The Value of Active Listening [Michael Fisher | Mr. Mobile]

Michael Fisher, known sometimes as  @TheMrMobile and others as @Captain2Phones, has been a consistent and valuable voice in the tech review community for the better part of a decade. But when you go from being one of a few voices in an industry to one of hundreds, how do you stand out? The answer, according to Michael, is consistent quality and innovative scripting.

We discussed a number of different aspects of his illustrious career, from the beginnings of the Mr. Mobile brand (and a reminder that, no, Michael's not an independent creator, but is in fact part of a larger company), how his approach to reporting has changed over the years, and most recently, his experiences co-founding a physical product company that harkens back to the days of that satisfying Blackberry clicks, bringing the experience to a modern touch screen audience.

(Also we nerded out about theatre stuff, but that's because we're giant theatre nerds.)

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
- Hello, friends.
Welcome to BuildingValue with Jason Nellis.
I'm Jason Nellis. And for thoseof you watching on YouTube,
you might notice thatI'm in an even different
or locale than I was on the last episode.
I'm traveling with family.We're trying a bunch
of new spots, and you'redefinitely gonna be seeing
and hearing from me in acouple of different places.
But for now, just know that theimportant thing is not about
where I'm broadcasting from,but to whom I'm speaking.

(00:23):
Today's interview is withthe man, the mystery,
the legend himself, Mr.
Mobil. That is Michael Fisher.
Now, I'm lucky enough tocall Michael Fisher a friend,
but he's also somebody who'staught me a tremendous amount
about being on YouTube,understanding the greater economy
for creators, and mostimportantly, thinking about how
to speak about the same thing
that everybody else is talking about in
new and innovative ways.

(00:44):
Our interview toucheson a number of subjects,
including his theaterbackground, which mirrors my own,
how his approach to working
with brands has evolved over the years,
and some of the benefits and challenges
of building a YouTubebrand with the backing
of a company versusdoing it independently.
There's a lot of reallygood stuff in here.
I hope you enjoy it. I know Idid. This is Michael Fisher.
- Welcome to Building Value.

(01:06):
I'm Jason Nellis,
and I am obsessed withthe Creator economy.
I've spent my career at theintersection of creativity
and technology buildingproducts at companies like Hulu
and Facebook, all trying to make it easier
and more valuable forartists to do what they love,
whether they're contentcreators themselves,
or the people buildingproducts that creators use.
Every one of the folks I interviewoffer compelling ideas on

(01:28):
how to create something of lasting value.
If you like what you hearand you want to get more,
please subscribe on YouTube
or wherever you consumefine podcast products.
And if you really love whatyou hear, leave a review.
That always helps. And withthat on, with the show.
And here we are today withthe man himself, the Mr.
Mo, the captain, two phones.

(01:49):
It's Michael Fisher, my dear friend.
And maybe perhaps the manwith the only better head
of hair on the internetthan me. How are you, sir?
- You had to wait untilmy barber blew me off
to call attention to my hair.
I, this is way too
- Big.
It looks spectacular. Stupid
- Looks, 'cause the headphonesare keeping it contained.
It doesn't matter. Yourhair is better than mine.
You can just say it. Jason,
- You're very sweet.

(02:10):
And for those of you listening in audio,
none of this makes any sense.
That's so, I apologize. That'sright. None of that matters.
. Um, how are you today,sir? It's good to see you.
- It's good to see you too.I'm, I'm, um, well, I, I,
my stock response to thatsince 2012 is that I'm busy
and, uh, I think that's nota thing you should make part
of your personality, butit just happens that way.
Content creator life. How are you?

(02:31):
- I'm good. I'm good. I'm, uh, excited
to chat today. Oh, we're making loud
- Noises.
My, my coffee mug stuck to my coaster
and it fell in my CaptainBacard coaster, actually.
That's, uh, very, very fun. Oh, wow.
- Yeah. Okay. I dig it. Thanks.
That man, that man has some
deep thoughts about a lot of things.
I like it. Mm-Hmm, .
Um, well, I think that'sactually a perfect place for us
to jump off from because,you know, a lot of the folks

(02:53):
that I talk to who are inthe content creator space,
they usually, uh, have abackground that is, uh,
exclusively, uh, in thearea of their interests.
So, um, they're, youknow, technical reviewers
because they love justtechnology, uh, their makeup, uh,
and beauty reviewers becausethey fell deeply in love
with a particular brand.
Uh, for you, of course, that'sthe case, uh, you've been a,

(03:13):
a techno file for ever.
But you also have something that you
and I share, which is adeep background in theater.
And so the first thingI'd love to talk about is
how do you think that that has helped you
or perhaps differentiatedyou in this space?
And more specifically, like,beyond just the ability
to be comfortable on camera.
Like what are the, thekinds of skills you find
that you use from thatexperience more frequently?

(03:34):
- Yeah, that's a, I I,I love that question
because it's coming froma fellow theater person,
and you know what it'slike to come off stage
after doing some of thehardest work of your,
of your life in creating a character.
And to have the first questionposed to you from any family
or friends be, God, how,
how do you remember all those lines?
I just don't understand. And you're like,

(03:55):
that's not actually the hard part.
It's, it's just rotemechanical, like just, it's,
you're just forcing it under your
brain. You're just practicing that
- Black out for twohours. What's the problem?
- . Everything elseis the hard part, right?
So yeah, there's a lot of, there's a lot
of the obvious stuff that that, that, um,
the acting background helpswith when you're doing a,
a YouTube or, or kind ofcontent creator lifestyle.

(04:17):
Like you said, beingcomfortable in front of a camera
for sure, just, you know,things you learn from exposure.
But what I found, um, is that
the way I create mystuff, which is that I,
I always have a fully written script
first before every video.
And what I find most useful,just every day when I'm doing
that and I'm preparing my script

(04:38):
for recording into voiceover or,
or on camera, is I kind ofanalyze my own script in the way
that I, as an actor, I usedto analyze somebody else's.
So, you know, that, that,
that just means divinginto every sentence.
And instead of taking apart objectives
and motivations as I wouldwould've in the theater world,
like, I actually focus onhow I'm gonna deliver it.

