What happened to Michelle Phan?

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
In 2005, a user named Ricebunny beganuploading picture makeup tutorials on her
blog and short video tutorials on Zanga.
Ricebunny then began uploadingmakeup tutorial videos to YouTube,
not knowing she would become oneof the first ever influencers and
regarded as the original beauty guru.
Welcome to Rewind Time.
This episode, we're talkingabout Michelle Phan.

(00:24):
Yeah.
It's Rewind Time.
Bow, bow, bow, bow, bow.
Bow, bow, bow, bow.
Welcome to Rewind Time, this episodeis about Michelle Phan, Lucy.
How are you?
I am well, thank you.
It is not as hot as our recordingtemperature for last week.

(00:46):
So, does that make you feel good?
How do you feel?
I'm more
dressed for the weather, asour video listeners can see.
For the audio audience, I'm wearing asinglet, so I think whatever the temp in
this room, I'm going to be ready for it.
But are you ready for today'sepisode talking about Michelle Phan?
We haven't covered a beautyguru on the podcast yet.

(01:08):
I figured it only made sense to startwith, I would say probably the most
iconic or like the most, to me, she is,and maybe that's a personal bias, but how
do you feel about covering beauty gurus?
I sort of expressly asked to cover abeauty guru because Yeah, as I said in
the iJustine episode and the Neil Ciceregaone, you mentioned it, comedy on YouTube.

(01:32):
I am, I'm keen to take a break from it.
Um, but this one actually was veryinteresting to me, as You know,
I'm not someone who traditionallyconsumes beauty content.
Really?
That might be a surprise to some of you.
I know, you're so,
I feel like you're so beautiful andyou just look always so put together.
I assumed you've been watching skincareand makeup tutorials, you know, no?

(01:53):
The
thing is I do follow skincaretrends and I'm broadly aware of
what's going on in that space.
But obviously a makeup, not somethingthat I have paid much attention to.
So, this was a whole new world for me interms of Beauty YouTube, so it did make
sense for us to start with some wouldsay the originator of Beauty YouTube.

(02:14):
Yeah, I mean, it's kind of debated.
I feel like everyone has their ownFirst beauty guru that they regard
as the OG, but for me, I feel likeMichelle Phan was my first beauty guru.
Is Jeffree Star a beauty guru?
Uh, yeah.
Because I
know about him.
How much do you know about him?
Not really anything,

(02:35):
I just know he does beauty, right?
Yeah.
Is James Charles a beauty guru?
Uh, yeah.
Okay, so I've got, I've, I'm actuallynot bad, I'm, I've got three,
and I knew about Michelle know
men, you only know male ones.
Do you know any other women,like, female beauty gurus?
Off the top of my head?
You can do it.
You can do it.
No.
Okay.

(02:55):
You can't do it.
Um.
Hmm.
Well, at some point we will cover.
James Charles and Jeffree Star, I'm sure,and those will certainly be episodes.
Look, it's
probably a good thing I don't knowthem, because the reason I know those
two is because of their notoriety.
Yeah.
So it's actually probablybetter to not be known by me.
Yeah.
Um, as someone not in the beauty space.
I guess I want to ask, were you aware ofMichelle Phan before we did this episode?

(03:19):
I can't be certain, but I believeI didn't know that she was a
beauty YouTuber, in that, I think,you would have spoken about her.
Mm hmm.
During Our relationship at somepoint, but I can't say I have seen
any of her videos or knew her content.
So, less certain than I was that I wasaware of Potter Puppet Pals, but more

(03:42):
certain than I was when I said I'dnever seen a Smosh or a Nigahiga video.
Her name rang a bell.
You were aware of her.
Yes.
In some capacity.
Okay.
Cool.
Cool, cool, cool.
And should I talk about myselfand my relationship with Michelle?
Of course.
Or shall, okay.
So I, I can't pinpoint exactly, and it wasreally hard for me when we were watching

(04:05):
the back catalogue of videos for whenexactly I started watching Michelle Phan,
but it was definitely in high school, likewith a lot of the YouTubers we've talked
about on this podcast, I want to say itwould have been like 2011 or 2010 at the
earliest or like 2012, 2013 at the latest.
But all I know is that there are somevideos that while I was watching them, I

(04:27):
was like, I remember these coming out atthe time, like in my subscription box.
And then there were some, like somevideos where I was like, I don't know if
I watched this at the time or if I justlike went back through her back catalog.
Cause I. Yeah, but I have seena lot of the videos we watched.
I was, I was quite, coming into thisepisode, I was very familiar with
Michelle's content, and with Michelle.

(04:49):
Um, so this was an episode I hadbeen anticipating for a while,
because I think she, yeah, isa quite interesting YouTuber.
Or at least to me, personally,I watched a lot of her content.
So, to me, I guessshe's Yeah, I was a fan.
I, I, I, I, the past tense, but I,
Let's not get ahead of ourselves.
Let's not get
ahead of ourselves, but I, Ithink her content is really,

(05:12):
yeah, really, really good.
I watched a lot of her content.
Let's start there.
I'm sure we'll get intoit during the episode.
Yeah, well,
much like many of our early adoptersof YouTube, Michelle had already.
Created a internet presencefor herself off the site.
She was a poster on, and I'm gonnatry and pronounce this, Zanga?

(05:33):
Zanga?
Zanga?
Is that You think it's Zanga?
I I was not a visitor of Zanga.
I'm not entirely sure what it was.
Like, not to be, like, so Gen Zvibes being like, I think that
was a little before my time.
But like, I think it was
It's like an online beauty blog,uh, with like discussion potential.
Yeah,
yeah.
Maybe like a live journal type vibe?
Look, I just know
they did their, like, useracquisition strategy on GeoCities.

(05:58):
What's that?
Oh, okay.
It's like, uh, from what Iunderstand, it's like, uh, sort
of like a precursor to Tumblr.
Like, it's like youhave a customizable HTML
page.
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
So, like, LiveJournal.
Yeah.
Right?
We're too young for this.
Let's not, let's not get, we'reabout, we're about YouTube, alright?
Someone can do the Zanga podcast.

(06:18):
Um, but she's posting on there underthe handle RiceBunny, which when I saw
in the early videos, I was a bit like,wow, that is, that is a choice of handle.
It does have, to me, someunsavory connotations.
I think she explained that she'sborn in the year of the rabbit.

(06:40):
So, that, and then also, this islike not a spoiler, she's revealed
to be like a Sailor Moon fan, andSailor Moon, her name is Usagi,
which is the Japanese word for bunny.
So, I, like, I, I get it, as, as afellow anime fan, as a former weeb.
Yeah, I, I just think that it has theconnotations of, it could be a slur.

(07:04):
What?
Uh, you wouldn't call
. Well, yeah, but, but she Okay.
A young Asian for who are, I would
never call a young MichelleFarhan a rice bunny.
That, that seems so problematic.
I
had a MSN username when Iwas in like middle school.
Yeah.
Which, um, I made this usernameand my mom actually was like,
you can't use that username.

(07:24):
Um, which was flower cupcake.
Oh.
What's wrong with that?
Well, it's pretty innocuous, but mymom was like, it's creepy for old men.
I think it maybe it identifiesyou as a young girl, as a child.
Yeah.
So.
But it's like, it's just a cute nickname.
Also for our viewers who aren't aware,Michelle Phan is Vietnamese American.
So she, she is Asian.

(07:45):
So you're not like,she's allowed to do that.
Yeah, of course.
Yeah.
I'm not saying, look, I just thinkit's, it's telling the channel becomes
Michelle Phan and not Rice Bunny.
I think it's a cute username.
I understand, like from the background.
I think it's fine.
So we're giving the tick to Ricebunny,but it's not for long because she does

(08:08):
post to YouTube and she does her firstmakeup tutorial, which is a natural look.
Lucy, did this look strikeyou as very natural?
Was it very of the time?
I think this was a goodLike, first makeup tutorial.
It's a good first of YouTube video.
It, obviously, I think youpointed out that it had some audio

(08:29):
issues, which were a little Yeah,
we should quickly touch on, alot of Michelle's early videos
have been copyright claimed.
There was actually a big legal, um, issuewith Michelle's channel later on, but
as a result A lot of the early videoshave had the original audio replaced,
and they now have, like, looping royalty

(08:50):
free
instrumentals, which are veryshort, some of them are only like
20 seconds, so you hear the same 20seconds of music over and over again.
And she's basically put captions in thevideo where she would have been narrating.
Instead of having
the voiceover, yeah.
So, to set the scene, a lot ofMichelle's early makeup tutorials are,
as you would imagine, videos of herapplying her makeup, but with, I would

(09:13):
describe, a very soothing voiceover.
I don't know, you didn't seem to feel anyparticular type of way about her voice,
but I personally think Michelle's voice,she could so do ASMR, and I say that
as an ASMR fan, I do listen to a lot ofASMR, Michelle has a very, like, soothing,
calm, like, serene quality to her videos,they're very, like, the pace isn't very

(09:35):
fast paced or intense or anything likethat, compared to some of the other early
YouTubers we've discussed, where they'revery, like, wham, bam, it's very, like,
And then you're just gonna take yourconcealer and place it under your eyes.
And it's like a very chill.
Yeah,
you're never going to experiencea negative emotion watching
an early Michelle Phan video.
No.
And I would say, and I guess I'm happyfor you to speak to this as well, but,

(09:59):
you know, like you've said, you're notsuper familiar with makeup content.
This was like your first forayinto like actually sitting down
and watching makeup videos.
But Michelle is very instructional.
She does give a lot of tips.
It is almost to me It'sreally professional, like
the way she discusses it.
I think multiple times while we werewatching the content I remarked that

(10:22):
it reminded me a little bit of likehow Like makeup was written about in
magazines Like a very like tip sortof format or very like I don't say
commercial because I don't mean thatin a negative way But it is very like
how For background for our listeners.
I used to work in like makeup in retailand the way you're like taught to Speak

(10:44):
to customers and like describe productand stuff is the way Michelle is speaking.
I don't know if there's a betterway for me to explain that.
I don't know if you have
No, I can I get what you mean.
Yeah, yeah.
It's very like You know, you want to takethis type of concealer, which has like
this amount of coverage, so da da da.
It's very, um, educational.
Gosh,
that was the word I was looking for.
Well, and I sort of asked you at thetime, because I, I kind of was like, wow,

(11:06):
there's a lot of steps in this routine.
You're so crazy for that.
And then you told me that actuallythere was not, um, and that you actually
did far more, which was interesting.
Yeah.
But I did want to ask about howAt the time, when you learnt to
do makeup, outside of like, somevery niche cases of where, like,

(11:28):
oh, I bought a DVD with a guide.
Most people, their only reference was,like, instructions in magazines, which
are still images, or having their familyand friends teach them how to apply.
Like, maybe you get your makeup doneprofessionally, for most people, a handful
of times in your life, but actuallyseeing a video of someone doing the step

(11:53):
by step, that would have been, like,a huge Instructional development for
average people's ability to do makeup.
Yeah, I would say I mostly learned how todo my makeup from watching YouTube videos.
And I have definitely pickedup tips that I still use today.
And I know people talk about that.
But yeah, Michelle, I wouldhave learned quite a lot from

(12:15):
watching Michelle's videos.
And even when we were watchingsome of them, I was like, Oh, I
remember learning that at the time.
And that's still somethingI do to this day.
Or like, I didn't realize that.
This was where I learned that.
Yep.
Do you know what I mean?
So
yeah, so Michelle does a series ofVideos once there's actually this
first video that she did it pickedup Significantly early on in terms of

(12:38):
views it now sits at 12 million viewsWow and many of Michelle's videos have
a similar Multi million view count.
Yeah,
she's very consistent in terms ofthe view counts that her videos get.
Mm
hmm.
I think it's because Primarily, sheis not a super prolific uploader,
and she also does stick to her mainchannel niches for the most part.

(13:00):
And the format is mostly, she kindof only swaps between a few formats.
There's the makeup tutorial format, andthen she occasionally does something
that's like, uh, like a productroundup, like a favorites kind of thing.
Um, and then later on she doessome like DIY, stuff like that.
But most of the time it is likethe voiceover instructional format.
I would say like 80 percent ofthe videos follow that format.

(13:21):
Would you agree, from what we watched?
Yeah, 100%.
Okay.
And so for listeners, this videowas published May 21, 2007.
So from there, we have someadditional looks, a seductive smoky
eye, which you can see, she's stillfilming, uh, it looks like a webcam.
It's in like four by three,almost square format.

(13:44):
But the audio significantlyimproves and she does introduce
her sign off, which is good luck.
Can you do your best Michelle good luck?
Well
Do you want No.
She's like, good luck.
But she, she does spins on it, you know,she doesn't always say it the same way.
Well,
but, what, can you do the, canyou do the I'm not gonna do an

(14:05):
impression of Michelle.
Oh.
You can, you do it for our business.
I just did, yeah, that was really good.
Good luck.
Yeah, that was great.
It's
so iconic.
Do you understand theiconicness of the good luck?
I mean, she does it on every video.
I think I'm introducing some of my own,like, long term viewer bias, where I'm
like, the iconic Michelle Goodluck, whichis just maybe a thing for her subscribers.

(14:30):
Yeah, I think so.
I was honestly, like, there wasa lot of videos where I was like
Good luck for, for what, girl?
Good luck with
achieving the look, because she'sjust taught you how to do the
look, and now you're going to doit, and she's saying good luck.
But
when she's recommending what'ssunscreen, like, do I need luck?
Anyway, I'm being, I'mbeing a bit of a hater.
No, it's cool, it's cool, it's a, likea, it's an original sign off, you know?

(14:51):
Yeah.
It's like, instead of just saying,like, comment, subscribe, good luck.
Yeah, that's unique.
Good for her.
I think it just, and again, we'll probablyget into it through the episode, but she
does have this sort of like, positivevibe throughout her videos, like she
often has like some kind of brief positivemessaging that goes for like 30 seconds

(15:13):
to a minute at the end of a video,which is like Like, you know, believe
in yourself, believe in your dreams.
Like it's a very, I don't know,inspirational, like girl loves an
inspirational quote on Pinterest vibe.
And I mean that in like
a kind way.
Like I, as like a teenager wouldbe seeing that and she would be
like, you know, believe in yourself.
The real beauty is inside of you.
And I'd be like, Oh, you know,it's, it's, it's, it's nice.

(15:34):
It's wholesome.
It's cute.
Yeah.
But did you like the smokey eyes?
Did I like the smoky eyes?
Yeah, like, sure.
I mean, I don't think there wasany looks from Michelle that I
Disliked, you know, I'm sure.
Are you gonna, which onewill you be attempting?
Oh, that's a good question.

(15:55):
Um, Maybe I'll, maybe leaveit till the end, you know.
Yeah, yeah,
I feel like I know there is one that Ifeel like you got very excited about.
Which we'll talk about.
Oh, actually, yes.
Okay, we'll get there.
And Michelle is also doing some outof the bedroom content at this point,
some like shopping stuff at CVS, so CVSinternational viewers, is that drugstore

(16:20):
tier in terms of American cosmetic sales?
Yeah.
Yeah, it's
like a, it's like a pharmacy.
It's like a chemist warehousevibe for our Australian listeners.
And then, so she's pitching the productsthat she's talking about, it's very
much like Anyone can afford this.
It's not, um, prohibitively expensivefor potentially, like, younger viewers.

(16:43):
Yeah, and I would say you can see herproduct knowledge here, where she's
kind of, she's going through the shelvesand she's talking about different
product lines and she's saying thingslike, this is actually, you know,
this brand is really ahead of its timebecause it's including retinol and it's
really affordable and like, oftentimesyou have to, only more expensive
brands have retinol, so if you'relooking for anti aging, go for this.
And I'm like, wow, that's pretty cool.

(17:03):
Sometimes the product knowledge isvery like, That's what it says on the
tin, um, which isn't wrong per se, butit is also a case of, and I think it
does speak to the time where we didn'thave as much, like, information at our
disposal, at disposal, in that, like,just because a brand says it has an
ingredient in it doesn't mean that it'snecessarily, like, effective or anything.

(17:26):
I apologize.
I'm getting, I feel like I'm gettinga bit into weeds, but this is, for
anyone who doesn't know, um, beautyis probably, like, my, one of my main
topics that I. Talk about online.
So that's why I'm very like
yeah, we need to give Michellethe Benefit of the time in that.
Yeah, of course.
She
was not receiving likethe many boxes of PR.

