Transcript 0:00 [upbeat music] Welcome back to Tasteland. I am your co-host, Francis Zehr. And I'm Daisy Alioto. And Daisy, who are we speaking with today? Today, we're talking to Dani Loftus. 0:16 She's a founder, writer, and investor focused on the digital evolution of culture, specifically fashion, and she also edits Dirt's, uh, Instagram-native magazine for creative complaining, AKA ICK. 0:32 And- Can we get some ews in the chat?... we are definitely gonna talk about ICK today. Yeah. Ew. Get some ew. [laughs] Um- Bah. Um- I'm really excited to talk with her. She's a fascinating person. 0:44 She also just moved to New York from London, and- Oh... um, before that was in Mexico City for a long time. So she might have some, some interesting, uh, anecdotes about moving continents in the year 2025. Mm. Yeah. 0:58 A complicated thing. Um- [laughs] I feel like I haven't talked to you in, like, a month. It's been, it's been a busy week. I was in New Orleans for ONA, Online News Association conference. 1:08 Um, spoke on a panel there, but what sticks most in my memory, of course, is the food. And you had your birthday while you were down there. I had my birthday. Uh- And what did you eat to celebrate your birthday? 1:17 Well, I went with my friend, um, one of my couple good friends who, who still lives down there, uh, to Evviva. Mm-hmm. E-V-V-I-V-A. I would highly recommend to anyone visiting New Orleans. 1:30 Um, I'd wanted to go because my favorite restaurant when I lived there was Margie's Grill, which is their whole thing was, like, Southeast Asian meat, Southern, the barbecue of both. 1:42 Um, like s- you know, grilled pork shoulders with, like, Thai dipping sauce and herb wraps, et cetera. But this place, um, that place closed down, but the chef owner is now a chef at this place, Evviva. 1:52 So we had, like, all sorts of seafood, you know, grilled and draped in herbs and lemon. Um, maybe the best bite there was some frog legs, which- Wow... have you ever had frog legs, Daisy? 2:06 I actually haven't, but not from- Disgust? Yeah, like, uh, nobody's ever offered one to me. Yeah. I would eat one. Well, you don't see them- I would eat, like, anything. I'm not picky at all. Yeah. 2:15 You never really see them. I mean, you see them a lot in New Orleans. I feel like- Yeah... outside of New Orleans, you don't see them that much. 2:20 Um, it's one of those things that's like, yeah, it tastes like chicken, whatever. Um, it was so insane that they were, like, so impossibly tender- Mm-hmm... like silky strands of white meat, again, in herbs, 2:34 drips of lemon on there. I also had a delicious- Just all the preparation. All the prep- Yeah... [laughs] all, all the preparation. 2:39 Um, also had a delicious pickled watermelon rind martini, which I've had plenty- That sounds really good... of gimmicky martinis. There's an epidemic of gimmicky martinis. Um, but this one was exceptional. 2:51 That sounds really delicious. Um- Mm-hmm... again, regretting podcasting through my lunch hour, but [laughs] Sorry. 3:00 Uh, well, I saw in the notes you highlighted one of my tweets, so you want me to defend this, or- I, no, I don't want you to defend it. I think it's a good tweet. 3:06 Um, I, I, I thought, I saw this graph, and it's absolutely shocking. I don't know, maybe Tom will, will make a clip out of this. We'll see. Mm. 3:14 But basically it was, it's, the, the gist of this is that high-income Americans, which I believe means people making over $200,000 a year, high-income Americans are behind roughly half of all US consumer spending, up from about a third in the early 1990s. 3:31 Um, well, so that's the tweet you're quote tweeting. It's, it, which is insane. Like, that is such an insane, insane statistic, which, but makes sense, I guess. 3:37 You know, those with more money will spend more money on, on consumption. Um, but what is your take on this tweet? 3:45 Well, I, I had already seen that stat floating around, and I did literally sent, like, a 10-minute voice memo about it to [laughs] Natasha and Dina, which got, like, 3:55 the beginning of it got screenshotted and put on Twitter. But, like- Mm... um, I started thinking about this around, like, the cost of the US Open tickets, 'cause I was like- Mm. Yeah... who is buying these? 4:06 Um- It was, like, $3,000 for the cheapest ticket to the final or something. Right, 'cause you hear, like, the majority of Americans are, you know, one medical bill away from being broke. Mm-hmm. 4:17 But then you're also, like, supposed to believe that a significant portion of the population could afford, like, thousands of dollars of US Open tickets. Well, not a significant portion though, right? 4:28 Well, a meaningful portion though, right? Mm. I think, 4:31 I think gerrymandering is a good word for this because, like, if your vote gets gerrymandered, you, uh, basically end up in a situation where, like, yes, you still have one vote, but your vote does not matter. Mm-hmm. 4:45 And the economy has historically responded to people voting for, with their dollar, but if all the spending has been gerrymandered up into 4:54 a smaller portion of the population, then, like, people can't vote with their dollar anymore, which has actually been a really, a big source of change in America in the past, and I think that's, like, 5:06 it's almost equally as dangerous, right? Mm. Because if this 10%- Well, wait, let me... So, so, so the tweet you wrote here was that American- Yeah... 5:13 consumption is being gerrymandered by people with the worst taste imaginable. We have to rebuild the media infrastructure that keeps their crassness in check. 5:19 But I think to, to, to put it in terms, um, to make sure I'm understanding this right, like, basically my, you know, joke about the, a, an epidemic of gimmick martinis earlier, it's like there's an epidemic of gimmick martinis and all these food publications writing about them because there are people in large cities spending a lot of money at expensive restaurants on gimmicky martinis, which then makes people write about gimmicky martinis, which then makes everybody think they have to be drinking gimmicky martinis, something like that. 5:52 Right, and also, like, advertisers are only interested in magazines that talk to these high spenders. Mm-hmm. 6:02 And so the magazines and newsletters are incentivized to-Speak to their taste, but having finally finished Empire of the Elite, that's really not the way that it used to work at all. Hmm. 6:12 Like, I think everything is cyclical, right? But, like, part of the reason Graydon Carter was hired to be the editor of Vanity Fair was because he had Spy, which made fun of these people. Hmm. 6:23 And it was influential because it made fun of them. 6:26 And then, of course, he started at Vanity Fair, and part of what happens when you have to, like, cover the elite from more of the inside is you start, you start to get worn down, and you're, like, less hard on them. 6:37 Mm-hmm. So then what's supposed to happen is somebody else is supposed to come up and make fun of you and make fun of, um, the establishment and swing the pendulum back. 6:47 But if the power of American spending gets so entrenched with the top 10%, um, not all of them are tasteless, a lot of them are, then you sort of lose that, like, fourth estate of culture because it's like who's gonna fund the people making fun of rich people and kind of like keeping- Mm-hmm... 7:05 them honest, in check, and, like, frankly insecure about whether they're surrounding themselves with enough people who are actually genuinely creating new stuff, edgy stuff. 7:16 [smacks lips] Um, and that has historically been the role of the media, and you can see that cycle in Conde Nast. Like, um, they were too late in adapting to, um, consumer... Like, 7:28 the reason Tina Brown came in and was able to unseat, um, the person who was running Vanity Fair- Mm... 7:33 before is, like, they were too late to the new consumer taste of the '80s, which was really crass compared to the previous era. 7:41 Uh, so they came in and catered to it, but they were to a certain extent also to keeping it in check. 