Thank you all for joining us today for our Ramadan fundraiser kickoff concert. But before we officially begin, a brief introduction of the event and series in general, both the Yemen Relief and Reconstruction Foundation and Code Pink host the series. My name is Arwal Mokdad. I volunteer with YRF. YRF provides relief in Yemen and advocates in the U.S. to end the war. I'm Danika. I work on the Yemen campaign at Code Pink. Code Pink has been working coalition with other organizations to stop U.S. involvement in the war in Yemen for years. And we always love working with Yemen Relief and Reconstruction Foundation. And this is actually the anniversary of Saudi UAE and U.S. intervention in Yemen. As many of you know, Yemen is experiencing the largest humanitarian crisis in the world. YRF does crucial life saving work on the ground in Yemen to address the crisis and all proceeds from this fundraiser will go to aid. If you would like to know more about YRF, please refer to our website and social media accounts. However, Yemen has a rich history and culture that also deserves attention. The Beyond the War series aims to showcase Yemen outside the context of war and center Yemeni voices. We hope to break stereotypes and build solidarity with Yemeni communities. To start off our fundraiser, we have Zaki Zikatro with us. Zaki's eyes have always been fixated on the arts. Looking at ways he could transform a space, enhance an experience or pull beauty out of something that would otherwise seem mundane. This thirst is what drove him to pursue graphic arts. So it drove him to establish his own company, Qifana, Lincoln Bio, and create cycling experiences. And it's what ultimately led him to pursue his love of world music beyond just listening. Zaki once again wanted to create, and his roots led him back to the sounds of the Ud. This instrument has always instilled the sort of peace in him, and he decided to learn and practice it well into his adult years. Learning and performing with the band Aswad has been grounding him ever since. Thank you for that introduction. And like I said, like Arwa said, we are doing a fundraiser. We're trying to raise $20,000 for food baskets to send to Yemen through Yemen Relief and Reconstruction Foundation. Food baskets average at about $50. They feed a family of six for an entire month. Baskets distributed during the month of Ramadan, which starts the next weekend, include dates for people to break their fast. It also includes powdered milk, flour, rice, oil, that kind of thing. We are already like at almost $12,000 out of our $20,000 goal. We're actually at $11,963. If anyone wants to bump us up and help us hit that $12,000 mark right now, you can donate in the link I just sent in the chat. So please check that out. And the very helpful thing that you could do is share the fundraiser on Twitter or send to a few of your friends who would throw in five, 10, whatever amount they can donate. Every dollar is very much appreciated. And with that, we can get started with the concert portion of the evening. So I will hand it over to Zaki. Thank you Danaka and thank you Arwa for having me. Nice to meet you all. So yeah, so I'll be playing the instrument called Ud. So I'm just gonna talk a little bit about the instrument. So first of all, this instrument's been around for some people say a thousand years. I mean, we don't know what we need the origin from. And one of the article that I read a while back that the old started with the bow, right?  And there was one, we were like, okay, why not? We put it together and see how it sounds like. So that's how the old started. I mean, this is one of the history that I read about the old. But obviously over the years, it finds the shapes, people being more creative about it and then mix it up with different wood, right? In this particular one, I designed this in Turkey and yeah, and it's a custom design with the African Ibanee wood and mixed with the Sumatran black wood. So all this is handmade and I designed it myself and then hand it over to the maker and then they design it. And as you can see, that's my logo, my personal logo. So yeah, so that's the history, a quick highlight of the history about the old and they usually have one, two, three, four, five, six, seven. So this particular one have 15 strings but usually they have 11. So I'll put additional strings called F, so that's the sound. So yeah, so that's just a quick highlight about the instrument and I'm about to play. So it's not really a song, old is known for the opening of the music, right? And this is like more like the soul of the music. And by the way, and the old have, it is related to the guitar. This is, think about this is the mother of the guitar. So when the Islamic empire left and the Spanish people, they're trying to take over and trying to duplicate it and they can't be able to do it. So they just create the guitar and that's where they get out of old. So that's how they relate it. But yeah, any questions before I go on to the opening of the concert? Anyone? Great. Can you guys hear me clear? Yeah, cool. So yeah, so like I said, this is not a songly just more the opening, right? So I'm gonna be Macam. So in the Middle Eastern music, they have a call Macamad, which is a different melody and different notes. So, and this one is particular one is gonna call the Bayati. I love it. Can people unmute and clap? I don't know if they're able to, but. No worries, we're gonna do it. So yeah, so that's any other questions? Yeah, if anyone has any questions in between songs, you're more than welcome to unmute and ask them. We did break 12,000 on the fundraiser. So thank you all so much. Something you could do is text your family, post the fundraiser on Facebook or Twitter or Instagram, whatever social media you use. There's descriptions on the link itself. So if you need any language to post the fundraiser with, it's all there. But yeah, thank you all so much for your generosity. So the next one, I'm going to kind of gather from different countries. So this one is gonna come from Egypt. So the music, so it's a vocal song. She's one of the very famous singer in Egypt in the 60s, 50s. And this particular song, I'm gonna play in the ombre. You know what? What I would do is almost share you guys the link on the message for the singer. So you guys can listen to it for richer because this is just the old, right? So yeah, let's see.  I mean, obviously, I think people who listen to Arabic music, I'm sure they know who's in the microphone. And I mean, even Jay-Z, I mean, do a remix out of that. Some of us are songs, right? So yeah, any other questions? If anyone has questions but doesn't want to unmute, you can type them in the chat and I can redirect the questions. That's also an option. We are $27 away from reaching 12th. Oh, just kidding. Someone just donated. We're at $1,100. Thank you. Robert just donated. Thank you so much. Keep sending it around. Getting to $20,000. We're supposed to have this fundraiser open for a few weeks, but it's going really well. So we'll see what happens. Thank you, everyone, who's donated so far. All right. So the next one is a little bit short is because the song, it's by Yemeni songs, is one of my favorite one called Imaa Tashroofoq. I know. Sorry. I'm Tashroofoq. So the meaning of this is actually, when can I see you? So original singer was Abu Bakr Salim. He's from Hanamout. He's a region in Yemen. So in the beginning, I mean, I'm just going to read you a couple of lines, of course. You know, if you listen to the music, for those who never listen to the music of this song, if you translate into songs, it mostly romantic love stories, right? Like, we are known for, you know, poets. I mean, we read poets. Just to present it to the audience. Because we are very creative in our mind in the way that we want to say something. We always say, with honey in our tongue. So the song goes, when can I see you? Oh, you've got a goodness, a godness of beauty. Tell me, please. When or when are you free? Yeah, and then, yeah, I'll send you guys all the link once I'm done with the music, and then you guys can check it out. The music and also the larynx. So I'm going to do the opening again for the music just to get my mood into a different makaman. And yeah, so yeah. So that's one of the songs a little bit shorter because it just looked right. And so the larynx is always changing. So that's what's nice about the song. But that's something that I'll share with you guys with everything so you can satisfy to listen to all the songs. Who's the song by again? By Abu Bakr Salim, I can send it to you. So this is the... So I'll send you one of the YouTube on the song actually in a second. Anyone who doesn't know, Abu Bakr Salim is kind of the bread and butter of Yemeni music. I don't know any other way to put it. He's iconic. He's well known across the Middle East. I'm currently living in Oman. And I went to a poetry, like music, open mic night. And at least two people, Omanis, were singing Abu Bakr. He's just such an iconic figure in the region. Yeah, Abu Bakr is like Oman kaltoum in the 60s. Like, it's known. But it's from the Khalidj side, which is from the Gulf side, which is the Khalidj is like where...  They get influenced from Himawa since the 60s. So this is, I'm just gonna play some Mawa, which is an improvising as I go. So it's not a song. And this is more, I'm just gonna play it as I go. So this is something new, something I might not be able to repeat it again, but this is something you guys technically get to life. I mean, life as I make it up. Yeah, so that's, I was playing at three different Makamat. So I just jumping from one melody to another. So I think you can hear one, there was, I was playing a Makamat called Hejaz. Questions, well, there's nothing, questions. I assume that everybody's already been, know what Odi is, and I'm sure you guys been across this instrument before the sound, so. Can you talk a little bit about, a little bit more about the tradition of what you were just doing? Cause I know we talked on the phone a little bit about, like playing as you go and like improvisation, kind of being an element of it. But if you- Yeah, so, you know, like, I would, when I pick up the music, right?  So one of the things I said about, we don't usually, a lot of our old player, they go by here, you know, we the music.  