(17:47):
No, no, no, no.
Beauty creators receive now like sheprobably couldn't say firsthand what
her experience was with every product.
No, of course.
Because she was buyingthem with her own money.
And as we learned later, likeshe is, does not come from a
particularly wealthy background.
Yeah, but I, I guessit's also a case of like.

(18:09):
I think, and I was like, even me likegrowing up being in like middle school
and to now, there's a real differencein terms of the information available
online about ingredient breakdowns inproducts and people having a better
understanding of formula, like I thinkit's a lot more common now for people
generally, but also just like beautycreators to have a bit more understanding

(18:29):
of just because a brand says it containslike You know, retinol, you can then,
or like vitamin C or whatever, you canlook at the ingredients list and be
like, oh, okay, maybe it's not effective.
Or you have, you know, creators likeLab Muffin Beauty Science who are
really like going into, like, thereare influencers or creators now who are
like cosmetic chemists, so there's a lotmore knowledge and education out there.

(18:54):
So she's doing, what I mean to say,because I feel like I was sort of
trashing her knowledge, I am not.
Michelle is doing a really goodjob with, like, the information
available at the time.
She, yeah, is quiteknowledgeable about products.
Yeah, I mean, to give some context,I saw a comment at the time when she
discussed that product containingretinol, and the person was like, How

(19:16):
dare you suggest young girls use retinol.
That's only for people that areold or with degenerative skin.
So, even at the time, saying use theretinol product, that was, uh, you
know, we should give her credit becausethat was not a widely held viewpoint.
At that stage.
No, for sure.
At least among her audience, it seems.

(19:37):
Yeah.
We say as two retinolusers in their twenties.
Oh, look,
I, with the exception of thestuff that you give me, all my
products are drug store tier and,you know, I have no complaints.
Yeah.
So, on ingredients, there are some earlyvideos, which, uh, you told me formed

(19:58):
part of a, you know, a trend of DIYbeauty, which I think is still something
that a lot of people have a passionfor, like creating your own masks.
Um, doing little beauty hackswith household products.
Yeah, I mean, you know, again,this is a YouTube history podcast,
but, uh, it's definitely a thingon TikTok, like people DIYing.
Um, I think now it's advanced tobeing people being a bit more crunchy,

(20:24):
which we were kind of debating.
You were asking me if thatthese hacks or DIYs that she did
make her like crunchy or not.
Um, I don't think they do.
I
think you're right because the two Iwanted to talk about, the first one is a
kitty litter mask, where she says becausekitty litter is made out of clay, and clay

(20:49):
masks are obviously well accepted in thebeauty industry, if I crunch up the kitty
litter and make a mask out of it, thatis like a cheap clay mask alternative.
So she, she proceeds to dothis in the video and, uh, rubs
kitty litter over her face.
How did you feel about this?

(21:11):
I know that this is part of, like,the Michelle lore, where people are
like, this was wild that she did this.
I think this is pretty emblematicof, like, early beauty YouTube slash,
at some point we will, and I don'tknow exactly when in the pod we'll
get to them, but viewers who areaware of them, we will get to, like,
DIY YouTubers or, like, LifestyleYouTubers, where DIYing and doing

(21:37):
stuff like this is very, like, common.
I She kinda has a point.
Like, she's not wrong.
Like, people want to make a clay maskand unscented kitty It's also just
like, it's unscented kitty litter.
It's 2 for a whole bag.
It is an economical Hack.
Um, I don't agree with likeeverything she says in the video.

(21:58):
'cause she kind of explains like someof the science and it's very like
extracting toxins, which is very common.
Beauty language.
It's a bit like, notlike extracting toxins.
I don't know.
I have some thoughts.
It kind of veers into that.
Like clean beauty, chemicals,da, da da, like rhetoric, but
again, very common at the time.

(22:18):
Mm-hmm.
Um, maybe it's thought with this is
that some of the creators that we've seen.
If they made this video, you wouldbe like, well, it's rage bait,
like they're being intentionallyprovocative to do this for views.
But I don't actually, I don't thinkMichelle really partakes in that.

(22:39):
Rage bait?
No, I don't think so.
In this, she's very explicitlybeing like, she is aware, and
she even says it throughout thevideo, like, I know this is crazy.
I know this soundsweird, but just trust me.
It's literally just the raw ingredientthat, like, is just in another form.
This is what they use it for.
But it's just not, and it'strue, like, would I do it?
I'm not necessarily sure.

(23:01):
But her point being that thingsare labelled as beauty products,
they're marked up crazily, it'sliterally just, you know, yeah.
In the second one of these, whereshe crushes up aspirin and puts
that on her face as sort of an antiacne mask, she does explicitly say
a lot of people are doing it tough.
You know, the global financial crisisis ongoing, and so these are like some

(23:25):
cheap alternatives to expensive skincare.
Um, she did later apologize forthe kitty litter video, not in a
serious way, but in a modern videowhere she rewatches her old content.
And she was like, I haveno idea why I made this.
And then she was like, I wantedto like Reconfirm, I do not

(23:49):
put kitty litter on my face.
But in, but also in that she was like,she was backing herself though in
like, she was like, yeah, it's true.
It is clay.
It is a clay mask.
It literally is, you know, so yeah,she was like, I don't actually do this
hack, but she wasn't disagreeing withher, her logic as to why she did it.
And that's why I'm like,I kind of respect it.

(24:12):
Um, there was also one that was like.
Lemon and sugar, like alemon sugar face scrub.
I don't know if this was aroundthis time or if it was later.
She does a few, like, DIY,easy, like, masks or hacks, um.
Yeah, one of them in 2009 Ithink is funny and it's how to
stretch your shoes with ice.

(24:33):
Which I was like, come on, like,if your shoe doesn't fit and
you're stretching it with ice.
But you are, you're backingMichelle on this one.
I understand, sometimesyou, uh, between shoe sizes.
Like, or a shoe companydoesn't do half sizes.
And the 9 is too big.
And the 8 is a little too small.

(24:53):
So you get an 8, or like, youhave two different sized feet.
Like,
But ice is the
stretcher?
Doesn't it melt in your
shoe?
No, you watch the video, I feellike, Did you learn nothing?
Have you learned
nothing?
Look, for me, I saw the video,and I immediately went to
Michelle Phan wiki feat and thereshe has a perfect five stars.

(25:15):
So is
that something you do often?
No, no, no Well, actually,
sorry when when when we whenwe have creators to do Lots
of like extended foot content.
I'm like, well, I know they havea rating You know, i'm curious
what was it and it was five stars.
So good for michelle
great for michelle a question mark

(25:35):
anyway, so Around this 2009,we have a real breakout
moment for Michelle's channel.
There is a BuzzFeed that'sascendant at the time.
People love BuzzFeed.
It's the next great media company.
And they promote Michelle'sLady Gaga poker face makeup

(25:57):
tutorial, which we watched.
Um, this video has so many views.
In fact, I'll look it up right now.
Lucy,
how
many views did it have, do you think?
I think it had 50 million?
So this video has 35 million views,and she would make a second video

(26:20):
for Bad Romance that has 56 millionviews, which BuzzFeed also promoted.
So these were hugebreakouts for Michelle Phan.
We did look at the Poker Facetutorial and make an observation
that she was now more commonlyusing non drugstore makeup products.
Oh yeah, I think I pointed this out.

(26:41):
Oh, I certainly did, yeah.
Okay, I noticed that, at this point, she'sstill using drugstore makeup products,
but I think in her original videos she'smostly using drugstore makeup, and at
this point it's definitely feeling likemore of a mix, which I would say is
pretty, a lot of people, I don't know,myself included, have a mix of makeup, you
know, you buy some stuff that's a littlemore pricey, but then you have your,

(27:03):
you know, cheap and cheerful favorites.
Yeah, you
gotta have your daily driver.
So true, bestie.
My makeup bestie.
Like, if
I'm just going to the shops, I'mnot wasting my designer products.
So true, diva.
Like,
they're not worth it.
Mm hmm.
Okay, diva.
Um, but I just noticed that, yeah, shewas starting to Yeah, use a bit more
of a variety in terms of products,which you kind of see going on.

(27:27):
I feel like there is, I don't know whichvideo it is, but there's one video in
particular where I was like, Oh, okay,we're using the fancy products now.
This one you did remarkshe used four different
eyeshadow palettes
to make the look.
Yes!
Yeah, so, and like relatable content,like sometimes you just want, you know,
the creamy vanilla color from thispalette, and then you want the blue from
the other palette, and then you wantthe sparkly one from the other palette.

(27:49):
But it's funny in like an early YouTubetutorial, Because I think I remarked
that it's really common in YouTubemakeup tutorials sort of going forward
to make it like easy for the viewer tocreate at home, or to use like, they
could buy one eyeshadow palette andfully recreate the look on themselves.
So it's very funny that she's like,I use this shimmery white from this

(28:11):
Revlon palette, and then I go in withthis Individual shimmer shade from
this, you know, thing and then I gowith this and this and I was like,
okay So we're laying around like fourdifferent shades from four different
palettes So in order to like accuratelyrecreate the look you would have to
buy like Five eyeshadow palettes.
I mean, the look slays.
I mean, I, give her some leeway onthis because she is recreating a

(28:33):
look from, uh, one of like the mosticonic makeup celebrities, right?
Who has a very well known professionalmakeup artist working with her, who would
also I imagine use very And also thislook does have a a cutout of a lightning
bolt that you stick to your face.
So I don't know if it's just like, you're,you're not going to be doing this one, uh,

(28:58):
outside of some very special occasions.
I mean,
that probably is accurate to howthe makeup artist made it is like
a bit of this, a bit of that.
I think it's just funny because I, I'vewatched so much makeup content on YouTube
that I am so used to creators, I guess,trying to make it like, thinking it from
the viewer's POV, how can this personeasily create it from home, also slash
like there's a commercial bend to it, likethey're wanting to sell you one palette.

(29:21):
Yeah.
Through
affiliate links and stuff.
Why sell
one when you can sell four?
Because no one wants to buyfour to re Well, I don't know,
it's just interesting, I guess.
Like, that's actually accurate tohow I do my makeup on a day to day.
I take a little from here, a littlefrom there, but I just interesting
from a tutorial perspective thatYeah, you're using like, quite the
slew of products, but it was cool,

(29:43):
it was a good video.
So, Michelle, at this point, verywell established YouTube following,
there is a video where she goeswith other YouTuber, Ray William
Johnson, to CVS and does his makeup.
What his makeup is, is literally justunder eye concealer and lip balm,
which I thought was, uh, underwhelming.

(30:05):
I wanted him to be glammed up, butshe's literally, she does actually
say, this is all that guys need.
Um, so it actually, it is a somewhathelpful tutorial, which is funny.
Yeah, she's trying
to be helpful, she's teaching, it'smeant to be a tutorial, and I suppose
like it makes sense, because Ray LiamJohnson, obviously, is another large
YouTuber, or like prolific YouTuber atthe time, so she's, and he's on camera,

(30:27):
I don't know, I think it makes sense,it's just a bit of a weird, it's a bit
of a weird video, but it so gives theenergy of like, I want to collab with
this person, what collab can we dothat makes sense, and then that's what.
That's what the video is.
Because
we've seen Michelle in some of RyanHiga's content, but on the whole, there
are not that many collabs in her content,and she doesn't seem to be as enmeshed

(30:51):
in that early YouTuber sphere that thecreators we've looked at so far have been.
Neil Cicerega is somewhat of an exception.
Yeah, well, I would say that she'sin a very separate, like, niche.
Like, a lot of the YouTubers, like, Smosh,NigaHiga, it's so giving, every time
we record we're like, Smosh, NigaHiga,but with like, early YouTubers it is

(31:12):
That it was the landscape, but a lotof them have I don't wanna say it's
like a dudes rock crossover But it'slike they're men doing comedy content.
It's sketch.
We never saw Michelle
at the streamies, you know
Well, we'd have to fact checkit but I don't think so.
Well, it's
more so she herself doesn't havea vlog channel Which is so common

(31:36):
amongst these creators at the time.
Like, she does seem to be morereserved, and we don't see as much
of her non beauty creative out.
I think as we go further into, like,later years, and like, YouTube is a
little bit more down the track, youwill see there is a pretty Drama again.

(31:58):
There is a pretty, uh, like There is atight knit beauty community where they
do do a lot of collabs and same withlike fashion lifestyle creators Like
there is a lot of collabing But I thinkMichelle being so like an early adopter
kind of again that pioneering firstbeauty guru there weren't that many
of She is quite singular at the time.

(32:18):
I would say so I think it kindof makes sense that she's not,
like, what would the collaborationthat she would do with Smosh be?
Do you know what I mean?
Like, what would that even look like?
And is there any audience crossover?
Is there any benefit to Michelle?
Not, it's a completely different thing.
Yeah, a hundred percent.
Yeah, I think it, but yeah,it's a good observation.

(32:40):
She's mostly Kind of on her own.
She does do some more personalitybased content around this time.
I would say the takeaways are, Michellesees herself as an artist, as in a, uh.
Someone who draws, someonewho paints, she, uh, She,
wait,
okay, it's cause she opens the videosaying, How, what is she, she's

(33:02):
like, I am an artist, it's like a,
She does kind of be like, You, peoplesay that makeup is so super, like
superficial, And that it's only about likecovering up your insecurities, but no.
Like I am an artist and I've beencreating art my whole life and she
shows Some of her, you know artisticwork Which we looked at and uh Well,

(33:26):
I'm sure there is, um, some snarkfrom the time where people did accuse
her of basically tracing existing,sorry, existing art from DeviantArt
and passing
it off as her own.
To
clarify, this video is her Sort ofnarrating and being like, it's like

(33:48):
a subscriber milestone video, Ithink it's all like a view master.
It's like a milestone video andit's a bit of a like, thank you so
much for all the love of my videos.
I want to tell you a bit more aboutmyself because you know I don't
really talk about myself so much andshe's drawing like she's doing like
a watercolor Sketch of Aerith fromFinal Fantasy and Cloud, is that right?

(34:08):
Yeah, important to note in this, shealso talks about how she's a gamer.
She comes out as a gamer.
Yeah, and Final Fantasy
VII, her favourite game at this stage.
Slay.
You were very surprised by this video.
You were like, because we justwatched like, a bunch of makeup
tutorials and she's suddenly like,I am an artist and I'm a gamer.
And you're like, whoa!
Well, it's more
like every YouTuber so farhas done gaming content.

(34:31):
And you thought And I thoughtmaybe we'd get away from that
here, but even our original beautyYouTuber is like, I love Tekken.
I love Final Fantasy.
And I'm like, oh, okay.
I mean, I, maybe there's something
to that.
I mean,
I like video games, so I'm not gonna hate.
I mean, me too.
So I wonder if there's like a thesiswe can draw up that like, people who
are like, interested in like, Yeah.

(34:52):
Technology?
100%. Yeah.
Early adopters of technology.
Are more likely to be on YouTube.
Yeah.
Someone get a PhD on that stat.
Um, but yeah.
So, so there was controversythat she didn't, was it for
this video specifically?
That was like, she didn't drawthis picture of Aerith in cloud.
I, look, I can't dig into the exact, uh,stuff because it's so, looking at this

(35:14):
stuff is like, a lot of it's expiredbecause it's all from the early 2010s.
I just know there are accusations thatare still repeated online that she did
pass off other artists work as her own.
It's pretty crazy that she had, like,stuff about her in such an early, like,
I know like gossip and snark stuff ispretty, um, par for the course for any

(35:38):
kind of mid to large size YouTuber now,but pretty crazy that in like the early.
Like pre, like 2010s and stuff.
There were people, becauselike, we weren't talking about
like the Ryan Higa snark.
Or, and, but you know who we didtalk about having like snark content?
Is iJustine.
So, there definitely is a bit of a
There is something

(35:58):
to female creators and theiraudience and the snark.
I won't make any Yeah, no,but Sweeping statements.
Yeah,
no, I Only
that I have observed that for many malecreators, there are no snark subreddits.
Mmm.
And the same can't be said.
For a lot of female creators, ofpotentially smaller sizes as well.

(36:19):
Yeah, but let's not, let's not, let's not
get into that.
Uh, she does a Barbiemakeup tutorial in 2009.
And it goes crazy with the views.
It has 69 million views now.
And, uh, even in 2014 it was known asthe most watched beauty video on YouTube.
Wow.

