Meta’s “creepy” new Ray Bans, Beehiiv teams with Discord, AND a visit from Lovable CEO Anton Osika! | E2181
This Week in Startups
Jason Calacanis
4.4 • 1.3K Ratings
🗓️ 19 September 2025
⏱️ 75 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Today’s show:
On an action-packed TWiST, Alex and Jason check out Meta’s latest wearables, which promise to fix the “constantly staring down at your phone” problem and prevent you from blocking that little light letting others know you’re filming them. Think the upgrade is worth $799 of your hard-earned money?
PLUS, Lovable CEO Anton Osika stops by to answer YOUR questions, talk about how people are using the iconic vibecoding app, balancing accessibility and user engagement with the need to actually bring in revenue, and why Stockholm has become arguably Europe’s leading tech hub.
AND Beehiiv joins with Discord, Google bakes Gemini into Chrome, and MORE of the week’s biggest tech news. Check out all this and more in a brand-new “This Week in Startups”!
Timestamps:
(0:00) Why Jason thinks Meta’s new $799 Smart Ray Bans, which covertly record people in 3K, are creepy!
(04:14) Why, in the technology business, not quitting is how you succeed.
(09:47) .TECH: Say it without saying it. Head to get.tech/twist or your favorite registrar to get a clean, sharp .tech domain today.
(10:54) Show Continues…
(17:02) Anton Osika from Lovable calls in from Stockholm: Why he thinks it’s Europe’s biggest tech hub.
(20:37) Sentry - New users get 3 months free of the Business plan (covers 150k errors). Go to http://sentry.io/twist and use code TWIST
(21:44) A look at Lovable’s new security features, to make founders feel more confident in their vibe coding
(27:31) How Lovable is balancing engagement with the need to make money
(29:55) Alphasense - Get deeper insights into your business with the power of AI search and market intelligence. Start with a free trial at https://www.alpha-sense.com/twist
(31:03) Show Continues…
(42:29) Anton’s tactical advice for founders who want to build a community around their product.
(49:14) A viewer asks: Is vibe coding CHEATING?
(59:01) Google is baking Gemini into Chrome… but how will it work? And what about privacy?
(01:05:05) Beehiiv links up with Discord. Why Alex has a few concerns!
(01:11:01) Responding to some of YOUR comments. (Leave us reviews and comments on Apple and Spotify!)
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Thank you to our partners:
.TECH: Say it without saying it. Head to get.tech/twist or your favorite registrar to get a clean, sharp .tech domain today.
Sentry - New users get 3 months free of the Business plan (covers 150k errors). Go to http://sentry.io/twist and use code TWIST
Alphasense - Get deeper insights into your business with the power of AI search and market intelligence. Start with a free trial at https://www.alpha-sense.com/twist
Great TWIST interviews: Will Guidara, Eoghan McCabe, Steve Huffman, Brian Chesky, Bob Moesta, Aaron Levie, Sophia Amoruso, Reid Hoffman, Frank Slootman, Billy McFarland
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | When do you think it crosses over? Like if you were to give an honest assessment or if we were going to make a polymarket and we were going to place a, you know, a bet on it, that lovable's security is twice as good as an expert. Twice as good as an expert. |
| 0:16.9 | For applications built fully in lovable compared to thismin building it from scratch, I think on average, like on average it would be more secure to be more secure. It's going to be in the coming 18 months. |
| 0:33.4 | This weekend startups is brought to you by Alpha Sense. Get deeper insights into your business with the power of AI search and market intelligence. |
| 0:42.8 | Start with a free trial at Alpha-Sense.com slash twist. |
| 0:48.5 | Sentry. |
| 0:49.4 | Your team should be focused on shipping features, not chasing down bugs. |
| 0:53.7 | New users get three months free |
| 0:55.3 | of the business plan, which covers 150,000 errors. Go to century.io slash twist and use the |
| 1:02.2 | code twist. And dot tech. Say it without saying it. Head to get. Dottech slash twist or your |
| 1:09.6 | favorite registrar to get a clean, sharp dot tech domain today. |
| 1:13.6 | Hey, everybody. Welcome back to this week in Startups. I'm your host, Jason Kalkanis. With me, |
| 1:18.1 | my co-host, Alex Wilhelm, we've got a full docket. You can watch the show live this week in |
| 1:23.5 | startups.com. There should be some live links, but x.com, LinkedIn, if you follow me, |
| 1:30.1 | substack, if you follow the show there, plenty of places to follow us live, including |
| 1:35.4 | YouTube. So go over to YouTube and just do a search for this week in startups. And we take |
| 1:39.4 | questions from the live audience. If you're listening to this and you're part of the podcast |
| 1:42.8 | group, no problem, Monday, Wednesday, Thursdays, 12 p.m., Central Time, also known as Texas Time. |
| 1:51.1 | So we've got a lot on the docket today, and I guess the biggest news story in big tech, |
| 1:59.1 | not little tech, is AI's meta glasses. |
| 2:03.3 | Seemed to be a hit, huh? |
| 2:05.2 | Metas AI glasses, this is the thing we talked about on the show quite a lot, Jason. |
| 2:08.7 | Just to remind everybody, they dropped an earlier version of their Rayban meta glasses that could |
... |
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