– English Lyrics

Lyrics & Translation

[English]

In 24 months, there will be not one

person in this room that will be able to

tell when they watch a human in a video

if that human even exists. Let alone if

it was generated by AI or generated by

your hands in Adobe, thus rendering you

to having to make a choice that you

either trust nothing or you realize

whether I, Gary, as a human amoding this

hoodie or whether it's an AI version of

me that doesn't exist. We're in a place

where every video on the internet, you

will not believe what the person is

saying because you're not sure if they

actually said it because you know that

there is technology now that allows

people to make videos of me saying

egregious things that I've never said.

AI is an insanely enormous wave that is

coming right at you. This AI one, this

is not the iPhone. This is not social

media. This is much more internet. This

is big. This is the rest of your life.

And professionally, it's going to impact

you. But even personally as a human

being all of you have one of two

options. Option one, you are going to

put your head in the sand and your

overall strategy is

or two you are going to grab a surfboard

and you will ride the largest wave that

has come at us since the internet itself

and you will be highly successful and

you will enjoy the ride.

Talk to me about AI.

It's going to kill them.

all do what should they do? What's your

approach to AI? How are you thinking

about that?

The easiest analogy that every one of

you should understand that I can really

do in one minute that I hope gets you on

the right side of this conversation. AI

is an insanely enormous wave that is

coming right at you. All of you have one

of two options. Option one, you are

going to put your head in the sand and

your overall strategy is

or two, you are going to grab a

surfboard

which is called your time and efforts to

learn how to use it and you will grab

this surfboard and you will ride the

largest wave that has come at us since

the internet itself and you will be

highly successful and you will enjoy the

ride.

Some of them will get smashed into the

rocks. I

I believe many people that I'm looking

at in blue light right now

will choose the first option

out of fear, out of complacency,

out of laziness,

which hurts for a room like this because

they pride themselves in not being lazy.

But being lazy

in the form of curiosity

and the work required in knowledge on

something that is this large

is way worse than being lazy and not

wanting to come to the office or only

working five hours a day. Way worse. If

you are here at this conference,

you are who you are. this room. Not one

person that decided to spend their time

to be in this room right now

should be on the side of laziness on

this issue. This room represents the

people that should be riding the

surfboards. But that is how great fear

is. Fear is the single worst energy in

society. Fear is what dictates so much

of your unhappiness. Fear is what leads

to the political, religious, and all the

other bad things that happen in our

society when we weaponize fear. Please,

my friends, do not let the fear of

another technology wave coming along

hurt you. This is your biggest

opportunity truly since the mid to late

90s to take advantage of the internet

and explode. But use the lessons of

history and know how many people poo

pooed or underestimated the internet and

allowed that technology to hurt them.

You've got recent history on your side.

Electricity demonizing. I taught a lot

of you that here today. That's a long

time ago. You may have not known that.

But many of you just looking at the

crowd, you were here when everyone said

social media didn't mean anything or the

iPhone. I mean, especially in Canada,

people thought the Blackberry was going

to win, you know,

like you

like like all of you in the I again

looking at the crowd, some of you have

had 20, 30, 40 year careers right now.

You've seen internet come along, be

underestimated, hurt and help people.

You've seen you've seen social media be

very underestimated 15 years ago. It is

the foundation of the reset of

geopolitics and commerce across the

world. You've seen the smartphone come

along. Do you know many people in here

when the smartphone came along said now

I'll keep my pager. I don't need anybody

calling me when I like like we continue

to demonize technologies. But this AI

one,

this AI one, this is not the iPhone.

This is not social media. This is much

more internet. This is big big. This is

not a fad. This is the rest of your life

and professionally it's going to impact

you but even personally as a human

being. You know how you make fun of your

grandma because she doesn't know how to

use some sort of app. A lot of you are

becoming your grandma right now.

I feel that my I remember the moment

that my mom was out on technology was

calling. She thought it was very rude

and she's basically like that's it. And

I felt that I felt that when my kids got

on Snapchat, I was like, I don't I don't

There are people literally becoming

their grandma right now on this AI

issue. And what will happen to them is

the same thing that happened to grandma,

which is you will have no choice.

Technology is undefeated,

my friends. Technology is undefeated. So

if anything, if anything is accomplished

at this conference today,

me knowing that five to 10 people based

on how passionate I've been for the last

five minutes, I believe that a dozen of

you will now actually leave here who

have been demonizing this or kind of

like hoping it's not coming will start

to allocate the hour a day of research

required and the downloading of apps and

the testing of apps and learning just

like you learned. everything else you

must do it. You will be hurt if you

don't.

Is that how you think you navigate

doing it? Making yourself try it out

like Yeah. In like the realest way. Like

I think again this should work for

everyone.

I was one of these people. I was scared

to learn how to swim. I was I didn't

want to drown. I I was scar I was late

to swimming. I was late to riding a

bike. I didn't want to skin my knee or

bang my elbow. I was scared to kiss a

girl. Like I was go I went through those

adolescence things. But you all know

this, you know, having your first kiss,

swimming, riding a bike, every one of

those things. Eventually, you just got

to a point where you were like, "Fuck

it." And you went,

"Yes, I'm swearing now.

I'm swearing. I've only been able,

friends. I've only been able to hold it

for so long."

