Why Karate Combat is Leaping into Web3 with Robert Bryan

30:57Combat sports are simple. You know, mono versus mono, who's going to win? It's a very simple thing to vote on. You know, our fans vote on who's going to win, but they also vote on who's going to fight who and also who we're going to recruit. You know, it's very simple things that fans... Who we're going to recruit. Interesting. Yeah, wow. It's very simple things that fans care a lot about. So combat sports, I think, work particularly well for this versus more complicated team sports. So, you know, we're really happy about specific application. But I think that, you know, in all the sports, I think owning, obviously it's not owning, it's different than that.

31:35But, you know, having real say in a sports team is one of the most sort of engaging things out there. You know, the Green Bay Packers, I don't even know if the stock actually owns the league, but man, everyone's so proud about their Green Bay Packers stock certificate. I think it's such an important concept throughout sports. And Web3 allows you to take it a step further, allowing you to do the airdrops and get people involved essentially for free. So I think it works well for sports. I don't know about our exact application outside of sports. I'm sure there's some tweaks to it that could have it work well.

32:16you know outside of the upwind gaming you know we're using we're using you know sort of our token a number of other ways that we think are unique and drive value as well that aren't really related to that concept so for instance in combat sports there's this huge you know this huge debate out there the leagues are making a lot of money you know all the are the fighters making enough but at the same time if you look at a lot of these other leagues you know where fire pays 50 the league doesn't really make any money. UFC is the other extreme. You know, you got Fiverr pay, I think it's below 20%.

32:49You know, and obviously they have some of the highest margins out there. So you sort of have, you know, how are you going to make these work? What we do with the token is that the, so there's a pool of tokens that fans are basically, you know, picking different fights. If you're a fighter and, you know, a lot of fans, you know, pick your fight because they're interested in it you know that's the size of the token pool maybe all the fans just want to fight bet on you know fight number five because that fighter walked out in the way in in a duck costume or something like that right so maybe that fight has a much larger um token pool the way we incentivize the fighters is we give them a percentage of the total tokens that fans have picked for their fight so it encourages them to promote their own fight so you have an immediate feedback looped it, right?

33:37And the, and, you know, in the UFC, they have, you know, whatever it is, you know, 30, 40 fighters on a card, you know, usually only the top one or two fights are incentivized, you know, by pay-per-view. And it's really hard to track, you know, what value you're actually having here. It's perfect. They can watch real time, how engaged the fans are in their fight and they're directly benefited from it. And, you know, all of our, all of our fighters have tokens as well. So we're essentially all incentivized together. And it's a great way to encourage the fighters to do the right thing and at the end of the day, benefit from it.

34:11So actually, you know, you, the DAO, the fighters, the fans, all holding the KC token is extremely central to the idea of like, the more we all engage in this thing, the more the whole kind of franchise will benefit from that. And of course, the up only aspect of this is kind of a certain level of irresistibility you know that they're taking out the downside there is this is this driving demand for the token you know like as a fan i'm guessing that like if i want to participate either i got to get you know airdropped some token or whatever which means you need to have a wallet address presumably for for these fans or they got to go somewhere and get the token in order for them to participate right so let's just say i just heard about this i'm like I'd love to, when's the next KC card?

35:00I want to tune in and watch the stream. How do I get me some KC token? What does that look like for fans right now? Well, the easiest way is to download the app. It's pretty easy to get involved that way. We give the fans some tokens when they start using the app day one. if you want to purchase we we don't sell any of the tokens um we just give them away we're using it more as a fan engagement tool honestly um i know externally you know fans can go to exchanges to purchase tokens separately um it depends on your jurisdiction um there's a host of rules around it but you know i think there's a number of the the top exchanges i saw out there that that do list the token so so if i download the app and you give me some token for just getting started but i know nothing about crypto have you set up like a custodial wallet for me so i can participate in the thing or do i need to turn up with my own non-custodial wallet exactly so yeah but the beauty of this idea is it's web3 it runs on web3 but the core the core functionality of it is built for sports fans.

