Produced By - Life Without Limits: AI, Travel, and Constant Growth | #66: Liam Lawson

Episode Date: August 19, 2024

Liam Lawson, the dynamic Editor in Chief at AI Tool Report, has spent the last 24+ months traveling the globe, immersing himself in diverse cultures from Nepal to Colombia. Alongside his editorial responsibilities, Liam engages deeply with sponsors and product teams to shape long-term AI strategies. His journey is fuelled by a relentless passion for learning and innovation, evident in his constant pursuit of new insights and projects. From discovering cutting-edge AI advancements to embracing the challenges and joys of global nomadism, Liam embodies a spirit of curiosity and adaptation. Join us as Liam shares his inspiring experiences and discusses his latest ventures, where he looks forward to blending his global experiences with new creative endeavours and continuing his quest for knowledge and growth. ⁠⁠ Connect with Liam: https://www.linkedin.com/in/liam-lawson-674b3120a/ AI Tool Report: https://www.aitoolreport.com/  Connect with Tommen: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tomasloucky/  Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thisistommen/  X: https://x.com/TomasLoucky  Podcast: Links: https://linktr.ee/produced_by  Website: https://produced-by-podcast.com/  Support: https://www.patreon.com/ProducedByPodcast  Creative Spotlight (LinkedIn newsletter): https://www.linkedin.com/build-relation/newsletter-follow?entityUrn=7092551882589528065  More: Trailblazed (marketing agency): https://trailblazed.digital/  Produced (email newsletter): https://produced.beehiiv.com/  My SkillShare Course: https://skl.sh/3Rh7ZtY  Produced By with Tommen is your weekly dose of inspiration where ambition meets creativity. Join us as we dive into the journeys of content creators, entrepreneurs, and other remarkable individuals who break barriers and redefine success. Each episode shares unique stories, challenges, and triumphs. From heartfelt struggles to incredible successes, these conversations will motivate you to push beyond your limits and chase your own dreams. Whether you're on a creative path or just love great stories, tune in and become part of a community that constantly strives to push the boundaries. Sit back, relax and enjoy. Connect with Tomas:X: https://x.com/TomasLoucky⁠⁠⁠Stan: https://stan.store/TommenLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tomasloucky/⁠⁠Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thisistommen/⁠⁠Unproduced:Newsletter: https://unproduced.substack.comYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@unproducednotesSpotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/033Ddo8ibDlLYoaP7FFLIWMore:Links: https://linktr.ee/produced_by⁠⁠⁠Newsletter: ⁠⁠⁠⁠https://producednewsletter.substack.com/⁠The Podcast Club: https://www.linkedin.com/groups/25420030/Tools & gear that support the show:Metricool: https://f.mtr.cool/HRJBZKRiverside: https://riverside.sjv.io/vDnDodFavikon: https://www.favikon.com?fpr=tommenRa Optics: https://ra-optics.myshopify.com/discount/TOMMEN?rfsn=8803777.591d19JamX: https://jamx.ai/podcasters-offer?ref_id=e02d48af-ef66-4e76-b804-c2e8d282a8bfSome links are affiliate links, which means I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. If you find them useful, using these links helps keep the podcast running. Thank you!  Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hello and welcome to Produced Buy. Just quickly before we begin, if we enjoy the show, please consider supporting it by joining our Patreon. You can choose from a list of memberships and we'll receive some exciting rewards. Thank you and back to the episode. Hello, Lyme, thank you for joining us today and welcome to the show. Thank you Thomas. I appreciate it. I'm excited to be on. So Lyme, can you please introduce yourself?

Yeah, so my name is Liam Lawson and I am the, editor-in-chief of AI Tool Report. We are the largest US-based AI newsletter out there. We cover pretty much what happens in AI on the daily. And then aside from AI Toll Report as well, we've got lots of kind of shoot-off businesses. We have our tools database. We're rolling out a pro offering next month. We've got a job board and lots of other things as well. So just kind of heavily involved in the AI space and kind of educating people and are just looking to get into AI. So that's kind of what I do, what my role is. I've just had the last two and a half weeks off out of office,

so I'm just back into work mode and straight into a podcast as well, which I'm excited to get my brain rolling again. Did you go somewhere for a holidays? Yeah, I mean, I was, so I've been traveling for the past two and a half years, so that's kind of a big part of my personality. So I was all over the world. I was in Asia for eight months. I was over in Australia, in New Zealand,

And the last nine months have been all over Latin America. So the last two and a half weeks, I've just been coming back and settling back into my home country, which is Glasgow. So I'll be here for kind of the foreseeable futures. The last two and a half weeks was just kind of that transition period of digital nomadding to coming back into everyday life and setting up a co-working and buying a flat, as you maybe see from behind me. It's a new apartment of mine. So, yeah, the last two and a half weeks have just been like getting everything in order. Yeah, well, that sounds exciting. We'll be excited to find out more about it. But can we start with your background? You said you're from Glasgow, so can you tell us more about, you know, where you come from, about your childhood? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, so I was born in a place called Eastgo Bride, which is 20 minutes outside of Glasgow, so just down to the south of that. And yeah, I grew up in a pretty middle class household. Parents were always lovely. I've got a big brother. I grew up playing rugby and football, as everyone does. And for me, to be honest, I was always very entrepreneurship based. My motivations were always based around money. I was always looking for different ways to do.

