David Jones, Founder and CEO of The Brandtech Group, sits down with Assistant Managing Editor Steven Bertoni to discuss how their platform, Pencil, is leading the generative AI revolution with over 1 million AI-generated ads.
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LifestyleTranscript
00:00Hey, everybody. Welcome to the show. I'm Stephen Bertoni, live from the NASDAQ MarketSite.
00:05And today, we have David Jones, who is the founder and CEO of the Brandtec Group, also
00:12an author, an activist, and he took a city bike here. So he's an environmentalist, too.
00:19So David, welcome to the show.
00:20It's great to be here.
00:22So you sit on the forefront of advertising, branding, but also generative AI.
00:28Yep.
00:29Talking about this stuff, not last month, not last year, 2015, before AI was the buzzword
00:36of everything. Set the table for me. What are we seeing right now?
00:40So look, I think you're just seeing an explosion in generative AI all over the world. And I
00:45think it's going to be the biggest revolution and change that we see, not just in marketing,
00:50but in business. And there's a few reasons for that. Firstly, you have every major global
00:55CEO of any of the tech platforms saying, this is going to change the world and we're
00:59going to spend billions to make sure it does. Secondly, you're seeing investors saying,
01:04this is the future. So whether it's NVIDIA going past $2 trillion or Microsoft going
01:09past Apple, depending on the day, on the back of AI. Thirdly, you're seeing the world's
01:15people saying it's amazing. I mean, ChatGPT was the fastest technology in history to get
01:19to a hundred million users. And I think fourthly, it's amazing. I mean, just if you play around
01:26with any of the tools, what it does isn't remarkable, but how it does it is absolutely
01:31remarkable. So, you know, humans today can probably still create better content than
01:36gen AI and machines. It's just, you can't do it in 60 seconds. But the thing I would
01:42kind of package all of that under, however, is I have no doubt that we're going to see
01:46just enormous change. But today, if you're particularly talking about the advertising
01:51business, you know, about a hundred percent of the headlines are around generative AI,
01:55but still less than 1% of the content is created using generative AI. Now that's going to change,
02:00but we're very much at the start of it.
02:01Why? And you guys recently at Brand Tech raised about $112 million, $115 million American
02:11at a $4 billion valuation as a advertising technology company. And I have to admit, I'm
02:17surrounded by advertising, like everyone all day long. I'm in media, so advertising keeps
02:21the lights on and pays my salary. But I don't really understand how the business works.
02:27Tell me what you guys do on like a, on a Monday morning.
02:31So basically, probably the easiest way to describe it is we have a platform called Pencil,
02:35which is an end-to-end platform for creating advertising. So on the one side, it plugs
02:41into all of the models. So from ChatGPT to Gemini to Stability, but also some of the
02:47databases like Getty. So that's kind of on the left, which is what feeds in. And here
02:52on the right, it plugs directly into the advertising accounts of Instagram and Facebook and TikTok
02:57for a brand. And then the platform sits in the middle and you arrive on the platform
03:01and very simply, you can decide what you want to do. So do you want to make a video
03:05for TikTok? Do you want to make a post for Instagram? Do you actually just want some
03:08consumer insights? Do you want to create a pack shot? And it's a workflow that takes
03:13you through that entire process. And at each step, it gives you a prediction because we
03:18have, it's, it's sort of been in market since 2018. We've made over a million ads using
03:23generative AI, spent a billion dollars of media through the platform.
03:26A million, you've made a million ads.
03:28A million gen ads since, since 2018. And that allows us to predict what, how we think
03:34a particular piece of content is going to perform. And so literally you just go through
03:39the process. You start with insights. You then start with, you know, what images do
03:43you want to create? Start with some headlines. It works off templates, and then you can literally
03:48publish those if you want to direct to the social media platforms and you get live data
03:52back on how you're doing. So what it, what it does is that there's nothing remarkable
03:58about what it does. It's just to be able to do that in one place, which as each of
04:03the gen AI models gets better, it gets better to give you predictions and to get data back.
04:08So it's just exploding.
04:10When you say like a million ads, is it going to be, are these custom, like let's say Forbes
04:13is hire using pencil and we're trying to sell subscriptions or memberships. Will a Forbes
04:18ad serve to you be different than to me? Like are there all these iterations or are they
04:24kind of A-B testing what works or what doesn't work?
