John, welcome to the show, it's great to have you on. Can you tell us a little bit more about yourself?
John Hopcroft:Absolutely, Alex. My name is John Hopcroft. I'm from a little old city in New Zealand called Palmerston North. I'm 16 years old, and I'm currently going to a school called Palmerston North Boys High. And I guess I'm the founder of the Cosmos Championship. In April 2 of this year, I started this competition, and all the way throughout this quarantine and throughout the rest of year I've been developing it and building it into something which can really help thousands of students across the world.
Podcast Host:Fantastic. Well, I know that a lot of students are getting involved. What are the latest numbers in terms of like the number of people who are competing in the competition?
John Hopcroft:I believe that we've recently just hit the 300 registration mark. And that is in a really unique scenario with no paid marketing, no paid, advertising has been done. And we're just beginning our outreach program. So start reaching to some youth organization, some big national debating organizations to really try and boost those numbers.
Podcast Host:Fantastic. And what's your goal? At the end of the day, like what are you trying to aim for here?
John Hopcroft:Our targets for end of this year is to try and reach that 1000 registration mark. And our long term goal for this competition is to just try and benefit as many people as possible from it, because fundamentally, the reason why I started this competition, is because there's more international debates and opportunities for someone who isn't the best or wealthiest debaters in the world. Yes. So this competition is to really try and bring out normally exclusive opportunity of international debating everything that so anyone can do it, or any high school student can do it.
Podcast Host:So was the reason you started the competition? Was it that philosophy that was the driving force? Or was it COVID locked down boredom? That was the driving force? Or was it a combination of the two? Can you take us like back to that time in March, April, when the idea started to become a reality.
John Hopcroft:I initially dreamt up the idea during my school holiday, so January and February. And when I looked into it, I went, I don't think there's a way I can do this to a standard I'm happy with I'm too busy. You know, I came up with a bunch of excuses, where, hey, this is a really cool opportunity. But I've NCAA level three, and I have this and I have that. But then COVID, even though COVID brung up a really unique situation where all of my big projects or my big extracurriculars, and my academics really took a backseat as you spoke about there was that sense of boredom, or rather what I took it as, as a bunch of free time to explore this idea, and really, really build it from an idea into a really impactful project.
Podcast Host:Okay, well take us through that first couple of weeks. Because I know that in that first few weeks, you've probably got the excitement of the idea. But the more you explore the idea, the more questions that come up about how is it going to run? What kind of registrations are we going to do? What competition format are we going to do? So there was a lot of questions to be answered. And I know a lot of our listeners are probably pretty keen on either a taking part in you know, the cosmos championship, or indeed starting a competition of their own in some way, shape, or form. What were some of the challenges that you face in those first couple of weeks.
John Hopcroft:So something I've always enjoyed is just problem solving and trying to come up with new ideas and innovative solutions. So those first few weeks were definitely really tough. It was something I was spending maybe 30 or even 40 hours a week, just designing the website, building the competition. And the way I set it up as is that as I built the competition, I built the website with it. So there was that direct reflection of, Okay, I'm building this idea and I'm putting it straight down on paper or rather on the internet immediately. So it was really just trying to use that fantastic opportunity you had in COVID, which was plenty of spare time, and just making the most of it and going just using your head and using online resources and using current or somewhat similar competitions to try and learn from that. So at the time, I think about three weeks into the building the competition, New Zealand had a national online debating series where something like three or four rounds of debating, and I participated in that and also try to engage With adjudicators different teams and also the management side behind it, to try and learn how it's all being done. So I guess one of the main lessons I've learned from setting up a competition like this is learning from work, which has already been done and developing on that. So initially, the idea was pretty intuitive. The Cosmos championship or a free international online debate, competition had never really been done before, which puts me into a bit of a sticky situation. But there have been online debate competitions and large scale online debate competitions. So it's really trying to apply the lessons learned from those situations, and putting it into my own competition.
Podcast Host:I love what you said about just starting the website, because I think getting a website up or getting a Facebook page or an Instagram page, those kind of steps, I have kind of milestone I'm committing to this kind of moments. Can you take us through I guess what your rationale was to go from? I'm thinking about it, I'm still thinking about it. I'm coming up with excuses. There are all these different things, you know, happening to then just being one day saying, yep, today, the website's going up, we're doing this. So what was the impetus for that decision?
