Ear Biscuits with Rhett & Link - 165: Do YouTubers Watch YouTube? Part 2 | Ear Biscuits Ep. 165

Episode Date: October 15, 2018

We asked. You shared. We watched. Find out what R&L thought about your YouTube recommendations, and whether they'd watch GMM if it wasn't their show, on this week's episode of Ear Biscuits. To learn... more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Starting point is 00:00:00 This, this, this, this is Mythical. Welcome to Ear Biscuits, I'm Rhett. Come on man, don't seem so. Why are you, don't sound like you don't wanna be here. I wanna be here, I'm just, I'm nervous. You're nervous? I'm just, yeah, I just. You're anxious about this.
Starting point is 00:00:23 I have so many thoughts. About this, about that topic. I've processed so much information. Well that sounds like you're overwhelmed. Welcome to Ear Biscuits, I'm Rhett. That's just how it came out. Welcome to Ear Biscuits, I'm Rhett. No, you sound.
Starting point is 00:00:36 Does that sound more excited? So I am excited. Are you frustrated? Yeah, I am. With the amount. The process. I think that there's so many thoughts in your brain that I think you're overwhelmed with the process that's led to this conversation.
Starting point is 00:00:53 And I'm Link. This week at the round table. Nice. Of dim lighting. Right. We are continuing the discussion from a number of weeks back surrounding the question, do YouTubers watch YouTube? And in part one, this is part two, we said, I hate to break it to us and anyone else who might be disappointed but no,
Starting point is 00:01:18 we don't really watch YouTube as a form of entertainment and that just feels. Wrong. It feels wrong. Ironic? Ironic. Surprising. There's a shame associated with it.
Starting point is 00:01:31 Shameful. So the question, the more operative question for part two, for me at least is, is there anything worth watching on YouTube for me, I'm not saying necessarily for you or for you, Rhett, but for me. And we ask you guys to suggest things that you thought would resonate with us that are on the YouTube platform. And then we started wrestling with the suggestions.
Starting point is 00:02:01 I actually started wrestling with a lot of things about, you know, we don't typically give assignments to ourself that then require a time commitment. So I started wrestling with that, like when am I gonna start watching, if I don't watch YouTube videos, I'm such a schedule-oriented person, I'm so focused, like when am I gonna get to it?
Starting point is 00:02:22 That's one thing I came up with and I'll come back to the other things, but I'm curious. Well I can speak to. I know you watched a lot more than I did. I did watch stuff and I got lots of thoughts. I can speak to that exact same thing. So.
Starting point is 00:02:33 So let's start there just with our overarching experience. To put things into perspective in terms of how much visual entertainment I already have in my life, I think I realized over the past few weeks that it actually isn't that much time. Right. What my life has become in terms of television, and I'm using television in the broad sense
Starting point is 00:02:56 of stuff that you can see that moves on a screen. Screen-tainment? Yeah, screen-tainment. Okay. It really comes down to my wife and I making a decision to watch a series that we're into before we go to bed. And that happens a minority of nights. And in fact, this week, we're recording this on a Thursday
Starting point is 00:03:24 and I have been spending most of my, and some work time as well, kind of checking out all these suggestions. We'll get into exactly how much I've enjoyed of each one or how far I went. But I only watched about 12 minutes of one episode of Ozark, because that's something that Jessie and I have been watching on Netflix.
Starting point is 00:03:45 Really liked the show. Because I fell asleep 12 minutes in to Ozark and I actually loved the show and I still fell asleep 12 minutes in. Did she keep watching or did she bed? She was like, you want me to cut this off? Because she looked over and I was like, you know, my eyes were beginning to close.
Starting point is 00:03:59 Yeah. But that's actually not an unusual week, just if we've got a lot of stuff going on, to not be able to actually have time to sit down and watch anything. So we're kind of constantly checking in with things that we talked about in part one, just for like research purposes,
Starting point is 00:04:14 see what friends are up to, and see what people are saying about the stuff that we're creating. But there just wasn't a lot of time, so it was a huge struggle for me to actually be able to digest the suggestions that were sent in. I mean it was very, very difficult.
Starting point is 00:04:30 Yeah we. Just because I just don't have a lot of time to watch stuff. We have structured our entertainment lives, our screen times to not include YouTube. So I wasn't willing to sacrifice the shows that Christy and I are watching. Like we're way behind but watching Game of Thrones I wasn't willing to sacrifice the shows that Christy and I are watching. Like we're way behind but watching Game of Thrones and I haven't even started to watch that Ozark show.
Starting point is 00:04:54 You gotta get to it. And you know I'm committed, I like to just do one thing at once. I don't read multiple books at once. I got all types of problems. You'll be doing Game of Thrones for a long time. Yeah. So there's no, I couldn't find a lot of time
Starting point is 00:05:08 to watch things and I think that is part of the issue is, well, when is there, I think the first question was, is there something that I can watch that you guys can recommend that will take the place of that thing that Christy and I are gonna watch before we go to sleep. And it was, that's a, I mean, that's a very narrow and lofty. I feel like that's an unrealistic criteria.
Starting point is 00:05:37 Approach to bring to YouTube. Because that's something that our wives would agree on. So I'm stepping back from that and saying. I don't watch anything that we don't watch together. If you're right, if I had more time on my hands to watch things for entertainment purposes, like let's say my wife was out of town and I was making personal individual decisions
Starting point is 00:06:01 about what I was gonna watch, like for instance, when my vasectomy was healing itself. That was like three days of just binge watching stuff. And again, it was all television. I mean I binge watched a bunch of Netflix series and movies during that time, that recovery time. But if I were to do that now, the question is, after the research that I've done, dipping my toes
Starting point is 00:06:29 into all these different new series and shows and channels, would I supplement, like if I get a second vasectomy, because you got two balls, I mean, you can get another one. Is that how it works? No, that's not how it works. If I get my vasectomy undone so I can procreate once again and there is a recovery time, would I then incorporate these suggestions
Starting point is 00:06:53 into the binge watching? That's the question for me. It's not about what I'm gonna watch with my wife because that's too narrow. Yeah, I actually think that I've learned some things and I'm gonna make some alterations because I feel like. Yeah, I was thinking that neck was too big on that shirt.
Starting point is 00:07:09 I've been missing, I've been missing some things, some things that I need in my life. Okay. And I have found those things thanks to your recommendations. Wow, and you didn't watch nearly as much as I did, but you still feel like you. Well, I read descriptions and I like.
Starting point is 00:07:30 Oh, you read descriptions. I called and, well, no, in order to prioritize what I felt would resonate with me. Okay, go ahead. So yeah, I mean, I'm nervous saying that, but I think it's like saying I'll get back on Instagram one day. Well, I wanna say a few things not about specific,
Starting point is 00:07:51 we'll save beginning to talk about specific shows for in a second, just cover all the bases here. Few things that are true about the process. You guys suggested a lot of things. Obviously we did not watch everything you suggested just because we didn't have time. But if more than a couple of people said something about it, we looked at it.
Starting point is 00:08:13 That was sort of the criteria that we followed. And then how far did I go? I watched enough to get the idea. But I did not, let's say if somebody had 30 minute videos on their channel because that was the case with a number of people. Yeah. I did not sit down and watch one whole episode
Starting point is 00:08:34 of anything because I just was like, I'm gonna shortchange somebody. So I would kind of scrub through, get the idea, get the feel of the personality, get the feel of the style of the editing, look at the frequency of uploads. Get the basic idea and I think I can draw a pretty good conclusion,
Starting point is 00:08:50 but I don't think this is a definitive conclusion as someone who's experienced the channel on a long-term basis, so just that's one caveat. Other thing I wanna say is, these are not necessarily endorsements of the people behind the channel. We live in a problematic time with problematic people and sometimes you can say you should check out this video
Starting point is 00:09:12 and then you find out that this person is already known to be problematic in some ways. I just wanna say that we have not done extensive research. This is very much just you suggested something, we looked at a few of their videos and came to a conclusion about their content. So this is not an endorsement of anybody personally
Starting point is 00:09:30 in anything they have done or haven't done. Well I'm glad you said that. Okay, because I know how y'all guys are. It's 2018, I know, I've been around in 2018 since the beginning of 2018. Man, you were here for it since the top. I've been here since January 1, 2018. Of 2018.
