Recapping the Mr Beast Joe Rogan Interview, The Billionaire Who Owns the Sports Jersey Market, Betting on Yourself, and More
But I thought his approach was smart and one that people should take, which is he goes, right now there's like 5 million people who collect sports cards. My question when we bought Topps was, how do we get 50 million or 500 million people to collect? And like, that's the only game I want to play is expanding the total size of this market from 5 million people who do this thing to 50 million people who do this thing. I feel like I could rule the world. I know I could be what I want to.
I put my all in it like no days off. On the road, let's travel.
Dude, I listened back to our last episode, the drunken episode. It was good. We were funny. People liked it.
I've heard that. What did you think was fun? Here's so for the listeners.
I listened to the whole episode. Imagine how good it must've been for me to listen, sit through the cringe of my own voice.
Well, for people listening, people will usually message Sean and I together, but sometimes separate. And they say, I liked this episode. And the response that we always have is, Why? What did you like about it?
What part? We fish hard for that compliment.
Well, no, I mean, it's not rude. I do really like it. I like what I did. We need to do more. What was funny?
Um, I think I literally came across as sort of like giggly drunk, uh, the whole episode. I was already— I, I just felt like I was having a good time. Like, watching myself have a good time made me have more fun. And the second was y'all's reactions were really good. So I'd pitch a kind of hailbrained idea, and then you were, your reaction was on point. And then Ben came in with like, not like, you know, reasonable, calm Ben. Ben was like, that is a terrible idea. Or he was like, no, Sam, you're dead wrong. This is a great idea. Imagine crawling onto this big-ass bed and like, blah, blah, blah. You know, he like really played into it. So I think it just had good energy and good vibes.
That's good. Yeah, we've had, we had people reach out to us about it. Um, so that's good.
So I'm gonna try to maintain that. Um, dude, right before this I was watching, you saw MrBeast went on Joe Rogan. I don't know if you caught the episode at all.
I didn't. I just a couple of the clips where they said like, what do you do with your money? And he's like, not much. He goes, I used to have a roommate up until recently and we each split our place for $700, but I got a fancier place because someone broke into my house. So I needed like some security, but it's still like pretty normal of a house.
Yeah, I didn't see that. So I've only seen one clip and it was basically the clip of like, how did you make it on YouTube? And it's a great clip, right?
Like, it's a—
what's he say? So he goes, so he's 23 now, and he goes, I started doing this when I was 11. And Joe's like, what, 11? He's like, yeah. He's like, I came home and I— he's like, I started doing this when I was 11. And he's like, I sucked, obviously, at the beginning. He's like, so he's like, he's like, look at me now. I don't look cool now. Like, imagine me at like 12. Like, I was like, you know, pimply, you know, pimply face, scrawny, awkward, mumbly kind of guy. And like, here I am trying to like make videos. And he's like, back then also YouTube really, there wasn't a thing like YouTubers wasn't like a thing 12, 13 years ago, you know? So it's like, he's like, yeah, I just was doing it 'cause I liked it. He goes, I hated school. He goes, I never, he's like, in high school I just never even brought a book home. Like, he's like, I remember doing zero studying. My parents got so mad at me. He's like, and then like when I turned 18, um, he's like, he's like, basically, so his, his went, it went in 3 phases. He goes, From 11 to 13, I was trying to make videos, but I was like super embarrassed because they were so bad. And Joe's like, do they still exist? He goes, no, I deleted my channel when I turned 13 because like I got like, I don't know, like bullied in school a little bit. I felt embarrassed. So I deleted all those videos, but I like started fresh again at 13 and like whatever, kept going. He's like, so then from 13 to like 17 or 18, I was just trying to make like videos all the time because my first video randomly got like 20,000 views. He's like, that was the best thing that ever happened to me. I got like this instant hit and I was hooked. And then like, it didn't happen again for a while, but like, that first one, which was about like, he like hacked some video game, like, here's how to beat this level in a video game or whatever. He's like, some obscure game, and it just like, people wanted to know how to do that hack. So that's how I got popular right away. Um, or he's like, that's how that video got popular. And then I got, I wanted to chase that, that, that feeling again. So he's like, I wasn't making any money. He's like, finally I got to the point where I was making a dollar a day. And he's like, yes. And he's like, so I saved up for like a few months and I bought a microphone. And I was like, yeah, like now I sound good. Like, here we go. And he's like, I just kept doing that. I kept like making a couple bucks, saving it, and then like buy a camera or buy like, you know, like a better computer so I could like edit the videos or screen record or whatever. And so he just kept doing that for like 6 years. He's like, my whole goal was that by the time I graduate from high school, can I like just make enough money doing this? Cause I don't want to do anything else.
