Happy
new year!
2024
january
refreshed with a trip to hawaii, we set out for the one main goal of the entire year:
sell
brainjolt
requirements:
1) give it a good home
2) die trying.
ad account disables.
head of paid is no where to be found.
how will we ever sell this dumpster fire.
we find out someone on the team is trying to sell secrets to a competitor.
squashed it.
but still,
how tf
do we sell?!
feeling uncertain, we take a beat to explore + think.
we also had a call with our first hypertext beneficiary ❤️
it was inspiring.
we have the spiciest gnocchi on the planet
emily learns how to make a rug
and zizi learns how to send text messages to josh on whatsapp.
and then we have our first
talks with a potential buyer.
it’s emily’s
ex boyfriend.
it is a
very bad idea ™️.
…who introduce us to dozens of interested parties!
from all over the world!!
we land our first
in-person buyer meeting
at a wework that shares
office space with
jessica alba’s
“the honest company”!!!
josh wears a zip up hoodie
with more holes on it
than we can count.
we are exhilarated + exhausted.
the road looks very, very long.
we try to stay positive
josh freezes a milky way with dry ice for adam … he said it reminded him of his childhood (we had a dentist on standby)
emily obsesses over a new espresso machine, tries to impress mackenzie thomas with wikipedia, and josh teaches zizi new ipad games
craig visits for an email workshop with us in wework and
a trip to
terranea
while josh’s grandpa’s health
heartbreakingly declines.
josh climbs up on his roof to get a new perspective.
february
emily meets her mom’s boyfriend from romania…
they re-connected a
50+ year friendship from when they were dancing partners in school
and we head to florida for grandpa’s funeral 💔
we all pick our favorite grandpa tie to wear at the memorial
its the first time in several years all of josh’s mom’s siblings have gotten together.
emily cries at the sight of her motel (it’s scary + not what was expected) and we almost get a gun drawn on us for arguing about getting a refund
(thankfully, a cute historic spot over a restaurant is available and crisis is averted)
we catch the sunset daily, climb banyan trees, ride bikes around venice, walk the jetty, and spend time with fam.
and then we have a business crisis at night while outside a gas station in florida
and our incredibly helpful finance guy goes on indefinite paternity leave.
we hire (and fire) two leaders
(one says they don’t use slack during business hours)
and again we wonder, how are we going to sell this thing.
but it’s emily’s birthday, so we go to the ringling museum, in between difficult business calls + meetings.
(it’s here that we get the idea to build a “museum of the internet” some day)
josh lives his dream life for another couple days with a 6-seater golf cart and home-made oatmeal cake from aunt lorry, and then we head back.
we land 18 interested buyers.
one remarks we must be too expensive based on our financials
things are looking up.
zizi gets a heart shaped pizza for valentine’s day 🍕
josh introduces a matching game to zizi on the ipad
nugget is baby babushka
❤️
and emily makes love/hate lists for various people (inspired by
we have 3 meetings with buyer prospects, and abraham comes to town to work on new test concepts
emily goes to utah to work on accounting, get fancy sodas, and walk on a frozen lake
josh gets zizi some hot pink rainboots and more pizza
and we show greg some love with obnoxious balloons delivered to his hotel during a soul-searching trip
haley comes for a fun bestie visit and obsess over custom charm necklaces + bracelets
we make our own version of
the 01/01/oh, oh hat
inspired by the
“time bomb y2k” documentary
that greg hyped up
[inspired by this guy in the film]
march
blue kazoo signs a deal with barnes & noble to be in 500 stores by fall
josh dives deeper into ai and makes zizi her own princess story, which she goes bananas over
and josh shows zizi real-time prompt engineering
our favorite event, naive yearly, makes a turn around from not likely to happen to setting a date, and we’re thrilled to work with the one and only kristoffer
we spent a lovely weekend in san clemente biking around and wondering why we don’t live there
and created a graveyard of project trackers from over the years.