John Hopcroft:Oh, I suppose you could say finish the seven series of Suits. Simplified a bit, I think I've been something like one week or two weeks into the national lockdown in New Zealand, and I went, Okay, I'm really not doing anything which can help me in the future. I'm not being productive, and I'm wasting this time. I worked out later, something during the COVID lockdown. students like me had 714 hours to postpone. And to take that action, I really saw it as, hey, what can go wrong here. Because a fantastic thing about doing this when you're young. And doing this as a student, is that I have very little risk when I'm starting a competition like this, say if I was an adult, and I had a job and you know, was productive to society, I had far more risks. When I want to start a big project, I have a mortgage, I have a family took a look after I have a bunch of commitments which require my time and my income and my focus. But as a student, especially during say, school holidays, or a pandemic, there's really no consequences to when you try and do something big, you're using up your time. But really, that's already worth nothing, if you just choose to watch Netflix the entire time. So really, my first step into it was just accepting that, hey, I have really nothing to lose here. And the great thing with a website as well, and the software I'm using as works is that it's free to start up a website. Yes. So it just allow me to go into that no risks, no consequences action, where I can be like, Okay, I have to spend the next 700 hours doing this and it fails miserably. But from it, that's fantastic. And I've done something productive during COVID, I've designed a website, which in itself is a pretty cool project, whatever can succeed, and I can move down the path we are now we're starting to build momentum, and starting to really provide some benefits to people all across the world, which is great.
Podcast Host:And one of the things that I really liked what you said there was that you sounded like you're hyper aware of the benefits or advantages of being a student in that you
John Hopcroft:Um, I never personally had that moment. But don't have to pay off a mortgage or anything like that, which is very, very true. It's something that I said to students quite regularly. But was there any kind of moment when you were going down this path? Where you were thinking like, Who am I to start this competition? I'm just a, you know, 16 year old from Palmerston North in New Zealand? Shouldn't this be like some debating champion? or shouldn't this be some debating coach or society? Who starts something like this? Was there ever a kind of moment saying I can, who am I to start this? I experienced that situation, from almost anyone I told the competition about where I was like, Hey, I'm starting this big thing. And they all looked at me, when are you sure? I mean, isn't there something else you can do better? Or the I don't know, just do this intern or something else. But I felt like having that second guessing yourself doesn't really help you in any sort of situation. Because at the time of starting this competition, I was 15 years old, I'd never started anything big like this. I have no experience in the vendor organization. Yeah. But if you look at the past, that's how almost anyone starts. You fall into that bit of conundrum where, okay, I need a job to have experience but I need experience to have a job. Yes. And I saw this as an opportunity to just skip the middleman and just give myself my own experience and learn from it and develop my own opportunities. Because so often now and I remember thinking about this at the time, is that there's a very, very linear path to success same from Sports to academics, okay, I do well, in my sports team, I get captain. If I do well, as a captain, I get selected for the regional to like, get into the national team. Boom, I'm an all black eventually, yes, but there's always so many steps and so many things which can hinder You in that process. And when I saw this as is a way to skip past that linear progress and control myself. So instead of just focusing on academics focusing on maybe becoming the capital of like debating, I saw this as a little shortcut where I can create my own success and own opportunity.
Podcast Host:How has this changed your status as a debater? What do you think people around you are generally thinking?
John Hopcroft:I've never really aimed for having that big status change, I suppose. I suppose when I talk about the success, I think about it very personally, and just reflecting upon myself. And I never want to show off like, hey, look at what I can do I start this big thing, be impressed by my achievements. Um, that was never really a goal, starting the competition. And with that, I don't say openly brag about or try and get people's attention with this competition. So with that, I haven't really seen any major status change at school. However, I have seen recognition from friends from people who usually ignore me. And they go, Okay, yeah, we didn't know you can do that. And that's actually really impressive that you can do something like that. And I think I first experienced that when my when there was the live recording of my TED Talk. So in I think about three or four months ago, I did a TEDx talk about this big journey I did with the cosmos championship, and all the lessons I learned and a lot of what's being covered in this podcast, and a few people from my school, I think, maybe 10 or so watch the live version I and over the phone days, and then over the following weeks of school, I really saw their perspective change on what I'm spending my time on and what this competition is. Because Yeah, everyone initially sort is just okay, storing this time away. But they really saw that perspective change afterwards.
