son sored in part by barracuda networks. simplify i.t. city national bank providing loans and lines of credit to help northern california businesses grow. >> it's a best selling book and now a movie. author andy weir on his success and whether he thinks moit day mon is the right man for the job. silicon valley disrupted just about every industry why not toothpaste? the plan and here's an idea. if there aren't enough places to live in san francisco, build more houses. our reporters this week on

"press here." good morning. i'm scott mcfwru. i hope you are a long time watcher. if you are, you know each week my team of reporters and i talk to various ceos and news makers. this is a serious show. not a sunday morning infomercial. let me talk to you about toothpaste. we have this morning a revolutionary toothpaste created in silicon valley. gets teeth 260% cleaner than the leading brand. but that's not all. it cut yours chances of cavities and leaves you minty fresh. let me ask you about this 250% claim.

people say it's twice as good as brand x. how is something 250% better? >> first we are going to look at what people do today. brush their teeth. you brush it the way your ancestors brushed 4,000 years ago by scrub them. then they scrubbed with twigs. now with -- >> there are detergents in there and fluoride. i can make toothpaste. >> absolutely you can. that's the reason why up to 90% of all american adults have gum inflammation and bleeding and 47% of american adults 66 million -- >> all right. you like the statistics. how is that 250% better? what did you do to toothpaste to make that 250% better? >> we started to look at it silicon valley style and said scrubbing ain't enough. how do you do it if you were going to design it from scratch? we said let's figure out how to break the molar bond between

dental plaque which is a biofilm. that's the way bacteria protects itself and makes itself into a lean, mean fighting machine. how do you break it in a way to disperse it rather than scrubbing it away? >> you call it dental gel. can i try it? >> absolutely. >> i want to see if it's minty fresh. >> it is edible. >> now the rest of us can't try it. >> really. >> it's yours now. >> tastes like mouthwash. i'm drinking it sh not brushing it. >> do you have to brush it? >> you do. what happens is this is designed in a scientific way. we want to deliver the gel into the plaque. so the pressure releases into the teeth when you brush it. >> i had a gum graft. one of the worst experiences of my life. i brush twice a day, go to the dentist twice a year.

>> which are normal things. >> i know. i wasn't as good about that before. how much does it cost and what would the investment be for something like this? >> four cups of starbucks coffee. >> per what? >> for six weeks of use, brushing twice a day. >> what does that come to? >> if you look you need eight tubes for a year. we offer packages. most of the customers buy one tube because they think it is too good to be true. >> people don't buy toothpaste for their health. based on commercials, right? surely procter & gamble has done research into this. in toothpaste commercials people kiss or it's about sparkle. right? if you told me that would prevent fwum disease down the road but this one over year would make my teeth sparklyiersparklier,

i would buy that one. i don't think we make the decision in the drugstore based on overall health. we wouldn't buy cigarette and vodka at the same time. >> the question is you buy cigarettes and vodka but can you make your trip to the dentist easier? what people are doing is buying product. i used to buy product before i got into this business. i thought i was doing a good job. america is a developed country. i thought i was buying something good for my teeth. i didn't realize what it did and didn't to. when you have been told you have gum disease you are looking for a solution. i don't have to market this. i have 66 million people asking for it. because they know a cleaner mouth means less disease. >> 66 million. is that people who have purchased or are on a waiting list? >> these people have been diagnosed with gum tz. their doctor told them, the dentist told them you have gum disease. we'll try to prevent the progression. they are looking for solutions. >> have the instances of gum

disease been rising over the years? is that why you see a need for a product like this? >> last year was the first year the cdc said gum disease is a serious problem. this is an epidemic 66 million people you have never heard of. yes, it's not like diabetes. on the other hand, it affects your lifestyle. this is a lifestyle product f. you use it people understand at a basic level if you have a clean mouth you have less disease. >> did you approach this as i'm going to change the world of toothpaste and revolutionize and 'tis rupt the industry or did you say i want to disrupt some kind of industry. what industries are out there? >> with all these things serendipity helps. we have bleeding gums. my partners have been researching the role of medals with the university of texas and uc irvine since 2002. >> it started with the dental health care. >> we have products. if we are going through the fda

