00:00hi everyone welcome to the a 6 & Z
00:02podcast today's episode is based on a
00:04conversation that was recorded at our
00:06recent a6 and Z summit event
00:08it features Ben Horowitz interviewing
00:10Jim Gilliam CEO and founder of nation
00:13builder and the conversation focuses on
00:15the role of that platform in the recent
00:18elections but more broadly what it means
00:20for the nature of movements how people
00:23organize and the future of leadership
00:25just a quick bit of background nation
00:28builder the platform that Jim's company
00:31built was the underlying software that
00:3540% of the national campaigns in this
00:38election ran on including four of the
00:41five presidential candidates including
00:44president-elect Trump so he has a
00:46special insight to this first of all the
00:50Republican nominee when he became the
00:52nominee had zero support from the
00:54mainstream press nobody from the
00:57nobody from Fox News nobody from The
00:59Wall Street Journal wanted Trump to win
01:01the Republican nomination like that was
01:03like absolutely not the guy they wanted
01:06the Republican Party didn't want him to
01:08and then he gets the nomination and I
01:11don't know what the count was but it was
01:12like 99 percent of newspapers endorsed
01:15Hillary and so the mainstream media had
01:18no impact on the election the political
01:21party had no impact on the election and
01:23more than that she out raised him seems
01:26like we're in the brave new world
01:28what does have an impact is this what
01:30we're living in from now on like all the
01:32old rules are out or is this just an
01:35anomaly at one time thank ya there's an
01:38there's been a lot of analysis from a
01:40political perspective of what happened
01:41and obviously I come from the technology
01:44perspective all of the outsider
01:46presidential candidates used nation
01:48builder our perspective and we've looked
01:50at this is in sort of classic disruption
01:53theory and a lot of times you know you
01:55would think of like oh the software
01:56itself right is what is what we're
01:59disrupting you know these software and
02:01political campaigns is extraordinarily
02:02expensive you needed all this army of
02:03consultants you spent millions of
02:05dollars particularly at the presidential
02:06level Hillary Clinton spent eight times
02:08more on software than Donald Trump did
02:12and so in destruction theory says that
02:14okay well then there's an opportunity at
02:16the low end of the market for all the
02:18folks have been ignored by the
02:20traditional software offerings nation
02:22builder it's into that sound we're a
02:23much more affordable option it's much
02:25more accessible it's affordable for
02:27people running for school board you name
02:29it but we're actually disrupting the
02:31political parties the political parties
02:33have traditionally been some of the
02:34gatekeepers to whether or not like you
02:37can run for office who gets the
02:39resources and what they've done is over
02:41time they've gone to sort of service
02:43towards the very high end of the market
02:45the contested elections right the
02:48presidential races the Senate campaigns
02:50that matter and the result is that the
02:52vast majority of the company is ignored
02:55and so that provided an opportunity for
02:57us to start to go in and start to
02:59provide those services
03:00we're not partisan anybody can use our
03:01software that was a total revolution it
03:03didn't matter what political party or
03:05what your ideology was but then we
03:07started writing the voter file okay so
03:09because you you said that very fast so
03:12you're providing the voter file what
03:16does the butter file mean like why is
03:17that important so in order to like know
03:21who can actually vote right you need to
03:23know have like the database of who those
03:25voters are in your district and that's
03:27compiled by counties like all the
03:29country the election boards now what the
03:32parties have done is that they've
03:33consolidated that information into sort
03:35of central databases and tried to like
03:37add value to it over time to differing
03:40sort of levels of success in general the
03:43Democrats have one system there's a
03:44monopoly behind it everybody has to use
03:46one system on the Republican side it's
03:49much more there's a lot more competition
03:50the voter file is really key and the
03:52result is in order to get access to that
03:55voter file you have to be blessed by the
03:59party and so if you can imagine in
04:01primary situations the folks that
04:04there's a lot of desire to kind of keep
04:07the outsiders out of the game or the
04:09folks that like haven't played ball or
04:11that kind of stuff and so people are
04:14frequently declined access to the voter
04:16file if you had to spend thousands of
04:18dollars through private vendors to get
04:20access to it it just wasn't viable and
04:22so we went and built a hole we Billy
