The CEO Advantage

IP Agreement & Exponential Advisor Structure

April 17, 2026 Ethan Brace & John Anderson ~25 min · Google Meet (Fathom-recorded)
Private — Internal Working Document

Meeting Framing

Two streams converged on this call: (1) cleaning up unresolved IP and severance from Replace Retirement — specifically Steve's unsigned severance — before the 10M Triangles venture has real value to protect, and (2) formalizing the entity structure for that venture, now that John's son's potential involvement and a trust's control requirement have added complexity.

"Formal IP protection for Legacy Map can't happen until we get Steve out of the picture." — John Anderson, 00:15:00

Key Decisions

Directionally Settled
  • Steve will be offered a personal-use IP license — 1:1 coaching for existing clients (Granger) and new individual clients. Prohibited: building an organization, building an LLM/AI, letting associates use it.
  • Ethan will draft the IP agreement for Steve and Elizabeth, and generate goodwill-gesture alternatives (phantom equity, revenue threshold, exit-triggered lump sum) for Bob O'Keefe.
  • Exponential Advisor LLC (already existing) will be the vehicle for the 10M Triangles venture. Anderson Advisors retains core IP and licenses to Exponential Advisor.
  • Michigan top-five vision stays under Anderson Advisors; Exponential Advisor carries the scalable triangle model.
  • The existing Ethan/John co-founder agreement needs a material rewrite to reflect: initial revenue flowing to Ethan, John's son as potential majority shareholder (trust requirement), and income based on role/contribution rather than equity %.
Open / Not Decided
  • Final goodwill structure — deferred to Bob
  • Whether Elizabeth actually signed the original RR severance
  • Formal IP registration for Legacy Map — trademark "floating" under RR until Steve signs
  • Whether Bob Evett ever gets equity in Exponential Advisor
  • AI liability specifics — flagged, not researched

Key Topics

1. The Steve Problem — Why This Matters Now

Steve never signed the Replace Retirement severance. Everyone else (Cindy, Michael Colley, Elizabeth in her own telling) signed immediately. As a result, IP that should sit cleanly in Anderson Advisors is in a gray zone.

"There's a trademark on the legacy map, but that's kind of just floating out there. I guess it's essentially owned by Replace Retirement until he signs off. Then it can become Anderson Advisor." — John Anderson, 00:15:06

John estimates Steve has "probably invoiced out a quarter million dollars by now, and he didn't have to pay me $25,000 for that" (00:06:18). The motivation for a goodwill gesture is personal — John doesn't want Steve to feel ignored when the venture succeeds, and he wants the signed release more than he wants to relitigate the compensation math.

The framing — push a signature through before the venture has visible value — is the call's strategic spine. It's also where the biggest gap sits: neither person named a deadline, a trigger, or what happens if Steve declines.

2. IP Usage Rights — What Steve and Elizabeth Can and Cannot Do

John's proposed terms (00:02:00–00:03:15):

  • Permitted: Use Legacy Map, Character Compass, and Triangle in 1:1 coaching for John's existing clients and for new individual clients in Steve's own network.
  • Prohibited: Creating an organization on the IP; building an LLM or AI system on it; letting anyone else use it — even associates inside Steve's own practice.
  • License is personal, not sublicensable, not assignable.

Elizabeth "never did coach a class" and "may not even know how to use the tools" (00:07:58–00:08:00). Her inclusion in the new agreement is housekeeping, not urgency. Prior agreements: John stated "I'm not sure there were agreements. It's a question I can't fully answer" (00:10:04).

3. Goodwill Gesture — Structure and Motivation

John wants to acknowledge early contribution without creating ongoing admin and without implying Steve has a contractual right to anything. Options surfaced on the call:

  • Exit trigger — 1% of entity value if/when the entity exits above ~$5M (one-time). John's apparent preference.
  • Revenue threshold — 1% of revenues above a defined threshold (recurring; creates annual accounting).
  • Phantom equity — economic rights without governance rights.
  • Lump sum — mentioned as a possibility; no specifics.
"It would be simply a goodwill gesture for the effort you put in over the years." — John Anderson, 00:07:03

Implicit paradox: John wants the gesture to be voluntary but also the sweetener that makes Steve sign. If it's the inducement to sign, it's consideration and must be in the contract; if it's a gift, it shouldn't be a contract term at all. This needs resolving before drafting.