Reading music, it helped when you were in a bigger group of musicians to play certain music, who read this music, right? So you guys can, so the audience in sync with what other musicians. However, Makamat has, there's hundreds of different Makamat, but the most main one, I'm just gonna talk about the, you know, the four things, right? Like Hijaz, they call the Western Makamat. By the way, I'm sorry about a lot of my background, I don't know if you guys can hear that, but there's a lot of motorcycles running around. So life of the city, right? So, so Hijaz, so what nice about it is they don't have friends, right? So the guitar have those lines between, right? On the neck, if you look at the guitar. So what you notice is that guitar is very limited, but you can play chord here. You notice I don't play chord at all, right? It made for one stroke at a time. But guitar, they were like playing a chord like, right? So it's a little bit different. That's why the frets difference. I mean, there's many things, but that's the main one, the main one. Now, the second one is the, the four Makamat of Hijaz, in order for you to learn though, when I was learning like the first thing I need to understand is this main one, the first one called Hijaz. Now Hijaz is the Western sound. So if you wanna play an American song, you wanna play on this Makamat because they call the Makamat from Hijaz, right? So like, so, so that's doh, right? So doh re mi fa so la si doh, right? So this is how it sounds. So that's if you notice, somebody playing the piano will sound the same thing on guitar or any other instrument, right? So if you, this Hijaz, all you need to play is within that note. Like, if I wanna play, you know, Western sound to it, right? So like, so you can play, I can't think of an American song at the moment, but I don't know if you know this song. It's Italian, right? But it's still the Western melodic sound to it, right? So that's one of them. I think my friend recognized that song that you were playing. Is it Bella Chow? Yeah, it is a Bella Chow. It is Italian music. It's a, it's a revolution music, but it won't get there. He recognized it from money heist. Yes, it is. It is money heist using that song. Yes. That's correct. Yeah, so, so that's one of them. Then you have, sorry, so they're called the Hijam, right? So that's the Western one. And then the Hijaz, I make mistakes, or Hijaz is more the Arabic, like night of the Arabian, and we've heard of those Disney, right? Like the Aladdin, for example. So it's like going from, let's start with the dough. Hijaz, that's the, it's just like, that's the Arabian night, right? Like there's more like Arab music, like one of the classic one, right? Now, and then there's Bayati. Bayati is where the Gulf, I mean, all middle, use this, this Makama. This is like really one of the Middle Eastern using this sound. By the way, before I go into Bayati, Hijaz also Flamingo using this, you can hear someone from the Flamingo sound. And then, yeah, so Bayati is actually a lot of the Gulf using this Bayati. So Bayati sounds like, it's very special because Bayati have the quarter notes. And this is where it makes a difference between the Western world and then the Oriental, right? The quarter notes, it's between, it's between the note. And you can't play it in the guitar. You can't play it in a piano. You can't even play in the trumpet unless they modify it to have that, right? So if you notice when I play Hijaz and Ajam, right? So I'm going to go with Ajam, which is the Western sound, like the Hijaz. That is in between. The last one is the Nahuan, which is my fifth one because you can cross the world with the Andalusian and the Spanish music, right? So this is the Nahuan, they call it the Nahuan. It's nice because, and also the Gulf, a lot of the Khaleiji, the Gulf region also play the Nahuan. So Bayati and Nahuan, they always put it together and play. Our closing will be playing the Nahuan. So I'm keeping that one in the last one, so yeah. So that's the four Makamat that I learned. And so technically, the Udh can play in music in the world. Like if somebody come from Africa and they want to play some African music, the Udh can complement that. If you want to play with the Western world, you can complement that too. And there's a lot of musicians actually mix the Udh and even with the composer of like a big, you know what all the drummer, the violins, what is it called? Symphony, right? So the Udh can go cross the world on different type of music. And that's what nice about that is that you can play with the Western world. So yeah, I hope I answered your questions very well. Yeah, thank you so much. And my friends here loved the money heist reference. So how about we do one more song? And then I know Arwa has some questions. And then if anyone in the audience also has questions, and then we can wrap up. We are at $12,100. If we can get to $12,200, that would be amazing. That would be two more families of six fed through the next month. So if you know anyone who might donate, please send them the link. We'd really, really appreciate it. But we'll throw it over to Zaki for his last songs.  This song, I think you guys know, but this song is from the old Anderusian song. It's very, very old. And people can't track it when it comes from. But I think it starts with a poem, and then I think somebody make it into music. A song. And a lot of actually very famous musicians are using this music. So I don't know if you guys know, I'm not bad with the song, but this is the song. If people want to unmute and do like a round of applause, that would be awesome. Thank you, Zaki. Thank you so much, Zaki, for the wonderful music. We're going to open it up to questions now. So if you have any questions, feel free to put it in the chat and mute yourself and ask. I believe there's the raise hand function if you want to ask a question verbally. And I'll just call on you. I am also a teacher in my free time. So I volunteer as much. Nice memories of please raise your hand. But I'll start us off with questions until people put it in the chat or raise their hands. I kind of want to discuss what you were mentioning earlier, Zaki, of how a lot of musicians do it by ear and how that plays into traditional concert structures and medulous style concerts. Do you mind sharing what those look like? For those who are unaware of what a medulous is, but the setting is how these traditional concerts work because it's not written music. Yeah. So I just went out. I went out.  Can you tell me more about something? And then I just forgot.  Oh yeah. So I was wondering, as you were mentioning earlier, a lot of musicians, musicians play by ear, right? Not written music. So I was wondering if you could talk about traditional concerts and the structure of those, right? Where you kind of have the singer going and then the musicians just have to follow whatever they go with. And then medulous. Where someone just starts reading poetry and playing food, kind of those structures from a musician's point of view. So it's a little bit different. Definitely. Right? Like, so you have to understand. I thought myself. Recently. Like I thought myself an old 2014 and I practice every four hours. Right? So some of the questions I'm not exposed as much as most of the musicians. It's learning old since they were little. However, I'll tell you what my experience was. So, um, So I, I, you know, I'm part of the band here in the bear. I call us what, and, you know, we have a music sheet that we have to read and kind of listen. So some of the songs, I don't even read it because. To follow up with the singer. So the rule. Engagement in the music world is that you have to follow the singer. You know, right?  They go faster. You have to go faster. Right. And, um, and that's something that would kind of nice because they can live between the two worlds because, you know, like the old, if you make mistakes, still some nice. This is what I learned. You can improvise quickly. If you know how to, you can improvise quickly. Right. And so, um, but yeah, but in terms of in a SWAT is more very organized. Um, in terms of like what music sheet that you have to read. And then when you're stopping and when you're playing, while the. See if they have a violinist playing first and then it will play. Actually it is very rule that you have to follow. Now in the modular settings, that's the origin of the song. And it's very rule that you have to follow. Now in the modular settings, that's the original and how they get together all the musicians, which is, it's a free fall. Right. Like everybody start playing and then the rhythm just start playing together. Like, like that's one of the measures. And some of them singing the very popular song, which is the improvise as they go. Like, so sometimes you say, Oh, I know that song, but it's different. It's like they make it because some people just improvise it as they go. But they still, what, what nice about it is that in measure, it's like, you can play the melody is a little bit different, but then you know the song, for example, like you use a certain song. Oh, I know that song, but like, but it's different. I like it. Right. Like. Still playing in the same. Right. Let's say by that, for example, but they do some extra stuff that it's different than the original song. So that's why you enable this. It's a more like a few, like, you know, some songs like they re-sample or fusionize the songs like those but still, you know, so I was playing. So I like it more in the measure style because like I can improvise it the way I want it versus, you know, playing in a more like in the settings where it's more like a band that you have to play, you know, certain songs for the audience. And it's almost like a symphony too, right? Like we're not symphony, like it's more assembly, like different, like we have like, it's violinist, you know, five oldest, but we have to, we have to in tune and sync. And much of this, again, it's free fall. So like you can play as long as you're playing the same Macabre and still something. And it's more fun because people start to stand up and that's it. Just nice. Yeah. Thank you for going over those differences between a swat and then a measure setting really fascinating. We have a question from Mary in the audience. She's wondering about the relationship of poetry to Yemeni music. Am I talking about that? Yeah, I mean, poetry has been around in, in not just in Yemen, but like in Middle East, right? But I mean, I mean, Yemen known for poetry. I mean, we even have a TV show for just a poetry, right? Like it's, it's, it's, it's the culture. It's part of us DNA from like years, thousands of years. So it's, and I think, I think that's one of the reason why every time you hear a story from like, I hear a story from my dad or my, my grandfather, they're always going to talk like, win my, my mom's heart or my grandma's heart. So it's just embedded in them, like how they talk, like a sweet talk and it's very poetic. Yeah.  