—what was his number?
So it did not happen. He's like, by the time I— he's like, by the time I graduated high school, I was making like $400 a month or something like that. And he's like, you know, it's $300, $400. He's like, so my mom gave me this ultimatum. She's like, you know, you're moving out or you're like going to community college. Like, you're not going to do this video thing. And so he's like, fuck, okay. He's like, I didn't want to go to community college. He's like, it's like the worst thing in the world. Just sitting there listening to this lecture. Like, it's not what I wanted to do. He's like, so I started skipping. He's like, every day I would just go to my car and instead of going to community college, I would just edit videos in my car. And he's like, I'd do that all day and I'd come home and my mom thought I went to school. He's like, and he's like, that created a clock because now she was gonna find out, like by the end of the semester I had zeros as my grades. Like she was gonna know that I did not go to community college. So I had to like, I bought myself like one semester more of time. He's like, and in that time I pulled it off. Like I got to the point where I could like self-sustain. I just moved out., and then I could like do this like full-time moving on my own. He's like, and so that's kind of like the progression of how I did it. And I was like, how awesome is that? How awesome is that? Exactly. Like a bet on yourself story where burn the bridge behind you. Right. So, so, you know, you, uh, we say burn the bridges. I don't know why we say that. It's burn the boats. Uh, like if you want to take the island, you got to burn the boats. And so he burned the boats when he, when he did that and, uh, and knew what he wanted to do. Right. Cause like, School's great, but school's not for everybody. If you, if you kind of know what you want to do, um, you're much better off, I think, competing in the free market on that thing than like competing for your teacher's like love and affection, you know, with writing the essay they want to grade as an A+, right? Like writing the thing they want you to write about in the format they want you to write in a way that will get them to give you the grade, right? Like that's like, that's like not a real market. Whereas you make videos on YouTube, you're competing in like a real market. Or you want to be an athlete.
Yeah, it's just that most people think that they're like going to do something for life and they aren't willing to or they don't actually want to. I think, I think the rarity here is not is someone 18 incapable? It's do they actually love what they're saying they love enough that they're willing to dedicate 10 or 20 years to it, right?
Yeah. Like, you know what I mean? Are you actually— do you actually have a thing you love? Most people do not. I remember my sister when she was going to college, my dad was like, all right, well, like, what do you want to major in? She's like, I don't know. He's like, well, what's your favorite subject? Like, what do you love to study? She's like, lunch. Like, you know, I just, I think I'm not, I don't have anything against any of them, but like, do any of them make me happy? Not really. So what, now what? And like, I think that's how most people's careers go. It's like, all right, well, I don't hate it, but I don't love it. But now what? What am I supposed to pick?
Yeah. Yeah. So I think that's the rarity here is that he actually, that he liked something enough. Um, but anyway, that's a good story. I'll have to go and watch this podcast.
