Andrew is in Atlanta visiting friends and continuing to think about how to best integrate more AI features into MetaMonster to make the product stickier. Sean had his first demo of Margins and... everything broke! But that's okay!

Links:

• Andrew’s Twitter: @AndrewAskins
• Andrew's website: https://www.andrewaskins.com/
• MetaMonster: https://metamonster.ai/
• Sean’s Twitter: @seanqsun
• Miscreants: http://miscreants.com/
• Margins: http://margins.so/
• Sean's website: https://seanqsun.com/

For more information about the podcast, check out https://www.smalleffortspod.com/.

Transcript:
00:00.93
Sean
This is a new background. Where are you?

00:07.44
Andrew
Oh, you can tell how well my brain is working today. Good Lord.

00:11.24
Sean
Yeah.

00:12.58
Andrew
i am staying with one of my college roommates in Atlanta. And after four years away from the South, my body has apparently completely forgotten how to function in a land of like pollen and pollinators. Every time I come to the South now, it's like the first three days I'm here.

00:30.46
Andrew
My nose is just like, fuck you, dude. So... Yeah, that's where I am. Check out my sweete my suite setup. I've got my suitcase with a couple books on it.

00:38.71
Sean
Amazing.

00:41.60
Sean
Amazing.

00:42.00
Andrew
Little, know, who needs a fancy stand-up desk when you've got a suitcase desk?

00:46.59
Sean
Yeah.

00:49.28
Sean
You can just record things. You can just do things.

00:52.52
Andrew
You know, don't have the fancy mic today.

00:52.93
Sean
Yeah.

00:55.88
Sean
Yep.

00:56.28
Andrew
know, the MacBook microphone is shockingly decent, maybe.

01:03.40
Sean
Yeah, your audio level is better than mine for what it's worth. So maybe should just swap. Maybe I should just... Yeah.

01:11.52
Andrew
Dude, it's all it's all an illusion. It's all just, like, stuff.

01:14.81
Sean
Exactly.

01:16.03
Andrew
And you don't need the stuff to do things. You can just do the things without the stuff.

01:21.45
Sean
Yeah. You just record it your vlog and on an iPhone and put on the internet. You might get a couple hundred thousand subscribers that way.

01:28.08
Andrew
Was it...

01:29.24
Sean
That's the Jackie Cho way.

01:30.69
Andrew
I just heard the other day that... Dude, do you remember Call Me Maybe?

01:36.79
Andrew
The song? The, like, pop song?

01:38.33
Sean
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. All right.

01:40.12
Andrew
That was recorded on a MacBook.

01:43.03
Sean
Whoa.

01:44.15
Andrew
But yeah, that was recorded on a MacBook, like on iMovie.

01:44.89
Sean
That's sick. That's I didn't know that. but That's crazy.

01:48.59
Andrew
It was just like them holding a MacBook.

01:51.86
Sean
I think have you heard Here With Me by David?

01:58.63
Andrew
No.

02:00.87
Andrew
Uh-huh.

02:02.46
Sean
I think that guy did it on his like iPhone. With like an iPhone like digital audio workstation and just cut it up.

02:10.33
Andrew
That's sick.

02:11.29
Sean
It's pretty crazy.

02:12.11
Andrew
That's wild.

02:12.22
Sean
I don't know. Kids these days, man.

02:14.27
Andrew
There really are no excuses. Yeah. yeah I think we might have a little bit of lag.

02:18.70
Sean
Yeah.

02:20.30
Andrew
It feels like we're lagging a little bit.

02:22.62
Sean
Oh, definitely. We definitely are lagging a little bit. Yeah.

02:25.65
Andrew
Okay.

02:26.21
Sean
Oh, well, all right, if you're listening, we're sorry.

02:26.53
Andrew
Well.

02:29.21
Sean
Well, we'll do better.

02:29.98
Andrew
Yeah.

02:30.48
Sean
not Not this week or next week. I'm traveling next week, so I will also have, I'll be on hotel Wi-Fi.

02:34.68
Andrew
Yeah. Also...

02:39.24
Andrew
Yeah. Zincaster's pretty good, though, at, like, cutting out pauses, so maybe there will be no lag to the user.

02:40.21
Sean
Yeah.

02:45.18
Andrew
It's just lag to us.

02:47.08
Sean
Maybe, yeah.

02:48.11
Andrew
User, listener, what call this? Yeah. Okay.

02:51.26
Sean
I don't know, people, friends.

02:51.45
Andrew
Alright. What's going on with you? what's What's going on in Miscreants land?

02:56.98
Sean
I don't know, man. Giant tax bill.

03:00.15
Andrew
Oh, yeah.

03:01.44
Sean
That's...

03:01.85
Andrew
Yeah. Sucks making money, huh?

03:03.93
Sean
I know. It's the worst. i

03:06.12
Andrew
the

03:06.64
Sean
Life is so much easier.

03:06.85
Andrew
It's so hard to be profitable.

03:08.97
Sean
Yeah. yeah Especially if all of our profits just went into last year's taxes. No, it's it's it's like...

03:14.28
Andrew
not all of your ta Not all of your profits went into last year's taxes.

03:17.34
Sean
All all of our profit this year so far are paying off the taxes from last year.

03:24.24
Andrew
Okay, that's very different. This year so far is a quarter of the year.

03:26.02
Sean
For sure.

03:28.38
Sean
For sure. For sure. For sure. For sure. Yeah. and it's it's It's good. It's fine. We will just have more taxes to pay next year. And it'll just be this.

03:36.53
Andrew
Yeah.

03:37.43
Sean
Yeah.

03:38.44
Andrew
Okay, wait.

03:39.24
Andrew
Controversial topic.

03:40.69
Sean
Yeah.

03:41.17
Andrew
Do you pay estimated taxes?

03:43.81
Sean
I would like to. hi

03:46.39
Andrew
So, no.

03:46.59
Sean
Yeah. I would like to. We don't.

03:49.77
Andrew
I don't pay estimated taxes, and I don't currently have plans to start paying estimated taxes.

03:55.40
Sean
why don't you have like a don't you get fined i'm not a cpa i don't okay yeah yeah

03:56.97
Andrew
Because... Yeah, but... Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, you pay a penalty if you don't pay estimated taxes, which kind of bullshit.

04:08.09
Andrew
Like... Okay, government, I'm not gonna go there. I don't wanna be the anti-tax guy. I actually think it's good to pay your taxes. I want the government to have money and exist, and I want social services to exist and national parks to exist.

04:21.30
Andrew
So I don't wanna be the anti-tax guy.

04:22.12
Sean
agreed

04:24.51
Andrew
But, you know, at the same time, as much as I want all of the national, you know, public services to exist, I also don't, like, love, like, giving the government an interest-free loan if I don't have to. Yeah.

04:39.67
Sean
Right, or getting fined for it if you don't. For sure.

04:42.19
Andrew
Yeah, well, I'm fine with getting fined for it if I don't. that's i'm I mean, yeah I don't know. but But yeah, so basically my thought is the penalty that I pay is relatively small.

04:54.75
Sean
Yeah.

04:55.56
Andrew
And I don't know what my income is going to be quarter...