And then when I come to the US when I was 16, and I start to realize it's like, it's a weird way I talk and when I try to translate it in English and it's funny. I mean, it's just, it's just interesting. Oh, it's not to them. It's not normal. It's different. It's very poetic, right? It's like, why are you so poetic when you talk when you can talk normal? I don't see that. And so, yeah. So I realized when I was, I come to America. So, you know, so that's from my experience in my life. I hope I answered the question. Mary, can you hear me? Yeah, I love that answer. Like you said, Yemeni. Yemeni and like out of tradition in general is very poetic. Yeah. And a lot of these like old school songs are just poems that people have added music to. Yeah, I mean, yeah, I mean, most music technically is poem. I mean, I can, you know, so they started with poem. I mean, a lot of music. They took it from old poem books. You know, so you can hear that like Lama Bada, for example, that's one of them. It wasn't. Some say it wasn't a song. What is it from point and they convert it into. So anyone has any other questions? Again, feel free to raise your hand or print that if not, I'll go on to our. Oh Dan, I could go for it. Just to chime in really quick. We're $25 away from our final goal of the night, which is $12,300 right now we're at 12,275. So if we can get a last $25 in there, that would be amazing. That would be such a great accomplishment for this fundraiser. That's my last plug for the fundraiser. I'm going to stop asking you all for money now. You can see it. This is what it looks like. It's nice because it has a nice. I look forward to that. Okay, so if there's not a question in the chart and no one's raising their hand, I will go to our final question of the night which is, what are some common themes and Yemeni songs. What is the common theme? I was, I was trying to share all the music that I was playing some of them. Thank you for doing that. What are some common themes in Yemeni songs? The common things, I mean, mostly Abu Bakr Salim, I mean that's he's the legend right and so. I'm sure is one of them. I can share it also on chat and also. And then the other song that I was playing today, which is the Mata Shufak, right, which is what I translated into, when can I see. So that's one of the two very common music in Yemeni, all the Yemeni knows when you start singing like all the Yemeni women. They start singing along with you. So that's, yeah. And he passed recently too. He just passed, I think, a couple of years, some of years ago. We have a question from Thayna. Who's your favorite Yemeni poet? Among the people, they're all a poet. But I don't have any specific, no. Yeah, I don't have any specific. I mean, I am more into, so, but just to go back in my background, so my background is, it's, I never was in musicians, right. And a poet, and when I was in high school in senior year, that's why I get into a court, but I don't have any specific. Yeah, so I mean, to answer your question, I don't have any specific, but I mean, the musicians also look both and they wrote this music. Yeah, thank you. Also something about Yemeni poetic tradition that you were discussing earlier is it's the culture itself is very poetic. So when I think of poems that I've heard a lot of times it's people talking, right. And it's through, it's reached so many mouths, this poetry, like it's hard to find the original. Yeah, or people themselves when you're talking to a kind of elder person, someone who's used like a tribal leader or whatnot. They'll give their answers in poetry. I remember that would drive me nuts as a child where I would ask my grandma for something and she would respond to them. Right. And I'm like, no, I want clear answer grandma. Don't just go to the poetry right now. Yeah, exactly. You're right. You're not like, so what does that mean? Yeah. So yeah, poetry is really embedded in everyday life in Yemen, I would say so I also struggle with that question is your favorite. I'm like, I guess it's the people around me. Yeah, that's true. I'm about to give you guys the English translations of the, the Yemeni songs that I mentioned earlier. That's the translation. Sorry, that's a lot. Thank you so much for sharing everything in the chat. Danica, unless you have anything to add, I think we can start shifting to closing statements. Yeah, closing. That sounds good. Great. Well, thank you everyone for joining us today. Thank you, Zaki, for your time. We really appreciate it. And thank you for the generous donations. We're really glad that we were able to raise so much money tonight and in general this fundraiser is going to stay open for a while. It's our Ramadan fundraiser. So feel free to share it with others, donate, whatever it may be, we really appreciate any support in Yemen needs the support as well. In general, please keep an eye out for our Beyond the War series. We're going to continue doing these and it's a great opportunity to learn about Yemeni culture and hear unique Yemeni perspectives, such as Zaki's.


I'll have to welcome everybody back to the independent investor channel live stream Sometimes I ponder during times like this whether or not it's all worth it You know, it's one of those things that I've been through ups and downs and stock market investing and when I share it with other people Perhaps maybe a lot less prepared or a lot less conditioned Than I might be You know these ups and downs they they define your your parameters of tolerance There's no doubt about it Each time I go through it. I wonder if it would would just be easier to just throw in the towel sometimes, you know Take the easy road I don't understand sometimes why we have to go through this journey and insist upon carving out such a difficult path for ourselves You know folks like me We we operate on a little different cylinder I typically think about progress a lot a lot and Doesn't necessarily mean that I I get on progress all the time or I have results that render successes all the time but I'm certainly beating the drum and I think it's our human nature sometimes to Ask yourself second guess yourself and what you're doing with your application Is it appreciated? I've been doing this project a while anyway, and here's to the 37 subscribers we gained last month I Question people's interest in the project Perhaps maybe I don't look at the part Perhaps maybe I don't jump at it the way that Graham Stefan does Yeah, sometimes I wonder if I should just not do YouTube all together honestly Anymore it's all I can do to come on and share a message with a with a group community I believe wholeheartedly in the message that we're putting through there's no doubt about that but Are we working against a project that is? so difficult to overcome in in people's complacency and and an understanding that there's a few advocates and ambassadors of Taking a chance and people who have learned over the over the years that you know fallen into the the everyday mundane routine of life you know might not be their way and The opportunity to come on and share What it means to take a chance Stock market investing allows you to do just that but it's an all-facets of your life, you know It's easy to have kids. It's much more difficult to be a good good father You know find a spouse if you're lucky enough what's it what's it like to be a good husband, you know what I mean? but Yeah, you know, it's it's interesting Deliberation for me for sure. I've been on a very interesting impasse the last year and a half I guess nothing like social media to draw out some of those Those those interesting impasses for me You know what whether or not what we're doing is is worth it, you know You go back and you reflect how quickly we've accelerated on on certain avenues And you look you can do the same thing that you can look back and say my goodness, man You know, I look at this market now and it seemed you know every day is down I've been getting kicked in the nuts since November. No doubt about it. I can't remember the last day I have to have up. I mean I have an update of four or five thousand bucks and I'm not even excited anymore you know, I Guess it's drawn me somewhat numb. I see you there Jason. I'll let you get dialed in there my friend I'm gonna bring Jay Mack on in here just shortly But just want to give kind of a thesis and a pulse anyway This video is gonna be Kings sarcasm nobody's better at The dry humor than me I find all all too often that words will come out of my mouth that are Pretty serious While I'm laughing my ass off in the back of my head to be honest with you What we're trying to drive to With helping people understand That it's it's all right It's all right when the market kicks up a little volatility The same market everybody was loving on last year is seemingly There worst enemy right now. I find that an interesting contrast and One that is repeated and revisited over and over and over and over and again in stock market investing And people seemingly want to redefine The exact same stock market that we've had for for many many decades Markets come and go in cycles You got to learn that And whether or not you want to scoff in the face of tried and true fundamentals with regard to diversification and dollar cost averaging well, then that's your own personal choice, but To footstomp those things for investors really opens the door for all investors certainly does and You know, it's it's one of those things that We'll continue to footstomp. I believe everybody out there can be an investor to some capacity and Open to blow down those those barriers for people and entry in the market if there's people out there that are interested in Seeking out the opportunity made possible through financial markets This is the place for you. We'll continue to footstomp the message as we evolve and grow And walk this path that we've carved for ourselves not necessarily To seek out the easy path But but to seek out those avenues that are less traveled man or robert ferrass to baby, right? All right That never hurts to try to plow your own as the name Implies The