You know, I think you can handle it. Um,

so I I think the same thing here. Like

like I get it. Like you know what's so

funny about me personally as a human?

Even though my entire career has been

maximizing new technologies and winning

on them, I by nature am not so I don't

want it to happen either. I'm at the

prime of my career. I've just spent 15

years building the largest independent

advertising agency in the world from

zero to $350 million a year. We'll do

this year. You think I want AI? Don't

clap because I'm in trouble.

And the point I'm trying to make is you

think I want AI to be here. I don't. I

won.

You just figured this thing out.

I I don't want this to happen either. I

just realize I have no choice. I do not

understand this idea

that you think you have a choice on this

issue. How many people are retiring in

the next 5 years? And I don't mean

you're going to execute so awesome that

you're going to sell it and buy a

private plane and whatever. I mean

you're old and you're finished. Raise

your hands.

I want you to truly raise your hands. I

want to see people retiring within the

next 5 years strictly because you're

actually retiring and going to hang out

somewhere warm. Raise your hands.

Like five.

Yeah, there's about I see you, lady. All

right. There's about seven. There's

about seven people here that plan on

retiring within the next five years.

What do you think this AI thing is going

to look like in five years, my friends?

Get on this and get on this. Like, in

fact, I think everyone here should get

up and leave this conference right now

cuz nothing's going to happen here with

me in the next 30 minutes that's more

important than them spending 30 minutes

on learning how to download the right AI

apps, using it, taking notes in every

meeting, making content. admin like your

admin. If who here has an admin? Raise

your hand. Raise your hands high please

if you have an admin. Uh right they

should be using it to make themselves

more efficient for you to be more

efficient. Like this is real life. This

is oxygen. This is oxygen.

Yeah.

Um I don't

want you to say because I think we can

get a lot out of this. We already have

some good advice. So while we're at it,

one of the things I like is like refusal

to accept excuses.

Yeah. So let's I want to drive through

some other ones that I hear a lot from

entrepreneurs. How hard it is to build a

business to build a business to it. Um

hiring, you know, lots of people like

it's hard to build out the team. Um I

can't find the right people. I'm West

Coast Eastern time. What do you say to

people like I just can't grow. I can't

find anymore.

Quit.

I mean, like, what do you want from me?

Pay pay more or use AI like I just told

you to, so you don't need to hire. Like,

I do not understand this concept of

crying. You You can't hire cuz you're in

Calgary. Move.

But I'm But I'm getting to a point like

there's no crying in baseball. They say,

"Well, there's definitely no crying in

business. What do you want from me? You

don't you don't think like it's easier

to build a business in America? Go do

it." Like, I love I love when people are

like, "Oh, it's so easy." Like every

everything is hard.

Do you understand that everything that

is great is hard? Love is hard as [ __ ]

right?

I know.

But like but like you're asking to build

a business.

You're when you were saying I'm going to

be an entrepreneur and I'm going to

build a business. You were asking for a

1% life. You were saying I am going to

live in the 1% where I live on my own

rules, on my own back, where I have full

control, where I do not have an

employer. Of course, it should be hard.

And if the market changes and it's

harder to hire, well, build a business

that can afford to pay more because

that's one of the variables. Or leverage

modern technology. Good news. The AI

thing, you know, they say it's going to

replace jobs. It is going to replace

jobs. Some of those jobs that are

replacing are the ones that you're

looking to hire for. Learn how to use

AI. You won't have to hire anybody. You

don't need to offshore in the

Philippines. You can offshore to a bot.

You like that?

I think so. So I you know what do I say

to excuses? Tough.

I I I don't I mean it like meaning like

I'm not trying to give tough love here.

Like I think everybody knows that I'm

right. Like I don't know. Like I I worry

about things all day long but

complaining about them like you're

you're in 247 solutions. Find a

solution. And when I say move, I mean

it. Like if you're going to sit here and

be like like I You don't get it, Gary.

There's nobody in Calgary. I'm like, you

don't get it, Rick. Move.

All right, we're going to do another

one. I like this. You don't have to move

either, but don't make excuses. Um, all

right. I want to talk about venture

capital because my turn now. I [ __ ]

love what you have to say about venture

capital. Um, Calgary is doing pretty

well now. There's some deals here.

Overall, you know, ventures slowing down

all over the place. You've said in the

past that the emphasis on fundraising

and pursuit of venture capital has

caused us to fundamentally lose the art

of building a real business, one that is

profitable each month and can pay its

own bills. We need to put pressure on

the entrepreneurial community as a whole

to start focusing on making money, not

raising money.

So talk to a room full of people who say

there's not enough access to capital in

Canada.

Move. I'm just kidding.

All right. This is having a wrong

effect. Tell them they can do it from

here

cuz they can. The point of me saying

move should inspire someone to say to

me, "No, I'm not moving and I can do it

here because you can." Meaning my big

thing on these kind of issues is going

back to the last question this one is if

you can point to someone who's done it

then it's been done you know like like

Spotify was invented in Sweden Facebook

was actually funded in Boston not

Silicon Valley this whole obsession with

Silicon Valley is laughable like there's

unlimited high netw worth individuals in

Calgary I have friends who LP raised

from Calgary. The LP level real checks.