(04:58):
And, you know, oftenyou'll, you'll hear, uh, not
to throw anybody under thebus, 'cause everybody does this
differently, but you'llhear people, um, you know,
who don't have a performance background
delivering copy that they've written.
And it can often come off rather flat.
Whereas I try to treat my copy
as something somebody else wrote
and then be like, okay, wellthere's antithesis here.
I can hit these words a little differently
and let's make sure that this word lands.

(05:20):
'cause otherwise thisjoke about this book,
lazy alliteration jokeI made doesn't work.
It's really about script analysis.
That's the thing I usemost often every day.
That's kind of the, the boringanswer. But my favorite,
- I I don't think it's, I
don't think it's that boring at all.
Thank you. I in fact,
before, uh, you, youhave another answer too.
- I do. Yeah. Yeah. Butyeah, you wanna jump on that?
Oh, okay. Well, um, in, in,

(05:41):
in interviews is the otherskillset that comes in
because acting is, um, thisis a cliche to you and me,
but to non-actors thatmight be new information.
Acting is very much just listening, right?
You're listening and reacting honestly.
And in an interview situation,it is so, so important
to be able to, when you're talking
to somebody in the tech space,or maybe a marketing person

(06:04):
or a PR person who wantsto sell you their version
of a story, it's so importantto be able to actively listen
and then decide whether you believe them
in a given moment or not.
And that's something we did just so often.
Back in the theater world,you studied Meisner,
you did the repetition, the,the, the observing your partner
and being like, I don'tknow that I believe you.
And how do I, how do Iact in response to that?

(06:24):
And it's, you know, I thinklistening is one of these skills
that has gone by the wayside
as a whole over the past few years.
I'm an old man, so I'llstart, I'll talk about that.
- Sorry, what were you saying?I wasn't paying attention.
- I see. This is the problem.You, you kids,
- you kids.
I'm older than you are .Um, no, I appreciate that.
But I, I think, you know, oneof the things that, that I've,
uh, appreciated about ourbackground, our common background,

(06:47):
um, is exactly what you said first,
the script writing and the script reading.
And I've actually oftenadvised folks I know
who are on the younger endto, to more focus on their
writing than their, theirability to speak to camera.
Yeah. Um, but I do think, uh,
and I'm curious about yourresponse to this statement.
The other thing I sometimesadvise people is go
to your local community theater
or your local, you know,school of whatever,

(07:07):
and take an acting class.
Just because getting comfortablebeing exposed in front
of people on a stage, Ithink actually speeds up the
experience of being on camera.
And the, the challenge that granted,
there are different challenges,
but ultimately that sense of nakedness
that you sometimes experiencethe first time you see
yourself on camera and have to
really evaluate a performance.
I think you can get therea little faster on an

(07:29):
onstage acting class.
Do you agree?
Disagree? Absolutely. What areyour thoughts? Oh, yeah. You,
- You're a hundred percent right.
And, and, and just gettingcomfortable also with, um,
feedback from a director.
Uh, because when you'rethrowing stuff on YouTube,
you're gonna get feedbackfrom the comments,
and lord knows that's awhole other conversation.
But like, once you arecomfortable getting in,
getting feedback in away that is, um, that,
that you can internalize

(07:50):
and kind of, I don't know,use as a tool rather than
react defensively as you always
do your first day of acting class.
Well, that's not really whatI was trying to, no, stop.
Just take the note, make anadjustment, let's work on it.
Let's, let's go forward.
We're trying to build something new here.
If you can maintain thatmindset, it's a lot easier to,
you know, put something outthere into the world for others

(08:12):
to be able to comment on.
And I think you're absolutely right.
It makes you morecomfortable with yourself,
but it makes you more comfortablewith the audience too,
no matter who that audience is.
- Well, and I think italso opens yourself out
to new audiences too.
If you're not trying to aimfor one particular crowd,
perhaps you get comfortableenough with yourself
that you develop a differentkind of, uh, aspect
of a persona that you'representing on camera, that

(08:33):
that opens up a new avenue for you.
I mean, I know you, you've done a lot on
Twitch, although not recently. Oh,
- Yeah, yeah. yeah,
- You did that.
I love that, that, that again, right?
That, that skillset applies tonot just, you know, you know,
filming on camera, but also live broadcast
and the ability to,you know, uh, negotiate
and navigate a live audiencewhile at the same time doing

(08:54):
something, uh, proactively.
Um, again, those, I Ithink it's interesting
how those skills really also dovetail.
- That's a really good point,
because I've never been an improv guy.
I wasn't a sketch guyor anything like that.
Like I, I, I, I leaned toward, uh, the,
you know, bloody dramas. Um, but
- Nerd- Yeah, I know.
But you learn regardless of what kind
of performance you're doing,you do learn the ability

(09:15):
to think on your feet becausesomething always goes wrong,
or an audience member sneezes
or something, somebody drops something
and you have to, you gottawork around it on stage.
And yes, in a live situationlike Twitch, same exact thing.
Somebody throws you a curveball from the comments
or something unexpected happensin the game you're doing,
and you, or you saysomething, maybe you, you, uh,
are talking too muchand you let a secret go

(09:36):
and you have to go, okay, well,I've gotta work around that.
It's, it's, there are justso many skills that come
along with being able tocram a dictionary's worth
of scripts into your head when you're,
when you study performance.
So, yeah, it's kind of never ending.
- Another differentiatorabout you, something
that is not common amongst most folks

(09:58):
who are independent content creators is
you did your own content at first
through other companies, right?
So you, you built the Mr.
Mobile brand through MobileNation. Mm-Hmm. .
You're now part of a, anorganization called Future Mm-Hmm.
. Um, you know,I think a lot of folks tend
to think about buildingan online brand, uh,
from the beginning as sort of a, a,
a one person band kind of experience.