7:46 And now it's like it's really run amok, and if the pendulum can swing back, it's gonna swing back really, really, really hard to hipsterdom because of that. But I, uh, I bet Dani has some thoughts on that. Oh, yeah. 7:58 Let her in. Let's let her in. [upbeat music] When Dani came in, Daisy, you were saying that this is going to create a return to hipsterdom. Mm-hmm. What do you mean when you say hipsterdom in this context? 8:14 You mean, like, people choosing alternative culture that's, that doesn't require as much spending? Um, I... It's kinda like the W. 8:21 David Marx thing of, like, people start making really weird stuff, and it eventually gets integrated into the mainstream. Like, the pendulum will swing back to, like, the people making weird eligible stuff. 8:34 'Cause my theory, and I don't know how you would, like, put this in economic terms, is, like, rich people eventually get sick of their own bullshit, and they always have this insecurity of, like, "Everyone's having fun without me." 8:47 Mm-hmm. Like, it literally doesn't matter if you're Elon Musk and you own Twitter, like, there is this, like, really guiding, like, emotional force in him that's like, "Everyone's having fun without me." 8:56 And so, like, when rich people get sick of their own bullshit and, like, each other and, like, Surf Lodge and whatever- [laughs]... they're always like, "Okay, what are the poors up to?" Mm-hmm. Right? 9:06 Because, like, nothing is more validating than to be able to go back down and LARP with artists who are genuinely, like, working class, struggling, creating weird stuff. Mm-hmm. 9:20 Well, this is the classic cycle of, like, a nightclub, right? Where, like, at first it's people who are in a scene who come- Mm-hmm... 9:25 and spend their money, and then, like, 10 years, like, 10 years later, they're barely there anymore, and it's all bridge and tunnel- Or like-... people, sort of thing... artist gentrification. 9:33 I mean, Dani, like, I'm sure you have an interesting perspective on, like, what, how this went down in, like, Mexico City. 9:38 But, like, Williamsburg now has a Chanel, and it was already on its second or third wave of gentrification by the time I moved to New York. But, like, 9:50 in, if you look at it in, like, a city, um, as, like, a microcosm of the economy, like, artists go where they can afford, and then they make it cool, and rich people follow. Mm-hmm. 10:00 Like, that cycle happens, you know, with everything. 10:03 But the problem is, like, in media or in a city, if nothing is inexpensive anymore, like, where do those people go to even, like, create the stuff that's gonna get rich people looking around and saying, "Wait, something fun is going on over here. 10:20 I need to, like, be involved"? I think the thing that's very interesting about what you say is I'm wondering if the framing applies only to people who are rich who have, let's say, a degree or a touch of liberal values. 10:34 Mm. So, like, let's say you frame it in WASPs. Mm-hmm. WASPs, no matter what, are not going to be like, "You know what I'd love to do? Sit in a dive bar in Brooklyn." [laughs] Mm. 10:44 Similar way, like aristocrats, another example. Or, like, the first thing that came into my head was when I went to Korea, and I thought, because I think what I see as somebody who indexes for, like, cool- Mm-hmm... 10:59 over consumer spend, I was like, "Korea's gonna be sick. I've seen all of this edgy stuff. It's gonna be sick." It actually is the place with the highest concentration of luxury stores. Hmm. 11:11 And we see K-pop, we see a degree of like, oh, cool, hot, cultural edge, but actually in reality, the style is incredibly preppy. And I watched an entire Korean reality... not reality TV show, but, like, 11:26 Gossip Girl-esque TV show before going, and actually it's incredibly regimented. It's very preppy. It's very flaunting of wealth. So I don't... And, like, you know, when I think... 11:37 I grew up in London, so yes, of course, there are a degree of what we like to call them in London, which is Trustafarians. Mm. So people whose family have insane amounts of money, but they like to go to Notting Hill. 11:50 And I think also the difference between England and America is we have something called the poorer you look, the richer you are. 11:57 If you come from an incredibly wealthy family, in general, it's very cool to talk about how you can't afford anything- [laughs]... 12:03 and, like, be a bit grubby, but then, you know, you fly off on the weekend to your parents' island in Mustique.Whereas in the US we're not, we don't, we don't quite do that yet. 12:11 And I wonder if it's also something cultural, where people who are ultra-conservative or exist in countries which have maybe newer money or conservative value systems will never tend towards hipsterdom 12:28 because that simply isn't even seen as cool or interesting, and it's actually ostentatious flaunting of wealth after flaunting of wealth. I would, I would push back on that. 12:40 At least, you know, I went to a small liberal arts college in, in Portland, Oregon, and, you know, there's these kids who dress like shit and would skateboard barefoot, longboard barefoot around on campus. 12:53 And then those are the kids who, you know, w- whose parents were paying the full price of admission and yet they were leaving with no student debt, right? 12:59 And, I don't know, maybe, maybe there's differences here on, on the East Coast, but, like, there for sure it was like, oh, the grimiest kid who is like, again, skateboarding barefoot for no reason, like, they perhaps have the most money. 13:14 Well, I think- Mm... that, but you're, I think you're agreeing though on the sort of like grubbiness as a signal. Yeah. 13:22 I would say with the WASP thing, at least in the United States, WASPs historically would mingle with poor creative types in the educational environment. Mm. So, like, they would go to the Ivy League schools- Mm... 13:34 and the little Ivy League schools, and then they would fall in with the Bohemians who were the scholarship students. 13:42 And they would stay together kind of socially throughout their lives with some sort of benefactor relationship. So- Some patronage. Yeah. 13:51 Like, what really brought this to mind for me was, like, this Wall Street Journal article about, um, people sitting in the Hamptons panicking about Zohran- Mm... 13:58 Mamdani becoming mayor of New York because he's a socialist. And historically, like champ- champion socialists and WASPs were, like, partying together. 14:07 They were all friends because they would've met at, like, Harvard or Princeton. And you, if you were the champion socialist, you were the poor friend, but you were also, like, the entertainment because you were- Mm... 14:17 like writing novels or whatever for your rich friends to read, participate in, or like- Well, what I, I feel like the, sorry Dan, for a second. I feel like the, uh, the, the ba- the, 14:27 the s- barefoot skateboarder, uh, [laughs] that's what I was looking for. The barefoot skateboarder, like, they're the type too who's gonna make you Venmo for the happy hour beer, right? 14:35 Like, there's, there's like- Oh, my God. Yeah... there's the separation of the patronage. Totally. But, like, I went to college with Zohran in one of those environments that has historically mixed 14:47 poor and richer people who will sort of like kind of stay in touch as time goes on. 14:55 And because of that, like, WASP value of like being on the museum board or being a patronage of the arts or really valuing education, it kinda gives this illusion of, like, upward mobility, but it's kind of like that every wealthy social circle has these, like, Bohemian ride-alongs. 