---
feed: "DANIEL_ON_SLOPE"
codex_section: "S09"
source: VideoTranscript
title: "360MEN WTA 202 - illusions"
conv_id: "video-D_kxmNP1CjM-20190117"
share_url: "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_kxmNP1CjM"
created: "2019-01-17"
message_count: 1
category:
  - "Personal Development"
  - "Entrepreneurship"
summary: "WTA Season 2 Episode 3 examines the deeper illusion that venture funding or accumulating 'stuff' makes the entrepreneurial journey easier or more successful. Daniel shares 22 years of 100% ownership of Intelligent Netware as proof that bootstrapping, while painful, preserves control and builds real character. He demonstrates visual illusions, stresses that the journey and family legacy story matter far more than possessions, and urges viewers to start telling their own stories immediately for their avatars and future generations."
keypoints:
  - "The real illusion is believing more venture money or toys equals success — it actually costs ownership and agility"
  - "After 22 years of bootstrapping, Daniel and Angelina still own 100% of Intelligent Netware — painful but worth it for grandkids and avatars"
  - "We don't see things as they are; we see them as we are — perception is not reality (visual illusion demo included)"
  - "Life can change in an instant (glacier fall, car wreck); the illusion of having 'all the time in the world' is dangerous"
  - "Google only indexes a fraction of the internet — huge room remains to create and place your story exactly where it belongs"
tags:
  - "illusions"
  - "venture-funding"
  - "100-percent-ownership"
  - "legacy-storytelling"
  - "journey-over-stuff"
  - "wta-2019"
  - "360men"
  - "bootstrapping"
monomyth_stage: "06 - Tests, Allies, Enemies"
gameboard_position: "Camp 1: Tests, Allies, Enemies"
truth_score: 85
entropy_score: "Medium"
tone:
  sentiment: "Earnest"
  emotions:
    - "Reflective"
    - "Cautionary"
    - "Motivational"
  sycophancy_level: "None"
  notes: "Daniel speaks directly and earnestly from a hotel room window in Hood River, using simple props and personal history to dismantle illusions. Brief light-hearted 'spa moment' with real-life Angelina at the very end provides warm contrast. Strong emphasis on legacy, character forged in pain, and immediate action to tell your story."
related_events: ["video-ngF-rfepBjM-20190104", "video-XvzcE9bcvuE-20190111"]
syndication_status:
  arnie: false
  chris: false
  redmond: false
  clint: false
  pilot: false
ma5_inheritance: "Initium"
pre_silicon: true
voice_print: false
codex_candidate: false
phase: "WTA Season 2 - Deepening Awareness of Illusions in Entrepreneurship & Legacy"
enriched_date: "2026-04-15"
---
![[D_kxmNP1CjM_maxres.jpg]]
### Original YouTube Description

How much is enough? Just a little more! In this weeks episode Daniel talks about a deeper level of illusion - that of having venture funding to make the enterprising journey a bit more comfortable - how much more comfortable? just a little more. The catch is - you lose ownership and control of how nimble your venture will be. After 22 years we still own 100% of Intelligent Netware.

WTA 202

### Cleaned Transcript

**Daniel:** This week we're on illusions. Do you see the illusion? Oh, Daniel's got this all figured out — he's all smart. No I don't. But I can say with confidence: hey, don't follow me. I figured this out. There's an illusion tied to having stuff. And I say it's more about the journey than about the stuff.

**Daniel:** I believe it was Craig McCaw that said he is not everything that shoe is nice to test that theory once in a while. You know, I'm a simple sidebar — I'm just sitting in front of a window. One cellphone. Good stabilization on this thing. Some people complain but you know what? He used to carry these big heavy Ikegami with Michael Lee now bowling that news if to shoot some news stories. Most expensive put the camera equipment around. It's the story that matters.

