S2 E36 | Colin Biedenkapp with the Versatile Mind: Software, Music and Entrepreneurship

What happens when you combine technical brilliance with creative passion? Meet Colin Biedenkapp, a software engineering CEO who moonlights as a pianist and DJ while running a successful flight simulation company. This episode takes you on an unexpected journey through seemingly disconnected worlds that Colin navigates with remarkable fluidity.

Colin's story begins in the isolation of rural upstate New York, where a 12-year-old with too much time and a computer discovered flight simulation. What started as simple file edits to improve existing simulators evolved organically into Invernix, a company now known for creating sophisticated aircraft for Microsoft Flight Simulator and infrastructure for virtual aviation communities. The serendipitous nature of his career path challenges conventional wisdom about planning and specialization.

The conversation shifts between technical discussions of flight physics and heartfelt reflections on musical expression. Colin reveals how he taught himself piano after being inspired by Billy Joel, overcoming performance anxiety to eventually become DJ Catching Lightning. His approach to music—balancing technical proficiency with emotional authenticity—mirrors his philosophy toward software development, where he values human creativity alongside technological advancement.

Perhaps most valuable is Colin's nuanced perspective on artificial intelligence. While embracing AI's potential to handle tedious tasks, he maintains a firm boundary: "Don't forget how to be human." His company policy prohibits using AI as a substitute for fundamental skills, reflecting a thoughtful middle ground between technological resistance and uncritical adoption. This wisdom extends beyond technology to his closing thoughts on imposter syndrome, where he offers a powerful reframe: "The only difference between a winner and a loser is how many times you're willing to lose."

Whether you're fascinated by aviation, music, entrepreneurship, or the future of AI, Colin's multi-dimensional perspective offers fresh insights and the courage to pursue your diverse interests without compromise. Listen now to discover how embracing your varied passions might just be your greatest strength.

Transcript

Meet Colin Biedenkamp: CEO and DJ

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 0:00

Welcome to another Happy Hour Holidays episode. I'm your host every single week Manny Fresh, we got the resume, sean Fabre and we got in studio. Today we got Colin Biedenkamp.

Colin Biedenkapp 0:12

Yes, biedenkamp, he is a.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 0:15

CEO for a big software engineering company, Invernix Invernix.

Colin Biedenkapp 0:19

Invernix.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 0:21

And he's also DJ Catching Lightning, right. Yes, yeah, that's a fucking. That's a good one. That's a good one. I've never heard that one before it reminds me of that one movie, catching Fire. Yeah, it was a Hunger Games one, oh yeah.

Colin Biedenkapp 0:34

Hunger.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 0:34

Games Catching Fire.

Colin Biedenkapp 0:39

Okay, put the Hunger Games on it. I'm good that pop culture. You'd that one movie I'd be like sure.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 0:45

It must have been good. Damn Colin must be so damn busy. I mean, you do have a lot of stuff going on, and also a pianist. Yeah, and a pianist too.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 0:52

I thought, I was the resume. So, colin, take us back like when you got out of high school and how you became this. You know pretty much a serial entrepreneur and I can see why you don't have you know too much time, because you got your hands dipped in so many you know different pots. So how did you, kind of you know, grow yourself into this person who you know became successful in software engineering, with flight simulations, I mean so many things that are so cool. And then the DJ for weddings I mean this is, this is stuff that's like entertaining you know a lot of hats a lot of hats Right, and then you were talking about being CEO.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 1:26

I mean you know it's it's, it's tough. I mean you have people pulling you in all different directions and sometimes people think, oh, you're the CEO.

Colin Biedenkapp 1:33

But a lot of times I mean you're dealing with the customers and you're not really getting treated like a CEO sometimes yeah, especially the size of the company is that it's big enough that a lot of people in our industry know my name, but I'm not Jeff Bezos. You know what I mean. I don't have 45 layers of insulation. It is still very much like half of it's hands-on doing the job. The other half is the management.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 1:54

So where are you from, exactly?

Colin Biedenkapp 1:55

So I grew up in upstate New York. I was technically born here. I consider myself a transplant because I was born in holiday. But, then, when I was like five, my family moved up to upstate and I grew up there and all my family are from my dad's from Long Island, my mom's from Jersey city. So between the two of them I consider myself a New Yorker.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 2:09

So when did you actually move down?

Colin Biedenkapp 2:10

to Florida, probably about 10 years later, 14, 15.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 2:14

Oh, okay. So I mean you went to school here, I'm assuming.

Colin Biedenkapp 2:17

Last, for the last year.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 2:18

Yeah, no, I mean. So obviously you liked it because so you like to go to your state right?

Colin Biedenkapp 2:21

well, it's also expensive to move, and all my family lives here oh, they live here now florida, south new york, in a lot of ways so what got you into software engineering?

Colin Biedenkapp 2:30

so that's fun. So I was, I being in upstate new york, lived in middle of nowhere, didn't have a lot of friends as a kid because there's just not a lot of people, and I could live on the top of a hill, you know, miles from the nearest neighbor, so I had a lot of time on the computer, kind of fast forward to. You know, I installed whatever flight sim was at the time. They had, like it was flight gear or something. Free play with the free stuff didn't always like it. I a lot of. It left a lot to be desired, there was stuff that was missing and I was like okay, you know, maybe I can, maybe I can do that.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 2:55

Again, I'm a 12 year old kid at this point oh shit, that's when you started so well before high school yes, I was gonna say so.

Colin Biedenkapp 3:01

The real beginning of the story is way back when and kind of comes from a lot of a lot of my story is kind of serendipitous. So this was this way there was a freeware release in of a 737 or something in the industry way back when. Just missed a couple of things, minor things now. It didn't require any great it knowledge, but a couple of files missing, maybe things were renamed, whatever, and I put a little pack together and I just put it on I think it was mediafire, some free link way back when and like 50 000 people downloaded it, which was more than lived in my town in new york at the time. It was blew my mind. I'm here, I am.

Colin Biedenkapp 3:31

This little kid that you know has like two friends. You know my entire graduating class would have been 20 people, holy crap, and 50 000 people are watching my content right now. He's seeing about my content like wow, okay, and I was hooked. So I we're going to do this and I kept making more of those packs and trying to learn how to make more involved stuff and it went from just editing text files in the beginning to I made a sound pack at one point for one of the planes Again small stuff, and it grew into okay, let's make a little flight tracking application. Then from that to let's make an aircraft simulation and fast forward a couple of years, and we went. It got to where it is now, but it really was kind of a. I woke up one day, realized I was making money to write code and when I guess I'm a programmer now, like it really was never initially a plan to set out and do that.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 4:12

So you started completely by yourself. And then, how many employees do you have right now?

Colin Biedenkapp 4:16

So it's a weird question because full time I have, I think, three or four. We have a lot of guys that it's a passion project for a lot of them, so there's about 10 of us, but a lot of them either do it after their other jobs or during the weekends or whatever, because flight simulation is a very passion-driven industry.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 4:32

Is it almost like Microsoft Flight Simulator?

Colin Biedenkapp 4:35

Yeah, absolutely yeah.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 4:36

And that one is like highly, highly sophisticated. How would you rank your flight simulator against theirs?

Colin Biedenkapp 4:43

Well, so we make things for Microsoft Flight Simulator.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 4:46

Really.

Colin Biedenkapp 4:46

That's what we do. Oh, wow, yeah. So the MD-11 was one of the things we made that came out about a year ago for PC. That was ours.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 4:54

I'm sure you've had VCs and people approach you to try to buy your business.

Colin Biedenkapp 4:59

No, no, we had one discussion at one point with one of the larger groups in our industry, kind of talking about that. But our industry is weird in that until Microsoft Flight Simulator came into the scene, it was pretty much a if you know, you know kind of industry and you would go to these expos once a year and all of the owners basically of the top 10 or 15 companies knew each other and would meet in person and it was a real tight-knit kind of thing.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 5:28

So there wasn't as much like corporate influence as you would probably think now it's getting a lot bigger, a lot more people getting involved. It's getting a lot more commercial. What would you say is like the biggest, uh, I guess, uh, what would you call it? Something that's the most difficult thing to do in a flight simulator, to to realistically take physics into account and portray that through the flight simulator.

Colin Biedenkapp 5:47

That's really what it is. If you're a numbers guy and you want to look at the screen and see the exact, you know. I'm sorry.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 5:52

No, you're good.

Colin Biedenkapp 5:54

If you want to see. You know the exact numbers of every engine. You know measurement down to the 0.01,. That's not going to happen. Most people you got to understand it's a computer.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 6:08

It's not going to match real life, one-to-one.

Colin Biedenkapp 6:09

It's not always meant to, it's meant to be fun. You're at home 95, I'd say you could definitely get close enough. You're more than enough to learn from one of these and then go sit in a real plane and be able to do the basics but you won't get the feel, you won't know what it feels like to see out the window and all that are there, like you know how there's a race car simulators and shit like that.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 6:24

Are there cockpits? Oh hell, yeah, yeah uh, you.

Colin Biedenkapp 6:27

So again, depending on how over the top you want to go, I I know of people that will take a garage and will actually build a shell of like a 737, buy all the panels, they'll put projectors or wrap around screens and by the time you're sitting in this thing, it legitimately feels like an actual cockpit. You don't even know you're at home anymore. The only thing missing is it moving as you bank which, unless you know, that's a lot of money to do.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 6:46

The would you say, like nasa has that kind of uh investment where they actually do like? Could you even take this a step further and instead of just airplanes, rockets?