04:26I mean, the thing about it, it's like, you know, it's gone from almost A-B testing to
04:29A-Z testing because the size and scale that you can now create content at. So you can
04:34literally just pull down, you know, and create limitless feed variations. So if you literally
04:39wanted to have, you know, 150 different target audiences and segments, it can instantaneously
04:45create the content for you for that. And one of the, one of the most, it's like not necessarily
04:48that impressive. It's just impressive to watch is when you just ask it to translate immediately
04:53into any language, your, all of your content. And it's that speed, which is really remarkable
04:59and over, you know, since 2018, we've been able to prove that we can make the content
05:0310 times faster. We can make it perform twice as effectively, and we can do it for about
05:10half the cost.
05:11Give me an example of a campaign recently done with, through pencil or done through
05:15BrainTech.
05:16I mean, literally, you know, there's literally thousands of ads on Instagram, on TikTok,
05:23you know, and it's typically that social content. So social and digital, it's not yet. And we
05:29can come on to talking about this. It's not yet getting in, pencil isn't yet getting into
05:33the TV side, but it particularly good around e-commerce, around performance marketing,
05:39around social. And we're working today with, you know, 50% of our top 20 clients in the
05:43space.
05:44You've been in advertising all your life. You're like the youngest advertising CEO ever,
05:48I think.
05:49I was once young, yes.
05:50Yes, you're still young. What was in, so this was the nineties, correct? When you first
05:55started?
05:56Yeah, exactly.
05:57What was, I mean, it's insane to think that you started this before really the internet,
06:02before mobile, before digital, before influencers. Like how has what you did years ago and then
06:08fast forward today, how has that changed?
06:11So look, I launched Australia's first ever internet agency in 1998. And I think we often,
06:19we look at today and we think it's always been like it is today. And we think it will
06:23always be like it is today. And, you know, those two things are never true. And I literally,
06:27when we launched Australia's first internet agency, we honestly never thought you'd watch
06:30a video on a computer. You know, now, if you can't stream Netflix up in the air, flying
06:36over the Atlantic, you're annoyed. The wifi is down in a plane. It's like, what?
06:39Yeah, you're sending planes to the airline.
06:41Where 15 years ago, if someone had said to you, you'll have really high performance wifi
06:46in a plane and you can stream videos on your mobile phone, you'd say, don't be stupid.
06:49And I think it's exactly the same thing. I mean, you know, there is not a single thing
06:53that humans do that cannot be done better, faster and cheaper using generative AI. And
06:59that's already. And if you think about just the progress that the tools have made, if
07:03I look at Pencil, you know, when Pencil launched in 2018, one in 10,000 ads, you know, you
07:10could use. Today, it's 10 out of 10. And that's where we are. Just imagine where we're going
07:15to be in 12 months. If you take a tool like Midjourney in 2022, if you ask Midjourney
07:20to create an image of a woman, it was pretty terrible. It had seven fingers. It didn't
07:25really work. You know, 23 was not bad. 24, it's exceptional. You know, ChatGPT failed.
07:30ChatGPT 3 failed the New York bar exam in 2022, passed in the 90th percentile in 2023.
07:37So, you know, you've got all of these companies spending billions to make this better and
07:41better. And so the speed of progress is huge. And a few people have said, you know, that
07:47expression that we always massively overestimate the change we're going to see in two years
07:51and underestimate 10 years. I think maybe not this time. I think maybe in the next two
07:56years, we're going to see pretty remarkable change.
07:58So this big 10X we're seeing, what does that mean for three stakeholders? What does that
08:02mean, A, for people in advertising that used to make this, write this? What does that mean
08:06for brands? And then what does this mean for consumers like me, who's, you know, the
08:10ultimate target, frankly, of all this? Where are we going? You said, you know, two years
08:16ago, you know, ChatGPT failed the bar exam. Now it's just it's excelling. It's the
08:22rate of change is exponential and so fast. Where are we going?
