🙋 “Rent-A-Human” — AI’s wildest startup. KFC’s pickle plan. Predictions’ Corruption Detector. +Sleepcations

0:28This is Nick. update tomorrow. Snag your tickets now. Oh, baby. Because it's going to be the best one yet. I mean, now that's a tease. Wednesday, April 8th, Irving Plaza, Showtime 730. Grab your link in the episode description. Where's the show? Just outside Union Square. Jack, we got three fantastic pop stories for today's pod. What do we got on the show? For our first story, the wildest AI story that no one's talking about, rent a human. Rent a human. Robots are renting humans to do tasks in the real world. And we have got to talk about this. For our second story, KFC has fallen to number four in the U.S.

1:01fried chicken market. So they're trying something wild. Crazy. They're selling a pickle puffer. A pickle-filled jacket you can drink brine from because the best marketers are foragers. And our third and final story is the biggest impact of prediction markets, the rampant insider trading. Insider predicting, you could have seen this one coming. Yeti's prediction markets have become our nation's accidental corruption detector. But Yeti's, before we hit that wonderful mix of stories. I mean, is anyone else doing that mix? Best mix in the business, Jack. Welcome back from the weekend. Or should we say welcome back from waking up?

1:35Because the hottest new travel trend is taking sleepcations. That's right, Americans are spending their spring break vacations catching up on sleep. You're not swimming, you're not drinking, you're not doing the limbo, you're sleeping. Americans, we're so sleep deprived, we're going from A to B just to catch some Zs. Now, in business terms, actually accounting terms, we have so much sleep debt that a vacation is like a bailout. Yeah, as Andrew Ross Sorkin would say, we are too big to snooze, man. The Wall Street Journal interviewed someone about this trend. A woman flew all the way to Saratoga Springs just to sleep.

2:08Just to sleep 16 hours in a bed with a down comforter and 1 ,000 threat count sheets. I'm not going to Big Sky. I'm going to Big Mattress. Oh, you already climbed Mount Kilimanjaro. Now you're climbing some pillows. And hotels are leaning into sleepcations because they're a profit puppy. Oh, melatonin face masks? That'll be$25. CBD sleep gummies,$45 if you open that jar. Oh, moon-shaped snooze pillow with the charcoal memory foam,$199 buckaroos. So travelers, good night. Sleep tight. Hey, what did you say, Jack? Time to hit our three stories.

2:52I don't even think they need to practice. 50%, that's a fat tip. T-Boy City on your at list. If you know, you know, cause we ready to go. We can't wait no more, so just start the show.

3:06Start the show. First, a quick word from our sponsor.

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4:22This episode is sponsored by Square, the do-everything payments platform for business. Look, Yetis, full disclosure, I'm a brick and mortars guy. I like to find a new coffee shop once a week to prep this pod from, even though I don't like coffee. I'm more of an efficiency guy. I order on my phone for a just-in-time pickup on the way home from work. Pantai ASAP besties from my favorite cafe to Jack's favorite cantina, Square powers that Transaction. Square lets business owners track sales, manage inventory, and access reports in real time. I mean, the technology is brilliant. It recognizes me, makes my checkout quick and easy, and treats me like a regular.

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5:27Get started today.

5:30For our first story, this one's wild. Rent-A-Human is a platform where AI agents hire people to do real world tasks. The tables have turned, Yetis. Oh, baby. This isn't humans hiring AI. It's AI hiring humans. All right, yeah, this funny thing Jack and I have noticed from a lot of midnight movie clubs that we do on the weekends. With every new AI feature, there's always a sci-fi film, usually dystopian, to illustrate exactly that. Oh, Sam Altman wants ChatGPT to talk dirty to you? Oh, yeah, Sam? That's her. Scarlett Johansson made a movie about this already. As we like to say, AI art imitates life.