Winnie, uh, there's one more that's like that that I think you'll appreciate. Um, there's a guy who's visiting, a kid who's visiting, basically my, my brother-in-law's nephew, this kid named Sebastian. And, uh, he's in town visiting. I haven't seen him in like 7 years. So I was like, oh, Sebastian, like, oh, you've, you hit puberty, you kind of grew up. He's like, he's still like, he's like kind of like, he's like a kid, right? He's still small, but like he's like ripped. And from the age of like, I met him when he was maybe 5, and back when he was 5, he was so into like, uh, wrestling and, and like UFC and MMA. And he would like, he knew every wrestler's promos, songs, moves, everything. Like I think a lot of kids do, but he could like, he would like practice them. He was like good at them. He could like do an impression of Stone Cold Steve Austin or The Rock or these guys. And then with fighting, he was like, got really into jiu-jitsu early on and got good at it to the point where he was like, by the age of, I want to say 8 or 9, he was like, Mom, like, this is what I'm going to do. I'm going to do fighting. Like, I'm going to be a fighter. So let's just like do that. How do I go train like 5 hours a day? Because that's what I want to do. And so from the age of like, he was already doing it when he was like a young kid, but I think from the age of like 8, 9, or 10, somewhere there. He started training like a professional. He homeschooled himself. So he's like, okay, I don't need to go to school anymore. Like, I'm going to do this. I'll homeschool to like, you know, continue passing these like grades or whatever. But like my real school is I spend 5 hours a day in this gym and I get good at this. So, and he's now like one of the— so he's 17 now. He's got his first amateur fight this year. He's one of the best jiu-jitsu players in the world. He's going to ADCC. Um, he's like the best in the— he's already the best in the state of Texas. He's one of the— he's like number 1 or number 2 nationally. Now he's going to go to the international competition, see if he can win that, like the world championships at age 17. He's been training all his striking. He's doing his first amateur fight. And this kid is so focused, so driven, so determined. And like, it's just kind of amazing to see like what a good kid he comes from. Like, you know, like single mom household and like, you know, but is he doing—
is he doing an MMA one with striking or just—
no, no, he's doing MMA now. So he's like, I love— he's like, I love it all. He's like, jiu-jitsu, I'm already the best. He's like, my striking was coming along. He's like, I want them to want to take me down because my striking is that good. He just talks like, like, dude, when I was 17, I didn't have a clue. I didn't have a clue about a clue. And so when I saw that, I was like, that's special. And it's just like, just the way I idolize kind of like the, the Billy of the Week. Like, I appreciate greatness when it's accomplished. I even, I like it even better when it's the raw talent that's just turning into a diamond. Give him, give him Sebastian. I think it's like, uh, I think it's like Olivares or I don't know how you say his last name. It's like a Hispanic last name. I'll send it to you. Is he, is he Indian? No, he's Hispanic. So I'll watch his videos and, um, jiu-jitsu is normally very boring. He's so athletic that his jiu-jitsu looks fun and he's like a showman. Like he comes out and the crowd has already heard about him. They've seen him on Instagram. Like the announcers know that he's like more acrobatic with the way he does things. And so he's got like an aura about him already. It's pretty dope to watch. Like, dude, this guy's going to be in the UFC. It's crazy. I've seen him since he was like 8 or 9 years old doing this. What's, what's he weigh? He's a flyweight. He's like a flyweight. So he's very, he's very small. He's like maybe 5'6", 125 pounds, like that sort of thing.
But maybe he'll fill out.
I guess he's— he worked out with us and like, it was like he put us all to shame. It was embarrassing. He was stronger than you. Yeah, he, he's, he's, he's like a dominant athlete. Like it's like, okay, we're going to do this hip raise, you know, thing. And it's like his explodes. It doesn't raise. Yeah. But like size matters.
So like even a, like a, like a, like a not strong 200-pound person can't— is stronger than a really strong 130.
So yeah, he's like a crazy man.
