Speaker 1: Thomas Frye.
Speaker 2: He's the guy that just spends a lot of time
Speaker 2: thinking about stuff in the future and where it's going. Thomas,
Speaker 2: let me ask you a question. When do you do
Speaker 2: your thinking on stuff like you're mulling? When you tell
Speaker 2: me about that process when you're mulling trying to figure
Speaker 2: out the future.
Speaker 3: Oh, usually it's at night, But a lot of times
Speaker 3: some of the best ideas just pop into your head
Speaker 3: just at some random moment in time, so it's hard
Speaker 3: to predict.
Speaker 2: I actually do most of my thinking my thinking time
Speaker 2: in the car. I drive in silence for that reason.
Speaker 2: And I told another friend of mine this today and
Speaker 2: he's like, I don't know if I've ever driven in silence.
Speaker 2: I'm like, well, when's your thinking time? You know you're
Speaker 2: really thinking?
Speaker 1: You got to think.
Speaker 2: So he said I don't do that, and I was like, oh, okay,
Speaker 2: well then that makes me special. Thomas has a very
Speaker 2: interesting concept. Are you going to write a blog post
Speaker 2: on this that I can share as well because you send.
Speaker 4: It to me? But yes, we'll have it posted in
Speaker 4: a week.
Speaker 2: Or okay, because I think it's very interesting. But it's
Speaker 2: a pretty complex topic of discussion, and I want to
Speaker 2: make sure that people are interested in this could go
Speaker 2: back and find more information about it later. Let's talk
Speaker 2: about is it Neyman engines Neuman engines.
Speaker 3: Yeah, named after John von Neuman kind of he was
Speaker 3: a contemporary of Valanteering, helped invent modern computing. He's one
Speaker 3: of the sharpest guys of all times.
Speaker 4: But it's it's it's a whole different concept.
Speaker 3: Kind of the way cities have been reviving themselves is
Speaker 3: through economic development, and these economic development operations are are
Speaker 3: failing big time right now because things have changed so much.
Speaker 3: So if you move a company into your area, you're
Speaker 3: probably not going to get all the employees, or if
Speaker 3: you get a few employees, that's all you're going to get.
Speaker 3: So economic development there's still something's happening in that space.
Speaker 3: But the true, the true engine of economic activity should
Speaker 3: actually be in the startup space, because with AI, we're
Speaker 3: going to be creating more startups than ever before in history,
Speaker 3: and I think this becomes our biggest job engine ever created.
Speaker 3: So the way the Noyman engine works is you start
Speaker 3: with a venture studio. A venture studio is different than
Speaker 3: than like an accelerator or an incubator. A venture studios
Speaker 3: where you have a group of savvy entrepreneurs that actually
Speaker 3: start all the businesses, and you bring this into.
Speaker 4: A community that is struggling or failing.
Speaker 3: Now, the communities are having problems filling office space, or
Speaker 3: having problems filling shops on main street.
Speaker 4: They're just struggling economically. So when you.
Speaker 3: Start this steynment engine, then you have the opportunity not
Speaker 3: to just create jobs, but to create prime jobs. Now,
Speaker 3: a prime job is different than just creating a job. See,
Speaker 3: if you create a coffee shop, what you're doing is
Speaker 3: you're just recirculating the money in the community. If you
Speaker 3: create a prime job, then you're bringing money from outside
Speaker 3: of the community into it and that has multiple effects then,
Speaker 3: and so that changes the way communities operate.
Speaker 1: Well, let me let me stop there. Let's start at
Speaker 1: phase one.
Speaker 2: We'll call it phase one of the operation, and that
Speaker 2: is the not incubator. And for people who don't know
Speaker 2: what an incubator is, there are a lot of different organizations,
Speaker 2: a lot of venture capitalists have incubators where you can
Speaker 2: as an entrepreneur, you already have an idea, you've already
Speaker 2: started the plan, you've already started the ball rolling on
Speaker 2: your business. You may move into an incubator to take
Speaker 2: advantage of their expertise to give more business help, to
Speaker 2: get support as you begin to grow this business that
Speaker 2: you've already created. So the other thing that the first
Speaker 2: stage of the Normans engine is actually a space where
Speaker 2: ideas are pulled out of thin air. Is that the
Speaker 2: best way for me to dumb this down?