Starting point is 00:09:49 So yeah, and also, just because we talk about it doesn't mean that I think you should watch it, but the majority of the things that I'm gonna talk about are things that I have something to say about them. That makes sense, doesn't it? They made me think about something. Can I just jump into and tell you the first thing that I decided to watch when I looked at the initial list
Starting point is 00:10:14 that we made? Yeah. It was the abandoned malls. So where is that? Defunct land? No. I got it on my laptop list here but I gotta scroll. Dead malls?
Starting point is 00:10:29 Yes, here it is right here. Channel called This is Dan Bell. Oh yeah, mm-hmm. I'm familiar. Because I'm like, dead malls. Man, I like the idea of that. Channel says, informative tours of some of the most depressed shopping malls in the mid-Atlantic region
Starting point is 00:10:46 and beyond. So I started watching one of these. It was like a weird exercise in editing, voiceover driven and I could tell, there were some clips from the inside of a mall but then it very quickly included these two women, like VHS seeming footage from the 80s of these two women, I think they were beauty pageant contestants.
Starting point is 00:11:19 It was like footage of them talking. So this was like found footage, okay? And then it was them, she was doing an interview about being on the slopes in, what's that place called? Not in Utah but in Colorado, Aspen. That's it, my brain's not working too well today. I've been watching too many YouTube videos lately.
Starting point is 00:11:43 My brain can't keep. We are in trouble. She's skiing in Aspen and she's talking about it and then he cut in footage of this, seemingly the same woman tumbling down the slopes and the music was very retro. Lot of great editing choices. I love comedic and odd editing.
Starting point is 00:12:01 So I'm like, oh, this can be good. It was like medium paced and then it started, this can be good. It was like medium paced, and then it started, it was just weird. You know, medium paced. And then it started to settle into tripod footage of slow pans of malls that are open for business. But pretty much dead. But nobody's there, and then he's added a layer of voiceover
Starting point is 00:12:28 where he's giving commentary on when the JCPenney first came to this mall and it's gonna leave at the end of the year so if the Dick's Sporting Goods doesn't come in, they're really in trouble and it's very dry. Oh I watched plenty of it. Oh you watched it? Oh yeah.
Starting point is 00:12:44 And I was like. I know you didn't watch much, I'm letting you talk about this one. So Mr. Dan Bell, I gotta give it to you, if that even, whether that's your real name or not, I think you're brilliant. Your sensibility, comedically and creatively and otherwise, I'm loving you.
Starting point is 00:13:06 I just don't, and I really enjoyed it, and I just don't know where that fits into, I just don't have a place in my life to keep going back to that. I wish I did. That is the operative question. Because I got so much joy from the fact that somebody had this idea and then went with it.
Starting point is 00:13:28 Not just for one video that was just a few minutes, but a video that was, I think it was a 15 minute, it could've been a 20 minute video. Some of them are very long. And then he does a lot of them. Well and he doesn't just have that, he has another series where he, two other guys, he may be with him but I think it's just two other guys
Starting point is 00:13:48 go to these dirty hotels and do basically I looked at the channel and I saw that. Reviews of really nasty hotels. They had a black light and I saw the trailer for that and there was like stuff that they find using a black light and I was like ah, this one's not as much for me. Okay well I wanna tell you what I think about that and then a lot of things that are very much like that
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Starting point is 00:16:13 Are you gonna tell me something you watched because I'm curious what's the first thing you went to? Well, this spreadsheet is no longer organized in the way that it was but Dan Bell was one of the first ones. It intrigued you as well. I took a peek at every single thing that made it into our spreadsheet.
Starting point is 00:16:31 And I remember coming to the conclusion that this is Dan Bell, Dan Bell has an incredible sense of humor, this is something that is very interesting to me but then I always ask the question and this is the question that I'm gonna ask about all of this is am I compelled to watch this? If I got home tonight and my wife was like,
Starting point is 00:16:49 I'm gonna go hang with my friends, and I had just unstructured personal creative time, would I choose to go to his channel for non-research purposes? And I think that it has nothing to do with the content because the content is great. It just has to do with the content because the content is great. It just has to do with the fact that I am more drawn to these things that fit a certain set of criteria
Starting point is 00:17:11 which I actually, I tweeted this to get, I wanted to make sure that I left no stone unturned. A lot of people criticized the tweet because they were like, you're setting up criteria that doesn't apply to YouTube videos. And I did that on purpose because I put the criteria on the stuff that I was looking for that applied to the stuff
Starting point is 00:17:30 that I was already watching to make sure that YouTube wasn't producing something that already fit the criteria of the stuff that I watch every night. So I said, which is? Please give me your racks of YouTube content that fits the following criteria. Number one is scripted slash narrative,
Starting point is 00:17:43 which I learned that a lot of people do not know what those words mean. Number two, it's not on YouTube Premium because I was already familiar with everything on YouTube Premium. Three, it's not a standalone video because there's lots of scripted sketches, but rather a story across multiple videos.
Starting point is 00:17:58 And four, it's regularly and currently being updated or scheduled because I want it to be something that I could point people to and there'd be something new to expect. Like I can anticipate the next season of a show. And I am gonna go through some of the stuff that people suggested. First of all, people suggested stuff, lots of people suggested stuff that was unscripted.
Starting point is 00:18:18 Documentary series, reality series, that kind of thing. Which that's fair game for the overall exercise but you were trying to narrow it down. I was specifically trying to go. Because already looked, because of the other stuff that we've already looked at. Yes, so. Hit me with something, man. What'd you watch?
Starting point is 00:18:34 I'm gonna go on to one that fascinated me that I'm calling this the niche interest category. So let's stay in that. Ants Canada. Okay, this is a dude, I guess he's in Canada, maybe just the ants are in Canada, but I assume they're in the same place. He has colonies, multiple colonies of ants, and he plays God with ants.
Starting point is 00:19:03 What do you mean by that? Meaning, say for instance, he has a fire ant colony that he calls the Fire Nation. And he has cameras in there filming what they're doing and then he floods the nest with water and does a voiceover. He basically gets all this footage of him flooding the nest with water and then trying to figure out
Starting point is 00:19:26 how are the ants going to respond? So it is like a story, right? And then he does this voiceover and shows you all the footage together and shows you how the ants responded. And I have to say that it was captivating, fascinating, mesmerizing. Well done, well edited?
Starting point is 00:19:45 Yeah, I mean it was not done to the degree that it would be done if he had like really high dollar like nature photography cameras that were like up inside the colony and stuff like that. It still feels like it's a dude with a camera, but he's getting very close to these ants. I mean I didn't find myself being frustrated with the footage if that's what you're getting at.
Starting point is 00:20:05 Yeah. And it was, it's pretty slow paced. We're talking on like 20 minutes to tell the story of ants. But it's regularly updated, lots of people watch it. That Fire Ant Nation thing had over two million views, I think if I'm recalling correctly. And it, it, oh. Did they survive?
Starting point is 00:20:23 You'll have to watch to find out. I'm not gonna do a spoiler. But that, that you talked about, Dan Bell, and then Ants Canada, and then there's a bunch of other ones to throw in here that we can go into in a second. I just was like, this could only exist on YouTube. YouTube has created a platform
Starting point is 00:20:45 for a dude to collect ants and tell stories about them on his own terms and on the ants' own terms for a very interested audience and a very faithful audience and AC fam I think he calls them, Ants Canada fam. Okay. And I was like that right there is a beautiful thing. Now I knew this existed, I knew that these niche interest, very very niche interest communities existed
Starting point is 00:21:16 but to see it in action and actually sit down and enjoy it, it was like a lot of light bulbs went off. I was like well of course this is what I'm finding. Something that could not and should not exist in any sort of traditional place. It is a YouTube thing exclusively. But you don't see yourself going back there. No, that's all I needed to see.