He's 6'3", 6'4". He's 200 pounds. And he's been training jiu-jitsu for maybe 4 or 5 years now, and he's like a, whatever, he's like a blue belt or whatever. They rolled and he got tapped like 15 times in the same, he got embarrassed by a 125-pounder, right? He's like, it wasn't close. He's like, I can't, I couldn't believe it. Like I thought, I thought the size and strength would just let me kind of maul a little bit.
And he's like, no, dude, I'm, I'm gonna Google him after this. I wanna see what he looks like. All right. You have a lot of stuff. I actually didn't research much at all because last time you said I've got so much.
Yeah, well, I might have been talking out my ass there, but we'll do it anyways. So I'll start with a couple of business things and then we'll go from there. So did you, did you see like what Michael, that guy Michael Rubin did?
So we talked about him a little bit. To be honest, I don't entirely understand what his business Fanatics does, but I know that like he's got 3 different companies right now. One of them was worth like $50 billion. Another one's worth like $1 billion. Another was worth like 5 or 10 billion. Like, it's just like crazy. It's like there's Fanatics and there's like 3 spinoffs of it.
Yeah, exactly. So I don't have like a ton of, you know, kind of like research on him or whatever, but basically Fanatics itself is worth over $10 billion. And what Fanatics does is they basically are a merch company, but for sports. And so what they do is you want to go buy a Steph Curry jersey, whether you buy it in the NBA shop, the Warriors shop or you just Google Steph Curry jersey and you land on Fanatics.com, it's Fanatics that's printing. They are actually like printing the jerseys and then shipping them out to customers.
I get that. I just don't understand how can just like a rookie, like a noob— I mean, he's not a noob anymore. He's been doing this since he was 21 and he's probably 55 now. How can just like a guy come in and just like muscle like the people who have had those contracts for 20 decades, for 20 years?
I also had that same exact question. Now, I know he was kind of like successful before this? I think he had done a—
it was called GSI, I think, Commerce, and he sold it to eBay for— I forget exactly how much, but he made like $80 or $90, I think. And then it didn't work out at eBay, so he bought back some of the stuff and he grew that to be big. And then he also spun out a few things. So this company called ShopRunner, which is quite popular, is basically like Amazon Prime for people who aren't on Amazon. He built that business and a few other things. And so he started as like a ski shop when he was 18, I think he said.
Yeah, exactly. Ski, sort of a ski business, whatever. Then became like kind of apparel logistics. So that's GSI Commerce. That's sports, again, sports commerce. He sold that to eBay. I think, I don't know if you said the price, $2.4 billion.
Yeah, I think he only walked away with like $80 billion, which is a lot. But, uh, I don't think he, I think he like gave up a ton of equity and he was like in his late 30s at the time.
And then, um, And then, yeah, I don't know how he got the contracts, but he basically just like continued licensing. I don't think he got exclusive. So I think he got the licenses to print, print the stuff. And then over time demonstrated that like they had the best product with the best delivery, with the best quality assurance and all that stuff. And so they ended up being like, we'll just power your shop, right? We'll be the, we'll be the default one when you go to like the team's websites.
Well, he also bought a, recently started a cards company that is making cards and they just, and then he was like, you know what, let's just buy Topps while we're at it. So I don't understand how he's totally just kind of brute force his way into this, it seems.
Yeah. So he, uh, exactly. So he bought Topps, which is kind of like a pretty interesting move. We've talked about trading cards. We talked about, um, you know, like this whole thing and what they're, what it seems like what they're going to do is they're going to say, all right, we got the licenses from the, from the sports teams. We can get, we can, we know licensing as a business. We can get the licenses for cards as well. We know printing and manufacturing. We can do that with the cards as well.. But then also with cards, there's like, basically it's the same customer, it's the same fan. So if I buy a Steph Curry jersey, odds are I'm gonna be like somewhat interested in like a Steph Curry rookie card. And what hit the, the, the reason I wanna bring him up is not because like I had some like deep insight on his like business plan, although I think it's pretty simple, which is like, we have the sports fan as a customer. What do they buy? One of the things that they might buy is collectibles. Okay, lemme go buy Topps and like, we'll, let's sell them collectibles. But I thought his approach was smart and one that people should take, which is he goes, Right now there's like 5 million people who collect sports cards. And, um, and so like the whole business is like these 5 million people and nobody has like taken a like big approach to this. It's been this like hobbyist kind of underground. And that's like the charm of it. Like if you go to like the annual sports card conference, it's like this dump in Cincinnati that's like, you know, these hobbyists bring their cardboard boxes and like some, you know, special shout out to like, you know, Kentucky Fried Chicken for sponsoring this year's conference, whatever, right?
