As conventional wisdom goes, spending time before family responsibilities kick in is best spent developing yourself. Our 20s are for maximizing how much we’re learning, experiencing, and trying things out. Then, the eventual goal is to consolidate all of it into one big swing, one focused journey that you can tie your life output and identity to.

So, if I’m preaching that you as a twenty something should be constantly learning and exploring, then I’m an advocate for the multidisciplinary young mind. I’ve spent the last few years obsessed with people across every sphere, and trying my best to sit at the intersection of each of them. I’m at a point now where I know a handful of people in every industry which makes me sort of relevant everywhere. But, I’m not the guy anywhere. Having one toe in means I get invited to a lot of birthday parties but I’m left out of industry news, late to trends, and not privy to insider insights as I’d like to be.

The beauty of being multidisciplinary is that it reduces the risk of picking wrong. Carl Jung (a renowned Swiss psychiatrist who wrote on human archetypes) talks about becoming who you actually are instead of who society programmed you to become. And to achieve that, you need to spend time exploring. Nietzsche’s famous quote “He who has a why to live can bear almost any how.” emphasizes the importance of choosing right. It also sets an exciting ceiling of fulfillment if you choose well

Not to simplify it with 18th century European wisdom, picking is hard. Søren Kierkegaard (godfather of existentialism) believed the source of all anxiety comes from infinite possibility. When applied to career and life direction, a young multi-disciplinarian suffers because they can imagine too many lives at once. Especially after taking taste bite sized tastes of many different outcomes.

There’s a beautiful world though where the swing is to combine everything into one. Steve Jobs was obsessed with intersection points. Apple succeeded because it existed at the intersection of technology and arts. As everyone knows, Jobs studied calligraphy, design, architecture, storytelling, Zen Buddhism, etc. He built Apple on the premise that creativity comes from synthesis rather than isolation. But even Jobs eventually concentrated all of his curiosity into one singular mission. At some point, you will too.

In choosing a swing, I’ve always defaulted to the simple Ikigai thought framework of finding the intersection of what you love, what you’re good at, what the world needs, and what sustains you. If you subscribe to the framework, Ikigai would say your 20s are for discovering where your curiosity, competence, and contribution overlap.

Exploring many paths and getting good at many things allows us to have an easier time picking our eventual end goal. David Brooks writes about “resume virtues” versus “eulogy virtues.” Resume virtues are what the market rewards: achievement, status, wealth, whereas Eulogy virtues are what people remember about you when you’re gone: character, generosity, depth, warmth, impact. Picking your path correctly ensures you’re moving towards each outcome simultaneously.

I think many ambitious people spend their 20s accidentally optimizing for resume virtues before realizing they’re emotionally craving a path that builds their eulogy virtues too.

Once you’re exposed to enough forms of success, you start realizing some of them feel spiritually unattractive to you, even if they’re objectively impressive.

For me, startups created that feeling.

I’ve spent years around founders and venture-backed companies. Smart people with high agency. The feeling that the future is being engineered in front of you. But startup success often gears toward one primary event: the exit. And then what? You sell the thing you spent a decade building. Maybe you stay on for a retention package. Maybe you don’t. Maybe you start over from scratch searching for another idea worthy of your life. The liquidation event doesn’t magically solve all your problems, regardless of how big the check is. The founder of Loom exited for $1 Billion+ and lost all his purpose. He said it was the worst thing to ever happen to him and now he’s an intern trying to find his footing again. (real story)

Just as startup success has its own unique trajectory, so does art, film, VC, media…If you look at music, management specifically, you don’t build toward one liquidity event. You build a roster and a world around it over time. You can have many hits (which isn’t unique to music of course) but you’re always hunting and always taking bets. Similar to VC, except you don’t have to talk to b2b saas founders all day!

But seriously, in music you can shape culture and touch hearts repeatedly. That feels infinitely more alive to me than spending fifteen years optimizing toward a singular acquisition and then asking what comes next.

Perhaps this is ultimately what your 20s are for: Not finding yourself or prematurely locking into a lane, but exposing yourself to enough worlds that you can eventually make an informed decision about which game deserves your life.

Eventually you will have to choose. No matter how good at being multidisciplinary you are. And when that moment comes, the goal is not simply to become successful. The goal is to know exactly why the thing you choose is worthy of your devotion in the first place.

Jobs I think are interesting

None of these jobs are publicly accessible. Each of them are shared exclusively from the founders direct to their networks. When you email, let them know where you found it.

Brand and content associate @ Apollo Bagels

Joey Scalabrino (Vol 18), is the chef and mastermind behind the brand identity of Apollo Bagels. He just returned from a successful popup in Japan. Now with 7 stores across Manhattan and Brooklyn (and 3 more soon to open), Apollo’s success has been entirely driven by word of mouth and quality of product. Joey needs help creating and producing content. You’ll get to work with him out of his office at WSA

Joey is one of the warmest, most thoughtful, generous people I’ve ever met. He’s uniquely approachable, and makes time to care for a long list of people in his life. If I was just graduating school and looking for someone to work and learn under, Joey would be at the top of my list.

Joey@apollobagels.com

Junior Creative Director @ Four Four Entertainment

Kian Mchugh (vol 24) has been building Four Four company for 2.5 years now. They’re a creative agency built on the idea you can create art with big tech companies, financial institutions, etc. A way to redirect big sums of capital to artists. You likely know him best from their work building the ultra-viral Poly Market grocery store. They’ve also worked with Complex Con, Netflix, Disney+, JP Morgan Chase, ESPN, Panera, Lacroix, and Coinbase. Their deck is great.

Kian is hiring junior creative directors to work on lifestyle and product based campaigns. They’ve scaled to a 20 person team. They’re also hiring an executive assistant to support the 3 partners.

Kian@fourfourent.com

Paid Intern for Digital and A&R @ &Friends

Danny Serebrennikov (vol 25) started the company 4 years ago as a music platform covering genre fluid left music. Think underground alternative including Lexa Gates, The Hellp, CC Natalie, Underscores, Sophia Stel, and Zulan. They grew to 180k followers on all platforms in year one. Danny wanted to get involved with artist development and expanded out of media alone and into a label model. His first two years were entirely self funded but in the last 6 months & friends is now with AWOL as their exclusive distributor and financier of the label.