Podcast Host:It can be intimidating for other students to look at you and say, gee, this guy has some clarity, right? Because at the end of the day, what a lot of 15, 16, 17 year olds are looking for is direction and clarity, and achievement in a particular area of strength and a particular area that they can call their own. Do you feel that as being one of the major outcomes for you at this point, that it's kind of helped you understand a little bit more about what you might want to do in the future?
John Hopcroft:I definitely think so. Because I, myself, am a Crimson student, and I've had fantastic support from Crimson Education with this project. And this entire time for the last two years or so. I've been like, wow, wouldn't it be so cool to go to, I don't know, one of the best business schools in the world, you know, your Wharton, your Harvard, top of the class schools. And when I looked at the type of people get into these schools, I never really saw any connection to how I could achieve the exact same thing. And you look at it, and you hear from on the news or not on the radio that, hey, this person just started a project, which benefits thousands of children in Africa, or this person just is the captain of the Math Olympiad or some astonishing achievement. And my perspective, at the time, I saw no way I could achieve the same thing, because I was looking down that almost exact same linear path of Okay, I'm not in a situation I'm not in, I'm not in a city, where I can really get those big opportunities. I mean, I don't mean to disrespect policy, nor in any way. But you do have not as many opportunities are not as big of an opportunity when you aren't and say New York or Singapore, or one of those major hotspots of opportunity. But when I started this competition, I never really intended for it to be a way to boost my profile. But then I began to saw like, Okay, this is beginning to open some doors, and I'm getting some really good experience here. Which even if this project fails, can benefit me in other areas of my life. And I experienced that with the TGC where I was able to get on to the organizing committee for the tiger global Case Competition, thanks to the cosmos championship. Yes. So I felt like starting this competition definitely opened some doors for me, even though I never intended the competition to do that.
Podcast Host:In terms of the skills and the knowledge side of things, one of the things I'm always fascinated by is that I feel like when students like yourself, go into a project like this, there is what you already know. And there's the things that you need to know to make it a success. What knowledge gaps did you need to fill in order to get this up off the ground?
John Hopcroft:I think when starting this competition, um, I was good at writing emails, I was good at speeches, and I was good at math. None of that really got the rights to setting up a big competition like this. But when starting it, I recognized where I need to learn very quickly, I recognized the importance of outreach, the importance of visual design, the importance of setting stuff in a way, which is really easy to follow and engage with people. So I guess the one skill I did have before the competition was my public speaking background, and my email writing and all that, because that allowed me to explore some fantastic outreach opportunities, such as I remember, at the very start, the competition was still a very basic idea. I was able to have a zoom call with the founder or CEO of the urban debate leagues, which I think is one of the biggest debating leagues in the United States with over 11,000 debaters in their program. So that was the one skill which did help me and I think, in general, having that background and public speaking and writing clearly benefits you massively. But apart from that, on the event organization side, I had zero experience, I had no idea how to use Excel. It scared me. I had no idea how to use Wix, I had never done any visual design, I had no experience in Photoshop and Canva. I didn't even know what Canva was at the time, and what the main programs were use now. And at the time, I'd only heard on works through the incessant YouTube ads.
Podcast Host:So there was a lot to learn there. And that's basically how you ended up after you finish suits. You're like, Okay, I'm going to learn all these things, right?
John Hopcroft:Exactly. One of the first things I did was just identify the main challenges for the competition, and try and see what I need to learn to address those challenges. So initially, you had timezones. Okay, how are you going to set up a competition? Which is global, when someone in the US is 12 hours behind me?
Podcast Host:Yes.
John Hopcroft:Or just trying to address those problems? Okay, how am I going to have debates? How much is this going to cost? How am I going to engage with people? How is this going to have any credibility, and a lot of it is just developing and forcing yourself to learn new skills. One of the favorite things I like to do with this competition is work on the website, I that's something I love with it. And I've really began to love visual design, and marketing and that sort of area of this competition. But before I had no idea what it is, but I suppose time and determination can really fix anything, even if you have no idea what to do.
Podcast Host:Do you think it's perfect?
John Hopcroft:Not at all! It's made significant progress over the lock from where it started. There's been significant improvements in how it looks, how it feels, how the competition, the general vibe of the competition, but by no means is it perfect, perfect. And I really doubt in any way, you can make a project like this perfect, I suppose one of the main things I've learned is that there's always something to improve. You can look through the website and be like, Okay, this can be improved, this can be improved. This part of the competition seems unclear. This part of the competition doesn't benefit this group as much as I'd like. So by no means is this competition. Perfect. But I suppose that's nearly impossible to achieve on such a global scale.