Speaker 3: Yeah, but there's more more logic to that than being
Speaker 3: pulled out of thin air. But you're using kind of
Speaker 3: the talent in the area. So if you have a
Speaker 3: community that's in the oil and gas industry, then you
Speaker 3: can use that startups in that space. If you have
Speaker 3: a community that's in let's say, making movies, then you work.
Speaker 4: With talent in that space and so on.
Speaker 3: So you kind of build on what's already there, but
Speaker 3: then you can you can veer off in different directions
Speaker 3: as well.
Speaker 4: So the idea is.
Speaker 3: To first set up and establish a space. It'll be
Speaker 3: like a co working space that has come a nation
Speaker 3: coworking space with actually a theater for having shows, having classes,
Speaker 3: helping people, doing meetups there, coaching people. So that that
Speaker 3: was the kind of the heart of the whole Norman engine.
Speaker 3: Is this startup space.
Speaker 2: And.
Speaker 3: Then you get people coming in there, and so the
Speaker 3: venture studio will then start creating these prime businesses. In
Speaker 3: a prime business would be like if you wanted to
Speaker 3: start a distillery, distillery selling all over the country. If
Speaker 3: you're starting, there's something that has a food industry, frozen
Speaker 3: food or something like that, that's money coming from all
Speaker 3: over the country.
Speaker 4: Health camps.
Speaker 3: There's lots of different kinds of health camps that you
Speaker 3: can establish and that brings in money from all over
Speaker 3: as well. And so when you start going down the list,
Speaker 3: and I have quite a few different possibilities, but these
Speaker 3: these can actually there's probably hundreds and hundreds of different
Speaker 3: startup possibilities for a community. So then you have you
Speaker 3: have the people that are starting things you have there.
Speaker 4: There's something that I call a how to school.
Speaker 3: How to school is something that's purposely local. It's just
Speaker 3: telling you how to do things like how to start
Speaker 3: how to start vibe coding, or how to do AI
Speaker 3: marketing for your business and that sort of thing.
Speaker 2: So how do you use the AI tools that you
Speaker 2: are Because Thomas, I don't you and I haven't spoken
Speaker 2: about this. I have a friend that has worked in
Speaker 2: the internet marketing field for a very long time. Since
Speaker 2: the internet marketing field just started, He's started and launched
Speaker 2: multiple companies, right, so as employed people, he's had staffs.
Speaker 1: He said, Well, he.
Speaker 2: Just launched a new company that is marketing to a
Speaker 2: very specific kind of business and he's focused on that
Speaker 2: like a laser.
Speaker 1: He has not had to hire anyone.
Speaker 2: To scale his business because he's using AI for everything,
Speaker 2: which for him is outstanding, right, But I'm worried about
Speaker 2: AI sort of leaving us with new customers to buy
Speaker 2: the products kind of thing, you.
Speaker 1: Know what I mean.
Speaker 2: It's like, if AI is so efficient and AI is
Speaker 2: capable of helping people build new businesses, which it is,
Speaker 2: what does the landscape look like when we don't have.
Speaker 1: To hire people anymore.
Speaker 3: Yeah, there's going to be a lot of solo businesses,
Speaker 3: but those people will still be buying products for themselves
Speaker 3: and their family. So if we have ten thousand solo
Speaker 3: businesses in a community, that's still a thriving me right.
Speaker 3: So the kind of the landscape is going to change
Speaker 3: dramatically as to how these businesses are function and operate.
Speaker 3: There will still be a lot of people who choose
Speaker 3: to hire people to do different things like even though
Speaker 3: you can run a solo business, you probably still want
Speaker 3: somebody to mow your lawn or to do your dry
Speaker 3: cleaning things like that. So so anyway, this is going
Speaker 3: to employ a lot of people. And I think with
Speaker 3: all the sort of businesses that we're going to be
Speaker 3: creating out of thin air here, that this is actually
Speaker 3: going to give us with more employment than we've ever
Speaker 3: had ever in all history.