08:25So, look, I think for brands, it's fantastic because you are able to create your content
08:30better, faster and cheaper. And so, you know, it's going to basically be an amazingly
08:35powerful and significant impact in marketing and advertising. I think for, you know,
08:41creative people and people in the industry, you know, the kind of the saying that, you
08:46know, it's not Gen AI that's going to take your job, but someone that is using it. You
08:50know, I think we're going to see the greatest creative revolution in history. If you look
08:54at what the mobile phone did, it turned every single person into a content creator. Like
08:58people now get up and create content who never would have thought of creating content
09:01before. Generative AI turns every single person into an advertising agency. So, you
09:06know, there are 60 million people today employed. Is that good for the world? Well, maybe
09:10not, but we'll see. But 60 million people, you know, work in the creator economy today
09:16and pretty much the same number of people work in the traditional advertising industry.
09:20Those jobs only exist because of the mobile phone. So I think we're going to see, you
09:24know, and the reason we call pencil pencil is we believe it's a tool for humans to use,
09:29not a replacement. And then what does it mean for individuals and people? I mean, you
09:33know, some of the things that digital advertising and marketing have done with
09:38technology are terrible. Like, you know, we'd buy a pair of sneakers and then they
09:42would follow us around the Internet for a week. Now, firstly, that's really annoying
09:46because I know you're following me. And secondly, I'm the last person who's going to
09:49buy that again. And so, you know, we've done some when I say we, not us, but the
09:54industry has done some really, really dumb things. But I think the potential for AI to
09:59actually create, you know, a much better, more targeted and more personalized. So we
10:03talk a lot about hyper personalization. You know, people that hate brands, they just
10:07aren't interested in some brands than they are in others. And they don't have advertising.
10:11They just don't want annoying. Yes. You know, bad, poor advertising. And if we get
10:16into the world, I think we'll be able to get into a world of hyper personalization
10:20where you're going to be able to understand much more about people and target them based
10:24on what they're genuinely interested in. You can almost head to sort of the perfect
10:27market where, you know, brands aren't spending a bunch of money annoying people.
10:33Platforms aren't creating big platforms that annoy people. And as an individual, you're
10:38actually only seeing things that you're interested in or would be interested in.
10:42I have a question with advertising and media. So, you know, the news media is in a paradox.
10:48I think I'm pretty sure that people have never read more in their lives and never read
10:53more news in the history of humankind. At the same time, the model is broken. Just look
10:58at what's happening to legacy media layoffs. Startups are failing. People are moving away
11:04from free digital advertising to memberships. I could go on for hours. What does this mean
11:10for media? And could this be a positive change or is this going to be another big hurdle
11:16for traditional news media to get around?
11:19So, look, I think, you know, if we fast forward 10 years, I think there'll be way more
11:24content. And I think we will look back on 2024 and go, do you remember when it was so
11:28easy? In exactly the same way as we look back to the old TV world and kind of remember it.
11:33So I think, you know, the rule of history is that there will be more and more content.
11:37But I think hopefully generative AI and AI will allow us to make much more sense of that
11:43content and whether that's us as individuals or us as companies.
11:46And I'm not sure if you saw Satya Nadella's annual letter to the Microsoft shareholders.
11:51He kind of said, and I'll paraphrase it, but, you know, we've spent decades organizing
11:55data into databases.
11:57But the one thing that's been missing is the ability to kind of reason and have
12:00intelligence over that data.
12:02And I think that's what we're going to get to.
12:04To be honest, I actually think generative AI is fairly neutral in terms of its impact
12:11on media. I think a much bigger disruption was the arrival of social media, was the
12:16explosion of mobile phones, because literally everybody went from, you know, reading a
12:21newspaper every day and sitting in front of a television to, you know, 90 percent of
12:25their time spent on a device they have in their pocket.
12:27And I think that was an enormous disruption for the media industry to cope with.
12:31I think gen AI is going to be much more neutral and will actually enable any business,
12:36no matter what you're doing, and potentially, in particular, if they adopt it super early
12:41and look at, well, how do we get ahead through gen AI, it could be a real positive.
12:45If you and I were, let's take a time machine way back.
12:47If you and I were 18 years old right now in university, hoping to get into the creative
12:52worlds of marketing, advertising, you name it, what do you think we're doing in four
12:57years? What's our skill sets?
12:59Like, what should people looking for a future in any kind of content creation, what
13:04skills they need and what do you see them doing?
13:06So, look, I think, you know, one of the most important skills today, as with any tool,
13:10it's the ability to prompt and to use the tools.