independent thought Is really what makes the community That much better Jason i'm going to bring him on in just a minute here. He's going to share an opportunity with us and I think it's really really special man from just a small corner really of youtube And I think making a huge difference It doesn't get any better than this and I don't want to steal jason's thunder because he's going to come on and share With the group something awful Impressive I was Super super stoked this week because a matter of fact it was a pretty darn tough week for me. It was pretty challenging You know youtube's been kind of a drag We we've had the subscriber bot clean out on youtube. So we've lost some subscribers to the bots, you know YouTube goes through and cleans out the garbage every now and then and it's like not everybody's real that sucks And I'll end the stock market Um, I certainly have some challenges going on at work all good too man. I'm looking to take on some Very admirable positions and and I'm humbled by the opportunity and quite frankly I'm always scared when I take a rank up. I'm I'm scared I know I always grow into the position man, but I think it just speaks to my You know my passion I guess for life and understanding that uh You know You live and you grow and you've never got it figured out Um, I I I I work around a lot of people who seemingly have it all figured out I'm not one of those. I I typically come into An opportunity a lot more diplomatic than that and a lot more humbled Uh in the opportunity that that we've got But um, yeah, it's it's been a real challenge and and it's been a challenge now for going on three and a half months from me Um, every everything in the portfolio right now is down I'll share with you guys the the drag on the portfolio and I don't know if you guys are are Suffering the the same. Uh, I looked at the year to date. I think we're off six and a half percent I believe in the Dow. I don't know what the s and p is down right now Uh, but it seems to be significantly painful more painful. I think now Uh, seemingly taking a a little bit more of a heavy stake into the fall of last year into some small cap and Of course a little bit more speculative Uh positions in the portfolio and to be honest with you guys, it just feels right I don't I just don't know how to codify it man. It just feels right My passive investments my value investing is not going anywhere. Um, it feeds my palette to You know to pursue some of those opportunities Some of these growth stocks are Sickly sickly oversold. Uh, I I'm I'm dumbfounded at what's going on It it seems like and I I bought jason will be happy with me. I bought some some um, some um, uh, OUST Um, which is lidar. I bought some of that this week because it's like I look at some of these names and they're trading at such discounts right now It's not even funny and and I tell you what man when this turns I actually think 2022 is going to be a positive. I really do. I I just don't see it is shaping up any other way Um, you know, the geopolitical risk right now doesn't help. It certainly doesn't help But when have we ever had a perfect world to invest in? When have we ever had? An environment where we don't have a pandemic to deal with where we don't have inflation to deal with I find it funny. Everybody's selling out of their stock right now to to to put all their assets stock appreciating asset Uh into the very vehicle that they're scared of A vehicle of cash losing value over time that makes no sense to me But yeah, go figure. I don't know a hell of a lot doesn't make sense to me But uh, just want to welcome the group. I gave it a few minutes to let let some folks in here I'm going to bring jason on with jay mack investing here Uh to share uh some of his insights as well make some announcements to the group here So you guys are going to want to stay tuned here Because this is big man. I I was really really proud of this. It was a hell of a development For the community and you guys are going to want to stick around and partake in this because you guys are all part of it As well, so stand by just a second. We'll bring jason on It's open door policy here on the independent investor channel got my brother from another mother j mack investing jason What's going on man? Unmute your mic. We want to hear what you have to say. Sorry about that. Good evening Uh, hello to you and your community. Happy friday. Cheers to everyone Appreciate it. I had a couple drinks earlier on so i'm i'm done having my libation.  So it's a little a little bit different tonight Well-earned partner well-earned What what's shaking man that lots of developments here coming up And um, you know, I I was super stoked for you man Like I said, I really wanted to put some thought into what we had talked about behind the scenes But uh, you know, would you like to share with what what you got going on with the group? Because it's super exciting man. You should be very proud of yourself right uh, yeah, let's stick with um the Original announcement my video because that what we were sharing in private. I'm not I'm away. I'm away a little bit on that announcement but but it'll I'll tie I'll tie into that a little bit and and kind of uh, um, you know Lead everyone on to what I'm talking about with that.  He didn't get his pr team to reach out to me. He didn't get you know, he didn't get you know His somebody, you know, uh, one of his managers to send me an email. He sent one directly, you know what I mean? That's right and um And he's done that a couple times on a couple different occasions. He um, the other the other tortoise acquisition Corp two that when I did that ceo interview thomas reached out in lieu of that ceo to ask if I would interview that you said I mean so He's just so he's such a great guy and and like he does everything like from a um, you know He knows how he knows how people Operate right and he knows how to treat people right so I imagine the culture and highly honest pretty pretty amazing And so I'm going to be able to go see that, you know in person live and in person And as I said in my video I've already got like probably it's more probably one of my most commented videos ever Already and doesn't have that many views just lots of comments lots of people everyone has Interest into highly on some more insights into into the inside of it, right? Yeah, for sure.  I mean i'm I'm hoping you get to kind of you know root around a little bit and talk to multiple people I mean, that's the whole point to the venue. Is that right? Exactly. Yep. Yeah for sure. Yeah, and um, like I like to talk to the guy that drives the truck around, you know, I like You know, I mean he's a trucker so You know, I like to talk to a few of the people I like to talk to the uh You know some of like you said the engineers and the like pr team any of those people that could um, you know Maybe maybe we can do a sit down It's still like the the actual format of what we're gonna do there is still I think we're gonna meet one one time before we go and do like a zoom call or something But um, yeah, but anyway, but uh, but what I wanted to come on your channel here is because I mean You you're one of the have become one of the biggest advocates and have grown into one of the bigger voices of highly on so um, no two things that I wanted to Um Say and ask of you and your community me and you've already talked about this, but Um, I wanted one I wanted to give you the opportunity to give one question to thomas and that would that'll be directly from you So and I'm gonna oppose it when I do the interview that this is from ryan independent So you can go hard as you want So this will be your question right and then and then one from your community So every everyone here, um, you know come up with something then and then ryan will choose it So it'll be one uh question from the independent investor community and one directly from ryan that I want to take to the interview with me Um, so that's really what kind of what uh, I wanted to talk about here tonight with you in your audience Fantastic, so what I'm gonna do is I'm leaving my email into the group. I do not want to send the thread Tonight, so there it is. I dropped it in there for you guys that know That's my direct line. Okay. It's not a huge secret So it's at the bottom of the thread right there ryan dot independent investor at gmail And I just want a foot stomp. I watched jason's video and I would encourage you to do so as well Um, we're we're gonna keep it above the board If you're gonna throw some garbage together, then that's what you're gonna get back. It's just that simple, okay My questions theme is gonna be around oam hub, okay That that really I think is the key from going to to to low volume to high volume scale up So I just want to invite any insight That thomas may have so that's going to be my topic and I'm going to coin the that topic because I think without it. I I think it's going to be problematic. It's going to extend that timeline to mass scale up and I've already done my Not crm but I tell you what I've done a lot of back and forth statistics on what I think or break even for highly on When they break into that mass scale Not just to keep the lights on guys But to actually kind of make a dent and and it's really kind of It's it's very doable That that's the irony is on the last video that I did where I really tried to break down the numbers The or the video before last when I was talking about Sales I think a lot of people looked at that and they were like well, yeah, of course they need sales That wasn't the point to that video the point was to earmark What highly on looked at on what they identified as a catalyst to go from low scale to to to that to that scale up Now they have one oam And so my question is going to be framed around whatever progress they've got at any at all Because the last time thomas mentioned it was on the q2 call when he talked about the oam hubs And there's a lot of work there to be done So if you're going to submit a question to me submit it directly to my email Be above board think about uh jason framed it as kind of like look man make it kind of like an essay If you're writing a college paper, all right Frame it good think about it think of a theme And we want to make sure that we're represented in the community as as as above board as we can I don't I don't foresee a lot of reciprocation on my question I don't because there may be some stuff there that is unshareable And I do I do think that thomas is very very careful. He's been scrutinized About you know, how repetitive he is and he repeats the same thing. Look the guy's super smart And and 90 of what he probably wants to say he cannot say it's just that simple So that's where some of the repetitive nature But I still have to ask the question because I think that is the looming question from my perspective So don't ask that that's the only reason I mentioned that into the group. Did you have something to add jay?  