15:11 And so, like, for these people in the Hamptons to be panicking about Zohran, it's like I know those people, like, aren't old money because nobody who's old money would be genuinely threatened by 15:22 somebody who's basically a champion socialist who went to college with Kennedys, like, which we did. Um, so it's this weird, like, it's new money, new values, and new spending habits, and I don't know. You're right. 15:37 Like, can, do people with conservative values just tune it out? And if that's the case though, why are they so, like, up in arms about Cracker Barrel or, like, Super Bowl commercials that, like, don't reflect 15:53 what they want the world to look like? Like, if you're a mega-church pastor living in middle America and you have millions of dollars, like, who cares? I think though there's a- Mm... 16:05 always this desire for the approval of the artistic class. Mm. Whether they'll admit it or not. You mean, what do you mean? So when you say about, like, the Cracker Barrel or something, who cares? 16:19 You're saying, like, why does the person who has the wealth and power care about this thing? 16:23 I w- I'm saying, like, even if they have conservative values, there's some part of them that, like, wants to be able to buy a Rothko. 16:31 You know, like right now, for so long, like, in the US it was that Republicans have political power but leftists had cultural power. 16:40 Now they're using the power of the state to try to make sure they have cultural power too by capturing, like, media- Mm... and podcasts and brands and stuff that has historically been, like, really liberal. 16:52 Um, but like there's only so much you can do, right? You can't stop somebody from going up on the stage at the Emmys and saying, "Fuck ICE." Mm-hmm. 17:01 And the richer they get, I think the angrier they get that they even have to see that. Because money- Mm... should be able to buy everything. Right. Money should be able- Mm... 17:10 to buy everything, but money can't buy other people thinking that you're cool, and that's why no matter how... [laughs] Dani disagrees. To, to a degree. [laughs] I mean, 17:22 there are definitely people who have bought their way into being cool, but I understand what you, what you mean. This is actually a great segue from- Also what you're saying, maybe... 17:29 my Daisy rant to something that I wanted to talk to you about, about, with you, Dani. 17:33 You told me about this book that I had actually never heard of that's being reissued with Apartamento, which I think is an incredible magazine and brand. Mm. And it's called Fashion Victim? Happy Victims. 17:44 Oh, Happy Victims. Okay. It's next to me. Tell us about this book because I actually think- I think it's beautiful... there's an interesting- Love the cover... consumer story here. 17:50 So I mean, first of all, I think the thing that's very important, um, is that I have, like, a problem where I have to buy clothes all the time. 17:57 [laughs] And I have been in, like, an extreme shame cycle because I'm living with my partner for the first time, and he's witnessed the problem. 18:06 [laughs] And, like, I feel very judged for it.And I think also to clarify, I'm not always buying clothes, but there's something that I feel incredibly, find incredibly cathartic- Mm-hmm... 18:17 and stimulating at the same time about understanding where everything I want is, and bidding on it, and seeing how cheaply I can get it. And like, it's what I do when I need to switch my brain off. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. 18:28 Like, when I'm doing the other things that I enjoy, like reading, watching films, consuming culture, I feel like I need to be taking stuff away 24/7. 18:38 I'm like, I have situations multiple times where I'm like, "Oh, I'm reading this, but my brain can't adequately process it. How am I gonna remember the information? I need to skip onto something else. My brain is fried." 18:48 Like, that happens to me a lot. The process of looking at clothes and then finding them very cheaply, no... There is no mental energy exerted there. Mm. 18:58 It's, it's a little bit like going on Tumblr in a way that's active with, like, some type of financial component. Um, I am also... I also like, think clothes are an art form. Mm-hmm. 19:11 Um, so the reason that this book, this kind of brings it onto why this book is very appealing to me. 19:18 So basically, it's called Happy Victims, and it is by a photographer whose name I am now ab- about to, like, grossly mispronounce. [laughs] But his name is Kiyochika Suzuki. Mm. And 19:32 it starts with a beautiful quote that I'm about to find, which is, "There is a kind of accepted hierarchy of collecting in society. At the top are books and fine art, then music, cars, and so on. 19:45 Clothes and shoes come at the bottom. Collectors of clothes don't command much respect, but I have great admiration for these people. That's why I call them happy victims." Mm. 19:54 "Many are shy young kids, and this is like a salvation for them." Mm. And I'm like, "Wow, I've never felt more seen." 20:00 Um, so essentially he went around Japan photographing people who live in these tiny apartments who are dedicated to the collection of clothes, often just by a single designer. Mm. 20:12 So it's images of these tiny apartments, and then the person will have a collection of Alexander McQueen, like, strewn all over the floor that is probably worth three years of their rent. 20:24 And they are really ascribing to the cult of the designer, and it's also resonant for me because I think because of the pure nature of fashion, because we have, you know, the one end we have Shein, at the other hand we have Alexander McQueen, you know, Jean-Paul Gaultier, et cetera, et cetera. 20:44 And because fashion is or has been inherently tied to the body or physical, or physical form, it's seen as inherently superficial in a way that fine art collection is not. Mm. And I personally disagree with that. 20:56 I think there is insane quantities of craft in fashion at the top end. 21:00 I think just because buying fashion at the bottom end is common because there is a degree of physiological necessity to wearing clothes that there isn't with art, it doesn't negate the fact that you could go to Times Square and pick up a $15 21:16 painting or grab something in SoHo for $15, and that is still art. 21:20 But because fine art collection is so much more common, and also fine art collectors have developed so much more of a narrative, not to mention the fact that historically fashion collection and consumption has been seen as a traditionally female collector form, and thus has been further denigrated, that it's not still actually 21:42 a form of collection that should be respected. Mm. 21:44 Well, it's almost like, like f- uh, if you're comparing it to fine art, it's like fashion collection is like photography collection in that there's, there's usually multiples. 21:52 In fashion, usually much many more multiples than in photography. In fine art photography, usually it's quite a limited print run, right? Whereas with a painting, there's only one of each painting. 22:01 Um, I, I mean, I think that's part of it too, right? I think it is. But then, you know, saying that, I have, like, a couple of... First of all, I have a couple of pieces that, like, there are three of them. Yeah. 22:11 Um, and I also think for me, like, the kick with anything is like, I like to find stuff that I know is worth a bunch of money that nobody else knows about. The RealReal absolutely crushes for that. 22:25 Like, first of all- Mm... I will not buy a mainstream luxury brand ever from, at full price. Yeah. 22:33 I think it is absolutely nuts that anyone does that anymore when you have The RealReal, you have Vestiaire Collective, you have eBay. Like, come on. Then it's also about finding archive pieces. 22:44 Like, I have a, I have, like, quite a lot of stuff that I bought for, like, $200 that I see is being sold for $3,000. Mm-hmm. 22:52 And as my mom always said, I would be a great vintage dealer if I wasn't obsessed with keeping everything. 