I don't know if you know that there's

there's oil money here like like like

you know like like this con there's also

like athletes that play for the Flames

who get paid a lot of money a year. They

might have a h 100,000 to give a

startup. Like I I this is a perspective

mind shift issue. What do I think? I

think there's unlimited opportunity to

raise capital when you have a company in

Calgary. There's also things I don't

know if you heard about this invention.

It's called a plane.

When you live in Calgary, you can take a

plane to Los Angeles or San Francisco or

Vancouver or Toronto or New York City or

Dubai or Doha or London. Like this like

I these these these concepts make me

laugh.

Like there's also something called a

phone. You can call someone. Zoom

exists. You can have a Zoom meeting

while you sit in Calgary with, you know,

a human that's in New York City and she

or he will give you money. Like, what

are we talking about here?

You talk about red.

Well, yeah, if you want to talk about

that part of the quote, like that's like

the concept of giving up a big piece of

your business for money that you're then

going to likely burn because, you know,

when you have money in your wallet, you

tend to burn it. Um, has always been

foreign to me. I I do think coming look,

capital matters. It helps some of the

biggest companies in the world. The

problem is it became cool. There's so

many companies that have raised capital

that never needed to. They just thought

they were supposed to. And so I think

you have to be if you're building Uber

or Facebook, you're going to need

capital. Like Amazon, yes, you will need

capital. But I think when you have a

small app or things of that nature,

there is a way to think about

monetization early on. Everybody was

going for the 1% 1% 1% unicorn idea.

There's a billion businesses that can be

done. And in fact, it's similar to the

way I think about people putting

mortgages down in their home. I I don't

mind raising capital. I think too many

people raise too much capital. Like a

lot of the businesses that are running

around in this room really only needed

$250,000,

not $4 million. And then the other issue

on that quote is everybody became

professional fundraisers, not actual

entrepreneurs. It all became about

financial arbitrage. How do I get to

metrics to raise the next round? Then we

got so unhealthy at a period of time

where if you get to enough metrics in

the series B, you could take money off a

pound. And so you were making money, but

none of your investors made money. And

there was still all these bad behaviors.

Luckily, the economic tighten up that

we've been through has actually cleaned

this up quite a bit. That's what

naturally happens. So I think we are in

better behavior than when I was talking

about that. But those are my thoughts on

those issues.

Yeah. I I always tell my editor, we

could change the whole sector if we

stopped talking about people raising

money and started saying that they

borrowed millions of dollars.

100%

I Yeah, I this celebration of the fund

raise was very toxic to young

entrepreneurs and you know and by the

way I don't cry for VCs because they're

just trying to deploy capital and show

returns that are fake to raise their

next round because they're living on

their two and 20. So like when people

like want to like you know say whose

fault it is, it's the whole ecosystem.

It's not just the founders and the

entrepreneurs. The VCs were playing

their own game and then the institutions

and the LPs were playing their own game

and on and on and on.

You think we're in a good direction

right now?

I like pain.

Yeah,

I do. I think I think adversity is the

foundation of success. I think when the

money's flowing and we're just printing

money that that's a problem. And I do

think that when we find the middle, we

always do much better. And unfortunately

in entrepreneurship, in politics, in

society, we've become way too left and

way too right when the center is always

the answer to the quiz.

Uh

I want to get a little bit of political

advice from you. You know, we're we're

in some pain, I think, right now as a

country in Canada. Um, we sort of

realized we've become overly dependent

on the US as a customer, as a protector.

Um, we have a hard time defining what

we're about, picking a thing. Um, you

know, I've heard you use the term scared

money. Scared money doesn't make money.

I feel like Canada has a bit of scared

money vibes these days. Um, if you look

at can when you look at at Canada's

brand, we got a new CEO. What's the

mood? What's your advice? What can do?

You know, I think I I think it's a

really challenging question. Look, what

has happened with these tariffs is

unprecedented was very hard to predict

and look the reality is is the US is one

of the most important global markets in

the world. And our relationship is

historically and still like let there be

no confusion. Just like any country, you

know, there's a big difference between a

government that's operating a country

and the people of a country. And we've

seen that from time. I was born in the

Soviet Union. Me personally, not my

parents, not my grandparents, me. I, the

human being, was born in the Soviet

Union. I can promise you that the people

that lived from 1917 to 1991 in the

Soviet Union did not see America the way

the government saw America. I promise

you that if you went and spoke to the

lovely people of North Korea right now,

their point of view on the world, if

they even knew what the hell's going on

in the world, is different than how the

government sees it. I think this is if

if I'm running Canada, I a realize that

this is an incredibly short-term blip.

Two, even if it's long-term, the reality

is is that you can sit on ideology all

you want. The reality is America should

be one of Canada's biggest customers

because it's one of the biggest markets

in the world. It's also Sweden's and

Peruse and like just like China is one

of America's biggest like it's just a

big market. Like this concept of like

let's just play within Canada is not

going to do Canada any good. Meaning

it's fine. And I do think that what the

world is definitely all gonna do right

now is get more insular because of this.

Every country, not just Canada, every

country is now thinking about how do

they grow their own economic situation

because now the cat's out of the bag and

like you never know when other tariffs

and other things and people can see that

tariffs and the economy is being

weaponized, right? We're getting away

from dropping bombs on each other. It's

more about economic behavior that is,

you know, creating these variables.