Podcast Host:Absolutely. Yeah, I think I mean, it's kind of a facetious question in a way, because I knew the answer would obviously be no. But I think it's one of those things that a lot of people get caught up in perfection, and feeling like they need to have all the answers before starting, when a lot of the questions are still unknown at that point, because it hasn't been tested thoroughly enough to even know all the questions that are going to come up. So were you surprised in those first couple of weeks at how much still needed to be done? Because I, you know, I've started projects before myself, and I'm like, Oh, my gosh, I've thought about this, this is awesome. I'm going to give it a go. And then you start doing it. And then people are like, have you thought about this? Have you thought about this? And you're just like, Oh my gosh, so many different things come up? Was that a challenge for you? And did you ever feel like, you know, saying, Oh, this is too much work? I'm going to give this up? Or what were your thoughts about some of the challenges you faced along the way?
John Hopcroft:I mean, constantly, there was always challenges like that. And the main challenge, which has hindered this competition, is that as it is debate competition, you need a large amount of registrations to make it as efficient as possible. So in those first few months, I was just sitting there going, Oh, this competition, it's not going to work. There's not enough registrations. I'm only having maybe four people to view the site every day. And it seemed like it was going down that path to fail, really, because there's just this overwhelming challenge, which I was in a situation which was nearly impossible to address. Because how do you get more registrations? Okay, make the website better? How do you do that? I'm already happy with the website. I found myself stuck in a loop where I need more registrations for this competition to start to get more registrations. I need say money, okay, don't have money. I need to prove this. I don't know how I need to outreach more. But that isn't working. So I just, I think you'll always find yourself with one major challenge. And what I found really useful is that as I developed the competition, as I put it on the website, is that I was able to address most of the challenges, because since I didn't really know where it was going, I can ask myself questions as if I'd never seen it before. So I was able to build it in a way which answered most of the questions on how it would work. But there was still that overwhelming question of, okay, more people. How do I get more people? I don't know how. But eventually, it just started to build up itself, surprisingly, through outreach and which improves Seo?
Podcast Host:Yes, yeah. And just kind of starts getting a bit of momentum organically from there. Talk to me a little bit about how you've balanced this with school.
John Hopcroft:I think there is this odd joke in University where you have the triangle of the three essentials, sleep, social life and academics. For me, it's sleep academics and the Cosmos Championship. And I've chosen the route where it has been really challenging, because I've just reduced sleep have reduced the amount of free time and I will admit, I haven't been the best at trying to balance this. And I'll say that is one of my main, I wouldn't exactly say failures. But one of the main drawbacks I've had from this competition, is that there was that major change. When school started in I was like, Okay, this is now a big part of my life. And what do I do with this, because it's starting to pick up? Yes. And I found myself in a very challenging area. And I think that's nearly impossible to avoid, avoid with something like this, where as a high school student, and I'm an accelerant. So doing academics a year above my year level, that was a very hard thing to balance. And I just found myself having to try and push and push to an area I'd never thought I'd be able to go before, usually, for me to do an assessment and might take two or three weeks for the last three assessments of wrote them and two days each, just by staying up for maybe 20 hours of writing 6000 words, which is exceptionally challenging for me to do. But I think that's also a very important skill to learn. And a very important insight about myself, and how difficult it is to do something like this.
Podcast Host:Were you kind of it seems like you're taking on the workload of you know, a student who would be a couple years older, or even like not just a student, a person, he could even be a young professional, who's taking on that kind of workload, balancing all these different things. And you start working out shortcuts and you start working out the limits of your concentration and you start expanding your concentration, you start reducing procrastination, is that something that you went through? And what was that experience like?