22:58 [laughs] Um, and, you know, with those pieces it will be like, you know, I have stuff from, like, early John Galliano when he was at Dior. Mm-hmm. 23:07 And obviously whoever was selling it didn't know how much it was worth, but in the same way as when you're collecting a fine art piece, it's imbued with the history of the piece 23:15 and then the trajectory of the artist or creative who made it. 23:19 Um, there's also obviously a thing where, because in general the way that you display fine art is static, if I have an art piece or, like, I have an art piece over here on my wall, 23:29 it being on my wall probably does not mean that it's going to get broken or it's going to atrophy over time, whereas every single time I wear a piece of clothing, it is being ruined. Mm-hmm. Mm. But I still like... 23:43 I don't know, just [objects clattering]. That's so cool. But so- It's so good... 23:47 Dani, with, you said The RealReal, Vestiaire Collective, like, are you still relying on the arbitrage play of the person not knowing what they're selling? And like, has the internet made it harder? 23:58 Because now, like, people can use AI or ChatGPT to identify stuff. Like, is it harder to find things that are underpriced? No, it's all about, it's all about understanding the consumer base and knowing where to look. Mm. 24:08 So great example is The RealReal. Obviously, The RealReal is the American market, but when I think of a RealReal consumer, I think of, like, Hampton's mum. 24:18 Mm.So if you are looking for stuff like Ralph Lauren, or Khaite, or Tory Burch, or Chanel, that stuff is high-priced. Mm-hmm. If you're looking for avant-garde fashion, 24:32 way, way underpriced, like Comme des Garcons, Ann Demeulemeester, Rick Owens. People in the US who shop on The RealReal clearly do not know how much that is worth. Mm. So that's being undersold. 24:42 If you go on Grailed, that's being o-oversold. And then it's like other stuff, like Depop is very, very much Gen Z trend focused, so everything Y2K there is now massively overpriced. 24:54 Um, Vivienne Westwood corsets, no way. And then you also have interesting stuff, like I think, could be wrong on this, but I think eBay is much bigger in the UK than it is in the US. You can get crazy... 25:07 Like this is a Vivienne Westwood T-shirt that I got from eBay for probably 80 pounds. I just saw it sold- it selling on US eBay for $500. Wow. So it's like, it's understanding where people are going for stuff. 25:25 If I wanted to be... And Vestiaire Collective, Vestiaire Collective is very good for European brands. Mm. And I also think it's platform dynamics, so like The RealReal like screws sellers over like mad. 25:36 Like it, it's actually nuts. Like I've never sold anything there, but I know from the price I'm buying stuff, like how much are you giving these people, like 50p from like the stuff they're selling? Mm. 25:48 Like I got a pair of older Statesman tracksuit bottoms the other day, which are full cashmere, retail price $2,000 for $200. Like what? And they, they were in pristine condition. So it's like, it's, it's wild. Mm-hmm. 26:05 It speaks also to the oversupply of fashion. And then the other thing that you have to understand to kind of hack the system is which platforms accept binding offers and which don't. Mm. 26:15 So Vestiaire Collective, for example, you can bid, and if people accept your bid, you don't have to buy it. So like that's also what I do, I'm like, "Okay, I could... How much could I get this for?" 26:25 And then I don't go through with the transaction. Yeah. 26:28 Um, eBay does not do that, so I have, I did once make a mistake where I bid, like I low-balled bid it, bid something just to see, and then it was like, "This much money has been taken out your account." 26:38 And I was like- [laughs] "Oh. Oh. Oh." One thing, really quick- That happened... 26:43 one, one thing with The RealReal as I understand it, I've never sold on The RealReal, but like you just mail them the stuff, and then they photograph, photograph it and sell it for you, right? 26:50 Whereas Grailed, which I've sold on Grailed, like y-you, you have to do all that. That's all on your end. 26:54 So like of course you are also going to then put it at a higher price because like you feel like you're selling it more directly, a little less mediated, whereas The RealReal is so mediated, and so also the people who are selling there probably don't really care so much about getting a buck back for it. 27:09 They just wanna get rid of it and like get a little bit for it, for it back without like really any money. That's why The RealReal's a bad business though. They've taken on all the costs of custodying everything. 27:18 Um, it's actually better to do the decentralized consumer tools for selling it yourself, in my opinion- Mm... and then be the platform discovery. But The RealReal also set the price for you. Mm. 27:30 So like Grailed or Vestiaire or eBay, you set the price. Mm-hmm. The RealReal set the price, and then as I know as a consumer, they drop the prices. So like 27:40 what I'll do is I'll set an alert for something knowing that they are gonna drop the price by $50 like every week. Yeah. Did The RealReal IPO? I remember that was like a big conversation. They did. I think so. 27:52 They IPO'd and then they... Give us the numbers. It's... Okay, so basically they've, the stock has diminished like 65% since they IPO'd. 28:03 Well, I also think some of this is like dynamics around people were shopping a lot during COVID. The pan- Did, is that when The RealReal went public? No, they IPO'd in 2019, so I guess like right before. 28:18 Were people shopping a lot during COVID? Well, they were buying certain types of things, right? 28:23 Like we had Andy Hunter on our last episode, who runs bookshop.org, which is, it aggregates stock from indie booksellers to compete with Amazon. Ooh. Um, and COVID was great for them. 28:35 Also, like you have to remember there was that bump of, um, crypto wealth during that period. Oh, true. This was like Clubhouse era, and people getting like their stimulus checks and their Bored Ape Yacht Club checks. 28:51 [laughs] So I do think people were buying stuff, yeah. But you think they were... 'Cause from my understanding, they were buying loungewear- Mm... 29:03 and then they were, I mean, this is why we had a whole digital asset boom. Because people were buying things that they could use to get the same kind of validation that they get wearing a new physical outfit out. Mm. 29:15 So they were buying things that gave them acceleration in, in digital worlds, or accelerated their status. And then I feel like they were really treating themselves at home with like beauty and loungewear- Yeah... 29:29 and candles. I mean, with the exception of me, who bought, I bought a massively underpriced Christopher Kane- [laughs]... 29:34 like gown, which also by the way is completely usefu- useless because it's white and it looks like a wedding dress, so I can't even wear it- [laughs]... to weddings. 29:42 Um, but I had it on a mannequin behind me, and I would look at it every day when I was locked in my house- That's nice... and I'd be like, I'd be like, "Oh, one day-" Well, I, uh, Tom Bechert- "... you and I"... 29:51 um, in his newsletter content today, um, who he was the VP of creative and content at Essence up until a year ago, I believe, right? Um, he published this newsletter today, what really happened to Essence. 30:02 I'm not behind the paywall, so I can't read the whole thing. Ooh. But this was on my mind today, where he was saying, um, uh, what, what was it? 30:08 I mean, fashion e-com in general has cooled after being red hot during the pandemic, which- Mm... 30:12 again, I'm not behind the paywall, so I didn't read it all, but I immediately thought of that when he said something about like were people really buying during the pandemic? 30:18 Um, I would trust him to have known that having been at Essence, right? Oh, please send this to me because I, first of all, I am like-I love Essence, obviously. 