(10:18):
And you had the benefit ofhaving a team, um, not that
to say you weren't doing alot of the work yourself,
but you were backed by organizations
that were helping supportyou through resources.
Uh, what were the pros and cons of that?
What was the experience likein terms of having a team, uh,
that maybe helped you,
but also perhaps there was something there
that hindered your, your, youknow, build out of the brand?

(10:39):
- Yeah, you said it right.
I mean, it doesn't matterhow many I've done this,
this interview, this portionof this interview, uh,
literally over a hundred times
I have said this on varioussocial media networks a billion
times, it doesn't matter.
No one notices, remembers,or chooses to remember it.
Everyone thinks, thank you,appreciate that .
Everyone thinks, um,everyone's routinely says

(11:01):
to me at least once a week, I'm
so glad you went independent.
And I'm like, well, I, I never did, uh,
I've never been an independentcreator, um, who has
to do all of the backgroundwork of running a business
in addition to making the content, right?
So, like even back before Mr.
Mobile, when I started inthe tech field at all, it was

(11:22):
because I wanted to gethired at a gadget blog.
And the one that hiredme Pocket now wanted
to focus on growing their YouTube channel.
And I happened to have skills
that dovetailed nicely with that.
But look, I was coming intothe space as an enthusiast.
I knew a lot about phones. I
didn't know anything about the business.
I didn't know anything about writing
for this particularniche, um, or anything.

(11:43):
So coming aboard a team ofthen, I think there were six
or seven of us, maybe eight
or nine, all a team of people, all
of whom knew more than Idid, was immensely helpful.
And, uh, to say nothing of, uh,their existing relationships
with manufacturers, with PRpeople, their other journalists,
uh, or journalists to begin with.
So I started in 2011,grateful to be surrounded

(12:07):
by people who knew more than I did.
And that has always beenthe case that has carried me
through until today, um, starting Mr.
Mobil, uh, you know, this was not my idea.
I am not a vision guy. Andthis will come up again.
I'm a, I'm a, I like to bedown in the weeds of the,
of whatever product I'm shipping, right?
I like to be focused on theproduct and or the content.

(12:29):
And, you know, I got aphone call from a guy who's,
who was known at thetime as CrackBerry Kevin,
and he said, we wanna makea YouTube channel on Mobile
Nations hosted by one person.
And we want that channelto basically do exactly
what you're doing at Pocket now,
but we want, we want you,we want you to do it for us.
I'm like, well, cool.Thank you for the offer.

(12:52):
It's 2013 and I'm notready to leave pocket now.
So, um, no thanks.
I tell you what, look,loved my team at Pocket now.
Still love them. I should have,I should have gone earlier.
I should have said yes right then.
Uh, I had just taken on a new role.
I thought there were somenew challenges to, um,
to maybe explore, but astends to happen in publishing,

(13:15):
you get sold, you getbought, you get sold.
Things just didn't growto the way we wanted to.
So thank God, Kevin sentme another email in 2015,
basically sent me the samemessage where he said, Hey,
just wanted to check in,see how you feel now.
And I was like, let's talk.
And what that resultedin was, uh, I got to

(13:35):
focus on the content.
I got to write the scripts,review the product,
figure out the best way to film it,
make a product I was proudof on the video side,
and everything elseother people could handle
who were better at thingslike sales and business
and setting up whatever, allthe, all the multitude of, of,
of, of things you are notnecessarily good at when you're

(13:55):
just a nerd who wants to talkabout gadgets on YouTube.
So, I mean, it, it, it was a gift
and it continues to be a gift.
Anytime you have that opportunity, again,
you have to go for it.
Um, in my opinion,
and the thing that peoplealways ask is, well,
isn't it a bummer that,you know, you don't make
as much money as you couldif you were fully independent

(14:17):
because of the structure of my deal
with Mobile Nations, and thenwe were bought by future.
Yes. And it's like,yeah, well, I mean, true,
but I also get an enormousamount of benefits in return.
Like, you know, um, I don'tknow, health insurance.
It's weird. You talk to peoplewho don't live in the us,
they're like, why don'tyou just go on your own?
You're like, well, I tell you what, uh,
health insurance is a big deal.

(14:38):
These teeth are jacked up.
I need, I need a lot of dental care.
Um, it's, uh, retirementstuff, uh, having a budget
for things like a space
and like things that a largerentity can give you like,
that are really undervalued in this world
of most everybody being an individual.
So I'm happy to have found that balance.

(15:00):
And I do a lot of indiindividual stuff on the side.
So it's, it's great for meright now, but it is unique.
- There's a lot therethat I want to unpack.
The first of which is I,
I appreciate from a viewer'sperspective how it may seem
as if you are an independent creator,
because externally facingeverybody looks like that, right?
Mm-Hmm. , thereis nobody on YouTube who,

(15:21):
unless it's the, youknow, so-and-So, you know,
it's the sure microphone guy, whatever,
you know, whoever that is, right?
Like, yeah. Like that generallyends up being a nameless
person or, you know,hi, I'm Jeff from Sure.
Microphones, you're like,I don't know who that is.
I don't really care. It'sabout the microphone. Right?
I really appreciate that,despite what some may view
as a limitation, working undera brand's specific guidelines

(15:42):
and, and dare I say, restrictions,
you've still built somethingthat feels very uniquely you,
which I think also is a testament
to mobile nations now future,
and their ability to giveyou the space to grow that.
Yeah. So that it wasn't acorporation giving you a guideline
of this is how we presentourselves, this is what you do,
but giving you the space tosay, this is where we are.
This is where the world is.Help us bridge that gap.

(16:04):
And you were able to buildyour own unique space in that,
which I think is rare.
Uh, and more importantly, uh, unique.
- Yeah, it absolutely is.
And I, again, I said it before,but it was a gift. And yeah.
Um, just to be clear, like allthe creative that is all me,
you know, all the, all the writing,
all the shooting thesedays, all the editing,
it's all the content that peoplesee is all coming from me.