do it. I started kind of my first business when I was 17 doing drop shipping as pretty much everyone did seven or eight years ago and then kind of went to different businesses from there. I had a sustainable clothing business for a while and

yeah, I don't know how far you want me to go into my background but that's kind of where I come up from is a lot of sports, a lot of entrepreneurship, perfectly middle class in terms of my background and stuff, but a very happy, healthy childhoods. I don't have a word wrong to say about it. And out of curiosity

with these early businesses that you started, how did they end up? Yeah, I mean the first one definitely failed and that drop-thripping business did not go well. I think I was selling it was always a dream of mind to travel. It was always like something that was in the forefront of

my mind was making money in traveling. So it was like travel goods I was selling. It was called Boltarc for business. And it did not do well. I think we made maybe four sales and then failed. and did not go well. But I mean, from there, like, you've got to fail in that first business. Everyone does. And from there, kind of started the other ones, a sustainable clothing business, done a little bit better.

I ran a vegan protein business. My brother for a while, which done a little bit better, that was all his doing. And he kind of brought me on to help with certain things, like photography and stuff. So, yeah, I mean, they got better and better and better with time, like each failure. was more of a success. And there was countless failures in there, but it never kind of deterred me from trying more and starting more, essentially. So is that an entrepreneurship or business also something that you studied?

Or was it just a passion project? Yeah, it was both. So, I mean, it was always a passion project, but that led me to go and study at a university. So I studied at university's draft Clyde in Glasgow, done four years there and studied business enterprise and marketing is my degree. So if I'm entirely honest with you, the first two and a half years were a lot of drinking and not so much studying, as most students kind of do. But a part of university experience.

Exactly, exactly. And I'm thankful for it, to be honest, because I speak to some people now that didn't do that in university and maybe took it very seriously. And now they're still in that kind of thing where they're drinking a lot, I got those years behind me by that point. I got them out of my system. So now I'm not, I'm not so focused on alcohol or drinking and stuff as well because I've got, I've done those years and I'm on to bigger and better things. But yeah, happy through my third year, that's from COVID-Tip. So everything went to staying at home. And I decided at the start of 2020, actually, before COVID-tit, that I was going to go sober for the entire year. So I got those

kind of first two years of drinking and I decided that sobriety was the way forward. So when COVID it, I was kind of right in the depths of sobriety and like tons of exercise, training for a marathon and stuff as well. So this kind of combination of having the sobriety with COVID and stuff, I just ended up focusing on my degree a lot more. And I think my first two years of university, I was like scraping by in terms of my scores and stuff. And then my third and fourth year, it was like 80, 90% and stuff in my degree.

So I think it was a combination of like that sobriety and that. exercise and COVID-tut as well, just kind of more time at home to focus on that. So yeah, a bit of a varied experience at university. I did love every second of it. And I loved that by the time I got to third and fourth year, I started taking it really seriously because of that sobriety. It gave me like the time, the mental space to really realize how much I loved the subject of entrepreneurship.

So, yeah, I loved every second of it, to be honest. So what were your plans that once you graduate, what would be your ideal job or how to start your career, basically. Yeah, I mean, it was always to travel. That was always the plan as I graduated, bounce off traveling. I never ever wanted to do a grad scheme or go the traditional corporate route.

The thought of just working someone else for no opportunity to grow. Just did not appeal to me whatsoever. I remember speaking to someone the other day and we were talking about it. And he was telling me how at his work, he's excelling and doing really well. but they said it's maybe in about four years or something we can put you up a pay

bracket and they were saying to me that you realized for these kind of corporate routines it's not based on your skill level or your quality as a person it's just based on the amount of years you put as a person which is just like a concept that is so foreign and never appealed to me so yeah I mean my plan once I graduated was always to travel so after I graduated I worked for six months for a specialty coffee roaster in Glasgow. Coffee became one of those kind of lockdown projects that I just absolutely loved. And I got obsessive with it.

And I was trying different beans and natural and washed and just got really obsessed with it. So I went done specialty coffee roasting and coffee marketing for a while. And then in February of 2022, I bought a one-way ticket to Nepal. And for two and a half years after then, I was doing the whole traveling and working thing. So what was it that interested you the most about traveling? Was that exploring countries or working like a freedom or what were the main motivations? Yeah, I mean I think out of life something that's important to me is that I live a really rich life. I want to experience like everything that there is to offer.