04:25voter file nationally inserted to
04:27provide it for free offering software
04:28for 29 bucks a month to go run for
04:30office first time anybody's ever done
04:32that vitae for free to anybody run for
04:34even if you don't use nation bowler so
04:36if the genie is out of the bottle then
04:38and the kind of hold that the political
04:42parties had on candidates and the
04:44influence of the mainstream media had on
04:46the population and the fact that like
04:49give them so much money's in politics
04:51does that matter anymore
04:52my name is going to be in politics well
04:54has a great return on investment so it's
04:56always going to be in politics but I
04:58think what what's exciting is that as
05:01the money sort of has flooded in it has
05:04become less relevant because the macro
05:06trends it plays that you can't just buy
05:08people's attention you can't just like
05:11you know advertising industry is like is
05:13dealing with this marketing teams are
05:14dealing with this you can't just buy it
05:16and so what matters is that your message
05:18and reaching people matters an awful lot
05:20more it's a ton more money in politics
05:22but it's becoming less and less relevant
05:24so now that the old rules are gone now
05:26like that I can no longer win an
05:29election by getting an endorsement from
05:31a major party getting an endorsement
05:32from the media raising a ton of money if
05:35I can't win like that then how do I win
05:37you have to have people who care about
05:39what you're doing since I turned that
05:41energy and that attention into donors
05:44turnout for events and volunteers like
05:47real world actual results and so that's
05:50the big opportunity for folks if you
05:52you've got to get out there with the
05:54message that really resonates and what
05:57we've seen is that like the campaigns
05:59there's been an awful lot of time
06:00putting together the technology in
06:01different ways they they lose sight of
06:04like oh what is the actual message
06:07that's going to reach people how do we
06:08get creative with what our campaigns
06:10look like we saw this happen
06:12very early on in with nation builder
06:14where on the Scottish National Party was
06:16really interested in using it we are one
06:18of our first beta customers and you know
06:22you may know the story now but they've
06:23since like they've won this historic
06:25election they held a referendum on
06:27declaring independence from the UK all
06:29kinds of amazing things but what
06:32happened in that very initial campaign
06:34was that they'd spent like
06:36year a year and a half trying to like
06:37pull together all of their different
06:39tech systems and they weren't really
06:40getting anywhere so even an early
06:43version of nation builder they were able
06:44to like stopped focusing on all those
06:47things instead they actually started to
06:49find all those folks that were tweeting
06:51about them right from the countryside
06:53engage with them get them to host
06:55parties and knock on doors and stuff
06:58like that it may tripled their party
06:59membership in the course of two and a
07:01half months and that's how they actually
07:03won so it's like the folks that are
07:05spending all their time trying to make
07:06the tech work is he trying to do it
07:08so in the presidential campaign I've
07:11been reading everything like all the the
07:14post game analysis and one of the things
07:15that really struck me was in Hillary's
07:18television advertisements were in Donald
07:21Trump's television advertisements 10.2%
07:24of his ads mentioned Hillary Clinton and
07:27in Hillary Clinton's television
07:28advertisements 100% of the ads mentioned
07:31Donald Trump do you think that was
07:33reflective of a lack of a message or how
07:36does that happen where two people are
07:39running against each other and they take
07:41such different tactics and did that
07:42impact the outcome do you think Hillary
07:45Clinton very deliberately built a kind
07:47of a technocratic campaign that is a
07:49deep part of the culture of the
07:51Democratic Party and that's also who she
07:53is right which she's like extremely
07:55extraordinary tactician and like getting
07:58things done and that but the result was
08:00like that was the belief was how they
08:02were going to win but it was it really
08:05distracted them from okay what is it
08:08that people actually care about right
08:10now not ten years ago or 20 years ago or
08:1330 years ago what is it right now and
08:15that pulling the eyes off the ball was
08:18the thing and meanwhile Donald Trump
08:21tapped into an energy source that was
08:24like extremely powerful and he knew it
08:28he was in he knew it intuitively you
08:30could tell and just kept stoking it and
08:32Stoke Eden's document you can do that
08:35and you can do it for like whatever it
08:36is that matters to you it doesn't have
08:38to be even your ideological if you don't