I have some friends who’ve interned for Danny in the past who have set themselves up in very nice music industry roles. Great hands on NYC summer internship.

Danny@andfriends.nyc

Paid Intern @ Anemoia Records

Ian Hunter (vol 23), formerly at WMG for 15 years (at Atlantic for a decade). Anamoia started as an imprint of Atlantic where they asked Ian to build out his own label. his first signing was the hellp, who he also managed. Last year, he got the rights from WMG to go on as a fully indie label. They just signed the quickly exploding The sound chalk makes.

Ian is looking for artists similar to TSCM and The hellp who fit into a genre but aren’t defined by it. He looks for people who did what 100 Gecs did in electronic, Skrillex in Dubstep, or Pop Smoke to rap. Stand alone acts. As an intern you’d directly assist to Ian and do A&R work under his wing. The goal is that he’d hire you full time.

Ian@anemoia.nyc

Creative Director @ Triptych Management

Jon Schulder (vol 19) founded the company to build better entertainment infrastructure for artists and creators. They manage 5 artists across music and content. It’s a young team built from 6 Harvard and Yale grads, all pushing the needle in the business of media and entertainment. You may know Wacomo, Yami Club, or Jev. Who also each hold equity in Tryptich.

Jon is incredibly connected with legacy players and leaders at big companies. He’s 25 with one of the largest independent networks I’ve ever seen. If you want to be around smart people (who need a creative director) and are extremely profitable, email Jon.

Jon@triptychmgmt.com

People to watch

Katie Lever, 26, vol 18

Katie (Kitty) grew up as an army brat, moving through 15 towns as a kid. She relied on social media early as a way to keep in touch with all the relationships she would build and then move away from. When she was 12 she ran a Tumblr account with 50,000 followers. Curating a world always came natural to her. Today, she is the personification of whimsy and eccentric as they come. You probably know her from her “Can I have a piece” series and then followed along into the iconic world she’s built around herself.

In school, katie was a D1 soccer player and spent all her free time thrifting clothes, reworking them and then selling them to girls on campus and have her friends model. Her athletic program awarded her most likely to make it in hollywood.

A true story of grit, after graduating, she was living in puerto rico modeling and moved to LA to get signed. After struggling to find her footing, she moved home to Tennessee where she was Door Dashing and working as a barista. She saved up enough money to move to New York where she lived in a small studio and literally shared a bed with another girl (not even romantically). Before her 2024 breakout year, she was a door girl, an assistant, worked in nightlfe; Kitty did whatever she could do to stay afloat.

Her philosophy in building the Kitty character is “if that unusual thing is true, then what else is true.” If this girl has all these things are in her purse, maybe she has a pet Golum too (she does). Kitty has now done runway shows, modeled for MAC Cosmetics, Cosmopolitlian, and most recently starred on the cover of lady gun.

It’s an active goal of Katie’s to be a part of a shift in consciousness. More prople to be inspired to feel whimsey, optimism, and belief in the world. Kitty is also a poet and soon to release a big project.

Jack Westerkamp, 27, vol 27

Jack is New Media’s leader in advertising and marketing news. Think Sports Center for the ad industry. He built Breaking and Entering as a social first engine to give people digestible and entertaining content within the ad world. They recently got covered in the wall street journal “the ad world is obsessed with these 27 year old guys”. They’re now running 9 million monthly views across 40k ig followers.

I asked about his thoughts on new media and what will stand the test of time. Jack says he owns the niche well, and believes there will a behavioral shift from tv to Youtube. Playing the same game as Julian Shapiro Barnum and Kareem Rahma, they’re part of a new class taking big bets on Youtube to circumnavigate big institutions and long production timelines.

I also asked what their X factor is to scaling into a spot where ad agencies have THEM on tv as opposed to CNBC. Jack says its all about delivering great content. To do so, they’ve built the show around people who don’t take themselves too seriously, guests and hires alike. So much so, that when they hire, “not taking yourself too seriously” is the only thing listed under responsibilities.

Julia Fernandez, 24, vol 27

Julia’s an experimental animator who works across many mediums. She likes to make things move that “shouldnt”, like ceramics. She likes working with tiles and still vessels. She’s worked in collab with West Elm, Emma Chamberlain, F.fern. And now she’s doing a project for a major luxury fashion brand

She believes that people are less compelled by computer generated things, they’re stopped by unique handmade objects. She thinks long term tying the art to the artist will be the artists power in the world of AI and new art. It proves work is real and human and worthy of building emotion around.

Julia’s multidisciplinary in that her ceramics work is almost always accompanied by video and animation. I asked who inspires her and who she spends time around. She shares space with 3 other ceramic artists, limsclay, gubean, and jhuangstudio. She bounces everything she does off of them. She also made sure to note that everything she knows and has accomplished is credit to the generosity of the New York community she’s found in art. Her aesthetic is inspired by experiential animation heros, John and Faith Hubly who left Walt Disney to pioneer their own career.

Her work is incredibly unique. This post is worth looking at to get a sense of how she intersects pottery and animation

Ziad Ahmed, 27, vol 26

In 8th grade, Ziad started a non profit to have discussions about the impacts of stereotypes. He built chapters around the world that landed him in the White House, in rooms with CEOs, and in conversation with global decision makers, all as a high schooler. He made it his mission to advocate on behalf of diverse young people. Though, despite his non profit success, he credits everything in who he is to being a model UN kid.

If you’ve seen, heard, or met Ziad, it’s because he’s now UTAs youngest honcho. He started JUV consulting as a junior in high school before continuing at Yale. It was a Gen-Z marketing agency with the goal of understanding the demographic as a cohort. He worked with 30 fortune 500 brands including Coach, Eos, Spotify, Lionsgate, and Fujifilm. With the network he built, he then founded Zcon, the first major conference of only Gen-Z speakers filled with CEOs and CMOs in the audience. They’ve hosted the flagship conference 3 times now, with thousands of attendees, 100 plus speakers and dozens of major sponsors. Being so deeply engrained with the next gen landed him a partnership with Cosmopolitian mag for their gen zers of the year section.