30:28 Um, I also read something before they were going bankrupt, which was to do with the fact that they massively disenfranchised, -ized emerging designers because the whole way they even make money is through the consistency- Hmm. 30:39 That Blackbird Spy Plane piece, that was so good. Yeah. Yeah, that's, that was- Yeah... Blackbird Spy Plane's, like best thing they've ever written. Exactly. 30:46 And I mean, it's hard because Essence obviously needs to make money. The reason I like Essence is because they pioneer emerging designers- Mm-hmm... 30:54 who, you know, probably very hard for them to get visibility in other places. It's also a very different consumer base than like a Bergdorf or a Saks Fifth Avenue or a Net-a-Porter or a Moda Operandi. 31:04 But nonetheless, it's shitty. Like, starting a fashion brand is incredibly hard. It's incredibly resource intensive. Mm-hmm. And it's very hard to make the numbers add up regardless. [upbeat music] Okay. 31:22 Well, okay. So, so, so to get back into it, um, I did wanna talk... Is it Doji? Doji? You wrote about it. Yeah. Doji. I was gonna... Actually, that was gonna be my transition as well. Mm-hmm. 31:31 Like, Danny, you wrote about Doji before the Essence bankruptcy was announced. Like, what, what role do platforms like Doji play and what, the, the space that Essence used to occupy? Well, what, what is Doji too? 31:46 For, for any listeners who, who aren't aware. 31:48 For me too, I've never used it, so to me it's like, oh, this is a place where it's like this kind of AI-enabled thing where you can pick a piece of clothing, let's say you're on Essence shopping, and you can say, "Oh, well, what would that look like on me?" 31:59 And then you can like... It'll apply it to your avatar. This is my understanding of Doji. Yeah. I think first of all what I'll say as a caveat is Doji and all of these companies in the AI try-ons space are very early. 32:11 So I think part of the bets around the way that they are raising, like Doji, for example, $14 million- Wow... is not based on what they are today, but also based on the way that they can pivot and what they can become. 32:21 So that's like my, my disclaimer for anyone who listens to this in the next six months where it may have completely changed. 32:27 But what it started off as was a app that allowed brands to increase conversion rate via virtual try-on. Mm-hmm. So 32:38 what it does is you take 12 images of yourself, it makes a virtual avatar of you, you can try on any piece from any clothing brand, and then there's a click-through to that, that clothing brand, that shop. 32:52 Um, and it's interesting because I think I've been in the fashion tech space for like five years now, so quite a long time, and when I first started, this was all being done with augmented reality. Mm-hmm. 33:04 And during the pandemic, the amount that there was like waxing lyrical about like how people being able to see an augmented reality fashion piece on themselves was completely changing the game for returns- Yeah... 33:16 and conversion. Like Shopify posted these like insane statistics, I don't know where they got them from, around like how many people converted after seeing themselves in AR. And even like 33:27 me, who like started off as doing like a lot of, you know, digital fashion work, you know, I have an Instagram called This Outfit Does Not Exist where I wear virtual clothes, all of that, I was kinda like, 33:38 I personally have, have never been sold seeing something in AR on myself. Mm-hmm. Mm. This is nuts. And I think the other thing that's important to note is returns are 33:51 a multi-billion dollar problem for fashion retailers. If you can crack that, you're crushing it. People have been trying to crack that for 15 years, and one of the biggest problems is size and fit. Mm-hmm. 34:02 So it doesn't actually matter if, let's say, Daisy could see that that fuchsia blazer is gonna look fantastic with her skin tone if it arrives to her house and it doesn't fit her. 34:11 And no company, including Doji, is actually solving that problem. I agree. Yeah. So it's a very, it's a very interesting space. 34:21 And the thing that I'm interested to see is, like, you know, one of the things I said candidly to Dorian was, I was like, "It's obviously sick-" Mm. "... that I can try on anything. That is great." 34:31 Is, is Dorian the founder of Doji? Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Um, so sick that I can try anything on, but quite frankly, when I first got Doji like six months ago, I used it, uh, I was obsessed with it. 34:44 I used it every day, like my ego, my vanity kicked in. I was like, "Look, it's me, but I'm hotter and thinner and taller, and I'm wearing like so much Rick Owens. I'm the best." [laughs] And then, 34:54 you know, now am I using it when I show up? Not really. And I think there needs to be some additional incentive. Like, if I knew that if I bought something through Doji I would get 5% off- Hmm... 35:07 or if I shared an image of myself wearing it, I got a discount, I think that kind of- 5% off... push is needed for consumer behavior, unless they pivot it into like something like, um, the company 35:21 Jenny Wang founded, who I also know, I think it's Alta, is doing- Mm-hmm... which I think their thing is building a Clueless closet. Mm-hmm. Which I think 35:29 potentially has more of a business case, because the thing that is obviously incredibly long to do is go into your closet, photograph everything, and have a virtual stylist who takes your clothes and then, and then helps you to style things. 35:43 I think that, that's like a very arduous task- Mm... to begin with. 35:47 But you could then quite easily plug into sites like Essence, Net-a-Porter, and Moda Operandi, where every single time something got bought, it could go into your closet. 35:56 And then hypothetically, number one, it could help you with styling, but then I could go into one of your closets and maybe make bids on your clothes. Mm-hmm. 36:02 So to me, there's more of a business case for something like that at this point-Than just, just virtual try-on or virtual styling. Yeah. Yeah. 36:12 I mean, for me too, like, w- there- every- I own three shirts from this one brand that are all the same model of shirt, but from different years and in different fabrics, and they all fit me slightly differently. 36:23 And, like, the shoulder seam is a l- is a little more dropped on this one, a little higher on this one, right? 36:27 And so having wasted so much money [laughs] over the past decade plus buying clothes online and returning them or selling them on Grailed for a loss or whatever, um, thinking I- that they would fit or that they would look good on me, and like, learning that lesson over and over, it's like there's, I- there's zero reason for me to trust the try-on thing. 36:44 Like, to me, it's, it's a little different from, like, when I was a teenager playing World of Warcraft and, like, wanting the specific set of armor for my character c- because I thought it would look cool, right? 36:53 Like that, the, the Doji to me is more similar to that than it is, like, a practical tool for my shopping. 36:58 Like, now I'm much more, like, interested in going to the physical store and trying stuff on and only spending the money if I've, if I've tried the thing on in person and seen, seen that it would fit, because I, I just can't bear to, like, spend another... 37:11 lose another $100 having to resell something I bought and then immediately resell it, right? 37:16 Um, but yeah, to me it's much more, like, Doji is much more akin to a video game experience than any practical shopping experience. 37:24 I think, I mean, the thing that I'll say, which obviously I caveated at the beginning, is Dorian and his co-founder I really think are incredible founders. Mm-hmm. 37:32 I think that they are in the very, very, very tiny slither of people who hit the sweet spot between technical expertise and actually having taste, and the fact that they have $14 million means that they can pivot this. 37:49 They can try to pi- it, you know, they could literally directly compete with something like Alta. Mm-hmm. They could work on fit tech. 37:57 They could, they, like, I think the $14 million inve- um, investment was very much a potential bet, and given what they built with $1.5 million or $2 million that they raised initially, I do think the things that we're dis- discussing are very much directions in which they could go. 38:13 Yeah. Well, so, like- Um-... 