Hey guys,

Man, what a week or 2! I know I’ve been slacking a little on the newsletter lately. I was doing an intense in-person bootcamp for entrepreneurs, pitching and diving right into another cohort this week! So I haven’t had a whole lot of time on my hands. However, I did manage to bring you some interesting stuff. Not as much as I want but here we go!

For now, here’s whats cookin:

• A one-day virtual speed networking summit? Whaat?!?! 👀

• 15 other net-fests you might be interested in 🤝

• How our 1st community pilot event went! 👊

• Some interesting news headlines 🗞

• My take on the Linkedin bot-field and a little more 🤖

• A few tools I came across 🛠

• And, of course, how I can help you grow 🚀

🔥 Vision 2 Venture Summit!🔥

Finding the right investors, partners, and opportunities shouldn’t be a guessing game. Thats why we’re building the Vision 2 Venture Summit! A one-day virtual event with 5 matchmaking tracks to help you meet people who can fund, mentor and grow your startup!

See the attendee list beforehand, pick who you actually want to meet, and get matched for back-to-back 1:1 video chats with investors, founders, and decision-makers who matter.

No awkward group sessions. No wasted time. Just high-speed, high-value connections designed to move your business forward—whether you’re raising, scaling, or making key hires. This is an event you won’t want to miss!

Interested in becoming a community partner or sponsor?

Shoot me an email at [email protected]

We Launched our 1st Community Pilot! 🎉

We helped Anthony Ronga kick off his Mighty Founders community and it was a hit! I didn’t quite know what to expect after switching event platforms but everything ran smoothly. We had 25 amazing Founders join us and curated 325 meetings! Here’s some of the feedback:

“I love how there was no waiting to listen to everyone talk one by one.”

“1-1 forced us to meet everyone and be prepared to discuss high level goals”

“Very engaging & the connections could be endless!”

“This was great keep it going!”

If you’re a founder, THIS is the community to be a apart of.

Apply to become a member today!

Events This Week!👇

O’ Down the Rabbit Hole 🐇

Once upon a time, LinkedIn was a place for actual professionals to connect. Now? It’s a graveyard of AI-generated posts, fake thought leaders, and DMs from people who swear they "loved your content" (even though you haven’t posted in weeks). AI is making networking easier, but at what cost? Are we actually building relationships or just automating bullshit?

Don’t get me wrong, I partake in a little automation too but, I haven’t done it on a massive scale - yet. To be honest, I need results and so do a million other people. With Linkedin setting even stricter limits on the number of connection requests and messages users can send each week, their whole goal of trying to “reduce spam” has to be backfiring. In fact, according to this study, over 50% of posts are AI generated. And, that’s only posts!

I just saw an ad where I can get 75 fake Linkedin profiles for $79 - not bad if you’re bootstrapping like me. But, then it got me thinking - a 1 to 75 ratio? If Linkedin is classifying every user with a sales navigator account as sales professionals - that’s 700,000. Even if a quarter of those users (175,000) start using a couple of fake profiles to increase their volume and reach, the numbers are going to start bypassing real users if they haven’t already. 

Then where will we be? Directing our bots to engage with other bots? 

Well, according to the SVP of Engineering, Mohak Shroff - that’s the goal.  

“Whether that’s helping a recruiter hire for the right role, a marketer be more successful or a learner building the right skill. We will put you, the professional, in the driver’s seat giving the agent directions for the tasks you need completed and providing oversight on actions so that it can learn your preferences and make interactions more personalized to how you work. This will give you more time and space to focus on what you love about your job, increasing your access to opportunity. We see this as giving our members and customers agency in the agentic era.”

What kind of BS is this? I understand everyone is rushing to automate everything but this just sounds dehumanizing. 

Obviously, Linkedin isn’t a long-term viable option.

Then, it got me thinking - is this really where we’re headed?

A few days ago, I watched this interview with NVIDIA’s CEO where he explains what they’re working on and how they see the future panning out.

If you’re not ready to face the truth, just stop reading now.

The two big takeaways from the video is this -

1) They’re training AI’s to learn based on completely different worlds - synthetic worlds that doesn’t even require humans. So, whatever they teach it will have no perception or understanding of how humans interact. Some next level sh*t!

But, it doesn’t stop there.

2) NVIDIA is also working on building a genetic AI twin that has your exact DNA. Meaning - there could be two of me and two of you and two of everyone. Of course, they say it’s for “production facilities” but come on.

We’ve gone from automating content, to fake profiles/avatars, and having AI agents do the work for us all to just replace ourselves.

Now, I don’t know where your heads at but I can’t sit with this for very long.

When I stood up and pitched BLKBOOK on Friday, one of the investors said he could see where these digital twins could be used in my product and thinking about it just made me uncomfortable.

The whole point of what I’m building is to bring people together. It requires human interaction and that’s the way I intend to keep it.

Honestly, I was just trying to write about Linkedin but damn, I really went down the rabbit hole this time!

Share your Networking Success Story! 🌟

Did someone in your network hook you up with your dream job, land you that big client, or make the intro that changed everything? We want the juicy details!

We’re on the hunt for inspiring, funny, or downright surprising stories about how networking opened doors and catapulted you to success. Think of it as your chance to brag—humbly, of course. 😉

What’s in it for you?
✔️ Showcase your story to a professional audience.
✔️ Build your personal brand and credibility.
✔️ Inspire others to invest in their networking efforts.
✔️ Free BLKBOOK event ticket.

How to Apply?
• Share a brief overview of your story.
• Include how your network played a key role.
• Submit your story here.

We’ll feature select stories in our newsletter and upcoming events. This is your chance to highlight the connections that made a difference and inspire others to start building their own.

Don’t be shy—your story could inspire someone else to make their next big move (and let’s be honest, we all love a good success story). 🚀