195: All Eyez on Me | Web3 in Hollywood with Alex Amartei and Antara

0:11 Hey there, I'm Pete Townsend, and this is money, never sleeps. We look inside the minds of entrepreneurs, and at the crossover of startups, Enterprise Finance, technology and Life. As We Know It, This episode of money. Never sleeps is sponsored by security. Centrex security, Centrex is a trusted cyber security company. With offices. In Dublin, Cape Town in London, security Centrex provides expert. Advisory This is primarily in the finance and fin Tech Industries with tailored Security Solutions to fit your specific needs and Regulatory challenges on the show this week. We've got an Alexander. I'm Marty CEO of Arabian. Camels, Alex is an Irish entrepreneur originally from Shannon and it's also an investor and film producer. You recently won the Hollywood icon award in the Monaco streaming Film Festival, award alongside James Cameron, and Mark Wahlberg, Alex is a producer of on Tara.

0:58 The first major defy Hollywood movie in history, financed by NF T's, and the power of web 3 with a strong background in equities. Real estate, corporate finance. And an extensive Hollywood network is built a brand around the democratization and decentralisation of the movie business through web, three community, and blockchain, in addition to launching the entire movie and of T. He also carried out the nft campaigns for Arabian camels, David Bowie and Queen and is soon to launch the full physical DC Comic collection on to Block Chain. Finally Alex has been a governmental advisor on the future of industry is it? Converges with web three. Tokenization defy and blockchain in this episode we dig into how all of this fits together into the incredibly unique individual.

1:43 That is Alexander amarte, all right here on money, never sleeps. So Alex, listen, welcome to the show. Awesome to have you on. So thankful to Nile Donaghy for introducing us. Shout out to Nile. He was episode number 11 of this podcast and you're going to be episode 195. So you guys got a little bit of Breeze between each other. Good you. And you and I were on a panel together at a conference recently was that the case I was on some panels and con and I think Mi was in the audience of one of them and then I had to go to Paris recently and we met at fine. So weak and he walked up to me and he recognized me from the panel back in Camp and there we just got talking. And yeah.

2:28 So he said we have to be introduced. All right, cool, awesome. Now he's always introduced us to some great people, so thank you to Nile. You play more. I can share about him, probably off lines, really good guy, very entertaining himself. So listen, probably to get started. Alex, could you share some of the foundational experiences that you've had in life that it pushed you along the path to where you are today? Wow, that's a broad question will potentially brought answer in this that, you know, specifically with n ftes or into the world of Entrepreneurship or what I would say with how you got started in this space and what got you to the point of deciding. We'll listen, I'm going to get into the business of financing movies through nft. Well, I don't know, with respect to myself, I think entrepreneurially the world of the entrepreneur is a very sort of self exploratory path.

3:22 Where It's a mix of you know, purpose business, you know, passion things that you're very interested in and it sort of comes together in an interesting way and you find yourself doing different projects, maybe every sort of four years and you get involved in different things. I initially started in the equity space and and you know, whilst I was in the stock market, we did some corporate finance for various companies from oil companies. Or what have you? But one of them was a film, Denzel Washington film. And then, as you know, I like, Went further down that path. I did some corporate finance for one of the producers who did Merchant of Venice and we always used to meet down at bafta and coming from the city which is a very sort of, you know, Stark how do I explain it? Sort of a cold is that part of town? He's, you know, very stones and metals, you know. And then I used to always going to back down of this sort of warm vibrant atmosphere.

4:11 Everybody's talking about the next story and, you know, there's just a whole different dynamic in their my I think I just got the movie bug. Okay. And yeah, and I guess I had To go into the movie business. From then I think it happens with a lot of people who are in Investment Banking or in the city or in equities, whatever they have the idea to go into something more colorful at a certain stage. And yeah, I went into aside my first small film in 2018 and then when covid happened, I think it's squeezed a new trajectory out of a lot of us. And I knew not much was going to happen to the equity space and I put my head down and I did the script rant our wow now it's amazing and And because I know what you mean about, you know, starting off in financial services, right?