(36:39):
Um, I imagine it still holdsthat title with 69 million views.
But we're not going to fact check that.
And we were noting how she's now usingLa Mer, which even I know about as like
Is it in this video?
Yeah.
Oh, that was so funny.
La Mer is like
a rich white woman product.

(36:59):
Like, it's in like Mecca Cosmetica,and it's like, I have more money than
Anyway, that's, that's Lemaire, shout out.
It's, so Sorry,
let me give you a right.
Is that, is, am I correct?
I'm just laughing.
Speaking as someone whohas Lemaire products.
I don't think I Oh, okay.
I've been given, like,small, like, sample sizes.
And I did used to work somewherewhere we retailed Lemaire.

(37:23):
And I would sell it to customers.
Um, I didn't actually oftenreally have to do much to sell it.
Like, they would just be like, I'm comingin for my refill of my 500 moisturizer.
And I'd be like, sick girlie, didyou want to get the lip balm too?
And she'd be like, why not?
And I'd be like, okay, diva, that'smy rent payment on this moisturizer.
But like people can spend theirmoney how they want, whatever.
Yes.
I would say there was definitelya demographic that purchased La

(37:45):
Mer, but that is their, you know.
We don't have to get into thebeauty marketing of it all.
Um, but, I thought it was justinteresting in this video.
I was really struck by the fact that shewas using a La Mer, like, face powder.
Which apparently is a nice product.
Not disparaging any of the products,I'm just saying they are expensive.
Um, but I You just
told me to say she uses somethingcalled a Coastal Scents palette.

(38:08):
Oh
yeah, she uses Coastal Sorry, Maxtakes the notes while we watch these
videos, and sometimes I'm like, wait,can you just make a note of that?
So, but Coastal Scents was likethe eyeshadow palette of the time.
It's like a big palette, I thinkthere's about 40 or 60 things.
It was quite affordable as well,and it was really colourful.
Especially because Michelle has starteddoing these more like costume or like

(38:29):
cosplay style makeup looks, um, andshe will go on to do a lot of them.
They do seem to be the heavyhitters for her because they're
very tutorial, like Halloween, Iwant to be Barbie for Halloween.
Yeah, well
I imagine that.
You don't, a lot of people don't needa tutorial to do their everyday office
makeup because they don't really care,but when they need to like spread, do

(38:49):
something more technically challenging,say for a dress up party, then they're
going to be like, Oh, okay, I'm goingto YouTube how to look like Barbie.
Yeah, sure.
So,
like there's a lot ofdemand for these videos.
A hundred percent.
Um, and I, I do feel likeI watched this video.
I can't remember if I watched it atthe time or if I watched it later, but
I've definitely seen this video before.

(39:09):
But yeah, the.
The contrast of the Lemur powder,which is like, I would say at least
a hundred US dollars, and then alsothe Coastal Scents makeup palette,
which is like, very affordable.
The idea being you buy this, you know,eyeshadow palette once and you have
like, every color of the rainbow,um, and you see her using it in a
lot of her future videos as well.
It was just like, I don't know.
It was like an early beauty, Iguess, community favourite, is the

(39:34):
Coastal Scents eyeshadow palettes.
I remember being a thing of thetime, so I just thought it was funny,
and a fun contrast in this video.
Because she's got the La Merpowder money, but we're still
also doing the Coastal Scents.
I'm like, so true.
I relate.
She has a sort of, yeah, likeyou mentioned, a little stint
of doing intellectual propertycharacter based makeup.

(39:54):
Such a weird way to describe it.
We have
Sailor Moon, where she actuallydoes a little transformation
into
Sailor Moon at the end.
If you've seen, can you telleveryone what Sailor Moon is
and what the transformation is?
Okay, sure.
Sailor
Moon is in a manga or anime, and it's likeabout magical girls, so she transforms

(40:16):
from being a high school girl into acrime fighting superhero, but with like
a very sleigh makeup, and it's like atransformation sequence, which is like
a pretty common trope in I'm sure you'veseen them in some way or shape or form.
I watched Sailor Moon growing up.
I'm a big, I'm a big Sailor Moon fan.
So for me watching this, Iwas like, Oh, this is so cute.

(40:38):
I remember at the time I saw itand I was like, this is so cool.
I probably tried to recreateit one time or another.
Um, but she recreates the transformationsequence where she's like.
Kind of putting on the gloveswith the sparkles, and like
the tiara appears on her head.
It's very magical.
It's very cute.
Um, and yeah, Michelle is aSailor Moon fan as well, big time.
And you can, you cansee that in this video.

(40:58):
It's, this is a good video.
I thought it was worth noting thatthe transformation sequence before
this Most of Michelle's videosare very much shot directly into
the camera with one perspective.
She might zoom in on her eyes when she'sfocusing on them, but there's not really
any sort of edited sequence or action.
Whereas this transformation look, youdo get to see like full body Michelle

(41:23):
and they do some after effects tomake the transformation happen.
So that technically isa bit more impressive.
Yeah, than what she was doing at the time.
Yeah.
This is To me, my favorite look.
This next video, it's theavatar inspired book Oh my God.
Which is inspired by the the 2009 JamesCameron film, avatar . And the video

(41:44):
opens with Michelle speaking abouthow she, since she watched Avatar,
she can't stop thinking about it.
And I think that's a definitionalcase of post Avatar depression,
which was an observed medical, uh,sickness following the 2009 movie.
You guys can google it, this is real.

(42:06):
I'm not doing alternativemedicine here, like some of the
creators we'll talk about later.
But no, Michelle does lookinspired by the movie.
She's not fully blue.
She just has, um, yeah, yeah, she justhas, it's inspired by the film, but, uh,
it's like a colorful eye makeup.
Look, you were like,Oh, this is pretty cool.

(42:26):
I was like, yeah, I, yeah, it'slike a, it's a avatar inspired look.
I don't know where you're wearingit, but I did remark to you that I'm
like, it kind of doesn't matter thatyou wouldn't recreate the full look.
It might just be that you recreatethe ombre eyeliner effect.
Or the color combination or whatever,but I did, it was quite funny to me how

(42:47):
into Avatar she is, but I mean, I guessyou can relate because you're an Avatar.
No, no, no, I was notthat into 2009 Avatar.
I saw it on release like theday of and was kind of like, oh,
that was, that was just fine.
Did you see it
in 3D?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, okay.
Just checking.
I did too.
Like a big, big James Cameron fan.
In fact, she, it's, it surprised me thatshe has the, uh, like the ball knowledge

(43:11):
to be like James Cameron's vision inthis film, because like, you know,
that shows that she's like connectingwith the film on a director level.
We
know that Michelle is a bit ofa nerd though, and I mean that
in like an affectionate term.
She's into Final Fantasy, um, and shetalks about other properties like later
on where she's like, I think, you know,these people are visionary directors
and you're like, okay, this girl's veryinto, Nerd stuff, like she's like, I'm

(43:37):
not fully transforming into a Na'vi.
I'll do that for Halloween, but like,so yeah, she's, she's very into it.
Um, as are you, I don't know.
I feel like, could you doa James Cameron podcast?
No, he doesn't actually make enough work.
I mean, you can do a podcast on anything.
Like we've proven that.
But, I don't think I wouldbe able to maintain interest.

(44:01):
But you are
a James Cameron, like, fan.
Or, I don't know, I just feel like youjust know a lot about James Cameron stuff.
Look, Terminator 2
is probably the best actionfilm of all time, so.
Okay.
Big ups.
And also, Titanic.
Sorry, I'm a big Titanic head.
Titanic is, like, Arguably the bestblockbuster, uh, certainly of the

(44:24):
1990s, maybe of the, you know, thepost CGI sort of, uh, Hollywood output.
But I want to bring us back toMichelle Phan here, because around
this time, we have, in the MoonlightSeduction look video, introduces
her sister in law, Promise.
Yep.
Do you know much about Promise?

(44:45):
Were you a fan?
I
was, I think, subscribed to Promise.
So Promise is Michelle's brother'sWife, so it's Michelle's sister in law,
and I don't know exactly if Promisehad a YouTube career like prior to
meeting Michelle or like her, Michelle'sbrother or whatever But Michelle does
have her own quite prolific YouTubecareer I was subscribed to Promise

(45:08):
Tumang at some point or another.
Promise, did she changeit to Promise Phan?
Not sure.
I was subscribed to Promise at onepoint and she also does like a makeup
transformation type videos Yeah, maybewe'll cover her at a different point.
Yeah, Michelle
includes her family in some of her contentand going forward you'll see, like, series

(45:30):
with her younger sister, for example,but I don't think she ever becomes Like,
collaborative to the extent that, like,you're like, oh, this is the Farn crew.
It's more like, oh, I'm doing a videoabout Thanksgiving and naturally
my family are in the background.
And then you're like, oh, there's promise.
So, at this time, we have the video,Four Different Chinese Girl Looks.

(45:53):
Which, uh, despite the title being, uh,you know, It's a weird title, I think.
Uh, but from an SEO perspective, bang on.
Who No, I don't, I mean, what?
No, I don't think so.
No one is searching up,like, Chinese, like, what?

(46:14):
Australian girl makeup.
No, okay, but then it would be like,okay, basically, to explain, because
I was like, what is this video?
Like, is Michelle being like, thisis how to look like a Chinese girl?
Like, very odd.
Um, but no, the actual video is her It's,I think it's in collaboration with Lumcom.
It's like she's gone to China with Lumcom.

(46:34):
The reason
I wanted to bring it up isthat at this point Michelle
has become a partner of Lumcom.
Um, it's like their first likeYouTuber person they're bringing on.
They gave her some like, you know,vanity title and it seems that
naturally Lumcom products are now a lotmore prominent in Michelle's videos.
Yeah.

(46:54):
The partnership does not end on thebest terms, and from what I understand,
Michelle has privated or deleted a lotof the partnership videos with LUMCOM.
Uh, so, there's only a few years ofthis, but this video is still up,
and yes, we, we could see that theLUMCOM influence was quite prominent.
I just can't get overthe title of this video.

(47:16):
Because, okay, I just need tosay, I was like, what the hell?
But then when you watch the video,it's her explaining, like, How
to go from like a natural lookto like, you know, it's basically
like a building on the same look.
So it's four makeup looks but in,you build it up over the day and it's
like a day to night kind of vibe.
She is also throughout the videoexplaining what Chinese makeup trends are.

(47:41):
Being like, oh, you know, um, it's likepopular to use like a slightly lighter
shade of foundation or whatever, right?
These are like the trends of the timethat she's observing as she is in China.
That is all fine.
It's just the way she titled the video.
You've been there though, and I'm sureyou understand that potentially this
was a request from part of LUMCOM.

(48:03):
Probably the Chinese marketingdepartment and they're like we have
specific demands for this video.
We want you to make this and Shemay have been like, well, that's,
that's a bit, that's weird, butthey might've been very insistent.
Like, this is how thesecollaborations often come together.
And you know that from me talking about

(48:23):
Yes, your work with, uh,across the divide, you know?
Yes, yes, you are oftentimes workingwith brands and they're like, we would
like it to be titled this, and you'relike, why would I title it that?
And going back and forth,uh, yeah, maybe, potentially.
But, it, yeah, the video is actuallybetter than the weirdness of
the title, is all I need to say.

(48:46):
A hundred percent.
Um, this, so, post LUNCOMM, 2011, avery funny video, Lipstick Bullet,
which opens unlike really anythingon the channel so far, in that it's
like, single camera action film shot.
Of Michelle, like, in a gunbattle, like a shootout, like
she's shooting a machine gun.

(49:06):
She's in like a war zone.
And you're like, what is
going on?
Uh, and the video is actually, uh, aboutrepairing your lipstick when it snaps.
Mm hmm.
Is that correct?
Is that like Yeah, it's when the
lipstick like falls out of the component.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Why does it do that?
Um, it could be because you windit up too much, and you, like, the
pressure and the angle you applyit on causes it to, like, snap off.

(49:28):
It could be because you've, um, itcould be soft from, like, the weather,
from the hot, if you, like, leave itin your car or something like that.
There's a lot of reasonswhy it would happen.
I have not really had it happento me, but It can happen, and
it's funny to do a tutorial DIYvideo with this insane framing.
Yeah,
I'm not sure why the idea for thiscame about, but it's very funny

(49:49):
because she, uh, basically is likehunkering down in cover and then
fixes her lipstick to reapply it.
It gives, well, because the video istitled Lipstick Bullet because that's
what it is called, the like, part ofthe lipstick is called the bullet,
so it kind of seems like, you know,it reminds me of that like, Cynthia.
Jesus died for our Cynthias.
It re Do you know what that is?

(50:11):
Okay.
No.
That's It's giving, like, bullet.
Lipstick bullet bullet in a gun and thenshe's like that's the video concept.
I
feel it's like yeah, it's like SNLThey'd be like, oh, you know, like
they call it a lipstick bullet.
So like what if it was like a gun?
Yeah Yeah, Wow She doesn't
actually use it as a gun No,
and actually the comments were like Ithought she was gonna shoot a lipstick

(50:33):
and I thought that as well This
video is crazy.
The
one thing from this video I thought wasreally funny is that when she like heats
up the the bullet to repair it if sheuses It's the largest, like, butane,
pig shaped lighter with three flames.
It's so huge.
It's like huge.
And the only, yeah, like
the only reason I feel you have this isif you are, like, smoking substances with

(50:56):
it, because you can't use it to lighta candle because of the three flames.
It's too huge, yeah.
Like, it's not, it's not appropriate forcooking because of the angle of the flame.
And she actually, years later, has anormal lighter and is struggling to light
something, and she has, like, a throw offcomment where she's like, Yeah, I wish
I had my big pig glider and I thoughtthat was so funny because like no one was

(51:17):
commenting at the time But I was like you
think do you think Michelle was blazing?
I hundred percent think she was blazingso shortly after this she does a very
funny sponsored piece of work for Toyoda.
It's a Hatsune Miku makeup tutorial.
Yes.
And this video slays, andit has the world is mine.
Guys, I was also a Hatsune Miku fan inlike late middle school, high school.

(51:41):
So I remember watching this videoand being like, this is so cool.
I wish I could look as good asMichelle Phan doing her like
Hatsune Miku makeup tutorial.
I did not attempt.
Um, but.
It, it's a makeup tutorial, butshe's like filming it in the desert.
Yeah, it's like the, you know, atsome point she becomes bi coastal,
as she stresses in her videos.

(52:01):
She's doing two weeks in NewYork, two weeks in LA, and this
is giving like, outside of LA.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Sort of plain vibe.
But what sets this video apart to you?
It's more the inclusion of the ToyotaCorolla and the fact that the video makes
a great stress to say that, uh, HudsonMika's official car is the Toyota Corolla.

(52:25):
I mean, so true.
It is Hat Mika's official car.
I've never seen herdrive a car 'cause she's.
Not real, but, hey, yeah, go off.
I think this sponsorship is prettycrazy, and I think, again, speaking to
like the Lancom partnership and stuff,at this point, Michelle Phan is like
a hot commercial property for brands.
She's super brand friendly.
She never swears.
All her content is very,yeah, super commercial.

(52:48):
It's very easy to, well, Idon't know if it is easy.
You can shoehorn in a lotof things into a makeup.
Like as part of the framing device,like in this one, it's literally at the
beginning and the end is the car stuff.
And then the rest of itis just a makeup tutorial.
The car isn't like,
I mean, surely you can put anything in.
Cause like a lot of women wear makeupevery single day and they go about doing.

(53:12):
Any number of things.
So
yes, kind of a, kind
of a goaded spawn opportunity.
Yeah.
I mean, it's great, but Michelle isgetting a lot of opportunities and more
and more her videos have partnershipsor sponsorships attached to them.
And her viewers are startingto notice, like you mentioned
that the Lancôme sponsorshipdidn't end on the best of terms.
And I think later on,Michelle references that.

(53:34):
Her viewers were not necessarilyso jazzed about her doing a
lot of this commercial content.
They were a bit like, you're a sellout.
Um, which I don't think is really fair, tobe honest, because she is still providing
value in, like, this Hatsune Miku video.
Yes, there's a Toyota Corollasponsorship, and they might
be like, that's a bit weird.
But she's still giving you a HatsuneMiku makeup tutorial that is of the

(53:56):
same quality as all of her other work.
I don't know, I think it's a bitYeah, there's a bit of a weird vibe.
I can understand people being like,wow, every video is sponsored.
And again, compared to other creatorsat the time, they're not getting all
their videos sponsored for prettyobvious reasons, or for reasons, like,
they're not as brand friendly, but Idon't know if it's necessarily fair.