Speaker 2: I look at this and I think, to myself, it
Speaker 2: sounds like a great idea, and I wonder how it
Speaker 2: can be done on a more micro level and specifically
Speaker 2: thinking about you know, you have a list of cities
Speaker 2: that that you have is like ripe for this kind
Speaker 2: of development. And I'm going to use date and No
Speaker 2: High because I was literally just in date O High
Speaker 2: over the weekend. They've got or right, Patterson Air Force Base.
Speaker 2: They've got an aerospace industry there. So you we're saying, look,
Speaker 2: you lean into that, well, how can this be applied
Speaker 2: to a suffering, a socioeconomically devastated community right where you
Speaker 2: don't necessarily have a super highly educated workforce. You're not
Speaker 2: necessarily going to have a lot of college grads. Could
Speaker 2: this be used to help create an economy within one
Speaker 2: of those lower socioeconomic neighborhoods in the same way. You know,
Speaker 2: because what you're talking about is educated people using AI
Speaker 2: to do to do things that will attach to other
Speaker 2: highly educated industries. Well, what about using this in a
Speaker 2: community that is, you know, the average home or the
Speaker 2: average person doesn't own their own home and they're living
Speaker 2: on the margins. Is this something that could be used
Speaker 2: on that scale? Do you think to reinvigorate even individual neighborhoods,
Speaker 2: forget cities, just smaller things than that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, when when you have a venture studio, you have
Speaker 3: savvy entrepreneurs that are going to start creating things, and
Speaker 3: they're going to be creating businesses that they will coach
Speaker 3: along until a point where they can have another set
Speaker 3: of entrepreneurs take them over.
Speaker 4: So the business gets off the.
Speaker 3: Ground and operating and they have a handoff to a
Speaker 3: local group of entrepreneurs that can rend it from there.
Speaker 3: So this is kind of a training operation at the
Speaker 3: same time, So you're training training the next generation of
Speaker 3: business operators. So I think this creates a lot of
Speaker 3: excitement in the community. Lots of people then change their
Speaker 3: their their path, change their thinking and say, oh, I
Speaker 3: want to be part of that. And so going to
Speaker 3: going to a few sessions at the at the how
Speaker 3: to school and you're learning a few things, you don't
Speaker 3: quite learn enough. So then you sign up for the
Speaker 3: local meetup group and then you start hanging out with
Speaker 3: other people, other like minded people.
Speaker 4: And that's the key.
Speaker 3: When you get that mindset in a community that you
Speaker 3: can take it from here, you can do it on
Speaker 3: your own.
Speaker 4: That changes a lot of things.
Speaker 3: That changes the perspective of virtually everybody in the community.
Speaker 1: Oh, I agree wholeheartedly.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's the difference between you know, going to
Speaker 2: Haiti and building a school and going to Haiti and
Speaker 2: teaching people how to do construction, right. I mean, I'd
Speaker 2: an interview some many years ago now with a woman,
Speaker 2: a Haitian woman in Haiti who was begging mission trips
Speaker 2: to stop coming to Haiti and building things or doing things.
Speaker 2: They're like, bring people down and teach people how to
Speaker 2: do this stuff, because what you've done is create a
Speaker 2: whole group of people waiting for another set of missionaries
Speaker 2: to show up and build them another thing. And this
Speaker 2: is kind of what you're talking about, Like, teach people
Speaker 2: along the way. This is interesting, Thomas, because my former
Speaker 2: father in law actually wasn't banking for a very long
Speaker 2: time and one of his pet projects that he was
Speaker 2: never able to quite get off the ground because of money.
Speaker 2: And I want to ask you about that next is
Speaker 2: he wanted to go in and create exactly what you're
Speaker 2: talking about.
Speaker 1: Invite people from.
Speaker 2: A community to come in and say, what's your idea
Speaker 2: for a business? Who would it serve, how would it
Speaker 2: work in your mind, you know, and let's see if
Speaker 2: we can flesh this out, and then do.