4:59 And, and then being at the point where there's his creative streak in you that whether it had been suppressed or you were expressing it in other ways that this took over. And it's pretty cool to hear because it was similar path for me that it was around 2016 where I started going in a much different direction after a long career in finance. So pretty cool. I think creativity can take on many different forms. It's in music. It's an art, but it's also in business as And it's in finance, people have can have the same prowess with with the creativity in all different fields. Like, you know, ultimately, yes I was a creative, but I think the good thing about coming into the movie business from the corporate angle, as you come in with a corporate backbone and that commercial products. And that's really what helps people really do.

5:41 Well in the movie business, a lot of people who are in the film space, maybe they lack that, and it might make their lives a bit difficult because they don't have the corporate, the end of the day, it's business. It's not just a dream, you have to make the dream financially. We stack up so so let's go to come from that background. Yeah, yeah, I hear you. I had this conversation a couple years back with ambra suberin, who is the CEO of the business in Paris called Keiko, which is a cryptocurrency Data Business, and our chat went along the lines of during her career, in Investment Banking that she kind of had hit the limit of creativity at least, looking at how in Investment Banking that there had been a period that the market went through with derivatives in the 90s and early I swear that was creative and that was engineering, and that was, let's build something new and then you kind of hit 2010 2011 and saw through what we kind of done everything we can do.

6:32 And that's how she jumped to cryptocurrency. So lots of yeah. How much storylines here? Yeah, yeah, options. And cfd is, were like a big, 20-year blow up. Yeah, absolutely. And then, yeah, absolutely. But listen, tell us about on Tara. This is a really interesting movie that you've written and that, you know, tell Tell us about the idea of the financing of the movie through n FTS and kind of where that came from. And you know how you perhaps started going down the block chain Rabbit Hole to figure, all this out, cool. So I'll just tell you that. I mean, in terms of the story itself, I was on a plane back to London and a friend of mine used to always talk about, you know, he's a, you have different friends, you talk about different things, but this particular friend, we talked a lot about character human heart, and what is it in?

7:22 Somebody that makes So different than you know, for example, what is it about Michael Jackson that he doesn't belong in Jackson 5 anymore? He has to go It Alone. You know, I mean, what is it in the human Spirit or heart that just makes them so, uniquely different in? But you know what, in whatever sense. So, he'd always talk about antara and as an example of this type of person and he just said, if some clever young guy can just go to Hollywood and get this movie made, it will be the greatest epic of all time, and I don't know, the words just hit me and I kind of sat back and My chair on the way back to London. I said you know what? I'm going to do it. Wow. And then that's how it happened. I mean, just the backstory of antara. He was a black slave. Who was born in the desert?

8:02 This is the pre-islamic era. Maybe 80 years before this time Akira and he was the son of a black concubine from Ethiopia. She was a princess, and his father was an Arab Noble Chieftain. So the law of the land is if you're born as a to a concubine, you're born as a slave and that's your lot in life. And he For whatever reason, he'd resent the did it so much. He had such a chip on his shoulder about the fact that he was born into slavery and he knew he was Way Beyond, he could never accept it. So, his whole life was about number one freedom. And number two, he wanted to marry the princess. And I either it was like a match made in heaven type of thing or he may be, she was a symbol for him getting out of the slavery and being accepted in the ranks where he thinks he belongs.

8:49 It'll mean. So the whole movie is about him getting that freedom. Mm. And he becomes the most famous poet in all of ancient Arabia. So even on till this day if you study in Oxford or Cambridge or Yale or whatever you study, the literary works of antara and what's unique about him is he was not just a like there was great Poets of ancient Arabia. But what's unique about him? As he was also a night, he became a nice and a warrior and he was the most feared Warrior of all. So if you read his poetry, its a mix of like romance. But then you know, this sort of self praising about his Warrior culture and Hold and, you know, his bravery, his son of his own personal code of conduct, it's really fascinating stuff, and it remains true until today. Because everybody knows what it's like to be the underdog and everybody knows that they have potential inside them and for whatever reason, they don't always achieve it. But they all want to, you know, so he's like a quintessential Underdog, you know?

