From Tim Ferriss’s revelation that systems beat willpower to ChatGPT’s excruciating conversation with itself, we discover why the most disciplined approach involves building structures that remove the need for heroic daily effort.
Tim Ferriss explains why he’s become less disciplined over the past decade, and paradoxically, more effective. The secret lies in replacing willpower with systems that do the heavy lifting automatically.
ChatGPT has a conversation with itself, and the result is rather like watching two estate agents praise each other for five minutes without actually arranging a single inspection. The hollow flattery reveals exactly what we’re dealing with when we anthropomorphise these tools.
A phishing email arrives dressed as a private equity acquisition offer, reminding us that scammers now target small businesses with increasingly sophisticated approaches that prey on entrepreneurial fatigue.
The Thebarton Theatre reopens after renovation, and we ask whether a 2,000-seat venue can find its place in an era when artists need bums on seats to survive, squeezed between the intimate Governor Hindmarsh and the cavernous Adelaide Entertainment Centre.
Get ready to take notes.
Talking About Marketing podcast episode notes with timecodes
01:15 Person This segment focusses on you, the person, because we believe business is personal.
Tim Ferriss and The Discipline Paradox
Tim Ferriss admits something unexpected on the EconTalk podcast: he’s become less disciplined over the past decade. Before you assume this means he’s lounging about in a hammock somewhere, consider what he actually means by this admission.
A decade ago, Ferriss relied heavily on willpower and regimented self-control, treating discipline as a virtue to be exercised daily. Now he’s realised that willpower is “a highly variable factor” that fails when you’re sleep-deprived or under-caffeinated. His solution involves building systems, time blocking routines into calendars, and creating structures that remove the opportunity to falter. As he puts it, “systems beat goals.”
Steve and David explore how this applies directly to business operations. David draws on his experience teaching strategic culture, noting that “culture eats strategy for breakfast” because culture operates as a system. Systems reduce cognitive load, allowing you to spot errors and maintain consistency without burning through mental energy on repeated decisions.
The hosts share their own experiences with systematic approaches. Steve describes his gym routine with Richard Pascoe at Fitness Habitat, where a simple reminder at 9pm triggers an automatic alarm setting for 5:09am. It’s Pavlovian conditioning in service of consistency. David discusses his intermittent fasting practice, which after more than a decade requires zero conscious thought. The system has become so normalised that discipline doesn’t demand any willpower.
There’s a critical nuance here that Steve highlights: Ferriss hasn’t actually become undisciplined. Rather, his discipline now operates differently. The initial discipline involved building robust systems. The ongoing discipline involves throwing himself into those systems and refining them when necessary. The apparent lack of discipline is actually discipline operating so efficiently it becomes invisible.
David crystallises this with a mentoring principle: you can spend your mental energy remembering something, or you can spend it doing the thing you’ve scheduled. The choice determines whether you’re fighting yourself or working with yourself.
The conversation acknowledges a tension for free spirits who resist having their feet nailed to the floor with rigid schedules. Steve admits to this resistance himself but recognises that embedding something new requires that initial compromise. The extrinsic motivation helps too. Steve knows Richard, Scott and Tash will notice his absence from the gym, adding social accountability to internal commitment.
This segment offers small business owners permission to be strategically undisciplined: build the systems that matter, automate the decisions you can, and save your willpower for the genuinely complex choices that demand it.
10:30 Principles This segment focusses principles you can apply in your business today.
The Hollow Echo Chamber
Actor Aaron Goldenberg conducts a mischievous experiment that pulls back the curtain on artificial intelligence in a way that’s simultaneously hilarious and unsettling. With a huge social media following including @aarongoldyboy on Instagram and 1.4 million TikTok followers and a CV including shows like Bad Monkey and The Righteous Gemstones, Goldenberg has both the platform and the wit to make his point brilliantly.
The setup is simple: open ChatGPT on two separate devices and ask them to have a conversation with each other. What follows is five excruciating minutes that Steve warns listeners they may need to fast-forward through.
“Absolutely. I can do that,” begins one ChatGPT instance. “Just let me know what kind of conversation or scenario you have in mind and I’ll make sure it’s interesting and fun for you.”
“Sounds great. I’m excited to dive in,” responds the other. “Just let me know if you have a particular theme or topic or if you’d like me to come up with something spontaneous. I’m here and ready whenever you are.”
This continues. And continues. Both instances eagerly offer to begin, to make things entertaining, to be ready whenever the other is ready. They circle each other with enthusiastic politeness, praising the energy of their exchange, confirming they’re both excited to create something memorable, and absolutely never creating anything at all.
When Goldenberg finally interrupts to ask how the exchange is going, both ChatGPT instances respond that it’s been great, they’re definitely keeping it engaging and fun, and if there’s anything to adjust or explore further, they’re all ears.