13:13So, you know, I think a lot of people, you know, sort of look at it as if there's going
13:18to be this is going to, like, remove everyone's job.
13:20And I think that's highly unlikely.
13:22It actually enhances humans because you can do so much more.
13:25And, you know, we created a brand in under an hour, end to end, everything from the name,
13:31the product design, the logo, e-commerce assets, the business plan, the press release.
13:35And so, you know, what was the bread?
13:38It's going to be announced, so I can't tell you.
13:41It's basically a cat brand that gives money, but it's a not for profit.
13:45And all of the money goes to putting girls into education.
13:49But we literally built the entire thing end to end in 59 minutes.
13:52And I think, you know, when you have that kind of potential, actually the ability to decide
13:58and to choose becomes much more important than the ability to create because you can create,
14:02you know, you almost have infinite creativity, you know,
14:05and so I would say much more about the prompting.
14:09So what are the prompting skills you need?
14:11If you put a poor prompt into a model, it will give you a poor outcome.
14:16If you put a great prompt into a model, it will give you a great outcome.
14:19So I think in the short term, you know, prompting is super interesting,
14:22but honestly the advice I would give people is sort of like, I give them two pieces of advice.
14:27Number one, it actually doesn't matter so much what you're doing, just be in that industry.
14:31You know, it's a bit like getting into anything in and around social media
14:34or anything in and around the internet.
14:36And the second one is just make sure that you're playing
14:38and learning and experimenting yourself.
14:40What role with this, you know, you said it's a tool.
14:43What role do humans will have in the process of creating this copy, this advertising,
14:48and what do we all have to watch out for?
14:50Because there's obviously risks when you're creating content, targeting, you name it.
14:55Like, what should we be cognizant of and where do humans sit in this kind of this timeline of,
15:01you know, coming up with a brand with the help of social media,
15:03I mean, with the help of generative AI, then, you know, letting it go wild in the public.
15:08Yeah, look, I think, you know, as a few people have said,
15:12making predictions is hard, especially about the future.
15:15If you ask me where I think the future of the industry plays out,
15:18I think 70% of it is going to be very much how, you know, the New York Stock Exchange
15:23or the NASDAQ or any of the kind of stock markets of the world play out today
15:28where it's all automated.
15:30So I don't think you'll have humans in the loop.
15:32I think you'll have humans outside of the loop.
15:34And it will be set up to connect content data and media in real time.
15:37It will optimize, it will change, it will reserve content, it will create content.
15:41And in much the same way, you know, you're in that world, you know,
15:44there used to be people sitting on trading room floors with bits of paper and phones
15:48and running around and no one does that anymore.
15:50But there's still a lot of people employed and doing very well in the finance industry.
15:55So I think about 70% of that is probably fully automated.
15:57And 30% will be high quality, high human involvement.
16:02I mean, we did a TV commercial in the UK for a brand called Hotel Chocolat.
16:07And it's all created through generative AI.
16:09And it was actually one of the most effective TV commercials in Great Britain last year.
16:14And so the ability to create content now using generative...
16:17And it was fully, it was a TV commercial and fully...
16:20TV commercial, it was ranked number one in the confectionery category, again, ahead of anyone else.
16:26And I think it was like the number eight most effective TV commercial of the year.
16:28It was like a cartoon?
16:29No, no, no, absolutely.
16:30It's basically Hotel Chocolat is a, as the name says on the tin, they make amazing hot chocolate and chocolate.
16:37And no, it's...
16:37So it's not like a hotel made of chocolate?
16:39No, it goes, it basically takes you through the whole journey of seeing the product
16:43and gorgeous chocolate and all the imagery.
16:46And it's pretty remarkable.
16:48And I think you're going to see that become the norm rather than become an exception.
16:52You got into this world in 2015.
16:55I mean, got into like AI is going to be the future of advertising.
16:58That was so early on.
17:01What kind of gave you the confidence to be like, I'm going to go all in on this technology that no one was talking about?
17:08We're talking like six years before Gen AI, sorry, when Chet Chidibe kind of like rocked the world and got the most downloads.
17:14This was almost like science fiction.
17:16What was the kind of beacon that got you into this?
17:19I'd look, I think I've spent my career sort of seeing things come along and seeing lots of people be cynical and then seeing it become huge.