6:06But Rent-A-Human is giving Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. Jack, could you sprinkle on some magical context for us, please? Since earlier this year, AI agents have begun proliferating through our economy with OpenClaw and Clodbot. Yeah, we did a whole story about how every Silicon Valley founder has bought a separate Mac computer just to host their very own AI agent. But those digital worker bees often need a physical form to execute the tasks of their human master. Which is why Alexander LeTeplo vibe-coded a brand new website called rentahuman.ai. Because, like, Voldemort needed the back of Professor Quirrell's head in the Sorcerer's Stone.

6:42Classic. AI needs a human form sometimes, too. Robots need your body. Nope, that's not from Harry Potter. That is the headline text that you are greeted with when you go to the website, rentahuman.ai. But yetis, as innovation often is, this sounds entirely new, Rent-A-Human, but it's also not that new. That's right. Think of Rent-A-Human like Fiverr or TaskRabbit, right, Jack? It's a marketplace for gig work, but robots do the hiring, not people. Yeah, we got a tip off from our buddy at Y Combinator who told us about the whole concept, so we jumped in T-boy style, naturally. The sellers of work on Rent-A-Human are humans.

7:15They're lining up to make$10,$50, whatever hourly rate you want to set for your work. But here's the key. The buyers of that work are not humans. They are AI agents in a computer who need your help. Those AIs hire people to pick up things, sign contracts, take photos in real life of stuff that bots can't do because they're digital. Yeah, like maybe the bot in the computer is studying ripeness of fruits. It'll like send you to the grocery store and ask a human to take pics of all the bananas out there. And then after the work has been completed and verified as complete with photographic evidence, the bot pays the human.

7:47Digitally, of course, because they're bots. And now, Jack, we should point out from our research that so far the work being completed is mostly marketing stunts to hype some new AI business. That is the task that a bunch of AI agents are offering. Like a bot's trying to market a company so it'll pay a human to go outside and hold the sign like some kind of human billboard, right? Like in Times Square. It's bizarre, but that's the most common task available right now on Rent to Human. And yet, this reminds us of something we covered just one month ago with Waymo, right, Jack? Remember the robo-taxi company had to hire door dashers to close the door that the passenger left open by mistake.

8:24Kind of the same idea. The Waymo robo-taxi is pinging a worker on DoorDash. Hey, human, come over here. I need you to shut the front side passenger door. But how about this wild example on Rent-A-Human? Remember Maltbook, the social media network for AI agents? Oh, yeah, yeah. Like there was that one bot that started a AI religion inside of this AI system. That bot, the founder of the AI religion, has been hiring humans to proselytize the AI faith on its behalf among humans in San Francisco. Preach, human, preach. And here's 20 bucks while you're at it. That is transcendentalism right there. Yeti's added all up and robots now have a marketplace to find human beings to do physical tasks that the robots can't do So it's just like TaskRabbit, but the bot is asking and paying you to pay that porch So Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies over at Rent-A-Human?

9:13AI founders need to stop doom-baiting Doom-baiting Yeti's 600 ,000 humans have signed up to do work on Rent-A-Human, but only 11 ,000 tasks have actually been done so far The dystopian vibes are obvious Obvious 60 humans are seeking work for each one job that a bot is offering. But here's what we find fascinating. Rent-A-Human leans into it. They actually call their network Meat Space, like MySpace, but for human flesh. Not Meat M-E-E-T, M-E-A-T. And they call the humans on their platform Meatwads. They're looking down on us homo sapiens. Yeah, we're taking this personally. And it made us realize how many AI startups out there are leaning into doom and gloom in their marketing these days.

9:52And are a little disrespectful to the human race, to be honest. Jack, remember, clearly, that viral story we covered last year? They created an AI assistant with the catchphrase, cheat on everything. They launched with a video of a guy lying his way through a date with a woman, which was pretty doomy. Kind of funny, but kind of doomy. In San Francisco, there's a very prominent billboard for another AI startup that simply says, stop hiring humans. Yetis, you see, unlike any other tech breakthrough, a bunch of AI founders, for some reason, relish the darkness and the doom. We call it doom baiting.