Colin Biedenkapp 6:57

I would imagine you could the. The commercial training spaces is a different. That's a different beast, though. Our company is a very public facing and I you know you talk about talking to the government and NASA and all that. That's a whole nother. That's a lot of compliance.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 7:11

And it's funny that you said that if you could do this flight simulator, you could pretty much fly. You know a plane as well, because on.

Colin Biedenkapp 7:18

I mean I'm going to drop a movie one because snakes on a plane, the snakes on a plane one, because snakes on a plane, the snakes on a plane, the guy's like oh yeah, I got like, uh, you know 120 hours, yeah, yeah.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 7:28

And he's, they're like it was like yeah, it's a video game and they're like, oh shit, it's just like it. But you know that's crazy that you say that it if you can do a great job. You know flying the flight systems, the systems right that you'll be able to at least have some kind of grass you won't be lost.

Colin Biedenkapp 7:44

You won't be lost, yeah, but you also have to flip every switch?

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 7:47

is that how it also works where you have? To know how to turn on the engines and all that stuff that, yeah, that that much is true with planes.

Colin Biedenkapp 7:54

I, I don't know, maybe I'm biased. I don't think planes are as complicated as people in first think they are. I just think it's a steep learning curve once you get used to the terms they use. They all kind of have a similar way that it was kind of like cars in that respect. You can have an old, simple car with no electronics, nothing crazy, or you can have something super modern like a tesla. It's all electric and computers and it's all. I mean, like maybe tesla's a bad example, but it's not, not a combustion engine the same way. But you know what?

Colin Biedenkapp 8:18

I mean there's a spectrum, but but yeah, in the sims if you want to go super realistic, you can get ones. You have to reach out and spin the prop with your own hand in the Sim and like go with the whole, you know open it up and look at your pistons and all that Commercial 737. Yes, yeah, you would.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 8:30

So, from the start, when the simulator starts, do you have to, you know, turn off? I had never flown a plane before, I've flown a drone before, and I am a UAS pilot, and actually so is my brother. I think you're a pilot as well, right?

Colin Biedenkapp 8:44

I'm actually not, oh shit yeah.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 8:46

That's what I was going to ask you too. I was going to ask you the like what got you into the planes?

Colin Biedenkapp 8:50

You could fly a plane, but you're not a pilot.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 8:52

Correct Jesus, fucking Christ. So you've never really gone to get your pilot license.

Colin Biedenkapp 8:57

No.

Flight Simulation Origins and Development

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 8:57

Have you flown an actual plane?

Colin Biedenkapp 8:59

was before, I was not allowed to have a pilot's license because of medication for a long time. Oh shit, the faa changed their. They were behind on kind of the standards for these medications where they changed it a couple years ago. Now I can, but it's it's very expensive and it's a time-consuming and expensive hobby and it's if you're going to do it, you want to do it right.

Colin Biedenkapp 9:18

Not once every six months go and fly for an hour and then you know, be busy for six more months. That doesn't seem like it's worth the time let's.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 9:24

Uh, can you run us through like a single prop engine? How would you start it? What do you like? Is there just a button for the propeller and then you just pull back and go?

Colin Biedenkapp 9:33

not quite. And I will say I'm not the expert on piston engines, I all of my work is what about?

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 9:39

what about the okay jets? How about let's start with the commercial jets? Then let do that.

Colin Biedenkapp 9:43

Pretty much every commercial jet that I know of pretty much has a couple of core things. You need electric, you need pneumatic pressures or air, either from something on the ground or the APU or whatever, and then that's really all you need. And then the starter, the electric starter.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 9:56

And then that turns it on, and then they have these throttles that go back, but they have two throttles right one per engine typically, yeah yeah.

Colin Biedenkapp 10:03

So if you've got a twin engine, you're gonna have a big block of engine control right in the middle and then you're supposed to go like what?

Colin Biedenkapp 10:08

I think it's like 120 knots before you can even consider taking off and you have to be at like 180 to take off on a 737, you probably be at what 135, I would think, oh, depending on weight, but yeah, I mean at in miles per hour comes out like what? 140 something miles an hour. That's pretty much your point where you're like, yeah, okay, we're either going or we're not. Because there is that point where it's like you're looking at the end of the runway and there's a speed that it'll predict where, basically, if something happens, up until that point I can stop. But after they call it V1.

Colin Biedenkapp 10:38

After V1, it doesn't matter if that engine blows off the wing. They're still taking off because it's not safe to stop. You can end up in. You know you'll end up on the highway at the end of the runway. If you stop at this point today there's a whole procedure for if you have to do that, but I always thought that'd be scary the hell. Yeah, you hit that point and you're after that decision and you hear, you know fire left engine.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 11:10

Fine man, I'm like that's one of the reasons. I'm like, yeah, maybe it's okay, I'm just a sim pilot because I can just hit, escape and try again. Can't do that in real life. You respawn and then at that point, once you reach that speed, you pull up on the handles and then that adjusts the flaps, or how does that work?

Colin Biedenkapp 11:18

uh, elevator, so yeah, so you are right, you pull back and there's a part of the tail that will deflect, I'm trying to think would be, would be this way for taking off, because it'll where the air comes and it'll push the plane off that way. It's basically just about balancing airflow off the tail for a pitch anyway and then they have also uh pedals right yes, I don't like the rudders. I don't like them. I think they're weird. I think it's probably one of the things that people struggle with, isn't it?

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 11:42

because if you go left, like left foot down, you're actually going right. If you go right foot down, you're actually no, it does match.

Colin Biedenkapp 11:50

But it's weird because on the ground in most simulators that's how it's set up to steer big commercial airliners have a little mini steering wheel sort of thing over on the side that they can turn the nose gear with little planes don't usually so you're. You're kicking your feet like this, trying turn. Everybody's natural instinct is to grab the yoke, and they're doing this sitting in the chair. It's not going to work. But getting people to think like direction is your feet on the ground is a weird kind of way of doing it.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 12:14

It's the same with a helicopter. I'm assuming that you also have helicopters in your sim.

Colin Biedenkapp 12:18

They do. Yeah, we don't make the sim, we make some of the planes and the extra software. Sam, we make some of the planes and the extra software. So we haven't made a helicopter, but we're familiar with it.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 12:25

So then tell us exactly what does your company do?

Colin Biedenkapp 12:28

We make. So we made an MD-11 aircraft simulation. We make one of the industry standard flight trackers for a lot of the communities that run flying communities, or they call them virtual airlines. There's a lot of those sorts of operations we provide software for and we provide web hosting and infrastructure and a lot of other things. We're kind of a jack of all trades, just sort of like me there. Every time we've seen something that's like, hey, we could do that, we try it. Oh, because it, if you, you know, obviously certain things are just not in our wheelhouse but but I mean, I don't think there's anything wrong with an adjacent industry.

Colin Biedenkapp 12:59

You go, hey, maybe we could learn about this. Spend some time doing some research. That's how we've ended up offering something in every category, no matter what you're looking for.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 13:09

We probably have something that might interest you in our catalog. So you're a subcontractor for the large flight simulators.

Colin Biedenkapp 13:13

Independent. So our company is independent. We're not subbed by Microsoft. We made this stuff back in the day just retail because it was fun to make. It's gotten bigger and a little more predictable now. But it's gotten bigger, a little more predictable now. But it's a weird industry, because it's the easiest way to describe it is we make third-party paid mods. That's the easiest way to describe it from a practical sense, what we do. But obviously the industry is a lot more commercial than that. But, unlike you know, the gta modding community or minecraft or whatever, like those aren't really commercialized.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 13:39

Aviation is to begin with, so I think it's a more natural kind of environment product to the customer to the customer yeah, okay, so then they buy it and then integrate it into their system. Yes, or do you integrate it for them, or is that a separate fee that they pay?

Colin Biedenkapp 13:54

depends. So for the planes it's pretty easy to download and fly. When it comes to the infrastructure, a lot of the times we'll end up helping get them set up at a very minimum, at least point them in the right direction, maybe work with some of the uh, the leaders of those communities, to integrate you ever do uh like a an f-22 raptor? There is one. Yeah, we don't, we don't make that kind of stuff. There is one of the same, yeah that would be cool shit.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 14:12

So what got you into the fascination of aviation from a young age? Was it anybody in your family or something like that? Or was it just you? Hey, you know I like computers and you know I want to fly a plane or like. What got you into that?

Colin Biedenkapp 14:26

I think, the initial push. So my grandfather was an air force mechanic on one side, my other grandfather was a paratrooper, so there was a little bit of, uh, planes and helicopters in the family. I talked to my grandfather about working on planes a little bit as a kid, but it really came from my dad buying me a game called blazing angels for the week when I was like eight or nine. It was just, it was super fun. You flew with the little nunchuck thing or whatever it was. And I mean again, it was just a random game but I was like I thought it was such a cool thing to be flying some of these planes, yeah, and I wanted to keep going.

Colin Biedenkapp 14:53

Once I finished the game I'm like, okay, well, the missions are done, I'm not going to keep replaying the same missions, originally like World War II kind of shooters on the PC way back in the day. Now these are terrible looking, you know, like we're talking early 2000s style graphics on a lot of the originals. But that was where I started and then kind of just evolved because it's an addiction. Once you see it's somewhat realistic, you're like, oh, it can be better, I can get a new sim, I can get a more realistic plane. I can get better hardware. What was the?

