#89: Shane Levine & Nico Muoio - Vibe Design 101

Jun 12, 2025

Guest

Nico Muoio

Guest

Shane Levine

Shane Levine, founder of Turbo Labs, and Nico Muoio, founder of Bottomless Labs, share their quirky high school entrepreneurship tales and discuss how nostalgia design impacts user experiences. They highlight the challenges of modern MVPs and how AI tools are transforming design standards. The duo also tackles why some ugly landing pages outperform their sleek counterparts. With anecdotes about pizza deliveries to VCs and using memes for business development, they blend humor with valuable insights on scaling creatively in today's digital landscape.

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ANECDOTE

Early Entrepreneurial Hustles

Shane Levine sold swords in middle school by reselling cheap katanas to classmates.
Jason Levin sold watches with thumb drives and stickers despite some cease and desist letters.

ANECDOTE

Viral Nostalgic iPod Wallpapers

Nico Muoio made money by creating viral iPod wallpapers and selling them online.
The nostalgic appeal played a key role in their success and visibility.

INSIGHT

Why Nostalgia Sells

Nostalgia works because it evokes memories of happier times or childhood innocence.
This psychological effect can contribute to emotional engagement with designs.

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Shane Levine is the founder of product design studio Turbo LabsNico Muoio is the founder of e-commerce optimization agency Bottomless Labs(00:20) Our weird high school entrepreneurship stories(05:30) How Shane made bucks with viral iPod wallpapers(06:40) Why nostalgia design works, and when it doesn’t(08:20) MVPs are dead: you only get one shot now(09:50) How AI tools raised the floor for design(11:20) Dropshipper smell test: even your mom can detect it(17:20) Why ugly landing pages sometimes convert better(19:20) Niko’s high school t-shirt empire and how it scaled(23:20) Our morbid project: HeavenWireless(25:20) Design tips for getting VCs to take you seriously(27:20) “Design is like a hot person”(29:20) The psychology behind people tolerating bad UX for good looks(31:20) The highlighter girl moment: getting obsessive in FigJam and Notion(33:20) Why billionaires don’t care about tools(37:20) Product-led growth by design: making people pay upfront(39:20) How a Gumroad link with old screenshots got 1,000 signups(41:20) Sending pizzas to VCs(43:20) Memes by mail and hyper-personal gifts as biz dev hacks(45:20) Scaling as a chaotic creative: systems, checklists, looms(47:20) What to do when your SOPs are fucked(51:20) Talking to ChatGPT like your dadJason Levin⁠⁠⁠ is the founder of meme marketing software Memelord Technologies (https://memelord.tech)Read Jason's weekly advice column on organic social media growth for startups:https://www.cyberpatterns.xyz/subscribeFollow Jason for cool ideas here: https://twitter.com/iamjasonlevinFollow Shane for design and product content here: https://twitter.com/theShaneLevineFollow Nico for DTC content here: https://twitter.com/NicoMuoioPast guests of The Jason Levin Show include: Eric Jorgenson, Greg Isenberg, Jack Raines, Paul Millerd, Mike Solana, Danny Miranda, Billy Oppenheimer, Jack Rhysider, Ben Wilson, and more.#startups #venturecapital #ycombinator #growthhacks #growthhacking #viralmarketing #marketing #marketingpodcast #marketingstrategy #marketingtips #marketinghacks #jasonlevin #techpodcast #entrepreneur #entrepreneurship #businesspodcast #indiehacking