What would I do? I would focus on

building the internal market as strong

as possible. What do I think about that?

I think this is a page that people

should take from China and America. Why

has China risen so much in the last 40,

50 years? It's because it's taken a more

economic American entrepreneurial

capitalistic approach to their internal

market. What what should Canada do? It

should keep every one of its best

entrepreneurs in Canada by creating

rules that benefit the people that

actually drive the economy.

[Applause]

Like like like it's and by the way, I

don't say this from a political lens of

like what do Republicans and Democrats

or conservatives and liberals think on

this issue? I I say this to every

government, including America. By the

way,

this is about to become a talent game

because of technology.

We can now have meetings in Zoom. And by

the way, Zoom is like a beeper. In 12

years, 15 years, we're all going to be

in VR glasses having meetings where

we're not going to be together, but it's

going to feel more like this than it

does on Zoom. And so all of a sudden,

you can live anywhere and conduct

business. And you take into account

private aviation and the costs going

down and technology, the most talented

humans in the world are about to become

the asset. And whoever has the most

positive tax laws and the most positive

ways to keep them are going to win.

London has a problem. The UK has a huge

problem right now. They are losing their

best talent. And and by the way, the

Middle East and other parts of the world

are not fooling around. America

was built on one concept, the American

dream. That concept literally for 150

years got all the best talent. No matter

where you were in the world, you were

born. And if you were an entrepreneur

and a creative and a maker and a driver,

a driver, your dream, whether you were

born in Cape Town or in Calgary or in

Stockholm, if you were an A+, your

number one dream in life was to get to

America. and America's immigration

policy and the brand and the policies on

taxing and how they kept their best

talent is why they became the world

power because they got the best talent

no matter where they were born to go

there. Countries are about to replicate

that. And what would I do if I ran

Canada? I would have a policy to get the

best talent in the entire world from

Africa, from Europe, from Asia, from

America. Like, do you know how many

Americans would move to Canada tomorrow

if they had policies that made it

financially interesting? Do you know how

beautiful this place is? Vancouver,

Toronto, Montreal. This place is loaded

with optionality.

But I'm not paying [ __ ] [ __ ]

taxes.

You get healthare though, right?

You get health. But here's the problem,

and I really like Canada a whole lot.

I'm going to say it nice and slow. You

get health care to a point.

Why do people come to America for the

big boy surgeries?

Hm.

So like again, we are no longer in a

place where humans don't feel like they

have optionality and they have to stay

where they're staying. We are now

competing for the best talent in the

world. And it's not just against Canada.

You've got golden visas being put up

every Portugal. You've got Saudi like

there. This is real time. It is. What

would I do if I was Canada? I would keep

my best people for damn sure and I would

create policies to attract the best

people. I'll give you an example of what

Canada did extremely well. I don't know

if this is on everybody's radar. The

level of Persian super brains that have

come to this country in the last 5 years

from Iran because of the policy on

immigration

is a huge win for Canada. These are

these are some of the smartest people

from a country that has a lot of natural

talent. And because your policies were

better than their policies and you had

more opportunity, people were willing to

take a short-term step back to be an

immigrant here than their life there

because long term it was more. And so

now you have a talent infusion. We

should replicate that at scale. The

problem is we have this crazy game going

on in the world where some countries are

and a lot of countries we all know this

are going more nationalism, right? No

immigrants. And then you have other

countries that are like, we actually

want the best immigrants and we'll make

it really cushy. This will become the

battle. That's what I would do if I ran

this.

And I think it's a battle about story,

right? Everything comes back to story.

What are you telling? What is the story

you're telling the world about who you

are?

Story, but also policy.

Yeah. I mean, like again, I will say

this nice and slow because it's

interesting. This is how you recruit

talent for your business, too.

every the best entrepreneurs in America

could move to Canada tomorrow if you

came up with a policy that said we will

have a process to evaluate the best

entrepreneurs and if you're one of those

people we will give you 10 years of

tax-free business behavior in Canada and

we will all moonwalk

to Canada

is that where we're at or we not you

know and those become that's what's but

by the way what's fun about me talking

about this because I don't usually talk

about politics is this is already

happening. What I'm saying meaning

countries have already started to make

these behaviors happen. This is a talent

warfare and that goes back to the first

question. How do you hire better? Make

it better for the best people.

We got to pay more contract. I like

that. All right. I'm gonna ask one more

and then we're going to go to the

audience. Um future looking at the

future. What is the thing? What is the

technology? What are the companies?

where the areas of focus that excite me

the most right now. What are you seeing

that

I'm going to put AI over here because

we've spent time on it. My favorite

thing that's happening right now that's

a huge opportunity especially for that

bearded gentleman Connor that I like so

much

is live social shopping.

So the QVCification

of social media is about to be a

monster. Speaking of China, this has

been going on for 10 years in Asia. Live

social shopping. Basically, I believe in

the next five years, somewhere between

10 and 30% of every piece of content

that you see in your feed on Tik Tok,

Instagram, Facebook, Snapchat, YouTube,

Twitter will be somebody selling

something live at that moment.

So, this is an enormously big economy.