Starting point is 00:21:40 That's the thing and I enjoyed it. But do I care about what happens with the fire ants next week? No, I don't. Lots of people do though. AC Fam's gonna be okay, you know what I'm saying? But Rhett's not gonna be a part of AC Fam and I feel like I should be ashamed of that
Starting point is 00:21:56 but I'm just being honest. There's another channel, is it not called Human? I mean does he own youtube.com slash human? We gotta check that, there's no way. That's just the name of his channel. That's just what he called it. I don't know what the actual URL is. And see this is one that I should, okay,
Starting point is 00:22:14 this is one that I should go back to. Description, wood cutting videos by a guy who loves wood cutting. And so I clicked on this and first of all, there's other videos on his channel. It's not highly formatted but it's a guy who climbs trees and he prunes and trims and cuts down trees or limbs off of trees as an employee of a company
Starting point is 00:22:38 which he does not appear to own or be in charge. He's just a guy with a chainsaw who works amongst a team of people. Are we getting him in trouble? I don't know, I don't know how, how much permission he has, he's like in people's backyards. And it's very well thought out. Climbing, he's got a GoPro on his helmet.
Starting point is 00:22:56 He's got a first person perspective and then like a ground perspective of what he's doing and he puts the videos up side by side so he's cutting this limb down and then you see from the street view the limb falling down from the tree. But there's a lifestyle vlog element. Like there were clips in the one video that I watched of him, he's like with the other team members
Starting point is 00:23:18 and he's like it's raining today, you guys excited? We're gonna get out there, we're gonna do this and like he got a response from one of his, a guy that he works with and then he's off, he's like all right, come take a look, we're going into the backyard, this is the tree and then you know, some of them get millions of views because.
Starting point is 00:23:37 Things happen. Because things happen, like something went wrong and he tied up the video. When things go wrong, yeah they get more views. Yeah, I don't think anybody died. But that was a lifestyle vlog of a guy cutting tree limbs. I'm a wood lover, right, you know that. I've made it very clear.
Starting point is 00:23:52 I watched a couple of these videos. I was like, this is very well done. This is the best way I could think to approach cutting down trees and filming it and putting it on YouTube. Yeah, you have no notes. No notes. And then I was like, but am I gonna come back and watch more of these? Even if it got more personal,
Starting point is 00:24:15 I don't think I would come back. I can tell you're not coming back. I don't think I'm coming back. I mean, I think about like, I think of daily vloggers who I never watched but you know, from the, I think of daily vloggers who I never watched but from everything that happens in their lives, you feel like you know them and I understand feeling like you're a part of somebody's life
Starting point is 00:24:36 on a daily basis. But have you ever followed somebody like that? No. I've never followed somebody like that which is again, this is another aspect that, this is sort of like a macro conclusion that we would eventually get to, we'll go ahead and say it now. YouTube is incredibly personality driven.
Starting point is 00:24:50 It's not format driven first, it's personality driven first. Even though we are talking about very niche things, you're still kind of understanding and exploring these niche things through the personality of someone who is kind of in charge of the whole thing and is letting you into their life and that's super appealing and I think that's even with what we do, you probably got into what we do based on one thing you saw.
Starting point is 00:25:18 It might have been way back in the day with a music video. It might have been an episode of GMM. It may have been this podcast. It may have been something else we did like Commercial Kings or Buddy System. But chances are you stuck around not just because you liked what we did but because you liked us in some way.
Starting point is 00:25:36 And that is an incredible thing that is very specific to YouTube. And then I just started thinking, do I just not like people? What's wrong with me? Like I can't commit to any person to the level that I would say I actually wanna know what's happening in their life every single day and I wanna keep going back.
Starting point is 00:25:56 Like it's just not something and I think it may be it's just a generational thing that I like miss some boat, some young boat. I miss the young boat. It's obviously valuable and compelling, you know? Because even when it's something that I'm interested in genuinely, but you know. Well that guy was just, you didn't,
Starting point is 00:26:15 I didn't get the impression that in between him cutting down limbs, you also started to learn about stakes in his private life. But if I actually. His wife's pregnant or something. If I was cutting down trees on a daily basis and like needed pointers and people to compare with, I might keep going back from a functional standpoint.
Starting point is 00:26:35 And then maybe I would get into the personality. Now let me, I want just, we can move to another category because I want to keep moving. Just a few other things we found in this niche interest just because it's just entertaining. Defunct Land, the thing I mentioned, this is basically history of extinct theme parks and other themed entertainment experiences.
Starting point is 00:26:53 There's an episode about the Nickelodeon Hotel. Then there's one called Steve1989MREinfo, that's the name of the channel. And this guy just does. We shouted him out on GMM. Just does MRE taste tests. Even more, getting even more niche, there's a channel called The Great War
Starting point is 00:27:12 that tells the story of World War I as it unfolded week by week. So literally when they started this series, they were like, it's week one in World War I, here's what happened in week one, and then every week they update it and you're following along with the World War I, here's what happened in week one, and then every week they update it, and you're following along with the World War. And it's this like incredibly detailed,
Starting point is 00:27:30 hosted by one guy as far as I could see with the ones I watched, like history buff video that I was mesmerized by, but I was kinda mesmerized by the concept, but I didn't think, I was like, you know, I'm not interested in following the World War week by week. But you know what, lots of people are. Well yeah and I haven't watched Ken Burns documentaries. I watched some of them but you know,
Starting point is 00:27:55 I don't find myself continuing to go back a lot. Yeah. So something even more in depth, I get it but it's not for me. I'm absolutely amazed by it and I understand why it exists and maybe there is something that I've yet to find that I will be, I mean, I like to eat beans, I'm all about beans but could you really have a channel about beans and if you did, would I continue watching it
Starting point is 00:28:22 even though I love, I like eating beans but I can't eat the beans I see on the screen, that rhymes. I'm like Dr. Seuss all of a sudden. Yeah, you can make that show but you wouldn't watch that show. That is the problem, isn't it? I wouldn't watch it.
Starting point is 00:28:36 You wouldn't watch it. Gosh. I feel guilty. Oh, another thing I wanna say, speaking of feeling guilty, we're not telling who recommended these things just because multiple people did and so that we would just forever be mispronouncing usernames. So thank you for everybody who participated. Sorry we're not calling you out for recommending these.
Starting point is 00:28:55 Okay, let's move on to what I'm calling the TV category because I think this is an interesting thing, the fact that there are shows on YouTube that are essentially replicating something that would exist on television. So we just talked about something that would only exist on YouTube that's based on a niche interest
Starting point is 00:29:13 that we're saying that while it's great, we would not go back to them. We haven't found that thing yet. But then there's the things that you could find elsewhere, but there are YouTube versions of them. Brave Wilderness. So Coyote Peterson, from what I've been told, gets maimed, bitten, chewed up, spit out,
Starting point is 00:29:30 any other uncomfortable verb with amazing, with an amazing ability to talk his way through it. I would definitely sit down with my kids, like Lincoln, I'm sure Lando would love it. I haven't done it. I know Lincoln's watched a few clips on his own. But if we're having some family hangout time, it's like hey, let's watch some videos.
Starting point is 00:29:57 Let's watch some Brave Wilderness videos. Like absolutely, we could do that. It's like the, he's the modern day Steve Irwin. Yeah, I mean we sat down and watched that Bear Grylls show. Let's watch Coyote Peterson, absolutely. And you might say that he actually has innovated on the platform because of the way he's like
Starting point is 00:30:16 letting himself get bit by things. It's something that is not, hasn't been part of traditional, you know, been part of traditional, what kind of TV, nature TV. So he's kind of, he's putting himself in the situation, putting himself in harm's way in a way that hasn't been done before. Incredibly well done. In a Steve Irwin way.
