QWERTY: Bit Goin' On

It’s a sort of ‘down tools’ time at the moment with a public holiday happening in Australia. Except its on the weekend, and there is no recognised public holiday replacement next week in Vic (there will be in NSW however) so you might say: there is no public holiday. But we sure do like thinking that there is one!

With that in mind, it’s a smaller email. No big song and dance. I have plenty happening in my world, soon to launch. And just like last year, I have been absolutely floored with chronic back pain (sciatica) which reared its head again 3-4 weeks ago with an absolute cooked vengeance, and left me flat on my back, literally.

But, it’s an interesting observation the next time around. Resilience stronger. Ability to seek proper care faster, and more pronounced. And I got a needle in my spine/adjusted my sciatic nerve yesterday which - even though I am agnostic- I am PRETTY SURE I saw god in that moment due to the out of body pain experience.

I have been semi-regularly writing GROUPED these days. That was not intentional. Some was to do with the age old ‘bEeN bUsY’ but moreso, I have had some exciting ventures bubbling away and it necessitated some extra thought on how it all worked together: GROUPED and <new things>

And I landed it. Sure, some organs re-arranged in the process of over-thinking, both cortisol and dopamine vying for my attention post haste, but I took a dip in Henley Beach Adelaide in Jan and somehow, some blockers became very clear all of a sudden, and that set me on my path of prep.

What this means is that GROUPED stays for sure, but will be even more expressive from my tippy-tapping on my QWERTY. Interviews, features, reports, but essentially, only me to you the reader (when I probably envisioned more people writing for GROUPED initially)

I have news on the way, I won’t overdo it today, I have an ask below about an event Im running in Sydnay, and I hope you have a great day (maybe even a public holiday)!

Event: AFTER DARK SYDNEY

That’s right, I’m running an event in Sydney next week, and it is a bit of a storytelling event, bit of a party, and there is a slight story in it too. This week, I even invented a little rivalry with good friend Rayn Ong (startup investor) about my needs to defeat him on the attendance for his event, vs mine. It’s silly, but enjoyable to me.

With the AFTER DARK event this time around, its actually quite a poignant moment for me, as having run FuckUp Nights in Melbourne and Sydney for 7+ years, The Abercrombie Hotel ended up being the site of the very last one (sadly without my wonderful co-conspirator Josh Lipscombe) and extremely ironically, ALSO at an event called AFTER DARK, albeit another version. Feels fateful.

Having run AFTER DARK with my new co-conspirator Kali Norman in Perth and Adelaide for ~200 signups each time, this one is promising to be a bit of a doozy, with nearly 250 signed up already, and I must defeat Rayn Ong’s 430+ (we will)

Its focused on people building hard businesses, predominantly in challenging or sub-culture realms.

I had an objective to lock in someone working in psychedelics/neuroplasticity, so how good that I was able to lock in the amazing Dr Sam Banister of Xylo Bio (fka Psylo) who has become a good friend, a fellow A24 film geek penpal, and a former guest on a ‘Future of Psychedelics’ event I ran back in 2022.

I had an objective to lock in someone working in extremely hard hardware, and then the team at Caligra presented themselves, which is nice serendipity as Caitlin Zotti the COO is actually from Perth - where AFTER DARK previously popped up, as have I regularly - and some investors I really like have invested in them. They make computer hardware for hardcore developers, and I think its sick.

I had a VERY SPECIFIC objective to make sure we had someone who worked in sextech/sexual wellness and a person who worked in disability focused tech, and we happened to luck out and find Heather Morrison who worked in both. A few years ago, she co-founded Bump'n - a disability-driven startup on a mission to put pleasure within reach for an overlooked community, creating the world's first sex toy for people with disabilities. It’s a fantastic story, and I’m looking forward to platforming it next week.

And I have another special guest (or even 2) that I’m working on :)

This event was given a small grant by Blackbird, who are curating the Sunrise conference, the reason I am in town (to announce my new stuff). Tell a friend in Sydney on the Tuesday night that they must attend, they will have a good time, and they are actively contributing to a good case here (annihilating Rayn Ong). RSVP HERE, and see more details via the jump 👇️ 

TO ROUND THINGS OUT

> I have a new business venture to announce on Monday, which I am EXTREMELY excited for. This is a true definition of a lifestyle business on the side, but one which really scratches a big creative itch and business opportunity I see out there for myself to go get, in an extremely fun way. I have a partner on it too, look fwd to telling you more. This is the first ‘proper business with a proper business partner’ I will have launched under the GROUP GROUP banner, and this excites me a lot. This was always the plan, to have multiple ventures under that roof.

> I have a new podcast coming out next week too, called CHEQUE CHECK, which features me interviewing a lot of investors who invest in a lot of different things. There is a funny gap of *investors don’t know how to market themselves but have to to send the signal out that they are funding companies 🤝 I know tons of very good and noble investors and want to do a good service for founders to know where the cash is* 15-20 min episodes only, self-produced by me only, I made some merch for it (see below) and LFG

> I am doing something extremely interesting with Claude/Anthropic in a few weeks time, will announce that next week also (jesus, bit going on next week I see)

> And, my new mysterious venture, which is focused on education, launches in second week of May, and that will see a new publication launched, a heavy emphasis on education, and I’ll plant a few seeds in the leadup to launch of what that looks like. Extremely excited to do that, and I had a slight pang of pride telling my Dad about it last night as he has been a teacher for 35+ years and has had a rough trot lately on the health front. It’s nice, the little things.

A Little Curation For Ya

I have long been a bit of a Batman fan, and the associated rogues gallery of villains. The Animated Series in the 90’s was everything to me. I heard they were making this Clayface movie, but that it would be full-on body horror, which had me intrigued, and then I saw the director had made Eden Lake, which might be one of the most fucked up movies I have ever seen in my life. TLDR: I’m excited!

And here’s my new CHEQUE CHECK merch, c/o the great crew at Full Cowboy. More on more merch, soon.

With that, I’m off. Thanks for getting GROUPED, and I’ll be in your inbox, on Monday. Cheers.