Juv was acquired by UTA, where Ziad is now building UTA Next Gen and leads a team of 20 people. Ziad is a people person with an excellent understanding of delivering insights to brands but also creating company structure and leadership that scales. Anyone who works at UTA next gen talks about Ziad any chance they get. He’s slated to be a power voice in business, political advocacy, and leadership for a long long time.

Brandon Fogarty, 25, vol 24

Brandon started a class of his own in high school. He picked a teacher to run the class and he used it as a ploy to start a his first fashion business. It was a pass fail class where he carved time to teach himself to build a biz, cut and sew, design clothes, and create a space to tell the story of the brand.

Now the founder of LES’s Komune Space, Brandon wanted to make a communal space to represent a curation of designers that were East Asia and Euro based but couldn’t break into the US because they lacked physical retail space. He goes after narrative driven brands that he can tell a story around.

Before knowing Brandon, my first impression of the store when I went in a year ago was finding a cigarette roller from Korea that dispensed one cleanly rolled smoke with the press of a well designed lever. It was from Nice Workshop, a home goods brand Brandon found out of Seoul. I remember also finding jewelry with bugs in it that I wouldn’t typically be a fan of, but I was. Brandon only has so many bug jewelry brands, so he knew what I was talking about - Chitiner. He also has a curation of fragrances from Vietnam that I encourage anyone who stops by to do a sniff test on.

His vision is to expand their physical offering on Orchard street. They just opened their inaugural art gallery next door for NYC design week and launched with a Lebanese designer (who also designed their fitting room). Whenever storefronts open up on the orchard street block, they plan to buy it and turn it into a product beyond clothing.

He sees the purpose of Komune to set up financial opportunity for people. They’re now building a tailor shop to offer free tailoring and hemming on any purchase. Their store associate ran it for a year on the side but now he’s hiring her full time as she’s gotten good enough to build a book of business for herself but didn’t have the resources to start it as a company of her own. So, the tailor shop will be their next Komune project.

3rd Space Update

There’s a past 3rd Space music highlight that I’m incredibly bullish on. At a casual poker game a month ago, we chatted about their management and I told him I’d intro him to some replacement options that could give him the care and thought he deserved. Making a list felt like telling your crush who they should go on a date with. Instead, I sent a text in the am proposing myself as a manager. He sent me a screenshot back that their ban gc had talked about it literally that night. We’re now in a 60 day trial period with them in partnership with Jon Schulder (the one from the jobs section). If all goes well, I’ll continue building my roster alongside Jon and Triptych.

Lowlights

• burnt out this month, happens to me twice a year. Sucks.

• I charge tickets because it’s important that our ecosystem has skin in the game, as we get access to more impressive people, willingness to pay goes down. A Substack writer I really look up to recently got very upset at me when I sent him a $130 ticket.

• Learning all about management from square 1 is exciting but I’m at the low point of the Dunning Kruger curve. (meaning, I’m conscious of how much I have to learn)

6/6 Event with McIntosh

• My favorite person, Tina Tarighian, made an interactive puzzle for our invitation. See it here.

• We’re taking over all 6 floors and I’m putting on what I believe to be a very well done experience.

• We partnered with Bedroom 6, my single favorite experience in New York

• Robbie Bent from Othership is sending us his favorite breath work facilitator

Our New Substack Section

• The writing will intersect historical context and insight into a current industry, contextualized by the author themself

• We have 5 more in the chamber and planning to post on a biweekly cadence

• We released our first post of Social Studies with Noah Berghammer

  • Read it here

Cannes Lions

• Thanks to Collins and Eron Lutterman, I’m curating 3 dinners at Collins House in Cannes alongside a cast of incredible brand leaders. (my enthusiasm levels are where you’d imagine). Please do text or email me if you’ll be there.

Writing is therapeutic for me, so I leaned into writing more than usual. If you’re all the way down here, it means a lot to me. Cheers

Jake

I grilled him a bit on who’s great now, who has potential, and some big successes in music who I personally don’t believe fit into the 1/1 category. He knew the stories and backgrounds of every single person I named, in detail, then justified their greatness (or lack of) with his thesis. Az wakes up every day with enthusiasm that today could be the day he finds his next 1/1 talent to impact culture with.

If you are great, Az will find you. It’s his life mission, and he’s damn good.

The question I get from nearly every college student I speak with is advice on how to network. If you are an artist or a founder (clarifying that this does not apply to typical career paths) find your collaborators, build your inner circle. Then, spend every ounce of your time focused on the product you are creating. Making it exceptional first is all that matters.

The people you want to meet: investors, editors, labels, studios, etc - their job is to find your exceptional work, get to it early, and build a relationship with YOU. They’re hungry to be first. They want a stake in your upside before the rest of the world catches on. That’s the game they’re playing. Many of them are making lots of money pursuing this as a dream job. When the work is good, they will find you.

Which means your only job is to give them something worth finding.

Paul Graham of Y Combinator (the startup accelerator that launched Airbnb, Dropbox, Stripe etc) preaches that the best founders are obsessive over 1 thing, the problem they’re solving, that is it. Rick Rubin, the legendary founder of Def Jam Records and producer behind albums from Johnny Cash to Jay-Z, puts it even more simply: the artist’s only job is to make the work as good as it possibly can be. Everything else is noise. And lastly, Ira Glass, the creator of This American Life and one of the great voices on creative development says the only way to close the gap between your taste and ability to contribute is relentless commitment to the work itself, over a long period of time.

So, if you give a shit what legends have to say, focus on the work. Concerning yourself too early with networking up is not in your interest. The work will get you there.

If you’re reading this and disagreeing, this is my note to you. You’re a very beautiful and unique color hex code (stay with me). Once you get someone’s notes before developing who you are too early, they mix with your beautiful color, which can be good. But now you get another note, and another and another and now you’re focused on the wrong game. Now you’re a blurry mix of what everyone wants you to be, now you’re a sloppy shade of brown, no trace of your beautiful 1/1 identity.

Even if you just want a wider friend network, the same principle stands. One of my favorite simple quotes is from Naval Ravikant (Angel List founder). The only way to surround yourself with interesting people, is to do interesting things.

Build for you. Relentlessly drive to improve it. The longer you do it the more you’ll see your dream network find it’s way to you.