38:14 ways they could go that I see to, that, that would make it more practical to me is, like, one, maybe every month or quarter or whatever, you're prompted to do, like, some full body scan that you can do with your phone that, like, more accurately represents, you know, the full 3D nature of your body, and then anything that they are... 38:30 Like, maybe they're partnering with retailers, say, in essence, who has a huge stock of all these clothing, they're partnering with them and, like, they're also doing, like, full scans of all those clothing to get the actual dimensions. 38:40 'Cause only then does it really become useful for the try-on thing in terms of like, "Oh, should I buy this thing because I, I know what it'll, will look like on me?" 38:48 Like, you have to have that, like, continuous update of actual dimensions. And Francis and Daisy... Francis, you mentioned you like to try on clothes. Mm-hmm. 38:58 In general, do you like the experience of shopping in physical retail locations? 39:02 I do now, but only more and more, and only once I started making enough money that I could actually afford to buy a place in, in an in-person shopping, right? 39:11 Like, when I was in college, I [laughs] I, I mentioned this a few, a couple months ago in an episode, like, uh, in Portland, Oregon, this shop Francis May, I went in a couple times to try something on specifically because I saw it [laughs] on Grailed for quite cheap, and then, then I wanted to just go try it on and buy it, which is so shameless. 39:27 And now I'm like, I do feel more ashamed of that sort of behavior. 39:30 But I do like spending a Saturday and going around New York and, like, going into a couple of my favorite shops and trying things on now, um, even if I'm not gonna buy the thing, because, like, I feel more comfortable in a shop where I can afford to buy it, whereas before I would only be able to buy a thing for a third of the price online, right? 39:48 I love how you say you feel ashamed about th- doing that. I feel no shame. [laughs] It's like the... I was in Gentle Monster the other day trying on sunglasses being like, "Oh, I'm gonna bid on this- [laughs] "... 39:57 in some type of e-com site." Like, ha. Ha ha ha. Um, Daisy, I'm about to ask you the same question, but I think- Mm... the thing that I would love someone to event- to invent or, like, 40:09 if I was a coder, which I'm so not, I would invent this. Mm-hmm. Um, and actually Bill Gates' daughter is trying with this thing called Pheaa. Yeah. But- Been following... 40:18 I, I would like something, and I would also like it to work in stores, where I can scan something with my phone and I can see every single place that exists on the internet- Mm-hmm... 40:26 Facebook Marketplace, eBay, RealReal, Vesti, everywhere, and the varying price points and conditions. Well, Google Shopping is kind of like a poor version, the poor man's version of this. 40:35 It's not do it, it just, it doesn't do it well enough. Mm. Like, as somebody who spends all my time, my spare, spare... My hobby is this, and like, the thing that kind of pisses me off is I know 40:47 there is definitely a world where some of these products are excluded because they have different keywords, but a lot of the time that's not even happening. 40:56 There's just, there are just these, like, data scraping silos, because I can search the same thing in multiple platforms and get different results than I get when I'm just shopping on Google. Yeah. I... 41:07 It's interesting, like, watching the shift. 41:10 So when I worked at Hodinkee, they were, like, custodying, I think it was, like, Hodinkee, and then they acquired this company Crown & Caliber because they wanted access to Crown & Caliber's inventory. 41:23 Like, there was this idea that, like, you know, it better, it's better to, like, have the watches in hand and sell them. 41:30 But then once I left Hodinkee, I started working for this company or consulting with this company called Bezel, and instead they were creating, like, the Grailed. So they were the listing 41:39 agent for all of these, um, watch dealers who the watch dealers had the watches. 41:47 People bought it on Bezel, and then, you know, the dealer sent it to that person directly, so they never had to deal with the supply chain of keeping the watches beyond, like, being an additional authentication layer. 42:00 Like, they really weren't responsible for the shipping or the, um, like, the quality of the watch or repairs or stuff like that. 42:07 And so I think it's like going back to-The real real, and then also Essence, like Essence, a lot of the things that contributed to the bankruptcy were around their warehousing and inventory and the challenges to that. 42:22 And so if Doji decided to pivot, I promise this relates to what we've been talking about, if Doji was like, "We're gonna be Essence, but like we're gonna let you tr- try stuff on and tell you everything it is on the web, but we at no point will be responsible for the warehousing logistics of those things," oh, like all of a sudden that's like really interesting, right? 42:39 Um, I also talked to a company called Le condo yesterday, um, that is sort of pitched as like the Spotify of fashion. Um, they're backed by A16Z right now, the pre-seed level. You've heard of this. Danny's nodding. 42:54 Um, they- I'm speaking to them next week. Okay. Yeah. So tell them I said hi. Yeah. We, as soon as we started talking, we're like, "We know these people and these people in common." 43:02 Um, but basically like you take a picture of your outfit, it anonymizes you, and your fit pics basically get fed into the algorithm of everyone using this platform. 43:14 So people can search for things by vibes, they could search for specific pieces and brands, and then they're sort of drawing on the, 43:22 the compendium of everyone's anonymized fit pics to get more data on like you can know, you can track over time what do you actually wear of what you own, but you can also start to see data portraits of like what other people are wearing and discover things. 43:37 And I was telling my friend Allison about this, and she was like, "Oh, I've kind of just been doing that, like lo-fi." 43:43 Like when she started dating her boyfriend, like he encouraged her to like take pictures of her outfits so she would know what she was wearing the most of, how she was putting it together. 43:53 And, um, I think a lot of people do that, and a lot of them don't even like post the outfits online. Um, so yeah, I think we're like, I don't know that AI will kill the fit pic. 44:07 I think like AI might usher in like the golden era of the fit pic. But what do you think that means for the clout around taste? So like something I put as my like- Oh, that's what I was gonna ask you. 44:20 So you have to tell us what you think [laughs] 'cause you're the guest. I mean, I mean, I wrote my Doji follow-up piece- Yeah... my, like my follow-up piece of the piece that was posted in Dirt- Mm-hmm... 44:28 basically around this idea of the, like the commodifi- the commodification or automation of taste when it comes to fashion. And like the argument I made was that, 44:41 kind of circling back to the very beginning of the conversation, yes, obviously there's been this like, let's call it the nouveau riche taste lev- layer, which is like, "Oh my God, look at my outfit. 44:51 It's Louis Vuitton monogrammed everywhere. It costs so much money, it means I have great fashion." Like, obviously, it doesn't mean you have good fashion. It's terrible. Um, unless it's ironic, then it's very funny. 