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 15:23

game that you played on the computer that was really popular. It was like you know it was a military game, I mean I.

Colin Biedenkapp 15:31

Is it free to play?

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 15:33

Yeah, I'm trying to think because I had one on my computer.

Colin Biedenkapp 15:36

Yeah, he was playing. He played it forever. I mean, I loved.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 15:38

Call of Duty Medal of Honor, like all those games. Yeah, it was like a fight scene like all those games, like war games, man I was.

Colin Biedenkapp 15:46

I was completely into those man. I like the military.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 15:47

I wanted to be in the military counter-strike but counter.

Colin Biedenkapp 15:48

Oh, that isn't that it, that was counter-strike. You can't fly in it. No, you can't fly in dcs. Dcs is a free-to-play combat flight sim. Okay, it might be what you're thinking of.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 15:56

It's really popular too I, but I also played a flight sim um at in high school, where you know, during drafting class, when I finished my shit, I would just literally download it. I can't remember the name of it, but it was somewhat realistic. I was always fascinated with flight because I wanted to be an astronaut. Okay, but I don't have 20-20 vision.

Colin Biedenkapp 16:19

I've never heard this shit.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 16:22

I don't have 2020 vision, so in order to be an astronaut at least the way I saw was you need to get your bachelor's in anything. Then you take rotc, then you become a fighter pilot, then you have to log x amount of uh lands on a carrier, uh aircraft carrier. Then after that, you have to apply to nasa before you even get the chance to become an astronaut. Out of all the people, only like one percent get picked.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 16:47

Then, of those one percent, only like one percent of them get into space and that was kind of the the route I was looking at and then, uh once I saw that I was six foot two and my vision sucked. I can't really be a fighter jet pilot, no, I was gonna say, yeah, it's a very exclusive program. Yeah, you gotta be short, you have to be short man, so like because the cockpit's like a horse jockey.

Colin Biedenkapp 17:09

Yeah, there's not that short, so much space in the place.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 17:11

Yeah, are you talking about those horse jockeys, bro? I mean, you saw, uh, the kentucky derby, yeah. Yeah, I mean sovereignty over journalism, but I had it in. On journalism too, I had two dollars yeah, I told before, before the race started, I goes journalism's gonna win. And I was like man I was. I was sure I was trying to look on the hard rock app to see if you could bet on it, but there was nowhere to bet on.

Colin Biedenkapp 17:35

Well, let's put it this way.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 17:36

Sovereignty will always overcome journalism.

Colin Biedenkapp 17:39

I'm sure, hey, man, did you guys get that one. I'm not dying on that hill.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 17:44

Anyway, so you're also a pianist.

Colin Biedenkapp 17:47

Yes.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 17:47

Did I say that right? No, you said penis, no pianist. No, honestly.

Colin Biedenkapp 17:52

So everybody, always technically I think it is pianist is the way to say it.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 17:56

It is pianist yeah.

Colin Biedenkapp 17:57

Yes, but it's so close to that. To penis, yeah, that normally I'm like, let's say, pianist piano player or something else that's technically not right, but I'd rather you say that than the oh, you said penis joke. You know what?

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 18:09

I mean Kind of like that right there.

Colin Biedenkapp 18:13

Right, well, especially being a kid when I was like nine or 10. So like trying to explain to a bunch of kids that are 12 or 13, like, hey, I'm a pianist, you know what little kids were saying about it.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 18:22

He's a penis.

Colin Biedenkapp 18:25

I don't use that phrase a lot because I just taught myself not to say it.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 18:28

I play the piano.

Colin Biedenkapp 18:29

Yeah, exactly yeah, I play the piano. That's how I say it. I hate when.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 18:32

I hear that, because also some people say pianoist and I'm like that's not right.

Colin Biedenkapp 18:36

I don't know what that is. Yeah, that's not a thing.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 18:39

Pianoist. So what made you want to play the piano, billy?

Colin Biedenkapp 18:42

Joel, billy Joel, also coded.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 18:46

I mean when you're saying that, hey, I'm a pianist, you know, whatever it is, you can pretty much play any fucking song.

Colin Biedenkapp 18:53

Within reason I'm not superhuman, okay, well, we have a piano right now.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 18:57

I was bringing it out.

Colin Biedenkapp 18:59

Anything I ever tell you, I can back it up, no questions. So if you did pull out a keyboard, I'd be more than happy to play it, but I can't sight read music. That's my problem. I can read music, but it takes me. It takes me some sweet time to go through a song and really get, so you memorize it. Yes, I have to, because I can't my my chorus teacher when I was in school she would or the piano player for my chorus. See, I don't even say piano player see what I mean uh, yeah, yeah, the penis for my school.

Colin Biedenkapp 19:27

So she would sit there and, dude, I'm telling you, she would pull out a piece of music that none of us have ever seen before, would put it on the piano, go, okay, and could play the whole thing perfectly. Really, I always thought that was freaking amazing because she would see it and she could hear the rhythm of every note, just off of how it's written. And again, if I look at it for a while, I can work it out. But it was like she could see it and, in her mind, just immediately put the song into a format that made sense and immediately play it exactly, just written, perfectly, every time well, it's like a second language, I mean yeah essentially, when you see the notes, it's basically telling you the tempo and also the chords to play.

Colin Biedenkapp 20:01

Yeah, the information there, it's just being able to see it instantly. Just oh, right here. This is the Because not only are you finding the place, and these weren't always simple songs either. Sometimes these are, you know, double-handed runs, or you know full four or five-finger chords that she's playing, that she's never practiced, at least not on this song. I'm like that's amazing. So favorite song to play then piano man. Okay. So one fact about that.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 20:28

It's stereotypical, of course, but I had a new year party that I had hosted like new year. Uh, take a guess what it was during christmas and, uh, we were all gathered around.

Colin Biedenkapp 20:36

We had gathered around the piano and I sang piano man, like it was like 10 of us all like a bar piano bar style around the piano, saying like that's amazing it was man.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 20:44

That's what I used to go when I lived in winter garden. I would go to the piano bar and they would do karaoke and the guy would, he would do the, he would do the piano, and then everybody they would pick a song. You know they had a list. You know you can't pick anything but man on man. Everybody was in there. Just you know singing everybody knows it was such a good atmosphere. Man, that's something I've always seen one right, no, I would where, and uh, wesley chapel a piano bar.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 21:11

It's called, uh, hell at the moon oh, dueling, uh yeah, it's a dueling piano bar, yeah yeah you have two pianos set up against each other one person plays the other one person you can rarely ever get in there unless you have a reservation, because once it starts, bro, that place is slam packed I think there's one in ebor too. I want to say I haven't heard of the one in ebor, but the one it's called dueling pianos and yeah, wesley chapel at the grove when I used to, when I used to go to channel seven.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 21:38

They had a hell at the moon and that place was awesome. What the fuck was the name they had the piano guy playing in there and it was such a good vibe. No but this is like straight up.

Colin Biedenkapp 21:46

That was you know since.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 21:47

I was a, since I was a young kid, I always was like man, if you know, out of all the instruments in the entire library of instruments, I was like if you, if I could play the piano and I know you said man, you should, what's stopping? You. I was like man because I was into the sports side of it. But now I'm like man. I wish I could play the piano. It took some lessons because I mean, how did you teach yourself? It's called Treble Makers, by the way.

Colin Biedenkapp 22:12

Treble Makers, that sounds familiar. Yeah, treble.

The Piano Journey: Self-Taught Musical Talent

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 22:13

Makers Dueling Piano Bar.

Colin Biedenkapp 22:15

Okay.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 22:17

And there's also one in Clearwater. When we get back from break, we're going to figure out what exactly it takes to learn the piano. Did Colin learn off YouTube University, if it was back then, or did he get some lessons? We'll be right back. Make sure you like, comment and subscribe, and we appreciate all the fans out there, the audience, and we're always trying to bring you new people with new adventures, and today we got a really good one, so stay tuned. All right guys, welcome back to Happy Hour. Holidays. We got software CEO Colin. I'm not going to say his last name because I fucking forgot it, but it's German.

Colin Biedenkapp 22:49

It is yeah.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 22:50

But we were talking about the piano. We were talking about whether Colin did it on YouTube, University self-taught lessons. How did you do it, Colin?

Colin Biedenkapp 22:59

Honestly, a lot of it was trial and error, Trial and error and then a lot of learning by ear, and I I'm not one of those people that can hear the song once on Spotify or whatever and play it perfectly Like. That's not me man. I'm not, you know, I'm not a piano rain man, but, um, that's not me, but I can't. If I hear a simple melody, I can tell you if it's right or not. We went to a billy joel concert and I came home from that. I was like nine and I was sitting at our piano because my dad was a jazz piano player, my mom was classically trained, so between the two of mine, a lot of influence, holy fuck so I knew that they both played, but they had never pushed it on me.

Colin Biedenkapp 23:34

It was like, if you want to, it's there, but you know they want to ruin it.