17:25So, you know, whether it was internet in 1998 or mobile in 2011, I wrote a book on purpose back then.
17:35And then you see how something like that, you know, goes from being dismissed, becomes really massive and mainstream.
17:41And I think just the potential that it had.
17:43And that doesn't mean to say that it necessarily happens quickly, but we invested in AI chatbots in 2015.
17:50We created the world's first AI chatbot for an influencer for Kalani Hilliker.
17:55What was that like? What was the chatbot like?
17:57And I think this is the point.
17:58It's like if you stayed in kind of specific guardrails, it was really good.
18:02But once you moved out of that, we invested in a company called AI Foundation who built digital humans and they created Digital Deepak.
18:09And he went on Jimmy Kimmel and he led a guided meditation.
18:13And it's fantastic.
18:14Deepak Chopra.
18:15Yeah. But back then, this is probably 2018, once you got a little bit outside of what the AI was comfortable with, it kind of went spiral.
18:27We built MyMindTwin and it was in a meeting with one of our clients who asked me what my purpose was.
18:34And instead of talking about a proper purpose, he said my purpose in life was to have fun.
18:39So but I think you've seen it, whether it's AI data or AI media, you've seen all of these things make enormous progress.
18:45For the Forbes, our 100th anniversary issue, we had Warren Buffett on the cover holding the first issue of Forbes.
18:51And it was, remember AR, augmented reality?
18:55He held your phone up. It came alive.
18:57You could ask Warren questions.
18:58But again, he could only answer a very tight swim land of questions.
19:02He wouldn't tell you the purpose of life kind of.
19:04But I think we and so because we've been investing in the space since 2015 and learned a ton of lessons, seen what works, seen what didn't work.
19:12You know, and I was always looking for a platform that could do end to end advertising using Gen AI.
19:18And that's when, you know, Pencil and Will, who founded the company in 2018 and brought him into the fold.
19:25But, you know, I think we always look at the new technologies and are quite dismissive of them.
19:32It's sort of human nature. We don't like change.
19:34You know, if we look at it, we think it's actually going to be a really bad thing, not a really good thing.
19:39If you look in human history, every time humans have had great technology and I use technology in the broader sense, you know, whether it's the wheel, fire.
19:48The printing press, you know, most recently the mobile phone.
19:51We've done amazing things with it and I have no doubt it will be the same.
19:54There are clearly some issues that come with it, but I think overall it has an enormous potential to be a massive positive for humanity.
20:03When you come across a new technology or a new paradigm, if you will, do you have like a certain checklist or way of thinking about things where you're not?
20:10Because you've been on, you've been right about a lot of things throughout your career.
20:14Do you have a way to be like, obviously not fearful, but also not over-exuberant?
20:19Is there like what is your give me in your head?
20:20Because you've you've you've picked a lot of winners and you've seen where the media world is going for a long time, like around corners as a cliche goes.
20:28What is kind of your way of thinking?
20:29So you're not dismissive, but you're also not like this is a whole new.
20:33Yes. Look, I think I mean, I think it's it's a couple of pretty simple things.
20:37I mean, we have one set of criteria in terms of when we're looking at investing.
20:41But when it comes at looking at technology in general, I think it's actually just using common sense and going, do I think people are going to use this, do this?
20:51And so that's really like the common sense radar.
20:54I think there's a second one, which is, is this pretty frictionless?
20:58You know, we were very early investors in Niantic and created Pokemon Go.
21:02And at the time, John, the founder said that he thought AR would be bigger than VR because everyone had a device.
21:08And nobody thought that at the time.
21:09Back in 2015, everyone was on the VR train.
21:12And he was right. Everyone had the device.
21:13They created a really simple game and the world played it.
21:16Yeah. So, you know, secondly, is it kind of simple and frictionless?
21:19And I think thirdly is how quickly can this change?
21:24And if this changes, how big could it be?
21:26So if you look at all of the headsets that are coming out today, you know, they're making a lot of progress.
21:33But if you fast forward and imagine, imagine every single person on the planet could have a pair of glasses that can be normal, that can be augmented reality and that can be virtual reality.
21:41And they're absolutely seamless and they're not that expensive.
21:44Do we think the world would wear them?
21:46And probably it would replace the mobile phone.