(54:16):
That could also be me coming fromthe fact that, like, nowadays, like,
pretty much every YouTube video issponsored, well like has an integration,
but because it's earlier, earliertimes for sponsorships and earlier
ways of doing it, it can be Having
it, criticizing your, your favefor selling out predates YouTube.
Yeah, yeah,
I think we, I was talking about thiswith you and you pulled up like a

(54:38):
Jay Z song, is that what it was?
There's a lot of like, people beinglike, I want the old Michelle, like, this
is not the same as how you used to be.
Uh, and there's like a Jay Z lyric fromlike, after his prime, but he's literally
like, want my old shit, buy my old albums.
And I feel like that appliesto many of the complaints where

(55:00):
people are like, you've changed.
It's like, yeah, she's now likeFive years older than she was.
Like, everyone changes.
Also,
like, and I think it comes fromus watching all of these videos
in a pretty, like, tight window oftime, as opposed to over the years.
I don't think she's really, like,her content is still pretty similar.
It's just, like, higher production.
Yeah, and it's, like, more, but it'sstill ultimately the same thing.

(55:22):
Um, I don't know.
I, it's just a bit of a weird vibe.
But yeah, was that why the Lancome?
Ambassadorship ended or like,did she not, I'm not sure.
From what I read secondhand, itseemed like the reception to some
of the collaboration and likeproducts that were launched was poor.
Right.
Okay.
So then they were like, let'sjust, let's just cut the cord.

(55:45):
I want to do some.
Michelle and love discussion becausethere are around this time There are some
videos where it's sort of like this one.
I'm talking about is the framingis midnight kiss and it starts It's
like the framing is like, oh you'relike talking to bae and like you want

(56:05):
to kiss him so bad So you're like arun to him in the square at night.
It's a New Year's Eve
makeup tutorial.
Oh, yeah.
Okay.
Yeah, so It makes sense.
Yeah, you've
got to kiss him before midnight.
What do you mean?
It, what?
Well.
What do you think?
It's
not like one of them was working.
Huh?
Why wasn't she just with bae?
Why
do you keep saying bae?

(56:26):
It's, on New Year's you wantto kiss someone at midnight.
That's like a thing.
Yeah, okay.
What, why are you saying it like that?
Well,
I just didn't get that from the video.
Or, I certainly couldn't remember.
I thought it was New Year's, but
I don't remember it.
The framing device is then,it's like, Happy New Year.
But she's like, alone.
It's like, if he also wasn't busy.
Look, look, look.

(56:47):
Yeah.
Anyway, this is the video, um,and she runs and the, the climax
of the video is her kissing thisguy, and you're like, celebration.
But the reveal In the end, and Michellewill often include like, behind the
scenes or bloopers, yeah, as uh,like the, the tail end of the video.
She makes this professional actor, Iimagine, wear, like, masking tape over

(57:13):
his lips so that when they do the filmkiss, their lips actually don't touch.
They're not actually kissing.
Yes.
Yeah.
And I was like, that is,uh, very Interesting.
Why?
Because you would, you justthink they should just kiss?
Well, it speaks to maybe some conservatismaround her not wanting to even kiss this

(57:39):
guy for the purposes of like, acting.
I think, you know what, I think it was,after seeing the rest of the videos,
I think she was actually already in arelationship with someone at this time.
Yes, I think you're probably correct.
And she didn't want to kiss
this person because she It feltto herself that she would maybe be
unfaithful, obviously it's actingand, you know, whatever, but she's not
an actor, so if she doesn't want tokiss someone, she does not have to.

(58:00):
I mean, hey,
even some of our greatest actors,I'm thinking Penn Badgley, they are
not going to do romantic scenes withpeople of the opposite sex, because
out of respect for their partner, soshe was just really early to that.
It's, it's fine, but um, yeah, so thisis like, it starts off with like a
cinematic thing, and then it just cuts tobeing a full makeup tutorial, and you're
like, oh, I thought it was going to belike a full short story kind of video.

(58:23):
Why?
There's just a makeup tutorialin the middle of it, and it's
just like the framing device.
And I was like, just you wait.
Well, because We get a videocalled Rouge in Love, and it is a
story about how a woman played byMichelle, presumably herself, but
it's basically all silent, so It's

(58:43):
like a silent film.
Also sponsored by Lumcom, I think.
Sponsored by Lumcom, set in Paris, it'sabout her and this presumably French man.
Uh, how they cross paths, and thenhe spends a lot of time trying to
find her, and then he's trackingher by her lipstick on, yeah, on
tissues and napkins and things.

(59:03):
It's a Cinderella narrative.
It's a Cinderella narrative, youknow, like the Prince Charming
trying to find Do you know, doyou know what Cinderella is about?
He's trying to find the womanwhose foot is so dainty it fits in
the shoe that she leaves behind.
You're so knowledgeable.
Thank you.
I'm so proud of you.
But yeah, it's, it's literallylike a Cinderella vibe.

(59:24):
Like, they have a meet cute, he fallsin love with her at first sight, she
disappears, and then he's trying to trackher down by the lipstick on the napkin.
Cute.
And then they meet, and then they kiss.
There is no makeup tutorial in this video.
It is a short film, which whenwe see the credits it has like,
A hundred people working on it.
It is very, like, uh, cinematic.

(59:45):
Any other thoughts?
I was mostly like, yeah, it's aninteresting brand piece for her channel,
because there is No makeup tutorial, butit is like a short film and I it's kind
of I thought it was similar to how Someof the other creators we've watched they
will break the channel format becauseit gives like well, this was my passion
project I wanted to make this Yeah AndI think this more just gives that agency

(01:00:10):
that work with LUMCOM were like wewould just have you star and what would
otherwise Just be like a LUMCOM ad rightbecause this this is And correct me if
I'm wrong, the framing of this is verysimilar to a lot of cosmetic ads, right?
Yeah, I mean, it's tying in, it'sassociating Lancôme lipstick, because
that's what she, she's shown applyingthe lipstick throughout the video,

(01:00:31):
and she applies like different coloursand whatever, although I will mention
that the lipstick on the tissue thathe's using to track her across the
city is always bright red, becausethat shows up better on camera, and
Michelle is mostly wearing like nudeor neutral lipsticks, which Yeah, even
I It could be like, bruh,that is not the same lipstick.
He's actually got the wrong woman.
Um, not important, but just to, that wouldbe so funny, but yeah, I get the point.

(01:00:54):
Um, but they're just associating Lancômeis an iconically like French brand.
Like being French is ahuge part of their brand.
Um, yeah.
Romance, love, it'sjust brand association.
And Michelle is slaying in this video.
She looks so good, the blowout,crazy, she's got cute little looks.
I thought this was a cute, cute video.
And she gets to kiss the, uh,attractive French man with the,

(01:01:17):
the swept, like, pompadour.
Yes.
At the
end.
Who?
Well, we learn that he, and we'llgive him a name, it's Dominic.
Dominic is actually her, atfirst, long distance, but
eventually live in boyfriend.
Who we learned that they met whileshe was actually in Paris, and She
was trying to order something ata cafe, and I'm sure the waitstaff

(01:01:40):
there were very accepting of her poorFrench skills, and not at all rude.
But he steps in and speaks French andhelps her order, and then they strike up
a long distance relationship, and thenhe appears in her videos going forward.
So, she does the classic,uh, boyfriend does my makeup.
Yep.
Which I have never seen an example of.

(01:02:03):
Yep.
You said that this wasa somewhat common trend.
Well, this, in the video, she'slike, I know you guys have been
requesting this, like, cause it's,it's a trend, and we will see them
again as we progress on this podcast.
Basically, every beauty guru who isactive around the time would do some
variation on The Boyfriend Does My Makeup.

(01:02:23):
Yeah.
And I wanted to say that I thinkthat he had an unfair advantage,
given we know he has starred in atleast one professional production.
He's
like an actor and model.
That's like his job.
Yeah, okay, there you go.
So he has
had makeup applied to himself.
So the fact, and he probably, youknow, if you're a startup model,
right, like you probably have tolearn how to do your own makeup.

(01:02:45):
If you're doing smallshoots and things, right?
I,
I, I don't
know.
You don't know?
But we assume so, right?
I think, I would just say that Domdoes a pretty good job in this video.
It is, and you haven't seen any others,but I'm sure any viewers who are familiar
with this like format of video is it'sso common for the boyfriend to do like
a comically bad job and like In somecases, like, they're purposefully being

(01:03:10):
worse at it than they probably are.
Like, they're drawing, like, red,like, spiral jigsaw, uh, like,
things like, engagement bait, though.
Yeah, and I get that that's funny.
I think it kind of plays into, like, abit of a annoying narrative of, like,
makeup is dumb and I don't care aboutdoing this video, my girlfriend is
being annoying and I have to do it.
Yeah, I mean, to an extent,

(01:03:31):
though, I, if you made me do this video,sincerely, I would have no idea what
anything did and it would be disastrous,whereas he does a passable job.
It looks pretty bad, but yeah,it's better than some other
ones I've seen where they're He
knows what the things do.
Uh, yeah, he, he tries his, he's activelytrying and I think that's endearing.
I think it's nice in these videos for theboyfriends to try and I guess show, like,

(01:03:56):
a respectful interest in what, for many oftheir girlfriends, is their, like, career.
I think that's what bothers me about it.
But maybe that's just,like, a personal ick.
I don't like it when the guysare like, Makeup is dumb.
It's like, Your girlfriend'spaying for the rent.
It's, like, so annoying.
Dom excluded, though.
He clearly is, he's, he'sgiving respectful energy.
Dom, just to flash forward, youknow, skip ahead to modern day.

(01:04:20):
We do not know?
If Michelle and Dom are still in arelationship, he has been seen or
like glimpsed in some of Promisesvideos post pandemic, and people think
they may be still together, but hisInstagram eventually went to private,

(01:04:42):
he stopped featuring in her videos.
And she doesn't speak about herrelationship, so it's actually
unclear what is happening there.
We
haven't really Have we talked aboutmany, like, YouTuber relationships yet?
I don't think so.
We spoke
about Ryan Higa dating Um, Arden Cho.
The girl from, yeah.

(01:05:03):
Yeah, Arden Cho fromPartner Track on Netflix.
Oh, sorry, I thought
from Ass, right?
Oh,
Ass.
Agents of
Secret stuff.
Yeah, and
Partner Track on Netflix.
Sorry, I only know, I onlyknow about YouTube movies.
This is the number one
Arden Cho stan podcast.
Um, but I think the reason Ithink why we thought it's worth
discussing is because he becomesa pretty big part of her channel.

(01:05:24):
I mean, is he a big part of the channel?
I guess it's more that wesee that the view counts on
videos with him in it are high.
People look up to Michelle.
Her audience thinks she isa very inspirational figure.
She's kind of entering her girl bossera where she's very successful.
You know, she's travelingto Paris with Lancome.
She's doing all this really cool stuff.
And she has this very, uh, veryattractive, respectful boyfriend.

(01:05:46):
Um, so everyone's like, wow, like.
Girl is living my dream.
There were people being likecouple goals about her and Dom.
Yeah,
a hundred percent.
And as we move forward and look at moreYouTubers, you'll see that there is
definitely, um, peaks and valleys toopening up about your relationships.
online.

(01:06:06):
Um, and so I think that'swhy we're talking about it.
Cause it's interesting that for aperiod of time, she seemed to like yet
leverage her relationship in her content.
I don't think that's in likea negative way, but she's just
being open about her relationship.
And then after a certain point, she justwas like, we're not doing that anymore.
And just never made avideo about him again.
It was like a period of like two yearswhere he was really in a lot of stuff.

(01:06:27):
And then she basically never talksabout him again, which is fine.
It's so her right to butit's interesting as to maybe.
External forces or something madeher change her mind on that, which
I think is so valid, by the way.
There are a lot of YouTubers who will,like, very actively even do, like,
couple vlogs and stuff like that, andthen, you know, one partner decides

(01:06:51):
they don't want to be online anymore.
We don't know.
It's not really up to us to speculate.
But I think it's interesting thatshe Or him or them together made that
decision, that they didn't want thatto be online, and I think it's so fair.
100%. We, speaking of having aboyfriend, the wear his dress shirt

(01:07:13):
video, I want to flag for some,Oh, for the concept, you said this
is something that people would do.
This is the thing,
you were like, so like, Whatis this demented content?
And I was like, thisis pretty of the time.
Yeah,
so she takes a man's like Oxfordbutton down and she's like, this

(01:07:34):
is how you can wrap the shirtaround yourself and make a dress.
Here's how you can make it a sarong.
Here's how you can wear it.
She's showing
you different ways to wear the shirt.
Yeah, but not like wear the shirt likeyou would like an oversized shirt.
It's like, no, you can liketie it around yourself.
And make it a strapless dress.
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah.
It looks.
Insane.

(01:07:55):
If you saw someone wearing this,you would be like, what is going on?
We recently went to, uh, a fashion showwhere the whole point was repurposing
men's dress wear into, uh, like, variousdifferent, like, ready to wear pieces.
Yep.
And those, you were like,oh, I, like, see the vision.

(01:08:16):
But if you saw someone wearing it, itwould be incredibly shocking, uh, and
this is much the same, like, I'm sorry,you can't wear a dress shirt tied around
yourself in the street and not havepeople be like, what are you doing?
This
this like 2012 ish?
Yeah.
Yeah, okay, the way I was like, Iknow this is 2012, there were a lot

(01:08:38):
of YouTubers being like, hacks onhow to turn your like, tartan shirt
into, like, A little strapless top,or like, a skirt, and whatever.
This is like, really common YouTube stuff.
So, for me, I was not surprised.
Do I think any of the looks look good?
Um, up for debate.
I think, I think some of them couldpass, if you didn't look for too long.

(01:09:00):
Like, but, I don't know.
I remember of the time I would have been,like, 15, I remember seeing these videos
and being like, Wow, that's a reallycool idea, how creative, how innovative.
You can buy one shirtand have six dresses.
Did any of them look good if I tried it?
No?
But, I respect it.

(01:09:20):
It's the kind of thing where it'slike, it looks good from like
maybe the front, but then from theback it looks like a bit weird.
Also, she's a company, she doesa few collabs with this guy, and
I just need to mention that heliterally looks like Ryan Reynolds.
I'll put a photo of him.
Yeah, it, like, they do I think he doeslike home cooking, like lifestyle content?
Um I, I'm not familiar with this man.

(01:09:41):
I'm giving Kiki Palmer, I'm like, sorryto this man, I do not know who he is.
But, yeah, he just looks like RyanReynolds, and I thought that was funny.
Anyway, that's our video.
Did you have anythingelse to say about it?
You just need to bring it up.
No, it was just
like
It broke your
brain a bit.
It made me, it was the only one where Igot rage baited into being like, no girl.
But it's not rage bait,she's being sincere.
Why didn't she ever wearthis in public then?

(01:10:02):
Because she has other dresses.
I know, but like surely if youare advocating for people to do
this, you should yourself, girl.
I dunno what to tell
you.
A lot of girls did DIY like this.
Fair enough.
And we'll see them eventually.
Yeah.
Um, okay, so, we're getting to a majormilestone in the Michelle journey.
And this is a follow me to work video.

(01:10:23):
And I didn't know where work.
Would be when we're watching this I waslike, oh sure you don't still have a job
um but The reveal is, and of course youknew this, is that she works at a company
called Ipsy, that she is a part owner of.
She's the founder, I think.
Okay.
Yeah.
And Ipsy is a, like a goodiebox makeup subscription service?

(01:10:48):
It's a makeup subscription bag.
So every month you pay, I thinkit was like 10 or something like
that originally, or maybe more.
But every month you pay a monthly fee,and you get shipped a little cute.
Like makeup bag and insideis some makeup products.
So we see her in a pretty big office, andwe're introduced to many of the staff,

(01:11:09):
so it seems like ipsy is like a prettywell subscribed service at this point,
where you Interested in Ipsy at the time?
Yeah, I remember being aware of ipsyand thinking it was really cool,
but unfortunately, I am Australian.
So, couldn't, couldn't get it.
They did not shipinternationally at the time.
I don't know if they do now.
I would think not.
I think it would be too,wouldn't quite work.

