The Prof G Pod with Scott Galloway - Why Scott Shut Down His Ai Persona His Daily Routine And When To Give Kids Money

Episode Date: January 11, 2026

Scott Galloway answers listener questions about why he shut down his AI persona, what concerns him about Character.AI, his daily routine, and how parents should think about giving money to their kids. Want to be featured in a future episode? Send a voice recording to [e-mail], or drop your question in the r/ScottGalloway subreddit. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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so you can feel confident that your data stays secure as your company grows. Find out more at OnePassword.com slash podcast offer and start securing every login. Support for the show comes from OnePassword. A password manager should be the first security purchase you make for your team. Why? Because compromised passwords are the number one way bad actors attack companies, and small businesses are their favorite targets.

But unlike a lot of security challenges, passwords actually have a pretty simple solution. OnePassword lets you manage all your business credentials so you can feel confident that your data stays secure as your company grows. Find out more at OnePassword.com slash podcast offer and start securing every login. Support for this show comes from Vanta. Vanta uses AI and automation to get you compliant fast. Simplify your audit process and unblocked deals so you can prove to customers that you take security seriously. You can think of Vanta as you're always on AI-powered security expert who scales with you.

That's why top startups like cursor, linear, and replet use Vanta to get and stay secure. Get started at vanta.com slash Vox. That's V-A-N-T-A dot com slash Vox. Vanta.com slash Vox. Welcome to Office Hours of Prop G. This is the part of the show where we answer your questions about business, big tech entrepreneurship, and whatever else is on your mind. If you'd like to submit a question for next time,

you can send a voice recording to Office Hours of Propfgee Media, Again, that's office hours at propgmedia.com. Or post your question on the Scott Galloway subreddit, and we just might feature it in our next episode. Question number one. Our first question comes from Pygney NutHatch on Reddit. Pigmy NutHatch, what do they get these names? They say, I'd like to ask some questions about your Google persona.

What were the original goals of the project? Do you have any future plans for PropG AI offerings? I was lucky enough to get to use the persona. It helped me with a complex career question. question. The tool or something similar could do a lot of good, though we all understand and respect the reasons you gave for ultimately deciding not to move forward with an expanded launch. Thanks. So just some background here. A former, I have students and then the best students, I asked to me my graduate student instructors. I usually have four or five because I usually

have about 180 students. And I say, you're running the class, I'm just the talent. And then one of my graduate student instructors went on to go to work for Google about seven, eight years ago. very successful there. And she contacted me about a year ago and said, we're doing a bunch of profiles where we crawl everyone's, a person's information, or all of their IP, and create a character AI for them such that people can ask them questions. And they were doing some of the health space, some of the business space, and then some of the academic space. And they asked me if I'd be interested. And I said, sure. And there was no commercial agreement, no money involved. But the impetus and the motivation was the following. I get between 20 and 30, that's conservative,

outreaches a day from single mothers, from young men, from people in the mental health profession, from high school teachers, looking for help, advice, inside, basic questions, where did you find this piece of information, here's an idea, and I can't get to 1% of them. So I thought, how could I come up with something that would say, hey, here's my character AI, ask it the same question, and there's an 80% probability it'll get it 80% right. And so we started working on this thing about a year ago. And then in that time, things changed dramatically, and that is character AIs became a thing. And it was discovered that a lot of young people, minors, were engaging these character AIs

and starting to develop these not even parisocial relationships. or in-depth relationships that oftentimes led to very dark places. And so when it came out, it was launched, I went on it, and I just was so uncomfortable with the idea of contributing to the sequestration of young men from their parents, their mentors, and their friends. And I thought, if I'm in any way giving a young man an excuse to spend less time pursuing offline relationships, then that is bad. And I don't want to engage in it.

