The Startup Ideas Podcast

In this episode, I sit down with Alex Finn for a full, screen-shared walkthrough of Hermes Desktop, the new desktop home for the Hermes AI agent. I open with a clear challenge: by the end, sell me on installing Hermes Desktop, show me real ways to make money and stay productive, and explain his move from OpenClaw. Alex tours every major surface — sessions, profiles, artifacts, skills, cron jobs, and sub-agents — and shares money-saving tactics at each step. We close on the idea that matters most to me: aiming these agents at other people's challenges as the clearest path to real value.

Timestamps

00:00 – Intro

04:04 – Sessions and Context Management

06:10 – Profiles Explained

08:49 – Model-Based vs Role-Based Profiles

12:58 – Artifacts as a Second Brain

14:32 – Why Alex Switched From OpenClaw

17:32 – Skills, Tools, and Tool Sets

19:19 – Messaging and Cron Setup

21:44 – Reverse Prompting and the Brain Dump

28:09 – Sub-Agents vs Profiles

32:12 – Putting It Together: Solving Challenges

32:38 – The Daily Business Opportunity Scan

37:05 – Local Models: Mac Studio vs DGX Spark

39:03 – Reframing Cost as Investment

41:59 – The Real Way to Make Money With Hermes

42:51 – Closing Thoughts

Key Points

Hermes Desktop pulls sessions, profiles, artifacts, skills, and cron jobs into one polished, Apple-style interface.

Smart session and context management keeps each message slim and keeps monthly costs low.

Profiles map to different models — Opus 4.8 for strategy, ChatGPT 5.5 for coding, a local Qwen model for free research — so each task runs on its best fit.

Reverse prompting plus a personal brain dump produces far stronger prompts, cron jobs, and outputs.

Sub-agents handle one skill across many parallel tasks; profiles handle work where each step needs a distinct skill set.

The biggest opportunity: aim your agent at Reddit and X to surface real problems you are positioned to solve.

The #1 tool to find startup ideas/trends - https://www.ideabrowser.com

LCA helps Fortune 500s and fast-growing startups build their future - from Warner Music to Fortnite to Dropbox. We turn 'what if' into reality with AI, apps, and next-gen products https://latecheckout.agency/

The Vibe Marketer - Resources for people into vibe marketing/marketing with AI: https://www.thevibemarketer.com/

FIND ME ON SOCIAL

X/Twitter: https://twitter.com/gregisenberg

Instagram: https://instagram.com/gregisenberg/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gisenberg/

FIND ALEX ON SOCIAL

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@AlexFinnOfficial/videos

X/Twitter: https://x.com/AlexFinnX

Creator Buddy: https://www.creatorbuddy.io/

In this solo episode I walk through Codex Sites end to end, building a real internal tool live so you can copy the exact workflow. I open by comparing Codex Sites with one-prompt tools like Replit and Lovable, then construct a Startup Ideas OS board in six prompts. Along the way I cover memory and persistent storage, safe actions, Codex skills, save-gates, and proving the loop so the app updates autonomously. The core promise: by the end you know how to ship a Codex Site that an agent keeps operating for you. This one suits builders who already live in Codex and want self-updating products.

Timestamps

00:00 – Intro and Episode Agenda

01:17 – Codex Sites vs Replit and Lovable

04:33 – The Build Plan: Startup Ideas OS

05:08 – Prompt 1: Build the Shell with Sites

07:02 – Plugins Worth Using and Game Studio

08:54 – First Board Review

09:21 – Prompt 2: Add Memory and Show the Data Model

10:56 – Prompt 3: Create Safe Actions

13:25 – Prompt 4: Create the Startup Ideas Admin Skill

14:51 – Prompt 5: Save-Gate and Checkpoints

16:29 – Prompt 6: Prove the Loop from a New Chat

18:10 – Publish, Auth, and Live Updates

20:28 – TLDR: Memory, Safe Actions, Skills

22:40 – The Real Unlock and Closing Thoughts

Key Points

Codex Sites rewards builders who already live in Codex by updating apps autonomously after launch.