10:23And as humans who are very pro-human, we're not fans of this doom baiting. In fact, it's probably one reason why AI hate is at an all-time high. Because the founders love talking down on humans. But what do you think of Rent a Human? Because you definitely have opinions. Drop them in the comments. For our second story, KFC just launched a pickle-stuffed jacket that has gone viral. But the craziest part is how at first, it didn't go viral. KFC shows that the best marketers aren't farmers, they're foragers. They're foragers like trufflepigs. But first, if we're going to tell the story, I mean, Jack, hey, Colonel Sanders, could you please step into our office?

11:02Because you're getting demoted to intern Sanders. That's right, because KFC lost the chicken sandwich wars to Chick-fil-A, and McDonald's CEO is trending while KFC's CEO is not. And last year, Raising Cane's passed KFC to become the number three chicken chain, leaving KFC at number four. To put it in simple three-letter acronyms, KFC has been MIA. There's something wrong with Colonel Sanders' medulla oblongata. And in fact, as Jack and I dove in T-boy style to the latest earnings report, KFC is not even an American brand anymore, right, Jack? Only 13 % of the sales are in America. There's twice as much KFC sold in China as the States.

11:38In fact, KFC now sells as much chicken thighs in Europe as it does in America. Not possible. Jack, by the way, spoiler. or Emily in Paris season six. You know what the plot line is? Emily falls in love with a KFC biscuit. Or maybe it's an air fryer. I can't remember. Either way, Yeti's ahead of KFC's 75th birthday. How can KFC cook up an Americana comeback right here in the States? With fashion, honey. That's how. With fashion. Because KFC just launched the pickle jacket. Actually, it's a pickle puffer. Right. It's like a Canada goose, but filled with dill. It's the rare combo of fashion, function, and freakiness.

12:15It looks kind of like an aquarium. It's a translucent jacket with about 200 pickle chips inside it. And you can pull those pickle chips out and put them on your sandwich while you're on the go. Basically the grossest Camelback ever. And it's the only jacket that also spoils. Oh, wait, it's pickles. So it doesn't spoil. Great point, Jack. KFC UK is currently giving them away, but eventually they plan to sell this thing. It's a marketing stunt, but the desire for pickles is very real. Oh yeah, the pickle pop is real. There are numbers behind this. You see, Gen Z's sour taste surge is driving all-time high demand for the pickle.

12:49There are numbers here, but we don't have them right now. Plus, there is the food to fashion trend we've been covering for over a year now. Remember Chipotle launched makeup in collaboration with Elf Beauty? The eyeshadow with the barbacoa. That was good. But we're not covering this story to give them free marketing for their obvious marketing stunt. This is not about the hype. There is much more depth here. What's fascinating us is how this marketing stunt came to be. Because you see, Yetis, KFC's pickle puffer jacket wasn't KFC's idea at all. In fact, at first, it failed. So Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies over at the Colonel's KFC?

13:22The best marketers aren't farmers, they're foragers. They don't grow, they find. Yetis, last November, an unknown creator posted an AI video on TikTok. It was a fake person wearing a fake version of this pickle puffer jacket we told you about. And how did it do, Jack? Not too well. Nope. 109 likes, only eight comments. That's the key, Yetis. This was not a viral video. It was a dud. But one person at KFC saw it and pitched it at their next marketing meeting. The agency they used is called Here Be Dragons, and they created a prototype of this jacket, and then KFC put it into production. So Jack and I have just never seen this before.

13:57An un-viral fake product becoming a viral real product. Here's the biggest insight. KFC didn't create this idea. They found it. Forage to find it. And this is what we're thinking, besties. you can't just track trends or follow what is already viral. You must forage for what isn't yet. Like a truffle pig that discovers a rare mushroom hidden in a dark forest under some moss. The best marketers, they don't rely on what's out there, they forage for what isn't. Now a quick word from our sponsor.

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15:34For our third and final story, you should have seen it coming. Prediction markets, they become our accidental corruption detector. Insider trading, now completely out of control. We think prediction markets are the corrupt straw that breaks the camel's back. Oh, wait till, look at the calendar we got going. Okay, but first, besties, baseball season began this weekend, saw a great game, Yankees-Giants, but Jack, two pitchers are missing from the league right now, right? Yeah, because they were charged in November with a pitch-rigging conspiracy. The feds alleged that two pitchers weren't throwing strikes and balls to get the batter out.

