# Hire for storytelling because code is easier to clone

Markdown copy of https://realalpha.app/s/hire-for-storytelling-because-code-is-easier-to-clone/ on Real Alpha, the best minutes from long interviews with the people building AI. Cite and link the page, not this copy.

- Speaker: [Farza Majeed](https://realalpha.app/builders/farza-majeed/) · Farza Majeed is founder of Hey Clicky and previously Buildspace. · Founded HeyClicky, a Mac AI buddy that sees your screen; previously founded Buildspace, an online builder school.
- Host: [Aaron Epstein](https://realalpha.app/people/aaron-epstein/) · General partner, Y Combinator · Co-founded Creative Market, a design marketplace later sold to Autodesk; hosts YC's Design Review.
- Show: Lightcone
- Episode: [This Is How You Should Actually Make Launch Videos](https://realalpha.app/v/v12aSIZIXUs/), Oct 23, 2026
- Moment: 38:44 to 42:38 of the episode (4 min), playing on https://realalpha.app/s/hire-for-storytelling-because-code-is-easier-to-clone/; the episode from there: https://realalpha.app/v/v12aSIZIXUs/?t=2324

## Quote

> “it's so easy to pump out more code and more software, but it's **harder than ever to actually talk** about what you are doing in a coherent way in front of an audience.”
> — [Farza Majeed](https://realalpha.app/builders/farza-majeed/) at [40:01](https://realalpha.app/v/v12aSIZIXUs/?t=2401) · Lightcone

## Takeaways

1. A filmmaker can make launching a consistent part of the team’s work.
2. An audience and community are harder to clone than software.
3. Prioritize crisp audio over expensive cameras or perfect visuals.

## About this segment

Farza Majeed explains why a filmmaker was among his first hires: communicating a product is harder than producing code, and an audience is difficult to copy. For simple videos, he says clear audio matters most.

From “This Is How You Should Actually Make Launch Videos”, Oct 23, 2026. [Watch the full episode](https://realalpha.app/v/v12aSIZIXUs/)

## Transcript

Transcribed by machine (Whisper) from the episode’s audio, so a word may be off here and there.

[38:51](https://realalpha.app/v/v12aSIZIXUs/?t=2331) in your early team which is small but a large portion of it is actually built to help you create and produce and get these videos out the door on a regular basis yeah i mean i always say like i'm okay at videos there are people out there who who are way better at me my first two hires were i knew from the beginning even before i started my company it's going to be number one a filmmaker and number two an engineer and it's number one is film it's filmmaker for me so that that is the first one, or whatever order they can come in.

[39:22](https://realalpha.app/v/v12aSIZIXUs/?t=2362) Why was that so important to you? I don't wanna put a ton of attention every day on making videos. I mean, any founder watching, any founder in YC, like nobody wants to do that every day. At some level, you do have to in the beginning, in the early days. And yeah, I mean, look at my clicky videos, like I'm forcing myself to just make videos and make stuff every day. At one point, you're like, well, this would be really great if someone's full-time job at my company was to kind of observe what we were doing and help us launch and constantly make it their uh their mission to make us look good when we launch as well and make us come off properly um and so that's why a filmmaker was one of the first hires i made at this company and my last company our film team was two people we were only like a seven person

[40:00](https://realalpha.app/v/v12aSIZIXUs/?t=2400) So even at this company, at one point, HeyClicky, we had three people making videos and one engineer. Because it's so funny, now, it's so easy to pump out more code and more software, but it's harder than ever to actually talk about what you are doing in a coherent way in front of an audience. Because now, Aaron, you know, someone can clone my product in like two minutes at this point. But again, what's really hard to clone is the audience and the community that I've built around what I'm doing and the energy around it.

[40:29](https://realalpha.app/v/v12aSIZIXUs/?t=2429) If you had an audience around your company of, say, 100,000 people that was really into what you were doing, maybe enterprise AI, you know, maybe something around, like, photography or whatever, whatever your niche is, that'd be useful. Because that's why, you know, I can make a video now about a new feature, and, like, thousands of people flood my app. That's awesome. That's, like, every founder's dream, right?

[40:49](https://realalpha.app/v/v12aSIZIXUs/?t=2449) Tell us more about the gear that you're using today to produce these videos. Yeah, so for demos on my computer, which is just, like, what I'm hacking on that day, I always use this thing called Screen Studio. i think it's like made by some indie hacker and it's just really good it's uh records your screen records your local audio makes your cursor look good and i think it costs like 30 bucks that's like one level then the next level is like well videos that more include me in a more kind of like uh kind of native way and for that i'll just pull up my iphone literally just a selfie camera and just record myself talking post or edit on my phone even um i use uh on my phone uh it's instagram's editing too it's called edits a lot so when i i do edit on my phone a good amount so that's the iphone uh nothing else required but then there's like the next level where it's like

[41:31](https://realalpha.app/v/v12aSIZIXUs/?t=2491) you feel like you want to do something a little bit more kind of like thought through cinematic uh and that's where i use my sony fx3 and sony fx30 or sony fx3 the cheaper one along with a dji mic it's actually funny the most important this is actually so important i can't believe i missed this the most important thing in any video you make it doesn't matter if it's a shitty loom or a shitty like little video or your iPhone is audio quality.

[41:57](https://realalpha.app/v/v12aSIZIXUs/?t=2517) If your audio is bad, I'm bouncing. I've watched some demos that are like 720p and just like the guy's in like a weird room in a basement, but his audio is crisp. And what he's working on is actually genuinely interesting. So I stick around. And so I don't care about the rest of it. I don't care what he looks like, anything. I'm like, I can hear him and I can see what he's doing. That's it. And so I think if every finder could just invest in one of those super cheap DJI mics, uh find them used online um or just any mic that's not your macbook mic your it's or your airpod mics those don't count yeah uh that would be really good and then for editing on my actual