So during university the best way I could get the most out of that experience was doing the drinking and be the party and doing the student experience. But I also, I don't want to live at home and do the same thing every day and have a routine. Like, I want to experience the richness of perspective of what life has to offer. So it was always just getting out there and experiencing different

cultures and foods and languages and people. It's just always something that I've wanted to do and that richness of life and just, like, put myself in the forefront of it. And I think there was definitely part of it that scared me, but I've realized very

much so that in my life things that terrify me or make me anxious and stuff it's usually a buy signal to go and do that thing because if I'm anxious about it I mean it's worth doing yeah I agree I like the mindset so then I know you mentioned a few places or areas before but what was the first country that you moved to the first one I traveled to was Nepal which was excuse my friend I wasn't expecting that I think most people, most people when they go travel, like, Asian stuff, they'll start in Thailand and Vietnam,

and to be fair, that's what I did after. But Nepal for me, I've always been a big hiker. And my brother had done it a couple years prior and had just been talking about how amazing it was. So, yeah, I was just like, what is the most wild, adventurous place I can think of? So did it meet expectations that it was actually amazing? Yeah, I mean, I went and done,

Everest base camp I'd done the Annaparna circuit there was times just hiking for like weeks on end and the Himalayas like surrounded by nothing else but a couple of other hikers and just like these shacks in the middle of nowhere and

you wake up at night and see the stars and you see the outline the Himalayas you can see Everest and the outline around you and stuff and I just felt so small but I loved that I felt so small like so unimportant. Like I was just, I felt so present, I think was the best way of putting it. And it was a proper adventure, which appeals to me. Like, I don't like the idea of having

too much of a safety net. I like the idea of taking risks. And that really kind of brought that out, it really made me feel alive. 100% lived up to expectations and even surpassed them, I think. Yeah. Yeah, it sounds awesome. And I think even the cuisine is delicious, isn't it? Nepali's not so much. So you would expect so because of geographical. I feel like I tried it and it was similar to India. It's a lot more dull than

Indian, which I'm surprised about as well. And so they have, because like Nepal is pretty much like a lot of Nepal is at really high elevation. So they don't have the climate to be able to grow these kind of beautiful herbs and spices that India does. So they're kind of a main dish. And Nepal is a thing called Dalbat,

which is essentially just, like lentils and like a few other kind of different things. But it's really, really bland. But they call it Dalbat Power 24-hour because everyone's just fueled on Dalbat all the time. Everyone just lives on this kind of very basic dish. And you can get it anywhere.

Like it's very, it's hearty. It'll keep you alive, but it's not, they're not known for flavour some food. Put it that way. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. And while being there, you were working remotely, right? And so at that time, the first couple months,

where I was away, I was working as a crypto consultant with a friend of mine. So, kind of my... Crypto, like, cryptocurrency? Yeah, exactly. So at that time, I was kind of balls deep in crypto, learning about it, kind of consulting people on... I was more than marketing side, so a friend of Mickle of mine owned a company called Web3 Adventures.

I think he still runs it as well. We kind of catch up now and then. But it was basically translating the value of crypto or consulting kind of traditional companies on how to get into the Web 3 market, maybe how to tokenize their assets, stuff like that. That just kind of, it was one of those things that started off as a passion project. And then through enough like self-research and stuff, we knew enough about it to be able to communicate to these traditional corporate companies, like what the crypto market looked like. you're trying to explain memes to like 50 year olds that have never seen a crypto coin in their life, no idea what NFTs are. So it was an interesting experience, but I think that's probably my biggest skill set is the ability to translate value of something. And I think that really comes into effect with what I do in AI as well as like AI is a pretty complex topic.

And a lot of my job has been able to explain these really complex topics. in simple terminology and I think that's where my skill set really lies. Yeah. Yep. So then from Nepal, what was the next place that you moved to? If we keep going the next place,

we could be going at this for a while. So the next place after Nepal was... Are there that many? I mean, I'll give you the full list just so we don't have to go down the mall. Nepal, Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Australia, New Zealand, U.S., Mexico, Guatemala, Costa Rica, Peru, Colombia.

And that's the final list. Okay, who wasn't expecting that? Yeah. So out of this, can you make... Out of this, can you maybe pick one that you enjoyed the most and the one that you didn't enjoy for some reason? Yeah, I'd say my, probably my three favorites were Mexico, Nepal and Vietnam. I think the things that they had in common, the places I visited in those

countries, is that they weren't particularly built up for tourists. They were just kind of like their own country. And if you were there, then as cool, you were in the country. And that was fine. But they weren't like, they weren't specifically catered for tourists. And they were just like amazing people, amazing food. Like amazing, like strong, like a really like strong sense. of identity and culture to them as well. And it was just like amazing to come in and experience them as someone foreign. I'd say the place I'd probably enjoyed the least would be in Bali and Costa Rica because they were so catered to what's the most mainstream one.

Yeah, exactly. Bali is so mainstream. And then Costa Rica was like that as well. Costa Rica was just filled with American tourists and you're in this like Central American country and everyone, all of the Costa Ricans will speak English with you, which I found really frustrating because I was like, I'm learning Spanish while I was over there. So I was trying to practice my Spanish and Costa Rica is so built up for tourists that you're just having these English conversations at the time. And it really frustrated me. And it was just like, I felt too

coddled. Like I was just too taking care of. And I was like, this doesn't feel like a raw experience. you know I mean? Yeah. And now are you, I mean, now you are in the Glasgow, but is the place that you are going to US, or is it the latest country that you've been to? Yeah, US was the country I was in before this. So we're based in Austin in Texas as a company.