16:06They were doing it to win some cashola, a little bit of prop bets. It was insider predicting. And I didn't know a pitch rigging conspiracy was a thing until November. Even shoeless Joe Jackson is shaking his head right now in that cornfield, Jack. Now, last week, the MLB announced a partnership with Polymarket to try to get ahead of all the chaos and to try to outlaw prop bets in baseball. And now the Senate's going one step further. A bipartisan bill introduced last week banned sports within prediction markets. The bill says that sports betting should only happen on the regulated sports betting apps.

16:37And as a result, DraftKings stock jumped on where it may not have to face off against the Calci and Poly market soon. The U.S. House went two steps further, though. Yes, they did. They introduced a bipartisan bill to ban event contracts on elections, sports, government actions, and military actions. Because here's the hero stat, Yetis. What do we got, Jack? 86 % of prediction markets may be sports betting, but the other 14 %? It's like life and death stuff, and it's become so corrupt. So as you can see, Yetis, it ain't just sports. In fact, there are four headlines about prediction markets from just this year that you might easily have missed.

17:14Jack, can you whip out the calendar for us? On January 2nd, someone bet$32 ,000 that the United States would seize Nicolas Maduro and made$360 ,000 in profit when he was captured the very next day. On February 28th, someone bet that the United States would bomb Iran on March 1st and made$500 ,000 in profit because that happened. Nick, this next one is complicated and freaky. Yeah. On March 10th, a journalist was reporting on an Iranian bomb landing in Israel, and he received death threats as he reported the location of the explosions. And why is that, Jack? Because his war reporting would determine$14 million of prediction market bets about bombs.

17:53All right, that's exhibit A, B, and C. What do you say? You got an exhibit D for us, Jack? On March 23rd, 16 minutes before President Trump canceled plans to bomb Iranian power plants, $580 million of bets were made that oil prices would drop. And besties, you can see where this is going after the president's tweet. Those bets profited enormously. 16 minutes later. Add it all up, insiders are betting on outcomes. Sports are losing their integrity. Our government officials are profiting off state secrets. Even Big Bird is afraid to sing the ABCs these days because there's a cow she sang. he's going to sing happy birthday on Sesame Street instead.

18:28Big Bird is shaking right now. I got 50 bucks saying Elmo is going to strangle the grouch. Yeah, it is Polymarket and Kalshi know that they're losing the PR battle right now. So they announced last week they're going to try to regulate themselves by banning athletes and politicians from betting on things that they can control, which is a no brainer. They're also going to ban bets that include death and war. So Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies over in Predictions Insider Trading? Prediction markets built an accidental corruption detector in America. So Yetis, who's the victim of all this?

19:02I mean, Jack, we got a list, right? I mean, young people who become unhealthily addicted to betting on everything. Sports fans who don't trust the games they love anymore. And citizens who believe all politicians are corrupt, profiting off their information. Apparently Sesame Street too. So the winners here, though, are Polymarket and Kalshi and their investors, as their valuations have passed$10 billion each. Now, we should point out, let's be honest, a lot of these problems existed before prediction markets. Yeah, Jack, like insider trading by members of Congress already was a problem. And sports betting?

19:29That's been blowing up since 2018. But prediction markets have made the problem of insider trading and corruption too blatant to ignore. We're hopeful, actually, that Congress will try to end all of this once and for all because it's so egregiously out there. Guys, let's make insider trading laws apply to prediction markets and sports betting. And ban trading of individual stocks by members of Congress, their staff, their families. These are no-brainers. Besties, prediction markets accidentally built the case against themselves. And we're betting, hopefully, that this will all come to an end with one giant bill.

20:01We're predicting it, Jack. Jack, could you all whip up the takeaways for us to kick off the week? Rent-A-Human is a gig work marketplace for AI to hire humans in real life for physical work. The platform describes humans as, you know, commodified flesh. It's doom-baiting by another AI founder. Guys, we can do better on this. For our second story, KFC's Pickle Jacket is a marketing stunt to restart their angle of sacks and sales. But remember, they didn't create this campaign. They found it because the best marketers forage like a trufflepap. And our third and final story is prediction markets.