Starting point is 00:30:36 In a Steve Irwin way, incredibly well done. He's very engaging and if I see one of his videos trending and it's like oh that's something that's crazy, I will watch it and be entertained by it. But again, does it pass the test of if I'm home alone, I make the choice to watch it? Not yet. It doesn't.
Starting point is 00:30:56 It's great. But that is going on my family list. Okay. Like I'm making that decision, so that's one of them. Minefield, lots of people talked about that. This is the YouTube premium series by Michael Stevens, Vsauce. This again, this is something that is very well done,
Starting point is 00:31:17 but there's other series on Netflix, Amazon, traditional television, Science Channel, that kinda check a lot of the same boxes. I have a personal connection to Michael because he's been on the show and I think he's sat right here at this table. Yep. And I like him a lot and so I'm more invested in it
Starting point is 00:31:39 when watching it because I'm like, oh there's a guy that I know who's hosting it. Well I was staying at my brother and sister-in-law's house and JB said he had watched a few of them. I'm like, oh yeah, I wanna watch some of these and we binged watched, like we had a few hours and we were just watching them and it's great. I mean, I would watch those with the kids too
Starting point is 00:31:59 because there's lots of stuff to learn and they're done in a very smart way and he's very, he just, it's very immersive. So learn and they're done in a very smart way and he's very, he just, it's very immersive. So it's very well done. Some are better than others depending on the topic. But that's true of any one of those. Yeah. Any one of those shows.
Starting point is 00:32:17 But again, I highly recommend that. And if I hadn't binge watched it, that would also be on like, in the family viewing, hey, we got an hour. We don an hour, we're not gonna sit down and watch a movie but we could sit down and watch something together. I actually think it could improve our family time if I started making a list of those things
Starting point is 00:32:35 because we just find ourselves like going into our own rooms because Lily wants to watch The Office by herself and Lincoln wants to be on his phone to play video games, it'd be a way to bring us together. Yeah. So that's on my list, I would say. Buzzfeed Unsolved, a lot of people talked about this. And I did watch a couple of episodes,
Starting point is 00:32:56 and I was interested in it, and to the same degree that I would be interested if I was in a certain mood while sort of flipping through Netflix suggestions and I saw some weird, unsolved mysteries type show. But typically the way that I would do that is if I was kinda trying to waste a little time before we watched a movie or we watched a scripted series
Starting point is 00:33:22 and I had a little time and I was like, I got 20 minutes, I'll check out this thing about this conspiracy and I would sit down and watch it. And to me, it checks the exact same box. I don't think that it's any better or worse than something, again, I don't have anything to compare it to, my guess is. I'll compare it to something loosely,
Starting point is 00:33:41 is Dark Tourist, which is a guy from New Zealand hosting a show on Netflix where it's a docu-follow series, he goes to like creepy slash dark places that you can buy a ticket to basically that are really weird. Very well done show, I highly recommend it if you're into dark tourism stuff. But again, I just had an hour, I was sitting on the couch
Starting point is 00:34:10 and a couple of kids were in there, I was like, I'll find something, I'm gonna go to Netflix and then I'm gonna find something. So I wasn't browsing on YouTube because I didn't have any hope that there would be anything that could like, we could have a shared experience for an hour. Right. You know, so I might add that one to the list.
Starting point is 00:34:27 I'm not as interested in it. Britton, my cousin, he's like super into ghosts and unsolved mystery type stuff and he loves that show. Buzzfeed Unsolved. Yeah, he told me that. Okay. But again, there's not a, there's, I think, well I got an hour, I'm gonna go on Netflix.
Starting point is 00:34:44 I just not, I got an hour, I'm gonna go on Netflix. I got an hour, I'm gonna go on YouTube. It's still appointment viewing and I think that's what really the question is is what on YouTube is gonna become a part of my appointment viewing? Well I am gonna get to some stuff that I think does pass the test for me but I'm not there yet. This is sort of an outlier that just fascinated me.
Starting point is 00:35:08 A guy named Brian Jordan Alvarez who is an actor that I have seen in things. He's been in a bunch of things so when you see his face you're like oh yeah I know that guy. And he's doing a really, really fascinating thing with his YouTube channel. He's basically doing. Did it involve ants?
Starting point is 00:35:28 Nope, no ants. It's not even in Canada as far as I can tell based on the landscape. It looks like Los Angeles mostly. He is doing traditional scripted content but he's putting it directly on YouTube. So a lot of people mention. Sketches?
Starting point is 00:35:45 He does sketches, he does standalone sketches, but a lot of people do standalone sketches. His sketches are actually funny, which is very difficult to find on YouTube, in my opinion. But what I will say that he's doing that is even more interesting, he has a series that I think he's in a couple of seasons of called The Gay and Wondrous Life of Caleb Gallo.
Starting point is 00:36:06 Okay. And. This is a character? It's a character that he plays and then he's got another actor, a woman that is in a lot of the things with him. They're kind of like a comedy duo together. They're in a bunch of the videos together.
Starting point is 00:36:19 She's also an established actress that's, like if you go to their IMDBs for both of these people, you see, oh, they're very busy, they're working actors. But they still put all this creative effort into these series. Like this is a web series that, okay, it doesn't have, it obviously doesn't have the budget of something
Starting point is 00:36:39 that's on a traditional network or even something that's on a YouTube premium. But you kind of very quickly sort of forget about that as soon as you start watching it. So it kind of has a little bit of a web series feel to it, but it's just well acted, well written, and he's a compelling character, she's a compelling character.
Starting point is 00:36:59 There's probably other stuff like this out there, but you guys recommended it, so I checked it out. And then the thing that kind of blew me away was the fact that just recently, he posted an entire movie, a feature-length movie called Grandmother's Gold, which is like an hour and 20 minute film that, I mean, they put a lot into this.
Starting point is 00:37:18 Now, they probably submitted it to film festivals, I don't know what else happened with it, but at some point he decided, I'm just gonna put it on YouTube. So just very interesting that he's doing things. How many views are we talking about? Of that film, maybe a couple hundred thousand, it's only been up for a few weeks.
Starting point is 00:37:32 Okay. Which is impressive for something that long and then a lot of the series itself, I think the Caleb Gallo series gets hundreds of thousands of views, maybe even a million on an episode or two. So there's a lot of people watching this. But he's doing something incredibly ambitious that's very, it's notable because we know how difficult
Starting point is 00:37:54 it is to create scripted content and we basically just made the decision that we're not gonna do it unless we get the kind of budgets that we can get from somebody like YouTube Premium because it's just too hard. Right. But he's. So what are you gonna,
Starting point is 00:38:09 are you gonna start watching his channel? I know that if, basically the way I feel about his channel right now, and this applies to the sketches too, it's just like okay, if I am like, I wanna laugh right now, like specifically wanna laugh and I know I can go to this channel and get a laugh. Am I gonna sit down and watch that entire movie? Maybe, but am I gonna watch it as opposed
Starting point is 00:38:35 to watching the Oscar nominated movies that I haven't gotten around to watching yet? If I do, it's gonna be because I'm impressed by the gumption that this guy has to go out and make a film. But if I haven't yet seen an Oscar-nominated film or something that somebody's recommending or something that's popping up on Rotten Tomatoes,
Starting point is 00:38:55 it's highly ranked, I'm probably gonna go to those features before I go to this self-financed thing that's gonna end up probably, ultimately, if I compare them apples to apples, it's not going to be as good. Okay, but I'm super impressed. Let me just say I'm super impressed. The guy, and I have no doubt that he's gonna end up
Starting point is 00:39:15 doing something that you'll know that name. Get to something that you're not only impressed by but is gonna impact your habits. Well this is another outlier and this already has impacted my habits. Okay. Is what Ethan and Hila are doing with their podcast. Really with their channel, H3H3 Productions,
Starting point is 00:39:37 I mean, we said it when we were on their podcast that they're some of the most genuinely funny people on YouTube, it's just like effortlessly funny, not trying too hard, it just happens. And everything Ethan says is just funny to me. And then what he decided to do with the H3 podcast, I think of his podcast in the way that I think about you know like Joe Rogan, if Joe Rogan's got somebody on
Starting point is 00:40:05 that I'm interested in, then I'm interested in the way that he's going to talk to them. Yeah, but that's a podcast, that's not what we're talking about here. It's YouTube content, that's all I'm saying. And so I'm saying that it's an outlier that I wanted to acknowledge because- But if you're gonna listen to it,
Starting point is 00:40:19 you're gonna listen to it through a podcasting app, you're not gonna watch the video. You. Yeah, I probably would enjoy it the way I do most of my podcasts which is by ear. Right. So you're making me take that one out. Okay, I'm just trying to be helpful.