36:19It's simple and they don't even have to know it's web three. So it's one of the easiest apps out there. You know, you download the app. We do have to give you a seed phrase because we are creating a wallet for you, but it's very simple. It's, I think it's like three clicks. You know, Apple makes it extremely easy. We actually have our, our Android app is launching in the next couple of weeks as well. It creates a wallet for you, but you don't even see the wallet. All you see is boom. Okay, you have whatever it is, you know, 88 karate tokens. And then you see a list of the fights coming up. Usually it's just the next fight.

36:52And you can click it. You see all the fighters. And then you can go in there. You know, you pick the winning fighter. You can just click and, you know, allocate your tokens. And when the fighter wins or loses, you see if you win additional tokens. And then we have another simple area where you can vote on different initiatives within the league. So for instance, you know, who's fighting for the title. And once again, you know, that's very simple. You know, it's just a picture. Here's what we're voting on, you know, click the way you're going to vote. And then it just has, so that, that was sort of enough right there to accomplish what we want, you know, have the fans engaged to simple concept, but it works very well.

37:31We have another, we have a number of other things that we're rolling out. And then obviously there's the basic stuff that we have to give people where they can, you know basic wallet functionality it's just sort of send receive tokens things along those lines so so as far as like most of the fans that are watching karate combat right now like that they will just not they'll have not have a clue that we're on web 3 rails right now right like is that other than it says other than it says karate tokens um and you you know you're going to win tokens other than that um no you don't have to be web 3 sophisticated whatsoever but i'm guessing that like there's there's probably a bunch of people that would be like oh i've just you know in the last three cards i've managed to treble my kc token stuff like is there a market for this token like can i go cash it out somewhere because i'm guessing if you can't and we'll come to the regulatory bit in a minute but if you're if you're not the the seller or trader or whatever the tokens you're not the you're not the market for the tokens have you seen people ask you and your team questions like, hey, how do I sell my KC token?

38:42Is that a question which comes up? Yeah. I mean, once again, the app makes it pretty simple. If you're doing well and you have a whole bunch of tokens, I think fans are pretty adept of their own and figuring out what their different options are to do with them. If they want to go and find someone else to buy, usually it's pretty easy for them to figure out how to do it. But our app, you know, from our end, we make it pretty easy for them to transfer their tokens wherever they want to. You know, it's their tokens. You know, it's up for them to do whatever they want with them. So we make it easy for them to transfer it to any other wallet.

39:19And from there, it's like any other cryptocurrency. Well, you know, I mean, one of the big things that like is a discussion in this space, no matter which brand or to be honest or company or use case that we talk about is basically the idea that you know the this this challenge that people have around scaling experiences because you know for people turning up who understand the idea of having custody of digital assets and having a wallet and I've got the things I can trade them on a marketplace over here I can interact with an experience over here that's still the very much the minority of people and you've you've got a sports franchise here and you have an acquisition model with with the KC token where a bunch of people will be coming in who have got no idea about that but the thing has a financial value so one of the things which I think is a really interesting question is is do you think that there's people that are through fans of martial arts are starting to get to know what it means to have tokens and transfer them into another wallet like who's all using the things Or is it actually that KC is maybe even attracting people who are familiar with crypto?

40:27So this is actually pretty interesting. So sitting back from a high level, you know, our goal with all of this was just to grow the fan base, right? And bring more people into the league in a fun, exciting way. And we thought it was perfect for that. But when we step back and we think about it, you know, obviously we have a number of other partners that are, you know, that we partner with. they're wondering, you know, what percentage of our fan base is already involved in cryptocurrency. And when you look at, when you think about the types of people out there, you know, the people who invest in crypto per currency, invest in, you know, meme stocks, and honestly are interested in combat sports and even more so wagering on combat sports.

41:08That Venn diagram is like three circles on top of each other. You know, it's like basically the exact same people. So in our heads, are like, oh, all these people, you know, are similar to ourselves. Probably a lot of them have wallets, right? You know, to us, you know, Web3 is so, so big. But surprisingly out there, you know, I'm not, you know, I'm a traditional guy now getting into Web3. You probably know the stats better than I do, but it's still surprisingly small number of people that have wallets, even in our space where we have like the perfect demographic for it, period, right? So, you know, We have noticed that.

