yeah, the, the Paul Graham essays are just killer. Just so much. I posted about it yesterday. When people refer 10 readers to my blog, I send them a book and my friend did that. And so he chose Hackers and Painters by Paul Graham. Nice. Yeah, just such, I mean, the first half is really good and then it gets into technical essays, which I can't understand, but the first half was solid and there's this essay like what you can't say. And it's just all about how like the freedom of thinking whatever you want. Like you can't say whatever you want, but you could think whatever you want. And I don't know, I think that's beautiful.

Yeah. I love Paul Graham as well. I also, so do you know who Julian Shapiro is? Yeah.

I haven't read too much of his work, but I've seen his name thrown around.

I think he's, I forget what his newsletter's called. It's like Demand Curve or something. Yeah, I think so. He had an interesting point. I can't remember if I read it or I heard it. On a podcast, and he used Paul Graham as an example of someone who doesn't write on a fixed cadence and how to him that's a signal of like Paul Graham's only putting something out when he really feels good about it or when he's like, I really need to say this. And that, I really like that about Paul Graham, because I think, and I'm struggling with this a little bit right now, that the the tension between like consistently putting stuff out so that like you're, you know, you're near top of mind for people, but then also I don't want to just put stuff out just to put stuff out. Like I want to feel pretty good about it. So I definitely, I look at Paul Graham as like a model of that. Like it can work if you're just putting out quality stuff. So yeah, I'm a huge, huge Paul Graham fan.

Yeah. Yeah. It definitely works for Paul Graham, but I wonder, it's definitely, you know, he's got the audience already and the money, the, he's got the totally kind of clout. But it's, yeah, I found once I turned on the weekly, like once I started going weekly in April, that's when, you know, I started really taking it seriously and it was the same time when I started writing for a living as well. And I was like, Oh, like this is, you know, my job. Like every week I send it out, like that's what I do, you know? And yeah, I love that. I love that feeling. Sometimes some essays aren't as good as others and that's just how it goes, but for sure. But yeah, the cadence I think is cool with like threads and digital products and stuff. Also curious, kind of what have you learned about marketing from Ryan and working with him? I feel like he's just, fucking legend when it comes to that.

Yeah, I first I've learned that like you just have to take it seriously, you know. It's like part of me, I think if before this I would have, I would have thought the work should, should stand for itself. If it's, if it's good enough, it'll find an audience. But that's, it's just like a sort of naive early thought I think that a lot of people experience. You have to— Ryan's analogy is like, it's like you get to the end of a marathon, which is like finishing the piece of work. And then instead of like putting a medal around your neck, they guide you to the next start of the next marathon, which is the marketing. I think that's like spot on. It's just like, there's, there's so many good, there's so much good stuff out there. So the differentiator I think is like who can do a good job of, of packaging it and selling it and just getting eyeballs on the stuff. So one of, one of Ryan's lines is to like meet people where they are and then bring them where you want to go. So for me, like I have a newsletter and I wish I could just like right there, because that's the style I like to write in, but I know I have to go to like Twitter, you know, and do some stuff there and then try to bring those people back to the newsletter. I'm trying to think of like anything really tactical I've learned from— I just think like, so we do the Daily Stoic email every day. And like, in a way that is like a piece of marketing. You know, like he's putting content out every day and it's high quality. And then once a year he's like, by the way, I have this book that I'm ready to sell. So it's sort of like a subtle— he subtly is keeping the audience around and then adding people to the audience to then when he has a book come out, like he can go straight to them. Um, so I think it's just like, for me, it's, it's just, it's all, it's all in one big pie sort of. Yeah. Have you read a book called, um, Inbound Marketing? No, I haven't. It's by, um, the, the guys from HubSpot, Brian Halligan and Dharmesh Shah. Okay. Um, but they're basically, their premise is like They coined that phrase inbound marketing as opposed to outbound marketing, which is like you're interrupting people with, you know, cold calling and emails and trying to just like sell your thing. But, but they're, they're like sort of content marketing, you know, just putting out really quality stuff that people are, are reading and engaging with because it's useful or helpful. And then You capture their email or whatever it is. And then when it's time to sell something, you've already built that trust. And I think that's sort of— when I read that book, I was noticing, I was like, this is kind of what Ryan does. So for people that are looking for a book, I definitely recommend Inbound Marketing. Yeah, 100%, man.