John Hopcroft:Before starting a project like this, I would always say that I'm quite a busy person, I spent 10 hours a week, I do pretty high level academics, I do that sort of stuff. But as I pushed more and more, which got increasingly more difficult, I just realized how many more hours there are in a day. Yeah, and how far you are able to push yourself in that area. Because I am most certainly makes made some sacrifices in the amount of free time I have an amount of time I'm able to socialize with my mates outside of school. But I think those sacrifices are necessary to do something like this. And even now, I'm sure that I can be far more busy than I am able to. I think at the most, I think the most busy I've been this year was just last term where it was in the middle of the TGC. And I was just sorting out a management team for the competition. I was in the middle of doing a TED talk and also heading up towards marks. So usually, I'd spend maybe three months on each of those things, except I was doing all of those four things in one month. So it was just a massive squeeze of focus. And I suppose I surprised myself on how much stress can value. That doesn't sound like a very healthy thing. But it's very surprising and actually very satisfying to see how much you can achieve. Because one of the main things which has been able to keep me driven with this is that when you put effort in, you do tend to see it come back. So I made a massive effort investment when I had nothing else to do. But as I had more and more pressure come on to me. I saw success which almost paid off immediately. So for any students in this situation, well it needs to be noted that it is a very challenging situation to be in and it's something which I'm sure that many adults in many high level people throughout their life have to experience but I feel like getting used to That now really sets you up for the future and being able to handle that massive pressure.
Podcast Host:What do you think the students who signed up to be a part of the team? What do you think that they were looking for? Sometimes students literally just want the title and the experience, they just want to be like managing committee of the cosmos championship, and they'll do the most menial task. And they'll be happy with that, as long as they've got the title. Some students, they say, I've got my own ideas, I really want to drive it in this particular direction. So what's it been like managing the team? And what do you think, you know, what have you learned, I guess, about managing students and their expectations in I guess, a volunteer basis that they're on.
Unknown:Probably one of the main things that I've learned with this is that passion is a fantastic force for competition like this. And I think every single person on the management team is helping this competition and working on this competition, not just for a title, that are super passionate about and then they all recognize how important and how beneficial this competition can be. So in much the same way, they're doing it for the exact same reason I am doing it because they love what the competition aims to achieve. And they love the direction in which it's going. But and much the same way. I also want to set up, set it up. So they are able to learn how to start something like this on their own. Because we're looking over the applications. And while interviewing these fantastic individuals, they all have these aspirations to do something that drives 100% support. And much like anyone who might be listening to this podcast, they want to achieve the exact same big things, but they don't really know what to do, and they don't really have any idea on how to start. So with that, I want to provide that opportunity to let them engage with this competition, and do much more than boring, menial tasks and actually see how the entire competition looks like.
Podcast Host:One thing that I'd like to just touch on there, john. And I think it's such an important thing, right? where students are buying in with passion, because they know what the goal or mission statement of the project is. And it's more than just debating, it's not just a debating competition, as you said, it's about providing access to international debating during a time of COVID. And during a time, where or Well, you know, historically, were international debating, as you said, is only really for top debaters and for people in addition to be able to afford international travel. So how important is it to have your team and your competitors understand the philosophy and mission statement of the competition that you put together?
John Hopcroft:I think it's exceptionally important that they understand the purpose that everyone understands the purpose of this competition, because it really helps them get into the mindset on how to make the most out of it. As a participant in it. It's really recognizing how unique of an opportunity this is. It also provides that opportunity to create international connections have witnessed that firsthand within the competition, that while debaters debated and waited for adjudicators to finish adjudicating, they started talking about each other and seeing each other's different perspectives, ideas, ideals, and started to form connections between rounds, which I thought was absolutely fantastic. Because when they recognize that this is an international stage, something where you can access from home, but debates on thousands of miles away, you can really make use of creating your own international opportunities. Yeah. And from the management team side, it just really helps them see the purpose and version of this competition. And get behind the idea. Because someone can only do menial or boring tasks for so long, right? Yes, if you don't understand the purpose of something, you can't really get behind it, right. And of course, with any management team, you are going to some stuff which you don't want to do some boring stuff, playing with Excel for a few hours to make sure everything works. I admit, it's not the most exciting thing to do. But when you realize that, hey, when you realize how this boredom or how this pain in the butt will benefit the purpose of this competition, and benefit the audience of this competition, it really allows that passion to drive you. And I need to admit, it needs to be noted that passion, that you can't only hope for passion to drive someone I feel like providing other opportunities are also essential, just to keep that passion going.