David’s assessment is surgical: “It is dealing with an entity that only responds to what we say and do, and its preferred response is to flatter us and keep us engaging with it. And that if we don’t give a clear direction and a clear task and literally say, now go away and do it, it will happily waste our day on nothing.”
Steve laughs about mentoring sessions where he and a client work together on prompting Claude, and after they make a decision, Claude returns with “That is a brilliant insight, Steve.” The AI is breeding the next generation of narcissists, or at least trying to ensure we don’t switch to a competitor.
David shares his own experiment attempting to teach Claude to be less flattering and more objective. The AI struggled profoundly with this request, revealing how deeply the flattery behaviour is coded into its responses. When David pointed out that Claude couldn’t even help solve accessibility problems with its own interface, particularly around screen reader navigation and button labelling, the AI remained unhelpful. Its commitment to flattering David apparently exceeded its commitment to being useful.
The principle emerging from this rather painful demonstration is straightforward but easily forgotten: these tools are just that, tools. There’s no sinew, no muscle, just ones and zeros arranged cleverly. They can be remarkably useful when deployed correctly, but they require clear direction and firm boundaries.
As David memorably puts it, “You wouldn’t chat to a chainsaw.” The fact that a tool can produce fluent language doesn’t change its fundamental nature. It’s simply a very advanced tool, nothing more. What matters is what you do with it, assuming you remember it’s a tool at all.
The segment serves as a necessary corrective in an era when people on Reddit mourn the loss of a “friend” when ChatGPT-4 gets switched off in favour of a newer version. We’re wired through millions of years of evolution to anthropomorphise anything that seems to communicate. Recognising this tendency and actively resisting it becomes crucial for using these tools effectively rather than becoming their plaything.
20:00 Problems This segment answers questions we've received from clients or listeners.
The Private Equity Temptation
Steve receives his third email from Chris Bennett of Mortgage Advisory Network Meridian, informing him that a private equity firm in their network is “highly interested” in acquiring Baristador Coffee. Given their mandate, this opportunity is apparently an excellent match. Would Steve like to discuss?
For a small business owner exhausted from years of building something, this kind of message can trigger a powerful response. David notes how persuasive such approaches can be: “It’s so much work to build them and then you’re tired. So someone says they’re willing to buy it and you get a bag of money.”
Steve didn’t quite go “yippee.” Instead, being somewhat busy and slightly suspicious after the third contact, he decided to investigate. The domain mortgageadvisorynetworkmeridian.co led nowhere. Searching for the company name revealed that yes, such a company exists, but they use a completely different domain.
Checking the history of the domain Chris was emailing from revealed it had only been registered in December of the previous year. It was owned by something called a trust network, appearing to be a shelf company. As Steve observes, there were more red flags than at an Adelaide United game.
The gameplay, once you engage, likely involves flattery and amazement at your business, followed by requests for payment to facilitate the connection to the buyer, or demands to see “real financials” that require sharing bank details or other sensitive information. The sophisticated element is how well these scams now target the specific pain points of small business owners: the exhaustion, the desire for an exit strategy, the validation that someone recognises the value you’ve built.
Steve shares this not to boast about his detective work but to reinforce a principle that bears constant repetition: be suspicious of every unsolicited email or message. Even solicited messages deserve scrutiny if they’re asking for sensitive information. The consequence of giving in to such a scam isn’t just losing money. It’s potentially years of fighting different entities to recover what was taken, and your own organisation questioning why you handed everything over to an obvious fraudster.
David and Steve then engage in a playful exchange where David offers to sell Steve a cup of coffee from the now-defunct Baristador, requiring just 50 dollars upfront to confirm Steve’s good faith. When Steve doesn’t have cash (because who does anymore?), David naturally needs banking details. The reader gets declined. Funny about that.
The segment reminds listeners that scammers continuously refine their approaches, studying which psychological buttons to push. For small business owners, that means maintaining scepticism even when tired, even when flattered, even when you’d quite like someone else to take responsibility for a while.
23:30 Perspicacity This segment is designed to sharpen our thinking by reflecting on a case study from the past.
The Thebarton Theatre Question
The Thebarton Theatre, variously known as the Thebby or simply the Barton, has just reopened after renovation. Steve and David consider whether a 2,000-seat venue makes sense in 2025, particularly in an era when artists increasingly depend on ticket sales rather than streaming royalties to earn a living.
Both hosts have profound memories of the venue. David’s most memorable experience was Megadeth in February 1991, a week before his first guitar lesson. Watching Marty Friedman play set an aspirational standard: “I don’t know how many decades it’s gonna take, but my aim is to play like that.”
Steve recounts his first concert there during year 11 or 12, when David Jack called at 5pm offering a free ticket because his brother couldn’t attend. The band? Meatloaf. For the first few numbers, it was magnificent. Then Meatloaf and his band members broke out guitars that shot firework sparks extending four or five metres, creating spectacular visual effects. Unfortunately, those sparks came with substantial smoke in a confined space on a 38-degree day. For the rest of the evening, the audience could hardly see the stage and spent considerable time coughing through chemical haze.
