The Robot Factory

Jonathan: can you hear that?

Caleb: uh, quite, quite clearly.

Jonathan: welcome back to The Robot
Factory podcast, where Caleb and

I record ourselves trying to build
software so that we can get it acquired.

I'm one of your hosts, Jonathan Bowers.

Caleb: And I am the
other host, Caleb Sharp.

Jonathan: Hey, welcome back.

You were in Disneyland for a little while.

what was the highlight of your trip?

Caleb: I did that, that custom
build your own light saber thing.

But you had to make reservations.

So before I could even really
decide that I wanted to do it.

Cause there was like three times left
and they were all late at night and that

day, and we were leaving the next day.

I was like, I guess I should do it.

You have to put in a credit card.

If you don't show up, they charge
you the full price of the lightsaber.

So you have to go.

Jonathan: what do they do if you,
if you don't show up and they

charge you for the lightsaber,
do you actually get a lightsaber?

Caleb: No, you just, pay for
it, but you don't get it.

If you don't show up and you, and
you need, you need a day before,

like you just cancel the day before.

So if you book it the same day,

like you

can't cancel So that was
a bit of a quick decision.

Cause I, I don't know, maybe
the times would have run out.

Um, I wander into the star wars land,
whatever it's called Galaxy's edge.

Right.

Go to the lightsaber building hut
and it's like me and 10 other people.

And we go in there, we
build our lightsabers

I have it for like an hour and
then I got to ship it home.

Cause it's not

going to fit on the

plane So I'll probably get it
in 10 to 15 days hopefully.

And it's not going

be broken

Jonathan: put a picture of
your lightsaber up on uh

Caleb: Yeah, I hope so too.

I have a couple pictures of me
holding it and they're super dorky.

So

Jonathan: I are any pictures of
people holding lightsabers Cool

Caleb: they're super
dorky, so well, we'll see.

Jonathan: Well welcome back seemlingly
a lot has changed since you were gone

Caleb: yeah

Jonathan: really

Caleb: I've

already been replaced.

Jonathan: that's not true You

Caleb: It's

been a week and

like well

Jonathan: speculated on
replacing you as the host the

Caleb: Uh

Jonathan: the

Caleb: how it starts

Jonathan: not a permanent replacement
Um so what happened was in the

last episode which we recorded
uh three weeks ago I believe

Caleb: Two, two weeks ago.

Jonathan: two weeks ago we recorded an
episode a real estate agent Um I'm going

to call him a friend um somebody that
we met recently and we've chatted with a

couple of Brendan Shaw not Brendan Fraser
not to be completed with confused with

Brandon Fraser I've made the mistake of
accidentally calling Brandon Shaw Brendan

Fraser in my mind And now it has stuck
in uh like a weird way uh Picture of

Brendan Fraser in our code base that we
use as testing because of that Anyways

we had a conversation with Brendan a
couple of weeks ago and the goal of that

conversation was really we were going to
chat with him about processes that he has

as a real estate agent that we thought
could be automated my goal or my thinking

was I don't have any skills to offer a
real estate agent in terms of like real

estate stuff Um but I can uh help them
automate things Cause I understand that

fairly well I just don't know what needs
automating And so I was thinking oh I'll

just I'll chat with Brendan and see what
kind of problems he has And then maybe

that'll be some content ideas that I can
use To write about and start generating

some audience of other real estate
agents who might also have that problem.

Anyways, one of the first things he
mentioned in the email exchange we

had was uh really want to talk about
property management I was like okay

let's talk about how do we automate
some property management stuff.

Go back and listen to the podcast Cause
it was it was a fun podcast We had some

good laughs but one of the things that
came up was he said he really wants

some property management software.

Nothing that he has found works
well or is just too expensive or

both And uh said he wanted to invest

Caleb: Yeah Well, multiple times

Jonathan: times Yeah we we I only I went
back and counted He said it three times

in the edited version of the podcast he
only said it once but he said it three

times in the in the recorded interview
Anyways So one of the things that we

have started doing is building products
very quickly with no code with no code

tools once we got the episode edited
or downloaded I cut all the stuff where

Brendan was talking about property
management uh sent it to our no-code

team and just gave them a brief overview
I was like Hey here's the summary of

this conversation they listened to it.