Replit, Lovable, and Bolt stay the simpler one-prompt choice; Codex Sites trades that for autonomy and self-updating products.

Out of the box you prompt in auth, databases, payments, email, analytics, and a secrets vault yourself.

I build a Startup Ideas OS board in six prompts: shell, memory, safe actions, a skill, a save-gate, and a proof loop.

Safe actions let an agent call approved buttons and named mutations, so edits flow from any chat.

The real payoff is autonomous products that Codex keeps operating and improving on a live URL.

The #1 tool to find startup ideas/trends - https://www.ideabrowser.com

LCA helps Fortune 500s and fast-growing startups build their future - from Warner Music to Fortnite to Dropbox. We turn 'what if' into reality with AI, apps, and next-gen products https://latecheckout.agency/

The Vibe Marketer - Resources for people into vibe marketing/marketing with AI: https://www.thevibemarketer.com/

FIND ME ON SOCIAL

X/Twitter: https://twitter.com/gregisenberg

Instagram: https://instagram.com/gregisenberg/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gisenberg/

In this solo episode, I break down the shift from a human-first internet to an agent-first one, where AI agents become the customers that discover, evaluate, pay, and recommend. I map the agent buying journey and the new infrastructure agents need: identity, tools, an inbox, memory, a wallet, and receipts. I ground it with concrete examples like AgentMail and Stripe's agent wallet, then show how to make your website agent-readable through structured docs, schemas, MCP tools, and executable actions. I close with rapid-fire startup ideas and my big prediction for the next ten years: build startups for agents.

Timestamps:

00:00 – Intro

00:49 – The tweet: build startups for agents

01:47 – Old web vs. agent web

02:24 – The agent buying journey

04:38 – What agents need: identity, tools, inbox, memory, wallet, receipts

05:30 – Examples: AgentMail, Stripe agent wallet, support, procurement, MCP, travel agent

08:24 – Building an agent-readable website

09:31 – What does this change for Startups

11:55 – Rapid-fire startup ideas for agents

13:07 – Closing Thoughts

Key Points

I explain that AI agents are becoming the primary customers online, with agent traffic set to outnumber human traffic.

I lay out the agent buying journey: finding, evaluating, transacting, using tools, and recommending to other agents.

I list what agents need beyond what humans need: identity, tools, an inbox, memory, a wallet, and receipts.

I walk through real examples like AgentMail, Stripe's agent wallet, support, procurement, MCP servers, and a travel agent.

I show how to make a site agent-readable with structured docs, schemas, MCP tools, SDKs, OAuth, checkout, sandboxes, and receipts.

I share rapid-fire startup ideas for the agentic era and frame my big prediction: build startups for agents.

The #1 tool to find startup ideas/trends - https://www.ideabrowser.com

LCA helps Fortune 500s and fast-growing startups build their future - from Warner Music to Fortnite to Dropbox. We turn 'what if' into reality with AI, apps, and next-gen products https://latecheckout.agency/

The Vibe Marketer - Resources for people into vibe marketing/marketing with AI: https://www.thevibemarketer.com/

FIND ME ON SOCIAL

X/Twitter: https://twitter.com/gregisenberg

Instagram: https://instagram.com/gregisenberg/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gisenberg/

Live from Google I/O, I sit down with Logan Kilpatrick from the Google DeepMind team to unpack everything Google just announced and what it means for founders, developers, and anyone trying to build with AI right now.

We dig into Gemini 3.5 Flash, the new Gemini Omni world model, the expanded Antigravity ecosystem, managed agents in the Gemini API, and the native Android app builder inside AI Studio. Logan breaks down how distillation is pushing Pro-level intelligence into Flash, where the biggest opportunities are for solo founders, and why the agentic era has finally moved from impressive demos to genuinely useful products.

Thanks to Google for flying me out to Google I/O and making this conversation possible.