How many people here sell something

physically? Raise your hands. Like you

sell a product, raise it high. Just

curious. Great. Everybody who just

raised their hand besides the AI hour,

you should spend an equal hour on live

social shopping. Literally going live on

Whatnot or Tik Tok shop right now, which

are the two leaders in Canada and

selling stuff literally on the show. The

human behavior on the other side of

buying stuff in this environment is

crazy. people spend more and will buy

things in a live shopping show on social

media that they would never buy on a

website or in a store. The entertainment

of it all, the hype of it all, the fun

of it all. And so I believe the biggest

trend of opportunity for many people in

this room is live social shopping.

The other thing that excites me is the

final chapter of social media. Meaning,

I believe we've only got another 5 to 10

years of this golden era that built

Connor's business, the books I write,

this social media world where everything

is free. It's free. You can post on

these platforms for free. And if your

piece of content is good, it could get

millions of views. And those views are

earned because of relevance, which leads

to consideration, which leads to people

buying things. I do believe that for

100% if I may just steal this for show

and tell I believe that everybody in

this room in seven years is wearing

these and in these is the UI and UX and

that this will go the way of the pager

and our entire world is being built

through here and in that world I'm not

sure how social works you know it may

still work with a feed here but I

believe this will become the primary

device of our society, not this in the

next decade. And within that decade,

when that happens, it resets all the

rules of marketing and business. All of

a sudden, physical location changes. And

so, I I think that meta on this project

Orion that they're working on is the

biggest thing that's going on in our

faces that no one's paying attention to.

I in the same way. How many people here

are over 45 years old? Raise your hands.

So for all of us that just raised our

hands,

I raised mine.

Yeah, but you you Yeah, you did this

that you were like you did a very um

uh

for all of us over 45, we lived our

entire childhood without the internet

and a phone. You know, I literally went

to college without ever having a

computer in my house, let alone being on

the internet, let alone having a phone.

We are all like, it's inconce. I mean,

do you understand what people would do

right now if I just stole their phone

right now from them? You would lose your

mind. You would not know how to

function. I believe that we will look

back at this era as an era. But I do

believe glasses are going to win. I

think it's coming. And so the thing that

I implore everyone if you have not taken

advantage of building brand on social

media in its form factor now that you

must go hard because this is a golden

era. We've never had a platform that was

free that could build fame and marketing

for free. Like I I will say the word

again, you know, like I do not

understand how you do not understand

this. When you buy a billboard, you pay

for it. When you do direct mail, you pay

for it. When you buy Google Adwords, you

pay for it. Radio, pay for it. Full page

ads in print, pay for it. Television

commercials, pay for it. Influencer

marketing, you pay the influencer.

Posting on social media is free and if

you're good at it, it gets views.

So, that's the other thing on my mind.

Yeah. Um, maybe we can combine live

social shopping with our policy.

Maybe. Maybe.

What do you want this group to know

about you? that's not

not much

else. It's not that I'm overly excited

about people knowing about me. I think

what would be great for this audience to

know from my perspective is that I

really believe that nice guys finish

first. I think the thing that I would

like a lot of you to know is that in

building a large business or in building

something substantial, I do not believe

that you have to compromise

your humanity. I do not believe that

sharp elbows are the only way to win in

business. I wish more people knew that

the foundation of sustained economic

success is actually by caring about

others.

Not trying to extract every penny out of

every deal, leaving something on the

table for the other side. building an

internal culture that leads to so much

retention within your organization that

you are able to go faster and harder

than your competitors because you have

so much trust amongst yourselves. And so

when I think about my past,

what's very clear to me is that the way

my motherthered me to be a good human

being is disproportionately the reason

I've had substantial financial success.

She reinforced

I thank you. I you know I think that and

this is you know I think that

unfortunately people really believe that

business is dirty and you have to kill

the other guy and all this and listen I

love competition. Um I I believe in

merit. I believe in those things. But I

yeah, I just it's very clear to me that

if you're running a marathon and you're

trying to do something significant

and for the long term, uh the better you

do it from a humanity standpoint, the

more likely it will happen.

Did you have people that you looked to

obviously your mom's a huge influence,

did you have people in business that you

looked to that you're like, "That's

that's that way to do it when I come

up."

No, I didn't. I idolized athletes and

other things like Randy the Macho Man

Savage and

I I looked up to different kind of

characters within business. Even to this

day, I have a very unique framework. I'm

very insular. It's me and the audience.

I always trusted the audience. To me, it

was me. The thing that molded me was the

end consumer. I didn't look up to Steve

Jobs or Bezos or Oprah or anything like

that. I thought the context was too

different. I believe too much in the

now. I believe things are moving too

fast. I think there's triedand-true

principles that work, but I feel like

I've been a businessman my whole life.

For context, in this room, whether it

was lemonade stands or trading cards and

then working in my father's liquor

store, I have been working since I was

six, seven years old. A lot of the core

rules of entrepreneurship were so

natural to me. I I don't learn really by

reading or watching. My currency of

learning is living in the truth. I think

entrepreneurship is not something you go

to university for. Entrepreneurship is

learned in the trenches and I I agree.

I bring my I bring my mom to all my

talks.

She's great.

