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Wizardest

Professor Paul Canettiwizardest.com
Paul Canetti, a designer with a degree in philosophy, sits down with people from large tech companies, startup founders, VCs, and other interesting personalities to learn about their past experiences and views on the future – with a concentration on the intersection of technology, media, and human nature. Paul is founder and CEO of MAZ, whose products are used by companies like Forbes, Hearst, and Bloomberg to develop their mobile and TV apps. Paul previously worked at Apple and is currently an Adjunct Associate Professor at Columbia Business School. He was named one of Inc. Magazine's "30 Under 30 World's Coolest Entrepreneurs", and MAZ was named one of Entrepreneur Magazine's "Best Entrepreneurial Companies in America".
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Episodes

E19 // “Ghosts of Media Tech Past, Present, & Future” Sarah Chubb, Principal, Sarah Chubb Consulting

Sarah Chubb is a media and ecommerce executive with over 25 years of experience building strong and profitable businesses online. She was the President of Condé Nast Digital and of Gilt City and has served as a senior advisor for IAC Publishing and The Daily Beast. Sarah reminisces on the early days of web publishing and monetizing content online, presents her recommended go-to-market strategy for any new media brand in the era of the Facebook/Google advertising duopoly, and shares lessons about...

Feb 20, 20181 hr 16 min

E18 // “Mental Athletes” Avani Agarwal, UX Designer at Google + Co-Founder at Stature

Avani Agarwal is a UX Designer at Google where she works on products that center around social good, and she is also the co-Founder of Stature, a lifestyle brand for petite women. Prior to joining Google in 2011, she previously worked as an Art Director at Yahoo. Avani discusses her approach to design, creating a unified UX across Google, designing for consumers vs. brands, her experience as a startup founder, how AI and data can help inform design decisions, and assorted other topics.

Jan 12, 20181 hr 11 min

E17 // “The Evolution of Presentation” Georg Petschnigg, Co-Founder and CEO at FiftyThree

Founded by former Microsoft engineers and designers, FiftyThree is the creator of the award-winning app Paper and their latest release, Paste, is taking on the holy grail of productivity tools: presentations. As an early proponent of iPad as a device for creating, Georg talks about the journey he’s taken at FiftyThree, design vs. engineering, auto-layouts, the economics of the App Store, and drawing inspiration from dance.

Dec 05, 20171 hr 30 min

E16 // “Can Subscriptions Save Democracy?” Ben Frumin, Editor-in-Chief at TheWeek.com

How can we break out of our media echo chambers? The Week aims to provide a balanced, spin-free collection of news and opinion pieces from all across the political spectrum — a service needed today more than ever. Ben Frumin talks politics, echo chambers, business models for news, and why it’s important to see things from the other side.

Nov 22, 20171 hr 14 min

E15 // “Getting Kidnapped by Bob Dylan” Marissa DeVito, Branded Content at SoundCloud

Marissa DeVito, daughter of legendary producer and record executive Don DeVito (Bob Dylan, Billy Joel, Aerosmith), talks about the current state and future of the music industry, her days creating early digital and social marketing strategies at Universal Music Group for artists like Justin Bieber, working at Sony Music Studios with Green Day and Beyoncé, pioneering digital remixing with her former startup Umixit, and ridiculous stories of getting lost with Bob Dylan as a child, and well as her ...

Nov 07, 20171 hr 35 min

E14 // “170 Years of News” Ted Mendelsohn, VP, Digital and Commercial Markets, Associated Press

The AP has been reporting and distributing news for over 170 years, first delivered by boat and today by fiber optics. An industry veteran for over 40 of those years, we discuss how the business of news has changed over time, the AP’s unique wholesale and non-profit models, the resiliency of text-based media, paradigm shifts both past and future, and a variety of other topics.

Oct 17, 20171 hr 6 min

E13 // “Putting the News in News Feed” Tara Vohra, News Partnerships at Facebook

The News Partnerships team helps journalists and media companies better leverage Facebook at a time when Facebook is playing an ever important role in the distribution of news — both real and fake. We talk all about fake news, workings of The Algorithm, business models for news, the age of individuals as publishers, and other assorted topics.