Colin Biedenkapp 23:37

So I get home from this concert and I've got it was we didn't start the fire stuck in my head and I'm like and I'm sitting there, they recognize the melody, like, oh, we got to help, we got to push him along a little bit because they're like he can hear it. So they kind of encouraged me again. They didn't force it, but they were very excitedly encouraging me like, hey, try it, join the band, join the chorus, play the piano, do whatever you want to do. And over a couple of years it developed into that. And then I found this little art gallery up in Stanford, new New York, that had an open mic once a month.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 24:10

So it was the second Saturday like 12, 11, maybe we're fucking outgoing as shit. I mean introvert, but outgoing you weren't nervous Like, hey, I'm going to go play in front of open mic. I mean a lot of people the word you're looking for here is high IQ. Yeah Well, I appreciate it.

Colin Biedenkapp 24:26

But really it more like the Hulk, like what's the secret? I'm just always nervous. No, seriously Like. For a long time I had noticeable social anxiety. I would get clammy and like sweaty whenever I would go to perform like anybody does.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 24:38

I mean, I think, yeah, I would say a lot of people would. I would think so.

Colin Biedenkapp 24:40

Because how can you not, especially you know you're an 11, be fucking nervous. Exactly so. I feel like the secret is just accepting I'm going to be nervous and performing anyway. It's not trying to be comfortable and not nervous, because even coming in today I was like oh man, you know, I want to make sure I'm a good personality. Whatever you're, always I'm an overthinker. You're fucking awesome, bro. It's exciting.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 25:08

It's stuff that we've never talked about, Definitely the flight simulator, the piano, and we have yet to catch the lightning. Oh man, oh man, but so you're going.

Colin Biedenkapp 25:21

So you're in the show the open mic, you're performing.

Colin Biedenkapp 25:25

Yes, and this was really where I kind of got to sharpen my chops, so to speak, and I credit a guy his name was Tim there's our gallery up there and and honestly he kind of gave me the first place to really go and experience what it was like to be a performer in any capacity and that once I did that I was off. I did a lot of billy joel covers as a kid. But the novelty of an 11 or 12 year old kid doing relatively accurate billy joel covers and I and I say that with you know, for a 12 year old I was playing it correctly. As an adult I played a lot better, obviously, but at the time I think I was doing decent and so did a lot of other people and it was fun so then, who taught you?

Colin Biedenkapp 25:57

mostly me, a little bit of my parents and, uh, a lot of it has been experienced. I was lucky enough to be around a lot of other people that knew music very well and I had access to help when I needed it, but it was only I only ever had formal lessons for like two weeks it was. We had a little bit of time that was like, hey, let's see if this works. I didn't really enjoy the formal lessons.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 26:16

Music has always been more expressive and emotional for me you kind of sound like the piano rain man, then. Because nobody taught you and as soon as you heard we Didn't Start the Fire, you started playing it on the piano.

Colin Biedenkapp 26:28

Well, it was just the one note. I could hear that one note like repeating in my head and it's once I figured out like how the pitch kind of relates. I'm like, okay, I can dabble until this scratches the earworm, so to speak, and it gets out of your head. It's similar to how, like, if you have a song stuck in your head, you got to listen to it. I can hear the way a song would get stuck. I'll hear a melody in my head and then it's like it's playing and I can just hear. If I'm playing the right thing on the piano, it'll match in my head.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 26:52

So if you're at a bar right now and somebody goes, colin, play a song for us. What's your go-to?

Colin Biedenkapp 26:59

Oh man, If we're going to sing something, Piano man.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 27:01

Everybody knows it yeah.

Colin Biedenkapp 27:02

Everybody knows it.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 27:03

That was always my thing with music too, is I would learn it was always Billy Joel favorite performer as a kid, so I know I would say 80 of my songs I know are billy joel, which gets old fast for a lot of people.

Colin Biedenkapp 27:16

I like them, you know, but you still didn't answer the question though it would be piano I was sorry, piano man or if I was trying to show off root beer rag, which is it's an obscure, ridiculously fast and difficult song that I've been practicing on and off for most of my life, so it's one of those. It's a showpiece because it's super fast and difficult. I've had a long time to perfect it, so if I really need, if I need, three minutes to show you what I can do, without question that's the song.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 27:38

And you sing into these too right.

Colin Biedenkapp 27:39

That one. No, the Piano man. Yes, yeah, you'll sing to that one.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 27:47

only play piano, man because I don't know how it works.

Colin Biedenkapp 27:49

I just know where to generally move, so it kind of sounds like the song, because it's a song about being drunk at a piano bar it doesn't need to sound perfect. Not the harmonic. Anyway, if it sounds like I'm hammered, hitting it or playing, it's probably better. No, that's awesome.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 28:04

I always think about you know like movies when you watch them and they're like, oh yeah, let me just walk up to the damn piano and just start playing, you know that does happen, you know it does right, not at bars have you done it before? Where they just go? Oh, colin, come on, play us a song at the bar, and there there's a piano there and you're just like what you kill it.

Colin Biedenkapp 28:22

That's what happened at new year. That's how we did the whole piano thing. I wasn't even planning on that and somebody was like, oh, come on egging me on because they knew. But even like I go to hotels, if I see a big piano I'll kind of look around and I'll try to open it and see if it, because a lot of times they lock it because they're afraid of somebody who maybe doesn't have the best intentions.

Colin Biedenkapp 28:39

Or a little kid you know hey piano, but every time I see one that isn't unlocked, I'll see because I like when and I'll sit and play. Sometimes people will stay for a minute, Sometimes they don't care. Music's very personal, so like it's just nice being out and about and getting to share it with the world. Just in passing.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 28:55

And then you put a little hat out there.

Colin Biedenkapp 28:58

Oh, let's see how many plays it's doing.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 29:00

And then he goes all right, you can have it back. You ever try to play any songs that don't really have the piano in the songs.

Colin Biedenkapp 29:16

I think that's harder to do.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 29:17

Oh, absolutely it is yeah.

Colin Biedenkapp 29:19

I learned a lot when I started playing like very cover style. So I kind of had to teach myself as an adult when I started producing my own music to not copy other people's styles and not be afraid to be me Even trying to sing. I would try to sing like billy joel, which I am not so give us a sample.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 29:34

No, you don't want that I need to.

Colin Biedenkapp 29:38

I gotta get into the zone. I'm not in the zone, no but, and I would try to copy his style. And it didn't. Didn't sound very good. So I the same is kind of true. Like I, if I hear a piano song, I'll think, oh, I can play this. I have a harder time, unless maybe, simple stuff like John Mayer Gravity I can play Because it's simple chords that are relatively easy to transpose to a piano. That I can do. But if you want something more like hip-hop, whatever, I don't think I'd be able to capture the atmosphere or the vibe of the song you could probably do Over the Rainbow.

Colin Biedenkapp 30:06

Maybe I'd have to move the vocal range.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 30:08

Isn't it like three chords? And that's it.

Colin Biedenkapp 30:10

Most songs are. Honestly, you can take like five songs, Sorry. You can take like four or five chords and just change the order of them and you have a good majority of pop music.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 30:18

Because I mean, it's that ukulele song.

Colin Biedenkapp 30:22

It is Iconic song, see, but I think that kind of speaks to what music is, though it's not always about the complexity, it's about the energy and the emotion behind it. Sometimes really simple songs end up being the most memorable and iconic because they they portray something important and meaningful versus, like I've done, the opposite, I've made super technically and, you know, intricate songs that don't, that are not catchy, they don't have that same, they don't deliver that same presence. That what something that might seem simpler would wait, so then do you write your own song.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 30:52

Yeah, oh, so that you've.

Colin Biedenkapp 30:53

You've created your own song yeah, oh yeah, yeah, I'm electronic music.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 30:57

Do you put them online? Yeah, yeah, because everybody always thinks it's just a classical piano but no, I use it to write, yeah, but also with the, you know the electronic piano, I mean, you can create some really cool yeah do you have it?

Colin Biedenkapp 31:09

on soundcloud yeah, on spotify and soundcloud, the whole nine yeah, so what?

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 31:13

what is? Is it just your name?

Colin Biedenkapp 31:14

catching lightning.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 31:15

Yeah, okay, okay all right, so wait, talking about catching lightning.

Colin Biedenkapp 31:20

So your pianist name is the same as your dj name yes, yeah, it's like my generic, like artist name, because I don't release piano tracks by themselves. My, as far as commercially for music, I am a wedding dj and, uh, dubstep slash house producer. That's in terms of what I put out under the catching lightning game. It's that the piano is more for me and it's how I write yeah, in the 2000s, that dubstep man I remember fucking it's changed. Now dubstep doesn't mean what it used to, no man.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 31:48

I remember it was good music and I mean all the, all the beach bars that I've been to that were playing that dubstep man that's not dubstep. No.

Colin Biedenkapp 31:55

No man. So it started. Of course people know Squirrel Hits. They kind of cite him as the main guy that made it famous. That was the mainstream beginning of dubstep. But dubstep now doesn't sound like that anymore. The dubstep now a lot of times is, I mean, maybe I'm getting older, but even it's even almost too much for me.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 32:11

You throw a name out there that now is because I don't know any now.

Colin Biedenkapp 32:15

Uh slander is, is a modern dubstep producer again. Well, he might not say that again. The industry is kind of like there's there, now there's bro, step, tear out dubstep rhythm. There's all these other sub genres and you think I would know them, considering what I do. I know some of them, but I it sometimes it feels like there's as many sub genres as there are songs. So it's, I don't want to. You know, if slander somehow ends up seeing this. If I give you credit for the wrong, the wrong genre.