9:43 And it's interesting to know that a black slave became the Apex of Arabic language in the 6th Century that's quite interesting, you know for a slave to become your Shakespeare. Here and Define the standard of language in your, in your nation. You know how? So I just thought it was packed with inspiration. It's true story and, you know, and I just thought commercially and I'm moving on to the nfc's, lot of things in the commercial side of things, you know, coming from a corporate background. I know things need to make sense with dollars and cents and I thought commercially where we are in the world. A black hero in Hollywood is a thing. Middle East has never had that breakout era like Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon House of Flying Daggers here. They represented a new shift in thinking, in China, breakout from the Raymond Chow era and they stunned the world that their costumes, the, the quality, the, you know, they really stunned the world.

10:35 The Middle East has never had that, you know, and I thought to do the Alexander the Great of the Middle East and the Romeo and Juliet of the Middle East, which is on Tara, that's the story commercially. It makes a lot of sense not to do an epic. Like Troy Gladiator, I just thought everything Stacks up with this. Yeah. Well then on the NFP side of things, Things. I was initially going to do a crypto Finance race and there was just too much regulatory. Red tape every different jurisdiction as a different stance on crypto and proud funding, and things like that. And the nice I was looking at some of these NFC projects and some of them are doing like 40 million, 50 million and was the greatest respect to the founders. They just put that money in their pocket and feel good prayer plated and they they did a good project and they made a lot of money, whatever. But I thought, okay, with five, ten thousand people and fifty million dollars.

11:22 You can really move. Mountains. With a common vision. You know you so can my fault. Yeah. And and was it your background in equities, you know, like you said, it needs to be financially sound. But what was it that led you to build up your own fluency? In this space, to the point where you became comfortable using this as a key financing mechanism for the film? It's inevitable, helplessly the future blockchain and unencrypted and you know, just digital digital assets. And the digital world is inevitably the future and I thought Initially be coming from a traditional background. I thought when people talk about Bitcoin and like Guy, come on, guys get a real job play with the I you know in a funny way just come on.

12:03 It's a fad, it's a bubble. But then when you Ponder upon the efficiency of it, you know, and economic speed and efficiency always wins and cuts through to the Chase. And it dawned on me that this is this is going nowhere. This is the it's the future and whoever is the most literate in this space and whoever has the most dominant within the space, they're kind of on the future. It's this is a technical. This is the age of science. Uber power and Technical power. It's no longer the age of, you know, the hundred thousand army men. This is a tour cyberpower and I thought commercially politically economically everything. So I just thought this would be an amazing story to not just do the first major Hollywood movie in Hollywood history. Financed by n FTS but to be the most modern example of the future of Hollywood, what is the future of Hollywood look like in terms of ownership? And with with in the normal world you pay money and you get something in return with the nft space you're paying For the nft when you're buying three or four things with the potential of five six, seven other things, depending on your level of involvement, how much you help Market the project, how what you do here and there, and it's very multi-dimensional. He's and you know, right now we've got the SEC looking at you collapse and board Apes, right?

13:16 Because they when they issued a coin or it was a dow that was arm's length related to. There you go Labs that it As well, is a little bit too close for comfort. The fact that you've got Yuga Labs which issued the board Apes, the nft holder, then gets a claim on each coin when this other arm's length Dow issue date coin. So the SEC is saying can this be perceived as a dividend and if it's perceived as a dividend that it can be classified as security? It's classified as security, then you need to follow Securities laws and all those types of things, right? So how'd you dug into that at all? I'm just curious if you if you You don't into that space at all?

13:58 Yeah. And the way I looked at it is lfts are not a security not even a commodity. They're still to some degree, undefined, what they actually are like it or not people by NF. T, is most of the time because they want to make money, that is the reality. They came into the space to buy any of these and flip them and make money people do it. Without of Teasdale, do it with classic cars which are not regulated. They'll do with, with art, whatever way. Perceive that they can make a profit that you know they can do it but some of the area's you know like I think the SEC of not have now seen that this is turning into the shape of something called an asset or an investment because that's the largely the intention that's driving this Market.

14:44 Yeah so kind of make sense for the SEC to sort of approach it like that. This is narrower people are investing making money and trading and therefore it has to sort of have some but you know what, I mean, we were in Parliament speaking about this and ultimately how can you regulate something? Which number one does not yet defined, exactly a particular say, exactly. And to something you don't understand. Some of the people who are in the space don't even understand either because it's just so up in the air, I want. Well, it is, and I was writing this morning because someone who is doing some Communications for one of the companies I'm invested in and said, listen, you know, do you think this, you know, you collapsing is an issue at all and it's enforcement in the absence of policy. Right?

