AI Summary
5 min readTrung Phan on Building Audience, Betting on AI, and the Power of Distribution
The 1% Rule and the Group Chat That Changed Everything
During the spring and summer of 2020, Trung Phan joined a group chat called the "100K Club." The premise was simple: a handful of writers—including Sahel Bloom, Sean Puri, Sam Parr, Nick Huber, and briefly Courtland Allen and Julian Shapiro—all had 10,000 to 15,000 Twitter followers and wanted to figure out how to reach 100,000. Today, several members have audiences approaching a million. Phan's argument is that this dynamic is replicable in any field: "The 1% of any field will just be there exchanging ideas. As soon as you have a couple people that are the top of their field exchanging ideas, no one else in that field that wants to compete can see that ground." The key insight is that Twitter's value isn't the "university" part—it's the social part. The same dynamic that made McGill's downtown Montreal campus a party hub also makes Twitter powerful: being able to connect with people, exchange ideas, and get into the right room. Phan points to "car dealership guy" as an example of someone whose niche content was so good that it elevated him beyond his vertical, attracting celebrities and CEOs.
From Partying to Publishing
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What you'll learn
- 1 (00:14) **McGill, Party School, and the Social Foundation of Success** - Trung explains how partying at McGill was an underrated career prep, especially for writing on the internet.
- 2 (03:30) **The "100K Club" Group Chat and the 1% Rule** - Trung describes the origin of the group chat with creators like Sahel Bloom, Sam Parr, and Nick Huber during COVID.
- 3 (09:37) **Trung's Origin Story: From McGill to Vietnam to The Hustle** - Trung details his non-linear path: partying at McGill, moving to Vietnam, writing a comedy screenplay, and eventually working at The Hustle.
- 4 (13:52) **Inside The Hustle: Daily Writing, Burnout, and Non-Traditional Talent** - Trung describes the intense daily newsletter grind at The Hustle during COVID and what made the team special.
- 5 (16:57) **The Value of Old Media vs. The New Substack Model** - A discussion on the power dynamics of traditional reporting versus independent writing.
- 6 (24:31) **The New TechCrunch: Lenny, Packy, and Decentralized Gatekeepers** - The conversation shifts to how attention has decentralized from a few tech blogs to many niche Substack newsletters.
- 7 (26:01) **Leaving The Hustle: The Pull of Independence and Audience Ownership** - Trung explains his decision to go solo, driven by a desire for creative freedom and the realization that distribution is half the battle.
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Show Notes
Today Greg is joined by Trung Phan. Trung is the co-host of the Not Investment Advice podcast and writes the SatPost newsletter. He was formerly the lead writer for the Hustle. In this episode, Greg and Trung talk about working at The Hustle, owning your distribution, and how to get the most out of ChatGPT.
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LINKS FOR THIS EPISODE:
Production Team:
https://www.bigoceanpodcasting.com
Trung Phan:
https://bearly.ai/
https://twitter.com/TrungTPhan
SHOW NOTES:
0:00 - Intro
7:45 - Meet Trung Phan
14:50 - How Greg sold 5by to StumbleUpon
24:17 - Why you need a through line in your work/life
28:15 - The story behind Bearly.ai
35:30 - Competition vs. opportunity in AI
41:58 - How Greg used ChatGPT to get paid $109K
49:30 - Should TikTok be banned?
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