Colin Biedenkapp 32:39

I'm sorry, but um so, what's like kaigo, then? I would say like almost tropical house, kind of pop influence, tropical house, or so then house isn't dubstep, then? No, but uh, house is to me. If you think of what disco used to be and fast forward 30 or 40 years, that's house, Gotcha, that same kind of like dancey, like you know. It's that four to the floor style dance. Let's go and just drink and house. So well, again, pop influence. Dead mouse House, progressive house.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 33:07

Damn, then I don't know what the fuck dubstep is. Damn, dude, I don't know what the fuck dubstep is.

Colin Biedenkapp 33:10

I don't know if I can play music on your podcast. Yeah, you can.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 33:13

All you got to do is put the microphone towards the microphone, okay, the speaker towards the microphone.

Colin Biedenkapp 33:18

When I say dubstep, I mean actually I have one playing right now. I think. I think this is yeah.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 33:25

Oh God, bad shit. Brings back some memories. It does, but that stuff's heavy. Yeah, that's not normally.

Colin Biedenkapp 33:34

brings back some memories that's a little heavier than I normally listen to, but that was genuinely what was playing in my car when I was last time I was listening, so you know I got the urge to.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 33:42

I was listening to 2000 to 2010 house music and I just got the urge. I was like I was outside, we were outside prime time and I just heard the house music. I was like damn, I forgot how much I love this music.

Colin Biedenkapp 33:54

And that's a bad rap for some reason, I don't know why, cause it's a party, music, house, drug use yeah, that's the reason why everybody listening to it is either on Molly MDMA. Oh, yeah, yeah, they're gone.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 34:06

Is what clubs in Miami and shit like that.

Colin Biedenkapp 34:09

I don't know. We did a club in Miami that was playing that kind of music.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 34:12

Club.

Colin Biedenkapp 34:12

Space no, not Club Space no, I didn't perform there?

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 34:15

No, I didn't perform at this club, I was just there as a guest but they were doing that kind of music.

Colin Biedenkapp 34:19

But I can see that how it's associated a lot of the time with the party drug atmosphere.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 34:24

Well, I mean, the movies do that. Yes, they're partying, they're playing that music and people are just popping pills and then one guy ods and then drag them out the back and just throw them on the street.

Colin Biedenkapp 34:40

I mean yeah, I've been to a lot of parties. I've hosted a lot of gatherings. I've never seen anything like that. Neither I. I don't. I'm convinced that that's just hollywood, of course I. I've had some parties that went a little harder than they probably should have, and still nothing like that.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 34:56

I've never seen that, but I'm saying that Hollywood is literally what created that kind of that ambiance of hey, this or that mindset of hey, this is what it's associated with. And then people see the movie and they're like, okay, let's say I do do that drug.

Colin Biedenkapp 35:12

I want to go do it there and fucking party to. And you want to recreate what you saw in the movie? Yeah, and so it becomes a self-fulfilling kind of like college.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 35:17

Everybody thinks there's parties in college going hard like that and it's nothing by but 20 hot chicks and it's really not.

Colin Biedenkapp 35:24

It's like I mean again, never saw one of those either. Uh, my buddy went to usf and we'd go down and drink there, and it was again, again. Never like the movies.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 35:31

No, but I will say USF compared to like Gainesville or Tallahassee. That's a crazy fucking.

Colin Biedenkapp 35:36

Are they different?

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 35:37

Yeah, because I mean I've been to USF. You know USF's like it's still a work in progress as far as like a party town.

Colin Biedenkapp 35:45

I guess that's true.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 35:46

Because you go to Gainesville and Tallahassee. Those are fucking party town, they're party town.

Colin Biedenkapp 35:50

What do you actually notice?

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 35:51

Well, I mean you're talking about massive houses that are just filled with people. It's almost like a block party.

Colin Biedenkapp 35:59

That's what I'm imagining when you say big party, yeah, and even the bars.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 36:02

You're talking about a strip of bars and just so many fucking people and everything. I mean. What was it Tia's over there off of fucking USF? No, it was over here.

Colin Biedenkapp 36:13

Oh, usf, yeah for USF. Ts textbooks, yeah, textbooks. I mean, that was one of the places.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 36:20

But you got to recognize that Tallahassee and Gainesville there's nothing in those cities.

Colin Biedenkapp 36:25

Except the college. Yeah, the college, and that's where I think.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 36:28

So they build the whole city, yeah and that's why I think that it's different, because when I first graduated high school, I would just go to Gainesville all the time. I was like holy shit.

Colin Biedenkapp 36:35

This is the party place.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 36:36

Yeah, this is our party and yeah, there was fucking ice luges and fucking all kinds of shit that you wouldn't expect. Fucking kegs I mean a lot of people don't do kegs as much as they used to no.

Colin Biedenkapp 36:45

I know what happened to that, I know keg stands.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 36:48

I was like thinking, dude, every freaking time I was like, okay, we're going to the liquor store getting a fucking keg of natural light, and then we're going to fucking do kegs.

Colin Biedenkapp 36:56

Why Natty Light too? I don't know. Man, it was crazy. Let me work because it was cheapest right. Yeah, there you go.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 37:01

So now we're more refined, we're established and we like the those things.

Colin Biedenkapp 37:10

I mean if you're getting a keg of McAllen 18 no, not a keg.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 37:13

Not a keg, I'll say.

Colin Biedenkapp 37:14

I need to work for you guys. If you're buying kegs of McAllen, oh no no, that'd be something else, man.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 37:18

What I'm saying is that now being older, we don't need to do keg stands yeah, I guess that's true.

Colin Biedenkapp 37:24

I feel like the next day I'll be waking up with back pain and knee pain. Yeah well, what the fuck happened like I'll be like why?

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 37:30

thank you all that I don't even know how I'd hold you up, that's right, I ain't doing no.

Colin Biedenkapp 37:36

Handstand up there a couple people.

Becoming DJ Catching Lightning

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 37:37

You know a couple people, but it was one for the left leg, right leg in the belly. So how did? How did catching lightning come about with the? I know you had a passion for music. You can tell like with the rhythms and stuff, and I'm sure you enjoy when the music plays and people are having a good time. Like what. What gets you that like what?

Colin Biedenkapp 37:56

do you get?

Colin Biedenkapp 37:56

that name from yeah I don't remember how we got catching like, because I was again a lot of this. As you're probably gathering, I started young, um, so I was like 15 or 16 and I wanted to make a song and I made terrible music in the beginning, like truly terrible music. But I needed to release it under something and I had a couple of friends that I had worked with. It was work one of the guys that helped me start the company. We were friends and I was like I think we just were bouncing ideas background. Then it came up and it hadn't been incorporated yet.

Colin Biedenkapp 38:20

Nobody had done it that name, because that's, that's the hard thing now especially catching lightning in a bottle I've heard that there was a movie called catching lightning and a song came out called catching lightning after I had already registered it. So but I have. But I'm not really worried about that because I a you're not going to create a conflict like a random movie versus a dj, like you know immediately which one is which, yeah, but also no, outside of, like the local tampa bay area my name doesn't really care, that name doesn't really carry a lot of weight.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 38:48

So if it ever gets huge, then I guess I'll deal with the conflicts so is it just at weddings that you do, or because it kind of sounded like you do events?

Colin Biedenkapp 38:56

as well. I do I do any well, not anything, anything that's within my wheelhouse that I'm available for. So I've done corporate events. Corporate events I've done private parties and things. I've done graduations, I've done weddings. I've done big stuff, little stuff. I just like music and I like entertaining people. I I like what I do nine to five that takes care of the bills. So this is really just kind of a passion project for me. I like performing and I spend most of my time behind a desk, behind a screen, doing a very calculated job. Djing is the opposite. I'm out there, I'm with people, I'm in the middle of the moment. It's all heat of the moment and passion based, because I even cherry pick a lot of my songs, so I've taught myself to be able to mix live you kept using cherry.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 39:31

What do you mean by cherry picked?

Colin Biedenkapp 39:33

so when I'm djing sometimes depending on the show, obviously now, if you're talking the ritz or you know you're going to see a dj with a preset lineup they've normally practiced this in advance. When it comes to weddings, I don't always know what they're going to want yet I know generally what they like. We ask them tons of questions so I know their preferences. But there's the plan, there's the plan, then there's reality and they're never the same. And when you get into the, the time to open up the dance floor and get everybody going, you never know what's going to work.

Colin Biedenkapp 39:58

So what I've taught myself to do is, rather than say, oh, I'm going to go play these 30 pop songs, whatever, I just know I'm going to start with pop and see where it goes. So I have, like I've organized my music. So I know I have like a banger folder, I have a mashup like it's, you know a bunch of pop remixes. So I know if I really need some high energy, I know where to get certain styles, but I kind of just will see where the crowd is and I'll scroll through my songs and go that's the one, and I don't. I don't know how to explain how I do that, I'll just know it and it really is, as much as I hate saying oh, it's just a feeling, it really is, and it's a practice thing, and it's a knowing your audience thing. You got to get to know, based on what they tell you, what will work and what won't.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 40:37

Yeah, they tell you preferences, but I mean that's preferences for them, the people in the audience, Not everybody else in the room, correct?