And so I was there for a little while early this year. I'll be back in Austin later this year as well. And then I think the plan next to, years do a full-time move to Argentina. After that, I think, is what's on the cards. Wow. And why Argentina, out of curiosity? I mean, just everyone I met

traveling has spoken such amazing things about it. The food is a part of the amazing. I'm a big kind of carnivore. I'm currently doing like a paleo diet, so they've got a lot of kind of cheap steak there. You can just live like a king. If you're earning in US dollars, and live in Argentina, like, you can live

a great lifestyle. The weather is amazing. They've got Patagonia down in Oshawa as well. They've got Barron Loche, so a lot of hiking. And I can practice my Spanish and really kind of flesh out that skill. Plus, I mean, like us, as a company, like we're dealing with majoratively U.S. clients. So it makes more sense for me to be on a U.S. time zone, which is where kind of Argentina helps. And I'll be taking trips back and forth to Austin as well. And with being faced with. And I guess some interesting things might be happening there thanks to their new president. Yeah.

We'll see what happens by the end of the year. And here by the time I'm there with Malay. You see what the infrastructure looks like and see what the protests look like. It'll certainly be an interesting time. But there's something about that in a sadistic sort of way. I don't know if this is horrible coming for an outsider, but the fact that it is in like that really interesting. time period I think appeals to me somewhat that it is like a little bit unstable and there's a lot of change and if I go there as well I'll learn a lot about people's

opinions of the country and the political stance and why things matter like people will be more strongly opinionated at this particular period of time and it'll be a big movement for change and stuff as well so I think there's something about all of that that does appeal to me as well and that will be able to actually really experience the Argentine spirit and why people care about the country too. Yeah, yeah, it sounds really exciting, I agree. And what is

it like living in Austin? If I'm not mistaken, isn't it the city that quite a few famous or well-known people moved from California? Yeah, I mean, I think Austin's known for a couple of things. One would be the comedy scene, so obviously Joe Rogan moved there and then a lot of

other comics and people like the entertainment business moved out as well. I think Lex is based there as well. Yeah, I think Lex is out there. Tim Ferriss is out there. Shane Gillis and stuff are all out there as well. So there's a lot of like huge names. Chris Williamson is probably my favorite podcaster. Yeah, Chris Williamson from Modern Wisdom. He's out in Austin as well. I think he's my favorite podcast. So the guy I listen to the most and kind of not closely model my life, but I respect a lot of the things he does. how he speaks about things. So yeah, there's a lot of huge people that love out there and kind of my

experience of Austin as well. The age demographic is mainly between the ages of 25 and 35. So you've got like a lot of young people that are out exercising. You'll see on the weekends everyone's like there's people out in big groups of bikes, big groups of running, big groups of kayaking down the river. They'll go to high rocks classes and then at night you've got like an amazing music scene, amazing comedy scene and stuff as well. So there's just, there's so much going on there right now, not to mention in comparison to Glasgow, where the weather is absolutely shocking.

It makes a world of difference to be able to step out and actually experience some sun on the daily. So that's a big factor. I've grown up in cold environments my whole life, and I hate it. The winter does not make me happy. So I want to live somewhere with a, considerable amount of sun would be nice.

Yeah. And when you move to Austin, was it your deliberate decision or was it maybe because the company told you that you need to move to this specific city? Yeah. So, I mean, me and Martin, so I'll kind of go into the story of how we got acquainted. So Martin is our CEO and founder. And I'm now a co-owner of the business. So it's kind of completely independent of I can move where I want to and stuff. But me, Martin, so he's the CEO and founder of AITil report. The way we got connected was actually via a Twitter DM.

So shout out to my boy Mitko, the guy that I worked with at Web 3 Adventures in the Crypto consultancy. I just chilling one day and then he sent me a message on WhatsApp. He was like, oh, I follow this guy on Twitter because Markman's post a lot of AI content at the time. And he was like,

oh, he's actually looking for a writer. And I've been writing online independently for a couple years. I wrote a lot in the way of philosophy and life silent, everything was interested. He just threw me this kind of Twitter thread and at the bottom, he said like, oh, I'm actually looking for someone to write the AI news letter.

I just dropped Martin a Twitter DM. We hopped on a call for an hour and literally the rest is history. Like that's how we got started as just a random Twitter DM hopping on a call and we were good to go. Oh, that's cool. You know, out of those calls messages and all kinds of offers that you receive, wouldn't expect something like this so really cool yeah i mean i think is as well allows you to travel as you said yeah i was going to say at that point as well i was applying

for lots of writing jobs and like just traditional roles and stuff and i think i got denied from like 130 like traditional like LinkedIn applications and indeed and stuff like that like just hadn't got accepted for any of them and then a twitter dm throws out there and now i'm doing like a kind of dream job where I absolutely love what I do and who I work with and stuff. I think it just goes to show like if you're looking for like building your career in this day and age, there's a real, real pathway to do things similar to like what yourself, like what you're doing and your work. You're doing podcasting. You've started yourself. If you want to boost your online presents, check out our digital marketing agency called Trailblazed.