Starting point is 00:40:34 Okay, all right. I feel like I found some things that are changing the game and I feel like I can commit. Feel like I can commit. Feel like I can commit. Give it to me, it's what I've been waiting for. Okay. I got a couple too but they're, they're gonna be different than yours I think.
Starting point is 00:40:53 There's other examples of these and both of these guys have been around for a while but I had never really dug into the degree that I did. And I'm calling these, the category mock vlog, okay? So this is people making what looks to be internet content that would typically be unscripted lifestyle stuff but then when you dig in you realize that it's all scripted and actually that's what makes it funny
Starting point is 00:41:22 or it's loosely scripted. Sugar Pine 7, okay so these guys won show of the year, right? They beat us in show of the year last year. Yeah. Probably happen again this year, someone will beat us. We're always nominated, never winning, always a bride, always a bridesmaid, never a bride, that's what we are. But so these guys are doing something,
Starting point is 00:41:45 the guy who kind of started the thing, and a multiple, a couple of the guys were on SourceFed. They were employees at SourceFed and the very first vlog is SourceFed has ended. And he does this, it's kind of a vlog meets Arrested Development meets Curb Your Enthusiasm.
Starting point is 00:42:07 He's basically, he's got a camera, he's filming his friends who, everybody's funny, all the personalities are funny. They're doing absolutely ridiculous things that are obviously set up and obviously planned and scripted but they're all improv-ing and then he is offering his VO commentary and it's this hybrid thing that doesn't exist anywhere else that I have seen and is genuinely very well done.
Starting point is 00:42:32 And then they've really. Are they creating scenarios? Oh I lost the TV remote, let's see if we can find it. Yeah very, very, it's all planned out. Which interestingly, one of the things we were talking about is like, you guys probably already know that like all of your favorite reality shows, if you happen to watch Keeping Up with the Kardashians,
Starting point is 00:42:54 you know that everything that's gonna take place in an episode is already determined before it happens. It's like, okay, well in this episode, you guys are gonna go to this party and this is the kind of, there's a room for things to move around a little bit, but it's all pretty much planned. It's interesting they're doing this. You're gonna walk in this room,
Starting point is 00:43:10 you're not gonna know where the remote is because a producer has hidden it. But theirs is much more, obviously theirs is intentionally funny, not unintentionally funny like a lot of reality television is. So it's just one of those things that I found that's like. It's a blurred genre in a very good and creative way. It's super innovative.
Starting point is 00:43:28 They're very committed to the YouTube game, like regularly giving you videos, they have a podcast, they have a schedule, they're reliable in that way. We met some of the guys at the Streamys last year. And I was like, yeah, I don't know, again, doesn't mean anything that we don't know, but we didn't know exactly who they were at the time. I looked at the stuff then, was like, yeah, I don't know, again, doesn't mean anything that we don't know but we didn't know exactly who they were at the time. I looked at the stuff then, was impressed with it
Starting point is 00:43:49 but as I dug in, I was like, yes, innovative, so kinda like changing the game, establishing a new genre, playing the YouTube game very well. So in other words, it's not like this disconnected, too cool for school kinda thing that can happen when sometimes there's people who do YouTube things, some of the people that I think we'll end up talking about where you kind of feel like they're above YouTube,
Starting point is 00:44:09 these guys are not too cool to be above the YouTube game. Like they've got a banner that says this is what happens every single day on our channel. And then lastly and most importantly for me, it's just genuinely funny. Like they're trying to be funny and they are funny. So, okay, I found one. And McJuggerNuggets does the same thing.
Starting point is 00:44:32 Yes, that's the other one I wanna talk about. This guy's been around for longer than Sugar Pine 7. I'd heard this name, this guy's in Pennsylvania, I believe. And he has for years. We met him too, dude. When did we meet him? We were introduced to him two years ago, three years ago. Just in passing at something.
Starting point is 00:44:54 Just feel like such a douche right now that you pointed that out. Just such a douche. I am a douche, it's fine. I own it, I own it every day. McJuggerNuggets, I just remember the name from when we met him but I hadn't seen the videos and I went and looked.
Starting point is 00:45:07 He is doing something that is so ambitious. I was fascinated equally by this but in a different way because he is doing these vlogs that they seem even more traditional just on the surface, like lifestyle vlogs. It's just like oh I'm just following this guy's day. But then you pretty quickly realize that no no no, this guy's mom and dad and brother and other people
Starting point is 00:45:34 and friends and other YouTubers sometimes, they're all a part of this and it's all scripted but they're all like incredible performers. Like you can still tell that it's kinda like I just got my dad to do this but it's I got my dad to do this in a way that, it's not just funny because he can't act, no it's funny because he can. Well the one that I remember is his dad got mad
Starting point is 00:45:58 and there's something about it, there was a gaming console that ended up getting taken outside and smashed by I think his dad or. I think he had something. There was some conflict. I think he had something go very viral at some point years ago. Yeah, that was years ago.
Starting point is 00:46:13 And that's the one that I watched because it was, you know, you can sort by popular. But I was very intrigued. But again, a lot of things that are gonna get me excited are things that are genuinely funny. Like I'm giving the guy no benefit of the doubt. He just is actually funny and is engaging and it's super ambitious.
Starting point is 00:46:34 Oh and you know what he. In what way is it ambitious? I don't know what you mean. 40 minute long vlog that is not, it's a scripted thing. It's like 40 minutes, it gets multiple locations. It's not him in a webcam, this is multiple locations. It's all shot through the lens of a camera.
Starting point is 00:46:52 Him lifestyle vlogging. As if he was vlogging but there's all these situations and all these scenes that get set up. He's actually up for a streaming as well, I think. Well that's encouraging. Potentially for best comedy or he may be in a category that we're in. Anyway, highly recommend it.
Starting point is 00:47:10 He's got older series that you can get into and then again, it's just this guy who made this decision to be like I'm not gonna go to LA and try to do this traditional thing, maybe you did, I don't know. I'm gonna be in Pennsylvania and I'm going to do something that he's kind of living in the constraints of low budget video but pushing it in this really innovative original way that's actually funny.
Starting point is 00:47:39 An emphasis on story. Yes. Comedy. Yes. Yes. And pulling it off, seemingly, with just relatives and friends and one camera. Yes. What are you gonna do about it? I am tempted to, there's a lot of content.
Starting point is 00:47:59 Sugar Pine 7, you kinda feel like you can just sort of, all right, all right, I can just kinda get in, I can just watch one of these, it's not too long, I don't have to be there from the beginning. With McJugger Nuggets I kinda feel like I have to be like, all right, pick the series and start from the beginning. But it's a lot, it would be a lot of time. Probably pick the current one,
Starting point is 00:48:21 because I think the, I kinda wanna pick the one that's up for the streaming. Well, I mean, I want to for one time in my life experience the excitement of waiting for someone to release a video that continues a story. I've never done that on YouTube. And if you're telling me he can do that, then my interest is piqued.