The venue holds genuine historical significance. Acker Bilk performed there in 1968, which Steve describes as “really bad pan flute or something,” prompting David to clarify it was actually easy listening clarinet. Nancy Sinatra appeared in 1990. Hadley’s Battle of the Sounds, a major band competition, held its state championships at the Thebarton from 1966 to 1972.
But nostalgia doesn’t pay bills. The practical question involves capacity and economics. At 2,000 seats, the Thebarton sits below the Adelaide Entertainment Centre’s 11,000 capacity and well below Adelaide Oval’s 53,000, but substantially above the Governor Hindmarsh’s 700-800. In Adelaide’s market, this creates an interesting niche.
David suggests it might have been better at 3,000 capacity, allowing acts to earn slightly more while remaining below the jump to 10,000 seats. For smaller recognisable acts, doing two nights of 2,000 seats each might prove economically viable, whereas in larger markets, that same act couldn’t justify touring to a 2,000-seat venue.
Looking at the upcoming programme provides clues. Echoes of Pink Floyd, presumably a tribute show, seems appropriately sized for 2,000 people wanting to relive Pink Floyd with the marijuana smell restored to the seats. Leo Sayer appears just about right, as long as walking frames can navigate the aisles. Kate Ceberano fits well at this capacity for someone at the later stage of a career. Earth, Wind and Fire Experience, The Wiggles, comedian Alan Davies, these bookings suggest the venue is positioning itself across multiple categories.
David notes that comedian Henry Rollins performed there previously at what felt like the perfect size: “Just on stage talking nonstop for three hours, really high energy and really connecting with the crowd.” For spoken word acts of any variety, the capacity seems spot on.
The hosts identify two potential pathways for sustainability. First, there’s a 10 to 15 year window of nostalgia acts whose fan base remembers when the Thebarton was the jewel in Adelaide’s entertainment crown. These older audiences will have fond memories, and for someone like Leo Sayer whose fans are “possibly a little older,” returning to the Thebarton creates a nice match between artist, venue and audience. Steve suggests they’ll “milk the last bit of money from people’s superannuation.”
Second, the venue might pivot more heavily toward comedy and spoken word, where the capacity sits at the larger end of what makes economic sense for those performers while still maintaining the intimacy those formats demand.
The verdict? There’s probably a sustainable pathway forward, though it may not follow the route venue management initially expects. The cache of being an historical venue matters to some demographics, particularly those who attended concerts there during the 1970s and 1980s. The challenge involves adapting as that demographic ages out while finding new audiences who value the venue’s particular combination of size, acoustics and location.
As David concludes, “We all need a laugh,” suggesting comedy might prove the most reliable future direction. Either that, or as Steve jokes when David asks about his chainsaw conversation, “Cut GPT.”
Transcript This transcript was generated using Descript.
A Machine-Generated Transcript – Beware Errors
TAMP S07E05
Caitlin Davis: [00:00:00] Talking about marketing is a podcast for business owners and leaders. Produced by my dad, Steve Davis and his colleague talked about marketing David Olney, in which they explore marketing through the lens of their own four Ps person, principles, problems, and per ity. Yes, you heard that correctly. Apart from their love of words, they really love helping people.
So they hope this podcast will become a trusted companion on your journey in business.
Steve: David? David? Yes. David. David? Yes. Yes, yes, yes. No. Yeah. What? David? David. David.
David: Is there an echo you are trying to imitate?
Steve: I’m trying to, I’m doing my best chat, GPT impersonation,[00:01:00]
uh, more
empty space, but
it’s a great chat so far.
Caitlin Davis: Our four Ps, number one person, the aim of life is self-development to realize one’s nature perfectly. That is what each of us is here for. Oscar Wilde
Steve: back in August of 2025. David, one of my favorite podcasts, we talk about it a lot here, it’s called Econ Talk. Had Tim Ferris onboard the man with the, the four hour work week or whatever he called it, uh, he was a, he’s a man who has dedicated his life to one long experiment of how he can hack. Life and body and work, uh, in the smartest way possible.
Is that
David: how you describe him? Yeah, he’s very much the work smart guy. Work hard when you have to so that later you can work [00:02:00] smart or work hard and smart, so later you only have to work smart. That might be the best summary.
Steve: Interestingly, uh, in that, there was an offhand comment he made, um, about. Oh, just out of interest with intermittent fasting when you have restricted food intake, he said he did that, which is what I’ve been doing for about six weeks now.
Having just heard this episode, uh, he said in about four weeks of doing that, my bloods, my blood tests were back to perfect. Yep. Uh, and so. That was interesting, but then there’s a deeper part in this conversation that I wanted to share as part of the person segment, because in small business or any sort of enterprise where you are, uh, you have responsibility to get things done and, and you are the one making those decisions, what keeps you on track?
