Monetizing Mobile Advances through OpenAI

0:00You're listening to a podcast right now. Driving, working out, walking the dog. If you're in a podcast, chances are you have something to say too. With RSS.com, starting your own podcast is free and easy. Upload an episode and we distribute it to Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, and more. Track your listeners, see where they're from, and start earning from ads just like this. If you've been thinking about starting a podcast, this is your sign. Start your new podcast for free today at RSS.com. Welcome to the AI Hustle podcast. Today on the podcast, we're talking about a wild piece of news from OpenAI.

0:37There is rumors and legends that they are going to be making a phone with AI agents replacing apps. I think for a lot of reasons, this makes sense. And then for a lot of reasons, there are question marks around the story. So we're going to get into all of that on the podcast today. Sam Altman and OpenAI has some awesome hardware partnerships and partners, and they are spending a lot of money in kind of that area. So this is kind of interesting for 100 different reasons. I mean, this is the number one piece of tech that we all use. It's in our pocket all day, every day. Would you get an open AI phone?

1:09Is this going to be different than the Rabbit R1? A lot of questions to answer on this. But before we do, I wanted to mention that every single week, Jamie and I record a episode that we post on our school community. It's exclusively over there. And we break down how we're growing and scaling our businesses using AI. So we demo our actual projects. We demo how we're actually building those projects. We demo how much money we're making from different things. So it's all there. It's all the paywalled stuff we can't talk about publicly. $19 a month. If you're interested in learning how to grow and scale your business, the tools, strategies, and techniques we're using, go check it out.

1:42This week, I recorded an entire video showing a vibe-coded app that I'm building, how much money my competitor is currently making. I break down how I built it and how I'm turning this into an app that I'll post on the App Store. So if you're interested in vibe-coding websites or businesses or software, I've made a ton of them and I break them down over there. This one is particularly interesting this week because it's my first vibe coded app. I've paid hundreds of thousands of dollars for apps in the past to get built, scaled them to hundreds of thousands of users. But this is the first one I've vibe coded myself because I'm not a developer.

2:14So anyways, if you want to go check it out, it's on the school community,$19 a month. Let's dive into what's going on with OpenAI, because maybe all of these apps that I'm talking about building right now are going to completely go away. And this phone is going to have AI agents that replaces apps. Jamie, what are your thoughts on this? Yeah, I mean, this whole concept really kind of blows my mind as far as how did it all work? Could be something that really does actually catch on to what extent, we don't know. But so apparently there's rumors that OpenAI, they're working on a phone in collaboration with MediaTek, Qualcomm, and Luxshare.

2:48So they're trying to put together a hardware that is focused on utilizing AI, using OpenAI, I should say, as its main engine, main driver of the software. And I think you already brought this up, but about maybe a couple of years ago, there was the rabbit phone that everyone kind of made fun of because it was like really lo-fi and it didn't really have a whole lot of function to it other than it was the AI was actually accessing different apps and doing things for you sort of. And this is way before all the AI agent talk came out. And so people didn't really quite understand it. But now I think we're in a new era of AI agents.

3:34And I think that this actually could be something quite useful. However, I can't imagine in my brain the idea of an app ever going away because, you know, OpenAI still has to access data from somewhere, integrate it all. And I feel like there's an element of the visual that people still want. They don't just want to see a bunch of text on a screen. There's the dopamine hit of different colors and swipes and things like that. So I don't really know how it would all work. Jane, what do you think about it? I think they have a couple different advantages here than, say, a company like Anthropik shipping this.

4:10I don't think Anthropik could ship a consumer phone. that would really work because they have a smaller audience that pays a lot more. But OpenAI is kind of at this interesting place where they're closing in on close to a billion weekly active users. Like that is so many people. So they have this just massive footprint of kind of general people. And a phone is the most general piece of hardware. Now, they recently have made a partnership with Johnny Ive, who formerly designed the iPhone for Apple, and he's kind of the famous Apple designer. and they've, you know, teased doing a hardware play. They haven't said exactly what it was.

4:43Some people think it's going to be like AirPods. Some people think maybe it's glasses. Maybe it's some like puck that sits on your desk and you talk to it like an Alexa. There's like all of these different ideas. And of course, Johnny Ive and Sam Altman have like done whole hype videos where they're together and they're like, it's just the most incredible piece of technology we've ever seen. It's so simple. It's so obvious. Like how has no one thought of this before? And of course, like they give no hints as to what it is. So there's definitely like this really funny vibe. But what I think actually happens is I think they've created a lot of hype and speculation and they could change the product to be anything they want.

5:13So even if they didn't originally set out to make a phone, I think maybe they're like, well, maybe we will make a phone because it's interesting and maybe a billion users, people would buy it. So I think it is weird going from they have one application, it's very useful, answers your questions for you, but you need an entire piece of glass that runs every software you have on your phone to power it. Like, can they make that leap and convince consumers that that's, you know, what they would want when they're, we're all used to our iPhones and we're all used to our, you know, our Androids. Like we're all just used to our phone companies.

5:46Android, it ties into everything. Google, iPhone, we have our blue bubbles. Like we all have our motes, right? To the reason why we use our phone. So like, what is OpenAI really going to be able to compete with? And so I just, I think this is interesting. And will they have like on screen apps? Like if I'm like, hey, text my wife XYZ, do I have to voice to text that? Do I just type that into a chat? like text Jill this or like, I don't know, is there like UI? Like, I don't know. It's just so, there's so many questions. I have so many questions about this. Would it be useful? Yeah, I think it'd be useful.