You can also enroll in a skillshare course, all the 10 tips on how to succeed in your creative career, which was inspired by the podcast. Lastly, make sure to subscribe to our weekly newsletter called Creative Spotlight to stay up to date with the show and more. Links are in the show notes. Thanks. I'd love to kind of hear a little bit more,

just if I can turn a question on you about how you kind of get started in the podcast. I can see from your length of time you've been doing it around a year now. as it's some sort of marketing agency as well. I'd love to hear a little bit more about how you start in what you do. Oh, about myself. Yeah. Oh, yeah, of course.

So I started podcast. It was just as a passion project. I mean, it's still actually a passion project. But before I worked in VFX industry in visual effects because I was always passionate about film and I wanted to start a career there. So I worked in this amazing VFX company. It was really awesome. It was like a dream, become a reality. And because of the people that I worked with and all the amazing projects that we worked with,

I thought that I had access to people with great stories, with big careers and a lot of interesting stuff to talk about. And it probably somehow sparked the idea to start the podcast because I can speak with these people. And hopefully it's going to sound cliche, but inspire other people that, you know, they can achieve that as well. because often you might expect that these people, I don't know, come from backgrounds from Hollywood or whatever. But when I speak with them, you actually find out that they are kind of regular people, but they just worked hard and somehow achieved that, which I think is really inspiring. And at the same time, I'm a curious person, so I like to talk about new people. It's like, for example, with you, we don't know each other, but now I meet someone completely new with interesting stories.

I like to talk with others. And then lastly, it's probably also motivating for me, because as you know, everyone sometimes feels ups and downs. But when you listen to someone and his story and, you know, his words, it helps me to continue basically pursuing my dreams and working, you know, on the stuff that I enjoy and on any goals. Yeah, amazing. I don't want to talk about too much.

in this episode since it's about you. Yeah, I still understand. I'm just curious as well. I appreciate you asking. Of course. I'm just curious as well, just before we turn questions around on me as well. How many episodes have you done of there podcasting now?

It's actually going to be, I've got a few that I haven't released, but it's 60 more than 60. Because after each 10 episodes, I release a special, so it's going to be over 60 episodes by now. and it will be a year pretty soon. I try to stay consistent,

release every week, so so far it's going well. Yeah, damn, it's impressive. I used to run a podcast as well when I got to 33 episodes, and the plan is to pick that back up again as well, so I know how hard it is to stay consistent with that. And why did you stop?

Or what made you stop? I think at the point, it just became too much. So what happened is I started the podcast while I was living in Australia. And it was going well. I thoroughly enjoyed it. Like, I really enjoyed the process of podcasting.

But when I started working with Martin Online, like that work just took over because there was just so much to be done and so much my day was taken up with it. And then from there, after Australia, I started traveling again to, like, New Zealand and Mexico and stuff like that as well. so because I did have a base, it was really hard to stay consistent with it.

But the plan is definitely to pick that back up again now that I've got a base. I'm trying to get a few guests. And we've got a podcast for EITO report as well. I've already recorded two of them, which should be releasing in the next couple of weeks. I do love the kind of conversation and podcasting. And as you said, meeting people that are interesting as well and getting the kind of story behind just that profile that you see on LinkedIn or Twitter. Yeah, yeah. And what was the podcast about? Was it about AI or not?

So, I mean, the podcast was just about like things I was interested in. So it was called This That Podcast and I tried to make it as variable as possible. So I'd done a couple interviews with like cold brew and coffee businesses in Melbourne. One of the podcasts I'd done a marathon as a podcast. So I took my mic out with me, done a marathon and at different parts of it. the city's podcast. I've done a 72-hour water fast as a podcast, where for 72 hours, I ate nothing and just podcasts at different parts of it. I've done a hinge date. So you know, hinge the dating app? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I've done that, so I asked a hinge date. Like, would you want to do a podcast in the first time you meet me? And we've recorded a podcast

on the first time we met each other, which was interesting. I've done a podcast in a sauna. Like it was just like I just wanted to Push the boundaries of like what a podcast would be and try things that hadn't been tried before So it was just a bunch of eclectic things I thought were interesting No, it sounds like a really innovative idea And especially with the podcasting scene that is quite oversaturated This sounds like something that helps you to stand out Yeah

I think there's so many interesting like opportunities for podcasting something Have you ever heard of like the terminology of like a hot girl walk? Probably not Okay, so it's just like this kind of meme that's kind of throwing about like TikTok and Twitter and like Instagram, the idea of a hot girl walks. It's like hot girls go for walks in the morning, right? And then loads of people I know, all the guys I know and stuff are like, oh, we'll go for a morning hot girl walk. It's just a wellness walk in the morning. But it could be a really way, really interesting way to like spice up the idea of a podcast where you get big tech CEOs and stuff on for a podcast and you're both going for a hot girl walk.

so people's brains tend to work better when they're actually walking. Do you know what I'm talking about? There is this podcast I discovered, and I think this guy is doing the podcast on a walk with someone, because I cannot remember the name now, but I discovered because he was speaking with Ali Abdal. I cannot remember the name now, but it's like a concept that they're exercising,

or they go for a walk outside and do the podcast during that, so I guess it's something similar. And the past, the podcast is quite big when I, when I, yeah. Yeah. You need to send me it, because I'm curious with that. And I've just always been an idea in my head for the past two weeks. Because you've got these big tech CEOs.