Uh so no, I didn't. In fact, back to my

opening line, the only time I've ever

really been significantly booed in my

career on stage was they told me not to

curse at this talk, so I won't use the

exact words, but I was at South by

Southwest in 2007 or eight, and my

opening line was, "F Jobs, and everybody

booed me because he was on such a

pedestal at the time." The point I was

trying to make is, "We don't have to be

jerkoffs to our employees to be

successful." And so

and so no my my teacher my mentor

my framework was always the 8 billion

people on earth on what they wanted to

buy why they bought things what they

were interested in why are they

interested in those things that has been

where I spend my energy

um one of the things I like that you

said is you think about like

understanding history allows you to do

pattern recognition.

Yes.

Um talk to me a little bit about that

and what like right now what are you

recognizing? What patterns are you

recognizing?

So electricity.

It's here right now.

Nobody here is thinking about that.

Only a short period of time ago,

electricity was invented. When

electricity was invented, kids,

most people did not put it in their home

because society said that there was

actual demons

in the electricity, demonizing

something. The slang term came from us

humans being scared that electricity had

demons in it. And so we would still use

candles in our home instead of bringing

electricity

because we were scared of new

technology.

Right now, the majority of this room, if

they're really paying attention, is

demonizing AI. They are scared of what

AI is going to do and how it's going to

take their money.

Yet, it will be like electricity. It

will be a profoundly good technology

that will be omniresent and will advance

manhood and create more opportunity, not

less. But because we are all right now

in this room in a place where it could

hurt us in the short term financially,

we are demonizing it. That would be an

example of me using history to tell me

what is happening right now.

Thank you.

[Applause]

Um, all right. I'm gonna throw it over

to you guys now. We're gonna bring some

people out to to uh with mic typing so

you can ask questions.

Go ahead, sir. What's your name? So my

name is saying I'm from a company called

convers

how aentic AI is helping Gary V or Gary

V's empire or if it's not helping or

building

well it's going to help because I own my

intellectual property right when you own

your IP when you know both in V friends

the world I'm building which is like my

Mickey Mouse Pokemon but it's it's it's

a super tool. It's going to allow me to

be dramatically more productive and

extract more value. And so, you know, to

again, to me, it's I don't view it as I

view it no different than I view social

media,

than I view apps, than I view the

internet. It becomes a tool that we will

harness to extract more value on

creating scaled demand, scaled

awareness, and scaled execution. It's

it's not like this separate thing,

right? It's just an overlaying

technology that will allow us to be more

efficient and get a lot more

productivity for a much lower cost.

Do you think you're going to count as

my my biggest business, Vayner Media,

the one that has 2500 employees

globally? My belief is that we're going

to grow into efficiency more so than

eliminate headcount. My belief is that

we're at 350 million in revenue now and

that we should be able to get to 500

million in revenue without reducing

headcount, but by dramatically slowing

down headcount by making every one of my

employees dramatically more effective by

them using AI.

Question over there.

Thank you.

Hi there. Oh, loud. My name is Mark. Run

a company called Sustainable. Turning

beer waste into a sustainable flower.

Love.

Uh thank you. You talked about at the

beginning how building trust and being a

leader that leaves something on the

table.

Yes.

Is a great way to build business and

move faster. How do you think leaders

today can do that given the wave of

change you've talked about through AI

and all the other things? What do you

think the top three things they could

do?

Just keep the mic in case there's some

back and forth work. I think it's I

think it's different for every business,

right? I think it's an intent more so

than a tactic. Meaning in your business,

to your point, if you're feeling the

impact of tariffs, if you're feeling the

impact of competition, like like being a

good person doesn't mean doing behavior

that puts your business out of business

and then nobody has a job, right? I I

think when I say leaving something on a

table, I think that's in the context of

negotiations,

you know? So, if you're negotiating with

someone and there's some room in between

a deal, a lot I I really do believe that

whether it's negotiating a salary raise

for an employee or doing a deal with a

vendor or a customer that both sides of

the equation kind of have a sense of the

way it went down. And if you have the

intent to do the best you can for all

three of those things that I said, I

believe that energy is felt. If you have

the intent to get every last penny, I

believe that energy is felt. So I think

how do you do these things? I think it

actually has to be your actual intent.

Whatever that, you know, in whatever

context it is, you know what I mean?

Yeah. And quick second question, just

cuz asking for forgiveness is easier.

Um,

if you're hitting a wall for the first

time in your business because of

potential other players seeing the

opportunity, seeing you guys potentially

heading towards a place of distress and

then wanting a better deal. What would

your advice be to the entrepreneur to

manage?

That's a really good question, brother.

I mean, you need to create optionality

in that scenario. If somebody's being

predatory because they can smell blood

in the water and they know that you're

in a pickle and you know I think you've

got a couple options. One, you suck it

up and you take the deal because you

have no choice or you create other

optionality. Borrowing money, raising

money, getting other customers. What's

tough about business is it's not

government. It's not academics. It's not

parenting. It's not this blurry thing

where you can make pretend. This is real

life. If you have a customer who can

smell that you're in a tough spot and

thus they're using that as a negotiation

tactic to get a better deal, that's

called business. And so what do you need

to do on the other side? One, take the L

and just deal with it and try to build

back up to create those options I told

you which allows you to tell them to go

screw themselves and then you got to

call their bluff.

I like option two. Appreciate you.