And like Eric's mom's for bringing cookies. Yeah, exactly.
Exactly. Third year running. Thank you, Mrs. K. So they're like, you know, that's the conference right now. So he's like, dude, why is that like that? But like SneakerCon is like this fucking state-of-the-art thing and CES is like this epic show that's like, you know, like cutting edge. So he's like, I'm going to do all that in the trade. No, he's like, nobody has spent a dollar on marketing collectibles. Like, nobody— like, it's like this hobbyist passion industry, but nobody goes out and markets this thing. He's like, but people have done that for sneakers and other things. So I think what he's gonna do, one, one smart thing, I like this part of the plan, was he's basically going to athletes that like to collect in general. He's gonna like make it known that these celebrities— oh, did you know, like, the whatever, you know, the, the guy from Billions, like the hedge fund manager, has like—
he's gonna build stuff. He's going to build like a media company on top of this a little bit, like a media company, or it's a, it's going to be a slick media play and they happen to sell the cards.
It's going to be, he's going to make it cool to collect. Right. Which is a smart thing. And the reason why, again, like, okay, that's just part of a plan. The one part I really liked is he goes, there's 5 million people who collect today. And what anybody else in the space has tried to do is try to get as much, take as much as they can from those 5 million. My question when we bought Topps was, How do we get 50 million or 500 million people to collect? And like, that's the only game I wanna play is expanding the total size of this market from 5 million people who do this thing to 50 million people who do this thing. And I just thought like, that's, that's a really powerful mental model for how you, how you build businesses. And I've talked about this before. That's the same, it's the same framework as the, the one that the guy from Slack did when he created Slack. He's like, yeah, there's work chat tools and some people use them, He's like, the reality is 8 out of the 10 customers that we talk to, companies that we talk to, they don't use a live chat tool. They use email. So he goes, his memo was called, we don't sell saddles here, right? Because he's like, if we just go to the existing people who like horseback riding, they probably already have a saddle. We try to convince them to switch because we got a better saddle. They're kind of familiar with their ways. We're always going to be in this like tiny niche. But if we sell the dream of horseback riding and show people how fun it is to go horseback riding. We increase the size of the overall market. And then when they say, oh wow, I love this thing, but my butt hurts, we'll say, great, we have a saddle for you. And so that's like just like a general approach to business that I think more people should take is increasing the, um, the size of the number of people who even want your category before saying pick me. Have you—
I agree. That's a really good insight. And an example of that is, have you seen, uh, so Kevin Rose, this tech guy for years, Kevin Rose. For some reason, after— I forget where he was. He was either— I think he was at Google leading like their venture arm. He left and he became the CEO. I think he became a part owner and the CEO of this blog called Hodinkee. I think that's how you— Hodinkee. And I remember hearing about that and I was like, what? He goes, yeah, it's a blog for watches.
And I was like, well, there was a middle step. So he created a studio, a lab to incubate ideas. And that's why he was even more crazy. He's like, Yeah, we're creating this like publication or this thing for watch collectors. And then that got acquired, I think, by either Hodinkee or that was called Hodinkee and it got acquired.
I'm not sure which one. Yeah, they, they sometimes— this guy already, already had this blog. Kevin was tinkering with it and they became one. And he started working on that and I was like, what the heck, man? You're like, who gives a shit about watches?
