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`0:59:12`

reason. You've seen this approach work at traditional companies, I imagine? It's not just companies that work in your way where there's no investors, they're not obsessed with growth? You've seen Shape Up implemented at traditional public type companies? Yeah, it's usually smaller teams. It's not like Airbnb, Brian's…

`0:59:57`

Or it could be this idea of appetites versus estimates, and they can work that into the way they work. Take whatever works. You don't have to go wholesale on any of these things. Awesome. A second question comes from Leo Polovets, one of my favorite VCs. He works at Susa Ventures. He asked the question…

`1:00:45`

Essentially, working on one sculpture, and constantly tweaking it and chiseling it and just polishing it, and just making it better and better, and better, and better, and better. I still thoroughly enjoy working on Basecamp. But a few years ago, we built this new thing called HEY, HEY.com email service, because we just felt like…

`1:01:34`

And then, a few years ago, we go, "You know what? We're makers. Let's be honest about ourselves." I'm talking about me, and I was talking about David. But we were just like, "We want to make more things again. We have some more ideas. Why are we suppressing ourselves? Let's not do…

`1:02:23`

back, I'd go, "I would probably answered it differently," or, "I don't even agree with the way I answered that." There's a million things like that happening all the time. But in terms of big things, I think that's the best example I can come up with. It's clear that you've…

`1:03:11`

It's funny because there are some principles I hold, perhaps, or some direction I'm headed, but I don't think about any of this ahead of time, including the company. We don't have a multi-year plan. I don't even have a one-year plan. I don't even have a six-month…

`1:03:57`

I'm on a path. We're going somewhere. I don't want to stand still. But I don't know where I'm going, and I'm perfectly comfortable with that. For me, it is really much about making it up as you go, based on, again, being in touch with how things feel to you…

`1:04:45`

to do something else. And then, if you're like, "Don't do those things," then what's the point of planning? People end up doing things they don't want to do because they said they were going to do them. Obligations in the future, I think, are quite dangerous, and I think they send people…

`1:05:31`

We didn't know all the tentacles that come up from that and what it's going to impact and touch, but we knew principally, we want to be able to do what we want to do. We want to be entrepreneurs and to me, that means working for yourself. The moment you go out and take…

`1:06:16`

We launch a new product, I don't know what's going to happen. We launched Basecamp, I didn't know what was going to happen. We launched HEY, I didn't know what was going to happen. We're going to launch some new stuff soon, I don't know what's going to happen. We…

`1:07:02`

To me, that's a sense of caring about the work itself. It's not so much about the outcome, which you don't control as much as you might think. Clearly, we want people to accept the work that we do and we want to find enough people who like it to make it sustainable, but…

`1:07:48`

we approach things very differently than most, and our products are very different than most. That's why they should be there. We should provide alternatives. As I said earlier, I don't like the word competition, because it almost sounds like you could be making the same thing. I want to provide an alternative, which is…

`1:08:36`

We're wrapping up the HEY calendar right now, which is the calendar we're building for our HEY email service. I'm really proud of it. I have no idea what's going to happen. It's very unusual. But I'm really proud of the work that we did, and that's enough for me…

`1:09:21`

The homepage, yeah. Okay. One of them is, work isn't war. You wrote a book about this roughly, about Work Doesn't Have to Suck, but I guess, can you just talk about why war work feels like war, and then what maybe people could do to make it feel less like war? This is about…

`1:10:10`

That's how people talk about business. I find that to be depressing. It just feels depressing to me. We use words to establish a perspective in a way of thinking about the world. And if those are the words that are in your head, then you feel like it's this war. This is the other…

`1:10:56`

I like to think of words that are more additive and alternative. " We can exist. Let's exist. Let's make something great." Not, "Let's beat them, let's conquer them, let's make a killing." Let's just make something great. I think that matters, and it changes the way you think about the work…

`1:11:43`

For someone that's thinking about going down this path and wants to bootstrap their company, that doesn't have a lot of money because it takes cash to start a business, do you have any advice for just how to get started down this path? Yeah. First of all, it's hard. This is hard. When…

`1:12:29`

You can't control the economy. You can't control how much advertising costs, but you control your own costs. The other thing I would encourage people to do is, figure out how to do as much as they can on their own before they bring on a second person. Really work and struggle through something on…

`1:13:16`

Don't spend anything on anything, basically, except the tool you use. Let's say, it's your laptop or whatever you're going to use. Get a good one. They don't cost much anymore. 1,500 bucks or something like that, you can get a really nice MacBook Air or whatever. You need an internet…

`1:14:02`

I think Brian Chesky had a really good bit on this, I think, on your podcast about how companies get complicated. And I loved that. When I was hearing it, I kept hearing this unfolding, this complex shape that you almost can't fold back. It's so complicated now that you don't even see where…