41:42Even our fans, I would say most of them are not super crypto savvy. Now that we're doing this, we've actually quickly gotten a large portion of Web3 community interest in us. So when we announced what we're doing, we had a huge number of Web3 enthusiasts now come and become interested in the league. Obviously, those guys are experts. But the martial arts only fans, I would say the vast majority of them didn't have a wallet. But the concept is so simple. they understand it pretty quickly, right? They're like, well, you're saying you're going to give me tokens. And if I pick the guy that wins, I'm going to get more tokens, right?

42:16People love free stuff. So, you know, they figure out pretty quick and we made the wallet simple. So you'd be surprised how excited they are to jump on board. And we talk about on our broadcast, you know, and even our commentators, you know, are pretty interesting. At first they said, oh, you know, what's this token thing? You know, they found we were pushing it. And then, you know, afterwards they hear about it. You know, they come back and they say, hey, this is awesome. You know, like, how do I get more tokens is a question that people always ask me, right? So, you know, I think people are learning pretty quickly and we keep the core aspect of it very simple.

42:49So I think people are coming around and they can actually figure out pretty easily, even with no tree knowledge. Well, I mean, I think it's very interesting to hear that because I think that's one of the hypotheses that gave rise to us even having this show in the first place is, are things that people love brands intellectual properties um art and media and these things are they actually a force for um you know people starting to use this stuff and it feels like that you you especially that it's built into the kind of acquisition model for kc that this is very much an experiment to watch isn't it and and and for the audience you know when you tune in and you watch one of the fights there is no ambiguity that there's a token involved right it is absolutely like plastered all over the screen and the commentators are saying, you know, don't forget to place your, to back your fighter or what have you.

43:39I forget how they kind of introduced that. But the Casey token is very integral to the experience of watching it. So you cannot miss it. Yeah, that's for sure. Most people are very happy about it. You know, there are a lot of hardcore fight fans that they already know that we have the token. So I don't think that some of them don't want to hear more of it. Um, so that, that, that was some of the only native feedback we actually did get. Some of the fight fans are like, man, this is such a cool promotion, but they're like, you keep telling us about the token. Um, we already know about it. And then like the first comment was like, yeah, we heard it was started by these crazy web three bros.

44:17And I was like, well, it's certainly not me. Uh, maybe my partner, but yeah, we, we keep talking about it just so all the new people understand it and it brings, you know, a lot of new people to the league, but it is so simple. I guess some of the OG karate combat fans are like, man, we already know how this works. Come on, it's easy. It wasn't from the beginning then, right? Like the token was something which you guys decided to introduce sometime down the line, is that right? Or was it there from the start? Yeah, so, you know, I go, now that we're involved, I go to all these Web3 conferences.

44:49And, you know, it seems like we stand apart. Most of the Web3 projects out there, basically the core of it is just Web3. You know, if it's a game, you know, the biggest draw by far is it's Web3, right? You know, you never see a game out there like Fortnite that's ridiculously popular and go say, hey, we're going to become totally a Web3 project, right? If someone did something like that, it would probably be insanely valuable, right? What we did was we had a traditional sports league. We were already in operations for three years. We were actually just becoming EBITDA positive, which is, you know, a huge mark in our business.

45:26and you know all the traditional sports investors out there you know they said they were very they're interested in investing in us all those different different things then we told them our web3 clan and they were like man that's a big risk these guys are these guys are really it's interesting but they're taking a big risk out there um you know we think it's worth it but we already had something that we really had private market fit and we're just using crypto to to supercharge it and you know i think that's generally the the the way to go if you can You already know the product works and then you're just supercharging it with some sort of additional alignment and incentives or customer acquisition with Web3.

46:03But there are actually some learning pains as well, taking a traditional business and moving it over to Web3. Well, but I mean, I think that if this whole sort of series is about brands and Web3, there was marketing before Web3, right? This company may have existed for 100 years, not just for six years. So the idea that you're using the technology, this emerging technology, to just amplify what you already know is working and grow the sport because, or grow the franchise because through this up-only gaming mechanic, there's now an incentive for me to go get the app and sort of play. You know, that's not rocket science either, right?