Jobs I think are interesting

Marketing Intern @ LE Pere

Abhi janamanchi (vol 25) built AWAL for 5 years before it’s sale to Sony in 2021. Prior to, it was the largest independent music distributor and label in the country. Upon leaving, he wanted to build in fashion. Abhi now uses his store space to host a range of programming from artist performances to book readings. Performing behind the counter he’s had Cash Cobain, Omar Apollo, Ravyn Lenae, and Denzel Curry

With it’s flagship store on the corner of Beautiful Orchard and Broome, Le Pere is a euro inspired contemporary mensware brand with a mix of tailored pieces and sportswear. They also have a curation of books, photobooks, and perfumes. The label sits in the same category as Our Legacy and Acme.

Abhi’s hiring a NYC student to come on board as a creative marketing and content intern to help run socials and support on creative production. Being a face forward creator is a huge plus.

Abhi@lepere.com

Head of Operations @ Assistants Vs Agents

Warner Bailey (vol 26) is the mastermind behind the Assistants vs Agents beast. The platform has a growth trajectory in entertainment akin to TBPN in tech. What started as a meme page has since expanded into a newsletter (see the mail cart here) with 40k subs, a job board with 57k job applications in the past 4 months, and a live talk show featuring some of entertainment’s biggest names across talent, business, and media. Warner’s also hosted 20 events last year, working closely with Meta, Disney, and even their own award show with Nikki Glaser.

All his media is with the umbrella goal removing the gatekeepers of entertainment and make it a more accessible industry to get started in.

Warner is actively hiring more junior people now, but in 3 months will bring on a head of ops to be a collaborator in overseeing process and strategy for the empire he’s building.

If you want to get in early, he’s on the hunt for a short form video editor now!

Warner@sunsetnine.co

Intern @ Suede Records

Ari Elkins (vol 18) has a music page with 2.5M+ followers across Tik Tok and IG. He makes playlists and acts as a trust worthy handsome face for music discovery. With his growing platform, Ari launched Suede in partnership with Virgin music group and UMG.

Suede is signing and developing rising stars through an expert digital marketing approach. Ari only cares to find timeless artists. He just signed Spuddy, Benni, and Alize. If you listen to any of them and agree with Aris curation, they’re hiring an intern to learn the ropes of single and album rollout, A&R talent sourcing, and creative concepting.

Ari wants to work with an NYC based college student. He’s is incredibly well liked. Being in his circle will open many serendipitous opportunities for you.

Ari@suederecords.com

Graphic Designer @ Camp Studios

Cristina Colina (vol 7) is cofounder and Creative Director at Creator Camp, a collective of creators who contribute positive story driven content to the internet. They’ve assembled one of the worlds most impressive creator netoworks. 2 years ago, they did a blowout retreat at a castle in Switzerland (backed by the country of Switzerland) and Patreon. It gave them enough traction to host a film festival in Austin last year with 10 films and 1200 attendees (sold out). The feature film went on to do 100 show times across the US, got a 98% on rotten tomatoes and was the number one indie film in the US on opening week

With their outrageous creator network of storytellers who grew up on the internet and care about the direction it’s headed in, they launched a sub division, Camp Studios. They’ve already worked with Yahoo, Samsung, Canon, and Stripe. Cristina’s looking for designers who excel at social media graphics and great at copy writing. You’ll be surrounded by a highly curated class of new age internet story tellers and filmmakers.

Apply

Also, the core Creator camp team is looking for videographers and editors. It’s not public yet but if the first paragraph excites you email: cristina@creatorcamp.co

People to watch

Asha Ward, 26, (vol 24)

Now writing at SNL, Asha grew up playing piano, trumpet, clarinet, and drum. She wanted to play clarinet in her school marching band but they ran out and told her she had to play bassoon. Her parents learned she could get a scholarship as a bassoon player and sent her to band camp. It was there she got into doing improv.

Moving to Manhattan was no easy task for Asha. She started with a job as a receptionist which she took before even living in the city. She had to take a 2 hour bus to and from work every day commuting from her aunt’s house in Jamaica Queens to Williamsburg. After a few weeks of work, she found a $700 room where her roommate’s boyfriend would do heroine in the bathroom. She wrote lots of material and started blowing up as a comic around the city. She opened for comics like Mary Beth Barone and Marcello Hernandez before getting an email to audition for SNL.

She didn’t get cast, but she did get hired as the youngest writer in SNL history. Asha’s now been there for 4 years. Each show, one or two of her skits get aired. Which is a big feat. What many don’t know, is that writers also creative direct the whole skit. Set design, costume, picking cast members for roles - to be an SNL writer is to be a creative director in comedy.

Long term Asha wants to do more standup and make her own tv show. All self-produced and self-written.

Atticus Torre, 28, (vol 25)

Atticus has a airbrushed mascot. It’s name is Espi Onage. The mascot is his vessel, the propaganda machine he can default on to push any message. To date, the mascot has shown up in collab with Carharrt WIP, Adidas, and Stussy under his brand Settings.

Atticus sees the character as a yin-yang symbol. Something that represents the light and dark of the world. He likes the idea of mixing comedy and trajedy.

He got his start in NYC doing design and tour merch for Soundcloud rapper Night Lovell after the artist saw his graffiti. Young Atticus realized while working for artists that he had to make things for himself to become an artist with stability.

He goes on road trips 2x per year to do drops and sell out in 10-15 mins in whatever city he stops in. He has a cult following that translates to IRL. He finds joy going to people’s neighborhoods as opposed to selling online so he can physically put products in the hands of his supporters. Fresh off his Adidas pop up, this Saturday he’s putting out his largest ever collection of 1/1 hand painted items.

Rayouf Alhumedhi, 25, (vol 25)

Rayouf created the headscarf emoji (🧕) as a 15 year old and established herself early in the conversation of who gets represented in technology. Today she’s investing in the future of creative tech at Bessemer.

She went to high school in Vienna and Berlin, then went to Stanford to study product design and stayed to pick up a masters in mechanical engineering. She spent time on the Netflix UI team before jumping into innovation research at Adidas skateboarding.

