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Hello friend,
Why you’re getting this: this is my Friends Newsletter, a brain dump of interesting things that I send to interesting people I've met and friends I want to stay in touch with. Zero pressure to stick around—just click unsubscribe if you don’t want to get it (don’t worry, I won’t be notified).
Here’s what I’m thinking about…
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Your business shouldn't do good…
It should maximize profit and forget the kumbaya stuff.
In fact, trying to help people might be the most selfish thing you can do.
This might sound evil—but hear me out…
I might have ruined a perfectly nice young entrepreneur last week.
He runs a web design agency, and a mutual friend suggested we connect.
"We mostly work with small businesses around Victoria," he told me. "The local spots. They don't have much budget, but that's kind of the point."
I could already see where this was going.
"That's great," I said. "What do you charge them?"
"We keep our prices as low as possible. Around $2,000 a month. I know we could charge way more if we went after bigger companies, but that's not what this is about."
He said this with such genuine conviction that I felt like an asshole for what I was about to say.
"But... they don't have any money," I said.
"So? That's exactly why they need our help."
I took a breath. Here we go.
"I'm about to say something that sounds completely backwards," I said. "But what if charging less is actually the selfish move?"
He crossed his arms. The defensive wall was going up. I could see it happening in real-time.
"How could helping small businesses possibly be bad?"
I've had this exact conversation probably twenty times.
Young, idealistic entrepreneur. Good heart. Terrible business model.
And every time, I sound like Gordon Gekko about to launch into the "Greed is Good" speech.
But I tried anyway.
"Ok, let's do the math. How many small businesses can you realistically work with at once?"
He thought about it. "Maybe five, if we're doing good work."
"And what's the most they can pay?"
"Like I said, about $2,000 per month is their limit. Any more and they just can't afford it."
"So that's $10,000 a month total, $120,000 a year. After paying two employees a reasonable wage and your expenses, you're left with maybe $10,000 profit. Maybe."
He nodded reluctantly.
"Look, it's not about the money—"
"Hang on," I interrupted. "Now imagine you take on five corporate clients instead. Accounting firms, wealth managers, tech startups. They can easily pay $10,000 a month each. How much is that annually?"
He did the math in his head. "That's... $600,000 a year."
"With the same expenses, that's $490,000 in profit. Compare that to your current $10,000. Now here's my question: what could you do with an extra $480,000 a year?"
"I mean... a lot. But that's not—"
"Humor me. Think about it. How could you use it to help small businesses?"
He paused. I could see him trying to figure out if this was a trap.
"I guess I could hire someone to do free work for small businesses."
"How many small businesses could one person help per year?"
"If they're doing quality work? Maybe ten to fifteen."
"So instead of directly helping five businesses at break-even, you could help fifteen through the person you fund. Plus you still have hundreds of thousands left over. You could give small business grants. Maybe you fund someone to create free resources for entrepreneurs. The options multiply."
I could see him processing this. But I also knew what was coming next.
"Here's the thing," he said. "That's all theoretical. What if I just take the corporate money and... don't do any of that? What if making that much money changes what I care about? I've seen it happen."
"Sure," I said. "It happens all the time. People tell themselves they'll make money first, help people later, and later never comes. Or they get used to the lifestyle and suddenly $490,000 doesn't feel like that much. But that’s a test for you: how serious are you about helping the world?"
He was quiet.
"There's something else too. Right now you're helping five businesses limp along. But you're also barely surviving. What happens when you burn out? What happens when one of your kids needs braces or you have a health issue? Your entire model depends on you sacrificing indefinitely. That's not sustainable for you, and it's fragile for your clients."
"So what's the alternative? Just... sell out?"
"No, but you need to separate your business model from your philanthropy. A struggling 'do-good' business that collapses helps nobody. A profitable business run by someone with values can deploy those profits into doing good."
I could see him wrestling with it.
"You know Patagonia?" I asked.
"The clothing company?"
"Right. They charge premium prices. $800 jackets that probably cost $100 to make. But they've turned their environmental values into their margin advantage. Their customers pay high prices specifically because Patagonia has proven they'll use those profits for environmental causes and buying their clothing makes them feel good about themselves. As a result, they've protected over 15 million acres of wildlife habitat."
