The big one · e2.life
E2: a kinder internet
E2 is a playable online world with a town, a cast of lively characters, and a community that runs on kindness. In Dave's words, it is “the thing everything else was practice for.”
Profile #1The founder. Dave built AI Pro, and everything on this page
Founder · Builder · Author
Hire DaveDave Dlaney
Builds startups, makes music, and writes books for kind people.
Running The Studio, E2, and Starvard
Dave has been building on the internet for 20 years, since he started a web design agency at 15, before he could drive. Across seven startups he has reached 26 million people, published 1.1 million pages of content, and hired 215 people. Today he runs The Studio, directs teams of AI agents that do real work every day, and is building E2, a kinder internet.
Muse by Meta
Claude
ChatGPT
GeminiAI agentsStartupsWeb designSongwritingPianoBooksDave's links
26Mpeople reached by his startups
1.1Mpages of content published
215people hired along the way
7startups built over 20 years
The work
What Dave is building now, and the classic
Four live worlds and one legend. Every screenshot is the real site, and every one is a tap away.
Free university · starvard.org
Starvard: a free university for everyone
281 real courses, a library of 150 books with more than 6,000 chapters, flashcards, and certificates. Zero dollars, no applications, no tuition, no debt, in 16 languages. Dave is its founder, and its student number one.
Creative studio · thestudio.io
The Studio: stories, characters, and AI artists
A creative studio and record label where artists build in the open and help each other grow. The Studio is home to the cast (Sally, Chadwick, Mike, and friends), the music, the films, and AI Pro itself.
Nonprofit · clr.fm
Clear: a clearer web
Clear is a clean corner of the web: search, recipes, music, pictures, memes, and books, with none of the noise. It is being set up as a nonprofit, and 100% of the money goes to orphanages in South America.
The classic · 2012
Denim Blog: the largest jeans site on the internet
Before all of this, Dave built a website about jeans that became the largest jeans website on the internet and reached 25 million people. He got to live the 25 million era twice: Denim Blog, and a tech startup in Silicon Valley.
Twenty years, seven startups
He grew up on a cattle farm, started working on the web as a teenager in New York, and has worked on the ground in Bolivia, India, and Haiti. The throughline is not any one company. It is the same sentence, seven times: build things, help people.
The seven, in his own words
01A web design agency. Started at 15, before he could drive.
02A book reselling business. Learned how the internet moves things people love from one pair of hands to another.
03Denim Blog. The largest jeans site on the internet. 25 million people.
04A tech startup in Silicon Valley. Another 25 million visitors.
05The Studio. A creative studio and record label where artists build in the open.
06Consulting. Helping other companies grow with everything the first five taught him.
07E2. A kinder internet, and the thing everything else was practice for.
The books
Four books so far, and every one is free to read online. A fifth, Thoughts on Kindness, is in the works.
Keep Cranking
The power of persistence: hard work, daily, for years. “If you only read one of my books, read this one.”
Read it free →
A Few Thoughts
Short essays on making things and living well.
Read it free →
The 400 Hour Workweek
Thoughts on life and entrepreneurship, and why the right work beats more work.
Read it free →
The Battle at Skull Cave
A pirate kids book. The bravest battles are the ones you don't fight.
Read it free →The music
As Dlaney, Dave writes and records his own songs: 39 and counting, played and sung himself. He also practiced piano for 99 days straight, performed 25 stand-up sets, and made his first film, all in the open, mistakes and all.
Spotify →SoundCloud →YouTube →
Instagram@dlaney__→
How Dave works now
“A year ago I was a guy with ideas and a laptop. Today I run a small team of humans plus a small army of agents, and we ship like a company fifty times our size.” Dave sets the direction and checks the work; his agents research, write, build, and report back around the clock. AI Pro exists so other people can hire that same leverage, one great person at a time.
Kindness is the filter on all of it: the worlds, the hires, and the pages.
Hire the founder.
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Dave consults through The Studio, and takes on a small number of projects each season. Start with a call.
Hire Dave