(01:11:31):
I think it was only like a 10price point at the time, so I think
they relied upon it being US only.
Um, but yeah, it was avery cool thing to see.
Uh, and also can we just say, this isa video where she's like, so I get up
and do my morning commute, I commuteby plane, how do you get to work?
Car, train, bus?
But for me, today it's by plane, andI remember just thinking, like, what a

(01:11:53):
funny, unintentionally funny line, becauseit's so, it's not relatable at all.
Um, but yeah, so she's commutingfrom her home in LA to San Fran,
where the Ipsy offices are.
Um, and Ipsy becomes a pretty big deal.
Yeah, ipsy is
still around today.
Yeah, Michelle's not a part of it anymore.

(01:12:13):
No, she left quite early on.
Mm
hmm.
Um, I think that at the time ipsydid actually was struggling in terms
of, uh, acquiring customers andyeah, so Presumably, she was bought
out or she voluntarily exited, buther involvement with Ipsy yet does
not, uh, extend to the present day.

(01:12:35):
But Ipsy is still very much, uh,like a very popular beauty membership
service, uh, I think we were tossingaround a billion dollar valuation?
Something like that.
At one point it was, I think while shewas with the company, it was valued
at, like, between 300 to 700 milliondollars while she was with the company.
So, yeah, pretty crazy.
There were a couple of competitorslike Boxycharm, which I think Ipsy

(01:12:57):
eventually acquired Boxycharm.
So, I think Ipsy is probably the mostpopular, or the biggest makeup subscri
or beauty subscription that there is.
And I would argue that itlike pioneered in the space.
This was like a verynew thing at the time.
I remember being like, what is this?
Um, so yeah, very, very cool.
Michelle doing a lot of innovation,she's truly in her girlboss era.

(01:13:20):
Yeah, she might have actually madea bunch of money from the various
acquisitions that ipsy went through.
Because in present day, shedoes seem quite wealthy.
Yes.
Um, but we'll get to that.
So, she's girlbossing with ipsy.
Yeah, she's girlbossing, but she'sstill doing her normal makeup content,
she does a look like Miranda Kerr.

(01:13:41):
Um.
Shout
out to an Australian icon.
Well, actually, a fellow Brisbaneite.
Oh, true.
Yeah.
She's from Brisbane.
Went to All Hallows.
Shout out.
Shout out to.
Brisbane private schools.
Brisbane
private school system.
Um.
But yeah, it's actually very, like,wow, Miranda Kerr, remember her?
She now is married to the Snapchat

(01:14:02):
founder,
and lives in, like, his megamansion in LA, and is rarely seen.
So, that's the goals.
You love going on a little Wikipediahaul while we're watching these videos.
Yeah, well, it's just like sucha like, where's that person now?
Um, she does a how to be a heartbreaker,which is, uh, like a video where
she takes all the products and she'slike, wow, coincidentally, these
are all in the ipsy bag this month.

(01:14:23):
Yes.
She starts doing this pretty frequently.
So she is, and it's smart, right?
You're a YouTuber.
You have your own brandthat you're invested in.
The best advertising is.
You know, free via your own channelto your millions of subscribers.
Um, so she does like a Marina andthe Diamonds tutorial with the
Marina and the Diamonds soundtrack.
Somehow this hasn't been copyright claimedor she got permission or something.

(01:14:47):
For anyone listening, can you tellthat I was a Tumblr girl in 2013?
Um, I feel like that's what allthese episodes are cluing people
into my random obscure fandoms.
Um, but yeah, I thought I rememberwatching this video at the time
and I thought it was really cool.
But yes, all the video,all the products used.
To create the look, coincidentally.

(01:15:08):
You can get in the ipsy bag for February.
So,
yeah.
Something you can't get in the ipsybag is a Japanese coffee bag that you
use the grounds of to make a scrubthat allegedly reduces your cellulite.
Ugh,
this video was a bit of a hardwatch for me, I have to say.
Um, it was popular at the time.

(01:15:28):
Uh, there's actually a really popularAustralian brand called Frank Body, which
I'm sure a lot of people may be familiarwith, that does coffee scrubs, um,
which again, allegedly reduce cellulite.
Or there's been research to suggestthat caffeine helps reduce cellulite.
We kind of, I am not anexpert in this, okay?
I personally am of the opinionthat, because you can see that

(01:15:49):
also with a technique called drybrushing, that can reduce cellulite.
I don't actually think that.
It's the fact that it's a coffeescrub that it reduces cellulite.
It's just like, increasingcirculation can reduce cellulite.
But I'm kind of getting ahead of it.
The point is Michelle makes a videoteaching you how to do a DIY coffee scrub
at home, but she talks about cellulite.
Yes.
From my notes, her talking pointsare that Cellulite has nothing to do

(01:16:14):
with weight, um, okay, but then shealso goes on to say it actually is a
result of things like your poor diet,
or
your, uh, like, lack of exercise,uh, so I don't necessarily think that
that's even better than her sayingthat it has nothing to do with weight,

(01:16:36):
because then she obviously goes on tosay that if you use this scrub, you
can, like, Extract the toxins and yourfatty deposits to reduce your cellulite.
Also, after being like, 90 percentof women have cellulite, when she
demonstrates the scrub on herself,it's naturally over her knee, upper

(01:16:57):
thigh, and upper calf, an areawhich She does not have cellulite.
I don't think many people evenwould, uh, so it's quite telling.
It's more that it's like, it's ashot that's like far enough away that
you wouldn't even be able to tell.
And she doesn't have to sho It's just,it's a bit of a weird video because
it's sort of being like, Everyonehas cellulite, guys, it's so normal,
but if you do have it, it's becauseyou've done something like morally bad.

(01:17:20):
Um, and now you can extract toxiIt's a bit of a, it's a bit of
an Icky vibe for me personally.
I don't like this type of beauty.
It comes off as very like, yeah,it's very like beauty industry TM
in terms of like, everyone has it.
It's because you're a bad person, butyou can fix it by doing this thing.
I don't know.

(01:17:40):
I did
want to talk about Michelle'sgeneral body positivity outlook.
Everyone is beautiful mantra, whichis something that is consistent across
the videos at this time, but also her.
Alleged use of, uh, beauty filters,which we have seen video evidence

(01:18:02):
of, specifically, it seems that shequite often will thin her face and
elongate her chin, so that she takeson a more, um Well, she basically
wants less width to her face.
She is, yeah, she's changing her faceshape through use of like video filters,

(01:18:24):
which you can do in, I don't knowif it's Premiere or what, there are
like tools you can do, uh, not to belike, but I'm like, I don't know how.
To use them.
Yeah.
Like, but she's apparentlydoing it and it's at the time.
It's pretty, I don't know if it'snecessarily uncommon, but like, because
she is doing a quite professional level ofproduction compared to probably a lot of

(01:18:45):
YouTubers around this point in like 2013,2014, um, it's yeah, something that people
don't know about, I would say that youcan do like people assume that the video
she's filming and not edited in this way.
Um,
She does a video where she talksabout how she changes the, like,

(01:19:06):
fold of her eyelid through using,um, What's, what's the uh, double
eyelid, like, sorry, eyelid tape.
Yes.
Yeah.
She's like, I put thetape on 22 hours a day.
For three months.
And it resolved my,um, unbalanced eyelids.
Uh, I think that anecdotally, yes,people have had success doing that.

(01:19:27):
But,
it's a non surgical alternativeto evening eyelids, I, I don't
know if these are really the samething, but it does build an overall,
there's a bit of a narrative, it,
I, look, I think that, Ben, we don't needto, um, you know, Make various guesses

(01:19:48):
about the specific procedures thatMichelle may have had or not had done.
But I think we probably both agree,if we look at her in the present
day versus when she started doingYouTube, that there have been changes
to her face that are not explained.

(01:20:11):
You probably
can't put Well, you wouldn't entirelybe able to put it down to just Aging.
No.
Or the passage
of time.
She looks a little different.
And that is Sorry,
she continues to use beauty filters evennow, and while she has acknowledged that
she does use those filters, they're onthings where it's like, this is like my
Like, natural, no makeup video, and yetpeople are like, I can see the telltale

(01:20:38):
signs of a filter applied to your face.
It's
like she turns her cheek and the, like,background behind her warps a little bit.
It's things like that.
Yeah, we haven't really hadto discuss this as of yet, um,
I, I have mixed feelings about this.
I think it's She, her kind of overalltakeaway is like, I think it's fine

(01:21:01):
for people to use these filters.
But yes, maybe people should be moreupfront about them, and that, because
at this point she down the track,she had received backlash about this.
And so she addressed it and I think anow deleted video, um, or a privated
video where she's like, yeah, I agree.
Um, you know, I think it's fine forpeople to use them, but they should be

(01:21:21):
transparent about when they're using them.
And that's a really good idea.
You guys, I haven't thought about that.
I should do that next time.
But that it's sort of puttingus up in a bit of a corner.
Cause she's saying it like she's not.
I've been doing it.
For 15 years.
For 15 years.
And, I don't know exactlywhen it started, but there is,
yeah, look, yeah, I just think.

(01:21:41):
For me, it's a case of like, obviouslycelebrities lie about cosmetic surgery,
but we don't necessarily, I don't thinklike, Chris Hemsworth is going, in
the movie he's not like, Making claimslike, this is my unenhanced body, I'm

(01:22:02):
so natural, and everyone is beautiful,because he's an actor, whereas when you're
a content creator, specifically like inthe beauty space, then those claims are
like directly related to your work, sowhen Michelle is like This is, like, my
natural, like, untouched look, or, like,everyone is beauty, everyone is beautiful,

(01:22:24):
you should accept, like, the way that youare, when she is, like, very transparently
using effects that she doesn't discloseto change that, or, like, having you
Procedures, potentially, to change theway she looks, that is when people are
like, well, this is, like, dishonest.
Yeah, I, I go back and forth, becauseI think, equally, when creators are

(01:22:49):
really transparent about things.
No, you know what, to be I wouldprefer that creators are transparent
about things because I think it'sbetter for them to be like, Hey,
if you've noticed that I've startedlooking XYZ in my videos, it's because
I actually had this procedure done.
There's obviously a thing therewhere then it's influencing people
to potentially pursue lookinginto getting that procedure.

(01:23:10):
Um, but you know, you have things like,and this is not a YouTuber, but like,
Kylie Jenner was saying for a reallylong period of time that she did not
have lip fillers, she obviously did.
And then she has now since come out beinglike, yeah, I lied about that because I
didn't want to like, tell people about it.
Then all these people, she was sayingthat it was because she used her lip
liner, so people were buying her lip linerthinking it would give the same effect.

(01:23:30):
So that's like, quite dishonestand not a great practice.
Um, I don't know if Michelle's doingit to like, that extent, where she's
being like, You know, my nose isreally snatched and it's because
I'm really good at contouring.
It's not to that level.
I think it's fine if you don't want tonecessarily talk about your procedures,
but in terms of like using filterson your videos and things like that.

(01:23:52):
Uh, yeah.
It, it's like a case by case sort ofbasis, I guess, but it's interesting.
Yeah.
And she talks about having insecuritiesand she's like, I think it's normal
for people to have insecurities.
Everyone has insecurities.
Um, but she's sort of also then beinglike, you shouldn't be insecure.
But.
Clearly, if you are having anamount of procedures or using

(01:24:12):
certain things like face slimmingfilters and not discussing them.
It, the messaging is a bit at oddswith, it's not really like practicing
what you preach, I suppose, which is,you know, you don't have to be perfect.
I don't think she should be demonizedfor this, but it's an interesting
element to her overall vibe.

(01:24:33):
Sure.
Yeah, I don't know.
What do you think?
I think that we should discuss.
EM Cosmetics.
M.
M Cosmetics.
Yeah.
M Cosmetics, which is mebackwards, I mean, M is.
So we have a video that'sbeen privated, but thank you,
someone, for re uploading it.

(01:24:55):
And it's called Finally My Makeup Brand,and it's her announcement that she is
going to be launching a Makeup line, whichis gonna be owned by L'Oreal, and Who also
own Lancome, so that'sthe connection there.
L'Oreal,
one of what, like, the two bigmakeup, like, band in LVMH?

(01:25:17):
Yeah, it's L'Oreal.
LVMH Estee Lauder, I would say.
So the
big three.
Yeah, and we should mention this is goingunder the L'Oreal Luxe category of brands.
So you have L'Oreal and then theL'Oreal brands in drugstores.
So that's, I think it's called, I'm notsure, but it'll be like L'Oreal, like
Prestige, like Mass Prestige or Mastige.
There's a lot of likerandom industry terms.

(01:25:39):
But those are like, there arebrands that are more commonly found
in the drugstore that are moreon the affordable side of things.
But M is part of L'Oreal Luxe.
So it's up there in price next to L'Oreal.
Um, so it's a higher price point,which is, um, Yeah, definitely plays
into how it's initially received.
We have some videos about hergoing to the L'Oreal offices

(01:26:01):
in New York like vlog style.
You can see that her boyfriend is thereand they have an apartment in New York.
Um, and she Flies back and forth betweenher home in LA where she shoots her
content and the offices in New YorkWhere she works with the L'Oreal team.
Yes,
this is the explanation for why she's beenbi coastal for two years because she's
been going on about like I'm bi coastaland I'm like But why are you in New York?

(01:26:24):
Like other than obviously like NewYork is cool And you would want to
live there and you are wealthy enoughThat you can do that, but there is
a bit of a like, we're like, why,why are you in New York so much?
But this video, Wake Up With Me InNYC, is like another Em Cosmetics
focused video, as opposed to justlike the brand announcement video,
but it's like, yeah, I guess a morecasual way of promoting the brand.

(01:26:45):
Um, but you noticed in this video, andthis is what prompted me to be like,
pause, we actually need to go watch theannouncement video because I think it's
been privated because you didn't see it,that you saw the Em Life Palette, which
is like the flagship product of the brand,and not knowing that it was her brand,
you were like, wow, that's really cool.
The big makeup palette.
What, yeah, do you wantto describe what it is?

(01:27:05):
Do you, do you want to describe it?
Okay, sure.
It's like, you have a big palette withall your colors, and then the colors are
modular in that you can pick them up andput them into a travel sized palette.
So that if you were going awayand only wanted five of your top
colors, you can just pop them outand put them in the small one.

(01:27:28):
Mm, yeah, or like, as she is doingit in the video, she's like, I'm
going to work, so I'm going to takethese ones here with me to touch up.
I'll say I don't ever touch upmy eyeshadow during the day, but
it, other than that, the ideais a really cool concept, like,
it's very cool.
I thought about it, but then I was like,hang on, how many people are so wealthy

(01:27:49):
that they need to Like, because I waslike, oh, it's like a travel sized one.
And so I'm like, oh, because you'reaway from your main makeup desk.
But I'm like, how often am Iaway from my house so that I need
to take my Makeup in a smallerthing to reapply at a later time.
I mean people maybe it would be like ifyou're going to the office because this

(01:28:11):
is pre work from home era if you're goingTo the office and you're wearing you're
like office makeup and you're takingthe palette with you Because you are
gonna like touch up your makeup afterwork so you can go out to get drinks
in New York City because you live InNew York City and your life is slay.
I'm like, I get it.
I think it's a really
cool
Yeah, but then that wouldn't bethe life palette from M Cosmetics.
And how, how strong
are these little blocks?

(01:28:32):
I feel like they don't, they would notstand up to moving back and forth a lot.
Oh, makeup
palettes, it would be fine.
Okay.
Yeah, they'd be fine.
Well, for whatever reason,this wasn't a huge hit.
So, the brand did not hit the wayI think, sorry, L'Oreal intended.
Uh, do you know, do you remember whatthe reception was like at the time?
I remember the announcement video.

(01:28:54):
I remember it coming out.
I remember being like,wow, this is really cool.
Like It's a really cool concept.
I was into makeup at this time.
It was not available in Australiaand I was like, womp womp.
But the price point, so the big lifepalette, which to be fair is a pretty
big palette, at the time was 75 USdollars, which was far and away,
like, considered a luxury price point.

(01:29:14):
Like, people were not spending75 US dollars on an eyeshadow
palette at this time.
Like.
A nice eyeshadow palette wouldmaybe be 45, 50 US dollars, so
this was like really expensive.
Obviously it's bigger, and the point isthat it's like four in one, and they can
be broken down into like the little ones,but yeah, it was definitely expensive.
The price point was quite high for heraudience, and people were basically

(01:29:36):
like, girl I love you, but like I'm not.
I'm not buying that.
Um, and then also, I think the generalreviews of the products were, uh,
lukewarm, like people, I think, wanted itto be good and were happy for Michelle,
but the actual quality of each individualeyeshadow in the pan would vary and was
not maybe living up to the expectation ofthe price point, um, to be fair, I think

(01:30:00):
a lot of luxury makeup Isn't necessarily,like, much better than, like, yeah, price
is not always relative to the quality,but I think the whole thing together
made people feel a bit, uh, disappointed.
I think people were rootingfor this to be good.
I was rooting for it to be good,and so I remember seeing that
people were, like, kinda meh on it,and I was a bit like, ugh, yikes.