Now she’s focused on how people interact with technology and how creators create. Artists filmmakers, marketers, anyone who pushes something to consumers requiring a creative process. She’s especially excited about in Flora (Weber Wong), Reve (Mike Speiser), Paper (Steven Haney), Untitled (Dan Lilenthal & Jose Chayet), and Tolan (Quinten Farmer). Rayouf believes that building with speed and velocity is not as important as silicon valley perceives. Finding thoughtful founders spending time understanding their audience over prioritizing breaking things and moving quick with exceptional quality is her game.

Georgia Jaffe, 24, (vol 18, before we had guests sign)

Founder of Indie Hourzz, she’s amassed 168k followers reaching 25 million accounts yearly. When she first started, it was a meme page highlighting up and coming artists. When covid hit, she poured all her energy into the page and reached out to artists who were releasing self produced music from their bedrooms.

As a student at Emerson College, she moved out of her campus dorm and into a 1 bedroom she could build into a studio. She built a team of filmmakers and audio engineers to start doing recorded shows. She’s grown to feature Rosalia, Lorde, Tame Impala, Chappel Roan, and more

With her expansive music network, she’s spread her wings into the industry to do creative and digital consulting. She works with Interscope, Capital, Atlantic, Columbia, Boom Records, AWAL (shoutout Ahbi), and Republic. Georgia’s an expert at building artist narratives and connecting them to their ideal audience.

Georgia wants Indie Hourzz to be a multi media platform known for getting to artists right before they break, pushing left of center music to the mainstream, and establishing deep relationships with festivals. She’s now hosting a stage with Spotify and Pigeons and Planes on May 16th at a Brooklyn festival (Move Forward Music), a huge win for Georgia and the brand.

Max Zavidow, 28, (vol 22)

Formerly rejected from USCs improv team for making the scene too much about him. This week Max won a Webby for video of the year

In his senior year, ahead of his banking job, he wanted to pursue stand up. After a year and a half at bank of America, he left for an easier job where he could spend more time making videos and doing open mics. He soon found his niche making 2-4 minute short films. They’re surreal and absurdist and the internet loves them. He’s since written for Almost Friday and hosted a Now This show.

Max wants to do for the internet what certain HBO shows did for television, redefining what TV could be. In the evolution of entertainment media, people used to see television as less than film, and before that film as less than theatre. Currently, the internet is seen as less than TV.

He wants to bring light to the creative magic you can put into the internet.

All Photos shot by Nic Cordeiro at our dinners

3rd Space Update

Our dinner in partnership with Red Bull for Coachella went well, we had an 11 person kitchen team and featured Sean Lew, who had never cooked for a dinner of that size (Sean’s a dancer) the beauty lies in the challenge. I spent way too much on the venue. If you saw the pics and you’re confused how much Red Bull paid for us to afford a castle, this is me admitting my impulsiveness to do grand things - all lessons to learn for next time.

Lowlights

I still perceive 3rd Space to be the same scale it was when we were hosting in professor’s living rooms in LA. I’ve been reluctant to build out necessary production teams and invest in AV equipment. I still have this feeling of needing to be scrappy when the people we’re building for do not appreciate low production.

The AV at the Red Bull dinner cut out and the wifi was glitchy during Benee and Aidan Cullen’s presentations which wasn’t my strongest look. I also was too busy producing to put adequate preparation into my speeches. They weren’t noticeably bad, but I know I could’ve done better with more thought.

Slingshot has backed us for numerous dinners now and we somehow forgot to put their product magazine in our gift box. Awful look, and a reflection of our lack of organization and no type A leader on the team.

In the next 60 days, here’s what you’ll see from 3rd Space

1. Expanding our content

   • Short form essay videos on people in our ecosystem. We’re gonna trial a more narrative spin on the “THIS is my friend” content style and do some collab posts with people we admire

2. Our next 2 events

   • Tomorrow, we’re hosting with the legendary Kid Super (Louis Vuitton’s Creative Director between Virgil Abloh and Pharrell)

   • In June, we’re hosting a 150 person listening event at the House of Sound in partnership with Mcintosh. We get to turn 5 listening rooms into whatever we want. Including a theatre.

3. Owning our hospitality

   • Sourcing a new guest chef for every dinner is my single biggest pain point every month. Almost 100% of chefs drop week of and I have to find a new one last minute.

   • USC had a supper club that climbed its way into a restaurant, Muse Santa Monica. They paved the way for us starting our first few dinners 2 years ago. One of the cofounders David Gelland is now in New York. We’re bringing him in to build out our culinary operations in house. To maintain consistent quality we need the same menu, same service, and same team every time.

4. A new column

   • Will Zimmerman, the youngest writer at the NY post, asks me once a week for intros to people from the ecosystem. He’s great at knowing who to write stories on and when. He has great pulse. Will and I are launching a new column here where we invite guests from the community to write a short essay to a curated question.

5. A job board

   • We’re building a way for our jobs to have a bit more longevity. We’re hoping it leads to a longer list of running opportunities and more people getting matched with life changing work.

I don’t take your attention for granted, grateful to have you reading and following along. Happy April

Jake

I’ve hesitated to define my own ideas around what it means to be young and excellent. But, last week Tina’s amazing girlfriend, Trudy Painter (pictured below) convinced me that with all the time I spend meeting people, I should.

Here’s my take on “young excellence”, and how I spot it.

First signs

1. Multidisciplinary interests/worlds touched

2. Despite point 1, they have a clear direction

3. Eager to talk about their work and knows how to make it legible (even if it isn’t)

4. Asks thoughtful questions about YOUR work

5. Will always find a way to offer an intro

Over time

1. Inherent sense of urgency. Ex: Calls or FaceTimes instead of texting.

2. Doesn’t use replaceable language, independently 1/1 in the way they articulate

3. They go to many events and panels, don’t succumb to the too-busy narrative

4. Cares deeply about who their mentors and immediate peers are

5. Celebrates others in public

As I’m sure you’re curious, I also consulted Tina on her definition. She says

“To be young and excellent, I find that age or experience is never a limiting factor. There’s deep wisdom present in these kinds of people. They never feel they’re too early or novice to jump at an ambitious thing or set a high quality bar.” Her other note: our friend Eron Lutterman, who’s Chief of Staff at COLLINS (8x agency of the year), has a respect and enthusiasm for tenured systems. For Tina, young excellence doesn’t require independence as a founder or artist, she says that to her, the most impressive path is growing fast in a structured system or institution.