Starting point is 00:48:39 And I think the one that's up for a streaming, it's like a murder mystery. Because like, the first person perspective dude at the beginning of the whole thing is like run over by a car. Can it really be as good as Ozark to you in your limited amount of time? No, I don't think so.
Starting point is 00:48:58 I don't think it can. I don't think that it can. Not that that's a comedy. It's an unfair comparison. I don't want to get there yet because that's gonna be where we land, right? Okay, okay. What else do you have?
Starting point is 00:49:10 I've got more, I can keep going through them. I have never watched a Casey Neistat video. Ever. Like I met the guy, I liked him. I heard his story, I liked him, I heard his story, I was intrigued, I've always respected him but I treated him like every other person on YouTube which is like, okay I'm gonna watch the thumbnails,
Starting point is 00:49:37 like I don't have time to watch the videos, I'm gonna watch the thumbnails and then they started making the thumbnails where it would like start to tick through different images in the video. And then you've watched the video. So I was like, oh that's even better, that's even better. And you know, okay, I started to understand a little bit
Starting point is 00:49:53 or I thought I did but I said, you know what, I'm just gonna sit down, I'm gonna watch a couple of his videos. And it's an interesting thing because I'm a huge fan of his now, it's just so easy because he's genuine, he's creative, he's smart, he's not much of an emphasis on comedy, it's so weird for me to like tell you about a Casey Neistat video, I'm the only one
Starting point is 00:50:20 who hasn't watched one. And I definitely think, I mean like, I appreciated the variety from video to video, but the, just the creativity quotient is so high that it's so inspiring to me as from an artistic level. And it's current, like he's talking about things that are happening like this video went viral,
Starting point is 00:50:54 I was gonna, you know, this guy on the subway shaving, I was going to retweet and he tells a great story. He's masterful in the way that he presents things. And then he makes you think. He's like, I didn't retweet this to get a laugh and then I found out the follow up story about this guy and he's talking about it and that's just one that I watch. He's running and he doesn't like the rain. He's talking about what's the best watch.
Starting point is 00:51:25 Sounds super exciting. What's the, I mean even something like that, it's like very engaging. But here's the thing that happened to me. I go into work mode. I'm like man, this inspires me. This immediately impacts how I approach what we create. And that's why I have not and do not watch YouTube videos
Starting point is 00:51:49 because I'll either waste my time with stuff that is not for me or I'll find something that engages me creatively and I just can't divorce it from the impact on my job and on what we're gonna create. And it, you know, it's like I've never watched a Try Guys video, never. You're strange. Because I don't feel like I can,
Starting point is 00:52:15 I just can't handle, I mean, Sturgill Simpson said that he did not listen to Jason Isbell's album. And I'm not trying, and I related to that. Well, what's your problem? But he said specifically why he didn't do it. He didn't wanna be influenced by it. Exactly, and the influence it has on me is that it, It stresses you out.
Starting point is 00:52:38 It stresses me out. But it, and it also makes me think, because with my personality profile, I'm like there's always a better way to do what I'm doing and if I don't change, this is all gonna slip away. So anything on YouTube that's working to me and I felt it, I felt it well up inside of me, even watching a Casey Neistat video
Starting point is 00:53:01 or the 30 minutes that I watched him and I just felt like I couldn't put enough of that aside to enjoy it as a viewer. But I actually feel like he's different enough but also inspiring enough that there's just the right amount of overlap that I could see me incorporating his videos into my daily or weekly routine. Okay well, to speak to.
Starting point is 00:53:28 Because I became a better person by watching. I became more inspired and that certainly counteracted any level of anxiety that welled up within me because I've got problems. So I mean, I have actually watched quite a few Casey Neistat videos and I've got problems. So I mean, I have actually watched quite a few Casey Neistat videos and I've always thought he was masterful at what he does. I usually wait until he's talking about something
Starting point is 00:53:54 that I'm interested in as opposed to following it on a regular basis. But to speak to what watching these folks, especially as we get into the Sugar Pine 7, the McJugger Nuggets, the Casey Neistats, and we're gonna keep going, what it does for me is it does make me anxious, it does make me stressed out, but mostly for me, it makes me frustrated.
Starting point is 00:54:18 I mean, the thing that I deal with mostly is frustration, like a creative block, not from lack of knowing what we want to do, but from feeling a little bit trapped, to be perfectly honest. So to expound on that, so with what we do with Good Mythical Morning, there's a few things about it, right? One is it's not really our creativity on display,
Starting point is 00:54:44 it's our personalities on display, right? If anything, the creativity is coming from the people who make the graphics or the specific formulation of the episodes, which is something that we're kind of overseeing as opposed to formulating ourselves. And so we created this place where we could just be ourselves and make each other laugh and people are coming in
Starting point is 00:55:10 and enjoying kind of our personalities and the jokes that we make and that kind of thing. But from a purely creative standpoint, crafting something, creating an experience where you're thinking about every element of it, you're thinking about the music and you're thinking about the script and you're thinking about the script, you're thinking about the plan and then how that plan
Starting point is 00:55:27 comes to fruition. That's something that we have sort of, we funneled a bunch of that into Buddy System. It was frustrating that a lot of people weren't able to see Buddy System because we feel like, especially with the second season of Buddy System, it was just like pure Rhett and Link creativity being just poured out, you know?
Starting point is 00:55:47 And I think it meets the criteria of your tweet, by the way. It does, it does, and I recommend it. But when I see these guys innovating and doing things that are artful in a way, I'm like, man, ah, I want to do more of that. Now, we'll say that we're constantly working on a lot of things besides GMM that are,
Starting point is 00:56:12 they're all designed to give us that opportunity to create that kind of experience. It's just the avenues that we're exploring, things happen slowly, nothing's a sure thing, and that kind of thing, but that's the main thing. What we've chosen to do is to try to make those things happen in a more traditional sense, being financed in a more traditional way
Starting point is 00:56:31 as opposed to saying screw traditional methods of making it in Hollywood and just make stuff freely and independently on YouTube mostly because you really can't do both things that we're doing. We kinda would have to make a choice. We'd have to make a choice, are we gonna go back and do what we used to do with music videos and sketches
Starting point is 00:56:54 or are we gonna keep doing GMM? It's just with the way that things work and there's only two of us, you kinda have to make a choice and GMM's not going away anytime soon. That's the anxiety that is created in me, the creative frustration that happens when I start watching things that are creatively inspiring. But you don't find yourself not watching for that reason?
Starting point is 00:57:16 No, no, no, no. I choose to watch to be frustrated by it. But I actually feel like I could watch, like I feel like I could watch, like I feel like I could watch DeFranco's show because it would, I would be more informed and it would help me engage with the topics that he covers. I actually, just as a side note, I've never watched a complete Philip DeFranco video.
Starting point is 00:57:47 I probably watch Phil, honestly, I probably watch him more than any other YouTuber. Because he's constantly talking about something that, I don't know if I finished the video, but I go to the section where he talks about the thing that I'm interested in. And I can see the value in it. Because I'm interested in his take on it.
Starting point is 00:58:01 Especially from a YouTube community standpoint, I think that, you know, I've always felt guilty, A, not watching fellow YouTubers, but also not being an active part of the community. And you know, I actually got a charge last week out of watching videos about YouTuber burnout and talking about that and I got a, I was like wow, actually I can see that I might start
Starting point is 00:58:30 to carve out a place for YouTube as a viewer in my life because of the community aspect and I knew that on paper but I started to understand it because I felt passionately about what they were saying and their perspectives and it helped me form my own perspective. So I'm actually open to that and that's something that we didn't dive into too much here.