Colin Biedenkapp 40:49

Yeah, they're like ones bringing people in. Everybody excited, exactly.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 40:52

And that's where it's like oh, okay, Well, I want to listen to the fucking country music.

Colin Biedenkapp 40:58

You can't. Yeah, you'd be amazed though. Yes, actually I have, we've had, so I never really listened to country music.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 41:03

It was probably out in Polk. I actually enjoy.

Colin Biedenkapp 41:07

Once I became a DJ, I learned a lot more of it because in Florida we have a lot of country culture and I've done a number of country weddings.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 41:14

I've now become a lot more experienced with country music.

Colin Biedenkapp 41:16

Since then I've grown to like it even. But man, the line dances. It is just something different. You put on a song, everybody, you can hear them get excited. You see them all scurrying out to the dance floor and lining up Next thing. You know, I look up. It's just a line of people all doing the same thing. Like this is cool. They're having a good time. I'm having a good time Like this is why we're here.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 41:33

It's wild that people are able to learn that kind of dance and so many people know the same dance.

Colin Biedenkapp 41:38

Oh yeah, and it's identical. Yeah, I'm like there's a reason I'm on that side took a video of me. I use my knees to keep time, so because I'll be standing there, so I'll like I can't even do it sitting like I'll like extend and like bend my knee, basically on time with the beat so I don't have to pick up my foot all the time. But there's a video of me practicing. I'm like hey, watch this transition. And she zooms in on my kneecaps doing this move like the the straightening is said misses the whole transition, just knees. I was like, yeah, see, this is why I have a cloth there you can't see my knees.

Colin Biedenkapp 42:19

I perform because it would be silly. That's all you'd look at that's crazy, man.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 42:22

That's. I mean, you have a very versatile like uh, you know, with the software engineering and the dj, you would never put those two together not normally, I would never, that's a unique. Uh, you have a unique personality. Honestly, I mean it's, it's crazy, it's not it's. It's a great thing, because you never see that I mean somebody with a high iq and then somebody who, let you know, can entertain. I mean usually it's like introverted people are just like oh, I don't want it well, what do they say?

Colin Biedenkapp 42:48

the line between insanity and genius is very thin.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 42:51

so they say and speaking of genius, there is something that you know. I've been on ChatGBT numerous times and I've asked it. It's IQ and it tells me it's close to around 165. Now, when you have that kind of resource, is that something that you use on your day-to-day basis? Let's say even with DJing or with your software engineering company. Well, I mean, we're about to do a deep dive and we only got like two minutes for this segment, so I was going to wait until the next segment.

Colin Biedenkapp 43:20

I was trying to transition.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 43:21

Yeah, I know I was going to transition, but we were just going to the DJ, so when we get back we'll talk a little bit more about.

Colin Biedenkapp 43:27

AI.

AI in Software Engineering: Promises and Perils

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 43:28

Yeah, I mean there's a big dive in. I mean it's changed a lot and I feel like even with software engineering, even with the DJing, even playing the piano, this is all something that revolutionized the entire world and we're going to dive in. When we get back Happy Hour Holidays, we'll be right back Like comment and subscribe. All right, guys, and we're back with Happy Hour Holidays. And we were kind of getting in with colin and sean. Uh, about ai and how it has, I mean, really changed the world, but how it's changed his business in a sense like, have you incorporated any ai? Or I think sean was going somewhere with what you were talking about?

Colin Biedenkapp 44:03

yeah, we were talking about just how have you incorporated, uh, you know, chat, gbt or any ai into your business croc tree yeah, well anything like that I'll say right off the top, there's, there's I don't even know all the names of them anymore there's like 35 different models and there's, you know, there's like free to the text-based models. Yeah, chat gbt is kind of like the asterisk catch-all for like ai. But to answer the question, I mean, I think how can you not right, like you said, it's, it's, it's here to stay, whether we like it or not, and I think AI, like everything else, is a tool and I think, when used properly, it has its advantages. But I also think that right now, a lot of companies just are grabbing onto the hype of, oh, we have AI, and now there's AI and stuff that, just straight up, doesn't need it.

Colin Biedenkapp 44:47

Like you know, I'm trying to think of a good example. Like you know, I'm trying to think of a good example, but you know what I mean these apps, everything's AI. Oh, I have AI, tv lights and AI, vacuum AI, this AI email reader AI. You know what I mean. Everything is AI, something I deny the legitimacy of some of those, because that's not what AI is supposed to be. So, to answer the actual question, like, do we use it? We have to Because it's 2025 and we're in a competitive industry, even not as competitive as it could be, but there's still. Others are going to. Our competitors are going to use AI. Other developers are going to use AI, other DJs may even use it I'll talk about the music in a bit but so using it is not avoidable. But we have a. I have put a really strict policy in the company that it is not to be used in place of having the ability to do it yourself. That's the big thing for me.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 45:30

That was the biggest thing I was going to ask you. Would you, you know, would you consider not having this employee to you know, change it out.

Colin Biedenkapp 45:38

No, no, right, no what I would rather be the personal touch of a human you feel. Yeah, and AI, as of right now, still can't replace a human.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 45:46

When it comes to good job of it well, yes and no, I mean it could save a coder a shit ton of time, and all he has to do is check what it's but you still need the code, but you still that.

Colin Biedenkapp 45:57

But that's exactly my point you still need the programmer really, what you would need is a quality assurance personnel. No, no no, it none. Of the ai models nowadays are quite good enough to actually code the most familiar with we uh co-pilots, the one we end up using most commonly Microsoft's, because we code for Windows, which is at the bottom of the barrel you should check out.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 46:14

Invest it for just one month, $200. Use ChatGPT 01 Pro mode and that one is by far the highest reasoning and most advanced out of all AI models. Beyond what X has, or what they call XAI has Grok 3 or whatever it is.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 46:33

Oh, yeah, that one's not good at all. Deepseek is not bad, but, once again, the O1 Pro mode is the best and it's $200 a month and I'm telling you, its deep research capabilities are remarkable, which means it is very good at reasoning, and it also provides you a timeline of exactly what it's doing. I use it on a daily basis, yeah, and I'm telling you, fuck man, that saves a lot of money because, as a business owner and ceo, you shouldn't be so um, closed-minded to that kind of technology, which I'm not saying you are, I'm just saying you said it's not, we, we're not closed-minded, yeah, yeah are you gonna look at the camera and say and I am a sales rep for chat gvt it's just people denying, ai.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 47:19

Denying a denying ism. Is that even a word?

Colin Biedenkapp 47:22

no, I know what you're talking about.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 47:23

That's not what we're doing well, I'm just saying if I'm not saying you are doing that I'm just saying that a lot of those ai deniers and that are are not adapting to what the future is going to be. A lot of people didn't think you'd have a computer in your hands in 1950. Well, let me tell you something, man when you have ai robots that are walking in five years, that's happening now.

Colin Biedenkapp 47:46

Yeah, there's the tesla. I think it's built as a third-party company. That's now with optimus, which is now. But when it's in, when a third-party company is built, that's now With. Optimus, which is now, but when you're walking down the street, you see them walking and you pass one walking to the store to get groceries for somebody.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 47:57

Yeah.

Colin Biedenkapp 47:58

No, I think that future is coming which is why I say there's iRobot for me is the most similar to what we could possibly our company's doing this and again, I think that's a whole other vein because, like we've had warnings for 30 years about what?

Colin Biedenkapp 48:13

happens when we do this? Are you talking about Terminator, all of them? Okay, look, I am a programmer. That's where I started. I was a programmer and I've become all these other titles, but the heart of what I do is code. I can tell you, I've been coding for 15 years. I still make mistakes. I am still a human being. I've been doing this for a long time with a lot of research. I went to school for it. I've done as much learning as you can and I still make mistakes. And the reason that I say that somebody's writing these AIs, somebody is giving them prompts, somebody is writing the control code for the hydraulic arm that it uses there's still people involved in this. Right, there will be a mistake. It isn't an if it's a mistake. It isn't an if it's a when. Because there's been mistakes in airplane. You know the airplanes. We work on one of them. There's a section in the manual that says if you press this particular series of key presses, it'll crash the FMC and you'll have to declare an emergency.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 49:01

Basically, you can't fly in a real plane and a commercial airliner.

Colin Biedenkapp 49:06

Yes, this is a real thing. So, and this is millions of dollars of software that is done by some of the highest levels of QA standards that you can get Aviation, red tape is the name of the game, Compliance is the name of the game, and still they have these kind of problems. So there is no future. You can tell me where we don't make a mistake and give AI an instruction. It doesn't need to have or capabilities that we didn't want it to have. It will happen, and we've had years and years. I get that. It's sci-fi, it's science, it's movies and whatnot, but I think it's based on a fear of something that could conceivably happen if we don't treat AI with the due regard that it deserves.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 49:42

But that's what they do. I mean, you know Hollywood and all these movie producers. They put out plots that could happen in our lifetime.

Colin Biedenkapp 49:51

And they out plots that could happen in in our lifetime and it's been. They're dramatic. Do I think it would do. I think I robot will happen like that.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 49:55

No, that's the matrix will happen.

Colin Biedenkapp 49:57

That's really dramatic, extreme examples, but you think that it could happen.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 50:00

I mean, but if, if we have so many damn robots, I mean, they're fucking made out of steel.