(16:25):
It's the support frameworkaround it that, um, you know,
that I have help with, which is
- Great.
Yeah. And healthcare is a pain in the
ass, so I get that too.
- Sure is, sure- Is . Um, woof.
Um, well that leads me to mynext topic, which is something
that you, you talk about a lot,
which is ethics and reviewing.
And you're very clear in your videos about
who's had the ability to approve.

(16:47):
Often, if, you know, I don'tthink anybody, maybe one
or two times you've evergiven somebody the ability
to give feedback on a video
before you've publishedit, maybe zero, once,
one time. Once, yep. Okay.
- Says, um, at and TI madeit. Okay. I regret it.
They made one change.
They made one change that didn't matter.
And I still regret it. ,
- But, but I think that's aninteresting line, which is not

(17:07):
to say that that creatorsthese days are more, um,
unethical in their reviews,
but you do see the line gettingblurrier sometimes with, um,
when creators are doing sponsored content
and they're really pushingthe content without fully
disclosing their relationship.
And even though the FCC hascome out here in the States
and has made requirements aboutwhen things are sponsored,
you sometimes see people sortof, you know, uh, flirt with

(17:29):
that line more than they should.
I know that ethics and reviewshas been an important part of
what you've done early on.
Was that a mandate from you? Or was
that a mandate from Mobile Nations?
Or how did that, how did
that line get drawn in the first place,
and how do you see thatevolution, uh, having grown today?
- Yeah, no, that was all, that was me.
Um, 'cause Mobile Nations did a lot,
like Mobile Nations had entireblogs that were dedicated

(17:50):
to just being the marketing arm of a,
of a company like CrackBerrywas very transparent about it.
But later, later in the game,
crackberry.com wasessentially the marketing arm
of Blackberry Mobile as tcl l So like no,
mobile Nations was, it was like on a
very case by case basis.
That stuff all came from me
because I was seeing at thetime, this sounds very, um,

(18:13):
you know, um, what do you callit, small and not meaningful.
Well, there's a word for that.
Insignificant, uh,insignificant or quaint.
That's the word I was going,this sounds very quaint now.
Yeah. Where it's like, like you
- And me, quaint- Indeed.
Yeah. Pardon me.
Let me stretch ,uh, my back .
Um, you know, my concern in those days was
what you were talkingabout, which is like, well,

(18:34):
people aren't really disclosing as clearly
that they're getting, you know,
at the time people wouldlight you up in the comments
for getting a review device for free.
They send you these phonesfor free, how can I trust you?
And it's like, that's just hilarious now.
Because at the time, of course,it was like, no, no, no.
Let me convey to you when one
of these shows up, am I excited?
Yes. But it is work showing up to my door,

(18:56):
and I have 8,500 phones.
Like the, the value of thesethings has just fallen to zero
for, for somebody like us. And you have
- To send most of them back, I- Presume you used to.
And now most manufacturersdon't want the logistical
hassle of asking for them back.
So No, they just pile up.
But you're not reallyallowed to sell them.
So you're just like, well, all right,
I'm just surrounded by crap.

(19:16):
Uh, . But okay.
To, to, to go back to your,to your earlier, like, to,
to your actual question, um, the,
the conversation shiftedover the last eight years
and people who used toget into the content space
to share a, an opinion, um,
and to make money based onincidental AdSense kind of ads,

(19:42):
um, they now, a a, a great, many of them,
and I say this without anyjudgment, this is just a great,
many of them have realized
that brands will pay them directly now.
And so rather than making, um,um, a review video say of a,
I don't know, a pick anelectric vacuum or a,
or a social robot or a,

(20:02):
or a smartphone, you can getmoney directly from the brand.
You can make a video thatis effectively a commercial.
And if you, if youraudience is cool with that,
well then you can have it both ways.
You can make content thatyou have a good time making
and you can get paid by a brand to do it.
And I think once thattipping point sort of started

(20:24):
to happen, it really accelerated quickly.
And now, I would say that's,that's the majority of, of
people on YouTube in thisspace of a notable name.
They do that at least some of the time.
And again, zero judgment from me.
Like, one of the benefits of being backed
by a large institutionis that I don't have
to worry about making money every week.
I don't have to worry about like, well,

(20:44):
if I don't take this offer from Samsung
to do a paid S 24 Ultra video,then I'm not gonna be able
to pay my rent or buy a newcamera or buy something.
Right? So it's just amatter of everybody setting,
setting their ethical thresholdsand disclosing adequately.
It has created kind ofa wild west situation
where you do have to, that's what's made

(21:05):
disclosure so important.
'cause before it was assumed that, well,
you're probably like apretend journalist, right?
You're probably doing thison the, and it's like, no.
Now everybody has setstheir own thresholds.
And I, people call me ajournalist and I reject it
'cause I'm not, um, the verge gets dragged
through the mud all the timeby hardcore nerds who are angry
with them for one reason or another.

(21:25):
But you look at their ethics policy
and they can't even take travel.
Like I see my friends whowork at the Verge at events
and they're like, yeah, we had
to stay at this crappy hotel down the road
because we couldn't take the travel
and lodging part of this,whatever this press junket was.
I take that, and I've said this
in my ethics policy the whole time.
I'm like, guys, I'm nota capital J journalist.
I will accept sponsored travel.

(21:46):
In fact, if a brand isoffering me sponsored travel,
I will be like, how, howlong is it business class?
Let's talk about me beingcomfortable in a chair
so I can actually work on the way there.
So, you know, another example of all
of us drawing our linesdifferently, and that's all Okay.
As long as you're transparent about it.
And when I made that thefocus of my, my ethics policy,

(22:09):
I think that's what peopleresonated the most with.
And it's not like, notlike you're the most
impartial perfect dude.
It's just like, anytime there'ssomething I think you should
know, you're gonna know it.
Which is just absurd sometimes.
'cause I'll get to the endof a video and I'll be like,
Motorola provided travel lodgingand, uh, one steak dinner
and two drinks, uh, , you
- Know, and they were watered down

(22:30):
and frankly, I could havesent them back, but I didn't,
'cause I was trying to bepolite to the bartender
who was working purely for tips. .
- Yeah, exactly. Right. Andit's like, okay, well, yeah,
you, you decide how muchdisclosure is too much then too.
So, you know, it's, um,it's a, it's a wild west.
I'm a little disappointed, I'll say.
Like, I did not get into this space
to make commercials for brands.
That is not what I want to do. Sure.