Starting point is 00:58:57 So I'm not saying DeFranco is my only place for that or in the stuff that Shane's doing, which we haven't talked about. I wanna talk about Shane last, I'm saving that. Is, it has a lot of overlap with the community but then engaging in terms of like the way, the creative way that he's treating it. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:59:16 But I, when I watched the Casey Neistat videos and I was just able to check my ego, I think it's, I think I would like to have a relationship with him as a viewer. Oh, well, I mean, I think I would have his phone number. No, not as a professional relationship, a viewing relationship. Okay, I'll talk to him about that.
Starting point is 00:59:46 Yeah, I could definitely see that, you know, that I could, oh, I could watch every single video he puts out. Well, let's talk about. But I have to carve out, I don't know when I would do that exactly in my life. You'll have to put it in your calendar. But that's, yeah, I gotta put it in my calendar.
Starting point is 01:00:01 Let's talk about what we're calling the candy category. It's not about candy, but it is something that we could not categorize, but that we both loved and wanted more of. Bill Wurtz. Still a piece of garbage. Now we knew about Bill Wurtz from several years ago when Ear Biscuits won best podcast.
Starting point is 01:00:23 It was either the Webbys or the Shortys. It was in New York. It was the Short It was either the Webbys or the Shortys. It was in New York. It was the Shortys. And I think it was the Shortys because you had to give a really short speech. DJ Khaled was backstage. And Ear Biscuits won best podcast. It beat Radiolab and our acceptance speech
Starting point is 01:00:38 was about how our podcast is not better than Radiolab and Radiolab should have won. And then Al Roker got up and was like, that's the weirdest acceptance speech I've ever seen. But that night, Bill Wurtz won something and then they played that I'm still a piece of garbage and we were both like, who is this guy? He also said something really funny when he got up there.
Starting point is 01:00:59 But, so I've enjoyed his stuff but then dug in again. It's surreal musical jingles with surreal visuals to accompany them with a certain splendid sound to his music sensibilities. He's got this recent song about Mount St. Helens. I mean, it's just. I will drop, I mean, this fills the slot that bad lip reading is in.
Starting point is 01:01:30 So this joins bad lip reading that I will drop everything and watch the new bad lip reading. And we're late to this game but I will drop everything and watch his latest. Of course. And you know, I went on Spotify and all of his songs are on there and I'm like driving down the road listening to him.
Starting point is 01:01:45 So Bill Wurtz is reliably great. And who's the other guy? And so sort of Bill Wurtz, if Bill were to take a dark turn, is Jack Stauber. So. Still music and trippy visuals. Similar sort of trippy stuff, very comedic. I think Jack probably inserts himself
Starting point is 01:02:07 a little bit more personally into the videos. Like, well, I mean, Bill does that too. Yeah. But it's like a combination of music videos, which are great, and animated videos that are just creepy and weird, but also incredibly funny, depending on what mood you're in. And it's much more, at least, I hope I'm not wrong in saying this, just creepy and weird but also incredibly funny depending on what mood you're in.
Starting point is 01:02:25 And it's much more, at least, I hope I'm not wrong in saying this, it seems to be much more regularly updated than Bill Wurtz. Like he's much more regular. It seems like he was doing like a weekly video. It's not just, his isn't just music but it's also like surreal sketches with a very, animated stuff, yeah.
Starting point is 01:02:41 Pinpointed. Jack Stauber. I think he's in, the one that I recommend watching, there's this animated one called PBJ, which is about peanut butter and jelly. And it's just. So funny. I mean, it is.
Starting point is 01:02:55 So specifically funny. I mean, you have to have a very specific sense of humor to like it, but I loved it. I mean, the candy stuff is just bite-sized. Whenever it hits your subscription box, you hear about it, you stop everything to watch it on your phone at any point. And I would show that to all my friends
Starting point is 01:03:13 and my wife and they would like it. So I would watch that with my wife, but it's a 30 second video in some cases. Yeah, it's a totally, it's just, you're standing in a line somewhere, you know? Right. I could have more of that in my life. Okay, well. Instead of just going on Reddit all the time.
Starting point is 01:03:30 Do you have anything else from the list that you wanna talk about because I wanted to save Shane for last and I have some strong things. The thing I wanna save for last that can be next to last is us, like I'm curious. Hey, us. Would, if you weren't us, would you watch Good Mythical Morning? So let's talk about Shane and then let's talk about that to shut it down because I think that was,
Starting point is 01:03:52 I think we brought up that question in part one. Okay, so. Would we watch Good Mythical Morning if we weren't in it? All right, we will answer that question before we're done. So I've talked about things that are innovative and mesmerizing and things that I can see myself going and committing to. And you talked about Shane in part one, a good amount.
Starting point is 01:04:11 But the thing that I will say again, and I don't know how many parts we're into the Jake Paul series by the time that you listen to this. And I will say that I haven't even watched part one yet because I'm saving it, here's why. Because I know that I can sit down in my place, in my bed, with my wife before I go to bed and say,
Starting point is 01:04:35 "'Hey, I want you to watch this series with me.'" And it is the one thing that I can, without reservation, be like, she's gonna be into this. Is what Shane has done with his approach to documentary on YouTube. Again, I just, it kinda started the conversation of like what else is there? And I'd say for the most part,
Starting point is 01:04:59 we pretty much found what we expected. We found really niche stuff. We found some people doing some really innovative things just based on the parameters of the platform. We found some really funny people. We found some people doing basically just replicating what you could find on television. But Shane is doing something that I think is different
Starting point is 01:05:18 for a reason because it is something you could find in terms of the format. There's compelling documentaries, it's become a huge part of our culture, entertainment culture, but he's the only one doing it about YouTube in the way that is actually interesting to people who are part of the community and has the access and the trust that you need
Starting point is 01:05:42 to be able to have the conversations that I know that he had with Jake Paul and do it in such a timely fashion. So to be a part of the community but to highlight the community in a way that a professional documentarian would do traditionally, that's something that doesn't exist. He's changed the game, I've already said it, but that's the one thing I can confidently say
Starting point is 01:06:06 that I've had to hold myself back from watching part one. It's 40 minutes long, he's got eight parts. I've had to hold myself back from watching it because I was like, I gotta watch all this other stuff and this is the one thing I'm gonna save and be like, Jesse, let's sit down and let's watch this together. So I still think that after this whole thing,
Starting point is 01:06:28 I'm back to Shane is doing the most compelling thing on YouTube right now. There it is, I said it again, I already said it, I said it again. I know that I'll like it when I watch it. And again, I just. Will you watch it? Yeah, I've got some more internal work to do
Starting point is 01:06:51 just to make sure that I don't, I just enjoy it. Like it has nothing to do with his work, it just has to do with me. Like I gotta get, I gotta stop working or seeing how does this impact what we do, you know? Or I wish, you know, it's like. Just write down, here's what I think, here's my advice. So yeah, I can do that.
Starting point is 01:07:10 When you feel compelled, when you feel like you shouldn't watch those things, just watch them and just take some notes so you just get the, you process whatever it is that you feel like you wanna learn and apply to what we do, just take some notes. And again, it's in no way competition. I'm pretty clear about that, right?
Starting point is 01:07:31 It's not about competition, am I better or are we falling behind? It just makes you feel like we have to make changes. It's not a comparison thing, it's a, I actually do get inspired and then I feel hamstrung do get inspired and then I feel hamstrung with you know, do I have a place where I can apply? And that's a funny thing to say when we could make anything we want technically.
Starting point is 01:07:55 Technically but not practically. Right. It seems like we could but practically the answer is no. Okay. Would you watch us? Would I watch us? Would I watch us? It's almost an impossible question. Okay.
Starting point is 01:08:10 Because I know myself. Yes and no. Okay, let me say the no part, I'll start with the no, I'll start with the negative. Well here's the, I think we're looking. Okay, I won't. No, I'm not trying to cut you off, I'm just, go ahead. The no part is.