6:18And is it where the future of software goes? Some people disagree with me, but I actually think that this is where software is going in the future. So I believe that we get to a point where it does beg the question, why do you need apps? Like, why do I need the Uber app? if I could just say like, hey, book me an Uber for tomorrow at 7 a.m. from my current location to the airport. And I think maybe the reason why you need apps is you need some sort of like visual feedback. I want you just like, let's say you book an Uber. It's like, okay, do you want to book the Uber at$7? And it's like, well, I don't know.

6:54Like, what are the other options? Like, we're so used to this UI. And so like, would we give up that UI where we can quickly scan or scroll or swipe or look or ingest a whole bunch of data for like a chat experience um i don't know but like that's that must be how billionaires do everything with their secretaries i don't have a secretary personally so i don't know but right like i'm assuming you have like or you got like your jarvis or you're like the the ai from um you know from like all the superhero movies where like you talk to it and it dictates and plans everything for your life so evidently some people have moved there would everyone move there i don't know yeah i I mean, I have a couple of thoughts.

7:31I've heard a couple of really interesting theories recently, just in the past couple of days of where AI is going. The one is that in the next few years, it'll become so powerful that it'll actually learn what you need and it'll adapt the software to fit your needs automatically. So I guess what I'm saying is like, you said, what's the problem with like a visual, like an Uber, you know, what if it could on the fly generate the visual, the user experience for you and give you the different options for what fare you want to choose. Do you want the Uber XL with the leather seats or do you want this and generate the whole user, the UX, the design on the fly as it's going?

8:15I think that could be a way to eliminate maybe 70 % to 80 % of apps is if it could actually generate that on the fly. I think that's really an interesting theory. The other theory that kind of goes along with that, with this whole thing, I'd love to hear your thoughts about it is kind of the resurgence of the idea of crypto and using actual digital tokens as a currency within your phone to, for example, book the Uber or order your food. And so people have a theory that a lot of these meme coins or old tokens are actually going to become useful again and crypto is going to boom again. What do you think about all that?

8:59that is an interesting concept if i mean i don't know because you could also just have like stripe or your credit card process or linked right into it and kind of like apple pay like it's super easy you double tap the two buttons on the side of your phone and it pays for stuff and so like i think you could just have apple pay paying for everything um or open ai might have i oh you know what it's gonna be if it's open ai and sam altman he owns world coin right it scans your retina to verify your identity. They're like doing a pilot with Tinder right now. So to verify you're a human, I'll bet you it's like all powered by WorldCoin.

9:33So yeah, we'll probably get a crypto that runs the whole thing if it's OpenAI. So yeah, probably not far from it. One thing that I do think is interesting is it says it will eliminate the need for all apps. I don't think it's going to, it's still going to rely on Uber. So it's going to have an API to Uber. So it's still going to go get the data from Uber. It's just, it's not going to be the Uber app that displays the UI to you, it will be OpenAI that will display. And they could literally display in the exact same way that Uber normally displays it or in a completely new way or maybe every single app has like the same visual feel but it's, do you know what I mean?

10:04Like it's still pulling from the Uber API. And I think this is actually where the future of all websites and technology need to go. So if you're building a software, what you need to start thinking about, and we'll probably do a whole other episode on this, but you need to start thinking about how your website, your business will integrate with agents and with AI when it's not humans doing everything. That's a whole nother discussion that I think is interesting. But I think for something like this phone, it'll probably still display things. And like you mentioned, it can generate stuff on the fly and it's getting the data from the API.

10:39So it's just how they display it, which it should be interesting. What's really crazy to me, though, is Chris Lanny said that OpenAI's first hardware product is going to be announced in the second half of 2026. Now, this isn't necessarily the phone. My guess is this is kind of what Johnny I've been opening. I haven't working on. So maybe we could see like some AirPods or like an Alexa type device. That's my guess on it. We're going to see that in the second half of 2026. So we got, you know, somewhere in the next nine months, we're basically going to see that come out. And I think depending on the reception of that hardware device will play a very heavy role.

11:11And if they decide to roll out a phone, if this thing is a major flop and nobody likes it, because let's be honest, these AI hardware devices have been big flops. I think the friendship or the friend.com pendant. I don't ever see anyone wearing those. With the exception of the meta Ray-Ban glasses, I think will be, are a big win. And I think they'll continue to be a big win. I think they shipped like six million of them at least already. So I think that glasses, oddly enough, will continue. And maybe some of these other areas will struggle more. But anyways, so yeah, I guess there is hope on the horizon for it.

11:48Meta's Ray-Bans are kind of crushing. with AI. Well, hey, if you got any value out of this episode, be sure to leave us a rating or review wherever you're listening. Really appreciate those and they help us reach more people. Again, check out the AI Hustle School community if you want to learn how to capitalize on some of these developments, learn how to actually make money in the real world using AI. Thanks for listening and we'll see you next time. You're listening to a podcast right now, driving, working out, walking the dog. If you're into podcasts, chances are you have something to say too.

12:17with rss.com starting your own podcast is free and easy upload an episode and we distribute it to apple podcasts spotify amazon music and more track your listeners see where they're from and start earning from ads just like this if you've been thinking about starting a podcast this is your sign start your new podcast for free today at rss.com