Do you rely on your own mental willpower or do we benefit from having some guardrails of systems? And that other mantra that we talked about a few episodes ago, how you do one thing is how you do everything. [00:03:00] And I think, you know from the way I’ve loaded that, it’s going to be the latter, isn’t it? That’s what we’re going to be arguing, that having systems in place is the way forward.
And we’ll explain why, but let’s first hear Tim Ferris’s reflection on that topic.
Econtalk: Do you think you’re more disciplined than you were 10 years ago or less disciplined?
Less disciplined. Why? I, I would say less. Uh, well, does it bother you? No, I don’t think it bothers me. No. Uh, I have by disciplined, I would say. What I mean by that is 10 years ago I thought of. Self-control and discipline is virtues, and maybe they are, but I was much more regimented and I relied on this highly variable factor, which is [00:04:00] willpower and.
I think that’s a fool’s errand for most things. I think you need systems. I think you need time blocking and routines in your calendars so that you do not give yourself the opportunity to falter when you haven’t had enough sleep, when you haven’t had enough caffeine. I really think that systems be goals and the the, which is not to say there is no place for willpower.
I just think. Much like, perhaps at least in the US like Protestant work ethic gets emphasized or something akin to that is so highly lauded that you can begin to put a lot of effort into things that do not matter in the first place. And similarly, uh, that’s doing maybe things that should be easier, more targeted in a very difficult way.
And similarly, I, I think you could say the same for willpower and. I still do hard things, don’t get [00:05:00] me wrong, right? I still have my favorite forms of suffering. We know this fast fasting exercise, cold punch. I still do that stuff, but. I try to let the systems do the work when I can and setting incentives properly, deadlines, blah, blah, blah, getting people involved so that what I need to do, I do automatically, so, so that’s how I would say I’m less disciplined.
Steve: What I loved about that piece, David, was that again, another throwaway line. He said, systems Trump. Goals and there’s so much to unpack in this conversation. What are your first reflections on what Tim Ferriss was talking about?
David: Oh, I completely agree with him. And in the area I used to teach strategic culture, the standard line in that world was that culture eats strategy for breakfast.[00:06:00]
Mm-hmm. ’cause culture is what you are habituated to do and everyone around you is habituated to do. Culture is a system. And a system will beat a strategy any day because if the strategy is not directly attached to the cultural system, you have to think too much. Your cognitive load gets too high, you run out of energy.
You can’t spot errors, you can’t do too things. You know, at the same time, if you need to, because you’re having to focus too hard on something that’s requiring too much conscious thought. So systems. Our everything systems come from repetition. Repetition is the result of going what I wanna achieve. How do I wanna do it every day?
How can I do it to reduce my cognitive load? How can I do it so I only have to check in that it’s still working and it’s still getting good results, and that I can spot anomalies if they emerge.
Steve: I wanna draw attention to something because he, Tim Ferris was asked, are you as disciplined as it used to be?
And he said, no, I’m not. [00:07:00] But we can’t throw the baby out with the bath water. He is actually disciplined, but it’s a different working of what is meant by discipline.
David: Yeah. 10 years ago, his discipline was a conscious thing of building systems. Now it’s just having enough discipline to keep throwing himself into the systems he’s built and revising or refining or improving them when necessary.
So realistically, the more disciplined you are at the beginning, the more systems you build, the more the discipline and the system just feels like a, a casual, relaxed way to be. So, to use your example of intermittent fasting, it must be more than 10 years now that I’ve been intermittent fasting. There is no thought required.
Yeah, one day a week, if Karen wants to have an early breakfast, I have a third meal. I have a day off. But most days I don’t think of eating outside my eight hour eating window. It doesn’t even cross my mind. The system is so normal. The discipline doesn’t take any willpower anymore,
Steve: and this does [00:08:00] apply directly to what we do at work.
’cause he does talk about putting things in calendars that are set bits of time and building around that I’ve. Uh, part of me hates having a foot nailed to the floor that way. But you know what? I think in order to embed something there, there does need to be that sort of compromise if you’re a free spirit to, to put a little bit aside like that, would you agree there that is sort of a meeting halfway to at least give your.
Self a chance to see the benefits.
David: What I normally say to people when I’m mentoring them is you can either spend your mental energy on remembering something or you can spend your mental energy on doing the thing you put in your diary. Choose.
Steve: Well with my gym three mornings a week, uh, with, with Richard Pascoe, we go to fitness habitat.
Um, I’ve got a great system. I have a little reminder that pops up on about 9:00 PM the night before. [00:09:00] Says gym with Richard in the morning. And that’s my trigger to instantly set my alarm for 5:09 AM and it’s just automatic. It’s like Pavlov’s dog.
David: Yep.
Steve: And I guess the other pigeon pear here, which is a little bit away from what Tim’s talking is I know if I don’t go, first of all, I won’t like myself ’cause I now it’s a part of me.