46:44This is what also what actual regulated betting sites do, right? you create an account and you get your first whatever$10 or$50 of betting or whatever like free knowing that that's just basically the price of acquisition and you all are doing the same thing but it's up only so you've you're you're really just you know you had something solid to build on and for most other people out there in brands I think that's that's really important to remember you're not addressing necessarily a a web3 native audience you're addressing karate fans or or or people who are fans of nma fighting and making that experience better that's actually something that sometimes i think we'll all do well to remember that don't get obsessed with the technology make the experience better and it feels like uh you know you guys took a swing on it but that's what it was really the the motivation behind that i i want to come back to what you said before though which is um you know you kind of almost glossed over it that KC is basically owned by the foundation, like by a DAO, right?

47:49And so there isn't any equity around. It's really just the value of the token. What is that like? Like, you know, being a DAO. And I'm talking a bit more sort of like from an operational perspective, like how you manage the relationships with DAO members, because that's a big operation, like running a DAO. as you know if you speak to any DAO operator or DAO member it's quite an operation to do that and how does decision making work for the company in that in that respect you know what and what was that like compared to more traditional your experience you've had it's it's definitely been interesting but the good thing is looking at from a very high level it this can be hard with a lot of traditional companies but sports are among the best students you know if you think about the NFL you know it's a whole bunch of owners running around I mean that's almost similar to a Dow right there you've got all these crazy billionaires spread across the United States just voting separately on on what's going to happen right so as sports actually are using a very similar structure to begin with the other thing is you know the sports almost like a protocol the the rules don't change very often right and you're just sort of feeding different inputs in this guy's fighting this guy and every once in a while you know maybe there's a small change to the way it works, right?

49:11So sports are uniquely set up to it. The small changes that you do have to do, just a lot of the understanding out there, that's where it can be tricky, right? Combat sports guys are some of the funnest people out there. You know, everyone's into exercise, things like that. But, you know, we're not huge fans of change, right? So, you know, take someone who's a marketing guy. I think we had someone who worked with us, great guy, but he's like, does this mean, Rob, I'm going to have to listen to these crazy guys in Discord about who's going to sponsor us? Like, this is going to be insanity, right?

49:46And, you know, they're all so concerned about it. They're like, am I going to be, like, listening to all these crazy guys out there? Like, who are going to recruit? You know, like, what if they have the best guy fight the worst guy in the league? Obviously, that wouldn't happen because there's a fighting commission. You know, but people were a little bit scared at first, but, you know, we have a great team. They're all open-minded. Now they love it. that same guy, you know, we were looking for sponsorships in the, in a category and he was like blasting on discord. He was like, Hey, you know, does anyone know like XYZ sponsors in this category?

50:16He actually got a few, a few intros. So, you know, it's been a learning curve. You know, at first they were really funny about it. You know, we had to have these company wide calls, go through it a few times. I think people were a little scared to ask. And it is, if you know nothing about web three and then the company that you work for is just going a hundred 100 % all the way, right? You know, we give them all tokens, but no one has stock anymore. Like that's a shocker right there to these people, right? So, yeah, it's a lot of change. It's a lot of learning. But, you know, even they know that Web3 is the way a lot of things are going.

50:51So they know we're kind of at the cutting edge. So they were excited about that. And now that they've learned about it, you know, everyone's super happy. You know, there's small pushback here and there. like, okay, maybe the social platform, you know, instead of just fighting posts, you know, now, you know, you do have to have some Web3 stuff in there, right? So, you know, every once in a while, you know, one of our poor fight guys gets some complicated, like, Web3 question he has to respond to, right? So, you know, it's still not 100 % positive, but overall, you know, I think every single, I think every single person's really happy about the transition, especially especially when they see the way it's turned out.

51:30Is anything surprised you? So this is a question I ask actually everybody who we've done one of these special episodes with. Because, you know, also having direct interaction with the community is not easy, right? It's kind of always on, which is, you know, it's definitely a bit of an adjustment for like, you know, you go from having a job to having like a community who's like, you know, they don't care what time it is and they don't care if you're in the office and there's an immediacy expectation with that. When you make an investment in having direct interaction with your community like that, then it's got to also feel like there's a, there's a, there's a, there's a, there's something that you get back from that.