Everyone wants to get out and walk and exercise. And it means these people that you are interviewing and have taken the time to interview you. They can actually just go out for a walk and get a coffee and be on the phone to you at the same point. And so I think that would be a good idea. I just think there's loads of ways that we can take podcasting. obviously the audio quality is going to suffer with that but and maybe it's a trade-off people are kind of willing to make to have that kind of conversation yeah especially if you are based in Austin it's like you may have access to some great minds you know CEOs founders and people like that yeah i mean you

could do it remotely you could also do it in person like there's so many different ways that you can kind of push that i guess i hope that since you said that now a kind of public it will you will need to commit to it and we will see some cool stuff in the future, some good content. You know what? I love that as an idea. Social pressure. Give me a month

and I'll make sure we get an episode of Fogger Walks. I'll make it happen. Yeah, sounds good. And then I want to at least a bit discuss your business in detail and what you do in the business in AI So can you introduce the company a bit and also what you do in there?

Yeah, so our company call is called AITIL report. We're basically a congregator of the news. We go through kind of scour the web and then try to provide you with the best daily digest that there is on the markets. Every day we'll kind of cover breaking news. We'll cover prompting and automations like engineering and that way. We'll give you some reading resources to read. read through kind of at your own pace and we'll introduce you to different like AI tools through our kind of training tools section and we're kind of constantly just looking for ways that we can

kind of deliver more value to you so that you can learn AI and easy easy pace that's kind of our main business right now from that we have like a bunch of different kind of offshoot businesses we created accreditations and that we're in partnership with kind of some top AI company so We create a partnership with assembly, guide, graft, and then kind of like prompting experts, kind of business experts and stuff as well, to give you an accreditation that you can share via LinkedIn that shows that you have a very kind of base level understanding of AI and you know what to do. We did have a job board that's currently under maintenance right now. We are actually relaunching our pro offering in partnership with HubSpot in July,

which I'm really excited to kind of talk about at a later point. And we do have a SASS. That's pretty cool. Yeah, it's been a long time coming. So we'll be launching that 1st of July. And the idea about a pro offering is we have like an entire database and catalog of basically like these resources you go into. But the biggest kind of selling point of it is that we're going to be producing a once weekly ultra premium AI newsletter. And it's all about actionable things.

So we're taking case studies with real businesses. going in and interviewing them. And then we're taking all the different tools that you could use. So if you're in marketing, we might look at like Julie's AI and different kind of three actionable insights that you can use a specific tool to do a specific task and actually walk you through that as well.

And then there's kind of loads of other parts. So HubSpot are providing some free gifts and stuff for the pro offering. And then you'll obviously have access to the pro community. So people are willing to pay a lot more to kind of network with the right people in that as well. so really excited about that launching in July. Yeah, it sounds awesome and sounds like a big plan for the company.

Yeah, it's going to be exciting. I think something we've missed as a business, as a company, since we've started as a real engagement with our community. And so obviously we produce kind of LinkedIn content, and we have newsletter and stuff, but we did realize that although we're producing really high quality material, we're essentially shouting at people. And it's something we've just realized that we have done wrong as a business.

We've not done as much actual engagement with our community and support for our community as we should have been doing. So that's a kind of real big push over the next six months to a year. How can we provide as much quality material and training and resources so that especially for me, like my focus in the business is really giving. these materials to entrepreneurs or want to be entrepreneurs or entrepreneurs, people within businesses that want to automate processes and give them the right tools and knowledge to save time or earn more with AI. It's kind of where we're looking at and for the foreseeable. Yeah. And how many people are in the company? So we're up to around six core members right now. And we have some agencies that that kind of runs some external things and but six core members at the moment

and we'll probably be making some new hires for and different kind of function roles within next couple months as we continue to grow so yeah we'll see how the year kind of plans out but we started with just me myself and Arturo as well who's our creative director and doubled the team within the past year which is exciting and it's looking pretty good for for growth for the foreseeable as well yeah and we're What does your day look like? I assume it will probably differ, but is there like, do you have a routine or is it literally different every day? Or what is it like?

Yeah, I mean, right now is different every day. I'm trying to standardize up more. We've just rented out a co-working space in Glasgow at the moment. So we'll be using that kind of create a bit of an office and a bit of a routine. But right now, it's just like my kind of role is kind of editor-in-chief as well. it's very much like project management. A lot of it is later in a day I'll have meeting with kind of relevant key people to different projects, but it's just pushing kind of key projects on.

We'll read through the kind of newsletter, take a look at like the different parts of the business. How can X, Y, and Z being improved? And then with the launch of the pool newsletter, it's kind of setting up the different environments and that. So it'll be hosting it on school, making sure we've all got the resources there. We've got automations in place as well. So yeah, a lot of it is just. like making tweaks to existing parts of the business and then kind of taking new projects that we can launch and being like, okay, how can we look as far into the future, understand what the market wants and then deliver the most value to said market as well.