(01:30:20):
I think now with the L'Orealcollection and The experience that
she has on ipsy, there is definitelya shift in the focus of the channel
towards being far more commercial.
And we even saw on her Welcome toMy Channel, uh, like trailer that
got some TV airtime around 2014,the comments were people Like we

(01:30:44):
mentioned being like, oh, this isquite different to what I subscribe to.
Yes, exactly.
Like you're so corporate now.
Yeah.
But the videos are alsogetting pretty good views.
So I feel like Michelle wasprobably not overly bothered.
She does a diet Pepsi, sorry, adiet Dr. Pepper ad at this time.
Addison Rae on the
brain.
It's kind of slay.
Yeah, it's actually I actually was

(01:31:05):
like, wow, that's a good ad.
Yeah, we saw it because it was just calledlike one of a kind, 30 seconds long.
We're like, what is this?
Uh, and
what if you, Michelle, you're talkingabout how there's millions of women that
do makeup and then there's only so manythousands that do it professionally.
But there's only one beautyYouTuber and that's you, Michelle.
That's,

(01:31:25):
uh, that's the pitch for this ad.
That's Don Draper pitching.
Yeah, it's like Michellebasically is being like.
You know, out of all of the people thatdo makeup, I'm the number one YouTuber.
Okay,
it's not actually, it's, it's meantto be like everyone's one of a kind.
I think it's meant to be more.
Okay, but
like.
But yes, obviously likeshe's one of a kind.
Yeah.
Which she is.
So, you know, fair enough.

(01:31:46):
Um, but she does this diet Pepsicommercial, which is quite.
And it's
straight up just postedon the main channel.
Like you're hitting normal videosand she posted a 40 second ad.
I think this is weird.
I understand, I so get what would havehappened at the time, they'd be like,
we're going to, we want to do this adwith you, we're going to run it on TV
or like on, you know, pre rolls forYouTube videos, but we also want you

(01:32:07):
to post it to your YouTube channeland that's part of the contract.
And you'd be like, okay, I thinknowadays they would not make her post
this on her actual YouTube channel.
I think she'd just say no.
Yeah.
You'd just be like, no.
But at the time, as we know from Carl'sJr. To get the bag, yeah, these creators
had to post the ad on their channel.
Yeah, it's an odd choice.

(01:32:27):
I don't think many brands would makethem do this now, or you might do like
a vlog being like, I'm in an ad andit's like behind the scenes, whatever,
but the way they do it, where they juststraight up post an ad on their channel.
Yeah, her, her viewers aregetting a little fatigued.
And again, I would like to state, Ido think Michelle's content is still
producing like, at this point, highquality makeup tutorials, but pretty
much every other video or pretty muchevery video I think at this point

(01:32:50):
is either like, In partnership withipsy or like doing an ipsy glam bag
like everything in the video is fromipsy So that's a commercial tie in.
She's using M by Michelle Phan productsThat's her brand or it's like, you
know a straight up commercial post it.
So Yeah, I don't know if it'snecessarily fair the ire She's getting
for being commercial but certainlyher channel and again in comparison

(01:33:13):
to maybe others on YouTube at thetime would have felt very Branded.
Yep.
So, in the years leading up to, um,2015, she sort of speedruns YouTube
commercialization in that she, she nowhas a multi channel network, and has
creators that she features in her video,did you call them the, the Ipsy Girls?

(01:33:35):
Yes.
So this was, I was introduced to a fewof these YouTubers like through Michelle,
um, and a lot of these YouTubers, beingan Ipsy Girl was like, Such a big deal
at the time if you're like a beautyyoutuber like because it's like being
a fashion Nova girl
Uh,
that's a desirable type of girl.
No, not really But sure, it's like Ithink these you know, Michelle would

(01:33:57):
maybe be inviting like at these timeThese are small creators and it's like
okay Maybe a metaphor that you couldbetter understand would be like imagine
if mr. Beast was like I want you to becomepart of the mr. Beast squad and I will
promote your channel Like, you'll bein some it actually is just like that.
It's, it's like becoming a part of theMrBeast crew, and you're in his videos,

(01:34:18):
and then your channel gets a bunchof subscribers through affiliation.
So these people are being shouted outby Michelle Phan on what is one of the
biggest platforms for beauty creatorson YouTube, and they're getting paid to
make videos in partnership with Ipsy, sothey're doing like commercial content.
Every month the Ipsy girls would doa video about the Ipsy bag, I think.

(01:34:42):
So, yeah, it.
I got introduced to a lot of creators,so I am Karen O, Jkissa, Desi and Katie,
I'm saying them together because they'rekind of like a duo, but like Desi Perkins
and Katie aka Lustalux, shoutout to Tash,friend of the pod who is a big Desi and
Katie fan, if we do the Desi and Katievideo, that'll be We'll have to have her
on as a guest, um, cause like, she, sheknows the law, but yeah, there's a lot of

(01:35:05):
YouTubers here that I was introduced tothrough Michelle, um, who were definitely
spotlighted and platformed, and thenthey have now gone on to become their
own very successful beauty creators intheir own right, so she does a lot for
these, these girlies and their career.
I mean, I feel, correct me if I'mwrong, multi channel networks are sort
of not at all the, uh, Yeah, they're,they're very much out of vogue.

(01:35:30):
I feel like no one, isanyone in them anymore?
No, I think, I don't know the history.
I think it's called Icon.
Okay.
I'm
not so across the history of the Iconnetwork, but I believe it does shut down.
Oh, sorry, her,
her one or?
It's, hers is Fawn, right?
For All Women.
Network?
Yeah, I think so.
Okay.
Let me just
check.
Uh For All Women Network.

(01:35:54):
And that eventually gotrebranded into Icon.
Okay.
But Icon is not aroundanymore, I don't think so.
No, I don't think many MCNsare still around, to be fair.
Um, but yeah.
I think these girlies will,at some point, leave the MCN.
Okay.
For one reason or another.
And also, I think Michelleleaves, like, Fawn slash Icon.
She's kind of in her founder era.
Like, she starts a lotof companies and then

(01:36:16):
There's also a lot of videos Departs.
On this channel now where Michelle maybedoes the intro and the outro on camera.
But the entire rest of thevideo, she is not on camera.
Like, it gives a production studioshot everything, and she just
came in and did the voiceover.
Yeah.
And the audience, you can see comments,people are like, Mm, I'm, I'm not sure.

(01:36:38):
Like, where's Michelle, basically?
Yeah, it's, and it's the ipsy girls, orlike, other ipsy affiliated creators,
or people from the Fawn Network.
Yes, and
she also starts, theystart doing trend reports.
Oh, yeah.
They don't do many of these, but it'sa real, like, Is this channel just
becoming, like, basically a content farm?
Because we have, like, completelydifferent, uh, girls in these

(01:36:59):
videos discussing, like, this isthe makeup trend of the season.
And it's like
It's a bit weird.
Yeah, it's, it's completely inconsistentwith, like, The video so far,
and she's also doing a series calledpillow talk, which is like a more
candid, like Q and A style contentwhen she's answering your questions.
And it's like an advice sort of segment.
She usually has like another YouTuber oncould be one of the ipsy girls, um, who

(01:37:22):
will help her answer these questions.
I remember seeing a viewer commentunder one of these videos being like,
Hey, it just seems like every video iseither a trend report or a pillow talk.
Where are the makeup tutorials that like,where is the Michelle solo makeup content?
Yeah.
Um, so, 2016, the channel does atrend report, and then goes dark

(01:37:47):
in that Michelle doesn't posta video for about another year.
Hmm.
I don't think there is any publicstatement, I don't think they
acknowledge where she is at all,it's just, it's like she just
vanishes off the face of the earth.
She is completely silent on herYouTube, her Instagram, every social
platform, she is just disappeared.

(01:38:09):
Um, I also did see that she, at thispoint, we will find out, but she has
packed up and has gone travelling.
She apparently also did noteven tell her business partner
at, uh, M, or any, or Ipsy.
Like, she didn't tell anyone.
She basically was like, Hey everyone,I'm just gonna peace out for a year.

(01:38:30):
Disappears.
Has gone, like, no contact.
No wifi.
Off the grid.
Yes.
Well, in 2017, she posts a Why I Leftvideo, which is animated in the style
of a Draw My Life she did earlier.
So,
She clearly, I'm not sure if shedrew this personally herself, but

(01:38:51):
you know, she has some artisticcredentials, or she proclaims to.
So, it's animated, and to give a quickoverview of the video, she is like, Oh,
you know, when I started doing earlyYouTube, there was like, um, You know,
it was like the possibilities, therewere so many, quick note for the purposes

(01:39:14):
of this podcast, the YouTubers that shefeatures in the sort of mock YouTube
setup at the beginning of the video,KevJumba, Nigahiga, Smosh, and then it.
A woman playing guitar calledKina Grannis, I don't know her,
and an account called VenetianPrincess, that I also don't know.

(01:39:34):
Mm, I'm not familiar.
But, you know, three of the topics,sorry, three of those creators have
featured in the video so far, so, wehave the same taste as Michelle, clearly.
Uh, but she does a pretty normal, like,burnout explanation, she talks about how
she Is like, so driven to further hercareer that she sacrifices her happiness.

(01:39:59):
She explicitly shows framefrom the Dr. Pepper ad when
discussing, like, this conflict.
And I was like, wow, I thoughtthe ad was pretty good, but okay.
Um, it might just be becauseit's a, uh, easily identifiable
visual holding the soft drink.
Um, she also, and this is interesting,she talks about how she Um, feels like she

(01:40:20):
has to present such a perfect image andshe shows like a visual of like the filter
effects on an iPhone camera, um, whichis interesting because, you know, we,
she wouldn't really talk about filters.
Yeah, she shows that she, she showslike an image of her like face tuning
herself, which is kind of, again,crazy because it's like that had been.
I guess going around as like arumor or people have been being

(01:40:43):
like, you seem to be editing yourphotos, again like snark, whatever.
So she's like indirectlyaddressing like that she does that.
But, like, doesn't talk about itagain for years, which is interesting.
And she also goes on about the effectthat the legal battle over the copyright
claims against her channel, how thattook a lot out of her, um, which, fair

(01:41:06):
enough, you know, it would be annoying.
I think you have some backgroundon that from the time.
So,
a lot of her earlier videos she uses.
Copyrighted music, or like music thatmaybe had been no copyright at the time.
Oh, actually, yes, I do have knowledgeof this because I have also had this
happen to me and it's very annoying.
So a lot of music creators, like onSoundCloud, for example, would be like,

(01:41:28):
this is a no copyright music track, feelfree to use it in your YouTube videos.
Like, I'm just making it for fun.
And then later down the line, they willsell their body of work to a company.
And then that company willstart doing copyright claims.
on YouTube videos being like weget to now have all of the AdSense
on this video like paid to us.

(01:41:48):
So I've had that happen where I hada stock track I used on my YouTube
channel pretty frequently and thatcreator of the track had been like
yeah you guys feel free to use it youknow so I used that and then I got
a claim on like a bunch of my Videosbeing like, you can't use this track.
Like we, we now get the adrevenue from these videos.
So then I have to stop usingthe track, which is so fine.

(01:42:08):
But that was basically whatwas happening to Michelle.
She was using music that was fine for awhile, and then suddenly was copyrighted.
And so she was going to lose a bunchof the monetization on her videos.
And considering she was getting millionsand millions of views, that would
be quite a, quite a financial hit.
And I think again, she could, it's likeretroactively being copyright claimed.

(01:42:30):
Like it was fine at the time.
But now it's not anymore, and so she'slike, I think her annoyance was kind of
fair, like obviously I think musiciansand stuff do own their own creative
copyright, but it is very annoying tobe like, retroactively like, we own the
money from this video that at the timewhen you did it, it was completely fine,
so, yeah.

(01:42:50):
How do you feel about this video overall,in terms of her reasons for leaving
YouTube and how she explains them?
I think it is I remember seeing thisvideo again when it came out, and I've
been like, yeah, where has Michelle been?
Like, because again, I watched a lotof her videos or was subscribed to her.
Um, I remember feeling quite, like,empathetic to her, like, she clearly

(01:43:12):
had been under quite a lot of stress.
She was very much girlbossing.
This is a case of burnout.
Um, I will say that we kind of realizedthat in this one year period where
she was like, I had to just go off thegrid and like, Disconnect, that we then
realize that in this one year period,she's also created an entire webcomic

(01:43:34):
and repurchased from L'Oreal the rightsto Em Cosmetics and relaunched the brand
with like a full new look and feel.
And I'm like, so you wereworking during the year off?
Like, she's like, yeah, I had to take ayear off and like, you know, decompress.
But I'm like, you did, you must havedone some work though in the last year.
Like,
yeah, I think it wasmore a year off YouTube.

(01:43:55):
Yeah, that's fair.
Um, yeah I was very empathetic andI think we didn't discuss the draw
my life that her discussion of likethe need to pursue success and like
financial security It does come from,yeah, we know a bit of her backstory.
She
has a troubled upbringing.

(01:44:16):
Yes.
Let's leave it at that.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Um, so you can definitely empathizewith that, um, how that has informed
perhaps the direction of hercareer and her choices, um, where
through her success, she was ableto achieve a lot of things like she
mentioned, it's being able to like.
You know, set her family up and lookafter her family and things, which I,

(01:44:38):
you know, am yeah, very empathetic to.
Um, how do you feel about this video?
I think the charitable view is thatyeah, she was burnt out because of the
various pressures on her from creating,um, and maintaining the YouTube channel.

(01:44:59):
I
think that there is a, an extent towhich like, And I've said this before
with other YouTubers and their burnout,um, issues, they, they really like to,
like, take a very self mythologizingapproach to their life, where they're
literally, they treat, like, creatingYouTube content like they're performing

(01:45:21):
some incredibly important work, um, whenI, I am more of the case of like, yeah,
girl, you should just take a holiday.
Um, but, you know, I'm, I'mnot a very popular YouTuber, so
maybe, you know, I don't know thepressures that come with doing that.
But I do think that, like, from normal,A, normal people have to work and

(01:45:43):
don't have the luxury, and she doesaddress that she has the money to do
it in the video, so fair play there.
But they don't have the luxuryto just quit their job when they
experience some unpleasantness.
They actually probably don't evenlike their job, and they also It will
then change jobs when they dislikeit, and they don't play that into
like a narrative of how, like, theirentire li their entire life has sort

(01:46:06):
of led to this decision, you know?
I, the only thing I'll say, and I guessmaybe I'm just coming from like, uh,
yeah, maybe a more charitable view, isthat Michelle, at this point, is involved
in multiple different companies thathave Large teams of people and her not

(01:46:27):
creating YouTube content or not continuingto be successful at what she does It
directly impacts like their ability tohave jobs like Em Cosmetics as a makeup
line is not doing well But it wouldcertainly not do well if she just stopped
uploading makeup Do you know what I mean?
Like she is responsible for many people'slivelihoods Um, and she also kind of does

(01:46:50):
illustrate like a visual of like, thereare a bunch of people in her room, like,
clearly she have like a management team orlike other, you know, kind of corporates
who are, in a sense, like, I don't wantto say like leeching off her, but they're
encouraging her to do things that maynot be in her personal best interest,
but are in the best interest of her.
They're making money.
So I think there's,
yeah,
if she is coming from a, from like a,like a people pleasing standpoint or

(01:47:13):
like wanting to do the right thing byother people, then yeah, that would
be really exhausting and tiring andshe would feel compelled to continue
even when she doesn't like shediscusses a feeling of feeling trapped.
And I think that's fair.
Hmm.
But
she is also Yeah, look,
I think the reasons areperfectly fine overall.
And given, like we've discussed,Michelle can be quite private,

(01:47:37):
I don't think we really have allof the relevant information to
make a super strict call on it.
So regardless of that, she basically,after this video, takes another two years
off YouTube and she then returns in 2019.