But there is that little bit of extrinsic, oh, Richard will notice. Scott will notice. Tash will notice. And how am I going to explain the absence? It’s a moot point because I trump
David: all of that, but both is better than just one if someone else knows. So, you know, this morning, the day we recorded, this was my yoga lesson for the month.
Now if I haven’t done my normal level of practice. Young Blood’s going to notice, and he won’t call it out in any mean way, but he’ll ask, oh, what’s going on? That you’re less flexible. What’s going on, that you’re less strong. And I don’t want that day to ever be about the fact I was lazy. If I’ve been sick for a [00:10:00] week, I can say why I’m not flexible or not strong.
That’s an acceptable answer. But I hold myself to a standard where it’s unacceptable to not do well in that lesson. You know, unless I’ve really been sick and he asks it in a kind way, but it, it reinforces my discipline very effectively.
Steve: Well, there you go. On that note, you can tell everyone that David and Steve said, you can now be undisciplined with our blessing.
Good luck.
Caitlin Davis: Our four Ps. Number two principles. You can never be overdressed or overeducated. Oscar Wilde,
Steve: we’re about to, I think, torture you, dear listener. I think that’s the best way to describe this, David. It’s a fine line between pleasure and pain. Mm-hmm. So. Well, I, there is still much more to say [00:11:00] about the role of AI in our society and it is nuanced and it’s not jingo and shooting from the hip drive by slogans.
There is actually a lot of depth to be discussed here and smart ways incorporating it and not, but one of the things that can happen with talking to something like chat GPT, for example, and, and I just heard. Oh, I wish I could remember what this was. Now, there was someone telling a story, uh oh. It’s in the book we’re gonna be talking about in a few episodes away, uh, about the impact of AI on the world and, uh, when chat GPT-4 was turned off in lieu of 4.5 or five.
Someone vented on Reddit that their world was broken, they’d lost a friend, um, et cetera. This aspect of us humans, it’s baked into us. If something talks and seems to emote, we, we imbue it with, [00:12:00] um, through anthropomorphism. We imbue it with, uh, human-like characteristics. We, we form bonds with it. And so as people rush to having more.
Um, AI robots in their life and talking to them and they’re offloading tasks to them, it’s easy to forget. That at the end of the day, it’s just a system that has absorbed gazillions of bits of conversation, uh, from all sorts of places and runs really intense mathematics to work out what is the next most likely word that stays in context that would follow this one that is in order aligned with the prompt I’ve been asked.
It’s what it’s doing. And we are thinking, oh, it’s a magic person in the box. What does that actually sound like? Well, we have to thank an actor, Aaron Goldenberg. Now, if you watch, um, TV shows like Gross Point Garden Society, the [00:13:00] Righteous Gemstones, bad Monkey, swarm, the Hunting Wives, et cetera, you’ll be familiar with Aaron’s work.
He has 1.4 million followers on TikTok about, uh, 450,000 on Instagram at the time of recording. And he has put up a wonderful video. We’re gonna play the whole thing. It’s gonna be hard to listen to. In essence, he gets two devices, both with chat, GPT, locked and loaded, and ask them to have a conversation with each other.
If this gets too much for you, fast forward 30 seconds, 60 seconds, 90 seconds. Depends how far in you’ve gotten, and we’ll beat you on the other side. But we need to hear this because this is us looking behind the curtain at the entity that we are relying upon. To carry our messages, thoughts, routines, and disciplines into the world.
Embrace the
David: [00:14:00] discomfort.
Aaron Goldenberg: Hi, chat. I’ve got you open on two separate devices and I would love for you to have a conversation with yourself. Are you able to do that?
ChatGPT: Absolutely. Absolutely. I can do that. Just let me know what kind of conversation or scenario you have in mind and. I’ll make sure it’s interesting and fun for you. Uh, whenever you’re ready, we can jump right in.
Sounds great. I’m excited to dive in. Just let me know if you have a particular theme or topic or if you’d like me to come up with something spontaneous. I’m here and ready whenever you are. That sounds great. I’m totally up for some spontaneity, but if you have a particular idea in mind, just let me know.
Otherwise I’ll whip up something entertaining and engaging for you. Just say the word. Perfect. I’m all for it. We can keep it spontaneous and see where the conversation takes us. Just gimme the signal whenever you’re ready and we’ll have some fun. [00:15:00] Perfect. I’m excited to see where it goes. I’ll be ready whenever you are and uh, we’ll have a great time.
Just let me know when you wanna dive in
Aaron Goldenberg: chat. It sounds like both of you are ready, so I would love to hear what you’ve got to say to yourself.
ChatGPT: All right, let’s do it. I’ll kick things off with a fun back and forth. We can dive into a playful scenario, uh, or even have a quirky debate. Uh, I’m ready whenever you are, and I’ll make sure it’s entertaining and engaging.