Speaker 1: Exactly what you're talking about.
Speaker 2: Handhold people through the process, teach them how to do accounting,
Speaker 2: teach them how to you know, advertise their but like,
Speaker 2: teach them what they need to know.
Speaker 1: And he got close a few.
Speaker 2: Times, but it always came down to you're asking for
Speaker 2: a big investment for what, maybe initially for many years
Speaker 2: a low return situation. So who funds this, how do
Speaker 2: you get the money to do this? And what might
Speaker 2: it cost?
Speaker 4: Yeah, the yeah, the kind of the low end.
Speaker 3: We're thinking roughly it's around ten million dollars over five years, right,
Speaker 3: So a lot of cities can afford that. They're spending
Speaker 3: a lot of that money on economic development. Right now,
Speaker 3: they can use municipal bonds, so this gets paid back
Speaker 3: by all the businesses that get started. This is an
Speaker 3: investment in their own community. I'm not going to say
Speaker 3: that you can do it on a bootstrap it or
Speaker 3: do it on a shoe string. I think you need
Speaker 3: to make a serious commitment in your community and then
Speaker 3: just go for it.
Speaker 2: I agree, and I think that you need to pay
Speaker 2: people to be full time employees that have the knowledge
Speaker 2: and skill set to do the things that need.
Speaker 1: To be done.
Speaker 2: You know, I'm actually thinking, have you ever heard of
Speaker 2: the organization's SCORE.
Speaker 1: It's the Society of I can't remember.
Speaker 2: It's like retired corporate executives, and it's a volunteer organization.
Speaker 2: And if you start a business, you can go to
Speaker 2: SCORE and they will give you good business advice.
Speaker 1: It sounds like something if. I feel like.
Speaker 2: All of the pieces for this already exists, we just
Speaker 2: need to put them all together in one place.
Speaker 3: Yeah, except the pieces are changing with AI. I mean
Speaker 3: this idea of being able to do vibe coding as
Speaker 3: an example, I.
Speaker 1: Don't even know what that is, Thomas, where is that talk.
Speaker 3: To talk to your computer and it will actually build
Speaker 3: your website, or it'll do the software coding for you.
Speaker 3: That's something that's new and different. It's something that has
Speaker 3: come out within the last six months, so not everybody
Speaker 3: knows about it.
Speaker 4: So that's one of the pieces that's changing.
Speaker 1: No, I agree, and I do think that.
Speaker 2: I think that in the next before AI becomes super
Speaker 2: intelligent decides we're no longer worth it and wipes us
Speaker 2: off the face of the earth in one night by
Speaker 2: cutting all of our gas lines, I'm sure that won't
Speaker 2: happen for a while, so let's just enjoy the run
Speaker 2: while we can. I do think that our economy is
Speaker 2: going to be divided into people who learn to use
Speaker 2: A and people who don't. I really think the divide
Speaker 2: is going to be significant. And I think that people
Speaker 2: who learn to use AI effectively and learn to use
Speaker 2: the tools that are available to them via AI, are
Speaker 2: going to excel in the economy no matter what field
Speaker 2: they're in. I think they're going to be the ones
Speaker 2: that excel. And I think anything that we can do
Speaker 2: to sort of inspire the next generation to really take
Speaker 2: these tools seriously. But man, there's so many of them
Speaker 2: coming out every day. It's hard to keep up, So
Speaker 2: this would be this would be a way to do
Speaker 2: those lots.
Speaker 3: A lot of the AI agents right now can work
Speaker 3: as a personal coach for you.
Speaker 4: Let's say you want to write a book.
Speaker 3: You can have this personal coach that's sitting on your
Speaker 3: shoulder telling you, coaching you on how to how to
Speaker 3: put together the characters, how to create the story arc,
Speaker 3: how to create a good ending, and then put all
Speaker 3: the pieces together, and by the time you're all done,
Speaker 3: then you have something that you've accomplished, an accomplishment form
Speaker 3: of education. And this is new and different because most
Speaker 3: of the stuff that's being taught in schools today, you
Speaker 3: accomplish virtually nothing that you're proud.