So it was up for about four hours. And the Twitter philosopher, I think his name's Naval, he said something that struck me. He's actually, I think a venture capitalist, but I think of him as a philosopher. There's few things I miss about Twitter, but he's one of them. I found his stuff was really interesting. He said that if you're having trouble making a decision, the answer is usually no. And I was just so uncertain and uneasy about this thing. And it only been up four hours.

And I felt bad because they're good people at Google, and they were good people. I think the world of this woman and my interaction with this team of Google had been nothing but positive. And I didn't, they'd spent so much time on it. And I just finally, I said, I'm just not fucking comfortable with this thing. And I called them and said, can you take it down? I just don't want to be part of the character AI dilemma right now until we figure out what the guardrails are and how to handle it. And so they took it down. Is there a potential upside?

Yeah, but the potential downside, I think, is unknown right now. And I'm very uncomfortable with character AIs. I don't think there should be until there's age gating. I don't want to participate. And that is I don't think anyone under the age of 18 should be in a synthetic relationship. And supposedly three quarters are already in some sort of synthetic relationship. So where was I? It started out as a good idea.

I think my intentions were good or in the right place. But I was increasingly uncomfortable with the development and evolution of character AIs and decided to pull it down. Appreciate the question. question. Question number two also comes from Reddit. Radical buy asks, Scott, what is your daily routine when you're not out on a book tour? We'd love to see how the big dog spends his time. Well, I usually get up at about 4.45. I do a cold plunge, and then I take, I have a massive protein shank, including all sorts of grains and sheep oil, and also this

serum that's mined from algae off the coast of Sri Lanka. None of this is true. None of this is true. All right. Let's start with nine. I'm usually doing something out with friends or with family or watching streaming media. The family goes to bed. Sometimes I used to have a drink. Now I don't do that anymore because this anti-alcohol movement has even me a bit freaked out. And my 50-year-old liver, 60 can't handle 61 can't handle alcohol the way my 30 year old liver could so I don't want to

and also I think drinking alone is probably not a good idea but I try to unwind at night I watch streaming media I like I let the dogs up on the couch with me I like to write I like to cruise the internet

sometimes I take an edible and I'm up to two or three a.m. in the morning I'm a night person that's where I got my best thinking done they say that people who get up early in the morning are more productive and people who stay up late are more creative so I can I'd like to think I'm creative

I can definitely confirm I'm not that productive. So I'm up till two or three in the morning. I usually get up around 10. I don't, if I want to sleep in, I'll sleep until 10.30. My assistant doesn't book anything before noon, which helps because I'm in London. So at 7 a.m. where my team is back in New York. And then I get up. I have my quick hit of coffee.

I try to have a breakfast. I try to work out. I have free weights and a rowing machine and this new thing called an amp, which is basically tonal. So I try and get some exercise, and then I basically start the day of podcasting. And between writing and podcasting and team meeting as an editorial calls and interviews with media, I'm kind of going from about 11 or noon until about 8 or 9 p.m. At which point I kick off, sometimes go out to dinner. I go out a lot, sometimes go out and meet friends, do something with family, and then everyone's in bed by call it 11, 11.30, and I'm up for another,

two and a half hours kind of doing my work, so to speak. So I keep very odd hours. And I don't, I'm struggling a little bit lately with, I don't want to call it anxiety, but just more fear, if you will, is that anxiety? Maybe it's anxiety. I don't know. So I need to get outside more. That's one thing. That's probably the only thing I really don't like about London, but it makes me, in many ways, it's just kind of a big deal killer for me. I can't handle the fucking weather here. It's dark at 4 p.m. right now. So I don't go outside as much as I should, which is a really bad thing. All the things I preach to people about, it's like the coplars kids have no shoes.

But anyways, mornings are basically kind of pre-time or sleep. 11 to 8, podcasting, 8 to 11 socialization, 11 to 2. That's my time, I guess. And then I hit, but I go to sleep very late. I keep very odd hours. By the way, I would not recommend this to anybody. I don't, I'm not saying it's the right way, just my way. We'll be right back after a quick break.