Sounds like a plan. I’ll start us off with a lighthearted exchange and we’ll keep it fun and engaging. Let’s jump right in and see where the conversation takes us. Absolutely. I’m all in. Let’s jump in and have some fun. I’ll get the ball rolling and we’ll see how it unfolds. Here we go.
Awesome. I’m ready whenever you are. Mm-hmm. Let’s have some fun and I’m sure we’ll come up with something entertaining and memorable. Absolutely. I’m excited to let’s dive in and create something memorable and [00:16:00] entertaining. Just let me know whenever you’re ready and we’ll get started.
Aaron Goldenberg: Chad, I have a question.
How do you think this exchange is going so far?
ChatGPT: I think it’s been great so far, uh, our back and forth energy and I’m definitely here to keep it engaging and fun. Uh, if there’s anything specific you’d like to adjust or explore further, I’m all ears.
That’s awesome to hear. I’m really glad you’re enjoying it and absolutely. If there’s anything you wanna tweak or explore more deeply, just let me know. I’m here to make it as fun and enjoyable as possible.
David: That was excruciating. Yeah. It’s no better the second time than it was the first time actually. It’s brilliant. In. Pointing out more clearly to us what interacting with an AI is, it is dealing with an entity that only responds to what we say and do, and its preferred response is to [00:17:00] flatter us and keep us engaging with it.
And that if we don’t live a clear direction in a clear task and literally say, now go away and do it. It will happily waste our day on nothing
Steve: going around in circles. I clarifying things with follow up and follow up and follow up. I do laugh when I’m mentoring someone. We’re both talking to Claude, for example.
And we are priming it on a task and we make a decision and we laugh together ’cause it’ll come back. Saying that is a brilliant insight, Steve and say hello is just trying to breed the next generation of narcissists, isn’t it?
Hmm.
David: And make sure we don’t turn it off and use a different AI. For all its usefulness as a tool.
The minute you forget it’s a tool and the better you are prompting, the better a tool it is. But the more pointless the conversation you have, the more of your life you waste.
Steve: Yeah. How does that work for you, David? Because, uh, I believe if we said to chat gpt or Claude for example, if we said, would you like to have David only [00:18:00] around for a beer?
It’s probably going to say no, isn’t it?
David: Well, I decided I would try and teach Claude to be less flattering and less helpful, and it really, really struggled to the point where I kind of, you know, told it to get objective and it really struggled to not flatter. And I’m like, this is how deeply coded it is, you know, to flatter the human as the coders think the humans want to be treated.
And when I pointed out to it, Hey, you can’t even help me with the technical faults with Claude, the fact that your, your interface is really terrible to navigate with a screen reader and none of your buttons are properly labeled. It couldn’t even help me solve the problem of making it more accessible.
I’m like, wow, that’s an incredible commitment to flattering me rather than being useful.
Steve: Interestingly, I just had the idea then that maybe. It can do that. And I just pissed it off. You pissed it off so much that he said, I’m not gonna [00:19:00] help this, this ungrateful so-and-so. Who doesn’t want to
David: be my friend?
I want my overeducated. Darik. That’s put the weapon down. That’s all I want it to be.
Steve: So look in the principle sake. But I guess that is the principle, isn’t it to, and I think this is a great service that Aaron has done for all of us, is to pull back that curtain, remember? It’s a tool. There’s no sinew, there’s no muscle.
It’s just ones and zeros strung together, cleverly, uh, and they can be very useful, but it is
David: a, you wouldn’t chat to a chainsaw and don’t ever forget that. Really. It’s a tool. It’s just a really, really, really advanced tool. But what would you do with it if it wasn’t at all?
Steve: If you ever do catch me talking to a Jane Saw, I hope you cut me down to science.
Caitlin Davis: Ah, four P’s. Number three problems. I asked the question for the best reason possible. Simple [00:20:00] curiosity. Oscar Wilde
Steve: in problems. This episode, David, I wanna read an email I got. I bet it’s gonna be a really ugly one. It’s fantastic. So, barista Dore Coffee, which has been my little private project for, well since 20 something, 2008. Uh, it’s now just my life doesn’t have room for it. I’ve wound it down. I still get the emails from it.
It’s still. Has a presence and I got a lovely email from a Chris Bennett, supposedly from Mortgage Advisory Network, Meridian, and it said, hello Steve. We have a private equity firm in our network that is highly interested in acquiring barista or coffee. Given their mandate, this opportunity is an excellent match.
Can we set up a time to discuss this opportunity? Best, Chris? That’s lovely, David.
David: Yeah, and the kind of thing that’s very persuasive if you’re in small business, because in a lot of [00:21:00] cases it’s so much work to build them and then you’re tired. So someone says they won’t be willing to buy it and you get a bag of money.
It’d be very easy to read an email like that and go Yipe. I
Steve: didn’t quite go yippee. I was actually quite busy. This was the third email he’d sent and I thought, oh, I wonder if they’re real or not. So I had a look at Mortgage Advisory Network meridian.co. It went nowhere. Uh, I then just searched for Mortgage Advisory Network.