Yeah. Aren't you like, yeah, like a blog?
Like, what are you thinking? And then I started watching some of their YouTube videos and it was either Kevin or the other guy who started the, the site and he was sitting with John Mayer and they were talking about their watches. And I sat for like 20 minutes watching this, like, where John Mayer was like, yeah, this watch is actually special for this reason. And I was like, that's amazing. And they had this show on YouTube where they were doing that. And I'm not a watch guy because I don't want to spend— I don't get joy out of— I get more stress out of spending $30,000 for something on my wrist. I kind of get annoyed with it. But I was watching his stuff and I was like, I want to own this. You've turned me into a connoisseur or a wannabe connoisseur. I want to be part of this. Exactly.
I want to want this. I don't know how yet. Yes. It's like sushi and wine. There's all been a whole bunch of these things where I'm like, oh, I kind of like the idea of getting into this hobby. Golf, right? Like I want to want it. Yes.
And that's how I felt with him. And I could see myself wanting to do this with cards. I, um, when I was a kid, did you ever collect Magic cards?
Not Magic, Pokémon for me, but yeah.
I did. I did Magic and I don't even remember how to play it. And I remember like, I was like, just let me look on eBay, see how much some of those are. And I was like, I'm just gonna buy some. This is, this is fun. It'll remind me of my childhood. And I would totally do that with sports cards, even though I don't pay attention to sports now. Just remind me of my childhood. I would buy like a Mark McGuire card or something like that. Um, but yeah, this is cool. I think that's a really good framework actually.
Have you heard of this startup called Whatnot? No. Oh dude, go to this. So, uh, just go to whatnot.com. W-H-A-T-N-O-T.com. Is everything just spelled how it's spelled? Whatnot. So this startup, so I'm gonna let you look at this. So I, this launched in, let's see, Whatnot launched.
This is slick. This is a really nice type.
Whatnot launched, I think in like in the last 2 years. So it launched in December 2019. Guess how much Whatnot is valued at right now? $100 million? Over $1 billion. There's a $1 billion startup you never heard of. And what do you do? So if you go into one of these, I don't know if you've, if you've opened up one of the livestreams. So it's basically a livestreaming site. Site, and all you do is you open up the livestream and it's somebody who's got a pack of cards and you could buy the pack and then they'll open it live and tell you what you got. And so like you could open up, you know, a Pokémon card pack or, uh, you know, an NBA card pack.
Wait, I'm, I'm going to buy it from him and he's going to open it live for me?
For you. And then he'll ship it to you. And then he's going to mail it. And then he'll ship it to you.
Oh wow. This is sick.
So like I have here.
Dude, their traffic is just like going up like crazy. This is really cool. It basically just kind of looks like a TikTok knockoff.
So I tried to invest in this and these fuckers didn't let me in. But, you know, I should have. Why not? I should have tried harder. Why not? Exactly. Why not?
What not? What did they— what did they say?
Well, they were just like, hey, we got like a lot of— we're oversubscribed. Let me see. And I joined the process a little late in the process. So they were like, let me see how much room we can make. And then it was sort of like We can't really make any room. You know, like we kind of have people who want all the allocation already.
How'd you find him?
A buddy of mine, Justin, had sent it to me as like, hey, I really, I'm really bullish on this one. He invested and I was like, oh great. And I got the in and I was like, you know, and I saw it and I was like, I understand this dude. I like did a bunch of stuff at Twitch and livestreaming. Like, I can help you guys. Look at me, I'm such a nice guy. And like this was pretty early, like the podcast wasn't very big yet. Um, so I didn't have as much of a brand in any way. Twitter wasn't that big yet. And, uh, and also I didn't hustle hard enough. Like I could have hustled harder, but it was already like a decent valuation at that point. I think it was like a, it was a pretty pricey, it was a decently pricey round. I mean, still it's up 10x since then.