45:04 Um, but you know, the, the real clout is celebrities wearing, for example, Archive. Like, it's the same as with anything. It's like, yes, your money could buy this, but actually you need access to do this. 45:15 You need access to buy a Rothko, arguably. Like, even if you're a billionaire, if you're not cool, you can't, it's tacky. You're tacky. Um, and I think the thing that Doji makes very interesting is 45:28 Doji can make it seem like you are wearing any Archive piece. So if that then translates into fit pics, how, like how is that going to change the way that people convey clout from what they're wearing? 45:40 On a, on the kind of other side is, you know, as we saw with See- But there's no Getty watermark on it, it's not fucking real. [laughs] That's how it's gonna translate. Well, you can easily put one on. 45:48 [laughs] Well, yeah, there's the market for that. There's my, uh, there's my next fund raise. Oh, Daisy, Daisy, I love this for you. 45:56 Um, and then of course there's- We, we should, Danny, let's just spin up a Getty watermark product. [laughs] Well, you could buy CodePen in, in the time it takes to- You, me, and Shrivya... finish this episode. 46:05 Let's do, let's do it. All right, we're gonna pivot this to a business session. No, no. Okay, Dan- Danny, what were you gonna say? 46:12 [laughs] I was gonna say that then there's kind of like another thing which obviously is happening across all industries but specifically across the creative industry, which is like what does it mean when 46:23 computer says yes and it can tell you what to do? So having good taste is obviously the fact that like you pulled the reference images, you put the clothes together, you did all this stuff. 46:35 And if Alta or Doji is telling me what a cool outfit is, and then I'm just all, and I'm just putting it on, that's not, like that's not me anymore. You don't know what a clock is anymore either. Yeah. Mm. 46:46 That, that's, that's not, that's not cool in the same way that if ChatGPT writes an exquisite essay- Mm-hmm Never happened... I actually, I wanna quote, I wanna quote something from your most recent newsletter. Uh, 46:58 this is... Give me a second. It's kind of an extended quote. Which was not written by ChatGPT. Not written by ChatGPT. Well, and that's kind of the point. I mean- So, okay... 47:04 I, I will never, ever- Extended, extended quote here, "Capitalism's cardinal value is monetizing each drop of sweat that leaks from a worker's brow. Technologies is optimizing the minutia of existence. 47:13 When the two intersect, they birth a specter of disruption that slips through previously impervious walls to terrorize the labor force. 47:20 Over the past three centuries, this ghost has been summoned with increasing frequency, emerging from machine after machine to reinvent the body. 47:27 First, the first set of industrial revolutions me- mechanized our fingers with the electric loom, our arms with the production line, and our legs with the steam engine. 47:35 The mind, the digital revolution enhanced our processing power, automating rudimentary mental tasks and expanding our capacity to access and analyze information." 47:44 And finally, this is the, the last part, "Most recently, the soul. In the last three years, AI has come for passion, automating products that hinge on the imagination and dedication that blooms into skill." 47:55 Um, so that's kind of what you'd been just saying here. So I wanted to, I wanted to [laughs] crystallize it in, in your words for the, for the listener. Francis, please, can you read out everything I've ever written? 48:05 [laughs] It's, that was like the most validating experience of my whole life. Happily. He also quotes from it in the voice. It was really good. It was really good. Um, so yeah. I think it's a... 48:15 I think when I was thinking about the soul thing, I was really like-I think this idea of like, it's not only 48:22 this idea that imagination can be, and I very much mean, quote-unquote, synthesized, but it's also the fact that in order to master your art form, you needed to dedicate yourself to it. Mm-hmm. 48:32 And then, you know, the way that I close it out is with that insane quote from, and I'm gonna mispronounce this person's name, Adam Master- Masterlini, um, from his 28 Incredibly Rude Notes on Writing. 48:46 And essentially, to paraphrase his argument, it was the fact that beautiful prose in and of themselves do not hold value. Mm-hmm. Yeah. 48:53 Or like they do in the way that like looking at a beautiful AI-generated image does because of, let's say, the golden ratio or something like that. 49:02 What is baked into cultural creation done by humans is the sacrifice or the opportunity cost implicit. Like, the fact that I dedicated my time, my energy, my blood, my sweat, my tears, my mortality- Mm-hmm... 49:15 all in all to this practice is part of what charges it with meaning. Mm-hmm. And I think that's, it's a hard thing because you can't, like, you can't watermark that. You can't watermark that. 49:26 The only thing you can do is, which I now think is gonna be important for every single creative, every single startup, every single employee, is reiterate the narrative that I created this- Mm-hmm... 49:36 this is why, this is how, um, and tell your story like artists have been doing for centuries. Um, but I wish there was some type of way to watermark humanity- Yeah. Well, that's-... in everything... 49:47 that's, that's in person. That's in-person shopping. That's sh- that's, that's talking in person, right? The only way to watermark humanity is to do it, is, is, is to not mediate through a computer. Yeah. 49:58 I also think, like, venture capital has swung so far in the direction of saying basically, like, grit, passion, 50:09 hard-won knowledge about your subject matter as a founder is worth less than the illusion of value, which is how you end up s- with stuff like Story Protocol, which is like a protocol that basically nobody uses that raised an ungodly amount of money to put, quote, "IP on chain." 50:27 Um, it was not founded by people who are passionate about storytelling. 50:34 It was founded by people who could effectively, um, reward their early investors by raising more money on the previous round, and that chain, that train obviously stops at some point. Mm-hmm. 50:48 Um, but you could see the lack of passion because, like, as soon as it, as soon as, um, you know, some of the leadership had vested their, like, token allocation, they were like, "I'm out." 50:57 And so it will be interesting to see what AI does to the division in the startup world between mission-driven people and mercenaries. Mm. Um, because I would say, like, if you're a mercenary, 51:10 you will [chuckles] you are determined to make it into that, like, top 10%, 50% consumer spending class as soon as possible at all costs, and, and it's working. 51:21 And I think, you know, there's this meme format of the permanent underclass. I actually don't think it's funny. I actually think it's quite dark. Yeah. 51:28 Um, because what people are basically saying is, like, we are building in our economy towards, uh, a system where there's no upward mobil-mobility whatsoever, um, which... 51:40 I mean, Danny, you can speak to the way that this works in the UK. Like, UK has more of a, a, a permanent class system than the United States, or at least in the mythology of what it is. But there's still, um, 51:58 you know, people talking to each other and collaborating, and, um, there's a culture of patronage, and, um, there's also, like, good, good benefits. So, like, you have a public health system. 52:13 Um, you know, what would it mean in the United States to have permanent classes, no upward mobility, and also no UBI or benefits or public health system? I mean, it's, it, it would be a disaster. 52:27 It's, it's a disaster any place it's ever happened and usually leads to, like, violent revolution. 52:33 Um, and so when people talk about the permanent underclass thing, it's like you're memetically prepping people to accept a system that would be the beginning of the downfall of our social fabric and political fabric. 