And then on Friday last week they
built one of the features they

built automated uh payment accepting
And the hard one I would say the

Caleb: Oh

Jonathan: arguably arguably probably the
easier one because they didn't have to

integrate with any kind of API one of the
things that we had talked about Actually

what do you think to ask you What do you
think they built Caleb One of the features

Caleb: Uh, well, I imagine if
it's accepting payments, it's

just like a link to Stripe maybe.

Jonathan: Good idea Yeah

Caleb: Yeah

Jonathan: they built e-transfer

Caleb: E-transfer like Interac e-transfer.

Jonathan: yeah

Caleb: they built it using
actual e-transfer or they

rebuilt what e-transfer is.

Jonathan: they they made it so that
we could automatically determine

when an e-transfer has has appeared
and to w which renter and which

uh like which amount owing So just

Caleb: Wow.

Jonathan: yeah

Caleb: Just like parsing emails or
is there like some deeper integrate.

Jonathan: Nope Just parsing emails

Caleb: Yeah

Jonathan: it's cool So I just I was
just talking with Daila she's on the

Little Robot team so she showed it to
me and there's like some edge cases

and it's not something we can actually
deploy right away but Yeah it works.

Also They've like made a design for
it Like it's not even just nasty ugly

looking like Steve Steve put some design
effort to it So they're trying a bunch

of different stuff on on Friday Um and
uh yeah Anyway so they they built built

this feature it up to some database
and it apparently works So you're not

being replaced as a host I know you

Caleb: Okay

Jonathan: some other projects coming
up that are not OpenHouse.Social

Caleb: Hmm

Jonathan: we really need to do
with OpenHouse.Social is have more

conversations with have more conversations
with real estate agents I want to I want

to build up more of an audience of real
estate agents about automation I don't

want to spend a lot of time iterating on
the features necessarily yet because I

want to get some more I just want to see
more evidence that people actually want

it and it doesn't make a lot of sense to
add to do more development I want to talk

about this other thing that we've started
building this property management thing

because the goal of this whole podcast
is we are launching and selling products.

We started with OpenHouse.Social We had
some conversations with some folks maybe

we pivot into a new product have other
products too that we're thinking about

bringing out to the show So it just
this one this one might come faster.

So you're not actually I don't want to
replace you as a host but maybe this

is now a three co-host podcast where

Caleb: Um

Jonathan: Me and Daila chatting about
random stuff It actually wouldn't

be bad because I think there is some
tasks that would need code not no code

Caleb: Right

Jonathan: yeah

Caleb: I wonder this for this
feed, like a new season of the

podcast, we kind of move on from
OpenHouse.Social and into something else.

I don't

I don't know if that makes sense.

Jonathan: I don't want to do that, no.

Caleb: You'd rather be like
episode 347 and it's all just

like

Jonathan: it's

Caleb: linear

Jonathan: every every week we've got
new stuff coming out and this is what

we did This is what we recorded I mean
this is I think I finally got it to a

place where editing this is somewhat low
effort uh another thing that happened

while you were gone as I quickly
release all all the episodes we have

Caleb: that

Jonathan: is no is no unrecorded episodes
yet to be released everything's out so

I want to not accelerate the cadence
but uh cause it's still be just weekly

not have not carry a backlog And if we

Caleb: Yeah

Jonathan: not record then we don't
release an episode and that's fine

Caleb: Yeah.

I mean, once people start complaining
about us not releasing episodes, then

we know that we're on the right track

Jonathan: Yeah exactly

Caleb: that means people
have miss listening to us.

Jonathan: Yeah that's right That's right
so what do you think about all of that

Caleb: Um, well, I still think
it sounds like I'm maybe being

replaced, not just in podcast,
but apparently in development too.

Cause I can't, I can't do the
thing, the whole thing in a day.

I mean I'm quick, but not that quick.

It's

Jonathan: Not so.

Let me clarify this.

This wasn't

done in a day

Caleb: Oh,

Jonathan: This was done in an hour

Caleb: oh, okay.

Yeah, sure

Jonathan: No I don't think it was an
hour I think it was an afternoon They sat

down on a Friday uh to meet about some
other stuff And then in the afternoon

they said okay let's focus on this
thing And uh just was also like trying

to be very disciplined about let's not
get distracted by all this other cool

stuff that we could be building and just

Caleb: Yeah

Jonathan: core thing

Caleb: Friday afternoon.

That's impressive.

I don't think I get anything
done at any Friday afternoon.

Jonathan: Yeah Cause you just sit around
and watch a videos about road construction

Caleb: Yeah, I was
actually complete tangent.

I was just looking yesterday.