I think I've only had to remove one comment So I think that has been that was because I drove it in in the video And um, you know and people will really respond, you know when when you know, they there's this is And I was telling my wife about it and I was telling you as well. We talked on the phone this week You know, this I'm a small youtuber. We're small youtubers in the big scheme of things, you know So I'm I'm this isn't just about me. I'm kind of taking it as um, I'm taking it as the community the Larger smaller community.  I was like We what we are is we're not big media. We're new media. We're the new media, right? So, um That's what that's what youtubers are and that's what content creators are. So, um So it's opportunity for the community. It's opportunity. I don't just look at it. This is opportunity for me That's why I that's why I really did want people to Give in and people someone, you know, there's always knuckleheads, right? Uh, you know, someone was like, you know, you're just like I wanted to just get the interview questions No, I wanted I want the community involved in it, you know, and and I want people's voices to be heard because you know I'll ask if I'm what I'm gonna do here's kind of what I've planned off the one Taking those couple questions from you you guys in your community And then I'm gonna take three to three to five of mine and whatever like the main thread That I can pick out from the comments Like there's a there's an underlying theme that I'm seeing, you know, everyone the one everyone wants to know like, uh Uh, you know about the shares. I'm gonna ask them about the shares, you know, we're selling shares I'm gonna I want to try to get specifics on it. No, I mean, I just want to know Are they scheduled are they scheduled because it's a publicly traded company It's public now. So but and I'm gonna I'm gonna do it very tactfully though So it won't be it won't be like got you any question. It'll be you know, listen. Just people just uh I had somebody on twitter today asking for a refund, you know And it's like listen and he got you got questions like this right here. It's like the sentiment Here's something you you really need to understand.  All right um Investing is not like anything else that you do in life Okay, it's not how you it's not the same as like how you make love to your spouse Okay, it's not the same as how you parent It's not the same as how you you know, enjoy yourself and have libation Go to the gym and hit the gym, right? We're passionate people. We're social investing doesn't have anything to do with that Okay And and people for some reason think that investing is something that they can frame in a box And make it something that makes sense It doesn't make sense to the human mind. Okay Now I I will say this about the retail community with this stock in particular because in respect to the question I'm sure it's coming from a genuine place There's probably a lot more angst Around this retail community with highly on just because the stock has been so dismal I mean, let's just tell it how it is the stock has been dismal but Does it speak to um investing as a whole or does it speak to to the game that you're asking to play? Highly on is a pre-revenue company Okay Now if you get involved with the pre-revenue company The the range of where it will be accepted in the eyes of the stock market Will be a lot more wide ranging than a company that has Metrics that can be drawn upon that are quantifiable. Okay Now right now highly on is being quantified on the low end of its spectrum Okay, it's resting up against its cash position right now at about 650 or so million dollars With a relatively light cash burn. Okay, right now the stock price evaluation is resting up against that It's completely normal to expect that that happens on the low end Now the question is how fast can it accelerate? How fast can something in way of news or especially a catalyst and a catalyst can come from any direction? Change that In in in a positive direction and I think unfortunately for a lot of people this sentiment is not just specific to this individual Shack, I I get where you're coming from. I share in a little bit of this But I I keep it in perspective Okay, and you have to understand that there hasn't been a whole lot of positive in that Looking at the stock and seeing that it's up, you know, 20 or 30 or 40 percent over the last month or so If you look at the six you look at the year to date, you know, you look at a year out It's pretty dismal And I think when you compound what's going on right now with what I feel is a pretty atrocious stock market This is pretty bad and it's isolated specifically to the small caps Now large caps are starting everything's rolling off right now I mean everything and nothing is immune even good companies good earnings come through and they they're still rolling off So, you know, I I'd like to see this kind of shy away from this the stock price especially Um, I'd love and you know this Jason. I know you can ask any question tactfully Um, the share sales don't really bother me. Uh me personally, they just don't bother me Those were pre-arranged sales The man's got what 33 million 34 million shares of the of the company You know, if you watch some of the older videos of thomas, you know, he talks about those late nights You know of inventing this company from the ground floor and it's went through a lot of different shifts and changes What if that was you that that's kind of like the american dream, you know If we could have had the foresight to to take our dream to to what is highly on holdings To reality. Okay in what we're seeing now We're just at the beginning stages. All right. We're not at the end stage. We're at the beginning stages And I don't know where we're going to be in six months. I don't know I don't know where we're going to be in a year or three years or five years But place your bets One of two things are going to happen and one of two things are going to happen and are inevitable To happen in stock market investing. It's going to go down or it's going to go up Place your bets as you see fit. You know what I mean? And I won't influence you on either side of the case I'm very very transparent with where my position lies And it's only aimed at helping people and educating people. You said I was an advocate of the company itself I like to look at it more of an education piece because I think education is lacking on the r and g side Jason I do I think that awareness needs to be put out there a lot more It's the driving force behind my message with highland Right on So what's new man I thought you'd have all kinds of stories man.  It is true This is like the wind down time where my mind is starting to settle I've been busy.  I left at about Four to go set up to do your dealer set up at a show for tomorrow. I got back at about seven Um, so yeah, man Life is busy. Life is good. Life is full And uh, but so but as I said in my video what what what I kind of want this to hope I'm hoping that what this does is kicks off Um, I got a few angles. I'm taking this thing Because you know, we're small channels, but um, I really do think, you know There that it's time for me personally in my channel to do some some changing it up some And in doing this a vlog style in person interview I'm hoping it's going to be a springboard where I can do these at other some of these other companies Coming up and that's something you and I were talking about there's another there's some other opportunities Some other events where lots of companies going to be there all together gathered at one place And that's what I'm hoping I don't want I don't want I'm just going to share that little a bit Because I want to firm some things up and get some confirmation on some stuff But all I gotta say is I'm hoping if this all goes well that that's And I'm not going to be doing this weekly.  Holly and I's not paying for anything. They're not paying me So that there's the answer to that if that's running around in your mind or they're paying me to go do this Nope, I'm paying for the I'm paying for the flight. I'm paying for a hotel. I'm paying for a rental car I'm paying for my meals. I'm paying for everything. They're not paying me I'm hoping I get some swag and maybe and maybe I can get some Excess of it and I can bring that back and I'll do a giveaway. I'll give send you a shirt and a hat You know, um, but that's probably all I'll get is maybe a meal while I'm there Maybe some lunch or something and then maybe some swag. They're not paying me a dime But you know, that's why we do these other promotional content videos Is you know, I'm gonna and I'm gonna go I'm gonna go probably harder I'm gonna try to do that harder this year to do to take some of these trips So when you see if the little thing pops up and it says that this video is promoted It's not a company that I necessarily invested in it is a promotional content piece So if you if you can watch our channels channels and separate those and understand that we I'll tell you what I probably make about On average about two to two hundred fifty dollars a month on youtube on ads Amen, that's all I make. Can you can you live? Can any of you in the calm in the comment section? Can you live on that? Damn, would you be good for you, man? Would you be investing all this time into content curation? If if you could if that's what you were making if you're making two hundred fifty dollars It's like third world money, you know what I mean? So that's why we do this other type of stuff looking for opportunities to make get sponsored content And maybe some real sponsors like whereas we're talking about a product. Otherwise, there's companies out here that are small Penny stocks that are looking to promote themselves Well, you know and then the pay is good. So anyway, I don't want to get in the weeds of any of that But that's what I'm telling you telling you all but I will say I've never been paid by any of these other any spack I've ever