That's something that I had to learn on Twitter and that I have to explain to everybody starting out, is you think you can't just sell, sell, sell every, every time, every tweet, every article. You know, you should, you should be giving, giving, giving, and then once every 10 or once every once in a while sell. And, um, you know, it's all about just giving as much free value as possible and people will find— like, people won't necessarily find it very easily, but they will find it and you'll share it. And yeah, um, it's, it's, it's definitely a new, new kind of vibe. My parents both run businesses, and trying to explain that is— they're used to Facebook ads and Google ads, you know? So it's the complete opposite approach. Um, and so yeah, it's, it's, it's fun to think about.

Um, I think one thing that like Ryan's taught me to think about is like, how do you buy stuff? You know? And it's not like, 'cause someone is spamming you. Like, it's not where you— so working backwards from like, I try to notice like when things, when marketing works on me and then sort of add that to the swipe file of like, oh, that was an interesting, like subtle sell. Um, but yeah, that's— it really is an interesting puzzle to try to piece together.

Yeah, 100%. I think, um, referral is such good marketing for me. That's usually when I buy stuff, is somebody talks about it on a podcast, like a book, or in somebody else's newsletter they drop a book that I should read or something like that. I find is the best. Like, I've never bought anything off an Instagram ad or a Facebook ad or Twitter ad. Like, Right. Ever. So I don't know. I'm personally never going to put money in there to do it. Like, I'll just have my friends post it on their newsletters or whatever. So. Right. Yeah. Curious, what's kind of the long-term plan for you or long-term goals? You know, keep working with Ryan, release your own work and keep going, or.

Yeah, I honestly, I don't. I don't really think very far down the line, and I probably should do this better, but yeah, I just, I really, I like where I'm at. I like the work I get to do. I like this sort of what my day looks like right now. I like working with Ryan on stuff he's working on. I would definitely, I definitely want to start to get my own stuff going a little bit more. And we just sort of have shifted a few things around internally to like relieve me of some of the other stuff I was doing to allow for that. But I just, yeah, I want to just like do the writing thing for— I was listening to Hasan Minhaj and he was like, the advice I give to artists is you do this forever, you know? And it's like, I want to do the writing thing for a long time. So I'm not in like a great rush to grow. I definitely, I want to grow my email list, but I don't need it to like pop tomorrow because I'll still be here in a year, 2 years, 3 years. And I think if I just like, it's sort of a trust the process mindset, but I think if I just do the work. And like, those things are again, what we were saying about like the byproduct of the process, but that's sort of how I feel about things. And I don't know exactly, like if you asked me 3 years ago or 4 years ago, like you'll be living in Austin, Texas, working for Ryan Holiday. That is so far beyond like what I could have, a goal I could have set for myself. So I don't really make or think about like long-term stuff. Just try to work on the things I want to be working on and just like sort of let go and hope for the best.

Facts. Trust the process. That's some Philly shit. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. I feel like that meme, trust the process, has actually taught me so much. Yeah.

It's now sort of cliché, but it is like sort of a profound— if you can like internalize it and actually Live that way. I think it, and there's various ways that, that you can put it, but, um, like we, Ryan's got this thing about like, um, the work has to be the win, you know?

Sorry, my dog is howling at the siren. It's all good.

Um, yo, run. But yeah, I'm a, I'm a big trust the process guy.

No, facts, facts. Uh, yeah, dude, that was really all the questions. Um, how much do you miss Wawa right now?

Yeah, I definitely miss it. Um, yeah, it's hard, man. That's our classic, you know, high school, nothing else to do, let's go just like get a bunch of food from Wawa. Yeah, but I definitely There's, and there's not really an equivalent of it in Texas. So it's now, now my thing is, is breakfast tacos.

I eat breakfast tacos almost every day. That sounds amazing. Yeah. I've, I've had breakfast burritos, never a breakfast taco. Um, good shit. How, how's Austin in general?

It's good. Um, I was, I was Trying to remember. Been here for like a year and a half now, and prior to living here, I didn't know a ton of people doing what I'm sort of doing in this space of online creator stuff, but there's tons of those people here in Austin, so it's been cool to like meet other people that are in the pursuit of a similar thing, and that energy is sort of contagious. So I think it's like, it elevates my motivation just being in their vicinity. And then just Austin in general is like good food, good live music. I'm like 2 minutes from Lady Bird Lake. And there's a 10-mile loop around the lake. It's like a gravel trail. So I go for like a run almost every day around Lady Bird. And yeah, I'm happy here. Where are you based?