"That feels different though. They're selling to rich people who can afford it."
"Exactly. Robin Hood! Take from the rich and give to the poor. They're not undercharging wealthy customers out of some misplaced sense of fairness, or selling high quality jackets to underprivileged people at cost. They're extracting maximum value from people who have it, then redirecting the money toward their mission. That's the model."
"So what do I do?" he asked.
"You need to decide whether you want to feel like a good person today or defer it for the long term and have more impact. Because in your case, I don't think you can do both."
I had to run to my next meeting. We said goodbye and I left him there, staring at his laptop.
Walking back to my car, I felt guilty.
I believed in what I said, but it's a counter-intuitive argument—telling somebody to forgo helping those in immediate need in order to help abstract people in the future.
Am I the asshole?
- For years, I’ve been shipping my blood to the United States.
In Canada, it’s shockingly difficult to get high quality bloodwork done. The kind Peter Attia would approve of.
So, for the last decade I’ve been using US-based services and shipping my blood down to the states. It’s expensive and annoying.
That is, until my friends Brad and Zia launched Healthspan.
It’s amazing: a phlebotomist shows up at your house, draws your blood in 10 minutes, and a few days later you see all of your biomarkers in a beautiful online dashboard. If you like, they’ll also work with you to optimize your health.
I just started using it and I’m super impressed.
Brad and Zia want your blood. Click here to give it to them
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AI is exciting, but also terrifying.
It could create a future where most labour is effectively free and we can all just hang out and play pickleball.
Or, total annihilation and chaos. Fun!
Over the past two years, I’ve spent the majority of my time thinking about it. Reading every book I can on the topic (my favorite is The Coming Wave by Mustafa Suleyman) and learning how to use all the tools.
My approach to AI is a little like Pascal’s Wager—the idea that you should believe in God as a way to hedge your bets. Pascal’s argument is that if you die, and heaven is real, you get to go there, versus eternal damnation. If you die and it’s not real, you lose nothing.
If you think my analogy comparing God to AI is a bit extreme, consider this scenario:
Imagine we just discovered that an advanced alien race is headed for earth and, at its current speed, will arrive some time around 2030. We know that it is infinitely smarter than us, and we have no idea whether it will be our friend or foe.
Pretty godlike, right? How would you feel?
However you would feel is how you should feel about AI.
Like Pascal, I’ve chosen to assume that artificial super-intelligence is coming in the next five to ten years, and I’m prepping accordingly.
There's two ways I'm preparing:
- I’ve invested in a company called IREN as a “hedge” (way to profit if AI disrupts everything).
I shared my thesis on My First Million, then in an X post back in February, and the stock has been on an absolute tear, up 336% since.
TLDR: IREN started out as a Bitcoin mining company. Over the last decade, they secured access to an insane amount of power (electricity) and they are building massive datacenters in Texas.
It controls enough electricity to power San Francisco three times over and, in the race to AI super-intelligence, power and computing are in insanely high demand. Once completed, these datacenters should make the stock worth somewhere between $80-$300+ per share (depending on how AI plays out), and the datacenters they’re building are valuable in any scenario, even if AI cools and super intelligence doesn’t play out.
As my friend Mohnish Pabrai says:
“Heads, I win big; tails, I don't lose much.”
I just wrote another post on X sharing that I still think the company is highly undervalued and a great way to hedge against / bet on AI without the valuation risk of companies like Nvidia and OpenAI.
*Not investment advice, do your own research!
- I’ve been obsessively learning how to build AI agents.
I don’t love that term, I actually prefer the term Digital Employees. Over the past six months, I’ve been using Lindy to automate all of the torturous administrative tasks that previously required someone from my team.
To be clear: this is not about removing jobs. It’s about removing tasks that are mindless and boring.
For example: I’ve built Digital Employees that:
- Book me haircuts
- Call restaurants that don't have OpenTable to make me reservations
- Manage my CRM
- Book meetings
And my absolute favorite: take the absolute deluge of emails from my children's school and convert them into calendar events. For example, let’s say my son’s class has a field trip on Thursday, it adds it to my calendar with notes including what I need to sign, what needs to be packed etc. It even adds a reminder on the calendar to pack a bag lunch the evening before. Game changer!