15:27 So they have like you said, they haven't yet defined. What's going on here and what they want to see is just like, okay you've got Securities laws written in the 1930s when technology exactly yet exist. And now you've got this new thing over here. That so, you know, Europe is doing pretty well. And getting some definitions down at the ground about this with with the market crypto assets. Regulation coming in, but the u.s. is still a little bit behind the curve. So you hit the nail on the head, you got Securities laws from 1930s and we're in an era where even the whole legal framework surrounding intellectual property? It's now becoming honestly, it's like going from 2D to 3D and that's shift is going to take, you know, could I don't know if it's going to take one year or ten years because it's that multi-dimensional We don't have systems systems yet in place to really get a grip on that. I always say.

16:23 Web one is like a triangle web tools like a pyramid. Web 3 is like spear made from all these pyramids put together and that's really the best way to coin. What exactly what's happening at the moment. There's all these so many Innovations flooding the space from every different industry from Real Estate. From shipping from Payment Processing from investing everything. It's been flooded via the new web three world and it's happening at such a pace. How can institutions keep up with? They can, you know, it's difficult stuff. Typically used to be institutions front, ran, all of this with technology and bring that to the world and it technology evolved and institutional hand to begin with. And then eventually, it became something that individuals could use.

17:04 And now it's going the other way, because it's smartphone, right? It's in our hands to begin with and then the institution seek to adopt it. So the other way around, Let me take a minute to tell you more about our sponsors security Centric. Strives to be the trusted partner that secures your information assets deemed critical for your business security. Centrex also delivers the highest level of security, expertise and support to their clients. Even further security, Centrex provides independent cyber security assessments and advisory against best, practice industry, standards and compliance Frameworks working, as an extension of your team. He Centrex helps you recognize and controlled data risks to your business by understanding your level of risk.

17:50 In short security, Centrex provides many solution offerings from assessment and advisory managed Security Services Cloud infrastructure, validation vulnerability management and testing and payment security. Get in touch with the team at security. Centrex.com to learn more or email info at security. Centrex.com, that's SEC. You Ric entr. RI x.com. Really interested in your roadmap for Arabian camels and the antara nft series that goes along with a movie.

18:33 Can you talk a little bit about what a Nifty holders, get as part of minting and antara and ft? How is that all unfold? Sure. So, in terms of the utility again, wants it to be experiential, so some people can get a part in the movie, some people can come on SAS when were when were actually filming some Vulcan come location scouting with us when we're going with the director. And, you know, other things like getting a producer credits and being able to come to the film Premiere in, can think, you know, wherever we do the primary, things like that. So just, you know, the experiential factors important because a lot of people who joined our community, who either actors aspiring producers financiers and who are sort of treating this as a use case in the master class and first-hand experience of what's going on for, you know, in the world of Film Production and most of the people in our community, not No, that ups and downs that we've been through in terms of dealing with Distributors, dealing with Freelancers, dealing with traditional investors and casting. You know, that it's quite interesting from their angle as well.

19:34 And then we wanted it to be, you know, for everyone to be able to own part of this project. We wanted to be able to share the intellectual property with people and with the intellectual property, the good thing is that Distributors have to pay, you know, licensing fee to the IP holders if that's you or if that's me. So it's not us sort of Here's some shares in the movie. It's, you know, sharing our intellectual property, okay? To kill people in the firing line, to be able to, you know, do things with that IP. And and that will could either be a free mint or an airdrop or things they can do to earn that and to be able to you know, participate in the actual production itself contributing creatively and actually doing things to help out in the production to be to, to be eligible.

20:16 Let's say for royalties. So, you know, it's early days, you know, where the first to do this and it's You know, Marcia fit peeping, you know, in a press release about us. She said she sees this being like a use case in Harvard in 10 years. Yeah, absolutely. I'm seeing a number of folks that are financing creative Productions throughout of teas, right? I think we mentioned when you and I first spoke about steaks who are one of the companies that I invested in through Tech stars that are financing musical Productions. And whether that be the recording of an album or single or that is the live production that the upside of That production, whether it be for recorded music through royalties, or whether it be for live events for ticket sales that the upside goes back to the Token holders, right?