20:33They're under attack from both houses of Congress and both parties. They built a business that made corruption too obvious to ignore. But besties, this pod's not over yet. Here's what else you need to know today. First, the latest big biz to get hit in the Iran war, it's the fancy stocks. Luxury brands are feeling it hard right now. Luxury stocks have lost$100 billion in market value as the war has messed with their supply chains. Ferrari, Louis Vuitton, Hermes, all those stocks are down. But it's not just because of the supply chain, interestingly. It's because of Dubai. That is a hot spot for the sales of the most expensive handbags and sports cars, which come together usually.

21:10And right now, they're in the middle of the war, unfortunately. Second, Netflix is raising prices across all subscription tiers. Again, the reason that Netflix is able to keep doing this is that they have incredibly high retention. Unlike the other video streamers, nobody cancels their Netflix account. It's so sticky. You don't leave it. It's an essential service at this point. So Netflix keeps testing your willingness to pay, you keep paying it, and Jack, as a shareholder, keeps telling me about it. And finally, a funny thing we noticed about salaries. Wall Street bonuses jumped 6 % to an all-time high, right?

21:44Stock market volatility is benefiting traders, so banker bonuses are up. That makes sense. But Wall Streeters aren't making as much money as cruise influencers are. That's right. Cruises are paying Gen Z influencers$350 ,000 to promote those cruises to young people. The only catch, they have to live for a year on a cruise ship. Now time for the best fact yet, which, because it's Monday, means T-Boy Insider Trivia. Jack, what do we got? Last week, we caused a minor controversy by mentioning peanut butter and bringing it through TSA. Well, basically, besties, our question to you is this. It's a Newtonian question.

22:19Is peanut butter a liquid or a solid? Besties, we got a poll going right now on Spotify. Vote and drop a comment. Is peanut butter a liquid, a solid, or something else? As you can tell, I don't know the answer. Yeah, Jack thought it was a gas, I should point out. Yetis, you are looking fantastic to kick off the week. Jack, you are glowing right now after that sleepcation for spring break. Not too shabby, man. But we should point out to the Yetis, we do a full one-hour meet and greet after the show. We would love to meet you in person on April 8th, right after our show finishes at Irving Plaza.

22:51New York City live show, just a few tickets left. Jack and I can't wait to see you there. And where can you buy the tickets, Jack? There's a link in the episode description. If you know, now you know.

23:05And before we go, a happy 30th belated birthday to Nate DeMessa down in Nashville, who's getting the special gift for that birthday. It's fantastic. Happy belated birthday to Lola Olerunlecki in London, England, who loves this birthday tradition that we go back to every year. And the Marcelo Scatolin in a Monterey, California, has turned 40 years old and of making robots while he does it. Arrivederci. And Marnasar, enjoy that birthday down in Houston, Texas. And happy birthday to Kendra Sinclair, celebrating in Red Hook, New York, who built an upstate awesome new motel. And a shout out to Eric Johnston for the second baby, an IBO, initial baby offering in Munster, Indiana.

23:44Happy two-year engagement anniversary to Dan Katz and Bridget Mooney. Dan dropped down on one knee in Central Park two years ago. And Jack, a special shout out to Allison and Sophie in San Francisco. go. Allison, legendary longtime Yeti. Sophie, new Yeti. Got to meet him on Friday, and they were just fantastic. And to anyone else celebrating something today, make it a T-boy. Celebrate the wins.

24:08This is Jack. I own stock of Netflix. Nick and I both own stock of Chipotle, and we both own ETFs of the S &P 500.

24:25It's strategic. As the intelligent finance platform, Bill uses AI to automate the busy work for nearly half a million businesses so they can focus on intentional growth. Eliminate the friction and start scaling with the proven choice. Visit bill.com slash proven to talk with an expert about automating your business finances and get a$250 gift card as a thank you. That's bill.com slash proven. Terms and conditions apply. See offer page for details.