and various clinical trials. we all had bleeding gums. we said knowing what we know of this. >> this is the worst start up story ever. we were trying to sell pez dispensers or we all have bleeding gums. it's never going to sell with usa today. >> the funny part -- >> it might actually. >> when the bleeding stopped we went to a clinical practice and said let's do a double blind study. the results were so good we looked and said yep, this is legal. but nobody will believe it. >> 250 better based on materials i have read and in published scientific papers. >> we looked at the data ourselves. this was pristine. we looked and laughed. we were happy. we said nobody will believe this. who thinks of toothpaste like this. we said let's go to an american university and let them do the study. they are the fwold standard.

that's the data you see. >> how do you compete. there are so many brands of toothpaste, so much advertising. >> things are price sensitive. you choose what's on sale. >> when you go for a commodity you're right. it's packaging and taste. that's how you look at it. when you are starting to say, imagine yourself in an aisle where there is one toothpaste two and a half times better than anything in this aisle for cleaning your teeth. it's up to you whether you want to pick it up or not. the reality is we are not advertising in the traditional way. our over 100,000 customers tell their friends we have people who buy 40 tubes. they tell their friends, relatives, the dentist. dentists call us because they are curious. it's that support from dentists and hygienists who buy for their families. >> i have to stop you there.

the first person on the show to ever try to revolutionize toothpaste. we are impressed. hopefully you have other tubes john hasn't licked. >> absolutely. >> thanks for being with us. up next author of the best-selling book turned movie "the martian" when "press here" continues.

giving away chapters of the book for free on his website. he ended up with one of the most popular books of the year. it went to number one on the new york times best seller list and then this happened. >> 4:30 a.m. our satellites detected a storm approaching mars. the storm escalated to severe. we have no choice but to abort the mission. during the evacuation astronaut mark watney was killed.

>> i'm entering this into the record. this is mark watney. i'm still alive. obviously. i have no way to contact nasa. or my crew mates. even if i could it would take four years for another manned mission to reach me. i'm in a lab designed to last 31 days. so i'm left with only one option. i have to science the hell out of this. >> andy weir is author of "the martian," a great book turned movie starring matt damon. it's the most riveting math problem you will ever read. thanks for being with us. i enjoyed the book. i am equally fascinated with how it started. first it must be surreal to see what was in your head out on a screen. it must be bizarre. >> it's like you said in your intro. everybody fantasizes about this

when writing a book. you never think it will happen. then it's like oh my god. >> you gave away your book on the website. then you tried to do it with kindle. you were just going to give it away and amazon said you have to charge something. it turns out to be a block buster success. >> yeah. it was a hobby. i was just posting it chapter by chapter to my website. my readers said make an e book. i did that. they said i don't know how to download it. put it on kindle. so i did and kindle said you have to charge a buck so i did that. it got up to the am ston best seller list which caught the attention of random house and fox. i have no idea what i did right. >> this is your third book? >> third book i wrote. fist book i have published. the earlier books, not that great. >> what were they about? related to this? >> no. completely different.

first was a distoep yan future thing. i wrote it before the internet. i destroyed all copies except one my mother has. then the second one was, okay it was a space opera kind of thing. it just wasn't well written. it had a decent plot. >> so you quit your day job? >> it's been a year and a half. i didn't quit my job until i was clear that "the martian" would make enough money to support me. >> you're a software engineer not a rocket scientist in any way. you were not a writer. it reminds me of tom clancy. the first book is about "the hunt for red october." he was an insurance sales man who did a lot of research about submarines. the same thing for you. you did a ton of research about, i have to get this guy to mars.

you just researched it all. >> also a lifetime interest and hobby of travel. it's easy to learn about things you're passionate about. it's been an interest of mine all along. >> so ridley scott will direct. i can't think of a better person to direct something like this. looks like "alien" in the trailer. what's your input or how are you involved in the making of the movie? >> mostly my job is to cash the check. once they acquire the film rights unless you're stephen king or j.k. rowling you don't get the demands. take it or leafve it. they chose to involve me. so i got to give feedback on the screen play. >> are you on the set? >> they invited me to the set. they finished filming a while ago. i didn't go because it was way over in budapest. >> budapest looks like mars.