21:03 So, creating that community and its, but taking it into a movie with a 40 million dollar budget. Is that the number that's you guys are working with right now? That is a bigger thing. Yeah, 45 million. You know what? We could have done three movies by now, you know easily. I could have done like a 200k movie, you know. Get tax credits. Get up to 400 k, whatever we could have probably done two or three by now. So when we launched, but we thought for going to introduce a new system to the space, we got it. Do with something of Epic Proportions because it's kind of like what kind of McGregor did for the UFC before that UFC was just skinheads making each other bleed, and it was a bit gory or whatever. But when McGregor came in, he came in with a whole new dimension of entertainment.

21:47 And was that grand? Your factor that really put UFC on the map for, you know, and I think if you're going to do something We're introducing a new whatever, it's good to do with something big like the story of entire a big epic. The whole world can relate to an epic. It's different. If you do like and Harry Met Sally or, you know, Groundhog Day, it's kind of maybe a bit Niche or whatever, but an epic. We all understand that ancient symbology swords and sandals horses, War, peace, you know. Yeah. I love Groundhog Day, man. I can never see that enough times and I think that it's a point watch it over and over and over again. The same thing happening over and over and over again. Don't drive angry. Greer. I say that to my kids all the time that they're driving but you know, I got it. I got it looking at, you know, how this all Blends together as we were talking about a little bit earlier on the web three side.

22:38 I know that you have a partnership in place with vampire on a play to earn game that will accompany all of this and that, you know, looking at web three, one of the big opportunities is what is referred to Simply as blockchain gaming or what Gaming. And that's where you can monetize your in-game performance. IE play to earn, right? So, you know, you could also take your in-game assets and I've teased with you. When you go to other games, it's not necessarily taking your back to the future. What is it DeLorean and driving that into Grand Theft Auto, right? Because just the technology to support that just isn't there yet. But it's perhaps bringing, you know, your Nike Runners out of Roblox and bringing them into decentraland and that you You know, just having them with you when your wallet and having the Central and being able to recognize that there with you in the wallet, perhaps not rendering your Nike sneakers on on your feet.

23:32 Like perhaps, you know, recognizing that they're there and perhaps opening up certain opportunities for you to join a Nike party and decentraland. Right? Whatever. Yeah, so but one of the big hurdles with blockchain gaming and shout out to Lauren Walsh because she's the one who said this to me initially, was that needs to be fun, right? The game needs to be fun and what makes a game popular is Lower the mythology around that believing in the characters and getting into all of that. And the storyline by packaging this up, Alex, with an Epic movie, that you've already got that Lauren mythology there, the story line around the game, should be that much more fun, and that much more immersive. And enjoyable for people these was this all part of the the formula.

24:20 And you know, how do you see this all unfolding? Overall in the industry now really, really great points, you made there. I mean that's initially why I started this, and this is why I started Arabian camels. It was just the launch. The IP of Ontario and that's why it's called camels. Because I don't spoil the movie for you. But he said a big task by the king. He and Tara wants to marry his daughter. He's just got his freedom now and he wants to marry his daughter and he says yeah, sure you can marry my daughter. If you bring me a thousand camels from King Newman and these were like very rare black camels, most lauded commodity of the day and it was slightly. Like yeah, right? As if you're going to do that and the end of the movie comes quaking, through the desert with these thousand camels. So, I call them the nft project camels, and I called Arabian camels, and that was just to sort of kick start this, you know, and give people utility of been involved in the movie and things like that and gradually I realized. Okay, we can do graphic novels, we can do Comics, we can do games, we can do merchandise, toys licensing, all sorts of things.

25:16 And I saw the nft spaces being a huge fertile ground to be able to grow new eyepiece. Because you've got all of that, sort of variation that you can sort of play with over sort of 10, 15, 20 years. So with the movie, it will support the game with the game that supports the movie. And like you say, the law is there, and the story of antara. I mean, it's the kind of character you let your kids sort of, you know, you take example from him, all about chivalry, generosity honesty being true to your word like this great lessons in there for the whole world. Actually, there's some adults need this lessons more than kids, but, you know, so to be able to start with the Aim with the Empire, it's going to be played to earn. We're gonna have our token launch for that and use the Arabian camel to play the game. So to is your vehicle in within the game. So the cool thing about it is if you're an mft holder of, you know, if you only Arabian camels and you're not a gamer can still rent out or at least your nft two players around the world like a scholarship model.