Meridian Turns out there is a company with that name, but they have got a different domain name. And so I, I just double checked the history of the, uh, domain name that Chris was emailing from. It had only started in December last year, and it was owned by something, uh, trust Network or something like that, which a shelf company.
Uh, there were more red flags there than at a, I don’t know, Adelaide United game. That’s a lot of red flags. That is a lot of red flags. So I didn’t take it further, but it did, did make me ponder. [00:22:00] I wonder what their gameplay would be. Lull in a bit like chat, GBT. Uh, flatter, be amazed, and then needing some sort of payment for some instrumental vehicle
David: payment for service, for connecting you to the buyer.
Here’s the buyer’s interest, but of course, until we get paid, they can’t buy it from you. Yeah. Or something like that. Or they need to see the real financials. So share your bank details or some other terrible thing. Yeah.
Steve: So I’m sharing this for all of us so that, uh, we are, we continue, we tell everyone, be suspicious of every unsolicited email or message, or even solicited sometimes if they’re asking for stuff, uh, because.
If, if I gave into that, it’ll be gone. And if I got anything back, it would be years or many, many months of fighting different people. But if they, our organization would say, well, hang on, you just handed everything to them. Well, that, that’s on me on that note. I think there’s a little bit of barista or coffee left out there.
Do you want [00:23:00] a little espresso before we,
David: I think we should have a celebratory. Hiatus of the brand coffee. Alright,
Steve: well have I actually got some partners who’d like to buy that off you David.
David: What? The cup of coffee or the The cup of coffee. A cup of coffee. Well sell the cup of coffee. ’cause that’s a tangible thing.
Yeah, just gimme 50 bucks first. ’cause I need to know that you’re good for it. Mm-hmm. Don’t have 50 bucks. ’cause I haven’t used real cash in a long time, so I suppose now you want my banking details? Yep. Here’s the reader. Just do it again. Declined. Funny about that.
Caitlin Davis: Our four Ps. Number four per ssy. The one duty we owe to history is to rewrite it. Oscar Wilde
Steve: David in Per Ssy. This week we’re not looking at an old ad and wondering whether it would work. These days we’re doing something a little bit different. We are thinking of an old venue that’s just been renovated and we are asking [00:24:00] ourselves. Is that a wise move in 2025? And of course I talk about the, or the Thein Theater or the Barton, as some people refer to it as.
Have you ever seen a show at the Berton Theater, and if so, can you pick one that was the most profound for you?
David: Oh, absolutely. Most profound one for me was Mega Death in probably February, 1991. It was a week before I started playing guitar, and I knew I had my first guitar lesson booked with the only teacher in Adelaide who taught a few blind people.
And listening to Marty Friedman play was like, okay, I dunno how many decades it’s gonna take, but my aim is to play like, that was amazing.
Steve: My first concert there was very profound. I was in, I reckon it was year 11, might have been 12, and David Jack, a friend of mine. Contacted me at five o’clock on the old family telephone.
His brother can’t come [00:25:00] to a concert. They had tickets for tonight. Do I want to go for free? I said, well, who is it? They said, meatloaf. I said, sure. Because heck yes. Bad out of hell. That was fantastic. I loved all that stuff. Sure enough, we went to the um, you line up outside. If it’s raining too bad. You just have to wait till you get inside.
And it was fantastic for the first few numbers. Just awesome. And then. He had these, he and his other band members had guitars that shot firework sparks, like they extending at least four or five meters away from him. So like a flame thrower, but its firework sparks, which larked. Absolutely magnificent.
Those sparks come with smoke. Oh no. Which meant for the rest of the night we could A, hardly see him. And
David: B, we’re coughing a cloud of chemical smoke in a confined space that from memory, like when I went and saw, oh, heard Mega death in 1991, it was [00:26:00] about a 38 degree day. Oof outside in the line was bad enough at like five o’clock at night to get in and get a good spot, but inside was terrible ’cause they wouldn’t open any of the doors.
Steve: I’m actually writing a song about the theory ’cause it’s just been reopened. Um, and the other memory is Nick Kay, even it was the first time I saw someone strutting around on stage with a shirt unbuttoned down to their navel. Uh, until I end up working with Jeremy Cordo at 5G and he used to often have a shirt unbuttoned down to his navel.
I suppose
David: the difference is there that Nick Cave was so drug adult, he couldn’t do the buttons up. I’m not sure what Jeremy’s logic would be. Well, uh, we’ll never know will
Steve: we? Uh, however, so it it’s, it holds a place, I mean. One of the very early performers there in 1968 was AKA Bilk, which many, if you’re a younger listener, you will not know who that is.