covered I've never been paid by any CEO of any of those companies And any of the any of these CEO interviews I've did Of spacks never been paid a dime by any of those. They're all been voluntary. I reached out to them I want to get to know them. I want to get the companies. I want to have the community involved So those are some of the things going on. I knew that to be the truth Um, I'm not really you could kind of tell if your good judge is sitting across from the message Me personally, I wouldn't have cared one way or the other How you make that money? I don't even care I'll double down on your ad revenue piece unless I'm willing to sell out to the algorithm for a year straight Take my shirt off and dance around like an ape and scream and yell at people Which I just won't do I just won't do I'm not saying it's right or wrong. I just won't do it man. I'm sorry I won't do it. Uh, I could I could make this channel blow up and I choose not to I choose to do this project and I've told jason this over the last few years Of doing youtube, but first of all, I don't have the time I don't have the bandwidth. Uh, I you know when you start to get really I don't know how folks do it to be honest with you without getting fried But I do enjoy doing the projects that I do right. I I love the live stream I love it. I love the ability to bring people together. I love providing just a small venue anyway Uh, I I do agree that it's a small channel But I I've always been provided this example, you know, if you if you could have 250 people in a room together and you were the keynote speaker, you know And I'm not saying that that we have 30 000 people in our in our auditorium I'm not saying that but I'll bet there's a few thousand people that are damn Devoted because they sit across from a message and they're like I don't know it seems like to me at least this is what I see You know of jason with j mac investing and a few other channels that I do visit On time to time to get my entertainment and education out of You know family man sincere Uh, can he make a mistake? Yeah, you know seemingly some of these youtubers man They've got all the answers here. It is and I'm here to tell you man That just doesn't exist. So uh, the sincerity goes a long way with me But I like the way you do your vlog styles at the card shows man You're really good at it Every now and then your daughter will pop in there every now and then and say hi, you know Yeah, that's pretty cool, man. You're you're pretty darn good at that And um, I think that that'll be a lot of fun to watch Well, I think that's that's I think that's given me the courage to kind of think about doing these things because I'm not not doing those.  It isn't just a clip. You see it's there's a lot of behind-the-scenes stuff It's like, you know a deal goes down and I'm like, you know, I have to talk to him I have to say now listen, I got a youtube channel Do you mind if we do if we put this in the in video and so there's there's a set up to even on the on the blog side, right because um You ran into that problem. I remember that I had to take one video. I had to take a video down because somebody it was a Through a show promoter the guy started whining to the show promoter And the and then the promoter's confronting me when I had a show and I was like, look man He isn't contacting me and then he started trying to like use scare tactics as a listen and here's here's something It's pretty funny. He she tried to use he said, um, you know, he the guy's a multimillionaire and he's like, um He's he's talking about getting his lawyers and stuff. I said I said, hey, man I said, how do you know I'm not a multimillionaire and and I have and then I've got better lawyers I said, you know, number one and number two Um, you don't have any disclosures at your at your at your events right here And then he put up he put up all these uh signs at the next show, right?  I'm gonna pop pop back and let you know And so anyway because he's trying to scare me with some lawyer stuff. I was like This you know, I mean come on man There's all these other and the thing was at this promoter's particular shows Some of the bigger channels have came and done videos there and they've like 20 30 000 views And you know, so there was there was already that in place at his show So I was like this guy is you know trying to scare me. You can scare me I think I think something here Kristen's got a kind of a just a comment And and you know, we are we are followers. I guess I I consider myself more of a follower of the company And the vision right, you know, it's nice. It provides credibility When a youtuber has An actual position in the company conviction enough to put their own dollars to work in the company I think in this particular instance, it's important to understand that This retail community is pretty big from a percentage of ownership And I was just telling jason this week if you've noticed the volume is just anemic There is no volume on the company right now People don't know what to do if you don't know the company, you're not buying it If you own the company, you're not selling it Institutions are hello. They're acquiring the company right now some trimming going on with institutions But they're not liquidating their positions. They're trimming and that's very They increased by quite a bit a really really big amount They sure did and you know, I I think it speaks to a a grander type of perspective when You know jason goes down there and he spoke to this a little bit and that that's what resonates with me He's not really just representing his personal message or his personal position He's representing a community that I mean there's there's a lot of us man like rp music does a good job and you know the wall street engineer I mean those cats are are crazy. You know, they're they're good man You know, they've got they've got their own message and their own conviction Little different makeup of positions certainly amongst to those groups, but I think to each his own with their stock disposition I talked to a lot of people who look at the highly home story With the company and they're fascinated. The vision is incredible And that that would have been one of my other questions is what I see jason I've got one of my guys in my group who's Covering the jobs specifically And what has transpired over the last three weeks has been remarkable job postings job filling And at an aggressive pace So what what my other question was going to be as I was thinking about this even before you were provided the opportunity Because I was thinking about codifying some questions for the call if I'm able to get through Was you know, you said that thomas is a really honest guy Says what he means all that stuff. I mean you can kind of tell At 28 29 years old as the CEO of a company at you know, I I don't know if most people Could just step into that role and just polish it off and they're good to go you know, but But you know, it's it's it's one of those things to where you look at it You see how aggressively he's building out the team with hiring and the conviction And the the focus on the vision In light of what's going on in the stock market You see the disconnect there. So I think what of interest to me is what drives his bullish thesis So strongly what is he hearing in feedback from industry? What are they providing him as validation? What of the what are the customers of the fleets? Providing in way of what could be waiting on the horizon to define that bullish thesis going forward When in the eyes of the stock market, this company is priced at liquidation right now I mean, it's given a hundred that hundred million dollar premium, but it's pretty close to liquidation Honestly, it's embarrassing So the disconnect between the two is very very real and that would be one of my interesting You know insights to hear from the top guy Because he may be a little bit more forthcoming on an interview Then what he would be normally on maybe a larger syndicate? Yahoo chatter, you know a cmbc, of course He's going to really be close to the best on those larger larger venues But maybe a smaller venue. He's able to give you like A little bit more granular insight on what he's hearing as far as consensus You know because I see him going at it hard And it's like is he really just putting on a dress to go to the party and not have anybody there? You know from that perspective like what is he seeing? You know, right? So so here's another here's another goal that I'd like to accomplish while there I don't know if it'll happen, but I want I want to have a drink with him afterwards for in the evening hours So I'm gonna pull them for and I'm gonna tell him, you know I don't want to talk about anything. I don't want to talk about any highly on or anything And nothing you come just get that. No, let's go.  Now. I know you're in north carolina. So there's a high bar, right? Right, but it's different. It's really what yeah, because you know, you're you're barbecue there is a beef and ours is pork, right? It's totally different world totally different world, so But you know, I don't like I said, I'm not counting or banking on that But I am gonna propose it and hope and maybe see if he'll take me up on that Because I'll be I'll be really cool and and I might just like, you know See if we could get like an instagram pick out getting a beer something like that, you know It seems like a very down to earth Down to earth guy You know what I'm interested jason is to actually see this guy's be given the the keys to this company Uh with some financial Yeah, I I think that's going to be that was that was rebecca. No one's i'm not nc barbecues. Anyway Nice. Sorry. No, no, no, I think I think it'll be interesting because Highly on has been turned out to financial markets to piranhas Ever since it's gone public It's well see here's really tough uh, and and here's my um Counter to that is that please it really is like uh like austere I mean, they just have blowout earnings and they and and it was that that was a sort of um, I think I was gonna Talk about it in a video that you could see that that this one earnings has changed the The course of the stock price of austere austere was it had got down almost to three dollars It's it's now it's it was up this positive for three or four days since earnings And even on a big big big red two and a half percent nasdaq's down today It was still still made it up green. So it's it's now its stock price has finally changed