we discover a very inappropriate joke about suicide on a brainjolt article and freak out thinking our ai copywriter bot made a terrible mistake… but find out it was a human writer and part ways.
buyer meetings
continue…
taylor swift’s eras tour movie comes out so we host a watch party! haley, bellamie, and the pipers fly out for the weekend to sing and dance and go to toppers
zizi gets double pink eye and emily + zizi both learn about eyedrops for the first time.
we ended march in pine mountain club for easter, watching home videos of josh as a teen playing punk covers while getting completely snowed in.
april
after geeking out on suno, josh makes a tiktok on how to make a lo-fi music channel with ai
emily officially changed her last name to her middle name, and swore to never change it again
josh introduced kahn academy to zizi as a learning tool, and while zizi loved it, we thought it was kind of dumb
abraham tours the tiniest house in minnesota and we seriously consider buying it as the hypertext house
tried taking zizi to a mschf art exhibit but the line was around the block, so we went to dinner in santa monica instead
josh went for a hike in malibu, encountered a mountain lion, and a random guy gave him a note and a cd of his music
and emily met him at nobu afterwards to celebrate not getting eaten by the lion.
second round meetings with interested buyers (including forbes), and 5 brand new prospects while josh is under the weather
one of them is a billionaire with a huge exit (although we didn’t realize) and josh tells him he did a good job and our bankers laugh at us
emily goes to a tiny zine poem workshop in the arts district with gabrielle
we took zizi to summerland: showed her the best pizza ever (bettina) but she fell asleep at the table
she also:
- tried kombucha for the first time
- loved staring at the ocean
- took her first rolling eye selfie
- re-created the iconic counter-top photos
emily and zizi made their own version of taylor swift’s “fortnite” music video
zizi was a little too inspired by post malone in that video and tried to recreate it one morning before school
josh continues to find new ways to scale
and we interviewed lawyers for the potential sale but everyone was so bad.
we had an in-person buyer meeting in a very cool office in culver city (where an ex-brainjolter also worked)
emily had a fun girls night for kat’s birthday in l.a.
and while still wondering if any of these companies will make an offer to buy brainjolt, we designed a coffee table book of ai ads josh made + printed our favorites to decorate our walls.
may
greg got a fax machine and we made him a song and sent faxes
we invested in anthropic and x.ai
and we had more second, third, and fourth round buyer meetings.
the grind is real, and so are motion sickness glasses from working in the car
to keep sane, josh still builds fun stuff like this font entirely with ai (with a few hiccups along the way)
we hire holly as head of paid, and are super excited as josh is overloaded running all the things: the company, paid media, and trying to sell at the same time
emily teaches zizi how to use voice-to-text with chatgpt and she designs things like dinosaurs made out of hearts.
we meet with a potential buyer, centerfield, in person at their office… which is in the same wework we had our very first buyer meeting in, but this time on the top floor in a massive board room.
during the meeting, josh notices a bird nest outside the window of the huge room and we’re all really hyped about it.
haley is in vegas for work, so we decide last minute to meet her there
and while taxiing for departure, we get our very first offer to buy brainjolt.
we both cry a little…
maybe this will work after all.
still, no one at the company knows.
we see a show at the sphere, enjoy nobu in vegas, go to a spa, and lose track of time enough to
miss our flight back
we rent a car, josh insists we get “road food” at mcdonald’s, and on the way, pull off on zzyzx road, just for fun.
and then…
we get a second offer!!
amidst the frenzy, haley tells emily that taylor swift tickets in stockholm, sweden, are way less than the shows in the u.s.
so on a wednesday night… emily + haley decide to leave the next day for a saturday taylor swift show in europe, and come back sunday.
josh + emily go to seattle to visit the company behind offer #2 – the smartest (and richest) people we’ve ever met.
we’re in a room all day with 14 people peppering 100’s of technical questions, have dinner with them, and it’s an incredible day.
we commit to keeping them in our lives, regardless of the deal.
they will later betray us, but we don’t know that yet.