4. Entity Structure — Exponential Advisor as the Moonshot Vehicle

Anderson Advisors is a single-owner boutique and can't host partners. John surfaced the solution mid-conversation: use the existing Exponential Advisor LLC as the organization that owns the moonshot. The structural decision is made; the implementation is not.

IP flow: Anderson Advisors holds core IP; Exponential Advisor licenses from Anderson Advisors to build the B2C product. License terms, royalty, scope, and whether the license survives an acquisition — none discussed.

John's son as majority shareholder: Required to satisfy the requirements of "the trust" (00:12:31). The son is not yet committed. The trust-control requirement is being designed around someone who may not participate.

Decoupling income from equity: Income can track role and contribution rather than cap table %. In an LLC this is legal but must be explicit in the operating agreement; verbal understandings don't bind.

5. AI Liability and IP Exposure — Flagged, Not Resolved

John asked directly: "Is the intellectual property protected in the LLM you're using?" (00:16:18). Ethan's answer: providers see "small slivers" of segmented context, not a structured view of the IP. He hedged in real time and committed to researching this properly for the notes.

John's two user-liability concerns: (1) self-harm — "if someone ends up, you know, killing themselves, we don't want to be liable for it" (00:18:11); (2) bad relationship advice — "anything that tells him, divorce your wife" (00:18:20). No mitigations discussed.

6. Michigan Vision — A Separately-Housed Moonshot

John's second vision: Michigan as a top-five state for living and working, built around EV and autonomous-vehicle adoption. It stays under Anderson Advisors, not Exponential Advisor. He drew an analogy to the 1970s gas crisis and the Japanese fuel-efficient car breakthrough.

"The Strait of Hormuz, it's a non-issue. It's the death knell of carbon and oil and gas. Trump doesn't realize, but he's basically just accelerated the entire process to electric." — John Anderson, 00:21:03

John referenced reading Steven Kotler's "Dark Side of Abundance" chapter and wrote to Kotler today. He also referenced "We Are As Gods" — note: that book is Kevin Kelly's, not Kotler's; worth verifying attribution before citing either in outreach.

Tensions & Open Questions

  1. 1 No forcing function on Steve. Every week, venture value goes up and Steve's leverage grows. Neither person named a deadline, a consequence for not signing, or whether John will revoke client access to create pressure. This is the single largest gap.
  2. 2 Goodwill gesture can't be both voluntary and a signing inducement. If it's in the contract, it's consideration. If it's a gift, it shouldn't be a contract term. The current plan blurs this.
  3. 3 IP chain of title is unverified. Trademark on Legacy Map still sits under Replace Retirement per John. Anderson Advisors can't license what it doesn't formally own. A buyer's first due diligence finding.
  4. 4 Exponential Advisor's existing history is unknown. The LLC already exists — formation reason, prior members, contracts, liabilities, tax posture all unexamined. Using a pre-existing entity inherits whatever baggage it has.
  5. 5 The son isn't in yet. "Assuming he wants to move forward" (00:12:09). The trust-majority-shareholder constraint is shaping the cap table around someone who hasn't committed.
  6. 6 Ethan's initial-revenue priority is verbal. John referenced it as an existing understanding (00:12:03). Nothing signed. If the son ends up majority shareholder with fiduciary protection and Ethan's priority is a handshake, the handshake loses.
  7. 7 Ethan's LLM answer needs actual research. The "small slivers" framing is directionally right for RAG/prompting but understates fine-tuning risk and ignores provider-tier differences. Ethan flagged this himself.
  8. 8 Two moonshots, two entities, one partnership. Michigan under Anderson Advisors, Triangle under Exponential Advisor. Ethan is co-founder on one. Is that the intent, or incidental to the IP-licensing structure?
  9. 9 Existing Ethan/John co-founder agreement has no disposition path. Amended? Superseded? Assigned? Terminated? Gap-risk until the new document is drafted and executed.
  10. 10 John wants to avoid Bob ($400/hr), but the sequencing multiplies Bob's hours. A single well-prepared brief to Bob (question list + draft + goodwill alternatives) costs less than multiple half-baked rounds.

