No We Are Not Losers

What do Elon Musk, Erling Haaland and Henry Cavill have in common? They're all gamers. Yet the stereotype about gaming and gamers remains.

In this solo episode of No We Are Not Losers, I go through why I think gamers are taking over the world. How games helped build the AI industry, what they teach us about decision-making, communication and leadership, and the friends and memories we get along the way.

Demis Hassabis and Google DeepMind, Jensen Huang and NVIDIA, Faker, Max Verstappen, xPetu and more, over my own League of Legends gameplay. I also get into what playing Overwatch and Apex Legends taught me, both in games and outside them.

I'm Willy Nilsson, an AI consultant in Stockholm. Usually I interview fascinating gamers while we play video games. This one's just me.

Chapters

00:00 Gamers, and No We Are Not Losers

01:35 What games taught me

02:25 Gaming and the stock market

04:22 The gamers building AI

04:42 Demis Hassabis, games and DeepMind

06:07 NVIDIA, Jensen Huang and the future of games

08:27 Flickr, Slack, Dota and PUBG

09:19 Athletes, racing drivers and gamers

10:09 Musicians, actors and gaming

11:19 Competition, Polytopia and Foldit

13:01 Surgeons and Xbox controllers

13:55 Decision-making under pressure

15:46 Tilt, confidence and picking your fights

17:29 StarCraft, Shopify and Claude Code

18:39 Teamwork, leadership and communication

22:29 Friendships and the Favela nuke

25:03 Learning how to learn

27:50 Learning with ChatGPT and Codex Voice

28:58 Warm-ups, practice and copying the best

30:35 Zenith's Vayne and HLE Zeka's Yone

32:04 Chippys, Kirei and Caedrel

33:33 Teaching, Ludwig and Streamer University

34:27 Theorycrafting, xPetu and first principles

36:30 Adapting when the game changes

37:09 Faker, performance and longevity

38:37 A gamer rooting for other gamers

Watch the podcast on YouTube:

https://www.youtube.com/@NoWeAreNotLosers

First episode with William: https://youtu.be/tGjvcBT5jBs

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nowearenotlosers/

X: https://x.com/WillyNilssonPod

Sources & credits

Complete source and image/video credits are included as text in the pinned comment and replies on the YouTube episode: https://youtu.be/BjI31UW8tkg

Presented and recorded by Willy Nilsson. League of Legends game content by Riot Games. William Wennerström appears in the excerpt from our first episode; Overwatch game content by Blizzard Entertainment. Additional excerpts: The Graham Norton Show, Variety, LoL Esports / Riot Games, Supercell and 롤 관전 매니저.

Elon Musk photograph: Marcel Grabowski / UK Government, CC BY 2.0, cropped/resized. Ludwig photograph: Maria Jose Govea / Red Bull Content Pool. Full links and individual portrait attributions in the complete credits.

What's life in Japan actually like once you live there? My friend William moved there, lived with around 40 housemates, and met a Japanese man who learned Swedish from Paradise Hotel.

William Wennerström is one of my closest friends and the first guest on No We Are Not Losers. We get into how he made the move, learning Japanese through anime and language school, making friends, everyday life in Tokyo, and why he wants to go back.

We're playing Overwatch throughout, which makes having a conversation a little harder than we expected. We also talk about drifting, building cars with his dad, and the Fast & Furious quote we used before school tests we hadn't prepared for.

Chapters

00:00 Opening

02:09 Introductions

02:45 Overwatch

13:35 Cars and drifting

16:46 What drifting costs

28:56 The AE86 community

33:24 Moving to Japan

36:35 Would he move back to Japan?

44:51 Arranging the move

51:12 First night in Tokyo

56:51 Everyday life

1:03:44 Swedish from Paradise Hotel

1:07:41 Swedish cafes in Tokyo

1:17:52 What matters now

1:19:55 Building with his dad

1:22:53 AI in the garage

1:26:38 Advice

1:31:36 Thank you

Follow William

https://www.instagram.com/williamwennerstrom/

https://www.instagram.com/accel_works/

TikTok: @accel_works

Follow No We Are Not Losers

https://www.instagram.com/nowearenotlosers/

https://x.com/WillyNilssonPod

https://open.spotify.com/show/033JRiVcggzVrdP1coGYMn

Photos and videos provided by William Wennerström.

If you enjoyed the conversation, share it with someone. Maybe I can join William in Japan. And also go to Turkey. Definitely for a vacation.

An introduction to No We Are Not Losers, where I, Willy, interview fascinating gamers while we do what we love: play video games.

Friends having a fun conversation, learning something new along the way. The conversations won't be perfect, as you'll probably notice.

For the first episode, I'm joined by one of my best friends, William.

Follow No We Are Not Losers: Instagram · X · YouTube

Background portrait credits, source photographs, licences and modifications