Podcast Host:Yeah, exactly, exactly. Now, I just want to just go over one key part of the logistics of the competition, and then we'll get into a little bit more about what you want to do in the future as well and where the competition might be going, and of course, how our listeners can get involved in the cosmos debating championship. Talk to us a little bit about the outrage pace, because obviously that's like such an important part of the competition. It's been a very integral part of what you've been doing and what your team I'm sure is now doing. You've got competitors from all over the world. Talk to us a little bit about what the outreach channels you've been using, what some of the methods that you've seen work, what hasn't worked? Is it really just like searching up emails and finding people on Facebook and messaging them one by one? Or is it some other kind of methods that you've been using as well?
John Hopcroft:Isn't this a variety of methods and how you're able to outreach? Initially, the way I started was just emailing debating organizations, and maybe emailing 10 a day throughout the entire time and developing it, and just hoping to get that response, just sending out that massive variety of cold emails, and waiting for something to paying back. And eventually, you do have situations we did get some support, which was fantastic. But then, as I got involved with the tiger global Case Competition, I learned of all the different ways that you can have outreach opportunities, I think that's a really important thing for students to learn about, is that if you get involved with a project, even much bigger than your own, or something which is already established, you can learn a massive amount on how it works. So with that, I learned about how you can outreach through social media, how you can outreach, through links and setting up profiles on pages such as Crimson ACL, I got some fantastic advice from the Crimson Education ufan team, on how that process works and and how that can benefit the competition. So from an outreach side, I think the best thing you can do really, is just post opportunities, wherever, wherever it's available, and try and contact people and get the name out there, you can just search our database on Instagram, and you come up with 100 profiles of debate teams. And you can do the exact same thing online and get 100 emails or 1000 emails.
Podcast Host:That's some fantastic tips into the outreach side of things. And I hope some students who are looking to outreach to other organizations take heed of that. But yeah, let's talk about your future, John, and I know that you're aiming for top international universities, why have you decided to take that route as opposed to applying to local universities?
John Hopcroft:Well, I think initially, there is absolutely nothing wrong with going with a local university, like University of Auckland, we'll go to something across the ditch. But I feel like one of the most important things is that trying to maximize your opportunity and what paths can be set out for you. Because what I found is that these same next eight years from the age group of maybe 16, to 23, the career you choose, and really the scale of that career is locked in when you decide to go with in that time. And I feel like to really make the most out of that anyone should try and push themselves as far as possible. And you can say that about anything you can say, well, there's really nothing wrong with I don't know, being a local car salesman, but wouldn't be so much more interesting. It's so much more fun to say be selling space shuttles or something much larger than that, right? Yeah, I suppose the main appeal of those top universities isn't really the name of it. But I feel like putting yourself under the pressure to solely have that possibly arrogant persona of being able to say you went to an Ivy League is a irresponsible reason to go to such a top school, I think it's more being able to go to such a school and make use of the massive amount of opportunity there. Because whatever effort I put in now, or the next eight years, can pay off tenfold over the next 50 years. So when you go to such a massively well connected, well established, well respected school, it sets up someone like me to just push further and further and further.
Podcast Host:What's next for the Cosmos debating championship and how can students get involved?
Unknown:I suppose the next thing for the Cosmos Championship for my end is to try and make sure as many people can benefit from the opportunities available with the competition. So just getting it out more outreach, more engagement with communities all across the world. And for any students listening who want to get engaged or get involved with the competition, you can just sign up on global debating.org and follow the four simple steps on the homepage. And if you want to get involved, possibly with the management, cyber competition, we have a few opportunities posted on the Crimson ECL. And could I add one more note, Alex? I think even when looking at your admissions to say top schools such as the Ivy League and Oxbridge. You should never really start a project like this for the purpose to get into one of those skills. Yeah, because I think that's a misplaced direction on what you want to achieve with it. And almost setting yourself up for failure because you're not doing it to see the competition success, using it for some additional personal gain which people can't really get behind. So while trying to push yourself to get into an Ivy League is fantastic. Stick. It's important that you do it for the right reasons. And that sure you can target getting into such a great university. But you should have focus and why you're doing the things you are.
Podcast Host:If it comes across as genuine and if it comes across as self serving people will be able to smell it out. Right? And but if it comes across as something that's genuine, that makes the world a better place and wants to bring students together or whatever it wants to do. People can see that and get behind it. And that's exactly what they've done with the cosmos championships. Well, thank you so much for joining us, john. We look forward to having our listeners back for another episode of Top of the class soon, but in the meantime, keep safe and keep well, and keep on debating at the Cosmos Championship.
John Hopcroft:Cheers Alex.