Oct 03, 20171 hr 22 min

E11 // “Inside Angel Investing” Angela Lee, Founder at 37 Angels

Angela Lee is Founder at 37 Angels, Chief Innovation Officer at Columbia Business School, and a lifelong educator and entrepreneur who was named one of Entrepreneur’s “6 Innovative Women to Watch”. We discuss what it takes to become an angel investor, the process of choosing which startups to invest in (hint: saying no a lot), and the power of education.

Sep 19, 20171 hr 16 min

E9 // "Society as a UX Problem" Andre Plaut, Associate Director, Learning & Development at Huge

As a fellow Apple and General Assembly alum, and now doing L&D at Huge, Andre Plaut has a passion for the intersection of technology, education, and storytelling. After working with the Obama campaign and as someone more keyed into politics than most, he views everything as a design problem, even society itself. We dive into topics including first amendment rights, racism, the problems with modern media and what we can learn from history, as well as trading tales from the first ever iPhone l...

Aug 23, 20171 hr 51 min

E8 // "Musician Turned Tech" Vik Hristov, Co-Founder & Chief of Product Design at [Stealth Startup]

Vik Hristov is a music producer and DJ turned tech entrepreneur — he is in underground mode on a new startup set to disrupt the restaurant industry. Having previously worked at Apple, Vik sees creativity as something that be applied in many different ways and strongly believes in the power of networking (he points out that 8 years after meeting he and recording a podcast as proof). We talk about topics ranging from veganism to hiring technical teams, and everything in between.

Aug 22, 20171 hr 5 min

E7 // “Faster Than Amazon” Brian Shimmerlik, Co-Founder and CEO at Vengo Labs

Vengo is a cloud-enabled network of touchscreen vending machines that is disrupting the world of physical on-demand commerce, with a media twist. Brian Shimmerlik, Co-Founder and CEO of Vengo Labs, tells the story of how he started the company, his experience as a CEO and growing a company culture, dealing with rejection, and about his legendary TV debut on Shark Tank. Ultimately Brian’s vision for the future of touchscreens and ecommerce extend well beyond the mobile screen that most of us spen...

Jul 18, 20171 hr 19 min

E6 // “Trump Might Be Right About Fake News” Blake Harris, Author of Console Wars

Blake Harris is a bestselling author, filmmaker, and the brains behind Console Wars, a comprehensive “business thriller” about the epic battle between Sega and Nintendo - soon to be a feature film in partnership with Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg as well as legendary producer Scott Rudin (think The Social Network, The Truman Show, and every other awesome movie ever), and he is now working on a new book about VR. We explore Blake's career and also get into a deep and rich discussion around media s...

Jun 30, 20172 hr 42 min

E5 // “AI Will Replace VC” Shawn Cheng, Principal at Vayner Capital

Shawn is the guy that Gary Vaynerchuk (prolific entrepreneur, author, investor, and star of the new TV series Planet of the Apps) trusts to figure out what is going to be the next big thing. Vayner Capital has invested in some amazing companies we’ve all heard of like Snapchat and Medium, and tons that you haven’t heard of yet — and that’s the whole point of early stage investing: getting in before it’s obvious. We talk about Shawn’s investment strategy, about Gary, about the future of VC, AR, f...

Jun 15, 20171 hr 22 min

E4 // “The Future of TV” Paul Wallace, VP - Media Solutions at VICE Media

Paul Wallace, VP - Media Solutions at VICE Media, and I had a fun conversation about everything media tech, ad tech, and the future of TV. We talk about what's happening at VICE, as well as programmatic advertising, monetizing off platform, OTT, and a variety of other related and not-so-related topics.

May 23, 20171 hr 4 min

E3 // "Why Startups Fail" Brian Scordato, Founder at Tacklebox Accelerator

Brian Scordato, Founder at Tacklebox Accelerator, an early stage accelerator, gives a unique perspective on why so many startups end up failing. Also featuring MAZ COO (and my brother!) Justin Canetti as the three of us discuss cover topics ranging from common startup mistakes, getting to know your customers, what Y Combinator is really like, key differences between B2C and B2B businesses, and which gym memberships include complimentary towels.

May 10, 20171 hr 9 min

E1 // “Engineer Turned PM” Dasmer Singh, Product Manager at Venmo

The first ever episode of the Wizardest Podcast features a conversation with Dasmer Singh, Product Manager at Venmo and explores topics ranging from iOS development and product management to iOS 10, iMessage Apps, Siri, Facebook Messenger bots, and everywhere in between.

Oct 10, 201659 min
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