You got to think about asking another

one. Okay. My name is Lisa.

Lisa.

I'm actually unemployed.

Okay.

And for product manager role.

Okay.

So, I know you talk about

Lisa, how much are you posting on

LinkedIn?

I've kind of been just chilling out for

the last couple.

And is that

I came here specifically to make some

connections like with Gary Vee.

Yep.

And uh yeah, after this I will be

blasting away on LinkedIn.

Good. Honestly, I mean, you're allowed

to chill and that sounds like you you

you wanted that and needed it for

yourself, but the reason I'm asking is

LinkedIn posting.

Yes.

You talking about your career, how

you've done the role in the past, what

you're seeing in the market,

you know, is disproportionately the

quickest way for you to get a new job,

much more than networking physically in

this room. So, I just want to encourage

you to do that daily.

I will certainly be doing that.

So,

me being a little bit older than a lot

of some of these people here and you

talk

good good news I can see the whole crowd

you're not older than a lot of people in

this

so you talk about all these things with

um all the technology and you know VR

and glasses and social media

yes

I don't want to be on my phone and on a

computer 247 like I I actually enjoy

going to Home Depot and walking around

and touching things before I buy them

I don't want going to be shopping online

all the time.

Well, you don't have to.

So, how do you find that balance or

by not doing it

by not

like like

I don't like you see everybody walking

on the streets with their heads down and

there seems to be a lot of I find lack

interpersonal le

your subjective opinion

on how society should be

has nothing to do with business. Okay.

So, when I hear your energy about this,

I also wish the kids were outside

playing.

I like 1983 a lot, too.

I think you're blurring your ideology

into a conversation about business.

So, the reason I'm bringing that up is

good news. If you do not want to shop

and be, you're going to be able to do

that. There's gonna be certain things

you're gonna be forced into. Like many

Yeah. Many people here never wanted to

use the internet. I used to have

unlimited people I did business with in

1999 where I would send them an email

and their secretary and admin would

print out the email and they would read

it and we would have a phone call to go

over it and I would say, "You're old.

You're a dinosaur. This is ridiculous."

And they said, "This is how I'm going to

do it forever." And then 5 years later,

we were emailing back and forth. You

will be forced into some stuff. But good

news, you want to go to Home Depot and

touch the wood, knock yourself out.

[Laughter]

Hey, just as a fast follow on that,

do you think that business has any like

do you worry at all about business

pushing too far in a negative direction?

Like is there anything that you see that

you're worried about or you can

separate?

No, of course. I mean, I think the

biggest issue in America is that

capitalism went too far and became

materialism and became, you know, like

all these fake capital. I love all these

my friends in America who are like, I

believe in free market and capitalism

and little small government and then

they spend all their time once they make

money trying to pay off politicians to

make rules to allow them to keep money.

I worry about humans are flawed. You

know that, right?

Not us. you know, like I I worry about

things, but I but I in the scenarios

we're talking here, I worry that I don't

worry about little things. And I think a

lot of us worry about little things and

have these micro ideologies that have

nothing to do with the professional

aspect of what's going on or the

business stuff. So yeah, of course I

worry about anything out of balance. But

do I believe that free market,

entrepreneurship, creativity, STR, like

do I believe in those things on its

merit? Of course, it's the history of

human spirit. Everything that we stand

on today as humans came on the shoulders

of humans that innovated and created

things to allow us to do that. This is

who's advanced our society. somebody in

Do you do you understand that 80% of the

world worked on farms before the tractor

was invented?

Do you know how profound that is? Like

there like you used to get compensated

if you were big and strong because there

were no machines.

And so, you know, I I think about those

things a lot. Most things don't scare

me. What scares me is when people use an

ideology

as a detriment to their advancement.

Okay. Red.

What's your name?

Oh, Jacob.

Jacob.

Thank you. So, I was just going to

relate that idea of demonization and AI.

Yes.

Though you used to demonize electricity,

there is still truth that electricity

can shock. It can kill you.

I mean, that's ludicrous.

I I I'm the reason I'm jumping in,

brother, is I you know I I'll let you

finish your point, but like

I mean that's where you're going to go.

Like somebody might get shocked. Like

you do know the math around the

likelihood of electricity killing you is

quite low. Yes,

absolutely.

Okay, keep going.

So, we've seen this recent change in AI

where it's getting harder to tell what's

AI generated and what's not.

No, no, we we are not in that place.

There is no scenario on earth where any

human in this conference will be able to

tell the difference in 24 months. So,

let's just go to the full end. Nobody

will be able to tell. Keep going.

So, how will that trust affect the way

that we sell on social media?

Well, what are you trying to trust?

Let's play out. I like this question.

What? Let's play it out. Give me a

example to help everybody understand

something that you would struggle with.

An AI generated human being that looks

like a human being selling something,

but you're not sure if it's really a

human being or not. Would you have a

propensity to not buy that red jacket

from something that you yourself would

not be able to tell if it is or isn't a

human? What what happens in Jacob's mind

in that scenario?

Propaganda.