**Daniel:** Richard Wiseman has been demonstrating illusions for over a decade that I know of. His YouTube channel has a couple million subscribers. He's got tens of thousands of comments. They all about the same thing because he still uploads in 4K. This bet: you need a square paper napkin and a marker pen. Draw a four by four grid on the paper. Add eight crosses like this and then challenge your friends to rip out each of the crosses but they're only allowed to tear the napkin once to win the bet. Hold the four corners to the center like this. Rotate the paper around and fold the top half over the bottom. Next fold the right hand side over the left and then fold the top over the bottom and finally fold the right hand side over the left. Now hold onto the bottom right corner and then carefully tear off the corner like this. Unfold the napkin and all of the crosses will be missing. And when you unfold the corner you'll have all of the crosses and you've won the bet. Amazing.

**Daniel:** You remember me introducing Dr. Politzer's room and his phrase that we don't see things the way they are — we see things the way we are. You know it's really good content, really great depth of insight into our own behavior but he has very few views and subscribers. Oh it must not be worth anything. Hmm. I would say have a second look.

**Daniel:** Take the read on Angelina. Here she is. And let's get started. Let's get at the ducks, would say here in Hood River. Let's get quacking. Here's the hotel we're in. Right above her is an office. We've been looking at. What's my point on illusions?

**Daniel:** It's an illusion to acquire stuff and think that's the sign of success. Nah, it's not it at all. Ask Jeff Bezos — he's losing half his stuff. It's fair. The journey that you make with your family and with yourself and with their future generations — you should tell that story because the journey is what's valuable. It's not what you acquire. It's not even the things that you post and build and leave as a legacy. It's not that at all. It's the experience in the wake that you make.

**Daniel:** Another facet, another aspect. I got a fake Trina care for this Graham care I worked with for about almost eight years. Trina was Graham's wife and producer of the Galloping Gourmet series and Trina always used to rant on me: Daniel get your hand out of camera, don't talk with your hands, put your hands off the camera. You know what she didn't know about YouTube? You could talk with your hands off the camera. She said they're distracting. I'm like no, that's how I talk. Thank you Trina, rest in peace.

**Daniel:** Take a closer look. Look at the one on the left. Thorns orange dot on the left and the orange dot on the right. Who's bigger? Who's more correct? Which one has more power? Low after the right. Which one's correct — the right or the left? You see what's going on? Turns out they're identical. Measure them. They're both exactly the same. What you see is not reality. What you see is a perception and you can easily be fooled.

**Daniel:** All right, so what's another aspect of this journey that can be an illusion? It's this: it's the false belief that your paraphernalia, the number of toys you have, the property that you own or don't own is more accurate, has any indication as to the value or the ultimate outcome of your enterprise, your mission, your venture. They're not correlated.

**Daniel:** Many people rely on the false comfort provided by venture money. Sure, hand off ownership of your venture to get the pain reduced during the journey — like an oxygen bottle going up Everest. The problem is you don't know how long it's going to take to get there and you may run out of oxygen in which case now you're in a lurch. You got to go get some more. The other side of that is that you think you have to always have the latest or you can't do without ABC. You're gonna get yourself in more debt than you can carry or you're gonna sell off more than you want. And there's a game played against you. They know how long it's gonna take — more than you want — and hope you're not gonna get enough money. You're gonna go another round. You're gonna lose more control. And when you finally figure it out you're not gonna earn enough.

**Daniel:** It's been 22 years in technology and Angelina and I still own 100% of the company and it has been painful. It has produced some character and I can tell my grandkids in the future and great-great grandkids through my avatar it was worth it. It was absolutely worth it.

**Daniel:** Look at your life now. It's not where mine has been. I changed lanes for you. We had an opportunity. So to you I'm talking to you. You can change lanes for your generation, your next generation and all of those family that you care to take. Don't be part of the useless class. Don't let the illusion of entertainment distract you from your mission and don't let the avarice associated with lots of collateral, lots of toys — don't let that be the thing that holds you back.

**Daniel:** Okay I'm done with my soapbox. That's what I've had to learn. That's part of putting those crampons and getting the backpack and the junk to go. Has been the delay. It's a lot to learn. It's a lot to unpack. If you will watch it a few times I'm earnest about it. All of me I know what this is.

**Daniel:** You say the illusion is “Oh Daniel's got this all figured out — he's all smart.” No I don't. I've simply said okay I'm ready. Let's go. Let's tell the story. And I've had to pay a price. It's been painful and rewarding on different levels.