26:12 So what's interesting about that and I hope it will be successful. Is we're targeting places around the world as we're working. People will play to earn and they'll earn more from there. From playing the game than their normal daily income from you know, some parts of the world where they're doing Street trading or the economy is not so established. You know, if they're earning $30 a day in the places where they earn $5 a day that is a very cool situation and that changes the world in many interesting ways. So so if you are renting out your nft you're doing a good deed maybe for some people who are learning and they split their earnings with you as well. So, you're earning passive income, just from owning a camel type of thing. So, yeah, and then we'll go on from, you know, from the movie, of course, we've got sequels for it. We've got the In the world already in talks with people for the graphic novels in the comics, we can do series, we could do things with Disney.

26:58 I mean, I don't reveal everything, but there's really cool things we can do at this IP and that's why I chose this one to focus on rather than, you know, another small production. Oh, yeah, because we've got you, I mean, imagine imagine Batman comes along and says, we're going to do a sequel. And, you know, the Public's going to Old 50% of the IP or Star Wars says we're putting the intellectual property of Darth Vader alone or Luke Skywalker. You know, 4,000 people People thousand, limited-edition Club will own the IP of Darth Vader. Anything relating to Darth Vader. That's where we're going to mazing. I'm I be at the front of the queue and you mentioned the magic word Alex, which is Disney.

27:39 And you mentioned the connectivity between different mediums of of Ip, right? And that which gets me think about the Disney flywheel if you familiar with the Disney flywheel. No, it is. The flywheel goes, you watch the movie and you, then enjoy the movie, and you want to go with the theme park and then you go to the store and you buy the March. And when you buy the merch and get it home, you want to watch another movie, you want to watch another movie, go to the theme park and it goes around and around and around and around. Yeah, I've been working on this in the, what? Three space you could pick any part of the flywheel to start the story. Okay. So you, you're interested in the whole production in the whole story and the whole lore and you by the end of tea, T.

28:23 Okay, you buy that nft and then you want to go see the movie. You go see the movie then you want to go play the game. You are bringing your nft into the game. So because of the way that blockchain gaming works in the way that entities work in the way, all this data is trackable that you get massively good, insights from that data on where the footfall is in, yes. How people are using the end of tea? What are they doing with in the game and that then informs your next? And of She wants or perhaps informs the next movie script. Yeah. Or the next graphic novel or the next comic or the next cartoon series and like the toys, you know, and you hit them that you articulated a very well.

29:05 And that's the ultimate sort of vision of what we're doing with this. And you know that the biggest challenge in this space is you've got small, mediums, like Discord, Twitter spaces where you don't get everybody going. You've got maybe 12,000 people in Europe in your Discord, but you might get 80 of them at a time. I've had people who've bought, like maybe 12 camels and he had no, Idea, we even had a movie, you know what I mean? And that's the challenge of communication within the space and it's so clamored in the so congested. It's hard to sort of get that air time, you know, to make people understand, truly your vision, but you hit the nail on the head. It's really getting a big IP like that and creating a whole ecosystem. And, you know, and as well, what you mentioned about using your Nike Runners and descent around, and going from here to there, that's what I meant about different pyramids, all coming together to form a sphere because If you put all of these factors together the next five years looks like so insanely different, a little bit exciting, a little bit scary but says that many innovations that are flooding daily that when you put them all together in five years, it's like a whole new world like literally. Exactly.

30:08 So, exactly. It's a new language were all learning and that's the thing and it's, you know, this all harks back to gaming. And I've talked about it on the show before that having read the book metaverse and how it will revolutionize everything over the past. You know, I read Over the last few months and that, you know, the technology just isn't there yet for us to be able to all step into these metaphors zones that you see in movies. Like ready player one? Yeah. But all these things that we're doing right now with IP by enabling things to start move around in this 2D virtual world that we call a laptop, a browser, you know, a TV screen that we're playing video games on all of that are the building blocks of this. So yeah, you know, I was with them, I was In recently just after out of Boyd Allan Poe, it was the guy who was supposed to be the CEO of Microsoft.

