Toronto Tech Week.
Caught Minister @EvanLSolomon on the sideline.
For a year I've said it here:
A G7 country shouldn't have to rent its own compute.
Canada's finally moving.
Rimouski sold out. Vancouver next.
Real GPUs. Real money. Canadian soil.
Early. But real.
Good to show up for the people building it.
San Francisco peaked before ChatGPT.
Most people think the AI boom made the Valley.
The data says it ended it.
Here's what changed - and why Microsoft's 70-rule three weeks ago is the proof, not the cause:
OpenAI raised at $852B.
Secondary market: $880B.
A 3% premium.
Anthropic raised at $380B.
Secondary market: $1T.
A 165% premium.
Same market. Same buyers.
The market is pricing AI capex as a liability now.
The bigger you are, the more they're discounting you.
Blackstone manages $1.3 trillion and 250+ companies.
Today they co-founded a $1.5B venture with Anthropic.
To deploy Claude across the portfolio.
The portfolio companies didn't get a vote.
Their owner picked their AI.
Anthropic's Mythos is alarming Powell and Bessent.
They just summoned top CEOs to Washington.
Mythos can break into your phone, laptop, and bank.
It wasn't told to. It just found ways on its own.
A 27-year-old security flaw. Fixed in 10 minutes.
Another survived 5 million security checks intact.
Trump spent a year trying to fire Powell.
Today his Treasury Secretary called him for help.
This is the biggest AI story since ChatGPT.
We are not ready.
UPDATE: Open-sourced it.
Ghost Narrator - self-hosted AI narration.
LLM rewrites your articles into scripts, voice model reads them. Runs on a Mac.
No API keys. No monthly bill. MIT license.
https://t.co/xOUzbaJp2c
Everyone has access to the same AI now.
Same answers. Same analysis. Same execution.
The gap isn't who has the best tools.
It's who has the best thinking underneath.
Mental models can't be prompted.
They're earned.
- Years of reading what nobody else read.
- Seeing what nobody else saw.
- Sitting with ideas until they become how you think.
Most people will hand that process to AI.
They'll get faster answers and weaker judgment.
The last edge that can't be automated - isn't what you know.
It's how you see.
4,000 people woke up employed this morning.
Jack Dorsey fired them one by one throughout today.
By market close, he was $2 billion richer.
Nobody called it theft. They called it innovation.
This is 2026.
I used to brag about my 'optimized' SaaS stack.
$2,400/month. 'Essential tools'.
Then I did the 30-year math.
$890,546.
3 Lamborghinis.
- For software I'll never own.
- That'll be obsolete in 2 years.
- While I preach 'forever hold'.
Nobody does this math.
Built a free calculator so you can 👇
.@SimpleDirectHQ's landing page: 30 minutes.
Claude Opus 4.5 for structure.
Design team for brand polish.
Saved $5K on contractor wireframes.
This is AI-first ops.
I run multiple businesses from Toronto with 5 people.
We compete with 50-person teams that raised millions.
No VC. No SF office. No fancy headquarters.
Here's the framework that makes it possible:
Capital, Code, Audience (The 3Cs)
And why most founders get all three wrong 👇
A VC posted: ‘You sold for $100M, what do you buy?’
500+ founders commented about Lambos.
Not one asked: ‘How much do I actually get?’
Here's what actually happens:
Mike Farley sold Tile for $205M in 2021.
$205M exit
-$141M raised (liquidation prefs)
-dilution
-taxes
= $800K/year for 10 years
Meta E6 (Staff Engineer): $800K/year. With weekends.
He built a product millions use daily.
Did everything the VC playbook says.
And barely beat a job.
This is why I stay profitable and own 100%.
To make $2M as a VC-backed founder:
You need a $50M+ exit.
To make $2M bootstrapped:
You need $200K/year for 10 years.
Which is easier?
I chose the math that actually works.
VC-backed founders get:
- Investor intros
- Advisor networks
- Portfolio company support
Everyone else gets... consultants by the hour.
SimpleDirect gives you the tools to build without the ecosystem tax.
No VC required.
We've been quiet.
Here's what we're building:
Self-serve tools for founders who can't follow the default playbook.
Bootstrap. Solo. International. Part-time.
You get the tools. You do the work.
First tool launching soon: Changelog 👀
Competitor raised $50M.
Their founder told me: 'You can't compete without capital.'
We're still here. They're struggling.
I check their LinkedIn sometimes.
Not healthy. But honest.
Go to founder events.
- Everyone's pitching.
- Everyone's networking.
- Everyone's 'building something big.'
I leave exhausted.
Realized: I don't actually like most founders.
I like the 5% who are honest about struggling.
The rest feel like performance art.