Some businesses were only going to be built by one specific person — it was either going to be built by that person or it wasn't going to exist at all.
The speaker argues that many iconic businesses — like the UFC, Airbnb, and Minecraft — succeeded only because of a singular founder's unique combination of traits, and that the 'esports needs its Dana White' observation extends to longevity and other industries. ✦ AI generated
Speaker 1 · My First Million · 2026-08-04 · original ↗
starts at this moment · 38:54
I think there are actually many businesses that were only going to be built by by one person. It was either going to be built by that person or it wasn't going to exist. And I don't think that's a popular belief, but when you hear these stories, you just can't imagine would there really have been another person who had the combination of the background, the the hustle, the insight, the personality, the force of will, like the combination of factors that it takes to make it happen. ... Esports needs its Dana White... anybody could have told you that, like fighting, martial arts, like it was a thing for sure, but the guy who was gonna make it the worldwide thing, it took a very special batch of entrepreneurial energy to do that. And somebody who was going to just break through walls for 20 years.
verbatim transcript · starts at 38:54
38:34built by by one person. it was either going to be built by that person or it wasn't going to exist. And I don't think that's a popular belief, but when you hear these stories, you just can't imagine would there [clears throat] really have been another person who had the this combination of the background, the the hustle, the insight, the personality, the force of will, like the combination of factors that it takes to
38:55make it happen. Uh the other time I felt this was when we were uh talking to Joe Gibbia from from Airbnb and he was telling the the true founding story of Airbnb and all of the headaches that they faced along the way and you know just being shut down and being sued and being this and being that and it was like being copied by these like much
39:12bigger more wellunded competitors and just the the number of times they escaped death in the first two years. It's like a dozen deaths that they escape. You know, they're they're out of funding and then they create a cereal box for John McCain and Barack Obama and they sell that at the conventions and they get just enough money to continue their business. It's like what the hell is going on? And so, you know, those are
39:34businesses that it's like, oh, Airbnb was not meant to survive. It broke the rules. It was supposed to die 12 times and it finally the universe gave in and was like, "Fine, go ahead and exist." It was not like just anybody was going to make that happen. [laughter] It was it was not going to happen that way. It's so good. There's this scene that um in in the movie Rudy, have you seen the the
39:54football show or the football movie Rudy? >> Yeah. Like Rudy's like talking to a priest uh and the priest is like, "Rudy, I've been a priest now for this long and there's only two things that I I've realized I believe in. There is a God and I ain't him." And uh [laughter] and whenever I hear stories of like Dana White, what do we say? or uh we we were
40:18uh paraphrasing someone else, but it was it was like make sure your passion burns so bright that everyone will come in town to like watch you burn something like that. When I hear stories like this, that's what I'm envious of. I'm like, I wish I cared about anything as much as this guy cared about a stupid card game. [laughter] >> Yeah, that's exactly right. when you hear the stories of like um these kind
40:38of like singular force of will creativity you know like the guy who who was the guy who created Minecraft one guy >> Notch yeah >> the whole thing himself you know what I mean um I I have a friend he's a very very smart venture capitalist you know this guy's like backed some of the biggest winners and he said something to me once about I remember when esports
41:01was like on trend and people were investing a lot in esports and uh Overwatch franchises were selling for 20 million a pop because they were trying to make it the next NBA and he wasn't buying any of it. And I'm like, "But this is kind of your thing. You like these like weird niched things that could be huge, but they're kind of written off and now they're starting to