before heading back, we visit the space needle and moma, why not.
and run into an ex-brainjolter on the plane on the way back, literally sitting in josh’s seat!!
after much deliberation, we decide to take offer #3… with centerfield, and sign a letter of intent.
are we really doing this? is this really happening?
terrified of the unknown journey ahead, we agree that we need to focus + lock in.
no distractions.
it’s going to get crazy.
and then emily finds out her landlords want to sell the apartment.
ugh.
josh and craig build a new tool called bob ross, and its a hit - jamming out 100’s of creatives in minutes.
and with kristoffer, we set our sights on slovenia for the 2nd annual naive yearly conference, which we’re nervous about missing due to sale implications but dedicated to figure it out.
but first, a family visit in florida… which include the aquarium, scrabble nights, and sunsets at the beach every night.
and we introduce zizi to rattler’s bbq,
while internally screaming at the possibility of actually selling this thing.
and the prospect of emily uprooting her life to a new place.
may
june
emily looks to altadena and pasadena for new homes… and discovers her credit score has tanked due to complications with a business credit card
josh texts emilys therapist from her phone and she jokes that she’s disturbed.
more pizza nights with zizi, mom + andras for his first sushi experience, and haley comes to join emily for a 20 year high school reunion.
the reunion is amazing, with the exception that emily lost her voice and it was impossible to talk.
we navigate another in person meeting with centerfield with 100’s of requests for various forms of diligence research and 20+ people in the room.
abraham surprises us for this big meeting by waiting out front, and emily is still without a voice + pounding hot tea the entire meeting.
josh makes zizi her first game… a matching game on the ipad, and she’s absolutely amazed
josh meets rahim (priya’s husband) irl for the first time after years of knowing about each other… before we even meet priya
it’s rare to meet another nerd who created a bbs as a kid, too
diligence continues to be grueling, but we try to stay sane. abraham starts swimming 3x per day, and josh joins in.
josh makes the cats meow pixel piano, and hands off two ad accounts to holly, thank goodness.
emily takes zizi for a pedicure for the first time, and zizi continues giving concerts outside the garage of the home that is now for sale.
emily starts packing up, but still fits in a mom’s trip with ivana and nathan to oxnard, and a fun celebration for zizi’s 4th birthday.
bellamie comes to visit, we go vintage shopping, visit a psychic for the first time, and we go to a radiohead cover concert and josh + bellamie absolutely hate it.
and then we’re given the news that diligence will require a test to prove ourselves, and the deal hinges on it.
this is not great.
our bankers are pissed. we’re pissed.
everyone advises us to say no + move on.
reluctantly, we agree to do it.
july
bellamie bets josh and abraham that she can hear the difference between hot and cold water being poured, wins $1 from the bet and frames it
we head to sacramento for the 4th of july to visit family… it’s 107 degrees, we swim with subnado’s, and discover bed bugs
and josh surprises his mom with a car
we negotiate the test requirements, including a test budget, and start testing like crazy.
we’re still not happy about it… the revenue for products are different from what we originally understood, and its stressful running the test while keeping it’s true purpose a secret
but we find a loophole… and quickly scale it
(this grabs the attention of quite a few exec’s who are not happy about it)
meanwhile, emily packs up everything and moves to pasadena
and while visiting terranea, josh realizes we’ve beaten the test requirements in 3 days
in the spirit of trying new local spots, emily starts a coffee shop diary and explores around with zizi
it’s exhausting driving the 60 miles round trip to santa clarita (where zizi is still going to school for another 2 months)
absolutely over being stretched in all directions, we make a bold decision to stop the test.
abraham and josh want to summarize the test findings in an email, but emily encourages “a presentation to end all presentations” in the big fancy boardroom
they ask us to keep going, but we’re so done. it’s not sustainable and we’re struggling to keep it all together.
meanwhile, nugget is losing more and more weight and is slowly dying, despite josh’s dedicated attempts to get him healthier.
emily’s health is also not great, with several issues and running a bunch of medical tests.