>> i have been there. it does. >> they did the studio work and the on location stuff, the stuff that looks like mars in jordan which does look like mars. >> if they were making a movie of something i wrote i would go to budapest to see it. >> i'm not a comfortable flyer. >> you write about space travel. >> look what happened to mark watney. >> true. i write about brave people. i'm not one of them. >> you wouldn't be one of the first colonists on mars? >> what do you think of matt damon? >> i don't have a firm visual image of my characters. they're a blob. i couldn't -- before they cast matt damon i couldn't have told you his hair color, eyes or ethnicity for sure. i'm thrilled. >> so weird because matt damon was in "interstellar" and he

plays a character stranded. there was certain deputy. >> and jessica chastain also. a lot of people pointed it out. it's irritating like oh this looks like an "interstellar" prequel or something. trust me. it's different. >> wildly different. >> and the -- >> oh that's fascinating. what if i were stuck on mars with a single potato and i have to survive. what can i do? you walk him through it. does that necessarily make an entertaining movie? is the pure science that you go through -- that makes the book so interesting. is there science lost? there almost has to be. >> the detail is lost but the accuracy is there. they don't give you all the details. they're like okay. you could see it in the trailer. he's growing potatoes. well, they don't give you the facts, figures and numbers of this is the crop yield and

stuff. >> which you do in the book. it's that detailed. >> did you experiment with growing crops? >> no. buttons tons of research. there are errors in the book here and there and places where i sacrificed edd accuracy for dramatic license. i tried to be accurate. >> you sacrificed accuracy? of all the books it shall. >> i know. >> the penultimate science book. >> nobody is innocent of it. the biggest is the sandstorm at the beginning that strands him there. in real life mars atmosphere is way too thin to knock anything over even with the fastest sandstorms there. most people don't know that. >> i got called out on that. he said good but the sandstorm -- >> you know when you're really successful is when elan musk

calls you out. >> i had an alternate beginning in mind. it's a man versus nature story and i wanted nature to get the first punch in. >> what was the alternate beginning. >> it was an engine test and there was an explosion that causes the problems. then the vehicle is starting to tip so they have to launch and thai sure watney is dead. >> not as dramatic. >> what does he know about it? >> a little. >> we wish you the best of luck with the movie. the book is extraordinary. "the martian." i recommend it. it's a great read. thanks for being with us. >> thanks for having me. >> here's a thought. if housing is too expensive, build more houses. can you debate the idea? we'll try when "press here" continues.

welcome back. i saw on the news a reporter talking about a protest in a mission neighborhood of san francisco. in which activists complained the cost of housing in the city was too high. and as a result they were standing in opposition to new developments. no new big high rises, they said. so long as people were struggling to make rent. they even delivered petitions to slow development. i was an english major but it struck me that the slowing of development of new homes would not improve the housing situation. you want to build more not fewer homes to make rent go down.

sonia agrees with my math and she's a math teacher who moved to the bay area and was so startled by the backwards approach to housing she started a protest group called san francisco bay area renters foundation. or sf barf for short which i assume you realized that. who become as pro development everybody is anti-something. nobody is pro something in san francisco. you are pro big business fwomt build towers all that stuff, genuinely. >> yeah. i came from philadelphia where we have tons of housing plenty: plenty... pleef was built for 2.5 million and we have 1.5 million people now. so we have to tear stuff down. the upside is you have plenty of room. you have real power with respect to your landlord.