But it was on the same path as all the other ones even though the revenue projections that that company has uh I mean, I'm telling you I listen into the I'm I'm as in tune with that company as I am with highly on and and I'm telling you They are going to be the leader in lidar for real like that. That's not even a I don't even think it's it's not even a stretch saying that They're creating a new digital flash uh lidar, uh, which Check this out. So they're their revenue projections, which they up their um They up their guidance for the year of this year And and it was on based on just current customers not adding in not one new customer and not Not adding in a new product lineup that they're In that's in development. That's that is through a startup that they acquired Which is just is going to target the automotive industry and So companies can begin signing up for that and no and this that's what all the other Lighter companies do is all the automotive ones takes like two to three years to get revenue on your books That's why none of the others that got revenue right yet other than velodyne, but ouster is kicking butt and taking names and they have like 600 customers shipping um Sensors out regularly to and it's man that that to me So actually that is my biggest position in my portfolio Then highly on the next behind it and then a lot of us then some other safer stocks, you know When we talk a lot about highly on in the other but I still you know, I actually started in the position and like facebook You know, there's other stocks, you know in the portfolio said like though, you know, there's this other channel Who will remain nameless who um, I think you're a fan of them, but I'm not um You know, he made a video about someone putting their whole Couple years worth of salary in the highly on why would you do that? Why would you do that? Well, why would you put that into one stock? I don't know. You know all all of your money I don't know. I bought six shares of a Uh, uh, oh usd today six No I bought a thousand Oh, yeah, I'm excited about that man. That's awesome. Um I'm telling you that's like a to me. That's gonna be like a Uh, I think it could wind up being like an not like an intel, you know That that market that that segment it is.  It's gonna be smaller than that But it like, you know, I think the main players in light are are gonna be like five to ten billion dollar companies, right? So we're not talking about mega cap companies, but you think about it So right now the market cap's about 500 million So if it gets to 10 billion 10 billion market cap, whatever you do the math on how much how many times x that is, you know I mean So, uh, so charam You know, you throw that out there. You might get the wrath of jason So i'm gonna defer to him first on this one. Okay, and then i'll give you my twist on it jason Do you mind just commenting on what you think on this comment, please? What do you think about this is Listen, I think well the problem the problem lies here with publicly traded stock investors is that They've never invested into a startup like a private company private companies have things like this occur Um, you all you basically what you do is you put your money into it and you forget about it in companies like the start-ups Highland is a startup But they're a public startup the spack. Well the spack opportunity has provided is for people like you Charam i'm probably Butchering your name But for you and for me it's provided so spack has up provided opportunities for companies to get well capitalized Well capitalized at one you know at one fell swoop without all of the red tape of an ipo So now what what what that two things that happen with that? It does allow some bad actors to come through and it does allow some that don't actually have a real product plan or Uh, or probably the wherewithal to make it to the end So for me highly on has the product lineup. They already have a working product which they they're using that to Um, the they worked out the kinks some of the kinks of learning about through their hybrid product That's being installed and they're going to announce revenue on that this quarter And they're using so they so in other words, yes No, this company's not early it is it but it is an early opportunity for investors to learn how to invest in A basically a startup in a publicly traded company That's my take on on it Let me rephrase the question to you jason Do you think investors who have invested in this company over the last 20 months have done so early? You know what I mean have investors invested in the company early And I I think there's a rhetorical answer to that that brings me back to the Okay, we've burned up 20 months in public markets and here we sit at four dollars You know And and just all that opportunity that you just spoke about Being made possible to retail investors guys. I let me let me f and level with you here. Okay That there's nothing That bothers me more than thinking that potentially my recommendation to stockholders out there has has resulted in a red In your portfolio. Okay. I get it I'm not happy about it, right? I can deal with it me. No doubt about it. I'm fine. Trust me been around the block a few times with this little girl, but There's people out there with two or three hundred shares that are just They seemingly like the world is gonna And There there is a little bit of tough love here that I think is is warranted And keep in mind here the traditional IPO process would have put a company like highly on under such scrutiny that it would have been only available From an angel investor You know private placement type of an offering and we wouldn't have had the opportunity now I come back to my original question Did investors invest in it too early? Okay. Now if you're watching this now The past is the past The stock is at four dollars and I pose my very simple summary It's either going to go up and or it's going to go down and I just think In a few years, we're going to have our answer. We really will and I'm not going to tell you what that's going to be I'm just going to say I'm not going anywhere. I'll be here two years from now. Jason will be here and I'll allow the cards to fall where they will with the with the hands that I've been dealt right now It's just that simple and it's an easy decision for me. It's not that hard. Make your decision So someone early in the chat. Well, I said something blah blah blah. They said Earnings the share will be two dollars. Blah blah those kind of comments happen all the time and here's the here's the The crazy thing about that is I invite I invite um I invite and I'm not afraid of the share price dropping, right? So Could you imagine being up about 200 a hundred share blocks at two dollars? that still I'm saying like Here's the here's the thing.  So by that so and I don't you know, I mean they do They do and it's and it's not insiders in the company. It's always, you know, big hedge funds and they are they somehow they always know They're buying right now. They are buying right now Well, I'm talking about when it when it when there will be a chance that it runs, you know Because where it gets into a market it'll be too late jason. That's what I'm saying And that's what I'm saying Here's the thing. Here's the thing with this type of thing. I need to understand a little bit more surrounding the context of projecting stock in this manner because Um, I'm old school. I've been doing this a long long time people are like, yeah, shut up, Ryan What does that mean? Well, well, it means that I've got a lot of experience To understand that this is not possible Okay, now you look at the charts and you say well If I was going to be a guessing man, which this is no more than a guess, Ryan And I don't mean to single you out. I don't but In all fairness you made the comment um This type of it's going to this or it's going to that The stock is off close to 90% peak to trough here as we sit now projecting this to you. So it's kind of like Kick a carcass while there's maggots crawling out of the carcass right now And that somehow makes you what I need to understand a little bit more context about what type of Analysis you have over this. Is it because you think that they're not going to report revenue? My sales video that I put out on highly on they already have at the low end 35 sales that was march of last year Not coming into march of march of last year 35 units sold and on the books now for those of you guys who reviewed the Balance sheet the accounts receivable had a few hundred thousand bucks in there already. Okay Now the projection for the 2021 year close was 300 units So the question is you start at 35 and I don't know what's transpired Every now and then we'll get a trickle of new companies that come out of the woodworks that highly on is Their customer right highly on has them as their customer. So the question becomes What is it going to be from 35 to let's say half of the units 150? What is there a possibility that they meet the 300? What if they beat the 300 units? I said on that sales video if they came out and sold 750 hybrid EX units it would still be immaterial It would still be immaterial now the stock would fly There's no doubt about that because there's a lot more inherently That would would tell the marketplace to say look this is a viable product It has a place in the marketplace, etc. etc stocks at eight nine dollars the next day It's just that simple. That's how it works And I'm doing the exact same thing you're doing But I've been around a long enough time to say This type of dialogue honestly. I see a lot of this in the yahoo thread. That's why I'm not there ever anymore Because there's about four or five people that go in there like to listen to themselves talk And this is really a lot of the conversation. Well, it's it's going to two It's at four now It must be going to three and then it must be going to two and ultimately the company's going to go out of business Okay, I would love for you to make that pitch not Against me on the independent investor channel, but certainly you're welcome to send your thoughts to morgan stanley and see how they feel about it certainly Very good. Good stuff Yeah, I just you know This is like this is the part of the time where and he could be right Ryan could be right it could go to two but I don't That's the thing is like people who come out and they make definitive comments like that um when Schools of thought in the market would suggest that that's just not possible You know, you're looking at a slide of a stock chart that has been nothing but descending over the last 18 to 20 months in the market, right? So it's easy to look at that and say well if I was going to be a betting man It must continue and that's just not fair because at any time at any time The most miniscule of stock position can turn into something huge That's the power of the stock market.  