Action Items

Ethan
  • Draft IP usage agreement for Steve and Elizabeth. Terms: personal 1:1 coaching permitted for John's existing clients plus Steve's own network; prohibited: organization-building, LLM/AI training, sublicensing, associate use. Include the goodwill gesture. Run by Bob before sending.
  • Generate 3–4 concrete goodwill-gesture structures with pros/cons for Bob: phantom equity, revenue-threshold %, exit-triggered lump sum, time-limited revenue share. Include tax treatment notes.
  • Document LLM IP exposure properly: data retention policies for Anthropic and OpenAI at each tier (consumer vs. enterprise), and the distinction between RAG/prompting and fine-tuning.
  • Draft the updated Ethan/John co-founder agreement for Exponential Advisor. Must reflect: Ethan's initial-revenue priority (with explicit waterfall language), income-by-role model, John's son as majority shareholder path, the IP license from Anderson Advisors, and the disposition of the existing co-founder agreement.
John
  • Confirm with Elizabeth whether she signed the original RR severance. Email is sufficient; no Bob call needed for this.
  • Brief Bob with the full packet (IP agreement draft + goodwill alternatives) in a single session rather than iterative calls.
  • Tuesday in-person meeting — confirm agenda (likely the drafts).
Joint
  • Align on Exponential Advisor cap-table and IP license before Bob is engaged. Ownership %, distribution mechanics, royalty rate, license scope, survival-on-acquisition — arrive at "here's what we want" first.
  • Evaluate Brian O'Keefe's son (OpenAI, legal) as AI-liability resource. No outreach until entity structure is cleaner.
  • Decide what happens to the existing Ethan/John co-founder agreement when the new entity stands up (amend, assign, supersede, terminate).

People Mentioned

Person Role / Relevance
Steve Former Replace Retirement partner. Never signed RR severance. Still coaches John's clients (Granger). Per John, has invoiced ~$250K using the IP with no finder's fee back. Signature is the gating item for the entire IP cleanup.
Elizabeth Former RR partner. Implied in notes she did sign the severance; willing to sign again if not. Never coached a class. Included as parallel housekeeping.
Bob Evett Current collaborator in Anderson Advisors. Zero equity there. New LLC opens a possible path; nothing proposed.
Brian O'Keefe ("Bob") John's attorney. Wrote the original RR severance. ~$400/hr. John is cost-sensitive about calls.
Brian O'Keefe's son Works at OpenAI on legal matters per John. Flagged as potential resource for AI liability. No outreach planned.
John's son Unnamed on call. Would need to be majority shareholder of Exponential Advisor to satisfy a trust requirement. Has not committed. Income would be role-based, decoupled from equity %.
Gino Cautionary tale — received introductions from John, never reciprocated. The emotional anchor for John's generosity toward Steve.
Troy's brother Todd A coach John referred into a client. Pays John a commission on renewal (John thinks ~10%, hedged). Cited as the reciprocity norm Steve has skipped.
Cindy Former RR participant; put money in, signed severance immediately.
Michael Colley John's friend; also put money in, signed immediately.
Steven Kotler Author of "Dark Side of Abundance" chapter John is reading. John wrote to him today. Note: "We Are As Gods" mentioned separately is Kevin Kelly's book — attribution uncertain in transcript.
Peter Diamandis Cited as the kind of exponential-thinker John is bringing into his thinking. Abundance 360 connection.