josh is doing everything he can for nugget like special diets, hydration, and several doctor visits.
it’s absolutely heartwrenching.
zizi is struggling with all of the recent changes as well and having full blown meltdowns. it’s a rough period for everyone.
we barely get through july’s amazon prime day (blacking out most of it)… one of our ad accounts goes down repeatedly due to being paid by credit card and both facebook + chase thinks it’s fraud due to the scale
perhaps as a coping mechanism, emily becomes obsessed with facebook marketplace, estate sales, and vintage shops
and emily + zizi befriend a physicist in his 90’s at a local coffee shop.
abraham comes back for the big test presentation and we hype oursleves up to take the bold stance that we’ve completed won the test.
we work on the preso for 2 straight days.
we practice and emily gets choked up beforehand (tears, always).
afterwards, abraham takes a nap on the wework floor, josh becomes obsessed with the hum of the conference room white noise, emily rushes back to get zizi from the ongoing hellish commute, and josh + abraham jump in the ocean.
we all hope that the deal is still on the table and that we didn’t blow everything up.
august
it’s a stressful, hectic time and josh + emily are fighting quite a bit
we cancel the copenhagen / slovenia airbnb + flights, thinking we wouldn’t be able to make it and are super sad but committed to getting the sale done
emily and zizi go to catcon in pasadena for the first time, joins a bbq with friendly neighbors… and finds out a famous actor from “titanic” also lives in the complex
one of our leaders finds out she has cancer so we cancel our minnesota onsite set for september and anxiously await more news.
emily cancels her month long stay in minnesota, considering all of the chaos and uncertainties
we experience a big downturn in profit, the trading team is not happy, and the timeline for the sale is in jeopardy as we continue to be in a miserable limbo.
we experience an agonizing week of silence post test presentation, and finally josh breaks the silence by calling to see what’s going on.
they say they have everything they need from the test, but call out that we don’t seem inclined on doing more anyway
haley comes to visit: we go to an estate sale, visit emily’s new place, sugarfish for lunch, run into our investment banker at the langham, get cookies from levain bakery and go to an arcade with josh
josh finds himself taking cold dips in the pool several times a day for survival and also gets into coke slurpees
after months of no-contact, the first buyer who gave an offer slips into our dm’s, which feels confusing.
and we get the news that blue kazoo is now in barnes & noble stores all across america.
emily gives zizi her old ipod from 2008 and brings her to her first estate sale… she loves both
josh + emily visit the museum of jurassic technology and it re-ignites our future museum plans for hypertext
josh takes emily to running springs to get some fresh mountain air for a day to try to chill out for once.
zizi has her last day at her preschool in santa clarita, which feels like a big deal
and we continue to make the best of pasadena… we visit old friends, and zizi falls in love with vroman’s bookstore.
september
we visit pine mountain before zizi starts her new school, and josh makes a typing game just for zizi
nugget passes away
zizi: “nugget is my best friend.”
emily visits the iconic malibu wave house for an estate sale (before karlie kloss moves in)
we are super torn up about missing naive yearly, so we decide at 10am to leave for a 7pm flight that same day.
because we booked last minute, we had no idea what to expect with lodging but ended up with the coolest airbnb with 100 steps to the top floor
emily dangled her feet over water at the canals for the first time
we discovered restaurant karla, went to reffin (twice, after going too late the first night), and lots of magical night bike rides through the city.
then on to ljubljana, slovenia and missed copenhagen a lot
met thom, joel, sarper, thomas, anna rose, sarah, and deepened our connection with kristoffer and ana.
the second annual
naive yearly is even more incredible than the first and we’re beyond grateful to have made the trip
📸: ana ❤️
we say yes to a spontaneous invitation to a countryside restaurant with 4 new friends…
laughed the entire time and marveled at the incredible food + connection.
on the ride back, mostly everyone feels sick from the windy roads and full bellies, and emily later threw it all up in her hotel.