(22:51):
It's not ever what I, it'snot what makes me happy.
What makes me happy is sharing an opinion
that I genuinely hold
and being able to try topack it up with facts.
Um huh And
- Sharing you opinionated.
- That's right. Yeah.
It's, my brother will askme a couple times a year,
why don't you just go work for Samsung?
I'm like, it's 'cause I don't want
to do that. You know? It's like,
- No, that's not the same thing at all.

(23:12):
No, it's not. Yeah, I get that.
Um, you and I have, I, I should disclose,
we have worked in the past a couple
of times on various stuff.
This is not a paid sponsorship. Right.
Um, thank goodness for that.
I think we're almost, uh, dare I say,
genuinely, uh, friends. Um,
- Yeah.
I'm still waiting on that check, Jason.
- Yeah. Well, you keep dodgingmy calls . Um, pay me.
But I, I appreciate that thereis also a change in the world

(23:36):
of how, you know, tech reviews are done,
reviews broadly are done right.
As you said, like, youknow, it's one thing
to hold an ethics line, it'sanother not to be a journalist.
Those things can, can sort ofshift and change over time.
Mm-Hmm. ,um, with that, though,
you are now a co-founder in an
actual physical product, right.
Clicks, which is a way
to bring back the physicalkeyboard, which I love.

(23:57):
Yeah. , um, stillwaiting for, still waiting
for my free case as a friend,but yeah, that's fine.
It's no big deal. I didn't really want
- One anyway, but it's- No big deal.
Um, you're on the list,
but more importantly Yeah, I'm, I'm sure.
But, but more importantly,um, I think it's interesting
that you've made the leapfrom reviewer to founder.
Mm-Hmm. . Um,I know firsthand your love
of the old Blackberry,uh, uh, physical keyboard.

(24:19):
You like that physical response, right?
Not that you don't love your iPhones,
but you know, there'ssomething about having a,
a physical keyboard to tap on
that I know brings you immense joy.
Yes. I just as an aside, hadthe very first Droid phone,
the Motorola Droid
- 2009- Specifically because Oh, yes.
Specifically because ithad a physical keyboard.
And then when I moved to theiPhone four SI had about a

(24:43):
week's worth of, uh, Idon't know how to do this.
This is very strange. Mythumbs feel very clumsy.
And then it clicked and I never went back.
- It clicked. Indeed. It,
- There you go.
So my first question is, beforewe talk about the genesis
of the product, do you findyou can type faster on a
physical keyboard with your thumbs? No,
- It's not about speed.
Um, okay. It's, it is mostdefinitely about everything else.

(25:04):
So it is my new fidget toy.
So since you brought upspeed, I use Monkey type.
Have you heard of this? It's, I have not.
It's a website that's justbasically gives you your typing
speed and accuracy, and it'svery clean and it's very fun.
That's my new like fidget toywhen I'm on a conference call
that's too long and whatever,
and I just, I just startdoing typing tests.
So I'm at about 60 words perminute on Clicks, and that's,

(25:25):
- So the next time we'reon a long call and I hear,
- You know, that is then, you know, yeah.
Shut the hell up. Let me talk uh,
active listening folks.
Um, so look, 60 is, isis fast enough for me.
What, what I will say is
that I don't mind beingslower on a physical keyboard
because typically ifI'm using the physical
keyboard, I'm doing it.

(25:46):
I'm, I'm writing aboutsomething I care about, not,
I'm not just bangingsomething out real quick,
like a quick email re response.
I'm doing a journal entry,or I'm doing a long email,
or I'm doing some, some script writing.
Um, and the benefits you get from Clicks
are the iOS shortcuts thatare baked into the iPhone.
So you can just navigatethe system using the keys

(26:07):
and not get your thumbs in the way
of the interface elements,
which has always been the dumbest thing.
This is one of the reasonsI love the Palm pri,
because you, that gesturearea, you didn't have
to get your hand in theway of what you were doing.
You can do that again. And also, um,
the tactility I mentioned before,
but like, group chats, veryannoying, very annoying
to be in a group chatand have all that context

(26:27):
and then pop up a virtual keyboard
that eats up all that context.
You're like, stop.
Give me the whole screen,
the virtual keyboard when itpops up now on other phones.
I'm like, Ugh. Ugh.
Why even have a screen thisbig if you're gonna cover up
half of it with a VKV? So, um, look,
- This is the definition
of a first world problembeing solved. I love this.

(26:47):
- That has been mycareer for over a decade.
Jason, now hey, welcome backto first world problems.
Let's talk about this volume rocker
and how it's kind ofmushy. Stay tuned. Oh my
- Gosh.
I think, I think we finallyhave our podcast together.
First world problems withMichael and Jason. There you
- Go. What's the problem with that?
- No, no, not nothing at all, in fact.
But I, I love
and appreciate that,that this is a product

(27:07):
that is not just, um,it's not just something
that you're doing to make money, right?
Because we do see a lot of creators
who are looking out in theworld and they're going,
how do I add to my monetization strategy?
Well, there's merch, right?Uh, t-shirts and hoodies
and coffee cups, right?
These are low hanging fruit
that any drop shipper can do for me.
Right? You actually went with a team.
You built a physical product.

(27:28):
So you didn't just found a company.
You founded a company anditerated on solving a problem,
which is the, the heart of any startup.
Mm-Hmm. . Andthen you launched it and,
and I, I will call out,you had a video about it.
You were very clear about,
this is something that I've worked on.
This is something I haveownership in. Right.
We drew that ethical linevery straightforward. Yes.
Um, and it seems like the market

(27:48):
response has been pretty positive.
You guys ran outta your first run
and you're waiting on your second, right?
- Yep. Founders edition soldout very happy about that.
We expected that. We didn't expect
it to happen quite as quickly.
And, um, you know, we're, weare hitting the deadlines,
almost all the deadlines weannounced, uh, to begin with.
And this is just, but it'sbeen such an education.
Like it doesn't matterif you are on schedule.