There's a, there's a Wikipedia page
of the comparison of traffic signs

between English speaking countries.

was very informative.

Jonathan: Oh what's the main takeaway
from that completely irrelevant And

Caleb: Um well, one of them is that
compared to the US Canada has a lot more

picture based signs, where the U S has
a lot of signs with just words on them.

Like we have a Drawbridge,
symbol sign where the U S just

has one that says Drawbridge.

Jonathan: Hmm

I

Caleb: that was interesting

Jonathan: better to
have the words I suppose

which is more accessible right

Caleb: Well okay

But if you don't speak English
now, you've accidentally driven

off a Drawbridge and you're in the

river

Jonathan: no for sure Yeah And that's
like that's an interesting yeah that's

interesting That is interesting because we
we kind of discuss this when we're doing

design we think about like okay should we
should we put a label on this button Or is

picture enough Right

Caleb: Yeah

Jonathan: the hamburger menu
Nobody knows what that means

Caleb: Yeah

Jonathan: knows what that means

Caleb: there

these

Jonathan: studies are that if you put
the word menu on it people use it more

because they understand what it is

So

Caleb: Yeah.

we've we've, kind of evolved designs,

we, we ended up leaving a
lot of people behind that.

Don't like catch onto those abstractions
that get more and more abstracted.

Um, one of the other signs that I
thought was really clever, um, it

was a no passing sign, so it's two
cars that are next to each other.

and this was only in the
Canadian one, but it had.

It has little like people in the
driver's seat on both of them.

So you can like tell that the
cars are going the same direction.

Cause otherwise it's unclear
like going directions.

it's like a little thing that if you're
used to driving, like you're used to

drivers be in the left side of the car,

you just kind of pick that up, that
those cars are traveling the same

without any other indicator.

And I thought, I thought that was a really
interesting deliberate design choice

Jonathan: that seems that seems
hard to get right too like I

would love to know the previous
iteration they got to that to that

Caleb: Yeah

Jonathan: it it seems like it's I
don't know Maybe it seems obvious

now Uh but then you think about it
a little bit and you're like oh man

they been some thought going into this

Caleb: Yeah.

Jonathan: what I'm excited about this
podcast for us Like we'll end up we'll

end up somewhere something it'll be
unimpressive Like it'll be like okay great

This this this whatever thing that you've
built yeah it's obvious but I hope I hope

that we get there And the reaction people
have is this is an obvious thing Like

obviously this makes sense um devil is in
the details and it was actually not that

obvious And it took us a while to like
to get there I don't know maybe it will

be obvious in all of this is just a waste
of time and we just think about it hard

enough and we'll get there But I hope not

Caleb: It's about the journey,
not the destination, but also

it's about the destination

makes us money.

Jonathan: yeah you didn't go to
Disneyland because because you

loved city hopping on flights and

driving across the Mojave desert

Caleb: no, no, not quite.

Jonathan: yeah So I don't know I don't
know when that's gonna happen When

we're going to maybe bring bring Daila
on but uh it'll happen at some point I

think I think Daila is going to come on
the podcast We're going to talk about

this this new product what else can
we talk about with regards to other

like the things that we're working on

Caleb: I tweaked the music
for the podcast a bit.

I did.

I uploaded it

slack

I

made the intro a bit longer
and beepier and boopier.

Jonathan: Ooh let

Caleb: Added some edit some looping,

uh

Jonathan: on hang on hang on
I'm going to go listen to it

yeah I dig it I dig it I like the
stuff at the beginning The um I don't

know if you call them sound effects Uh

Caleb: Yeah

Jonathan: the bit that
sounds like being activated

Caleb: Yeah I had, I had fun with that.

Just pulling a bunch of
like samples from splice.

That was fun.

I like, I like.

Jonathan: It's got a little bit
more texture to it It's cool

Caleb: I might spend
some more time on a more.

Complete outro, but that'll, that'll come

Jonathan: The uh this is a this is
a process It's an iterative process

Caleb: other, it does feel
weird to iterate iteratively,

change the podcast music.

Cause it'll, I don't know

Jonathan: it still

Caleb: it

Jonathan: same

Caleb: it's like if

you watch a TV show and every time
the intro is like slightly different,

I don't know

Jonathan: when it's a little
different I'm okay with changing

interim music the bit especially cause
it's all it's all the same Like it's the

same it's the same song It's just sort of

Caleb: Yeah

it's like, is it similar enough?