New York, New York City. Oh, nice. Yeah. So I was in Philly, then New Jersey, slowly made my way up. So yeah, it's— dude, same energy, man. It's— Just around so many creators. It's so nice. It's so inspiring. Like, yeah, all my friends are on the Twitter grind or whatever, the creator economy.

And so let me ask you, if you— do you have any advice for me as far as Twitter goes or just content in general? Like, yeah, um, I'm starting to think, I'm starting to think more about, um, doing some Twitter stuff. And I'm just starting to dip my toe in it. So if you have any sage advice. Yeah. Yeah.

Threads are obviously like, as you've seen from your threads, like they'll bring in a lot of followers and newsletter subscribers. But you know, when it comes down to just friends who are like, help you out in the future, it's just like stuff like this, man, making connections and you know, taking it offline, having phone calls, having, you know, Lunches, coffees, and you know, all the people, like I posted yesterday that I just left my job to freelance. Like all these people who are congratulating, like I've talked to, I've had phone calls with, like, you know, these are a lot of them I consider friends, you know? So it's really like, for me, it's just like the, you know, and the way to get organic engagement is to organically engage, like, you know, it's just to vibe with other people and give back. So. But for followers and subscribers, Threads, you know, that's the key. Yeah. Which I feel like you have a good handle on, so. Yeah. But yeah, that's the, it's just like DMing Ryan or emailing. It's just sending DMs and like meeting people you think are cool, asking for a phone call and like, that's it. Like not even ask, just say, hey, let's talk. You know? That's it.

No, it reminds me, I liked your piece. Learn a Community Language about just the immersion of being in a Discord or Slack, and that's how you learned what you learned about crypto. And I was like, I think that's what I just need to do with Twitter is just be on it and see, get a feel for what's happening there.

Yeah. Yeah. So there's this guy, David Perell, who He's big now and runs a writing academy. I think he lives in Austin. Yeah. I know David. Yeah. Yeah. So I heard him on a podcast a year ago, almost exactly a year ago. And he is like, yeah, when I was like 21, I invested, I was like, I'm gonna invest 2 hours a day on Twitter and see what happens. I was like, oh, people spend that much time on Twitter. I was like, all right, you know what, if he's taking it seriously and it worked for him, And once I started like spending more time and just, yeah, shit took off and my life changed. You know, it was crazy.

It was so like in those 2 hours, are you commenting on stuff and I mean retweeting and like that kind of, that kind of thing?

I mean, yeah, I'm commenting, DMing, like putting out, or not even just like 2 hours scrolling or whatever, but also working on my own tweets and like crafting stuff, DMing, setting up calls. You know, it's just like a combination of all things. And then also just scheduling tweets, you know, of course, like every, you know, Sunday or Monday I schedule 'em out for the week and like, it's just free leverage, you know? And then for Threads also. Yeah. When it comes down to just like my boy Austin taught me this, which is like hustle for distribution, you know, like send it, send it around to your friends. Like don't be afraid of just sending it to me or sending it to whoever. And like, asking them to retweet. That's how I got mine to go viral. And it's, you know, obviously great content, but also like send it to your homies and they'll help you out. Cuz like that's what friends do kind of thing, you know? Mm-hmm. It's yeah. So it's a, it's a, yeah.

Twitter's fun. Yeah. And then I know, I know like the hook is like the key, right? Yeah. It's all the hook. What, any, any advice there? Like ways you think about it?

Yeah. Tactics. 3 lines, uh, always, basically always 3 lines, uh, or less if possible. Um, don't do any symbols in, in the hook. Um, that like decreases it. No, like you want people to click out. Yeah. Yeah. And for whatever reason with the algorithm, I think it just like decreases it. And then, um, obviously as short and punchy as possible. Um, while still conveying meaning. Um, you know, it's, it's like what Ryan's really good at, man. Like the cliffhanger kind of vibe where you want people to keep clicking and, and going for it. Um, so I think your hook with Ryan was really good. The one that you did where it's like super interesting, obviously, like even something like about Australia or, you know, going like that. Like that's something like people wanna read about, you know, you got an interesting life, you got shit to talk about. You know? So, right. Yeah.

Yeah. And then the other thing I wanted to ask you is like your, your content consumption, cuz I, I, I read a bunch of your stuff and I really, I think we like come at similar things from different angles, but a similar style of like, you're really good at pulling like quotes and, and, and stories from what you seem to be reading. So I was curious about that.