**Daniel:** So when the illusion is you can map it all out like an architect like I used to do with buildings — figure out every step between here and there — map it all out. Nope. You don't know enough yet. It's too complicated. Nobody knows enough yet. It's way more complicated than humans can figure it out. You wait. Convergence is coming. If I dare say transhumanism doesn't freak too many of you out. Onboarding of our… well let's just call it Internet of Things being onboarded. You got a lot of change coming. A lot of change. And you may not think it's gonna happen but it's the same as each week's episode. It's gonna happen. Start telling your story.

**Daniel:** The illusion is you've got all the time in the world. I fell off a glacier. I thought I was just going up to have some fun with some friends. Life can change in an instant. Angelina's car wreck — she was supposed to be on Apprentice 3. She was heading back from the studio. All over. Not even her fault. You don't know. None of us knows. That's worth thinking about. Don't you go for it.

**Daniel:** You might recall that I've said don't believe me — test me. This is a point of view somewhere between scotoma and illusion. Google boy — everything's in Google. Not based on the 40 thousand websites that I'm responsible for hosting. Google is indexing about 40%. Growth of the internet is compounding ly more content than there are data centers to store it. So Google has to decide what stuff do we store. Well they're gonna keep stuff that they're being paid by advertisers and everything else in the world — ah rubbish bin.

**Daniel:** So when you go to Google thinking it'll find out all the options possible on a menu — wrong. A lot of options are not on the menu. Try searching something specifically when you're ready to buy for it — not just when you're curious to learn about it. Put a quote before and after. That's called a Boolean search. Quote your string of four or five words and quote. Often you'll get a little note at the top: no results found. Meaning there's still a lot of room on the internet to put stuff but Google can't keep up. But if you put something exactly where it's supposed to be — everything in its place.

**Daniel:** Yeah so you were that one's going. An illusion is lots of property is a good indicator of sustainability or of your value. If that were true try to explain Kodak, Blockbuster, Kmart, Sears. All organizations go through it. Solopreneur up through Tier four — they all die. Some starve to death. Some don't iterate. Sound familiar?

**Daniel:** Come on get your gear on. Grab that camera. You can be more nimble than they are. Let's change some lanes. It's the story that matters. It's how the AI is gonna digest you and that your avatar's gonna be built on what you most commonly do. So I do — you watch. This year we do — we watch. Next year you're gonna be doing it and I'm gonna watch.

**Daniel:** Get your camera. Turn it on. Point it at the ceiling when you're sitting in front of a window and talk.

[Music]

**Daniel:** Who cares? Talk to your grandkids. Build your corpus. Don't wait for tomorrow. Might be an illusion.

**Angelina (real):** What are you doing?

**Daniel:** I'm having a spa moment as I brew my coffee and warming my feet up because I've been programming and the floor's cold so blood flow shuts off your extremities. Your brain stays you know working. You code somewhere you might do that. And how did you tell me about this in the other room to make me come over? I said I'm doing an Angelina moment — wellness by choice. Use what you have.

---

**CODEX ENTRY**

**Date:** 2019-01-17  
**File:** 360MEN WTA 202 - illusions.md  
**Monomyth Stage:** 06 - Tests, Allies, Enemies  
**Gameboard:** Camp 1: Tests, Allies, Enemies  
**MA5 Domain:** Initium  
**Summary:** Daniel dismantles the illusion that venture capital or accumulating possessions eases the entrepreneurial path, contrasting it with the proven value of 100% ownership, character forged in pain, and the primacy of the family journey story.  
**Key Insight:** The journey itself — and the legacy story you tell along the way — is what builds lasting value and AI avatars for future generations; venture money trades control for temporary comfort and often ends in diluted ownership.  
**Narrative Significance:** This episode deepens the Scotomaville/Initium arc by naming the seductive illusions that test every hero (funding myths, stuff-as-success, “plenty of time”), reinforcing the “We Do — We Watch” call to immediate storytelling and nimble bootstrapping as the true path through the Tests phase.

---

**INITIUM.**