I feel like if it switches up to.

don't know if you're just listening
to like Spotify or something, it's

playing through all the podcasts.

And all of a sudden the
interviews is different.

You might think that you're
listening to a different podcast.

Jonathan: it's fun too So one of the one
of the things I was reading about some

thread on Twitter like things you're
doing wrong on your podcast And one

of them was Trying to fit a formula.

Like don't do that Like just do do
what feels right What feels true to you

And I like the idea of monkeying with
some of the music a little bit fun I

don't want to do this if it's not fun

Caleb: Yeah.

Yeah

Yeah.

I agree.

I don't care what people think.

I don't care if it's not as palatable.

If the music keeps
changing, it's more fun.

Jonathan: It's more fun and and like
we're not re I mean part of why we're

recording this podcast is for Tangible
benefit but also it cause it's fun and I

Caleb: Yeah

Jonathan: it I don't want to not I
don't want to stop wanting to record

stuff And part of that is like
monkeying with the music and playing

with new ways of making audiograms

Caleb: Yeah.

Jonathan: uh being deliberate
about what I clip out uh to share

an audio grams so that they're
not really that useful Just funny

Caleb: I think there's some
charm to it not being like

overproduced and super polished.

Jonathan: Yeah

Caleb: like to think

Jonathan: anyways let's wrap this back
up to talking about real estate stuff

Actually I want to share another thing
with you I met with another real estate

agent got some ideas about automation
So one of the things that came up was

uh she was describing describing some
workflow that she does with email And I

said oh you could could you have you tried
using this snooze button And she says

what's that And I sort of guide her to
the button in Gmail And she's she's like

is amazing Like this solves my problem
And then actually Daila I brought it up

with Daila too I said the same thing to
her I was like oh yeah just just snooze

This snooze email she's like I had never
pressed that button Like I didn't know it

did that And so it it was surprising and
but it seemed really valuable So that's

one of the things I'm going to put in
my little piece of content I figure out

what I'm going to do how I'm going to
do it Um it's like just some like simple

Gmail tips You know like you had said
at once before is that it doesn't have

to be I think your quote was it doesn't
have to be good I mean I think it's a

good tip It's just it's not profound

Caleb: Yeah

Jonathan: to someone because
someone doesn't know that that's

and you

Caleb: that XKCD.

There's always someone who's learning
something for the first time.

Jonathan: Yeah.

even, people, who are.

who have used tools for a long time.

There's always something
that somebody doesn't know.

Caleb: Especially anything from Google,
like Gmail, there's so many buttons.

I don't even think I
know what all of them do.

Jonathan: Oh, no.

Yeah.

I don't know.

Caleb: Like it's it's

Jonathan: use Gmail that much,
but, um, I know what snooze is.

And so she was just describing
this workflow and I was like, oh

yeah, no, I think you could use,
I think you could use snooze for

Caleb: Hm

Jonathan: She's like what?

She tried it up.

Like, is awesome.

Caleb: That's funny funny

Jonathan: there's a, there's
a few things like that.

And I've recorded.

I've recorded a little demo of meet,
building a DIY CRM, uh, do it yourself,

customer relationship management tool.

Um, I'm actually pretty,
pretty pleased with

automates a lot of stuff.

Um, so th there's some content
there that I'm hoping to work on.

And then a conversation with, um,
somebody who, runs a platform, I want

to say for real estate agents, we talked
bunch about some different things.

Um, I made him a, uh, just a quick, a
quick demo of what the app is capable

of, uh, cause he wanted, he wanted to see
if it could work for his platform in a.

doing something slightly different.

So I quickly whipped up a, an
example of what that could look like.

kind of unsure, but he's going to
try and reach out to some of his

real estate agents and see if he
can find some, some early adopters

that might be willing to chat.

so that, that might be promising.

We'll see if that goes anywhere,
but, it was kind of, yeah.

yeah, so it's, it's still making some
progress just it's it's kind of slow.

Cause like, like we had said once before,
this is a bit of a side project, but uh,

it's potentially moving, uh, moving over
to make way to a new product that we

may have discovered through the podcast,
which is, which is pretty exciting.

Caleb: You've been listening
to The Robot Factory.

I've been your host, Caleb Sharp

Jonathan: I also have been
your host Jonathan Bowers.

Caleb: stay tuned for next week's episode.

Don't forget to subscribe on,
uh, apple podcasts and wait.

Yeah.

Jonathan: kind of everywhere.

Everywhere you get podcasts.

I think I actually have no idea.