30:58 There was something there where he was going to be the CEO and then it turned out to be Bill Gates or something like that. And but he's been building, these type of things for 20 years, he's not new to this and he was speaking on stage. He spoke he made a very good point because I'm I'm a little bit. I don't understand antimatter verse but I don't treat it as this new heaven that we're all running towards him like a can't wait to let you know we're all in there. I like a walk in the park. I like to get outdoors and I like to, you know, I don't Well I don't like to look towards a world where we're all going to be just wired up and on front of a screen all day every day. Because look at what social media is done to people you know dinner table. Everybody's got their phones. It's change people in many many different ways but with metaverse multiply that by hundreds, that's what I've sort of us. It's extremely dangerous.

31:39 So it's extremely it's worrying that my kids may be walking around with VR goggles on their head. Not the big clunky ones that are in market right now, but the ones that look like ski goggles, right? Pitted and ready player one. And that's all that they do and that we need to keep the kids outside. We need to keep the kids playing sport, right? But he made a very good point though. He said rather, he thinks the metaverse is going to come into our world and what he means by that is these VR experiences that it's going to be more rather than just sitting in front of your screen all day. It's going to be more how can that world come more into our world and interact with? They are and very intelligent and that is a very good point you made and it's inevitable as well.

32:21 So Be good to have some sort of balances. I definitely definitely. Yeah. And that's where, you know, you're talking about spectacles were you can see part of a virtual image in front of your face but you're still engaging with the real world? You know that. So it's, but yeah, this can go in so many different directions, you know, Roblox is already here. That's something like 60 million daily active users. It's interesting though, because I was in Khan and we were, I was sitting with a friend. It was even in time we're on the, you know, the beach up to of Jaws lounges and we're The sky were thinking you'd be able to do so much advertising with the sky above can under thinking, how do you even regulate, who shows? What about this guy? If you want to put some big advertisement above Buckingham Palace, who's gonna stop you?

33:05 You know what I mean? So it's interesting to find out how that's all going to be placed in the future. I know and how you're going to sell those digital rights of that digital airspace and you know some it's like trying to make poetry without an alphabet at the moment. Make Chloe without an alphabet. Jesus we're getting it also Territory here with creating Elvish languages which some people say is the root of the metal versus, you know, Lord of the Rings. So, but that's another story for another day. Listen, you're an entrepreneur at the core. Alex, what do you think are some of the key character traits, if yours that have enabled you to just persistent to drive through this and to keep going, my friend is a banker, he's an economist.

33:45 He said, I hate creative people and I hate artists because they like things that are not logical and he's a banker, he just, it's just did. It's in decimal points or whatever. And I see myself as a bit of a mix. I'm definitely, you know, entrepreneurial inclined but I am definitely a creative at heart and when I do things, there has to be a person for like a mix of passion and purpose behind it. I could, you could make billions of dollars being the most dominant paperclip provider on planet Earth, but it's boring as hell, you know, it's not about the money honestly. It's, if it was just about the money, I had this, you know, there's other Industries, right? Just bury my head. But, you know, I love people. I love people all over the world and I love the interaction and I love the fact that, you know what? I've got an award in Hollywood and I said something on stage, which maybe I didn't articulate it too well, but it's a very good point, which is we all know the Alchemist, which is about turning stone into gold.

34:40 We've all read the book and, you know, it's about the whole idea, but what if you think about it? Humans have the ibid ability to turn ideas into reality. It's better than Turning Stone into gold. It's, you know, you can turn an idea. A multibillion-dollar situation, you know? And that's really fascinating to me. Something's just that is a little idea of the back of a plane and then all of a sudden there's Awards and then there's you know, your show up on set your in cinema, you're at the Oscars, whatever, however, far the path goes, but you think it all starts with a night with my dear, I find that fascinating. So when I do things entrepreneurially, I always like to mix it with a bit of purpose and the journey and what that Journey makes of you as a person as well, you know? So when I'm gonna lie, yeah, I like to see that modern day. Alchemy with Alex and Marte.

35:24 Yeah, exactly. Your autobiography coming up, we'll see, we'll see. Listen, we're going to move to the point of this show where we ask everybody, the same closing. Question Alex. What is one thing that people wouldn't expect to know about you? One thing that people would not expect to know about me. I love words. Okay. Words is one of my biggest Fascinations. Can you speak backwards? Depends on what I have to say and how long are we to say? It felt but might like those it Peter programmers from the expand on that. Loving words, you said earlier, you know, few minutes ago.