josh + emily go for a different countryside drive… exploring vogel ski spot and a restaurant that made us commit to either inside or outside dining but no option to change once seated which we thought was funny
we leave for a long layover in frankfurt, but at this point emily is getting more and more sick and tried going to the doctor at the airport… which was wildly unhelpful
and on the day of the flight back home, we get a purchase agreement from centerfield to buy brainjolt.
we go through rounds and rounds of back and forths… and after much deliberation, abraham + josh + emily decide to move forward
while we were gone, zizi makes a best friend at her new school, and they play every day after school in the grass
we go to downtown la to introduce zizi to kazunori + grand central market, and visit a kids museum
started generating sms revenue which is exciting
and josh’s fridge breaks.
october
all systems are go for a sale close date of october 31st, and we’re sprinting to make sure everything is complete
there is an influx of diligence asks, and emily spends every waking moment working on it through weekends and lunches
a potential investor from indonesia last year (remember??) reaches out after ghosting for a whole year
zizi learns how to write “emily”, 1 2 3 4 5, tries a balance bike, and discovers she loves foggy mornings
kristoffer shares josh’s write-up in his newsletter and references how naive yearly almost didn’t happen
we receive our very first handwritten “unsubscribe” letter in the mail
amazon breaks their data during the october “big deals day” event, leaving the team scrambling and guessing at profit numbers while we try to scale
we pivot with band-aid solutions and fake versions of our data, and still pull off over a million in profit over the two days.
we head to big sur to try to take a breather and re-group for the last push to the finish line.
while there, we discover the place is way bigger than we realized and try to get friends to join us (with no success)
we weep uncontrollably while watching the 80’s version of anne of green gables
on our way back, we decide solvang is the the most overrated place in the entire world and throw away gross pastries from 3 different places
greg + jenny swan visit, and we introduce them to din tai fung and enjoy walks around the neighborhood.
with 2 weeks left to go, we’re wrecked over learning the “net working capital” calculation included in our deal, and josh wants to ditch the entire deal.
it feels insane and we are so demotivated.
we muster up the guts to pay them a visit in their fancy beverly hills office.
we fake smiles but we are so haggard at this point. the finance guy laughs at us trying to argue with the formula.
much is out of our control - but not the phone wallpaper image for the investment banker leading the buy-side of this deal. josh changes it to an image of lord sauron in an attempt to feel better.
emily disassociates by throwing herself into decorating her wall for better video call presence but taps into rage when left off important deal meetings
josh angrily emails the local park to replace the squeaky swings, and victoriously, they do! a small win amidst a huge storm of even more uncertainty.
we (somehow) manage a quick 24 hour cross-country trip to visit josh’s parents and take them out to dinner
…with enough time to get back one week before the deal is scheduled to close.
josh scribbles out an iconic “7 days to close” checklist, and we all die inside at the amount of work.
it’s 18+ hour days from here on out
we find out we need to change the “brainjolt llc” name post-close… we settle on zzyzx systems, and no one can say or spell it
emily fights with our sharky lender trying to get out of a loan the previous brainjolt team put in place… and gets them to cut their insane fees in half
we fit in a meeting with wikipedia (as a benefactor from last year) and we learn a lot of cool things about how wikipedia runs
we head into halloween, 100% ready to close and then celebrate with trick-or-treating with zizi afterwards…
only to find out the deal is not going to close today.
we wait and wait during a long drawn out call at zizi’s school during after school pick-up…
and end up cancelling trick-or-treating.
we fake smiles for zizi but we’re sad and disappointed… and now unsure if it will go through at all.
november
we’re exhausted, frustrated, and on pins and needles for days while a couple of annoying diligence requests trickle in.
and then…
on november 5th…
at 7 o’clock in the morning…
after a few stressful unplanned last minute calls…
we sold brainjolt!!!
we did it!
we hardly know what to do!
emily and zizi surprise josh with balloons, and later we go to a diner called russell’s to have breakfast for lunch.
we are beside oursleves.