if you're there and pay rent and you're not ruining the house and the landlord says i want to raise your rent $100. you can say, do it i'm leaving. that's a real negotiation. so you keep your renters because it's the devil you know on both sides. the general rent level is sort of the same no matter where you are. that's the real power we need and we don't have here. we are in a shortage. >> you probably can't build enough high rises in san francisco to absorb every person coming in. at least you could start. i like to tribe the organization as the increased capacity arm of the anti-displacement movement. every time you build a new unit you reduce the placement by however many people move into it. we have way more people than

houses. every time we build houses we can accommodate however many people you build houses for. >> does the organization advocate on behalf of low income people? >> that's not our main -- there are other people doing it already. ironically it's like very astonishing. if you're not working at all. if you are eld elderly. >> there are middle class people with a lot of trouble. >> exactly. that's what's astonishing. it's appropriate for there to be social service agencies. that help people that are no income and fwif them subsidy. what we see is as hud disappeared from funding that type of housing. state shutdown redevelopment those organizers are interfering with the ability to have people who can buy housing to do it.

a lot of people have jobs, make good wages. >> and there is construction everywhere. there is plenty of room for them to develop, grow move around and get tax breaks. >> office space. yet when it comes to housing there is a lack of it across the board. we have a homeless issue that'sfestering. keeps growing in stature in san francisco. there is a report recently. meanwhile middle class because of the cost. it's beyond high rises. are there any other types of options. >> definitely. >> this is a bay area wide problem. there are all kinds of suburbia that can use it. there are parking lots everywhere. >> entry level house. 833,000. >> yeah too much. >> too much. >> there is plenty of room to grow in san jose. people get upset at you.

you have a master's degree in economics. you have worked for housing nonprofits in the past. people get angry at you because you're proposing we build houses. >> yeah. that's because since we stopped -- since it went out of style to develop, now when you build a house inevitably you are someone else. so there is always someone nearby the new house to have a complaint. >> i'm not proposing we level the presidio or anything. >> no that's a park. >> but we'll have to get taller or we do nothing but understand san francisco is unaffordable to most people. >> i live in west oakland. san francisco is full. >> no vacancy. >> yeah. people ask all the time. how does building extensive housing do anything for lower income people? the vast majority of low income

people don't live in programmed housing. i have never made more than $35,000 a year and never lived in subsidized housing. i live in old housing in an unfashionable neighborhood which right now it shall or was four years ago when i loved there -- was east oakland. prices are rising in oakland because when they don't build in san francisco, people missouri to the bay area because they have a job they notice west oakland is eight minutes away from the central business district. so prices are rising. if we put the higher income people in new expensive housing i don't have to compete with them. >> with 30 seconds left you would like politicians to understand. >> politicians are on our side. >> whoever is your detractor. >> it's regular people. i want people to start to think about the bay area has to double, right? go around your community. find some lot. be like i think this is a lot where i could see 25 units.

e-mail your representative. be like hey, this is where i want this built. >> housing in an era of we don't have enough houses. logical enough.

>> that's our show for this week. thank you for making us part of your sunday morning. >> announcer: press here sponsored by barracuda networks. cloud solutions and security that simplifies i.t. helping northern california businesses grow.

>> damian trujillo: hello, and welcome to "comunidad del valle." i'm damian trujillo, and today the crisis of human trafficking, what we doing locally to address the issue? plus, the music of little joe y la familia on your "comunidad del valle." >> male announcer: nbc bay area presents comunidad del valle," with damian trujillo. >> damian: we begin today with the annual north fair oaks community festival, comin' up in redwood city. with me on the show is the sheriff of san mateo county, sheriff greg munks. thank you for being on the show here, sir. >> greg munks: thank you damian. >> damian: we do have a video that is actually from your website. now, this is--i guess this is, kind of, taking community policing to the next level times two, if you will. talk about the purpose of the north fair oaks festival, there in redwood city. >> greg: sure. it's something we've been doing for--this is our 14th year, and it is a form of community policing. it's all about buildin