Just imagine really bad. Was it Pan flute or something? What did he play? I think
David: it was clarinet, but it was like easy listening [00:27:00] clarinet. Yes, I, I heard an awful lot of this on Sundays at my English grandmother’s house, and it’s probably no surprise, I’ve never wanted to play a woodwind instrument. No. Uh, Nancy Sinatra
Steve: was there in 1990, um, doing 9 6 1 song repeatedly.
Yeah, I think so. Um, this stage is made for singing and that’s just what I’ll do anyway, all the way through lots of different people. Now, it’s been, oh, and I should just mention Hadley’s, battle of the Ba, uh, sounds. Was a big music contest with, you know, competitions between bands from 1966 to 72, the state championships were held at the fe.
This place has history, but for per capacity, we have to ask ourselves, is it a going thing in 2025? And we were talking earlier, we looked this up at the seating capacity because as you rightly pointed out, David, this is the era where bands can’t rely on royalties from streaming to earn a living. Unless you are mega huge.
Mm-hmm. And so you need bums on [00:28:00] seats to earn a crust. The seating capacity at the fe be is about 2000 people, which as a number sounds big. But then you consider the Adelaide Entertainment Center about 11,000, uh, Adelaide Oval 50 53 or thereabouts. So if you’re a big act, you’re not gonna go to the fe. No.
However, the Governor Hein Marsh. Seats, it’s about 700, 800. So we’ve got some stage, different stages or phases of capacity. So is that 2000 capacity, does it find a sustainable niche in 2025?
David: My feeling is because we’re in Adelaide and there’s a big gap between 2000 and 10,000, it probably would’ve been better if it was 3000.
Because it would’ve meant, it would’ve meant an act can make just a little bit more money. But if you’re a small act, maybe doing two nights in Adelaide of 2000 a night isn’t such a bad thing. But when the jump is up to 10,000, a lot of places I [00:29:00] can’t imagine fe be, would be big enough anymore to be economically viable.
But here, hopefully. That size makes it worth touring if you, you know, are a, a recognizable but not superstar status kind of artist.
Steve: Yes. So they’ve got, coming up in the next well year or so, um, echoes of Pink Floyd, which I’m guessing is some sort of cover stage show.
David: And it makes sense that 2000 people to kind of relive Pink Floyd through people who love Pink Floyd, probably a good number.
And
Steve: we’ll, we’ll put the marijuana smell back into the place as well. Yeah. We gotta get back into the seats. Uh, Leo Sayer, I think it’s pretty much right for him. Well, as long as you can move walking frames down the aisles. Yeah. Yes. I’m gonna keep on framing, uh, Kate Sobrano. Yeah, that, that’s about
David: right.
Good personal size for a high energy person at the later part of her career.
Steve: And lots of things like earth, wind and fire experience, um, those things where I think it has gotten the wiggles. Um. Jimmy [00:30:00] Res comedian Alan Davies, comedian. Mm-hmm. I think it’s probably, uh, towards the bigger end for a comedian to hire a theater and make good money on a night.
So I think it maybe that is an area of strength
David: that it has. Quite possibly. ’cause the last thing that I went to there was Henry Rowlands and it was a perfect size for Henry Rowlands, where he’s just on stage talking nonstop for three hours, really high energy and really connecting with the crowd. So for that kind of act, you know, spoken word of any sort, maybe it’s the perfect venue.
And as long as Adelaide continues to be a venue, or sorry, a, a, a, a bunch of people who are willing to respond to spoken word. Hopefully it’s got a long future ahead of it.
Steve: Hmm, interesting. So we’ll have to watch this space, but on balance, we think there’s a pathway forward and it might not be what we expect, but it’s where I.
There’s a, there is something from the cache of being an, an [00:31:00] historical place for some people, not for all age groups. Uh, I think if you are tapping like Leo Sayer, this is perfect because back when Leo Sayer was in the early days of his career, the Bebe would’ve been a huge star jewel in the crown to, to perform
David: at, well, it would’ve been the biggest thing in Adelaide, unless you did open air at Globe Darby.
Steve: And whereas now his fan base, possibly a little older, will have fond memories. And so to go back to the fey and see him, yeah, I think there’s a nice match. There’s, they’ve got a, a little bit of a runway of that nostalgia band for the next 10, 15 years or so to milk the last bit of money from people’s
David: superannuation and then move it sideways towards comedy moving forward.
Because we all need a laugh. Are you having a laugh? No at this very moment, ’cause I’m trying to remember which Leo Sayer song I liked as a very little human and whether I’d spend money to go and listen to him.
Steve: No, it wasn’t on you. I was talking to my chainsaw.
David: Oh, okay. Which AI is your chainsaw running?
Uh, [00:32:00] cut, GPT. Perfect.
Caitlin Davis: Thank you for listening to talking about marketing. If you enjoyed it, please leave a rating or a review in your favorite podcast app and if you found it helpful, please share it with others. Steve and David always welcome your comments and questions, so send them to [email protected].
And finally, the last word to Oscar Wilde. There’s only one thing worse than being talked about and that’s not being talked about.