08:40agree with him a lot of people don't
08:41you've got to be able to tap into that
08:44thing and so the Trump campaign weren't
08:46running the campaign the way you're
08:47supposed to but at the end of the day
08:49what he did was on his cellphone
08:51whatever it was that was coming up for
08:53him he like put it out there in the
08:55world that energy could turn into donors
08:57volunteers and people turning out at
08:59those massive rallies and you're one of
09:01the things that you mentioned to me in
09:03the past was that his supporters like
09:07when you look at just supporters of
09:09political candidates were unusually
09:11rabid like how does that manifest itself
09:14and and why does it matter yeah because
09:16that energy turns into like people
09:19actually doing things for the campaign
09:21and there was a kind of a double whammy
09:23that was happening on the Clinton side
09:25where like the energy wasn't
09:27particularly strong to begin with in on
09:29top of it they were over super confident
09:31that they were going to win so there was
09:33no real urgency and they try to create
09:35or do you see around Trump but nobody
09:37ever believed it because everybody
09:38thought there was no chance he could
09:40ever win if you look at the number of
09:42votes over the last couple of
09:44presidential elections
09:46you know Trump got the same roughly the
09:48same number of votes as like the
09:49previous two Republican nominees but
09:52Hillary Clinton got dramatically less
09:54and Obama did and that was the that was
09:55the real difference we've got brexit
09:57we've got Trump is this a better world
10:01we entered like a much worse world so I
10:04really love the Internet I put a book
10:06about my life called the Internet as my
10:08religion and a lot of people are really
10:10questioning you know is the world you
10:15know the Internet's getting attacked by
10:17the mainstream media
10:18you know they they've lost the power so
10:20that's not that surprising but I would
10:22say that people are scared and that's
10:25part of why they're voting this way you
10:28know there's a big shift that or that
10:30 just like it it's a massive
10:32transformation that's happening as a
10:33result of the internet for me you know I
10:36believe God is what happens when
10:38humanity is connected and was very
10:41different about my god is that we get to
10:45decide how it is that will behave like
10:49each of us contribute to that so the
10:52future is not written the Internet can
10:54like reflect back whatever it is that we
10:56wanted to and we need more and more
10:59leaders to step up and say look this is
11:00the way that I want it to be
11:02so what gets me excited particularly
11:06right now is that there's so much energy
11:08that has been stirred up what people are
11:09actually like hey like it matters what
11:12it is that I think and what it is that I
11:14do this the world isn't happening to me
11:16I can make the world happen and so
11:19I want to shift that energy from like oh
11:24anybody can have a really significant
11:26impact and then we can make the world
11:28that we want so I'm really fed that so I
11:30guess it's who knows where it goes we
11:33don't know like it could go horribly
11:35wrong and awful or not and that's why
11:39y'all are here you know
11:40okay well that that's a happy way of
11:43looking at it but if God is humanity
11:46connected there's a very strong argument
11:48that humanity is getting much more
11:50balkanized people are sticking to their
11:52special interest group they're only
11:53reading things that they already believe
11:55they're not talking to each other
11:57outside of their circles and you know
12:00part of the shock and then there would
12:02have been kind of I think shock on both
12:04sides I think that if Hillary had won a
12:05lot of the Trump supporters would have
12:07been going like I can't even believe
12:08this I don't know anybody who voted for
12:10Hillary are we ever gonna get passed up
12:12or is there is there a way past that in
12:15terms of getting to a more common
12:18culture more shared values or are we
12:20gonna continue kind of running down
12:22opposite directions where the path that
12:25we're on right now is definitely going
12:26down opposite direction something has to
12:28change absolutely the thing for me is
12:31like I grew up like as a kid in this
12:33sort of Christian evangelical bubble and
12:36back when it was like really hard to
12:38create bubbles like we had our own
12:40bookstores we had our own media we had
12:43our own satellite television we had
12:45like.we Union it was like this carefully
12:47I didn't go to normal school I always
12:49say have like Liberty University
12:51television yes and so I actually kind of
12:59know something about bubbles and so I
13:01used to saw the Internet as my way out
13:04of that bubble and that's what I loved
13:06so much about it is that there were all
13:08these like crazy people that I never had