52:12And almost everybody that we've had on the show has unanimously said that something happened or they learned something which surprised them from their community. Have you got any examples of like, you know, you mentioned one, like actually, we may even got a couple of intros to sponsors we wanted to speak to have there been any other examples of where you'd say you know what if we hadn't had direct interaction with our kc community um then we would never have done x or we would have never have changed y is there anything that you get from from from having that always on interaction we we've had tons of things i mean my favorite was quite quite simple um we were we were in we were in the discord once and someone got uh this was really early on they got a casey tattoo on their neck right we're like fly that guy out one week later he was sitting front row right so there's simple things like that um but we have had a lot of people in our in the community particularly on the on the fight recruitment side there's there are a number of different styles of fighting around the world, you know, fighters are from all over the world.

53:21We, we've had a number of the community members identify, you know, a number of talented fighters and we've actually brought, you know, a lot of them on to where they're spending, you know, the majority of their time on fighter recruitment for KC. So, you know, we've actually had a number of people, you know, that were just doing completely other jobs that are now, you know, just, just working full, full time, you know, to sort of move the brand forward. So I think that's been a big change. And now when there's, you know, another role that's needed, our first go-to place is our community. And, you know, it's really helped us, you know, gain some very talented individuals.

54:01And I don't know, I don't think we would have hired or not, obviously it's not hired. I don't think we would have be working with those, with a number of those guys if they weren't sort of community members first. that's actually also quite a common story, right? That actually the Discord almost becomes your highest fidelity recruiting channel for specific roles where people want to contribute what they can. And there would be no contact otherwise. There'd be, you know, info at karatecombat.com. I mean, now that you see, I'm sure it happens all the time in Web3. I think it makes sense. But for us, I guess it's just interesting because these roles have like nothing to do with Web3, right?

54:41It's like, you know, fighter recruitment, right? We wouldn't expect, you know, roles like that to be filled from discord. Yeah, that's, yeah, I think, I think you're, I think you're probably right about that. Now, what about like, you know, that you've got, you, you basically have a fungible token. This is not an NFT play, right? This is a, you have a KC token, right? Um, and most of the brands that, um, we've talked, that we've spoken to, um, and also that, you know, at Science Magic Studios that we speak to are really quite a bit more focused, right now, at least, on how do NFTs and the use of NFTs across other Web3 environments drive consumer engagement.

55:22This token model is a little bit more like the zone, which has been a little bit more tricky for crypto recently when it comes to things like securities law and regulation. Has this been a barrier for you, especially being in a company based in the US where there's been plenty of you know recent news and the SEC is very active as well in trying to make examples of tokens and securities with mixed success perhaps does it has this had an impact for you as a company as well or is this something which you know you you just kind of keep going until you're told it's an issue what's the what's the vibe well you know from a high level I would say that there is a lack of clarity for sure.

56:11And I think there's a lot of other projects out there that are doing something financially related, something along those lines. What we're doing is like quite simple, right? And unlike the spectrum of regulatory risk, things like that, I think we would be on the lowest end of the scale. That being said, there still is a lack of clarity. So, you know, obviously, you know, Cry Combat's assets have a lot of value. You know, it's very important to the fans and community members, you know, that the league continues. So, you know, we've been extremely careful to do everything, you know, as perfectly as we can from a regulatory perspective based on the knowledge out there.

56:55And frankly, it's just been really costly due to the lack of clarity. So, you know, I think that for people are already taking advantage of Web3 traditional businesses, you know, all of that, and it's moving that direction. But I still think that there's a number of unneeded hurdles. And, you know, I'm really looking forward to clarity in the regulatory environment. You know, honestly, it's really unfortunate. I've had to become an expert there, you know, to make sure that, you know, everything's done perfectly. perfectly and I'm here trying to run you know sports sleep where people beat each other up right like that that's what we want to have happen here and you know there is a lot of regulatory uncertainty out there but you know it is what it is and we really hope that you know everything's cleared up I mean does it you said it's being costly do you mean literally just in paying for lawyers or is there is there some other aspect like is it inhibiting your growth in some fashion is it about where the token can be listed and limiting demand for the token like like like how how is that yeah you know it's a number of different things you know obviously you know we can you know certain things and you know only work and in certain geographies right you know that that's one of the limits um and yeah there's a there's a number of different different things out there um you know different hoops that you have to jump through you know we sort of jump through all these different hoops you know in case they matter down the road they might matter they might not you know just there's not a good framework out there for us to know what to do So you just have to go above and beyond and sort of be absolutely as careful as possible.