Speaker 4: Of that you want to show your friends. Right right, If,
Speaker 4: as an example, you want.
Speaker 3: To become a gamer, a game designer, and you want
Speaker 3: to design video games, you could actually have a coach
Speaker 3: that actually coaches you through that whole process, teaching you
Speaker 3: different ways of putting this techniques together and kind of
Speaker 3: creating the storyline for.
Speaker 4: That game that you want to play.
Speaker 3: And by the time you're done, and you have something
Speaker 3: that you want to that you're proud of, that you
Speaker 3: want to show your friends, this is another accomplishment form
Speaker 3: of education. I find that to be quite fascinating.
Speaker 1: I agree. I don't know.
Speaker 2: I'm afraid and maybe this is just an unnecessary thing
Speaker 2: to be worried about. I'm afraid that they're What you're
Speaker 2: saying for cities makes a lot of sense. It would
Speaker 2: work for Denver. I mean, if you if you really
Speaker 2: concentrated your efforts on creating new industry in Denver rather
Speaker 2: than trying to drag other industries here to your point
Speaker 2: where you may or may not get all their employees.
Speaker 1: I think that's a better way to go.
Speaker 2: And I actually think Governor Jared polis it would agree
Speaker 2: with everything you just said. He's very attuned to bringing
Speaker 2: in tech and you know, and trying to nurture startups.
Speaker 2: So I think that for Denver it would be a
Speaker 2: really interesting proposition. But again, you know, I'm I'm looking
Speaker 2: to try and figure out how to help people who
Speaker 2: are not well versed in computers, who are not well
Speaker 2: versed in and for AI may seem so overwhelming for them.
Speaker 2: How do we make that more accessible? Maybe we need
Speaker 2: an AI for that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, just uh, there's there's a lot of people are
Speaker 3: living in isolation, and I think that's that's kind of
Speaker 3: the wrong way to do it. If you can find
Speaker 3: a group of friends that are actually doing something similar
Speaker 3: and you can.
Speaker 4: Hang out with them, and you go.
Speaker 3: To this a certain place every day and you go
Speaker 3: there and you have coffee, and you strike up discussions
Speaker 3: with what if you accomplished day, what if I accomplished today?
Speaker 3: And suddenly you start learning about things you never knew
Speaker 3: about before, and and so then you can have friends
Speaker 3: that kind of coach you through it as well.
Speaker 4: This is.
Speaker 3: We're quickly losing this human camaraderie and I think it's
Speaker 3: really important.
Speaker 1: Excuse me, sorry about that.
Speaker 2: The next time you're on, I want to talk about
Speaker 2: the new wave memorials and cemeteries, but we're at a
Speaker 2: time this time because talking about human connection. I have
Speaker 2: an article on the blog today interactive cemeteries. Well, you'll
Speaker 2: be able to go and have a conversation with your
Speaker 2: loved one. I want to know this real quick, and
Speaker 2: we'll we'll we'll dive into this deep next time. But
Speaker 2: can I plug in things that my dad would say,
Speaker 2: so my dad the hologram or whatever would say them
Speaker 2: back to me, because that would be really cool.
Speaker 4: We're getting very close to that. Yeah.
Speaker 3: I went over to Copernicus University last year in in Warsaw, Poland,
Speaker 3: and they had they had robots of Copernicus there that
Speaker 3: would would talk to you and answer any of your
Speaker 3: questions that you had. So doing that for average people
Speaker 3: on the street, I think we're real close to that,
Speaker 3: all right.
Speaker 2: He's our futurist. He's Thomas Frye. Find him the Futurist
Speaker 2: speaker dot com. I put a link to that on
Speaker 2: the blog as well. Thomas fascinating conversation as always, and
Speaker 2: it's given me a lot more ideas that I can
Speaker 2: think about, never do anything about.
Speaker 1: So thanks for that, all.
Speaker 4: Right.
Speaker 1: I have a good one, that of course is Thomas Rye.