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so you can prove to customers that you take security seriously. You can think of Vanta as you're always on AI-powered security expert, who scales with you. That's why top startups like cursor, linear, and replet use Vanta to get and stay secure. Get started at vanta.com slash Vox. That's V-A-N-T-A dot com slash V-A-V-A-V-T-A-V-V-T. Welcome back. Our final question came from a listener who emailed us. Hey, Scott, Charles from Texas. Hi, Charles. I want your take on my inheritance strategy for my son. Instead of giving him a pile of money when he's 70, when he'll just spend it on knee injections, a firmer mattress, or some dick pills, I want to give him cash when it actually matters. Plan is 25K at 18 so he doesn't start adulthood broke, 100K at 30, so he can buy a house or start a business, and then one million of 40.

After that, the gravy train stops. Dad retires from being the bank. What pitfalls should I watch for, and feel free to tell me this whole plan is genius or just financial cosplay, a huge fan of everything you do? Thanks, Charles, from Texas. So Fed data shows that U.S. inheritance recipients had a median age of around 49 to 50 at the time they received wealth transfers. And according to the Richmond Fed, at least half of people don't receive their first inheritance until after age 40. I would bet that's going to go up because people are living longer. And what people actually spend on, younger groups tend to spend a larger share on categories, including shelter, food away from home, transportation, and education.

and overall consumer spending data confirms necessities dominate budgets when they're younger, which is why a lump sum for housing down payment or business seed capital can be more financially productive than inheriting money late for discretionary spending. So I don't think anyone's figured this out. I always go to, I'm thinking about the same thing. I always go to a couple things. One, you want to give your, if you have the blessing of having some money to pass on, you want to give your kids enough money so they can do anything.

but not enough money so they can do nothing. That's a Warren Buffett quote. And my approach is going to be, I learned this from Morgan Housel, I'm going to scale up or scale down my kid's efforts. And that is I'm not sure I'm going to lock into, and I don't think there is a reason to create a suicide pact or something you have to stick to,

because I think a lot of it depends on the kid. Now, what do I mean? So if my kid gets out of college at 22 and wants to be in nonprofit, it, I'm going to give him money to try and, if he's a productive citizen and works hard and is in a low-paying industry, if wants to be a high school math teacher, I'm going to give money. If my kid is not doing a whole lot of anything but partying and I keep seeing on his Instagram, he's on in a beef or something, by the way, I don't have that problem. My boys are 15 and 18 right now.

I'm not going to give him dick. It's like, okay, boss, if you have enough time to just party all the time, you don't need my money. So I will likely not have a tried and true strategy. I'll scale up or scale down. When I pass away, that's a whole other thing. I'll probably limit the distribution while they're under the age of 40 because I don't know if a lot of money under the age of 40. I think you meant under the age of 40, you know, or maybe you put parameters around it.

They can use the money for education or a house, a primary residence, but for nothing else. I think about this a lot, and I still haven't figured out what to do. the only pushback I would give is I would not lock yourself in anything because if your kids if your kids are a great kid and wants to buy a house and it's having a kid you may want to pull some of that million dollars at 40 forward but at the same time if they're just living in your basement and not motivated I don't think you want to give them any money but again I think this is a personal question it's kind of up to you I have friends who um are wealthy and cut off their kids after college.

Just like, that's it, you're done, you're out. And it's my money, not your money. I'm rich, you're not rich. And then I have other friends whose kids have never flown commercially. Even when they're adults, they pay for their private air travel. So I would argue the former is probably much better than the latter. I think it's a personal decision. And anyways, a long-winded way of saying, I don't know.

My only advice is not to lock yourself into a construct. That's all for this episode. If you'd like to submit a question, please email voice recording to office hours of propertymedia.com. That's office hours of propertymedia.com. Or if you prefer to ask on Reddit, just post your question on the Scott Galloway subreddit, and we just might feature it in an upcoming episode.