(28:10):
If people wait long enoughfor something that they want,
which very grateful they want it,
they will consider you late.
And then you will get a lot of, uh,
you'll get a lot of pushback about that.
And then you will run intoproblems that you're not allowed
to talk about because
of reasons you're notallowed to talk about.
And I will stop the sentencebefore I reveal a secret.
Uh, but like, it's like, guys,these are all good things.

(28:30):
We're not, we don't haveissues with the product,
but like, we have to solvethese problems if we want to
deliver the best product we can.
And I can't tell you aboutit, but please just trust me.
You're gonna get the thingand you're gonna love it.
But it's such a strange world
to be on the exactopposite side of the table
and to be like, yeah.
You know, uh, yeah. Jason, I'm
glad you brought up the word Blackberry.
We don't really, uh, talk muchabout Blackberry, you know?

(28:53):
'cause it's not really,it's a new thing, right?
Let's talk about the iPadand its magic keyboard.
And I start to do like the spingame where it's like, let's,
let's, let's get back to the kbs.
And it's so weird
to not be the guy who's just beenlike, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
All right. Yeah. Cut thebs. Just tell me it's you.
So you made a Blackberryfor the iPhone. Yeah. Go.
It's good, right? This is good. My goal,
- I gotta tell you, being thisis the first time I've been
on this side of theconversation with you, Uhhuh.

(29:15):
'cause usually I'm theone working at the startup
or the big company, ,
and we've brought youin for something, right?
And to be the guy who'slike, yeah, yeah, yeah.
It's Blackberry for aniPhone. I, I, I get it.
I understand how, howfreeing this must be for you.
It's addictive. Wherecan I get more drugs?
Like my God, ,
- It's so great.
It's so great every singletime to, to come into a room.
And that's one of thethings I truly still enjoy,

(29:35):
is like coming into a room withpeople who've made something
and been like, got it.
What do you got for me? Okay. That's cool.
That's compelling. Have you,have you thought about this?
Oh, and that's another thing.
The briefings themselves, the number
of questions you get from, fromjournalists or creators or,
or Inbetweeners who are justlike, did you somebody,
I think the 47th person

(29:55):
of the day asked us at CESDid you think about making
it a slider instead?
So it's not always so long.
And Kevin CrackBerry Kevin,who is also, who's a co-founder
of Clicks with me, has hadgotten so fed up by this point.
He was just like, you. No, no,
we never thought of that at all.
. But it was, itwas a cool, like, it's,
it's been a fun learningexperience to for sure to be,

(30:17):
to be on this side of things.
- Well, I'm glad. Are you,um, are you finding the role
of founder or co-founder in this case, uh,
to be one you might continue to pursue?
Or is this really unique andspecific to this product?
- You know, I'd like to,
but it's, again, it, part
of the learning experienceis learning what you're,
what you're good at, no matterwhat you're doing, right?
You're, there's things you'regood at and you like doing,

(30:39):
and then there's things youhave to put up with doing.
And I'm learning, um,
as we get into almost ayear now of my involvement
with this, with this, uh, outfit
that when I joineddidn't even have an name
or corporate structure.
Uh, what I'm learning is
that I don't like the operational stuff.
I like the nitty gritty product stuff.

(31:00):
And this will not surprise you. Like the,
I like talking about, well,
what font are we gonna use on the P to
and how are we gonna differentiate the
apostrophe from the comma?
And where are we gonna put the period?
And like, how big should this be?
I like product design stuff. Ilike product iteration stuff.
So I think what I do inthe future will be more,
if I do more of thisstuff, it'll be more that

(31:22):
and internal testing.
And, you know, that's beenthe thing I've done the most,
been the in-house reviewer tobe like, how does this feel?
Does this sucker? Is it great?
So yeah, that's more, morestuff that I'd like to,
there's not a really, anentrepreneurial bone in my body.
I'm not, uh, and,
and again, it goes backto my earlier point.
That's why you partner withthe right people, right.
Partner with people whohave the skills. You don't.
- A hundred percent. Uh, well,

(31:43):
and I don't think there's a founder I know
who would ever claim
that they can do thewhole thing themselves
because, um, that's insane.
And more importantly, um,everybody has a specialty.
And your specialty is of course,on the product side, it's
where you've been forall these years as well
as the evangelist side.
Yep. But you may not be an operations guy,
you may not be a finance guy.
And those are, you know,you may not be the guy
who integrates all those teams

(32:04):
and sort of gels the, the machine.
Right. Those are very differentskill sets I kept. Totally.
Um, yeah, we can havethat conversation anytime.
That's been my worldfor most of my career.
Um, I'm still learninghow to do your career. Um,
- Well, I admire that.
No, yeah, because it is, it's so hard
and it's, it's under celebrated.
Again, like I said before,all the, the architecture
of like in the creatorspace, all the people
who make the creator able to do the thing.