58:33And yeah, the legal fees for that do add up. Management's time for that does add up. And there are some things that we have to restrict or be very careful about as a result. Well, I think probably many of the people watching here will be on the same page where the appetite for clarity is obviously very, very high. and hopefully it won't just take a series of lawsuits to develop that. And yeah, we'll see because like the use of the token as an acquisition tool here is actually something which feels like it's got real legs on much wider applications than just combat sports actually. Let's switch gears a little bit, right?

59:15We talked a lot about KC, you know, a journey where like the product itself, the experience itself the fight itself is different right rules format the aesthetics of it how you're um treating and recruiting fighters there the web 3 aspect which came a little bit down the line as a way to really just amplify that grow the fan base make that experience sticky more engaged the more you earn and i i for one i'm extremely excited to see how this all unfolds um because nowadays the question of like how would you start a franchise in 2023 or how would you start a brand in 2023 when basically what the world is doing right now is juicing all the existing ips for every cent that they're possibly worth the big get bigger right so this experiment is fascinating to watch here's my question do you think or even do perhaps do you know of like other areas in this intersection between sports and entertainment where we might expect more disruption perhaps, right?

1:00:21Like think about the sports formats that have been existing for decades and decades, like tennis, like cricket's been quite good actually at starting to adopt new formats. The Kings League for soccer in Spain and you've got all sorts of stuff going on with golf. Do you think we're just going to see more and more of this stuff? And is your expectation that you guys will be the front runners on Web3 for a while or you think people might start following your lead? Yeah, well, there's a few different things out there. So you have just, you know, this weird area of disruption of sports in general. So I think for the longest time, you know, you had baseball, basketball, hockey, football in the United States, right?

1:01:04Before we even talk about the new sports out there, you know, out of nowhere, you have something that's been around forever like F1 now becoming, you know, a huge sport in the United States. States. Right. So I think the traditional sports landscape is moving around. You know, you see a number of sort of challenger sports out there, you know, beanbag, paddle ball, drone league, things like that. You know, I think that there'll be, you know, a number of winners and losers there. I think similar to everyone growing in the United States, being kind of an up and coming sport that's still been around for a decent amount of time.

1:01:41I think combat sports is sort of there as well. You know, that's across combat sports, what we're doing, you know, the UFC, I mean, even something like boxing, right. You know, arguably some of the most famous influencers in the world, you know, it's kind of becoming their go-to sport out there. And I think you're seeing a large number, a large amount of disruption among sports. And I think that, you know, a lot of people are using new technologies, web three or otherwise to try to gain edge in that, you know, you've seen fan controlled football and a number of other things. So I think there's going to be winners and losers you know we'll see who has the right mix and model to make things work you know we like where we're situated but i think you know there's a lot of things going on and i think that there's going to be a limited number of people that kind of come out of this on top to be honest you know people only have so much time and sports are a highly fixed cost intensive business and you really need a big global fan base in order to make them work so so um i've got two questions left for you um one of them is like okay so you guys have placed placed quite a significant bet on web3 then in terms of not just not just like the acquisition and engagement side of it but also just the governance of the company if there's one thing that you're like a bit like i would say worried about but that that might actually sort of be something you really need to learn to figure out this is going to be successful in the long run for this the mechanics you've chosen for casey what would you say that is sorry do you mean like some some understanding on the the web three side that's kind of key to the success on the traditional side yeah well maybe i'll just phrase it a bit more simply um is there anything that concerns you maybe about the bet that you've placed right you know when you place a hypothesis okay yeah i understand what you're saying um I mean, there's definitely a different set of risks.

1:03:38I mean, not that I'm concerned about or unconcerned about it, just something that's markedly different. I mean, frankly, if you look at our need for capital potentially, you have the traditional sports market where you have VCP investors. Obviously, if we're Web3, the ups and downs of that market can be significantly different from sports funding. You know, could be worse, you know, could be better. You know, I'm a Web3 proponent, so I want to get on that train. I think that there'll actually be, you know, more liquidity for something like what we're doing in the long run. You know, but that's different, and that's always a risk, right?