13:10access to before so for me the Internet
13:13it's not about cradles its actually
13:14breaking free from the bubble but now
13:17like everybody they want to create their
13:18bubble and wheeze and this is a normal
13:20human tendency it plays in all kinds in
13:22our life all the time it's why folks
13:24move to the suburbs it's why you know
13:25all the things and so that is not a good
13:29force going for it we have two big very
13:31intentionally figure out ways for people
13:34to come together and start to hear and
13:36understand each other in ways that are
13:38really deeply meaningful it's impossible
13:40I believe to occur at all online at this
13:42point the internet is my religion
13:44right we've been dealing with what it
13:46brings up for our own staff as you can
13:48imagine everybody has their own
13:49political beliefs yeah how did your some
13:52of your employees go home and say hey
13:55yay we just our software you know the
13:59president was on it president-elect and
14:01you know some of them really pure in
14:03hate Trump how did that how did that go
14:05over for them we screamed pretty heavily
14:08for folks who are ready to be
14:10facilitators and where it's no longer
14:12about you and what you want
14:15it's about facilitating what other
14:16people want we're ready for it
14:18so it's intense being in this role but
14:21it's also incredibly important because
14:23if we start to decide who has the right
14:26to run for officer who has the right to
14:29leader who has the right to organize
14:30it's a really really slippery slope what
14:33what are the other things they shouldn't
14:35have because I disagree with them that's
14:37what America is built on that is what we
14:38are exporting to the world
14:39so we've now gotten past the will of the
14:43party the will of the media and the will
14:44of money and we're at like the actual
14:47raw will of the people and there have
14:49been a huge number of pieces that have
14:53come out saying maybe democracy is bad
14:55maybe you know we should change the
14:57rules is that raised is true democracy
14:59actually not a good thing is the kind of
15:02filtered democracy that we've lived in a
15:05better system are they wrong or they
15:08right they have a point I believe this
15:10country was founded on freedom and
15:11opportunity for everybody that was like
15:13the basic thing democracy or were
15:14represented about democracy rather was
15:16sort of the best way that we can kind of
15:18come up with that but if you think about
15:20elections in particular its majority
15:23rule which means that the minority
15:26we have freedom and opportunity so it is
15:29not an ideal system at all I think if we
15:32go when we say okay well if democracy is
15:34really about everybody having a voice
15:36everybody having freedom and everybody
15:37having opportunity to do it is that they
15:40want to do we need to start thinking
15:42about moving beyond elections that is in
15:45credits think about the fundamental
15:47cultural value that is creating here we
15:50are at combat with each other
15:51fundamentally we are not about
15:53understanding each other we're not about
15:55coming together and solving our bigger
15:57problems we're saying that fundamentally
15:59it is about conflict and that is so
16:01deeply baked into American culture it's
16:04actually hard to imagine that not being
16:07there I think until we look at new ways
16:09of solving our problems that are
16:13fundamentally democratic me like
16:15everybody can be involved and like and
16:17we're and everybody's voices are heard
16:18we're gonna have this problem it's why
16:21nation builder is leadership Stoppers
16:22it's about leadership you have to run
16:24for office to go and find a 50 or a
16:27thousand or a million other people who
16:29care about what you're doing and going
16:30and make that happen that's a great
16:32thing about capitalism it's also the
16:34great thing about communities like in
16:36crowdfunding and all of these sort of
16:38new things that were exploring online is
16:40that those opportunities are becoming
16:42more and more available and and people
16:43don't quite realize it yet they don't
16:45realize that like there's a lot that you
16:47can do yourself a fugitive have that
16:50courage to stand up but I think as more
16:53and more people do that you know the
16:55institutions of elections and politics
16:59and even government will become less and
17:01less relevant to people's lives as
17:03completely new systems are built by
17:06leaders outside of that system creating
17:07something new and we'll see that that'll
17:10be a big shift that the internet I
17:12chem technology changed the way we have
17:16the conversation we have had this fairly
17:19crude thing which is a vote and you know
17:21it's not vote to get what you want it's
17:24kind of vote in the 50-point so 1% of
17:29the people agree with me then I get what