What’s amazing is that these Digital Employees are getting more and more capable. Right now, it feels like we’re in the BlackBerry/Palm Treo phase, but the iPhone is coming soon. Building these things is somewhat fiddly right now, but soon it will be a breeze.
It’s blown me away by how many of my tech entrepreneur friends have no clue how to build AI agents or utilize these tools—most are barely even using ChatGPT. It reminds me of the late 90s, when everyone knew “the web” was a big deal but nobody was sure how to use it in their business.
So, today, I’m excited to announce that I’m going to help them out.
Me and my partner David just launched a new AI agency: Digital People. We help companies implement AI to automate their most irritating and mind-numbing workflows.
If your team is burning hours on manual, repetitive work—moving data around, making routine decisions, or even handling complex processes that feel automatable—we can help. Our goal is simple: save you from drudgery and accelerate your business.
PS: If you want to learn how to build Digital Employees yourself, I'm hosting a 1-day workshop with Lindy Drope from Lindy (yes, the company was named after her) in Victoria on October 20th. We only have about 10 spots left—grab a ticket here if you're interested.
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These moves can help prepare you for two potential scenarios:
One where AI achieves superintelligence, is benevolent, and you’re hedged against your business being disrupted by it (you made a bunch of money by owning the power/compute it required to become superintelligent—the toll road to AGI).
And the second, a scenario where AI doesn’t necessarily achieve superintelligence but disrupts jobs. In that world, knowing how to use AI will probably be one of the most critical skills to continue to be relevant as an entrepreneur or employee.
I, for one, welcome our new AI overlords 🖖
- Do you know a rich person?
Ask yourself: how did they get rich?
Either they inherited a bunch of money (boring) or they most likely started a business.
If it’s the latter, ask yourself an important question:
“Would they want to sell their business to Andrew?”
They could be burnt out, or old and wanting to retire.
Or maybe they just want to move to Mexico and live a life of leisure.
Whatever it is, if they own a great business, I would like to buy it.
And if you introduce me, and I end up buying their company, I’ll pay you $25,000.
I’m open to any and all businesses, as long as they make at least $500,000 per year in profit (not revenue), have been running for at least five years, and do something positive.
Go! The lines are open.
- Every once in a while, I like to brag about one of my friends.
Today, I want to brag about my friend Vic.
She’s one of those people who makes you leave lunch buzzing with ideas.
Who asks you a gazillion questions and shows they remember everything.
The kind of person who charges your battery.
Which is weird, because she’s also an absurdly talented designer. And those two qualities rarely go together.
Often, the uber-cool designer type is not friendly or warm. They’re usually quiet, and sometimes judgemental.
Vic, on the other hand, is the opposite.
And whatever weird thing she’s doing today—clothing, typeface, aesthetic—I’m always confident everyone else will be doing it within 6-12 months.
A few years ago, she moved away from Victoria (boo) and started a creative agency in Copenhagen helping brands with their design and strategy.
She’s the best and you should work with her. Or worst case, if you’re in Copenhagen, email her for a coffee!
Random Stuff:
- I was recently in Toronto and was absolutely blown away by Sweat and Tonic, a beautiful gym that had everything a healthy person could want: a cafe and smoothie bar to work in, saunas and cold plunges, and every type of exercise class and gym equipment money could buy. I’m yet to find anything similar in Victoria, and a few friends and I are interested in backing someone to create something like it. If you might be this person or know this person, email me.
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Adam Savage of MythBusters fame sat down with Ryan Norbauer and went into delightfully nerdy depth about what makes his absurd keyboards worth $5,000. YouTube
- I’m sick of hotels. I’m still on the hunt for a beautiful, well-located house to rent for 5-14 days at a time in Vancouver. If anyone has a furnished spot they’re open to renting out, send me an email!
- Zoe and I loved Gianmarco Soresi’s new standup special ‘Thief of Joy’. It's absolutely hilarious. YouTube
- I also had a good chuckle at this dumb Shane Gillis sketch. YouTube
- Christmas is coming. If you live in Victoria, my home services business, PressurePros, is offering holiday lights installation services. Email them, they’d love your business.
- If you like Persian food and live in Victoria, Niloo is very tasty.
That’s all for now…
-Andrew
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