Recode Decode: Basecamp CEO Jason Fried

Decoder with Nilay Patel

Vox Media Podcast Network

Technology, Business

4.3 • 3.2K Ratings

🗓️ 23 January 2019

⏱️ 59 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Basecamp CEO Jason Fried talks with Recode's Kara Swisher about his most recent book, It Doesn't Have to Be Crazy at Work, which he co-wrote with his business partner David Heinemeier Hansson. In this episode: How Basecamp got started; why chat apps like Slack and Basecamp's own Campfire are bad for productivity; the things that make work crazy, including access to coworkers' calendars, ASAP-response culture and codependent departments; why Basecamp does not set any goals internally other than "be profitable"; how Silicon Valley's "world domination mindset" stresses workers out; which tech exec would win in a fight?; the fakeness of fancy office perks; the problems with serial entrepreneurship, best practices and intentional sleep deprivation; "hacking anything is stupid"; why venture capital destroys more businesses than it helps; and how tech companies are trying to avoid becoming Philip Morris. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	When you drive a Chevy electric vehicle, you're getting more than a way to get from point A to point B.
0:06.0	You're saying goodbye to gas stations and hello to open roads.
0:10.0	With the growing network of public charging stations, you'll be able to charge your EV while you shop, work, or do whatever you want to be doing with your time.
0:17.0	Chevy is making EVs for everyone, everywhere. Go to chevrelay.com slash electric to learn more.
0:24.0	Sabotage hired goons and a landfill in Utah.
0:32.0	How Steve Jobs' revolutionary catastrophe of a computer, the Apple Lisa, earned a brief second life, and then was buried for good.
0:42.0	Watch the Verges documentary, Lisa's final act, now on YouTube.
0:47.0	Hi, I'm Cara Swisher, Editor-at-large recode.
0:52.0	You may know me as someone who hoped to visit Everest Base Camp until they told me I couldn't drive there, but in my spare time I talked tech and you're listening to recode decode from the Vox Media Podcast Network.
1:02.0	Today in the red chair is Jason Fried, the founder and CEO of Base Camp.
1:07.0	The company's products include the Project Managing App Base Camp, which is super popular, an online chat service for co-workers, one of the first out in the chat services called Campfire.
1:17.0	He's also the co-author of several books, most recently, it doesn't have to be crazy at work. Jason, welcome to recode decode.
1:23.0	Make sure of me on.
1:24.0	Just so you know, you're known to be a very funny guy, so you better keep up with me here.
1:28.0	Let's talk a little bit about Base Camp and how you got to do Base Camp, because Base Camp was one of the first, there's been a lot of these and there's all kinds of different things, but you guys were one of the first to think about different workflow, way before Slack, way before anybody else.
1:41.0	Yeah, way before, yeah, 2004.
1:43.0	Yeah, I remember, I remember when you did you.
1:45.0	Yeah, way back when, 20 years ago.
1:46.0	Talk a little bit about your background and how you got to Base Camp, because you did a bunch of other things before.
1:50.0	Sure, well before Base Camp, I was freelancing to a website design.
1:54.0	And then we built a lot of early internet people were doing.
1:57.0	That's where we started basically.
	...

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