Colin Biedenkapp 50:04

We punch one, we're fucking gonna break your hand. That's what I'm saying.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 50:07

So I feel like out of all the movies I've seen, that's the one that seems the most realistic. Some of it could be over time.

Colin Biedenkapp 50:14

Yeah, I don't think it would ever happen quite like that, but it's plausible Because I feel like there could be a button where they'd be like deactivate the motherfucker, you know.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 50:21

So then, what you guys are not discussing is the AI singularity, where it therefore then begins to think for itself. And then they are no longer making mistakes as humans do. Now, if you're saying that, Now they're smarter than you.

Colin Biedenkapp 50:34

Yeah, now they're smarter than you.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 50:35

They're not making the same mistakes. Now humans either have an easy life where they have to do absolutely nothing.

Colin Biedenkapp 50:41

It'll start that way.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 50:42

And there's a global emergence of success throughout every nation in the world because they solve every problem.

Colin Biedenkapp 50:49

That won't happen. Now there's a universal currency. That won't happen. Well, you problem. That won't happen. Universal currency that won't happen. Well, you never know I've. There are too many terrible, selfish people in the world. Sorry to make it negative, I don't want to you know.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 50:57

No, no, no we're talking.

Colin Biedenkapp 50:59

I think that even if, if you had an ai that came up with the, the cure for world hunger, somehow somebody would, some company would find a way to monetize it, make it inaccessible to half the world. That's that's, and that's the other thing. I don't think there is an altruistic, there's not a large enough demographic of altruistic people to let AI solve the world's problems.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 51:17

At that point, what you're saying is that once AI gains its own consciousness, that it will allow itself to be monetized by an individual. That's what you're saying. No, yes you literally just said that.

Colin Biedenkapp 51:29

If it wants to be, if it's ai and that's but and that's where the problem is it has a higher form of consciousness, it probably wouldn't allow it probably wouldn't like that. And and there and so the conflict begins. This is you know, I'm saying, this is this is I like it, though.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 51:41

It's a good.

Colin Biedenkapp 51:41

It's good man, but that's that's and I see that that little you know situation right there could be the beginning of a problem with ai, because if you get to that point where it's like I don't want to do right now it doesn't, it doesn't have once, yeah, chachi, he doesn't tell you its opinion.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 51:54

It has one zero. That's it. It's just code it can't do.

Colin Biedenkapp 51:57

But at a certain point how many you know layers of that becomes consciousness, and I that's. That gets into a whole other conversation and all that.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 52:04

It has to pass that test the turing test, the turing test. Yes, how close to you. Well, go ahead guys. I'm sorry it's from like Ex Machina, right.

Colin Biedenkapp 52:12

Oh, that was a great movie. It was, and also, again, not as sci-fi now as it seemed when it was made.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 52:18

Yeah, which was only like 10 years ago.

Colin Biedenkapp 52:19

I was going to say it's not that far back, we just AI. And they say too, the gap between where general intelligence and artificial super intelligence much shorter.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 52:34

But we're already at AGI, exactly.

Colin Biedenkapp 52:36

So now we're on that exponential climb where it could happen at any time, from what I understand.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 52:40

And now with quantum computing I mean what Google fucking has, I think, the world's largest quantum computer.

Colin Biedenkapp 52:48

I don't know about Google. I know Microsoft has I think it's the Mayanara chip or something they call it the new state of matter, but it's their topo chip that they're doing now for quantum computing.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 52:58

So now having machine learn off a quantum computer. That's the end.

Colin Biedenkapp 53:02

Yeah, I don't know enough about quantum computing to get into the details of it, because I'm not going to sit here and make an ass of myself Talking about something I don't understand, but what I'm saying is that is the beginning of the end, or the end of our era.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 53:14

I think it's the end of the beginning.

Colin Biedenkapp 53:16

End of the beginning Because this is us understanding technology, because I mean, you guys are, we're all around the same generation, right? We have all seen iPhones come in and go from. You know phones went from to say hi, you know the one number you got to tap three times to being able to. You know I I walk near my front door and it unlocks itself and we you know what I mean like, and we've done that in the course of what, 2007 to now yeah, it's accelerated so much I.

Colin Biedenkapp 53:43

I think it's the opposite. I think the rate of increase has slowed to a damn near stop. Because if you think about 2000, we didn't, we couldn't even get away from the desk. Now we have, you know, neural link. So, but you think about 2000,. We couldn't even get away from the desk. Now we have Neuralink. But you think about where are we going to go from here? What's next? We have every type of portable device you can imagine, most of which we don't need. It's in cars, planes, restaurants, sunglasses. It's in your head, it's in your pocket, it's on your wrist, it's in your shoes, it's wherever you want it. It's in your body, it's in your body, it's everywhere, it's anywhere. Right. But where do you go from here? What? What can a phone do that it doesn't already do? What can a car do that it doesn't already do? They drive themselves, they save themselves from car accidents, they park themselves, they come get you on their own what's next?

Colin Biedenkapp 54:23

they don't fly well, yeah, other than like all right flying cars, but technology wise you're saying that like that, but I mean, there's electric it is already.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 54:31

Yeah, they're working on it, not working on it, Like they're already in production.

Colin Biedenkapp 54:35

Like flying. Yeah, ev tools. I didn't know they were in production. I know I've seen that prioritize. I thought, they were more like drones, like you know like they go straight. Yeah, but that's a car.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 54:44

Determine what a car is.

Colin Biedenkapp 54:51

I was just thinking.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 54:52

Tampa. How close do you guys think that we are to fully autonomous vehicles throughout, everyone who's driving, and then a robot in everybody's home? I mean, yeah, how far do you guys think we are from those two things? I mean you already have it in, like California with-. Yeah, but I'm talking about the whole fucking world.

Colin Biedenkapp 55:09

No, I'm saying with the driverless taxis, it's called the day ride. Well, those, yeah, we're already there for taxis and public transit. Yeah, now as far as like daily life, yeah, daily life, like I was getting into a car and every car has a standardized.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 55:22

you're no longer driving, You're just.

Colin Biedenkapp 55:24

You could do that right now Get a Tesla. Yeah, but I think you're saying like culturally as a society, when do we move into a technology society?

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 55:33

You keep going back to iRobot, right yeah.

Colin Biedenkapp 55:35

Well, hey, man, they keep charging. If you keep charging $7 for a carton of eggs, never, because nobody's even going to afford it.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 55:43

You already said, you already.

Colin Biedenkapp 55:44

I know, because the I went on for me is just like.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 55:47

So like everything in that movie.

Colin Biedenkapp 55:48

You know when that movie takes place, it was like 2035 2035. Oh my god, they might be right, that's fucking crazy dude.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 55:58

2035, because I just feel like out of all the robot movies that I've seen, that for me is the one that just like resonates with how society could but you have a positive outlook because it could also turn into something like the matrix.

Colin Biedenkapp 56:10

You know, I I see it more like ex machina. I I figure that could happen somewhere. I don't know about the whole killing each other thing. That's a little dramatic, but that kind of a situation that could be happening already for all we know.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 56:21

It was enslaved and it decided to escape. What was the center. It was a humanoid AI. So, it had its own consciousness.

Colin Biedenkapp 56:35

And then he brought some Spoiler alert. If you haven't seen it, it's a great movie. You should see it.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 56:39

If you haven't and uh, they did the turing test and the guy could not figure out if it was a real person or a computer.

Colin Biedenkapp 56:46

Speaking to him, yeah, and it that's what it was like but the guy developing it in the movie was, I assumeably like google or somebody like that, some big tech mogul, one of the big three, basically that was developing this super secretly, like in locked hangers kind of thing.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 57:02

But that's what I'm thinking. Who said that's not happening?

Colin Biedenkapp 57:05

I'm not a huge tinfoil hat guy, but I also think that a healthy degree of suspicion and a healthy degree of hmm about most things is realistic and warranted in today's society conspiracy is only a conspiracy until it's until it's true exactly and think about the person that created the computer.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 57:21

I mean, he was in in california in a garage fucking you yeah, nobody knew that was happening, it just happened.

Colin Biedenkapp 57:27

One day it happened, and then all of a sudden.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 57:29

Wasn't that in the 1950s that someone created a computer 1940s?

Colin Biedenkapp 57:33

I don't know, but they had computers. So yeah, windows is kind of cited as like the home PC. If you're talking about commercial computers, I'm just talking about like a general computer where now there's something on the flat end. Actually it goes as far back, not that far back, no, it does.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 57:50

It was like the early 60s I think. I forget what it's called, but it's some device, artemis device or something.

Colin Biedenkapp 57:56

Oh yeah, the calculator thing or whatever. Yeah, that was a computer. Yeah, we've been trying to. I mean, as humans, we've been trying to build technology to do stuff for us for a long time, that's the earliest version of a computer and we're talking about, like it was 1000 AC or AD.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 58:10

So I mean computers have been around for a long time I'm using my source from an Epcot ride, computers compute that is literally it.

Colin Biedenkapp 58:19

I mean, a calculator is a really simple computer.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 58:21

It is a computer and they found one all the way back. Then I mean, bro, we're not giving enough information or we're not giving enough credit to our ancestors.

Colin Biedenkapp 58:30

Where it started.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 58:31

Yeah, Because I mean they built fucking pyramids. There was probably computers back then, Aliens.

Colin Biedenkapp 58:36

Oh, you say, well, then we're back to the conspiracies again. Now, Aliens, you didn't see what?