Considerations Not Discussed — Concepts, Ideas & Gotchas

A. Steve's Leverage and the Negotiation
1
Negotiation Steve's BATNA is the status quo, and it's good for him. He's earning ~$250K coaching John's clients with no finder's fee, no signed restrictions, and no contractual IP limits. Any agreement John offers replaces that with restrictions plus a future-contingent sweetener. The rational move is to delay indefinitely — which is exactly what he's done. The goodwill gesture needs to be worth more than continued unrestricted use, or there has to be a stick.
2
Strategy What's the stick? John's options if Steve refuses: (a) revoke client access — forces the issue but burns the Granger relationship; (b) cease-and-desist on further IP use — escalatory, attorney-driven; (c) compete directly and hope Steve's informal use fades. None were discussed. Pick one before drafting.
3
Tactics "Get him to sign while he doesn't think about it too much" is a tactic, not a plan. Works only if the ask is small enough that Steve signs on autopilot. A contract that includes a 1% exit participation and explicit prohibitions on organization-building invites exactly the scrutiny John wants to avoid. The tactic and the terms are in tension.
4
Drafting Framing: license agreement, not severance. A fresh "severance" in 2026 invites the question "severance from what?" If there was no underlying written agreement (per John at 00:10:04), drafting it as a new IP license with a release of claims avoids implying retroactive rights Steve didn't previously have.
5
Legal Drafting specifics to pin down. Three related questions the agreement must answer: (a) is the license revocable at will, on material breach only, or never? (b) any non-compete clause in Michigan needs defensible geographic/temporal limits — draft IP restrictions to survive even if the non-compete is struck; (c) what happens on Steve's death — terminates, or passes to his estate?
B. IP Provenance and Chain of Title
6
IP Anderson Advisors may not actually own the core IP yet. John's own words: the Legacy Map trademark is "essentially owned by Replace Retirement until he signs off" (00:15:06). This is a title defect. Every downstream plan — licensing to Exponential Advisor, exit, investor due diligence — depends on clean title. Bob should pull the actual trademark record and confirm registrant.
7
IP / Copyright If Steve contributed to the IP, his claim isn't only to use. Jointly-developed work without a written assignment can leave a contributor with co-ownership rights under copyright (not trademark). If Steve helped develop Legacy Map materials during RR and never assigned them, Anderson Advisors' title may be weaker than John assumes. Ask: what did Steve actually help create, when, and under what agreement?
C. Exponential Advisor — The Vehicle
8
Due Diligence Do diligence on the existing LLC. It "already exists" — but for what? Prior members, filings, liabilities, tax history, name-reservation conflicts. Cheap to check, expensive to discover post-signing.
9
Tax / Transfer Pricing The Anderson Advisors → Exponential Advisor IP license must be arm's-length. Common owner across both sides means the license can be recharacterized by the IRS or by an acquirer. Document the rate, scope, exclusivity, and the basis for the rate.
10
M&A / Exit License survival on acquisition. If Exponential Advisor is acquired, does the IP license transfer with it, or does the acquirer have to renegotiate with John/Anderson Advisors? Single most important commercial term in the license — it controls the exit. Address it in the license, not in the sale.
11
Entity Structure Entity form: LLC vs. C-corp. If there's any realistic path to outside investment or an exit over ~$10M, C-corp may be better (§1202 QSBS can exclude up to 100% of capital gains on a qualifying exit — not available to LLCs taxed as pass-throughs). Decide before equity is issued; conversion later has tax cost.
12
Tax / Gift John's son as majority shareholder — gift tax and valuation. Transferring majority equity to a family member can trigger gift-tax valuation issues. A defensible valuation (409A-style) at the moment of grant protects against later IRS disputes.
13