1:04:19You know, another live projects out there are highly dependent on, you know, on the price of Bitcoin, on the price of Ethereum. You know, a lot of the revenues are highly correlated to that. We're a bit different. Whether or not an energy drink wants to sponsor us based on our viewership is a lot less correlated to crypto prices than most of the Web3 projects out there. But that being said, it could still, you know, affect our access to capital, right? If, you know, we wake up tomorrow and somehow Ethereum magically blows up, right? You know, obviously something like that will never happen. But, you know, some other similar project can negatively impact us.

1:05:02even though our core business, you know, isn't as related to the price of these securities. So, you know, that's obviously a new risk. And, you know, there's some other things, you know, that we're always careful of. You know, there could always be some crazy regulatory decision, something along those lines. So, you know, there's concerns out there, but that's the case with any new space. And, you know, we'd happily accept those risks for the benefits. and you know as it as things clear up i think a lot of these things will actually end up being clarified in a positive manner and just just hopefully end up being a tailwind for us well as you said it's not like you didn't have evidence that you're that there's demand for your product with or without the uh the web3 element so in in essence like there's there's kind of a flaw no pun intended of um a value associated with that because if people find that entertaining that's that's the basics right there yep yep people always ask me uh i mean it's a ridiculous question but you know the first financial institutional question that we get a lot of the time you know from the foundation is oh could it be could it be turned back into a normal company if you know the whole web3 space blows up i was like honestly i don't know and i don't care where we're going all the way but yeah like a true founder right like funny question that we always get that you know well um okay i said there were two questions left for you um um i don't actually know if i've used them up but i know i've got one left um let's let's think a little bit ahead now um you know what's your dream for karate combat for say 12 to 24 months from now well i think the main thing is to continue to grow our community on honestly it's just fun you know the more people that get involved everyone enjoys what we're doing it's just a great thing to be be a part of three years ago if i wore a karate team a karate combat t-shirt no one had the faintest idea what it is you know now if you go out people stop you because it's a niche up-and-coming brand by a lot of people have heard of it and they say oh you know you know about that that's awesome you know i've been watching it right so it's just great to kind of see that and And then with Web3, it brings the community even closer.

1:07:20So I just love to continue growing it, get more and more people involved. That's the thing that continues to happen that I enjoy seeing every single year. And then the one big change that I'm also excited about is we have this basic app functionality. And people already like that. And I think as we add more and more different ways that they can interact with the token, and more utility, you know, more say in different things. I think that'll create even more fan engagement in really unique ways and sort of grow the sense of community even further. So that's the big thing that I'd be really interested to see, you know, probably in maybe like eight to 12 month timeframe as those features roll out.

1:08:07Well, Robert, thank you for sharing a little bit of the story about how you got here. So about a lot of the story of how you got Karate Combat to where it is today and where you see that going. Maybe for the audience, just to remind them where they can find out more about you, Robert Bryan, and Karate Combat. Yeah, yeah. Our next event, September 15th, it's in the Dominican Republic. You know, obviously, seeing in person is the absolute best way, but it's awesome online, too. Karate.com, you know, we're on Instagram, Karate Combat, you know, Facebook everywhere. And, you know, once again, a lot of these other combat leagues, people assume you have to pay a ton of money.

1:08:46You can watch our events live for free on almost all of our platforms. So tune in, you know, they're usually once a month on Saturday. Our schedule's available on karate.com and take a look at it, download our app, and we'd love to have you, you know, join the fun over here at Karate Combat. Robert, I want to say thank you so much again for spending the time with us today. I'm almost sure that the people watching here will agree that karate combat is one to watch, not maybe just for the fights, but also just to see how this whole business model using the power of Web3 for fan engagement is all going to play out.

1:09:27And I can certainly tell you that me and a lot of others are rooting for you and we'll be paying some really close attention and picking up some tokens. So thank you once again very much for joining us today. Great. appreciate you having me on. What's up, revolutionaries? Thanks for tuning in. For more content like this, head over to realvision.com and get unfiltered access to the very best, brightest, and biggest names in finance.