52:46 And I just think it's so bizarre because if AI is going to, where it can be widely adopted, um, I personally, if I was an advocate of AI, and I'm n- I wouldn't consider myself an advocate. 52:58 I would consider myself somebody who wants to work with the available technologies. Like, the narrative that I would be pushing memetically, [lips smack] 53:07 um, you know, and whatever would be, like, closer to, like, the abundance thing- Mm... that's happening right now, the abundance conversation. Oh, AI will usher in, um, permanent and infinite class mobility. 53:19 Um, so those, like, it's interesting to see those two thought systems, like, mingling on X, especially, like, right now. Um, and it feels weird because it feels like not the real world, but also very much the real world. 53:35 I think it's really interesting. I think, you know, f- for me, from, like, a purely ideological standpoint, it all go-- like, dates back to, like, John Rawls' veil of ignorance. 53:44 Like, design a society as if you're the lowest person in it. Mm-hmm. And I think what we have in the UK that's great is we have benefits for people that allow them to live, like healthcare. 53:56 The fact you guys don't have this in America is absolutely nuts. Um, and obviously, there is, uh, I would say, partially because of the in-baked class system, going back to the thing we said before, 54:08 coming from privilege is, is seen as pretty embarrassing- Mm... in England. Like, it's something you are ashamed of because you are very aware- You can't wash yourself from it fully. You can never wash yourself from it. 54:21 No. No. Like, if you're a lord, you're a lord. But it's not even if you're a lord, you're a lord. Like-I remember when I was nine... 54:28 Like, it's something that I've always been conscious of, like, in terms of the education I got. 54:31 Or, like, my mom comes from Manchester, which is a much less well-off part of the UK, and her parents taught her to speak nicely. That was, like, the most important thing. Mm. 54:41 So it's like all of these small social codes implicit in your behaviors. And, like, I remember being 19, and... 54:48 No, it was, like, exact- It was, like, when I was 22, and I'd just graduated college, and I was about to get my first job, and it was, like, all about all of the implicit things that give you privilege. 54:57 And I was like, "Shit, even if I don't ask anyone for an introduction, I'm still so privileged." Like, what do I do? Like- Mm... 55:04 that, like, that is ca- that is literally called b- Like, being English is being embarrassed about, like, everything you as an American, and I don't mean you guys- Yeah... but I mean, like, 55:13 you would, like, show off about. Yeah. Um, I think, you know, the, the, like, the flip side of that is in England it's a bit cringe to have ambition, and I think there is a lot more anger 55:26 at wealth and privilege, because it's this idea that, like, how did you get that? I could never get that. 55:31 Whereas somebody on the street in America, especially in New York, there's still this kind of, "If I hustle enough, I could get to where you are." 55:38 So I don't think there's as much animosity as there is in the UK, which is something that I find, that I find very interesting. Um- Did you watch Industry? Desi, why- You are literally... 55:51 I started watching Industry- Uh-huh... I'm not joking, 10 days ago. Oh my God. Okay. I started watching it on a plane. I started with season three. 55:58 All I've done for the past, like, 10 days is been like, "Hey, everyone, I'm watching Industry. Are you watching Industry? I'm watching Industry. Are you watching Industry?" 56:05 And then also being like, am I becoming a trader by, by osmosis? Like, there are some very complex things going on just in terms of, like, financial lingo in this show. 56:16 Like, there'll, there'll be quite a lot of situations where I'm like, something bad is happening, but I have no idea what. [laughs] Like, I just got to the... 56:22 You know when, um, when Harper is doing, is doing this trade with Rishi? Mm-hmm. With, like... And, and he, she, like, puts her finger down, and she's selling. Like, it's, it's a whole thing. Yeah. 56:34 And I actually would like to spend some time researching- They're, like, arbitraging sterling or whatever. Yeah... They're doing some arbitrage, but, like, it, it's, it's pretty complex. 56:40 But please carry on with what you were saying, because, yes- Oh, well-... I am currently obsessed with Industry... we had the creators on this podcast- About a year ago... 56:47 and they were talking about a lot of the entrenched class stuff. 'Cause we were talking about Harper as, like, she's the character that drives the plot forward. 56:54 She's the chaos agent, because she represents the sort of American- Mm... striving. Um, and to a certain extent, like, her boss does as well, Eric, and that's why they have that relationship. But it's like 57:04 Industry would not have the tension to be prestige television if they weren't mixing Americans and Brits- Interesting Absolutely... 57:11 in the show, because so much of what drives the tension forward is that, um, the different, like, the willingness to strive or different ways of being Machiavellian. 57:23 Even Rishi and his desire to prove himself and, you know, be accepted in that cricket club community. Oh, God. 57:30 Like, I feel like we know, already know some of the next season's gonna be filmed in New York, and I wonder if it will take away some of that tension, because, like we said on the episode, there's 57:44 thousands of Harpers in New York. Mm-hmm. Um, yeah. I mean, New York is just made up of Harpers. The thing that I find so weird, by the way, about the way that there's this framing- Mm-hmm... 57:54 is there's this framing that she is a terrible person. Mm-hmm. I'm like, I don't, I don't get that at all. Like, for me, she's one of the most likable characters. Yasmin, zero. Like, no. 58:09 It's 'cause you went to all-girls school with- [laughs]... uh, 100 Yasmins. No, but, like... [laughs] Yeah, but it's, like, Yasmin is dumb. Mm-hmm. Yeah. And she's a bitch. And, like, like, Harper is a hustler. 58:20 And, like- Well-adapted... I think she, I think she's a badass as well. Mm. And she's out for herself, but quite frankly, in that environment, so should everybody else be. 58:29 And I think, in general, the way she does it is, like, pretty elegant. Whereas, like, Yasmin, I, I, I really dislike. But that's why I find it so weird, all of these things. Like, people being like, "You're so selfish. 58:41 You're a sociopath." I'm like, she isn't really. She's just, like, good at her job and actually smart and, like, hustling. [laughs] Don't know what type of person that makes me, but... I... Well, 58:53 no, I think that that's, like, definitely interesting talking after you've seen, like, all three seasons. But I do think 59:02 this idea of Harper as, like, a narcissist is a little bit overblown, because what the show really does is, like, 59:10 sort of like what The Sopranos did, where it's like you can have this logic of the, like, you know, if you're, if you're in the mafia, what is a virtuous move within that system is different from what is- Mm... 59:22 like, broadly virtuous. Like, if you're in a bank, what is a virtuous move within that system is different from what's broadly virtuous. 59:29 But every character every, at some point in the show will have their narcissism revealed. No character is all good or all bad. I think we root for Harper more as the underdog, because, um, 59:43 she's, you know, she's coming from nothing. And we're all primed to, like, root for her, like the Tony Soprano or the Don Draper. And speaking of The Sopranos, we're gonna end this episode right here, quite suddenly. 59:58 [laughs] This has been Taste Lead. Thank you for listening. We all die. We all die. We're all dead. 1:00:03 [outro music]