Fiduciary Fiduciary tension: co-founder Ethan vs. family-member majority holder. John owes Ethan fiduciary duties as co-founder. Issuing a majority stake to a family member in the new entity, while those terms are negotiated, creates a potential conflict. Protections to consider: independent valuation, tag-along rights for Ethan, anti-dilution on future family grants.
14
Operating Agreement Income-by-role and Ethan's initial-revenue priority both need explicit operating-agreement clauses. Disparate distributions that don't track equity are legal in an LLC but must be documented — otherwise the IRS can recharacterize as guaranteed payments, or a majority holder can change the rules later. Ethan's initial-revenue priority is currently verbal; a majority holder is not bound by verbal history.
15
Contracts Existing Ethan/John co-founder agreement — disposition path. Assigned to Exponential Advisor? Amended in place? Superseded by the new operating agreement? Terminated? None is the default; silence leaves ambiguity that surfaces at exit.
D. Goodwill Gesture — Structural Specifics
16
Admin / Tax Revenue-threshold share creates perpetual audit exposure. Pays yearly, requires accounting every year, gives Steve (or his estate) standing to audit. Exit-triggered lump sum is administratively cleaner and has a natural end.
17
Tax Phantom equity vs. profits interest — different tax treatment. Phantom equity pays as ordinary income when triggered. A profits interest (LLC-specific, granted at FMV with no capital account) can qualify for capital-gains treatment on appreciation.
18
Drafting Contract vs. gift — pick one. If contractual: it's consideration, include it, make it enforceable. If voluntary/gift: don't put it in the contract — commit separately in a side letter or pay when the time comes. Contractual-but-labeled-"goodwill" is the worst of both worlds.
19
Securities Securities-law status of exit-contingent payments. An exit-contingent % can look like an unregistered security depending on structure and recipient. Confirm whether Steve and Elizabeth are accredited investors, and whether the chosen structure has securities exposure.
20
M&A Third-party beneficiary risk at M&A. A contractual right to 1% of exit shows up in due diligence and the acquirer will want it resolved. Draft the clause to pay from seller proceeds at close — not as an obligation of the buyer going forward.
E. AI Liability and IP Exposure (JohnBot)
21
AI / Data Provider data retention by tier — Ethan's write-up must be specific. Anthropic enterprise API: zero retention and no training by default. Consumer Claude.ai: retains and may train unless opted out. OpenAI enterprise API: zero retention. ChatGPT consumer: retains. Which tier JohnBot uses for development and which for production are separate questions; both must be documented.
22
AI / Architecture RAG/prompting vs. fine-tuning — different exposure profiles. RAG and prompting keep John's IP on Ethan's infrastructure; the provider sees only the query plus retrieved context. Fine-tuning embeds content into model weights at the provider — a meaningfully different risk. State the architecture explicitly.
23
Legal / Safety Unauthorized-practice zones and user-safety infrastructure. "Divorce your wife" and self-harm scenarios land in state-regulated territory. Disclaimers alone are insufficient. Minimum pre-launch infrastructure: ToS with liability caps, mandatory-arbitration clause, E&O insurance on the entity, crisis-detection guardrails in the system prompt with 988 referrals, and a clear "coaching not therapy/medical/legal advice" scope statement — enforced in both contract and code.
F. Michigan Vision (Separately Housed)
24
Brand / Legal / Structure Brand, IP ownership, and vehicle structure. Three linked issues: (a) Active state-level advocacy attaches to John's personal brand via Anderson Advisors; conservative clients may read it as political signaling. (b) Michigan frameworks developed under Anderson Advisors do not automatically travel to Exponential Advisor at exit unless the inter-entity license covers them. (c) If the initiative grows into organized lobbying, a for-profit LLC is the wrong wrapper — 501(c)(4) or trade-association (c)(6) structures permit lobbying that an LLC cannot do without political exposure to the business entity.