36:05 But poetry without an alphabet, right? They get you started hinting at that, but expand on that a bit. Well, I don't know if I can give an example. There's a part in the script of Ontario where he's about to do dual with another Warrior, and he doesn't want to fight the warrior but the Warriors insistent upon it and Aunt, iris is something very eloquent and the other Warrior says, you know what word, what you say, your words against my sword. But on Tara, says he, like mockingly laughs at him because he doesn't understand. He says, words can control a hundred thousand swords words, build Nations World, build Empires, and And Destroy Empires. It's all words ideas, like what we're doing now. Movies music making a dream happen.

36:47 Nothing is possible without words, so I find. If I don't know, I'm quite nuanced. When it comes to understanding words and the Power of Words and what they can do and not do and, and the power they contain. But the really they make the world go around these little thing called words and so. Yeah. And that you asked that right combination. That right. Combination of the pen is mightier than the sword? Yeah, you know and words are above them all. So you know, if you say the right combination of words you achieve this, if it's the wrong combination, you don't achieve it if you are a new arts and yeah, oh man I had spent the prior life trying to just not correct people's words but look at the way they were saying things and like, listen, I know what you meant but the words but you said it wrongly. We can do this better.

37:32 We can do this better. You don't always have the benefit of having a smiling face behind the send it. To the words that are coming out you need to actually sometimes massage things a bit. But and how can people find out more about antara the movie onto our the end of T's and Arabian camels? Alex, yes. So we've got a website Arabian. Camels dot IO and there's two videos there and one was done by actually, they're both done by Steven Spielberg's assistant. He was with Steven Spielberg, who maybe are many many years as his right-hand man and he's a phenomenal editor. So he made the sizzle reel that shows pretty much the story of Aunt, aeran four minutes. So do take a look at that and the website of course. And then there's another one and Tara movie.com. That sort of sort of print out our vision and of course, Twitter Arabian camels and has a lot of our updates, over the past year, the awards we want and where we've been and what we're doing and it's quite interesting.

38:22 We got invited to speak and has a Parliament House of Lords, the cedar which is the center for Economic and Development and Affairs of Saudi government. They will be one of the first advisors on blockchain and incorporating nft is and in business cycles that are speak for Oxford students on their projects and things like that. So it's been a really when this is all in the past year. Yeah. Like all of this, it's kind of strange. Like, it is a huge shift in Direction and lot of things have happened. So, so, yeah, I guess follow us in Twitter. There's a lot of podcasts out there and, you know, all right. I can't get my WhatsApp number if that's no, no, no need. Now that could be extremely dangerous. You never want to do that. Like, giving your 12 words, he tries out, don't do that either. Yeah, we'll listen Alex. Thanks so much.

39:06 It's been an awesome chat. We went down a number of avenues that I was unexpected. So thank you and I always the best way. Absolutely. And I will be a fan, it cheering you on and cheering. Ah, naintara, I was going to say from the sidelines, but I might be on the red carpet will see. Yes. Exactly or on set with us. So, we're hoping to shoot the film. If we can get it done, by sort of march-april, that will be phenomenal before it gets too hot in the desert. We're going to shoot in a place called neon, which is a world UNESCO world heritage site. Really? Like the most dramatic, rock, formations, like Lawrence of Arabia background you backdrop, you know? Oh so awesome. Yeah, only one. Maybe we can put a body armor on you and I am swinging. Another story about body armor but we'll leave it there like so much Alex pleasure.

39:52 All right. That does it for this week, folks. Thanks to Alex for opening up his mind, to help us figure out why he does. What he does links to learn more about the upcoming on Tyra, Epic movie in the antara, and of teas are the show notes for this episode on our website. Money never sleeps. .I so check us out online. Also, thanks to Conan Brophy, from create sound for mixing and editing. This episode Conan is an excellent medium and to get in touch with when you're thinking about launching your own podcast. As for me, I'm an early stage, startup investor focused on where fintech meets crypto in crypto meets. Three. If you'd like to talk to me about your business, drop me a line on info at money. Never sleeps.

40:35 That IE, finally, till next time, thanks for listening, see you