Jobs I think are interesting

Brand partnerships @ Anvara

You’d work under Andrei Stenmark (24, Vol 6). He sends cold emails to fortune 100 CEOs with 30-40 follow ups until they respond. It’s led him to relationships with Mastercard, Delta, Go Puff, Shake Shack etc

Anvara is a high ticket sponsorship marketplace. He just raised a $3.2M Seed round led by the first investor of the biggest ad tech company in the world. They now have $1B in sponsorship inventory with ties across the MLB, MLS, and some of the biggest festivals around the country. They’re tackling the transparency problem in sponsorship markets for major cultural and sporting events. He has no direct competitors. The moat is being entirely network enabled.

Apply

Head of Marketing @ Cosmos

With a former exit to Square Space under his belt, Andy McCune (vol 25) took a shot at Pinterest a year and a half ago and hit. The biggest creative teams in the world are already on platform. Notably, the creative teams from Nike, Chanel, A24, Apple, Adidas, On Running and J.Crew all use Cosmos internally to help organize campaign imagery and references.

He Raised $15M series A earlier this year led by Google Ventures, Accel, Matrix, and Shine Capital. He’s up to 1B impressions on the platform.

He’ll soon have the MOMA, Met, and iconic legacy photographers on the platform as a source of truth archive. Long term, Cosmos will have the best understanding of a user’s taste and aesthetic. They just unveiled their shop feature.

This role is for someone more tenured.

Apply

Social Media Strategists @

Led by Danny Cole (25, vol 20) and Jake McEvoy (25, vol 21), welcome is leading the next era of taste. They leverage their access and credibility to act a a tier 1 creative agency. They service companies like Red Bull, Puma, Uniqlo, Prada, Balenciaga, Vans, etc. They’ve recently started working with series A and B startups too.

Currently earning roughly 3 billion impressions per year, they threw Fake Mink’s first North America show, directed Red Bull’s nyc party series, etc. Behind the scenes, the company posts about underground artists, then use the trust built to develop their teams and strategizing their distribution. Most recently with the sound chalk makes.

They’re looking for editorial pitches and stories. Freelancers wanting to interview, write, etc. You’re a good culture fit if your taste is central to your character

Also looking for video producers and directors for longer tail more ambitious projects

Email: Jake@welcomejpeg.com (say we sent you)

Chief of Staff @ Nucleus

You’d work under Michael Axman (vol 19) across all 3 pillars of the company. They prolifically make warm intros into their ecosystem (over 10,000, all tracked). They’ve deployed over 50M in capital into 24 companies (SPVs), and they host 50-60 events per year.

I like Michael a lot. Serial giver. Great role for a high energy character who wants to touch investing and build lots and lots of relationships.

Email: Ax@thenucleusnetwork.com (tell him Jake sent you)

Short Form Editor @ TBPN

They are the frontier new media company. If new media is exiting to you and you want to break in, get TBPN on your resume and hustle to climb internally (that’s my advice). Nik Shawa is their chief of staff (24, vol 25).

Becoming a unicorn founder in 2026 implies you’re making a TBPN appearance. To do so, you have to go through Nik. They’ve had Travis Kalanik, Zuckerburg, Sam Altman, Bryan Johnson, Andrew Huberman, the list goes on. Short form editing for them is your foot in the door. I know there’s a handful of editors reading this right now, trust, send the email…

Email: Nik@tbpn.com

People to watch

Sean Thielen-Esperaza, 29, (vol 25)

Sean has spent his most recent chapter as head of creative technology at Complex. Meaning, he speaks the same language as art directors, content creators, and designers, but can build and deploy the creative suite for them to work within. He’s recently been poached to do the same at a leading AI research lab. Honestly a nuke of a hire, I expect to read press on it soon.

Here’s why I love him. He’s straddled media, fine art, sculpture, and furniture design all his life. Each of which get astronomically less capital allocation than tech. This upset him, so he started an artist grant program to gift people (no strings) who are great in their field but wouldn’t otherwise have capital access.

He’s the archetypal silhouette of an emerging new class. It’s someone making money at a frontier tech company, but has personal interest in culture and art. According to Sean, it’s up to them to be a steward of capital, give money away, and invest in very human art. “It’s a new class of patrons.” Sean wants to make it cool to fund culture and financially back the arts.

Kayra Theodore, 27, (vol 23)

She put me on to the world of hair artistry. Kayra goes outside of the biggest Paris Fashion Week shows with no invite. She extravagantly does her own hair, people ask her who did it thinking she’s in the show. She gets to say “me” and build relationships off of it. If you see her in public with her hair done (look at her ig) she’s a magnet

She’s already had projects with Nike and recently did Nara Smith’s hair for a big shoot. Her goal (and my expectation for her) is to lead Louis Vuitton’s hair team for a season. She’s a bubbly and beautiful personality, I foresee her being a leader in the world of hair art, especially if the fashion pendulum continues swinging towards more eclectic looks.

Speaking to her brilliant character, she’s also working on a comic book of a black girl who’s hair are her powers, she’s world building a future for herself to have runway shows dedicated to her hair art (hasn’t been done).

Macy Gilliam, 25 (vol 25)

Born and raised in Oklahoma, then off to college in Spain, then studied abroad (from Spain) in Berlin, then Amsterdam and Montreal. Macy has an incredibly unique lens on the world and the people who live in it.

She got her start running Morning Brew’s twitter. Then she started touching more projects in the video realm. Now she runs Out There, a show where Macy takes field trips to explore unexpected jobs and asks questions about how the job works. She’s explored being a plumber, working a hot dog cart outside the met, she drove in the Google street view car, learned to be a magician for a night (which she sold tickets to). The show has grown to be the best performing show on Morning Brew’s Youtube channel. She wants to move into the documentary space long term.

Tina Tarighian called her young excellence.

Ash Gill, 27 (vol 24)

I’m generally an advocate of friends who’s work is both unapologetic and doesn’t remind me of anything else. Ash is in a class of her own as a comedian. She’s embarking on a nationwide tour to do a live comedy/music show.

Ash started @a_twink_and_a_redhead in college with her long time best friend (twink). The two of them share a playful and deeply politically incorrect sense of gay humor thats led them to be called the most iconic pop duo of all time, almost exclusively by the gays.