the next few weeks are a whirlwind.
we head to utah to meet with cpa’s and have a major miscommunication on what was supposed to be prepared.
we’re overwhelmed with all of the post-deal implications but still manage to have a nice dinner at a utah steakhouse, visit a bougie ski store, and continue celebrating
centerfield takes over meeting with the entire team, makes announcements, shares pr releases, introduces everyone to hr, and flies the entire team into the corporate headquarters in playa vista.
emily, abraham, and josh sneak away to nobu in malibu to reflect + celebrate on the most impossible journey ever
we take leadership to a dinner in santa monica and the waitress brings josh a paper with a candle on it
josh gives a presentation to the new entire company about the acquisition, who we are, and what we do and is super nervous about it but totally slays
and we take our very first driver-less robot car rides (with waymo) all around playa vista.
what a
time!
the entire piper family come to california for thanksgiving, we show them around the new office, and get a 15 passenger van so we can ride around in style together
the day before thanksgiving, we pick up priya from the airport (who we managed to convince to spend the holiday with us), surprise everyone with a party bus, pick up emily’s family and take everyone to our favorite pizza place in the most ridiculous fashion ever
we all have thanksgiving at emily’s mom’s house and it’s so wonderful having so many people together after the craziest year yet.
we have a mini piper-palooza and emily takes all 4 pipers + zizi to a trampoline house, in n out, breakfast, and whitsun randomly gets a bloody nose which is terrifying
but the work isn’t done…
we’re knee-deep in integrations with systems and people, fielding emotions from the team, and stressed about how in the world to double revenue next year
even amongst the chaos, we have a successful black friday + cyber monday event and sign adidas as a parter which everyone is hyped about
details emerge about the long road of sorting out final tasks of selling a company (equity, investment bankers, insurance, payouts, and so much more)
but even throughout the whirlwind, josh makes + shows zizi her own “number munchers” game ❤️
december
the piper’s flight is cancelled so we get one more day of together time
and after a wonderful holiday with friends and family (and relief from sharing the big news that we kept close to chest for so long), we head to maui for josh’s birthday
on the way, emily loses a huge bet with josh on something dumb, but the good news is that the loser has to pay hypertext, so we all win
josh learns to fly a plane, including take off and landing and cruising around the island of molokai
josh’s birthday dinner surprise is created by a local private chef, we swim, explore, and enjoy the road to hana
it’s not 100% relaxing though… we’re still working and freaking out about things like facebook credit lines with holiday spend ramping up way beyond our expectations
we host a leadership onsite in marina del rey, and brainjolt ends up having the best 4th quarter of all time.
we get a crash course in all of the tax rules needed for selling a company, and continue to stress about trial by fire with all of the things we wish we’d known before.
this includes dragging zizi to a lot of chase bank appointments where she learns about “business”
during zizi’s christmas musical at school, we meet + become fast friends with zizi’s favorite classmate ariella, and her older sisters teach zizi how to climb a tree.
somehow, ariella gets a hold of josh’s phone and hulk smashes it on the ground so hard it sparks
emily takes zizi to cirque du soleil in santa monica to make fun christmas memories, but on the way home she has the biggest meltdown ever, everyone cries, and hours later zizi comes down with a fever and declares to “never, ebber” eat cotton candy again
it’s a mad scramble getting year-end business things prepped and emily spends a lot of that stress in tears, per usual
but we invite haley, paul, and bellamie to meet us in yosemite for christmas in a gorgeous house with the most ridiculous gemstone bathtub, impossible to locate light switches, and have burgers on an indoor grill for dinner
meanwhile, josh’s sweet aunt is involved in a terrible family dispute with an estranged cousin who breaks her arm and makes it into the news
we end the year supporting 13 organizations with hypertext foundation givings
and on new years eve, we got a late night sneak peek of the rose parade floats driving down the street from emily’s apartment.
what. a. year. !!!
thank you for reading ❤️
Happy
new year!
from josh + emily