Why did they take the position in the first place? Number two? How could this position transpire over time? That's the key I mean, are you really just trying to be right if it goes to two like I'll give you a pat on the back and say You're you're badass. You are right on a statement that you made willy nilly on a live stream, you know Um But but you do have to entertain the prospects of potentially being wrong as well It's that simple and the the more the more experience you have in the stock market, man The more you actually throw out the potential That you could be wrong That's that's that that's the truth of it. I know nobody's got this thing licked nobody I agree with what uh, Kyle just said a lot of people especially a lot of these twitter finned twitter guys They need to turn off their trading account and like pull away from the stock market for he said a year But just at least a month and just stop for a little bit, you know, like And and this is people, you know Like people that do predictions like you talk about, you know, I mean you just you just gotta just chill sometimes and just you know So What you got right? I think I think there's a level of fitness That needs to be had in the stock market is was one thing that really kind of it's always impressed me about you jason is that You haven't invested for a long long time and and I don't mean to say that to be rude I think you would agree with me that that's the truth What I would what I would double down on that comment with is you seemingly have a tolerance that escapes a lot of people That have been doing this a lot a long time What what in the freak is going on Yeah, there's a certain level of tolerance in this game that is necessary to succeed It's that simple. Yeah, exactly that and and making like and And not just because we're we we have dug in because we've made videos on this company I think the I think an investor in single stocks should also be doing that too, you know Digging in digging in deep into a company as well so that when it does go down you have the conviction to say You know What what this company is and what it represents? The share price doesn't actually represent what the company is when you can when you can When you can see that connection Then you can say, you know what so that means I should I can buy more because at this these levels This is you know, like you talk about there's value here at this share price And and you know, you could say that there's a lot actually a lot of companies right now You know that are moving into that place grow companies that are moving into that place, you know You know, even like Roku Roku is down from 450 to 110 now They're back down to 110 dollars zoom is finally coming into a lot. I'm not probably gonna buy zoom But I'm thinking about I'm thinking about Roku because Roku's hardware Monopoly pretty much is like it's just about unstoppable You know and and now it's finally back in a normal range It ran to that on speculation a couple years ago when earnings weren't matching that kind of growth level Well now it's it's it's got revenue of I think multiple like A billion plus, you know in a quarter You know what I mean and like that's what I'm saying and now the stock price starts to make sense Right, but when you're if you're buying it at 450, no But so, you know, that's my thing, you know It just it just you just gotta really know the companies that you're investing in If you're gonna play the single stock game.  It's just that simple It doesn't take any due diligence to buy the s and p 500 zero 100 percent of people out there could read enough books To justify the passive benefits of investing in the s and p 500 requires zero due diligence Zero none. It only takes the fortitude to start and buy. That's it Okay, if you're gonna venture off into single stock investing and you're gonna exclusively play in that arena Okay You're playing somewhat of an angel's game and that's why I talk about the fitness that's important to be in place My portfolio set adjacent over the last couple of years. I haven't done a whole lot with the portfolio It's set. I have it the way that I want I'm fine tuning at this particular juncture and a lot of people look at it and say well, you know You're highly invested and highly on it. It's it's a heavy investment It goes beyond my three to four percent rule. I'm at nine percent right now So it's it's significantly above that rule But I have enormous positions in other crafts right that I've built up over time. Those haven't changed at all Those are there. I will not touch those I deploy a very very astute discipline to passive investing and so when you want to talk about You know Fitness to enter into or justify a position like a highly on You look at that from that lens and you're like that makes a little more sense Ryan's not just putting his whole wad on on a speculative company or few This is the tip of the iceberg for me guys I've worked for decades to get to this point and I'm not saying you can't buy 100 shares of highly on I'm not saying that What I'm saying is don't buy that 100 share of highly on Exclusively and then come a bitch and complain to me because you're down 30 or 40 dollars in the position Okay, you should have never been in the position in the first place because your vision for that Holding was that it was going to make you hundreds of thousands of dollars Quickly and overnight and that's just not the game that you play especially in this speculative game that we've got going on now And it can be very powerful. The tides will change and they change quickly. I've seen this many many times before If you like listen to rick schnellman You you want to talk about it?  I think Yeah 56 that's not small potatoes there boys ladies and gentlemen And he's a retail investor just like a lot of others. I believe that there is A couple million dollar position. I believe a couple. It's a huge position in the discord as well So there's a few enormous positions These positions out there guys you're you're not going to hear And that's the funny thing is i'm open to scrutiny because I subject myself to that scrutiny But there is going to be a lot of people that make a ton of money and you'll never hear from them You will never ever hear from them because they know One thing that is pure and simple about the stock market Everybody has the same equal Access to to the markets. It's how you deploy that separates the the the players from the non-players. It's that simple Exactly Exactly All right, brother. I'm gonna let you close it out.  Thanks for coming on. Thank you so much, man. Check out jason's channel Please email your me or question jason's going down to highlander represent Please send your comments to me and I will forward those along to jason. Thank you so much for coming on my brother Take it easy. All right. Please have a great have a great weekend, brother. Thanks you too Yeah, so when we Codify the message here and foot stomp what we're doing it. It definitely makes sense I had a whole laundry list of Of interesting things I was going to go through. I was going to drop a bomb of sarcasm on you guys Tonight and I had the engine started but I do want to thank jason for coming on and sharing that opportunity I've said many many times on the channel. I celebrate success I celebrate your success. I I celebrate the community's success You know for me a big deal of this community is the network piece Yeah, yeah, it's the ability to connect with people on the fly that quick Um and people that I would have never had the chance to meet in passing at walmart You know, you can come in and check out the message for a few times and I won't even know you're there Um, but the more you frequent the channel you'll understand kind of where my motives lie And where I see value in people and what they bring to the table I only bring a singular perspective Let me let me give you a truth bomb and I don't have all the answers And I got news for you neither do you But uh, if there's one thing that I've learned in this life, man collectively We probably stand the best chance of of of creating something special and It it will be one of those special creations of a community like this that will be impossible to create as individuals And I want to fundstomp that message that These opportunities are just that We we highlight those opportunities To yes, like I said be scrutinized, of course Have the comments and I do want to thank the commenters even though some of you guys may Be of be perceived that you were provided some tough love No problem. No problem.  Or are you interested in in being right when it counts? Mm-hmm Stock market investing allows you the opportunity to hold the cards Until you want to play them and it allows you to play that hand When you've got the hand to be played It's just that simple. It's a it's an awesome thing to be involved with It is the singular greatest contributor to my wealth And we will continue to foot stump the message for all individuals That make the way into the independent investor channel community Guys appreciate you guys staying with me for the totality I didn't get to a lot of comments tonight. I do apologize No problem We foot stump this message every friday and I would love to cordially invite you guys back It it does not go round without your guys's involvement And I I'm I'm super humbled to facilitate the message Provide that platform at least from a singular basis on the independent investor channel to allow all investors beginning and astute alike To come down share ideas and provide those opportunities in the market and You know really really foot stump those and help define them for those investors out there just looking for a path to walk For their own prosperity Looking to empower one investor at a time in this journey guys Thank you so much for tuning in. I appreciate it. Have a great rest of the weekend Happy president's day to all of you guys and we'll catch you next friday on the independent investor channel live stream Fastest 60 minutes on youtube. Take it easy guys be well You