Yeah. I mean, you've heard of Readwise?

Oh yeah.

Yeah. So that's like my, that's my shit. Definitely life-changing on that one. Just Readwise to Notion. And I don't know, my brain works in weird ways where like I'm writing and then I think of a quote I heard like a month ago or I had in Readwise and I just pull it out and then just saving and bookmarking tweets. Like really that's it. And just reading like any book that seems interesting. I'm not, I know Ryan reads like one book at a time. My brain doesn't work like that. I read like two or three or more and just bounce around whatever seems interesting and invest however much money on Amazon Books as I need, like whatever looks interesting, I'm gonna like, you know, it's it's gonna, it'll pay back with content or me making money freelancing. So I just think about it as a business investment for everything, just buy a bunch.

So yeah, no, I'm the same way. I'm always got like 4 that I'm in and out of. I'm reading this book now called First We Read, Then We Write, and it's basically a compilation of everything Ralph Waldo Emerson said or wrote about reading. And he had this like, he classified readers into 4 groups, the hourglass, the sponge, the jelly bag, and the Golconda. And I guess the Golconda is like a rich mine. And he was like, the hourglass takes nothing in, the sponge holds onto nothing but a little dirt and sediment. The jelly bag only takes in like useless information. And then the Golconda keeps only like the pure gems. And then the biographer, the guy who put this book together was like, Emerson was a Golconda reader par excellence. Like he was just like, he would go through a book and he could very quickly like find the really good parts. And that's how I sort of think about reading. Like I'm just looking for those like gems. Um, so I'm just like you, I'm like bouncing in and out of books, like trying to find the good stuff. Yeah.

Yeah. I, um, I just bought the book that you suggested on Amazon. It's really, it's like short.

It's like, it's like, you know, 100 pages. Um, yeah, it's really good.

Nice. And then also like listening to weird people on podcasts and just like reading weird people that like other people aren't reading. Like, there's this guy Michael Malice who's like an anarchist kind of dude. Yeah. And he had Mark Andreessen on his podcast, and Mark Andreessen like name-dropped a book about preference falsification, some like 400-page textbook. I was like, oh, I'm gonna read that shit.

Yeah, dude, I love Mark Andreessen.

Yeah, I mean, anything he talks about is gonna be fire. So I was like, oh, this is so interesting. And it's super interesting. Like, I, I'd never heard the words preference falsification education before that, but my whole life I knew what, like in my head, I knew what it was. So I'm probably gonna be writing about that a bit cuz I'm reading about it.

But yeah, another, another hack I use is like, if, if people are talking about a book, I'll look up that author and go listen to interviews of them talking about the book. And they always talk about like the most important parts of, of the book, you know? And then I get the book and like go find and, and get like more context around the idea they're talking about.

Nice. Yeah, I do the same thing.

Like the, if I hear an interesting phrase like that, what was it? Falsification. Yeah. Preference falsification. Like, oh, that's a good phrase. Let me go like Google what that is. And then you just like follow that breadcrumb.

Yeah. I mean, just having like the intellectual curiosity that we both have to like follow rabbit holes, you know, not be afraid to follow a damn rabbit hole wherever it may lead you. And then another hack which I had, which I think you might actually enjoy, the two threads that grew my following by like 6,000 followers alone, just from like two threads were from, I went on a website that hosts research papers, like, and I just looked at crypto research papers and made them simpler and wrote 'em in threads.

And that was really it. That's very Malcolm Gladwellian of you.

Yeah. I mean, that's really smart.

What's, what site? SSRN or something.

Yeah, I've heard of it. Yeah, man. So I mean, I think you'd probably find some like sociology or whatever might be, might pique your interest. They got everything and you know, I could send you the threads that went viral cuz my hook was basically I read a 37-page paper so you didn't have to. Yeah. Yeah. And it's like, because nobody wants to read it and this shit is not made for the average person. So I just made it simple and it worked.

Dude. I mean, that is, that's really smart. Yeah. Send me those. I wanna read those. Yeah. But I think it's like, like Gladwell people, critics will say he's a popularizer and he's like, yeah, like there's really good information in these papers, but like The guys that write them didn't write them in a way that anyone else can understand. So it's like a service of, there's like really important ideas out there, but how can they be communicated in a way that like we can understand?