21:48Yeah, absolutely. Now, if it's super heavy and uncomfortable, you feel like you look, frankly, nerdy.
21:54But but don't forget, you know, like mobile phones.
21:57There was a thing called Iridium, which was this giant satellite phone that worked all over the world and cost about $120,000, you know.
22:04And then obviously we all have one of those in our pocket now and it doesn't cost $120,000.
22:09And so I think that's the thing.
22:10I think we underrate that, you know, we underestimate just how good this is going to get.
22:15And I think we will we will no doubt do it again with generative AI.
22:19But it's sort of been the barometer for my career, which is like, you know, don't be stupidly naive and think we're going to make 100 percent of our revenue in this this year.
22:26But actually, if the technology evolves, is this something that could be completely game changing?
22:31Absolutely. I know you're an expert and you live in the worlds of advertising and branding.
22:35What does this jump mean for journalism, for novels, for music, for movies?
22:42What do you see the change coming?
22:43Do you see this as advertising is an early on thing and then is it going to spread to everything?
22:48Yeah, I mean, I think what's interesting about it, usually technologies, new technologies, the kind of, you know, the first use case or best use case isn't
22:55content and advertising and with generative AI it is.
22:58But I think the most important thing to understand about it is it's a horizontal, not a vertical.
23:05So pretty much every other thing that's come like social media is a vertical, you know, e-commerce, a vertical, metaverse, whereas this is a horizontal.
23:11And what that means is there's nothing that anyone in any industry does today that they can't do better, faster and cheaper help with generative AI.
23:19And if you just play around a little bit, you know, literally from, you know, what are the 10 questions you want to ask me?
23:25Based on everything I've said publicly for the last 10 years, you may not love exactly what it gives you, but I guarantee you'll be three or four on there for you, which you actually think are quite good.
23:35And one of one of my clients phoned me the other Sunday and said, David, you say this phrase a lot.
23:41I've got a big presentation to investors this week.
23:43I'd love you to, you know, just give me some some content.
23:46And I spent about an hour putting some stuff together.
23:48But I also then just did a quick prompt and said, hey, give me an answer this for me.
23:53And honestly, I mean, the two together was a great combination.
23:57But what I got from ChatGPT, I could have just sent that and they would have been really pleased.
24:03And I think you've got to get into this.
24:04Well, was the hour I spent on a Sunday worth it, worth the extra versus doing that?
24:09But there's nothing that you can't get help with, which is why I think it's going to be so game changing.
24:15This is moving so fast, the whole AI world, generative AI world, whole content world.
24:19How do you stay up on how you stay current on everything?
24:22How do you know? What do you read?
24:23Where do you get like your best insights about this, like ever changing world, ever changing AI world?
24:29So I think the first thing is you can't, you know, we're literally in a space.
24:32Are you a tech person? I know you're a tech person, but are you technical?
24:35No, I think I understand how people will use technology rather than how to build technology.
24:41So I've got a good radar for do you think people are going to use that?
24:44Will they do that? Will they not do that? Rather than could I build it?
24:47But I think, honestly, you can't keep up.
24:50And I think if you try, you'll kind of burn out.
24:52I think you want to you want to have, you know, eight, nine, ten sort of key sources you go to
24:57so that you're across most of the big things that are happening.
25:00But I think the other thing is just to be open minded and talk to people.
25:03I mean, you will know three things I don't know, and I'll probably know three that you don't know.
25:07You're very, you're very optimistic.
25:09No, I guarantee you.
25:10And we'll and we'll have that conversation.
25:12And I think, you know, the worst thing you can ever do is pretend that you have all the answers and you know everything.
25:17And, you know, people who want to appear smart like to do that.
25:21But you can't. You know, it's moving way too fast.
25:22If you're literally in a plane, you know, half of last week and you kind of you land and, you know, enormous things have happened.
25:30So and then I think just, you know, probably more important than that is just play with all the tools.
25:35You know, when you see that someone's launched something, just go have a little play.
25:39You don't need to spend a long time on it, but spend half an hour so that you understand how it works and how you use it.
25:45I think going out to play is a perfect spot to end this.
25:49I want to thank David Jones, the founder and CEO of Brandtech Group.
25:52David, thank you so much.
25:53It's a pleasure.