They own their audience. I’d even call them category defining in the gay comedy. It’s led them into a series partnership with InStyle mag, a guest spot on Andy Cohen’s show, etc. I expect Ash to be around for a long time, her career is still in it’s infancy considering where I believe her ceiling to be.

Carly Heitner, 26 (vol 23)

Carly founded an agency that connects influencers into Broadway shows. She started her career doing socials for shows but says she was more enthused by the growing creator economy, so she left to build on her own company.

She says that theatre industry is infamously 10 years behind. She built an influencer network by cold emailing talent and offering to get them tickets to shows. Easy “yes” from them of course. She sees herself as the intersection of Broadway and pop culture. The company has a strong cultural tailwind as more theatre leans into cultural relevance, as seen with Jake Shane’s casting.

She also has a short form show, Picnik Playlist, where she talks about theatre while sitting on the ground with actors. She asks questions they wouldn’t get on the media circuit. The page has accumulated 180k followers over 34 episodes. Young Excellence.

All Photos shot by Nic Cordeiro at our dinners

3rd Space Update

My close friends know that I lack consistency when asked what the long term vision for 3rd Space is. Writing about the journey here every month will give me a way to collect my thoughts, but more importantly, share them with you.

We’re hosting Red Bull’s pre-Coachella dinner this year in LA: writing it gives me goosebumps. It’s been a dream of mine to work with Red Bull AND to have my hands in the machine that is Coachella (even in a small pre-Coachella capacity). I told my friends I was committed to planting roots in New York and not jumping at shiny things. But fuck it, when Red Bull calls…

Team: Caitlyn Liu has stepped into a COO role on the team. In 2 months, she’s organized our production, art direction, systems, and managed to detangle my brain.

My current fixation: There was a point where I thought this newsletter would be the business model. At another point, I thought we’d open a physical space, I’ve toyed with an agency model too. The more reflection I’ve done, the more I’ve given myself the grace to think without the constraints of a definitive end goal.

Similar to Andrei and Anvara, 3rd Space will need to evolve into something where the moat is network. What if our two worlds of thought (tech and art) were intertwined by one operating entity? What if CAA and Sequoia lived under the same roof? If we know everybody, we can be the bridge of trust for anything.

Current dilemma is that I don’t yet know a way to intersect the two advantageously and avoid building 2 companies at once. Just my current fixation as I make more intros across startup funding, hiring and GTM/ creator partnerships, music, film, etc.

We have sponsors: We now have 2 amazing partners for our dinners!!

Slash is the fastest growing fintech platform of all time. Highest treasury yield + highest cash back on the market for founder banking. We can intro them to our tech and startup guests. If they end up onboarding Its a win win. They flew Simar Boparai in from SF for vol 25

Slingshot manages all healthcare, taxes and accounting for freelance and creative talent. Easy obvious win for everyone involved. Their founder Sanil Chawla, is a dear friend and vol 23 alum.

We situated it where both sides of our ecosystem are being serviced, non competitively. We got amazing reviews from our guests and both sponsors after our most recent dinner. Planning to keep riding.

Hoping to get back into my flow of writing these. Email me if you land one of the jobs (people love forgetting to tell me)

“Collective effervescence.” It originates from Émile Durkheim, a founding figure in modern sociology. He describes it as “when people share in ritual and experience, they are united.” Today the term is actively used in the theatre community to articulate that when we share space and move together, we move further, faster. There’s also a very human buzz that feels amazing to experience. (so I hear, I’m no actor)

It’s obviously become cliché to make IRL bets with anti-AI as the justification, but I think those who align themselves with communities, rituals, and the like-minded will move further, faster than people who fall into an isolation hole. Here’s people and jobs that I feel are aligned with the term.

jobs I think are interesting

Chief of Staff @Life On Film

These are the pioneers of the street interview explosion. Two years in, They’re finally getting their first office and expanding their team.

Life on film passed 1B views last year. They hit 1M on YouTube and have 5M across all platforms. They’ve partnered with brands like Microsoft, Meta, Nike, Home Depot, Fuji film and worked with talent like post Malone, Dua Lipa, President Biden, Scarlett Johansson, Travis Scott, Tame Impala, Fred Again, Mr beast, Ed Sheeran and more. They passed 1M in revenue and expect to double in 2026. Short form content story telling machines are exploding in revenue right now LOF is not only the leanest team, but they’re leading the charge.

They’re also on the prowl for a video editor to join them. They’re content specialists who understand how to tap into the mainstream zeitgeist better than anyone (the numbers tell). 100k base + profit share bonus.

If you know someone who may be a fit, they’ve put up a 5k bounty.

Apply

Production Intern @We Are Ona

Ona is the coolest culinary studio in the world, and there isn’t a close second. I don’t know them personally, but I did a project with them for Frieze LA when I was in school and their team is an eclectic bunch of Europeans. They do a beautiful job story telling and creating a post modern allure. They work with clientele like Chanel, Gucci, Saint Laurent, Valentino, Hermès, Jacquemus, Givenchy, etc. If you get the gig you’ll get to say the same.

*Actual details: 6-month internship (Jan- June) at their In-person NYC office. They note that it must be for credit at an accredited school

Email your resume to alison@weareona.co by January 31, 2026 (say we sent you)

Project Manager @ Matte Projects

Matte is one of the world’s premier creative agencies. Beyond an agency, Matte is a nyc institution of projects and people. Great leaders building companies, making decisions in entertainment, working in tech and vc, many got their start at Matte. They call it the Matte Mafia. It’s a boot camp. Kids working at Matte have been known to work longer and harder than their banking peers. Coming out of Matte, whatever you want to do next is on a silver platter.

They have an incredibly high quality bar, hire well, and do great work. Their founding team is still intimately involved (check out Matt Rowean’s Substack)

There’s tons of open roles linked below

Apply

Event Producer @ 3rd Space

I know, a little corny to promote my own job on my newsletter of putting other people on, I’m self aware. I promise

Managing relationships with venues, rental companies, wine sponsors, coordinating set up and breakdown, tracking costs of production, I want to work with someone who loves it, excels at it, and wants to be a thought partner in making our experience 11/10. We have ~20% of each guest list saying “it was the single best thing I’ve ever been to, they’re onto something”. I want that number to be at 80. If we work with you, you’ll have access to our entire network. If network access and knowing interesting people doesn’t excite you, it’s not a fit.