(01:47:59):
The video is just called Hello,and it's a quick little walkthrough
of some of her office space.
She now has, uh, like a larger MCosmetics sort of warehouse brand.
They're showing off some of theproducts, sorry, some of the products
that they have in their new line up.

(01:48:20):
And they have like a very cool,like a robot camera that She's
invested in like a robot company.
Yeah.
She's in her investingin tech era, which will
Like this video is astealth ad, so to speak.
But I don't think anyone reallyminds because she had been
away from YouTube for so long.
And also if you, if your work is at acompany and you do a vlog, then yeah,

(01:48:43):
it makes sense that the company is
How do you like, what is your firstvideo back that you do after like three
years really of not doing anything?
And I think she even says that inthe description being like, didn't
really know how to come back.
So I figured I'd just do this quickvideo to kind of show you like.
What I'm up to these days, and thenI'll like, come back and do some
more content later, which she does.
Well, I mean, the video you do whenyou come back is the one she then

(01:49:05):
does, which is watching my old videos,which is a classic elder YouTuber,
uh, trope, and she, she watches theold videos, and that's the one where
she's like, wow, I can't believeI put Um, kitty litter on my face.
Um, and I will say that I think, and thisis, we've noticed this across all the
new, new as in post sabbatical Michellevideos, is that she is A lot more, I don't

(01:49:32):
want to say herself, but she certainlyis a bit more loose, a bit more casual.
She swears now, if that gives youan idea of what we're getting at.
Yeah, and
the comments are all like,oh my god, you swore.
Like, I've realized I'venever heard you swear.
I like, she looks at um, one of the,like it's a makeup sponge, and she's
like, yeah, it looks like a butt plug.
And you're like, and all the aud yeah,the audience are like, wow, Michelle,

(01:49:55):
fun, tape, buttplug, that's crazy.
But I personally, I think she seems, like,way more personable post, uh, her break.
Yeah, and I think it's worthmentioning as well, because prior to,
I think at Michelle's height of her,like, success, which is very, like,
sustained over a long period of time.
She's consistently getting 1 million,2 million, 3 million, 5 million

(01:50:16):
views on her videos for years.
Um, The way that makeup and beauty contentcreation is now, like, modern, like, the
current era of beauty content creationis way more casual, a lot more chatty, as
opposed to the more, like, formal stylingsof a makeup tutorial with a voiceover.
So

(01:50:37):
That is how I think of beauty YouTubers.
It's like, they're really, like,commentary or As the streamies would
say, you know, like first personcreators and the makeup is like, uh,
basically like a setup for them todo like a piece to camera discussing
what's going on in their life.

(01:50:57):
Yeah, I mean, not, not always.
I do think a lot of, but yes and no.
Yeah, I know there's
still like instructionalcontent out there.
Yeah,
or you're reviewing the productas you're talking about it.
But it's a lot easier to, and it'scynical, but it's a lot easier to monetize
your parasocial connection with youraudience than it is to review products.

(01:51:18):
It's more, you're more personal.
You're getting to know that person andtheir personality more because it's you
in real time talking about something,I mean, obviously it's edited, but as
opposed to writing a script and doing avoiceover, which you can do many times.
It's, yeah, it's adifferent, different vibe.
So Michelle is, I guess, adapting to,uh, that newer style of content or

(01:51:38):
she's like leaning into what's popular.
She's not, um, as concerned withmaintaining a very like perfect facade
or having that really put togetherclean brand friendly commercial image.
So it, it, it's, yeah, it's definitelya different vibe, but it's nice.
I, I, I agree.
It's very fun to have Michelle saythat something looks like shit.
Yeah.
I mean, she comes back and sheactually does look like shit.

(01:52:00):
Some quote unquote normal Michelle videosin terms of their like Halloween creepy
makeup But she also goes and does somereally like nontraditional content like
she posts her Horror manga, is thatwhat I'm describing it correctly as?

(01:52:22):
It's hard to describe what thisvideo is because I remember seeing
it and being like I would subscribe.
The title is
my real life scare stories ormy real life scary stories.
Yeah
And they're almost like drawnin the style of like Junji Ito.
Um, Manga, like graphic novels wherethey're like a horror style drawing
where she's talking about like creepydolls and like beheaded ghosts and stuff.

(01:52:46):
It's very, um, strange.
It's very
not G rated.
Yeah, it's a bit spooky.
But I remember seeing this video in mysubscriptions and then watching it a bit
and being like, this one's not No, no, no.
But I was like, thisone's not really for me.
Like, I appreciate this.
I think it's cool.
But I was like, this is Yeah, it'sa cool video and a lot of people
were very appreciative of it becausethey were like, wow, you know,

(01:53:07):
it's so good to see you being socreative and like, it's a cool video.
Um, but yeah, it's very different andit also leads into maybe her, like,
spiritual side a little bit because she'sdiscussing like her personal experiences
with like paranormal happenings.
More on that later.
So, she is vlogging more.
She now does like a, a somewhatannual Thanksgiving vlog.

(01:53:32):
You are
really into these.
Yeah, well, cause you get tosee her really nice house.
And I was also just curious whatfood they were gonna serve, because
her mum is also in these videos, uh,and I don't think we've seen her on
camera before, so that's kinda cool.
Yeah.
Um, no, Dom.
Dom, not on camera, so unclear wherehe is, um, but she does, you know,

(01:53:54):
does like the full Thanksgivingspread and she seems to like this
content because they, they basicallydo one, uh, every year and there's
some more product review stuff, um.
She's doing makeup tutorials with likeM Cosmetics, the new, newly relaunched
M Cosmetics, which as a sidebar, Ihave tried some of the new M Cosmetics
products and they were I don't haveany at the moment, um, because I

(01:54:19):
only had like a couple of pieces andI did, I did declutter them because
they were not like the right colorfor me because I have to buy it online
only like I can't buy it in person.
Sorry, just sidebar I need tosay, because the rebrand and
all of that was really cool.
Like it's way more in touch with her.
The brand feels way moreMichelle and way more.
For her audience than the previousiteration done by L'Oreal.

(01:54:43):
It's very like, I remember I think there launch had a lot of hype around it
like people like this is really cool.
So yeah.
Yeah, I'm dancing around this this nextvideo because it's just it's so It's
so crazy and such a break with things.
Just imagining being subscribedand seeing this, especially
if you were like This was me.
Yeah.
I just subscribed and saw this.

(01:55:03):
If you're a big fan and thenout of nowhere this comes.
Uh, so the video is calledBitcoin Explained Simply.
Yeah.
And it has Michelle on thethumbnail with the Bitcoin symbol.
And I'm sure everyone waslike, has Michelle been hacked?
Like, what is going on here?
And the video is Michelle,basically, advocating for Bitcoin.

(01:55:30):
She does a littleexplanation about what it is.
She can't really go into too much detailbecause the video is only 10 minutes long.
And she does say, wow, there's somany things to talk about here.
But there's a few odd things that I noted.
Um, she says a line where it's like,Well, people are like, Bitcoin uses
so much energy, but If we want tobe interstellar beings, then we have

(01:55:55):
to use this energy to, like, get offEarth, and I was like, I'm sorry, what?
Like, girl, you make the lip balm,like, where is this coming from?
It's really, um Michelle does usevery, like, flowery language and
you can tell she believes in, like,spiritual things, but up until this
point she's never been, like, ifwe want to be interstellar beings.

(01:56:17):
She's
never discussed the economy, which is abig thing in this video, she's like, or
Bitcoin is a hedge against inflation.
Inflation.
She's obsessed with the idea ofInflation is bad, and you need
Bitcoin to prevent your money frombecoming worthless due to inflation.
Uh, to that I would just say, just putyour money in a savings account, and

(01:56:37):
This is not financial advice, we'renot a financial advice podcast.
Exactly, hypothetically do that,and you know, at worst you'll be
nil with inflation, but anyway I
think it's important to say, and youcan, we can cut this out if you like,
but we're not like, fully anti doe.
. Do you want to discuss?
We
can discuss, yeah.
I think it's important to say, just asa reference, like, you have Bitcoin.

(01:56:59):
I inadvertently have Bitcoin, given Ipurchased it some years ago to use to
buy a service, and I did not buy thatservice, and as a result, that Bitcoin
significantly increased in value.
But I didn't buy it as an investment.
You
weren't like, I'm a crypto.
I am against Bitcoin as An investmentvehicle, a hundred percent.

(01:57:23):
Yeah,
we, yeah, we are not cryptokings, T. M. We, I, I personally
am very skeptical of crypto.
I feel like the amount of, and I'msure we'll eventually talk about them,
but the amount of, like, influencerswho do, like, crypto rug pulls and,
like, scams and things like that.
I just think it's very Yeah.
I, I think both, like, the technology isreally cool, but as a store of currency

(01:57:46):
or as a way to, like, do transactions,like, Michelle says, she uses this
example where she's like, well, if Iwant to send money to someone in Japan,
then I have to, like, go to the bankand the bank will be like, we'll just,
who does the person in Japan bank with?
And she basically makes out as ifit's like, Really difficult thing to
send money internationally and they

(01:58:08):
take this really nominal feeand who's deciding the fee
and it's like okay She's like
well instead I could just send itto like a public wallet and I pay a
minimal Transaction fee and it's likewell actually there is a transaction
fee But also the reason there arethese guardrails in place when you send
money to people is that so if someoneintercepts my email and puts in the wrong

(01:58:31):
Bitcoin address Uh, when I send themthat Bitcoin, I basically lose my money.
So, naturally, banks are like,we're gonna put in some, uh, you
know, some boundaries to prevent ourcustomers from just being scammed.
And this is not us being like,
pro big bank, but the way she'stalking about it is very like,
uh, it's just so out of nowhere.

(01:58:52):
There are
some like, there are some, sorry,there are some like, telltale, uh,
uses of Language that you recognizeif you sort of like following the
the grifter sphere where she's doingthings being like well The media you
can't trust the media narrative orlike you need to do your own research
Yes, yeah, and apparently I did havea little look into it She was at the

(01:59:15):
time also because she was in the cryptospace on her Twitter was like doing
a lot of Bitcoin stuff and was likeretweeting like alt right crypto bros.
So it was a bit of a weird shift.
And I remember seeing this videoin my subscription box, as someone
subscribed to Michelle being like,what is this girl going on about?
Like Diva, what are you doing?

(01:59:38):
It was, it was odd.
It was odd.
And the comments on thevideo are quite negative.
Like people are being like.
Why are you doing this?
And also it didn't obviously age wellbecause there were like obviously some big
Bitcoin dips and people also being likethis kind of feeling like you're advising
your followers because she kind of is.
She's being like youshould get into Bitcoin.
And she is, she's not, yeah.
Well, she is
involved in a, like, browserextension that is kind of like.

(02:00:03):
It's like Honey.
Um, yeah, like.
Which has recently been ina big scandal, by the way.
Exactly, but
rather than you getting paid, like,you know, cents on the dollar, you
get given tiny amounts of Bitcoin.
Satoshi.
Yeah.
Wow, yeah, it's, we could.
Which,
that is a product that so gives like,them being like, how can we get More
women to buy Bitcoin and they'relike, well, what do women love to do?

(02:00:27):
They love to shop.
So if we can attach it toshopping, that's our in.
And I saw from her Twitter stuff They'relike brand voices being like our events
We got like so many more women interestedin crypto than the average event and that
was like their big spin on it Anyway,
it's a bit we could talk at thisWe could talk about this at length.
It's cooked.

(02:00:48):
Well, let's just say Bitcoin remains partof the channel when she does Q& A stuff.
People will ask her like, How doyou feel about the Bitcoin dip?
And she's like, I don't carebecause I'm never selling.
Uh, so, Look, she's in on Bitcoin.
That is interesting.
The videos until now, It'ssort of a continue of that.

(02:01:09):
Uh, content cadence we discussed before,she's not super active but she'll post
Q& A stuff, she'll post content withher family, she'll post at Thanksgiving,
yeah, when there's new products, she'lldo a makeup video, um, I did think it was
interesting how some of her makeup videosnow are in the style that you discussed
previously, where it's not her old formof like, step by step instructions.

(02:01:34):
With the voiceover.
Yes, it's more her discussing her,you know, she's having a, having a yap
and
she's also applying theproduct at the same time.
Yeah.
It's kind of cool.
Yeah, I think the format worksfor her and yeah, I think she's
adapted to the new format.
Um, I don't know if we cover it in ourrun sheet, but I need to say that I,

(02:01:57):
as a subscriber of Michelle, I am, Idon't believe I'm subscribed anymore.
I think I have unsubscribed toMichelle, and I don't know if it
was the Bitcoin video or somethingelse, but I also followed Michelle
on Instagram, and obviously we are aYouTube history podcast, so I won't
go too in depth into this, but I dothink it speaks to, obviously, like,

(02:02:19):
How your persona across your differentchannels can affect your audience.
Yep.
Do you want to talk aboutthe Instagram stuff?
Just really,
I didn't look at this because Iremember it happening at the time.
I think I
was following her and I waslike, this is a bit concerning.
So I think we mentioned it.
Yeah.
In the Bitcoin thing and like in the scarystories thing, Michelle has been known

(02:02:42):
to have a spiritual, um, Interest, orlike an interest in spirit, spirituality.
Well, she
herself is religious,like she talks about God.
Yeah, she
talks about God from time to time.
Won't hear us
talk about God.
Uh, yeah, we are both atheistic, agnostic.
I'm not saying my religious alphabet.
Oh,
okay.
Okay, I'm agnostic, so I am veryrespectful of other people having, you

(02:03:05):
know, religious interests and thingslike that, but I personally am not.
I went to a Christian school.
I decided it wasn't really for me,but I respect that it, you know,
does things for other people.
I don't think I reallyneed to do a disclaimer.
I think you can practice whateverreligion you want as long as it,
you know, is respectful and you'renot necessarily, uh, bringing those
beliefs or placing them on otherpeople who don't want to be involved.

(02:03:27):
Uh, so yeah, Michelle'slike into astrology.
She's, she's a bit woo as well.
So she's like into spirituality andreligion, but she's also a bit woo.
And that, together, brought up someInstagram stories where she was talking
about going to this like, meditationretreat run by a guy named Joe Dispenza.
I'm not very, uh, like, across Joe, um,but it's a bit, it's a bit cult y, guys.

(02:03:50):
Or at the least, even if it'snot a cult, it's just very, um
It's like pseudoscience.
There's, she posted an Instagram storybasically being like, I'm on this retreat.
I'm putting in the work.
I'm sleeping for four hours.
I'm meditating for five hours.
I can't go to the bathroomuntil I finish meditating.
Then we do two hours of science.
And you're like, what arethe two hours of science?
And then she's like, Ihealed a man in a wheelchair.

(02:04:11):
And now he's not only walking,but he's dancing with joy.
I remember seeing these Instagramstories being like, what the fuck?
Like, it just was so, and again,I don't want to be like, Okay.
You can't, but it just felt like she was,because of her large audience and her
platform, and she was being like everyoneshould get, you know, this is such a life

(02:04:32):
changing experience for me, this is soamazing, it did put me off a little bit.
I don't know if it's really necessarilyfair to be like, people who talk
about religion, like it puts me off.
It's not so much that, I followplenty of creators who are Many LA
girlies go into meditation retreats.
Yeah, but Not many healingmen in wheelchairs.
They claim that they heal a man who's in a
wheelchair, which is soIt's just a very, like, ugh.

(02:04:53):
And a lot of people were like,Michelle, I think you're in a cult.
Or like, were concerned about her.
There was then a Q& A, so I guesstechnically it does tie back into
a YouTube channel, because she dida Q& A, and she was like, I can't
believe so many people were worriedabout me being in a cult, and I
really had to like, think about it.
But like, guys, don'tworry, I'm not in a cult.
I'm not the type of personwho would be in a cult.
And I was like, that'svery Yeah, it was just odd.

(02:05:14):
The vibes were odd.
It's like the combined, like,she's into crypto, she's into,
like, healing men in wheelchairs.
She also put up an Instagram story.
I think maybe this was the one thatmade me unfollow her, which was where
she was saying, like, This is duringCOVID, and she was like, essential oils
can protect you from getting COVID.
Yeah,
it's just like, she's, she has likepseudoscience beliefs or alternative

(02:05:38):
medicine beliefs or just like thingslike that, which I personally think
saying those things to a very largeaudience, especially when your audience
like primarily follows you for, and I'mnot saying she just has to do beauty.
Content, but yeah, like do you havea responsibility and maybe this ties
back into the stuff about her usingfilters or not disclosing surgery or

(02:05:59):
allegedly like saying she didn't getsurgery and it was something else
when it was surgery, things like that.
It's a bit like if you want to havethis really large platform, and I
know people don't sign up to be rolemodels, but ultimately you do have to
take responsibility for the fact thatyou are telling millions of people.
If they just burn a rosemary essentialoil, they're not going to get COVID.