Yeah. And I can imagine that now with the boom around AI and recently how it's, you know, been trending everywhere, is it difficult to stand out from the competition? Can you see that they are emerging other companies? And if so, what? What do you do or how does your company manage you to stand out? Yeah, I mean, for sure, like the newsletter space specifically is one of those places there is like good competition. So I'd say like our biggest kind of competitors in the space are the rundown, run by like Ron Chong, who does a great job of that. And superhuman as well, who do a great job as well. The Cannes do an amazing job with producing that. Yeah, I mean, like there's people producing. great quality material, great quality insights.

I think we were kind of going as a company, is we're kind of trying to stand out with a more authoritative tone to do more kind of like true journalism. And that kind of fits in with what we do with the podcast as well. So Arturo primarily runs a podcast. He does a lot of podcasts with commissioners and governors and stuff in the US as well. So we really try to differentiate in that way

and bringing like, instead of giving you the meme of the day, we're actually giving you proper content you can use. It's the same with those kind of automations we're providing the actionable insights. We're trying to provide you with like things are going to make a difference rather than culturally what's going in and seen where we stand out as a business. Yeah, yeah. And you are also active on LinkedIn. So can you tell us more about your presence on LinkedIn? Do you see it as something that helps you to create a brand for the company or are actually building brand for your.

so? Yeah, I mean, so far has been about building a brand for the company as well, like myself and Martin, and obviously I've been on my two and a half week hiatus, so I've not posted in a way, I'm just getting back into the routine of that. But yeah, it's mainly been about the company, to be honest. I think the way we're kind of looking at it, if you understand, you know, Barstool Sports, you heard of them before. I haven't, to be honest. Barstall is like this company that's based in the US. They're kind of like a sports media company run by a guy called Dave Portnoy. And the way he looks at it is he hires individual creators to work under the brand of Barstool, but still kind of produce their own content. And I think that's how we look at like the ITO report.

Like we now have six members. Myself, who's more interested in entrepreneurship side of things, Martin, who runs the business and is really into like actually scaling things, Arturo, who's a little bit more creative and does like. things on the political landscape. Kyle, who's just been brought on and does a lot around stock and trading. So if you imagine us all as individual people with these kind of expert

areas that we actually excel in, we're all under that AI TO report branding, but we've got these different areas that we can have excel and create. And so that's the way we're kind of looking at it. It's like we are building out those personal brands and those kind of personal expertise, but it's all under that kind of umbrella of AITIL report

because that's what we're producing and work on and build upon. Yeah. Sounds cool. And you mentioned it before. Your inspiration or, you know, when we discussed Modern Wisdom and Chris Williamson, who are your maybe other inspirations for some people that you look up to, if they are any? Yeah, it's hard. It's hard to say with inspirations. I'd say Martin, my boss especially is like he's been a huge inspiration for me. We've obviously met multiple times in real life as well and he's just like such a good guy and he does a lot with effective altruism as well

and so from the business stuff like the money he makes from it like a lot of that goes to go into relevant charities and support other people and so he's a huge inspiration and just has a lot of these stuff that are then I'd say Chris Williamson I love the stuff that he does around like mindfulness specifically

He's done like the three years sober and stuff as well. It's something I'm going to be starting to do as of next year. So those are kind of big ones from me. Tim Ferriss, probably. It's how I got into entrepreneurship in the first place. Reading the four-hour work week, which is something to the room. Yeah, exactly. You knew exactly what I was going to say, right?

Four-hour work week was like the book that made entrepreneurship make sense. I mean, I was like, if this guy can do it and start a protein, business, then I can do it too. And obviously he's like his idea of being like the human guinea pig. And so he just goes and tries everything for himself, which really speaks to my kind of philosophy of trying to get like the richness of life as well. And so I love that idea of like experimentation and trying everything. I'd say those three people are probably kind of my biggest influences and inspiration. Yeah. I was then about to ask you maybe about some books if you are reading, but I guess it will be maybe the one from Tim Ferriss, or are there any other?

Yeah, I'm trying to think, I think the books that, like, I kind of, I'd say that I connect with, I bond with, and, like, I appreciate most is usually some degree of, like, personal development, spirituality. I'd say the single book that I've got the most value of is one called, You may have heard of it before. Seven Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Coving. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, like, one of the most, like, kind of pop your self-development boots. So I think the thing I got the most value of is this idea of a mission statement.

So he talks about the concept of having a mission statement in life and, like, writing down what your real principles and your values are. And being driven from those principles and values rather than, like, what your immediate wants. needs are. And that's kind of like a concept that's been reiterated in like countless books, like principles by Ray Dalio says exactly the same. And a lot of other people talk about it that same as well. And I think that's something that drives me is like having those principles, reminding myself what my principles are and like what really matters to me and letting that affect my decision making most rather than, oh, can I make Y amount of dollars or Z amount of dollars and this year, like, it doesn't matter if it's not in line with what's actually going to make you truly satisfied and happy as a person.