Full Transcript

Full Transcript (expand) ~25 min · Fathom ID 139049217
Ethan Brace
00:00:09
Heading up north today?
John Anderson
00:00:11
Mm-hmm.
Ethan Brace
00:00:18
Well, let's get it rolling then.
Ethan Brace
00:00:21
You have been working on your vision, I've noticed.
John Anderson
00:00:29
I continued to do a little more tweaking to it last week.
John Anderson
00:00:35
And, you know, there's two parts. There's the 10 million triangles, 10 years, and then the other one is making Michigan top five place to live and work in America. I like that goal.
John Anderson
00:00:53
And as I get it further along, then I'll share it all. And then I also sent you — back when you originally asked, do you have anything for me to work from? And I sent the actual agreement, the severance thing, or whatever it's called, that they're supposed to sign.
John Anderson
00:01:24
And it's my understanding, everybody signed it, but Steve, but I'm not sure, I'd have to reach out — I hate reaching out to the attorney because it costs $400 an hour — but Elizabeth implied in a couple notes that she did sign it, and if she didn't, she'd be happy to do so.
John Anderson
00:02:00
I guess this is what I'm willing to do: he can continue to use the intellectual property of the legacy map, character compass, and triangle in work he's doing for my clients. As an example, at Granger Construction, he still has one client there. So that pathway remains open. Two, if he wants to do one-on-one work with somebody in his own network, utilizing those tools, that would be acceptable. What would not be acceptable is for him to create an organization or an LLM that uses that intellectual property. That exclusively belongs to Anderson Advisors.
John Anderson
00:03:02
So it's only for his use. And again, if you wanted to build an organization out or share it with somebody he works with today, it's only allowed for him to do the work, not for others.
Ethan Brace
00:03:13
Or AI or systems. Right.
John Anderson
00:03:17
And then one of the things for us to consider is that if we, when we build out our product and send it out to the universe and everybody gets on board in terms of wanting to use it and we have 10 million triangles — would we want to allow both Steve and Elizabeth to have 1%? Of that entity and the value of it.
John Anderson
00:03:55
And maybe what's — because the problem is when I did this with this current company is I gave a friend of mine 1%, but then you got to get them to sign off and it creates extra hassles when you're trying to do something or include capital or whatever. So maybe if it's not, it could be like phantom equity or something or maybe it's some sort of revenue share that if revenues exceeded X and then they would get 1%.
John Anderson
00:04:30
I just thought we had a really big windfall — because they were all back on the Replace Retirement — that maybe there's some way to share in that.
Ethan Brace
00:04:52
Are you wanting to involve Elizabeth and Steve still in some small way? Is that why you're considering offering them part of it?
John Anderson
00:05:08
I'm doing it because I felt kind of shafted by Gino — that he never thanked me for the introductions, never benefited beyond that. Now, in the case of Steve, he has been compensated. He did put some money into Replace Retirement, but he has been compensated because I've let him work with my clients, which he continues to do to this day, and he doesn't pay any finder's fee for that.
John Anderson
00:05:44
So for instance, Troy's brother Todd, I made an introduction for him, and he pays me — I think it's, I forget what the royalty is, is it 10%? — he gives me a commission every year that he renews with that client. He's happy to do that. And so in Steve's case, he's probably invoiced out a quarter million dollars by now, and he didn't have to pay me $25,000 for that.
John Anderson
00:06:39
I was just trying to see if there was some way — if we had some big win, we could also make it based on some number — that if for some reason the entity was purchased for, you know, $5,000,000 or something, it would be a one time lump sum settlement or something. I don't know. It would be simply a goodwill gesture for the effort you put in over the years. And we're just not ignoring that.
John Anderson
00:07:18
And maybe that's the simplest thing is to say, if there was an exit of, let's say $5 million or more — problem is then they're going to want a bigger share. I don't know, but we can run this by Bob.
Ethan Brace
00:07:34
We can come up with some other ideas around how to do that too. I'll generate some.
John Anderson
00:07:43
By the way, neither of them asked for this. I was just trying to be generous. What they asked for — what Steve asked for, and he thought it would be fair for Elizabeth — she wasn't as concerned because she's really not doing any of this. She never did coach a class. So she may not even know how to use the tools. But anyway, in Steve's case, he's like, you know, I was there while you helped build this, and I'd like to have some way to continue to use it. And so that was all I asked. I said that there's not a legal repercussion. And that's why I also thought this was important, because if we, when we build this 10 million triangles, it's going to be worth a lot. We need to have all that intellectual property belonging to us, not him.
John Anderson