17:31I want and if they don't then I don't so
17:34like you actually have choice you just
17:37have a vote is there something beyond
17:39the vote that we eventually get to
17:41because now we can keep track of
17:42everybody and what they want yeah I
17:44think what we're gonna see is a massive
17:47explosion and the freedom for people to
17:49choose how they want to be governed the
17:51internet really enables this because the
17:53the borders in geography matter less and
17:57less I identify more with people that
18:00are like me and in totally different way
18:01than the folks that like to live near me
18:03part of the reason our company's called
18:05nation builder is the idea that there
18:07won't just be 250 nations in the world
18:10anymore there will be 250 million of
18:12them and there's such an opportunity for
18:15folks to lead in that era and so as that
18:18happens more and more and as the
18:20technology as if it's the blockchain and
18:22other things allow sort of these
18:24different entities to start to relate to
18:27each other the old way will become less
18:30and less and less relevant
18:31I believe that ultimately that gets us
18:34to the fundamental principle that this
18:37country was founded on which are which
18:39is freedom and opportunity but it's
18:41gonna be extraordinarily messy and
18:44painful and what what what troubles me a
18:46lot is that you know we don't have
18:49leadership like the folks that people
18:51are looking to as leaders right now
18:52which is largely political leaders who
18:55the president is or any of the world
18:57leaders they're not talking about this
19:01massive transformational shift like
19:03people so people are afraid legitimately
19:07right they don't have jobs they don't
19:09know what's going on as we start to
19:11accept that oh wow this is everything is
19:14changing now everything we can start to
19:17put together the stories the narratives
19:20the policies that will sort of lead us
19:23through that transition and they're
19:24really healthy ways to that we can
19:26create the world that we actually want
19:28to create instead of the world that the
19:30technology is just kind of like
19:31spiraling us towards we saw a massive
19:34spike in signups to our site run for
19:37office org called run for office a door
19:40it turns out there's how many offices in
19:42the United States you can run for is
19:43like 500,000 we don't
19:44hundred thousand offices you can run for
19:47us so there's five hundred thousand jobs
19:48you can run some you know you can be an
19:51elected official so there is energy for
19:54folks to actually get engaged in the
19:55process which is which is exciting but
19:57fundamentally the internet and
19:59technologies like moving so fast it's
20:02just so hard to keep up with it so we
20:04need a much more distributed
20:05decentralized way of doing that the
20:07problem is that folks haven't made that
20:09flip in their minds right there's that
20:12Steve Jobs quote as soon as you realize
20:13that everything that exists in the world
20:14was created by somebody so give me an
20:17example of something that somebody did
20:19that the government would ordinarily do
20:22but they were able to do much easier by
20:25themselves my favorite story of this is
20:27really early on there's very inspiring
20:29to me there's a speech in Hawaii it's
20:33called a Polihale state parks beautiful
20:35beach of course in Hawaii and the rainy
20:39season came and it washed out this key
20:41bridge that was going to sort of allow
20:43people to get to the beach it was like a
20:4513 mile dirt road and they're really
20:48concerned because all of the tourists
20:50small businesses the renting kayaks are
20:53stuff like that weren't gonna have any
20:54customers once a springtime game and so
20:57they went to the government it say hey
20:58guys can come you know fix the bridge
20:59and they're like yeah sure we'll get to
21:04it probably cool years and well actually
21:08you know maybe not because like I said
21:09it cost about eight million dollars we
21:11don't really have any budget and so you
21:14know these businesses would have gone
21:15out of business either just wasn't an
21:16option so a surfer this Bruce surfer was
21:21like we can figure this out so he got
21:23like 20 25 people together he got
21:26somebody to donate a crane and somebody
21:27else is donating some wood and
21:28ditch-digger and all this stuff and they
21:31fixed the bridge themselves in eight
21:37my hero Bucky fuller he said this with
21:40it very clearly you know you don't
21:41change things by trying to sort of fight
21:43the existing reality you change things
21:45by creating a new model that makes the
21:47existing one obsolete
21:49there is so much opportunity now for
21:54everyone to create those
21:56new things that just make the other ones
21:58obsolete and that's a beautiful note to
22:01end on thank you Jim thank you everybody
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