Timestamps

00:00 – Intro

00:53 – Gemini 3.5 Flash: The New Workhorse Model

01:49 – How Flash 3.5 Stacks Up Against Sonnet

02:38 – Gemini Omni: A World Model for Any Input and Output

06:18 – Building a Content and Creator Layer on Omni

08:21 – What to look forward to

10:53 – Google Spark and Managed Agents

14:00 – The Agentic Era and Requests for Startups

17:17 – The Antigravity Ecosystem Overhaul

18:51 – AI Studio vs. Antigravity: Vibe Coding vs. Agentic Engineering

21:31 – Native Android Apps Built Inside AI Studio

23:44 – Closing Thoughts

Key Points

Gemini 3.5 Flash ships as a Sonnet-level workhorse model tuned for long-running agentic tasks, coding, and tool use, available on day one to 900M+ Gemini app users.

Gemini Omni is a single model that takes any input and produces any output across video, image, audio, and music, fusing Veo, Nano Banana, Lyria, and TTS into one system.

Managed agents in the Gemini API let builders ship agentic products with a single API call, using skills and markdown instead of writing orchestration code.

The Antigravity suite now spans an IDE, agent manager, CLI, SDK, and API surface, all sharing the same agent harness that powers Gemini Spark.

AI Studio targets vibe coding and now builds native Android apps for free, while Antigravity targets production-quality, million-line-codebase engineering.

The cost of intelligence keeps dropping thanks to distillation, opening up smaller markets that previously needed a 40-person team and venture funding to address.

The #1 tool to find startup ideas/trends - https://www.ideabrowser.com

LCA helps Fortune 500s and fast-growing startups build their future - from Warner Music to Fortnite to Dropbox. We turn 'what if' into reality with AI, apps, and next-gen products https://latecheckout.agency/

The Vibe Marketer - Resources for people into vibe marketing/marketing with AI: https://www.thevibemarketer.com/

FIND ME ON SOCIAL

X/Twitter: https://twitter.com/gregisenberg

Instagram: https://instagram.com/gregisenberg/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gisenberg/

FIND LOGAN ON SOCIAL

X/Twitter: https://x.com/OfficialLoganK

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@LoganKilpatrickYT

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/logankilpatrick/

I sit down with my friend Jonathan Courtney, a.k.a. Jicecream, to dig into the 9 biggest startup opportunities I see right now across B2C, AI, mobile, and IRL. We each pick ideas, trade reactions, and pressure-test them live. The conversation ranges from agent-first "action apps" to elder tech, third spaces, hobby retreats, pet health, AI-native media, and the case for selling AI "junior employees" to small businesses. Listeners walk away with a concrete map of where to build in 2026, plus the framing I use to decide which niche is worth marrying.

Timestamps:

00:00 – Intro

01:14 – Idea 1: Unscripted Creator Shows (Twitch model for tech)

07:50 – Idea 2: Action Apps: AI Agent Native Apps

16:39 – Idea 3: Loneliness and IRL Communities

26:47 – Idea 4: Elder Tech: Building for 65+

33:21 – Idea 5: Adult Hobbies

38:17 – Idea 6: AI Employee and AI Agents

45:33 – Idea 7: Personalized Nutrition/Health

53:08 – Idea 8: Pet Health and AI for Animals

57:34 – Idea 9: AI-Native Media Companies Done Right

01:03:18 – Stacking Ideas: Live + Retreats + Entrepreneurs

01:07:22 – Final Thoughts

The #1 tool to find startup ideas/trends - https://www.ideabrowser.com

LCA helps Fortune 500s and fast-growing startups build their future - from Warner Music to Fortnite to Dropbox. We turn 'what if' into reality with AI, apps, and next-gen products https://latecheckout.agency/

The Vibe Marketer - Resources for people into vibe marketing/marketing with AI: https://www.thevibemarketer.com/

FIND ME ON SOCIAL

X/Twitter: https://twitter.com/gregisenberg

Instagram: https://instagram.com/gregisenberg/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gisenberg/

FIND JONATHAN ON SOCIAL

Unscheduled CEO Podcast: https://www.unscheduledceo.com/

X/Twitter: https://twitter.com/Jicecream

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jonathan-courtney-4510644b/