Are they young? Are they kids?
No, they, uh, the guy, the founder Grant, he had a pretty impressive background. I don't remember exactly what it was, but like, look at this. So So I went on, uh, I immediately went on Whatnot, but Whatnot at the time was more for like, uh, Magic and Pokémon and things like that. I like sports cards, so there's like other versions of this that are for sports cards. And so I went on one and so I did this. So I end up dropping $700 on these useless cards that I end up getting. I got nothing good out of my pack. The guy who was opening was just like, oh, you know, like the best one, this one he sent in the, in the, the frame. Is somebody named Ignas Bradžikius on the Knicks. Never heard of this guy. Like, you know, he literally, you know, in college he averaged 14 points a game. So like, you know, I don't know who this guy is. I don't think he plays. And that was the best card I got out of it. But I dropped $700 because you could just with Apple Pay, you're like, oh, I want to buy a diamond pack. Oh, that's how they do it. You're just Apple Paying and I'm just clicking, I'm Face IDing and just dropping $100 at a time on these packs. And it's like such an addiction because it's like, dude, it could be a Luka card, it could be a Giannis card. Like, you could get one of the big ones in this thing. And it was so dangerous. I was like, I can't open this app ever again. You know, this is, you know, this is a small divorce bomb that I'm looking at here. I need to, like, distance myself from this.
Do you remember when we talked about this thing? I forgot what it was called. Ben, maybe you can look it up. But basically, when you're buying fancy art that costs like millions of dollars, you want to store it in a free port. That's what it's called. So basically, I'm going to— I don't want to sound like too much of an idiot because we talked about this like 2 years ago, but I think when you're buying art, as long as you keep it in a particular type of country, you don't need to pay sales tax, I guess, on it or something like that. And so people will keep them in certain countries because they're like, I don't want this like $20 million thing. I don't even want it in my house. I just want to store it, or I'll just store like a lot of my collection. And I wonder we talked about free ports for like some of these, for some of these newer collector items. And we talked about that 2 years ago. I actually think I would like to see if there's an update, if there's anyone that launched anything like this.
Yeah. So basically a free port lets you store your art for an unlimited amount of time without taxation. I believe, I think they're like, you don't have to declare it. Um, so like you, you could sort of put your art there and you don't, because it's like, it's like in limbo. It's like neither here nor there. And so therefore it's like, we're just holding, I'm holding it for a friend. Yeah, exactly. And I don't know exactly how it works. Like, I don't think it's a total free lunch. Um, in fact, I was actually, I was literally watching a video about this yesterday and then I like paused a third of the way through. Cause I had to do something. There's a, there's a good video about this on YouTube of a guy explaining in like 8 minutes, uh, how free ports work. And basically, Uh, yeah, it's like a, I think the entire art market is like very money laundry. Um, and even within that, then Freeports are like this, like extra hack on top of that. But, uh, I want to get back. I want to get to the bottom of how Freeports work. If you know, I don't think it's that complicated, but I just haven't looked into it.
I don't think it's that complicated either, but I wonder if you, let's say that you bought that $700 pack of cards and there was something in there that potentially was worth $5,000. Like if you could just send it to a third party just to hang onto it. And then when you're ready, just click a button and sell it. Maybe you would want that. Right.
And there's this other thing, which is like people, uh, like rich people will donate their art to a museum, take the tax write-off, but the museum is like a cottage on their, it's like a part of the, it's like the West Wing of their mansion. It's like they create these like nonprofits that like they're, they, these nonprofit museums that exist like on their estate and things like that.
Is that really how it works?
There's some stuff I was in the video. He was talking about that or, you know, he mentioned that I don't, that's not what a free port is necessarily, but I think that's just like yet another thing. Like, why do these people buy art for like, you know, $50 million and donate it? And it's like, well, because, you know, XYZ.
All right, that's the episode.
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