Email 2 new guests we should consider + your resume, Jake@3rdspace.xyz

people to watch

Phoebe Mckinley, 25 (vol 21)

Her dad was a journalist for the Times, so she became a lover of people places and things while moving around every 3 years. Post Cornell, she started her career as an exec assistant at A24 films for their co-founder and COO as well as the CFO. She’s now bounced to Cherry Lane Theatre, A24’s longest running off broadway theatre in NYC and culture staple in the West Village. She’s their youngest producer.

Instagram | Linkedin

London Jackson, 27 (vol 22)

Got signed to Roc Nation as a 14 year old then went to RCA as a teenager and toured with Tate McRae. Started his company Kickback a year ago, a designer hardware brand that makes nostalgic tech, all screenless, all retro-futuristic feeling. All 12 of his drops have sold out. Most recent drop sold out in the first minute (100 pieces). He’s hit 1M in revenue with no ad spend. London says his tailwind is people spending time offline and romanticizing products that enforce the same. He makes great short form on ig too.

Instagram | Linkedin

Trudy Painter, 25 (vol 22)

Former MIT lacrosse player, Trudy comes an intersection of top creative and top technical talent. She was involved in all the creative work around the Google Gemini roll out. She led their strategy on how they promoted it to an everyday audience, which she did successfully. She double majored in CS and media studies while publishing research for the MIT MEDIA LAB. Out of school, she was recruited to creative lab 5 at Google. She then joined as the second engineering hire at Gizmo. Everyone always asks me for top engineers, Trudy is great. Trudy will build. If you can, build your relationship with her early.

Instagram | Website

Josh Charow, 27 (vol 22)

Started his camera journey climbing buildings, bridges and abandoned subway stations to photograph areas the public doesn’t see. As a 14 year old, he came up shooting the Rap Caviar Hulu show. Shot Tyler the Creator, Roddie Rich, Coi Leray, etc. He started his IG page 5 years ago, now at 700k followers. He hosts a series on artists who live in uniquely visual studios and lofts around New York City. He’s a master story teller of their lives and the buildings they live and work in. It’s been written up in cultured mag, New York Times, NY mag, etc. He’s amassed 100M+ views in the last year. Josh says he’ll always be making documentaries, finding stories, and telling them

Instagram | Website

Mia Arbucci, 28 (vol 22)

Mia grew up playing 7 instruments. They’ve since become a music curation extraordinaire. They started their NYC career building all of elsewhere’s socials strategy before being poached to be the face of POSH and growing the page to 65k in 3 months. Mia has a very monotone (kinda bitchy but hot fun) character in their content that hooks. Mia now has a music curation ig page that’s grown to 30k followers in her first 2 months. They make and share playlists that tie to niche subgenres of music with crazy backstories. Mia’s lining up artist interviews next month. They’re also on the market as a content strategist.

Instagram

people you should hire

Robbie Stinchcomb, 30 (vol 15)

Spent his first 5 years as a designer at Adidas innovation, had multiple shoes worn in the Olympics. For the past 2.5 years, Robbie was a lead designer at MSCHF. Now full time freelancing out of his Chinatown studio. 3D printers wall to wall to do projects for clients ranging from Katy Perry to college kids with an idea. He calls his work the thought to finger tip pipeline. He has work on the moon through the lunar archive, has made animal prosthetics, and designed the shoes for Wakanda which went on to win an Oscar. Robbie can create any wearable or 3D concept. I endorse

Instagram | Website

Dylan Eskovitz, 20 (vol 13 highlight)

Started interning at Apple TV for 2 years as a 16 year old in LA. Founded hos company Circus Seventeen as a 17 year old. Now a 20 year old NYU student working on $100,000 production projects (nobody his age is doing this). He now has a hyper specialization in doing productions for funds and startups. His work takes incredibly tasteful color grading and sound design and applies it to a world that often doesn’t get it. Great to work with. Bet on the kid!!

Instagram

Sofia D’Angelo, 26 (vol 17)

A 21 Clive Davis NYU grad and founding member of the band Michelle. She sang and led creative for the 6 person band. They played Lolapalooza, Gov Ball, Outside lands, toured with Still Woozy, Arlo parks etc. They were signed to Atlantic records and Wasserman on the agency side. The band after playing at a soldout Webster hall farewell show in October and now Sofia is a solo independent artist looking for a full time job in social media and creative strategy somewhere in house. She brings her music industry network along with her. Sofia is a yes girl, phenomenal communicator, and will evangelize whatever project she works on.

Instagram

events happening in NYC (where I expect you’ll find other great people)

Bec Lauder & Friends @ Monsieur

Wednesday, Jan 28 @830

Expect a circus of performers and a lower east side crowd. Bring lots of energy, jumping and likely dancing. Bec puts on a loud and energetic show.

Tickets

Ray Kush @ Laissez Faire

Friday, Jan 30 @11

Come ready to dance. Hosted by our friends Victor Houston and Tolga Dogan Laissez Faire. Kash brings an underground sound that blends deep house, tech-house, and techno.

Tickets

Hannah Rothbard @81 Leonard Gallery

Saturday, Jan 31 @6

Rothbard’s first Solo show in NYC. expect a Lower east side crowd with a touch of elegance. This show brings collage and painting together to tell the story of identity. Our resident artist, Nic Cordeiro’s number one gallery opening pick of the week.

@ 81 Leonard Street

Chloe Southern, Ariel Bold, & Rebecca McCartney @NUBLU

Saturday, Jan 31 @7

Come chill out and listen to a 3rd Space alumnus. Chloe has a beautiful voice and acoustic sound. Nublu is a well curated intimate spot in the East Village. Bring a friend, make a friend, we expect lovely energy.

Tickets

closing note

You probably found us through Instagram. It’s all ominous and loosely explained over there. To add some color, we’re a dinner series connecting exceptional (but low ego) young people. Pretty simple, nothing new. We talk to every guest on the phone via a referral system. We do our best to help as many people as we can by empowering them with other great people.

We follow all past guests. If you know someone who’s been, ask them about us.

Fondly,

Jake