00:08:36
So does that give you enough to frame something up?
Ethan Brace
00:08:43
You're looking to offer just some goodwill to the people who have put in some time. And one idea was to offer 1% at a specific exit price if we reach that. And maybe some other ideas around ongoing output, equity output.
John Anderson
00:09:08
The only other piece is that they can use the intellectual property to coach one-off clients, but not to build an organization, not to allow other people to use the intellectual property. It's solely for them in a one-on-one client case.
Ethan Brace
00:09:42
And you have all of the agreements with them from the past?
John Anderson
00:10:04
I'm not sure there were agreements. It's a question I can't fully answer. All I know is that the attorney who's been with us, Brian O'Keefe, wrote up the one that ended the relationship. And again, Cindy had put money in and my friend Michael Colley had. Everybody signed off immediately, except for Elizabeth and Steve. And Elizabeth dragged her feet a little bit just because she's Elizabeth. And she, in her mind, she signed off. And if she hasn't, she had no problem with it without any further agreement. And all Steve said, originally, he said, I'll create this and then we'll do it. And he didn't create it. So then I said, I'll create this. And then I did, but I didn't save it. I gave a hard copy to Elizabeth. I never had a copy. And then, so then we're back around to, he said, oh, I'll create it, which drags us on for another year.
John Anderson
00:11:00
It's been on for several years now, but he never follows through on anything, so that's why I decided we better take the lead on this because pretty soon we're going to have something and then he's going to be all hot and bothered on it.
Ethan Brace
00:11:14
Get him to agree while he doesn't think about it too much. Yeah, we're doing it. Makes sense. Okay, so come up with an agreement that gives just that goodwill gesture towards them and gets them to sign off on moving forward.
John Anderson
00:11:34
And then the other thing is, you know, you created an agreement for you and I, and now we've added some moving parts in. So maybe, you know, you do something that reflects this idea of sort of income generation activities — you know, like my son and so on, that's all sort of going — that needs to be paid back. And then we also talked about that all the initial revenue would flow to you. So we need to address that.
John Anderson
00:12:09
And then we might even start to think about how to bring John in, assuming he wants to move forward, because in his case it would have to be structured that he is the majority shareholder to meet the requirements of the will — I mean, the trust. But that doesn't mean we can't treat the income differently. Maybe it's based on roles or something. So that may be a way to be both fair and work around some of those things, which means he would still get income based on his position. Income would be based on people's position and contribution or something.
John Anderson
00:13:00
And then it also leaves the doorway — Bob does not have an equity position in Anderson. Nobody has one but me. As matter of fact, we have to create a separate LLC to do that, which was maybe how we use that Exponential Advisor name since it already exists. And it's already a legal entity. And then we figure out how to — that's the organization that owns the moonshot.
Ethan Brace
00:13:30
There are a few things to work out. The agreement with previous people, the agreements moving forward with Exponential Advisor, what the pricing and payment structure looks like for us as we get into it.
John Anderson
00:14:00
The nice thing about these sort of two moonshot ideas is there's this making Michigan top five places — that could still remain under sort of the Anderson Advisor umbrella, and the triangle idea could be under Exponential Advisor. And similar to what we just said about Steve and Elizabeth, it's like I still need to have ownership of the intellectual property as sort of a boutique consulting firm. Maybe I'm licensing it to Exponential Advisor — we can figure out.
Ethan Brace
00:14:40
Do you have any sort of legal wrapper around your IP, the whole system that you've built?
John Anderson
00:14:52
No, and that was one of the things that Brian O'Keefe — we've done a couple things but nothing can happen until we get Steve out of the picture. Like there's a trademark on the legacy map, but that's kind of just floating out there. I guess it's essentially owned by Replace Retirement until he signs off. Then it can become Anderson Advisor. But that's where we're going to have to decide — we want to protect me to be able to continue doing business. So maybe it all remains the intellectual property of Anderson Advisors, and Exponential Advisor has some agreement for use of it, in order to make a B-to-C kind of model or something.
John Anderson
00:16:01
And before we ever get an attorney to really ink the thing down, we should say: basically, this is what we came up with, this is what we want. I have a separate question on legal matters — is the intellectual property protected in the LLM you're using?
Ethan Brace
00:16:24