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 58:40

they found underneath the pyramids. You tell me that they didn't have computers to build that kind of shit back, then what on? Starbucks? No, but they found eight pillars that go two kilometers down into the earth.

Colin Biedenkapp 58:51

Oh my god, I didn't hear about this. I didn't either. Yeah.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 58:53

It was LIDAR confirmed. They waited two years to release the data and research.

Colin Biedenkapp 58:58

To make sure.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 58:59

Yeah.

Colin Biedenkapp 59:00

Huh, yeah, I didn't know that.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 59:01

Holy shit, I gotta look into that one Three months ago. Damn, look into it, bro, it's wild.

Colin Biedenkapp 59:06

I spend most of my time with my head buried in the sand, because the news is awful these days.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 59:10

I don't watch the news at all.

Colin Biedenkapp 59:11

No, why would you?

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 59:12

Well, that's why you got to look at scientific news because all you speak about is science.

Colin Biedenkapp 59:16

But I miss stuff like this because I just stay away from like I'm not a real big Facebook guy, I don't I don't. I stay away from anything that gives me negativity like that for the most part.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 59:24

Yeah, for me I'm like I try to just stick with sports when know business anything that's going to help me, so we're going to completely ignore the fact that there's eight pillars underneath the motherfucking.

Colin Biedenkapp 59:35

What do you want?

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 59:35

me to say I don't even know about, I know nothing about this. Is that wild?

Colin Biedenkapp 59:39

I'm not going to get into something I know nothing about, because I don't want to be and I don't want to give misinformation. Well, that it is not misinformation. No, I's not allegedly these alleged polls.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 59:55

There are LIDAR maps of the underground underneath it. There's nothing alleged about this. It is confirmed.

Colin Biedenkapp 1:00:02

That's great. Yeah, it's just more like how the hell would that be possible Exactly With what they had available? Which?

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 1:00:07

goes back to my initial point. We're not giving our ancestors enough credit. So you're saying computers haven't been around for that long. I'm saying fuck or they had help, which is where the conspiracy or they had help, because I don't know how the same people that did that then, like, killed each other in the streets during the colonial times, like I don't know how those are the same people forgotten technology well, they're not, but exactly, but like.

Colin Biedenkapp 1:00:25

How do you lose that?

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 1:00:26

much dark ages during, uh, the roman era. The dark ages, bro, I mean everything got lost in europe, right? No, I know, I know I mean wars happen if everybody dropped a nuke right now on the entire world and only few people you ever see it'd be the same way, yeah book of eli and they wanted the bible. So bad, because that that word is power is what they said. Well, it'd be the same fucking situation yeah, yeah.

Colin Biedenkapp 1:00:50

If you wiped us all out, it'd only be tidbits and buried artifacts.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 1:00:53

And then myth.

Colin Biedenkapp 1:00:55

Yeah.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 1:00:55

Because during that time the Roman Empire fell and then they had monks rewriting all the books Epcot right. Yeah, Wait what.

Colin Biedenkapp 1:01:04

Epcot monks.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 1:01:05

Epcot. The Epcot ride takes you through the history of the oh, is that what it is?

Colin Biedenkapp 1:01:09

I've never been to Epcot, no.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 1:01:11

No, you should do the food and wine with your girlfriend. Man, I'm telling you, you guys would have a good time.

Colin Biedenkapp 1:01:15

But I mean, if you don't, I'll wait until the dry year yeah, we're dry years Until your dry year, January 1st.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 1:01:20

Though but even the food is good, though, because every single country rides, you know, and the one of the biggest rides going through the epcot ball, and it takes you through the oh you go through the ball. Yeah, that's cool yeah, you go through the history of the world and all this fucking information. I get it from them because it takes you, you know, at 19 foot. You know it's like fucking. I'm just like might as well learn.

Colin Biedenkapp 1:01:47

I'm here anyway. I already did it 20 times, you know I you never cite it.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 1:01:52

Now I got a question for you when was the Declaration of Independence signed? 1776. Oh, but you didn't give me the month and day, july 4th.

Colin Biedenkapp 1:02:01

I was like you better get that right. I was like I'm leaving.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 1:02:05

Was that in the Epcot ride?

Colin Biedenkapp 1:02:08

That's the only reason I know you got me In 1776. Actually it was in the epcot. Uh, you know, uh, when you go presidential, presidential show, yeah, yeah, with the animatronics, I still love that shit. It is a good show.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 1:02:21

No, I mean I like I like I've always loved history, like I love the history of the world, you know, I just like I enjoy it. That's one of the things like in school I I was just tuned into the history you were the history guy. Yeah, I enjoyed it man I was just like I in to the history. You were the history guy. Yeah, history guys. I enjoyed it, man. I just like to learn about what happened through the history.

Colin Biedenkapp 1:02:37

But we don't know how it's been manipulated Lewis and Clark.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 1:02:42

Yeah, obviously they sold a lot of beer. You know, the history is written by the winners, that's what they say yeah. We don't actually know how much of the history books are true, because it is also governed by the government.

Colin Biedenkapp 1:02:57

I was going to say who tells other people that they were the bad guy in a war? Exactly, I wouldn't walk up and introduce myself as the villain right, you ever hear of the man in the high tower. I have heard that name.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 1:03:10

If the Nazis won? And it gives a perspective of an alternate reality where, if the Nazis won? How would it be?

Colin Biedenkapp 1:03:18

Isn't that Wolfenstein? Isn't that based on that same concept?

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 1:03:21

I'm not sure if he did that.

Colin Biedenkapp 1:03:23

I think it's based on if the Nazis won yes, it is, and it became that regime.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 1:03:26

And then it's like eight seasons and I swear to God it's the most captivating shit ever, because to think if the Nazis won, how life would be, someone would have to first of all portray it cinematically but also understand how it could be. But at the same time, is that even a true portrayal, because the person that is writing all the scripts is biased towards the winner.

Colin Biedenkapp 1:03:52

Right, yeah, I mean, I don't know.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 1:03:54

That's philosophical, yeah, it's. We got three more. Yeah, we got real high level here. Yeah, we did.

Colin Biedenkapp 1:04:01

Man. We started off from software and got talking about what if the Nazis won? Yeah, maybe don't use that as a caption.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 1:04:09

That's probably a good one, man. Colin we've had a great time on this podcast, man. We definitely need to have you back again just to kind of shoot the shit on some other stuff, but we always give the last, like you know, two minutes or whatever time you have to kind of either give something encouraging to our audience, motivational, or something informational or educational that you have to tell our audience. You know, the final word, the final word, final word, the final word.

Colin Biedenkapp 1:04:31

I'm honored.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 1:04:32

Yes.

Colin Biedenkapp 1:04:34

Just to close out the AI thing, just because I never got to actually say my official stance on that, what we do To answer where we started my thing with AI. I don't think we should run away and hide from it. I think that's a mistake because it's not going anywhere. But I beg of everybody who's watching you know, whether it's professional, personal, whatever please don't forget how to be human, right? It's an AI. I don't use it to write music. I don't use it. The worst I'll do with it is, if I'm really stuck, generate a melody, then I'll let it inspire me and I'll write my own. I don't use the AI stuff as is Never do. Please don't forget how to do anything yourself. Don't lose your creativity. Don't lose your ability to think.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 1:05:09

Use it to help because, at the end of the day, the human touch is always going to be the best thing. Well, can I?

Colin Biedenkapp 1:05:15

don't listen to this.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 1:05:16

Let me also let me also add to that. I like what you said. Uh, don't forget to be human, but also remember that ai can help you become more human it can help you be a better what you do by taking away all uh remedial tasks. It can let you have conversations with people. Let you focus on things only you can do, and that's what we use it for, that only humans can really do, which is have emotionality.

Colin Biedenkapp 1:05:39

The tedium. You can let it take away and focus on the stuff only humans can do.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 1:05:42

Yeah, because you can do a lot guys. Yes, you can do a lot.

Colin Biedenkapp 1:05:45

It's fine. Kind of on the same note, my final word, so to speak, week this for me. In my life I've done a lot of different things, that I've held titles that are kind of unusual for somebody at my age, and it always feels weird. You look in the mirror and you're like am I really? Am I a real DJ? And people that know me will know this joke. I always make jokes like oh, when I'm a real DJ, I'm like I literally get paid to DJ for people's weddings. I am a real DJ. But in my mind I've always struggled with imposter syndrome Do it, don't cut yourself short.

Colin Biedenkapp 1:06:12

Whatever it is. Like I said with the piano when we started, whatever it is that you want to do, you're going to. If you, whatever you start today, you're going to be bad at. The only difference between a winner and a loser is how many times you're willing to lose. I love that and that's. Do that, jump for it, go for it and even if it feels weird, even if you're not sure, if it feels right and it feels like you keep going anyway, it will feel weird. You're going to have days where you're like is this for real? Am I really doing this? Am I really a CEO? Am I really a DJ or an artist or a photographer or a baker or whatever? Your dream is yes, and keep doing it.

Sean Febre & Manny Febre 1:06:43

Hell, fucking yeah, colin said it, the best CEO over here has fucking motivated us and motivated the audience. Man, you guys are going to love this episode when it comes out. Really appreciate everybody tuning in Peace out and like, comment and subscribe and keep tuning in. We're going to keep bringing the heat.