Starting point is 01:08:27 I don't want you to give me the answer and then I just have to say yeah, I agree. Okay, well. Because I don't know what I think. If you know what you think, I have to figure it out by talking. That's why I cut you off. Okay, I don't think we're gonna think the same thing though.
Starting point is 01:08:38 I don't know what I think. Well then just let me talk and then think and talk within a second. Because then I'll just agree with you. No you won't. The reason I would not watch us is because I don't watch anything on a daily basis. Because the structure that we created,
Starting point is 01:08:50 which is actually the reason for the success of the show in many ways, is the fact that we created a 10 to 15 minute experience, and if you add more, you're getting up to 20 minutes every single day that you can carve out and you know it's gonna happen at a certain time. Right. My schedule does not allow currently
Starting point is 01:09:08 for that window to be, there is no window. There is no, I don't watch anything. The only thing that I do on a regular basis is during my drive into work, I will listen to a podcast or a book on tape, Audible. And that's the window and our show doesn't fit, we don't, we have a podcast but we're making it right now. But GMM is not that, so I don't have a place
Starting point is 01:09:38 for a daily video, so no, I would not watch our show as it is intended to be watched every day. That's my no part, I have a yes part that I would not watch our show as it is intended to be watched every day. That's my no part. I have a yes part that I would watch. And I think that everything you said is the reason why that would be a yes for me because I know I could count on it, I could make it a part of my daily routine
Starting point is 01:10:00 like the way that thankfully so many people have. And so I could actually, again, you know, I was joking about, you were joking about the calendar, but yeah, it's because I'm so schedule oriented, like okay, I could have a relationship with this show because I can count on it. And you know, if it gives me something that I need, it's just like, you know, when my grandparents watch,
Starting point is 01:10:27 you know, they watch Pat Sajak every night, you know? It's like, all right, that's what, after dinner, that's what we do. Sit down and watch the wheels spin. And I think a lot of people do that with our show. They watch it after dinner, with breakfast, whatever. We just, as a family, we don't have those things that we watch, we listen to music while we eat dinner.
Starting point is 01:10:46 That's what we've just made some different choices that don't allow for Good Mythical Morning on a daily basis or something like it. I think the other thing we were getting at is that we're so compelled by story. That's the brilliant thing that Shane did is that he, you know, in a making a murder kind of way, he draws you in in multiple part series
Starting point is 01:11:06 and then it fits a certain time slot that you wanna fill with story and intrigue and in that case, reality and also learning about a fascinating person or situation. So as far as the content of our show, I mean there's not that much story. I think a lot of people, we put a lot of that in this podcast now because it was part of
Starting point is 01:11:38 Good Mythical Morning early on and I think it's a big part of this show now. Yeah, right. But that being said, since it's not a big part of this show now. Yeah, right. But that being said, since it's not a big part of Good Mythical Morning anymore, I don't know if I would watch because it's missing that, the story, which could be a reality story that has stakes or with other people on YouTube
Starting point is 01:12:04 that I'm trying, that I'm open to. Or it could be scripted, or it obviously lacks a scripted story. So I don't know if, because I think that would be the next thing because would I be entertained by those guys? I mean, I guess so. Well, so that's the yes part I wanna say
Starting point is 01:12:22 and this is some weird egotistical thing to say. But I can get to a place, and I do this sometimes when I'm watching back one of our videos. Now usually my motivation to go to one of our videos is to see what people are thinking about it. If I do that within the YouTube Studio app, I don't have to watch the video, I can just see the comments.
Starting point is 01:12:43 But every once in a while I'll do that while I'm on the internet and I go to the video and it just starts playing. Or if the kids to watch the video, I can just see the comments, but every once in a while I'll do that while I'm on the internet and I go to the video and it just starts playing. Or if the kids are watching the video, when I get home I'll watch an episode. I find myself watching, or if there was something particular about that episode that I wanted to see how it came across, something new, watch it back.
Starting point is 01:12:57 But the majority of what we make on GMM we don't watch back. But I can put myself in the shoes of a person who is not us, just watching us, and there are many times when I'm sitting there watching and I think to myself, those guys are funny. I think for me it's like, I like those guys. I like those guys. I'm saying that like, I'm like,
Starting point is 01:13:25 just like I said about, you'll notice that all the people that I connected with, I said genuinely funny. And I am, I will say with a total egotistical pride, I think I'm genuinely funny. You, no, I think we're both genuinely funny. I think the comedy that we've created is genuinely funny. Otherwise I would feel sick about what we're doing. Yeah that would be horrible.
Starting point is 01:13:53 You know what I'm saying? Yeah. But that's one of the reasons we keep doing it is I think we're actually creating a genuinely funny, engaging thing that just because it fits a format that I couldn't practically fit into my life right now doesn't mean that I can't, as a third party, look at it and be like,
Starting point is 01:14:15 I see, I get it, I understand why you'd wanna sit down and watch those guys. Got it, move on to the next thing. That's how I would evaluate us, pridefully. But unashamedly, at the same time. What have we learned? Man, I don't know what it is about this whole exercise. It was tiring.
Starting point is 01:14:40 So exhausting, I literally feel exhausted. Let's go work some more though because that's what we're gonna do. Yeah, yeah. I think that the Casey Neistat thing for me, I do acknowledge that it's an odd thing to say but I think it opens a door for me to say, okay, there may be room for personality driven,
Starting point is 01:15:08 high creativity quotient content in my life on a weekly basis that I could follow him and other people like him that I could find and have a viewing relationship, an ongoing viewing relationship with those people. And that's a totally different approach than what I thought I was looking for, which was appointment viewing
Starting point is 01:15:41 to when I would normally watch a documentary or like a scripted thing. Yeah, and I think the conclusion for me is I don't see my viewing habits changing drastically because of this exercise. I think that I am going to primarily continue to enjoy scripted and again, to clarify, when I say scripted, I mean there was a script written for it.
Starting point is 01:16:08 Oh. So story-based, scripted television and movies is gonna be my primary source of entertainment. And then I'm going to do popcorn enjoyment of certain shorter things on YouTube. But the thing I'm adding, I've already talked about Shane, I think he could fill that spot, but I think that some of the people that I mentioned
Starting point is 01:16:29 who are doing innovative things are, I feel like I'm on the verge of doing a deeper dive if I can find the time, and I don't think I would regret any of that. So I think I have been changed somewhat. But I wanna do this again. I feel like this is an exercise that we have to do at least annually.
Starting point is 01:16:52 Well yeah and I do feel like in the, definitely before Good Mythical Morning when we didn't have a format that we like put our head down and we could just focus on, I did watch a lot of YouTube videos in the name of research and impacting, like I was a student of everything that was working on YouTube to impact what we were gonna do next.
Starting point is 01:17:16 Like probably a lot more than you. And I think that's why I have such a hard time turning that off. So, but I also feel like I can be engaged and inspired and it can affect our work and that's also a good thing as long as I put it in its place, but I've turned it off entirely for a few years and I've missed out.
Starting point is 01:17:37 So I think that's another aspect of, I can crack that door back open. Thank you for helping us do that with all of your suggestions and for hanging with us. Hopefully you're not exhausted having listened to us. I just like, I actually feel bad at the end of a podcast saying man, I'm exhausted. But um.
Starting point is 01:17:56 Well it's just the culmination of this exercise. And what we didn't say was like what does this mean for YouTube and people like us? Because I was hoping that we'd come back and there'd be like more stuff and be like there's hope for people who YouTube doesn't work for them and it's gonna start working for them and they're gonna come in droves.
Starting point is 01:18:15 I think that's, I think first of all, I think YouTube Premium is trying to fill that void and maybe they will. But I think that ultimately people like me and you are just gonna get old and die. Well that's a safe bet. Yeah, I think that's. And a great ending. All right guys, we'll speak at you next week,
Starting point is 01:18:33 but trust, we're gonna be getting older and closer to dying. Hashtag Ear Biscuits.

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