(32:26):
Like all the people who on a film set
who support the actors on screen.
I just had a film shoot acrossfrom my apartment the other
night, and there were, oh my God, 85 crew
to two actor, three actors.
And it was like, I, you know,you never, it never ceases
to surprise me anew.
I've been on plenty of sets,

(32:47):
but how much, how big thatratio, that disparity is
and how little thosepeople are ever thought of,
- Uh, and, and howlittle they're paid. Um,
- Indeed. Which,
- Yeah, I also don'tmiss, but I, I'm with you.
I think my feeling is, uh,I think similar to yours in
that I feel very lucky whereI've been in my career.
Um, you know, you talk about,you know, turning down a job,

(33:08):
I dunno if you know this, Iturned down the job at Hulu when
I was 23 before accepting it.
I didn't know that a dayor so later. Uh, yeah.
So, so, um, uh, sidebarstory time, I guess. Yeah.
Um, so I, I moved to LA when I was 23.
Um, I got a job
through a family friendat Dick Clark Productions
where I was a pa and Iworked on the American Music

(33:28):
Awards of 2007.
Wow. I, uh, I worked onthe, uh, new Year's Rock
and Eve with Ryan Seacrest.
Uh, and the, that's,that's filmed by the way,
those, at least it was then.
Um, all the things that yousee where they cut to the stage
with like Fergie dancing with 150 people,
those are all filmed weeks before.
Huh. Interesting. In asurprise to nobody .
Um, and I, while I was workingthere, uh, temp agency,

(33:51):
I'd signed up for assoon as I'd gotten to la
and this is, by the way, duringthe writer strike of 2007.
So our mutual dream oflike stardom and stage
and screen, like none ofthat was happening then.
I was barely making anymoney. Mm-Hmm. .
Um, the temp agencysent me on an interview
for a company nobody hadheard of called Hulu.
And their whole thing was,we're taking media from DVDs
and we're making it available online.
And I was like, oh,that's, I get, I get that.

(34:12):
I can do that. Yeah. Um,and they offered me the job,
but the guy who offered me thejob from the temp agency was
basically, they wereworking on commission.
And so he was just like, okay,so you're taking the job.
I'm like, well, no.Like, you know, I know.
It's, it's, it's temp to hire
and I know I need a minute tolike, you know, just process
that I've got this great,I'm not making any money,
but I'm working at a production company.
I feel like this is thebeginning of my Hollywood story.

(34:33):
I really just wanna, you know,think about it for a minute.
And he got his boss on the phone
who was in typical Hollywood fashion,
just berated the hell out of me.
Of course. And so I basicallysaid, F you and hung up.
- Good - For you. And, andthen about an hour later,
the hiring director at Hulu called me
and was like, yeah,they're just being jerks.
Like, just call me tomorrow. It's no big
deal, . And I was like, oh,
- Oh,- Okay.
And then I slept on it and thenext day was like, you know,

(34:55):
I could probably work there for
a few months and make some money.
Sure. I'll take the job.And then that was the end
of my traditional Hollywood career.
- , you know what?
It's gone really well for you since,
so I'm think you made the right call.
I'm glad you you, I'm glad you made
that made the reversal so quickly though,
- Honestly.
Uh, candidly, me too. Forany number of reasons,
not the least of which was23-year-old Jason was stupid.
Oh, was that guy was Yeah.

(35:16):
- 20. Yeah. Yeah.
No, I'm glad that I am not on the path
that 23-year-old me would'veset me on for sure. Yeah.
- Those guys were, thoseguys were not bright.
They had some work,thought they were bright
- Work to do. Absolutely. Yeah.
- Yeah. Yeah. Plus I hadn't
really figured out the haircut yet.
I got the part down, but like, the same.
- Anyway,- It doesn't make sense.
- .- Alright.

(35:36):
Well now that, that we'reoff track, I, I want
to bring us back to theconversation around, um, some
of the nitty gritty of what you do.
And the first thing I I, Iwanna jump into is editing.
So, uh, recently chatted withour good friend Kevin Nether.
Yes. Kevin Te Ninja. Yes.
Um, and he and I were talkingabout retention, editing
and how that has become somethingthat for a minute was sort
of the meta of YouTube.

(35:57):
The idea being that,you know, you're editing
with this constant attractionof what's coming next
and this constant, youknow, sort of stay tuned.
'cause then we're gonnabe talking about this
and, you know, let me reveal this.
You know, you've seen the $1 duck,
now here's the $1 million golden duck.
Kind of crazy that we now see the Mr.
Beast ification ofYouTube in a certain way.
Um, you have neverreally fallen into that.

(36:18):
In fact, the structure ofyour stories have been very
narratively driven ratherthan being, um, sort of,
um, enticing.
Uh, and not to say
that those videos aren'tnarratively driven so much
as they're much moresort of, um, pandering,
I would say is maybe not the kindest word,
but perhaps the most honest.
Um, as you see these, you know,uh, uh, editing waves come

(36:39):
and go, these different sortof themes throughout the,
the course of the last decade.
Um, do you ever find yourselfsort of more attracted
to those kinds of, uh, pushesand pulls riding those waves
and seeing if that helps build your brand?
Or is it more you stick with what you know
and it has proven to work well for you?
- No, you know, there are ways there,
there are many ways I wouldlike to change the nature

(37:02):
of the content that I produce.
Um, there's a lot ofoptimization I would like
to do if given the resourcesand the, and the time
and frankly the personal bandwidth.
'cause I, I do a lot ofother things, but no editing.
That, that is neversomething I've geeked out on
or I love all the tools YouTube gives you.
I love that. I can look second by second
and see where people's attention is.

(37:24):
And it always looks like this.It's always a diminishing
thing over time because that'sjust how every video goes.
People tune out and there'salways a monster dip
where the sponsor segment isthat you had to put in there
and then, then they come back
and then you're like, okay, cool.
And my retention, I'vealways been satisfied with,
it's always been above average.
And what that has said to me over time is
that what I am doing works.

(37:44):
And it is a narrative structure.
Like you say, I try andtell a, a story every time,
which sounds pretentious andsounds also overly complicated,
but really, you don'tneed much for a story.
You need a beginning, a middle, and an end
and a review template as meaningless
as the word review hasbecome, still gives you that,
that opportunity to tella very simple story.
Here's the thing. Is it good? Let's see.

