Cult Holdings Co-Founder @willhmayer, who led the Rick Rubin-Polymarket ad, shares the five core tenets of how to build a brand with a cult following: "First is doctrine. Having identity before features, what is the sacred text that everybody abides by? Most brands have a tagline, but what can truly be enforced and felt by the community? @bryan_johnson's done this incredibly well. Most religions have commandments or tenets. Brands have slogans like, 'Think Different' or 'Just Do It.' You have longer forms of doctrine, like the Technological Republic by Alex Karp or Zero to One." "Second is ritual. Bryan, through the Don't Die Dinner series, did such a beautiful job. You guys have a ritual here every day, five days a week. But what are the initiations into your brand or community? It's about forming a ritual that becomes a habit that becomes identity over time." "Third is symbols and language. How can you take elements to create in-groups versus out-groups? What are the key features that signal people who are insiders versus outsiders to your brand? CrossFit doesn't call them workouts, they're WODs. With Equinox, we never said gyms, we would say clubs. The Catholic Church used stained glass windows to educate an overwhelmingly illiterate population in the 12th century to indoctrinate them into the Church." "Fourth is a charismatic leader, which, again, you have in Bryan. You have in folks like @PalmerLuckey, where you almost icon yourself with the goatee, Hawaiian shirts, flip-flops, things like that are so incredibly important." "Fifth is an enemy. Every brand needs a nemesis. A lot of people use competitors. Apple's enemy started with IBM in its 1984 campaign. But over time, it evolved to the concept of conformity. Because when you get bigger than your competition, that enemy loses power. But if it's like an overwhelming thought that can never truly be defeated, the enemy always keeps power."

Happy Wednesday. On today's show: - @benthompson (Stratechery) - @vincentweisser (Prime Intellect) - @RodrigoLiang (SambaNova) - @alanapalmedo (Paradigm) - @willhmayer (Cult Holdings) - Byron Boots (Overland AI) - Tucker Brown (CAA Evolution) See you on the stream.