My idea is that if it's becomes harder

to

not harder, there will be not one person

in this room that will be able to tell

when they watch a human in a video in 24

months if that human even exists. Let

alone if it was generated by AI or

generated by your hands in Adobe,

you won't be able to tell if that human

actually exists or not. That's happening

right now, let alone 24 months. But I'm

going to give it another 24 months to

get even stronger than it is now. Let's

keep playing. You're in Instagram. You

see somebody saying, "This new red

jacket is super awesome." You're going

to have it in your brain that that human

may or may not exist. What happens next

in your mind?

It's going to be harder to tell whether

I can trust that.

What's the monitor? Let me

Well, the whole statistics if I don't

see someone who's real, who's actually

wearing a product or doing something

with

Jacob, how old are you?

Um, just turned 18.

18. So, let me tell you something you'll

find interesting. In It's 2025. In 2003,

um,

something came along called online

dating.

And when it came out, most of the people

in this room that were around judged it.

In fact, most of the marriages that

happened in in 2001, 2, 3, four, five,

six, seven that came through people

meeting online, that couple would lie to

their friends and family on how they

met. They would tell them stories that

they met at a bar or somewhere else, not

that they had met online because it was

so taboo.

You would agree now that in your

generation, Tinder and other aspects

that is now normal. It doesn't seem

crazy for someone to meet on a dating

app. You agree?

Absolutely.

When you are 40 and there's an

18-year-old Jacob standing up here and

they talk about AI, humans, and this

that they won't even know what the hell

you were talking about today. It will

become the norm.

You're going to you're you may decide

from an ideology that you think it's

weird. It will just become

real. I I know I know. But good news. I

think my flight got delayed a little

bit. I want to I want to finish this out

because it's going to help.

Jacob, you're not going to be able to

tell. You will live in 100% distrust.

You do know that, right? You right now

should assume that some of the people

you're seeing on social media don't

exist

because you won't be able to tell. You

do understand that next year you must

live a life where you don't believe any

of it.

You you're following where I'm going

with this?

So my belief is that that won't be

sustainable for you and you'll realize

it doesn't [ __ ] matter.

Jacob, you're not going to be able to

tell.

Thus, rendering you to having to make a

choice that you either trust nothing or

you realize whether I, Gary, as a human

amoding this hoodie or whether it's an

AI version of me that doesn't exist.

That has nothing to do with you deciding

if you think a hoodie is nice or not.

I'm going to get

If I may, if I may, if I may, I will.

I'll get to him. Don't worry, I got a

few minutes. I'm going to make another

point, Jacob, and everybody. You have to

understand what I talked about the

mundane with Jacob. Let's go to the not

mundane, your new CEO, our president,

me, Gary Vee, and everybody else. We are

in a place in 24 months where every

video on the internet you will not

believe what the person is saying

because you're not sure if they actually

said it. This is called a deep fake

video. This is one of the most important

things that is happening in our society.

For the last hundred years, video proof

has been the judge and jury of our

society.

What that means is very important. What

I just talked to Jacob about was silly.

Do you buy a blouse or not?

But what if every world leader, every

human, every celebrity, every time you

saw a video of them, you could not have

the ability to believe this was true

because you know, cuz we do know that

there is technology now that allows

people to make videos of me saying

egregious things that I've never said.

This is why the blockchain

is one of the most important

technologies in the world. Right now,

everyone's very caught up in what it

means for Bitcoin and what it means for

cryptocurrency and is are NFTTS

important or is it a fad? But what it is

is it's the single most important ledger

in the universe. It is a ledger that

proves something is true and nobody owns

it. Not China, not America, not Canada,

not Amazon, not Google. These are

decentralized

servers that no one controls and can be

a source of truth. For example,

every single video that I'm making next

year will first be minted as an NFT on

the blockchain

to prove that I made that video. And

there will be technology that comes

along that allows us to see from the

internet to the blockchain and back. You

need me off? I'm coming. I'm coming. I'm

coming. But I'm making a profound point

here.

This is a very big deal. And this is

also the reason so many of you should be

learning about blockchain technology. It

is not about crypto memecoin fads. It is

about a source of truth that will allow

our society to go forward in the next

century.

Thank you, Calgary.

Thanks, everybody. Great.

[Music]

Key Vocabulary

Vocabulary	Meanings
trust /trʌst/ A2	verb - to believe in the reliability or truth of someone or something
fear /fɪər/ B1	noun - an unpleasant emotion caused by the belief that someone or something is dangerous
option /ˈɒp.ʃən/ B1	noun - one thing that can be chosen from a set of possibilities
ride /raɪd/ A2	verb - to travel in a vehicle driven by someone else
head /hed/ A1	noun - the top part of the human body
choose /tʃuːz/ A1	verb - to decide what you want from two or more things or possibilities
technology /tekˈnɒl.ə.dʒi/ B1	noun - the studyand application of technical aspects of a subject
business /ˈbɪz.nɪs/ A2	noun - the activity of buying and selling goods and services
human /ˈhjuː.mən/ A2	adjective - relating to people noun - a person
video /ˈvɪd.i.əʊ/ A2	noun - a recording of moving pictures and sound
internet /ˈɪn.tə.net/ A2	noun - a system for connecting computers around the world
wave /weɪv/ B1	noun - a raised line of water on the surface of water
grab /ɡræb/ A2	verb - to take hold of something suddenly
people /ˈpiː.pəl/ A1	noun - persons
build /bɪld/ A2	verb - to make something by putting parts together