So I'd say that. Some people could think it's a cop-out because it's got like a really click-baity title. The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, but I love that book and reread it all the time. Yeah, yeah. No, I agree. And even if it may be click-beta, you still need to make it somehow catchy to stand out, you know, from the market because there are loads. And I agree. I read it as well.

and it's amazing book and only recommend it to people as well. Yeah. And as we will be finishing soon, can you tell people when they can follow you, whether it's you or our company or, you know, anything that you would like to share? Yeah, I mean, to follow the company, we've got like our website up and running. We can see the business and the newsletter and all the offshoots, and it's just Aitour Report.com. Pretty easy.

myself I'm on LinkedIn just Liam Lawson I would say so there's I don't know if you watch F1 but there's a pretty famous now F1 driver with the exact same name as me Liam Lawson and he's younger and handsome and very successful so if you type in my name

it'll come up this F1 driver so I'm not that guy I do not drive F1 this guy is overtaking me I do not to be honest Yeah, type and Liam Walsk to Google and it just comes up this TV F1 driver. Oh,

I was about to ask if he's from Scotland so he's from New Zealand. Yeah, he's from New Zealand and he's younger and he's handsome and I hate it. I hate it. That's really cool. I didn't know that. I will add any links to the show notes and before we finish, is there anything

final that you would like to share whether it's some kind of message or something that I should have asked you and didn't ask you or you know just send anything to the audience finish i've got one answer to that and i've got one question for you as well so my answer to it would be that for anyone kind of thinking that they can't do like an online business or like they'll never make it and stuff like that i think all it is is about increasing your surface area of luck right it's just it doesn't matter what you do it be writing online, it can be podcasting, it could be taking pictures of post at notes and

and put it on an Instagram account. It doesn't matter what you do. All that matters is that you do something by yourself. Find a passion project, find where that is, and just do it and post about it online and be consistent. And if you do any of them for long enough, like your surface area of luck just increases and increases increases. I found like from podcasting, just doing 30 episodes, the amount of opportunities that came my way. were incredible. Like, I'd never have expected podcasting to actually add so much value to my life. And it did, even just doing that.

And then writing online, I was writing into the ether. No one's reading it. But that gave me this skill that's really applicable to my job today. And people really appreciate that as well. So I would just say try to do something. It doesn't fucking matter what it is. Do anything and just get after it and do it. Don't get stuck behind like that.

terrifying notion that it has to be everything right now or it has to be super successful within the year. Like just do it regardless, regardless results. Do something, keep doing it and find your kind of niche from there. And that would be my words of advice. Don't get caught up in that. And eventually your surface area of luck will just become large enough. The opportunities will come your way. And then I can only agree with you. The last question I'd have for you is like from doing these 60 episodes, what kind of was maybe one or two common threads that you've noticed across the people you talk to? Because I imagine you talked to a lot of like entrepreneurs, people in the space, people in AI and tech and stuff.

So what maybe one or two common threads you've noticed and maybe the personality traits across these different people you spoke to? Yeah, it may be something that I mentioned before, which was that people often think that, or at least that's what I would think, that, you know, you are successful. So maybe you were, I don't know, brought up from, with rich parents. I don't know, you know, the background that the beginnings were easy for you. That maybe, I don't know, you know, that was, how do you say, put it on a silver plate. But that's not really true. Because when I speak with these people, I can see, I would say the patterns that most of the people doubted their selves in the beginnings. That was hard.

It was tough. Quite often, you know, they had failures. when it comes, for example, with fresh businesses, even such as what you said or, I don't know, tried several different ventures until they found something that finally worked out. So I think, again, it's going to sound like a cliche, but behind these successful people, there is a long journey and journey that was not full of failures, but they experienced failures, they learn from it and didn't give up. because all of us have ups and downs, often failures, and you want to give up. But ultimately, you need to learn from it. And then hopefully use what you learned and then continue going despite those failures. So I think that is something important that I learn from them.

And then one more thing that I would mention is don't compare yourself to others. That's advice that I heard from many people. And it's also something that I often do as well, although I know. that I shouldn't do it. So I try to remind myself because you see someone successful, especially these days on social media, you know, beautiful pictures, amazing life, holidays, whatever. But you don't know what's the background. You don't know what's the truth. You don't know what was the journey. How did they get there? If it's truth, if it's not truth. And everyone has a different journey, different background. So definitely don't compare yourself to others.

And that will be probably the message that I would try to share. I think it makes you happier. It helps you and it's there is this amazing quote. I think it's the comparison is a teeth of joy. I don't want to say something that is not true, but I think it may be from Mark Twain or someone. So that will be good advice. Yeah. I think exactly what you said there, those two things.

It's super important for people to hear. So thank you for sharing. No, I appreciate the message. It's, I wasn't expecting that, so it's really nice did you ask me a question as well, although it's a podcast about yourself. I mean, you said before we start, let's just do it as a friendly conversation. So here we are. That is a good point, yeah.

Yeah, yeah, and I really enjoyed it. So just to be aware of time, I want to say a huge thank you. It was great to meet you. Been following you on LinkedIn. So I feel like I've known you a bit. so it wasn't like with a stranger but I really enjoyed it. It was inspiring.

You've got some amazing plans. You know, amazing stuff ahead for you, for the company. I will make sure to keep following and supporting. So thank you so much. Thank you for having me on. I really appreciate it. It was my pleasure. Wish you good luck and speak soon.

Thank you, bro. Speak soon. Thank you for listening. If you enjoy the show, please leave us a five-star review on your favorite podcast app, get in touch to provide your feedback, or share any ideas for future guests.

Thank you and see you soon.