(02:06:22):
Like that is a dangerous beliefto be spreading on your platform.
So I, I did actually, I do believe I haveunfollowed Michelle, which, um, yeah,
I, I really like a lot of her content.
I really respect her as a creator,but I don't, this new bend
was a bit of a concern to me.
And I will say for like, to hercredit, this stuff is not super

(02:06:45):
prominent on her YouTube channel.
Hmm.
No.
Which is good, because weshouldn't spread disinformation.
But she has like a millionfollowers on her Instagram.
But yes, yeah,
naturally.
Yeah, it's it's not great.
Yeah, and then like she peoplewould then be like Michelle.
That's not true You shouldn't say thatand she'd just be like, oh, you know

(02:07:07):
She'll she'll like back herself onit or like double down or I kind of
walk it back a bit, but not completelyand I think that is also a bit like
Yeah, I think it's more like she seesthe youtubers like A platform for her
business, but she's like my Instagram.
Well, that's me.
Like, I'm going to expressmy personal opinions.

(02:07:29):
Um, and yeah, except
when it's about Bitcoin.
Well, if she is probably let's be real.
She probably owns a lot of Bitcoin andit's in her interest for people to buy it.
So the price goes up.
I don't know.
I just these sort of things.
I'm not being like you can't be your wholeself or you can't Do other things online.
I'm not of the belief that creatorsneed to be like singular in what they

(02:07:51):
do or like to stay in a box, but ityeah, I think some of these beliefs.
I was like, I was not aware thatthat was your vibe, Michelle.
I'm going to have to tapout like the Bitcoin.
The pseudoscience stuff, the, like,alternative health you can cure,
like, some of that retreat stuff,they're claiming that these people
recovered from, like, illnessesthrough the power of meditation.

(02:08:14):
It's very Yeah, 100%.
It's like Steve Jobs core, you know?
Yeah.
It's very And we know
how that turned out.
Look, it's
very Just ask
iJustine.
Uh, it's, it's just very, like, I don'tknow, I don't want to be, like, rich
people, like It's, but it's like, yeah,
look, it's very much of a typeof woman with her money and her

(02:08:36):
age that lives in California.
And I, I want to be like, I don't thinkanything she says is so, um, You know,
unsavory, that like, wow, I'm, you can't,I can't believe you watch Michelle Phan.
It's more just like,there's some unpleasantness.
I even think with the COVID thing, sheliterally came and said, she was like, Oh,

(02:08:57):
I just said this because a nurse told me.
Um, she didn't fully double down.
Um, and I don't think there's, uh,I don't think this stuff will sort
of like, Consume her content, likesome creators allow their beliefs to
like, completely, um, disrupt theiroutput, um, but yeah, it is a shame, I

(02:09:17):
think, to See, this is how it's gone.
Cause, you know, as I said,Modern Michelle, I think
we, I think we chop it up.
She seems otherwise pretty cool.
She's funny.
I laughed at some of thevideos post sabbatical.
And I certainly didn'tlaugh non ironically.

(02:09:38):
At the stuff before then.
I mean, she talks about the,you know, visionary video
game director Hideo Kojima.
She's a fan.
She loves
Kojima.
She
talks about all her favorite games.
Yeah.
Final Fantasy X. That's,you know, it's a deep cut.
Yeah, but um, yeah, I just felt theneed to mention it because it, it's not
super prominent in her YouTube stuff,but I do think like that is an element.

(02:10:01):
That has come up and is a bit, yeah.
And there's like other stuff aswell we haven't talked about.
I'm sure some people haveseen some things online.
She promoted like a class with aperson who was, there's a lot of drama.
I don't want to talk about that.
Yeah.
I
do want to talk aboutwhere she's at now though.
And that's having recently finished thefirst, and not sure if there'll be more,

(02:10:24):
but at least One series of a podcast.
Mm hmm.
Which I don't think has a title.
It's just
Afterglow.
Afterglow.
There you go.
Afterglow Where she does like aone on one sit down interview with
a normally another famous youtuberso guests that We would know, Brian
Heeger,
prominently, uh, and Rosanna Pansino.

(02:10:48):
Yes, you got it.
Yes.
You're learning.
Uh,
so, there are otherpeople who I don't know.
Do you remember any of them?
A lot of them are like I know,sorry, Promise, uh, her sister
in law is one of the episodes.
There are some other creators,yeah, I'm not familiar with them.
She's
mostly inviting on like OGYouTubers, so I'm sure we'll
cover quite a few of them in time.

(02:11:10):
Um, I was actually listening to anepisode of the pod this morning,
just to get myself familiar with it.
I have listened to a littlebit of it here and there.
Like, again, this is the thing, Ikind of like was like, I need to take
a step back from Michelle's content.
This is kind of spooking me a little bit.
But the podcast, I think,has been like a fun, yeah.

(02:11:32):
New format for Michelle to work at.
Um, and yeah, I was listeningto her podcast with Rosanna this
morning and it was pretty good.
It was like a nice back and forth.
Michelle is very good at podcasting.
It allows her, and she even talks in theepisode about how it's like a nice new
medium where she feels very free, that shedoesn't have to be constrained by the fact
that she's a beauty creator and that shedid feel that constraint for a long time.

(02:11:56):
And the podcast is like a nice wayfor her to be able to talk about
a range of topics and be herself.
Um.
Drop the f bomb.
Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
But like, to talk about, like,they talk about, like, Mr. Beast
and stuff in the episode, which.
So, yeah, maybe worth a listen.
But, um, uh, yeah, I think she clearly,at least herself, definitely felt that

(02:12:16):
she was really stuck in a format andshe is kind of at a point, which I
think a lot of creators get to, whereyou just go to, you know what, it
doesn't matter if my views are goingto be much lower now or whatever, I'm
just going to move forward with makingthe content I want to create, which I
think a lot of YouTubers can make from.
Uh, it's a decision they can makebecause they're like financially free.

(02:12:36):
Like
I agree.
Yeah.
And I think it's admirable thateven though these new videos, they
are not pulling in the millionsof views that the old stuff did.
Yeah, I think the
Rosanna podcast episodehad about 40, 000 views.
Yeah.
Which is, yeah, really different to
But, like, by all means, if you'reindependently now wealthy Then

(02:12:57):
If you want to have a podcast.
It's nothing to sniff at.
Yeah,
exactly.
Yeah, do a passion project.
Yeah.
Or do a project that's new anddifferent and makes you feel, like,
personally fulfilled, by all means.
For 40, 000,
you know, listeners?
Nothing to sniff at.
Exactly.
We'd love to get there.
Certainly, I can't turn my nose up at it.
Of course, yeah.
But yeah, she hasn't done, like, the crashouts where she comes back and is like, you

(02:13:17):
know, Ryan style, where she's like, wow,this new content, it just doesn't perform.
It seems like she is not reallybothered about that these days.
Yeah,
she's made her peace.
And obviously she has Em Cosmetics.
She's diversified her wealth towhere she is no longer reliant
upon her YouTube channel, andshe's done that very successfully.
Like Em Cosmetics is its own thing.
It's very tied in with Michelle, butit's also like successful on its own.

(02:13:39):
She doesn't need to be in everyEm Cosmetics campaign in order
for it to make money, I assume.
I assume I don't know exactlyhow the brand's going right now.
I need to check in actually.
Um, but yeah.
Okay, wow.
So, that was a long chat.
I didn't think it would be this long.
I know, neither did I, but here we are.
Um, in conclusion,Michelle Phan, what's your

(02:14:04):
takeaway?
I, it's been interestingto Go through it with you.
I mean as every episode is obviouslythat's the format of this podcast but
especially because I am Quite familiarwith Michelle's content was subscribed
for a long period of time and veryfamiliar with like, you know I knew
about Michelle leaving and coming backI knew about her boyfriend and I kind

(02:14:27):
of was quite aware of a lot of whatwas going on, but having Experiencing
that with someone else and being likeWhoa, this Bitcoin video is crazy.
I'm like, good.
I'm glad I'm not the onlyone who felt that way.
Um, but yeah, Michelle is probablyof everyone we've covered so far, the
most commercially successful, uh, orI guess most successful full stop in

(02:14:51):
terms of like, she has really branchedout and owns multiple companies, uh,
has really taken her YouTube careerand, um, kind of yet gone off on.
She's done a lot of things, but isstill, I guess, connected to YouTube.
I think we will talk about some creatorswho become very successful and they

(02:15:12):
just completely leave YouTube behind,in favor of like traditional media or
doing something else completely, but shestill does feel like a connection, um,
to YouTube.
I, given like the insight into herlife, we have Following, um, her
sabbatical, yeah, I'm a bit, I wouldnot have been surprised if she just
retired from YouTube, essentially.

(02:15:32):
Because it does seem like shehas a full office of staff.
She has a company to develop.
She has like a family of peoplewho presumably rely on her.
So it's, I think if you are still likea Michelle Phan fan, it's actually
quite nice how she still maintains.

(02:15:52):
A public presence.
Yeah.
Even if it's like a lot more mutedthan it was, you know, I felt that
way when she was like releasingthe Thanksgiving vlogs and stuff
and pre bitcoin . But like, I, Idid feel like, wow, it's so nice
to see Michelle back and Yeah.
And honestly
these pod, the podcast, thatepisodes are like 45 minutes long.
Mm. So, you know the eight episodesof that, that's probably more Michelle

(02:16:15):
Farn content than you would've got in.
Like her whole YouTube career.
Yeah, no, like
you will know more about becauseI will say from the early videos.
It felt like I Didn't really knowwho Michelle was she seemed very much
like You know a blank slate for theviewer to project themselves on it's

(02:16:36):
probably why you know part of thereason She was very successful, but she
had very normal Aspirational things,like she had a successful career, she
had a hot boyfriend, she was good atmakeup, but until, yeah, she came back
later on, uh, and I found that, like,obviously I'm not someone who watches

(02:16:56):
beauty YouTube, but I found it prettyinteresting watching her sort of pioneer
in that space, and I certainly feltit was an easier watch than watching.
You know, some of thecreators we've watched.
It's certainly aged better.
Basically an extremelylow level of cringe.
Yeah, I don't think

(02:17:16):
anything was really I mean I
was a bit like, with the DIY,
but
Um,
it's not,
yeah,
the, the difference is she justshowed the DIY as a concept.
She didn't wear the DIY in public.
She didn't do these things thatdisrupt other people's lives.
Yeah,
yeah, yeah, no, for sure.
Um, did you have a favoriteMichelle Phan video?

(02:17:38):
Oh, I almost forgot to mentionin the, the vlog in around 2019,
one of her family members has.
A Shane Dawson, like,bag, Oh, it's one of her
employees at her workplace.
Yes, but this bag, this pig bag.
What is Yeah, I was fully like,another Shane Dawson mention.

(02:18:00):
Have we
had a single, other than LonelyGirl, I think Shane Dawson has
come up in every single episode.
He's come up in Smosh, he's comeup in Ryan Higa, Yeah, iJustine.
And Neil!
Why does he have a A handbag.
Anyway, we will get to that.
I was very, I was very interested.
The Shane Dawson episode,
it's, it's a, it's likea ticking time bomb.
There's only a, there's only a matter oftime before we'll have to dive into that.

(02:18:23):
Um, which will have to be overmultiple episodes, I think.
I don't think there's away we can cover it in one.
I agree.
Um, that was Did youhave a favorite video?
Oh, a favorite video?
Um, I think it was probablyYou like the Bitcoin
video?
I quite liked
the office tour.
Which
one?
The one, not the one where she returned,the full office tour where she went

(02:18:47):
through the M Cosmetics, um, Her own, whenshe owns it, the full office of there,
because they have a very quite cool likewarehouse conversion office where it's
like double stories, um, the computersare in one section, and then they have a
bunch of other like individual conferencerooms with, Nice TVs, they have like a

(02:19:09):
robot arm that shoots their content thatwe spoke about and I just overall was
like, oh, and Michelle was, um, you know,in her new, um, chopping it up style.
So I quite like that video.
Otherwise of the old stuff, um,probably the avatar inspired look, just
cause I thought it was really funny.
Yeah.
What about you?

(02:19:30):
I think I do like the new videos.
I agree.
Like the newer style where she'sbeing a little more candid.
I quite like that style of content, likethe Thanksgiving vlog is pretty cute, but
I have to say I have a special place inmy heart for both the Sailor Moon makeup
tutorial and the Hatsune Miku video.
I was quite into anime at the time whenI was watching her videos, um, and I

(02:19:51):
thought it was cool that it was likea fusion of two things that I really
liked, and they are really cute videos.
And you can see that Michelle islike genuinely like into those
things as well, so it's like a fanelement, but it's also instructional.
Her voice is very calming and soothing.
I don't know.
They're just cute.
I
like them.
All right.
That is Michelle Phan, as Ido at the end of each episode.

(02:20:16):
Lucy, what are yousubscribing to this week?
This week I am subscribing toInfinity Nikki, which I have been
playing for a while, but I haven'ttalked about on the pod yet.
Um, Infinity Nikki, for those of youwho don't know, is a free to play game
on the PC, mobile, and PlayStation?

(02:20:39):
And probably Xbox as well.
Probably.
Everything but Switch,
I think.
Yeah, for now.
But, um, Infinity Nikki is a It's a gachastyle game, so if you've played Genshin
Impact, it's sort of like that, but Icouldn't get into Genshin Impact, but
I'm very into Infinity Nikki because itis like fashion based, so it's a lot of
emphasis on collecting cute outfits, uh,running around a very beautiful world with

(02:21:03):
your companion Momo, you play as Nikki.
Momo
is like a cat thing.
Well, it's sort of explicitlyin the lore he's not a cat.
Okay, but like But he
is a cat.
Okay.
But he's not.
Yeah.
There's a, look, the lore, thelore of Infinity Nikki is crazy.
I did play, um, a chapter last night,where you find out that a bunch of
people have been in a slave labor camp.

(02:21:27):
Yep.
Wow.
Yeah.
Are they just making clothes?
Like, what's the slavery element?
They're just in
cages.
Okay.
Yeah.
Fair enough.
Crazy, um, spoiler for InfinityNikki lore, but I don't think, out
of context you'd be like, what?
Because in the start of the gameyou're just like, collecting
flowers to make skirts.
Um, but yeah, it's a very fun, relaxingtime, uh, if you don't play a lot of games

(02:21:48):
I think it's pretty easy to get into.
Um, and it's free.
So, yeah, I just, I don'tknow, I feel like Michelle
Phan would like Infinity Nikki.
Wow, yes.
I actually think you're bang on there.
Yeah, because it's like animeaesthetics, it's fashion, and
there's a makeup element too.
You can do Nikki's makeup.
Um,.
Yeah, I feel like Michellecould, uh, get behind it.

(02:22:09):
How about you?
What are you subscribing to this week?
I'm subscribing to
JazzApples.
What?
So, in case you're not familiar, theJazz Apple is like a , uh, version of,
you know, the classic Red Apple, butit's like, way crisper, and that's the
main appeal of the Jazz Apple, I think.

(02:22:30):
And you pay, like, somewhat of apremium on the fruit, but I definitely
would, uh, say that it's worthit, and It's definitely gone up to
my number one supermarket apple.
So I've been really enjoyingthe Jazz Apple as of late.
Okay, Jazz Apples.
Jazz Apples and Infinity Nikki.
That's what we'resubscribing to this week.

(02:22:51):
Uh huh.
Well.
You seem taken aback.
Do you not like jazz?
I enjoy a jazz apple.
I mean, I purchased them.
I like jazz.
Okay, Barry B. Benson.
Anyway, that was the MichellePhan episode of Rewind Time.
Thank you so much for your comments andenjoyment of the first few episodes.

(02:23:13):
Yes,
you're among famous otheryoutubers like iJustine.
Yes,
our fan iJustine.
Check out her comment on her episode.
Thank you so much for your support.
Queen of iPod.
We love you, Queen of Apple.
Shout out to iJustine.
Yeah, Michelle doesn't comment on thisepisode, um, flop error, you know.
Anyway, thank you so much for listening,and we will see you next week.

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