So for things like that, the usage is tracked at a high level. It's not the details. So what's happening — what the LLM services can actually see us doing is pretty siloed and segmented. It's just small slivers that are sent back and forth between our systems and theirs. So there's no real structure. So what we're actually going back and forth with — that said, I will draw out the things that I don't fully understand about this and make sure that's included in today's notes.
John Anderson
00:17:13
And I asked that because I remember a couple of things I learned at Abundance 360 — you can have private agents, you've got to pay for it, but you don't have to give this to the ether. So we've got to think through that. And then the other thing — Brian said actually his son who works with, uh, OpenAI — and his whole thing is like all around the legal protections. So he may be a resource we can use. When I asked about that, he said, oh, that's what my son does.
John Anderson
00:18:11
And then — we want to, because if someone ends up, you know, killing themselves, we don't want to be liable for it. Right? And then, or anything that tells him, you know, divorce your wife, she sounds horrible. So we don't want to get into those types of things. And just run-away stuff that we can't perceive today.
John Anderson
00:18:37
Then the other piece of the puzzle — as I continue to think through this — just like I got comfortable with the idea, well, it won't do as good a job as I do, but it still gets people headed in the right direction. And I'm okay with that.
John Anderson
00:19:01
Out of this book, We Are As Gods, it's such a good book. I finally wrote Steven today — just couldn't wait to tell him just how much I appreciate his writing, and here's a couple things I'm working on, that we are feeding really good stuff into AI, and I don't want to lose sight of the importance of that, too. Instead of going out there and controlling the world stuff, it's like, no, let's make people better. And I don't want to lose sight of the importance of that, even if it does risk some things being copied or whatever.
John Anderson
00:19:55
That's essentially what led to the Michigan thing. I'm like, okay, well, I'm bringing in these people like Peter Diamandis, and it's like, well, why couldn't this be the best state in the country? We got natural resources, almost incomparable. If you think autonomous vehicles are around, then the trend going up north this afternoon would be a non-issue — get in your autonomous vehicle. Like we would be meeting right now. And then drones — I probably wouldn't drive anyway. I would just take a drone up to Gaylord or something. So if you had a business located in Gaylord and people will say, I want to go to Chicago for a weekend — no problem, you just drone over. When you leave the bar at 2am and you drone back.
John Anderson
00:21:00
I want to talk to our leaders to say, you've got to just look at the lens through where we're going, not from where we've been. The Strait of Hormuz, it's a non-issue. It's the death knell of carbon and oil and gas. Trump doesn't realize, but he's basically just accelerated the entire process to electric. I know that's not what he intended, but this is the same thing as the gas crisis in the 70s. Everybody after that, all of a sudden the Japanese came in with these efficient, fuel-efficient cars that nobody really gave much credit to. And they're like, this is a nice car. That damn piece of junk I'm driving around isn't built as well. So all of a sudden the Japanese just gobbled up the market.
John Anderson
00:21:56
This will be the inflection point that releases electric vehicles, everybody's going to say. When we were at the BMW last week, you said the next version we got coming out is like 465-mile range. And of course on my weekly feed in China, they're getting like 600 miles. So you give me a 600-mile car, I'm in.
Ethan Brace
00:22:24
It's game over.
John Anderson
00:22:25
Well, that's all just around the corner. So this drill baby drill is just so ignorant. This morning I'm reading Kotler's thing — this chapter was called The Dark Side of Abundance. But he finished it up, he said: meanwhile, China added more solar in 2023 than the entire world did in 2022. And they did it again in 2025. So. Like, that's what they're doing. They're trying to get away from oil and gas as fast as they can. They don't want to have to deal with the Russians, and they don't want to bring the oil up from the Middle East, so they have no choice.
John Anderson
00:23:21
And we've got an administration like, no, let's shove out some more coal and burn some more oil, and it's just like, God, you guys are in the dark ages. That's my mission. It's like the state should not be in the dark ages. Guys, I just want to give you all the content. I'll bring in all the experts, and then you decide which side of this equation you want to be. If you really think oil and gas is the way to go, then put five more fuel lines under the Mackinac Straits, and if that ruins our Great Lakes — well, who cares if it's our kids that'll live with it? So anyway, I'm sorry. Getting preachy.
Ethan Brace
00:24:11
Oh, I love it.
John Anderson
00:24:13
I'll call you right back. I think we're good. I will plan on seeing you Tuesday.
Ethan Brace
00:24:19
See you Tuesday morning. Yeah. Sounds great.
John Anderson
00:24:21
Thank you, Ethan. And I'm really excited about what we're doing. I hope that comes across.
Ethan Brace
00:24:27
I'm excited, too. All right. Have a good weekend. You too. See you.