Learn from Will Smith's Past Experience

On tour for the original Men in Black movie release, Will Smith gained a valuable insight that can help content creators today as well - on YouTube and Twitch. Particularly Minecraft content creators that want to grow their channel and promote themselves to an international audience!

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In this episode, we talk about internationalization, reaching a global audience with your YouTube channel, and producing content that appeals to a wide range of people around the world. Minecraft is a worldwide game, and your content is consumed worldwide. Because of that, we need to think about how language is used in different parts of the world, and how that impacts Minecraft videos we create for our audience.

Disclaimers:

1. Will Smith has slapped down a few music records, several blockbuster films, and - more recently - a comedian named Chris Rock. I do not condone the actions at the Academy Awards in 2022 at all, and I do not believe that violence is ever the answer to our problems. For the purposes of this podcast episode however, I have decided to mostly ignore those recent events and focus entirely on the events of the year 1997 instead.
2. The audio snippet was taken from an audiobook, found on Audible. Anyone potentially deciding to purchase that audiobook should be made aware of it's occasional course language and other elements that are inappropriate for a young audience.

References:
The audio recording of Will Smith contained in this episode comes from his audiobook on Audible, simply titled "Will".
Copyright for the audio recording belongs to authors Will Smith and Mark Manson, and publisher Penguin Audio.
https://www.audible.com.au/pd/Will-Audiobook/1473571995

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Episode Transcript

(00:03):
Will Smith is a movie star,
musician and well-known
face around the world.
He was involved in TV series
like The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air,
had record-setting music albums
and as a actor was involved
in box office hit movies like
Independence Day
Bad Boys
Men In Black
and I Am Legend.
Whatever you may
think of him personally,
there's no denying
that we can learn some lessons

(00:24):
from his experiences.
Lessons that you and I
can apply to YouTube,
Twitch and other content creation.
Thinking back to just before
the release of his movie
Men in Black,
Will Smith shared
an important lesson
that he learned on
the movie’s promotional tours...
Men in Black was slated
for release on July 2nd, 1997.
This was the same weekend

(00:45):
that Independence Day
had hit cinemas (previous year).
In Hollywood,
all weekends are not equal.
The 4th of July was the most
coveted slot of the year.
When the studios put your movie
on that date, they are
betting the farm on you.
I decided
I wanted to publicly

(01:05):
lean into the pressure.
In all of my press interviews,
I began referring
to the 4th of July
as “Big Willy Weekend”.
They ate it up.
It made headlines everywhere!
In the UK,
it had an added (though unintended) media benefit,
because "Willie" is slang

(01:28):
for the male reproductive organ,
and big
means BIG.
On YouTube & Twitch,
your audience is global.
You aren't just reaching out
to people in your local town.
They're not even restricted
just to those
who speak the same language
because Google's translation
services are able
to create subtitles for your videos
automatically.
Sometimes in real time,

(01:48):
those subtitles
are being translated
and generated as the viewers
are watching!
Because of this, there are
two very important things
to keep in mind for all content
that you create.
The first
and most obvious lesson
we can learn from
Will's experience
is that words
don't mean the same thing
in all parts of the world.
FIRST LESSON:
Choose the words that you use
carefully.
"Willie" was a nickname
that Will Smith was referred to

(02:09):
by some of his friends
and peers.
He didn't know
until he went on that tour
that it was slang
for something else in the UK.
Similarly,
there are words like "thong"
that mean a different thing,
depending on where you live.
In Australia,
where I am,
it's a type of sandal
that you can wear on your feet.
In other parts of the world,
well... let's just say
you don't wear it on your feet!
Your commentary on a stream,

(02:30):
the jokes that you make in videos,
and other references you make,
they may have unintended
results.
Best case scenario,
people laugh because it's funny.
Another scenario is
that you might say something
and it means absolutely nothing
to the viewer.
The viewer might not get
the reference.
They may lose interest
and they may click away
or disconnect
from what you're saying
because they have no idea
what you're talking about.
As someone
living in South Australia,

(02:51):
I might refer to a "stobie pole".
Not only would you not know
what it is internationally,
even in other Australian states,
including neighboring states,
you wouldn't know what
a "stobie pole" is.
It's local to my specific area.
So using that
in an illustration,
you as the viewer
won't have a clue
what I'm referring to.
You won't get the point
And the worst case scenario,
is that what you say
may be offensive to people

(03:12):
in certain parts of the world.
You can't go around
walking on eggshells constantly
questioning everything you say.
But it is worth at least
thinking about this
and keeping it in mind.
And it's worth showing
respect and understanding
when a viewer comes to you
and starts complaining...
but you don't understand
what they're complaining about
or why they're concerned
because of a
cultural difference.
What's the second lesson

(03:32):
that we can learn?
Well,
the second lesson is to speak
clearly with simple language
so that you can be understood.
Those are understand
your language
may not be native speakers.
By using simple words,
speaking clearly into microphone,
and removing background noise
and distractions,
you are setting up your viewer
to get as much value
out of your content
as possible.
Speaking clearly

(03:53):
also has a few other added
benefits that
you probably haven't considered.
One of those is that
it makes it easier for Google's
auto translation software
to detect what you're saying,
and then convert that
into other languages.
Translation is difficult as it is.
Let's not make it harder
by giving YouTube dodgy audio.
Another benefit
is that if
Google knows what you said,
it's able
to accurately
index your content

(04:13):
and know what you're
talking about at each moment.
That means
better recommendations
to viewers, and the people that
are recommended to watch your
video will watch,
and are more interested
and stick around, which in turn
gives you more views,
gives you more subscribers
and potentially,
if you monetize,
gives you more money.
gives you more money.
So the lessons are...
As a content creator,
you should be aware
of cultural differences.
And simple, clear

(04:34):
commentary has many benefits.
What else do you think
we can learn from movie stars,
Will Smith or otherwise?
You can comment on the YouTube
version of this episode
with your thoughts.