(38:06):
It's not good, it's bad. Please subscribe.
Like, you know, whatever, you know, um, and, and,
and that template is flexible enough
to let you do all kinds
of fun interpretations for a while there.
You know, we saw, I thinkpandemic jumpstarted a lot of us.
Uh, it's certainly like DavidCogan, the Unlocker, one

(38:27):
of my favorite dudes personal friend, uh,
started doing all these,um, real world tests
where he would take productsto interesting venues to test.
And he still does them today.Those are still reviews.
Um, so it is, it's really a matter of,
and what I decided to do was just focus,
lean harder into the narrative.
'cause people appreciate a nice cinema

(38:48):
to graphically complex shot from me.
And they like, you know,the sound of my voice.
But what most people reallyare there for is the,
is the structure of the script.
Um, so yeah, I I havenot concerned myself with
making my content look anything like Mr.
Beast. Uh,

(39:09):
and it, I had
to look up retention editingto be honest with you.
Um, just 'cause I haven't, but,
but you know, that charitably
or, um, frankly that has, that has led
to a degree of stagnancy.
Again, I'd like to change things up.
It is time to change things up.
Um, but I've been doing this a long time
and you have to get otherpeople's ideas in the mix.

(39:32):
'cause you eventually do runout of, of inspiration. Right.
- Well, I have an idea.What about a plucky co-host
with a pair of glassesand, uh, an attitude?
Uh, and you can talkabout adopting me Mm-Hmm.
As if it's season eight ofsome long running. I was gonna
- Say this sounds like TGIF. Yeah. Yeah.
- I think there mightbe some legs in there.
I'm thinking of four different shows

(39:52):
that have all used this plot line. Yeah.
- And then in like, after two years,
if it's not working out, we send you
upstairs and you never comeback home. Right, right.
- Yeah. Right. Or you'djust use the same B roll
of me coming down waving
and going right back up thestairs in the same shots
or in the same, you know,segments over and over again.
- That's all you need. Yeah, exactly.
- Hey guys, I can't have a real name.
It's gotta be like seven or three
- .
Yeah. Yeah. We couldbreak that out. I think.

(40:13):
Let's talk offline about that. Yeah,
- Great, great.
, you know, Ijust, I I'm always looking
for new opportunities, I thinkis really the important thing
that is, we're makingthis about me, you and me.
But, um, what you, so, so the,the structure of the script
dictates how you buildright from beginning to end.
Mm-Hmm. , takeme through a little bit.
Like, if, if somebodyasked you to sit down

(40:34):
and teach a masterclass on how you script,
just gimme the, the, the main points.
Like what would be the thingsyou would offer new creators
in terms of how to thinkabout their scripting?
- Get in the shower and don'ttake your phone in with you.
Uh, the shower is like one of the, can I
- Just say that's just goodadvice broadly, like, just
- Don't take phone the shower.
You would be surprised how often I

(40:54):
do not follow that advice.
My phone is a constant shower companion
and it ruins my last, I toldyou they have too many phones.
What else am I gonna do?Uh, it's where I store them.
No, uh, I,
- I can't be good for the batteries
- .
Um, I have had some ofthe best creative ideas
of my life in the shower, um,
because I, uh, it is an isolation booth.

(41:18):
I am there without distractions,
without people can't reach me,
and I am just there with my own thoughts.
So really, and if, ifwhatever the equivalent
of a shower is in your life,go to that isolation booth.
Go to that space where you'renot looking at your phone
and let your brain kindof like a sponge, kind of
decompress, kind of unpack itself

(41:39):
after having been squeezed by, uh,
by these constant disruptions.
And you will find that
that solves a lot of your, your,
your creative problemswhen it, when it comes
to writing a script, becauseit's not actually all that hard
to use a thing for a week,maintain a list of good and bad,

(42:00):
and then assemble that cohesively.
I think what's difficult is assembling
it in a way that's interesting.
And I don't always dothat. Well, the Lord knows.
I mean, you can tellwhen I'm pressed for time
and I have to crush fivedays of work into two days
because of whatever, you know,
you'll see it in the comments even.
It's like, didn't think you, uh,
didn't really think yougave this one your all.
And I'm like, I didn't.Thank you for noticing.
Appreciate it. Um,
because it's about morethan sounding pretty,

(42:22):
and it's about more than pretty shots.
It's about telling a story
that's worth telling orthat people wanna hear.
And that's why the writing is the
most important part, to be honest.
The writing and the, and the delivery.
Um, I always said like,have something worth saying
or have a different way of saying it.
I don't always have something new to say.
If you look at my reviewconclusions, they are very often

(42:44):
what other people have said.
Um, I just, I I sometimeshave a different way
of saying it, and I thinkthat's why it works.
- I remember some years ago, uh,
everybody on the same day suddenly had a
review for a Dyson vacuum.
- Oh my God. Yeah. Butthey weren't reviews. They
- Were sponsor.
I don't know that youdid. I don't Hell, was
- That you guys too?
No, it was, it was Bonko.It was, uh, okay. Yeah.

(43:04):
It was a big sponsor campaign. Yeah.
- Um, but I do remember that.
And, and, and I rememberhow everybody magically came
to the same conclusion abouthow great of a vacuum it was.
And I think that was the,that was, I think right
before the FCC came downwith its mandate about,
you know, sponsored content.
And people were, they weren't,not saying it was sponsored,
but it was like buried in minuteeight of a 12 minute video

(43:26):
that's like, and Dyson supportedthis video by sending it
to us and, you know, blah,blah, blah. Yeah. Um,
- It's, I love that aboutthe FTC rules, though.
They do have to say like,you're not allowed to do,
- I keep saying Ft Cyou're right. It's the ftc
- Yeah.
Federal trade. Yeah.
And, you know, you've gottaput those disclosures up front.
You've gotta be as clear as possible.
I'm like, look, nobody gets it right all
of a hundred percent of the time,
but, you know, you've gottamake a good faith effort

(43:47):
to understand people, understandwhere you're coming from.
- Totally. I, I just think it'sinteresting in relevance to
what you were saying amoment ago about, like,
sometimes it's really hard when you come
to the same conclusion as
everybody, everybody'ssaying it differently.
And we've seen so many instances
where everybody says it thesame way, the same time.
It's like those super cutsyou see on TikTok of, uh,
you know, the, all the news Sinclair
saying the same thing, the same,

(44:07):
- This is extremely dangerousto our democracy. Yes. Yes.
- Yep. Um, and as is,as is sponsored content
that is all suddenly, uh,in support of one product
that's just magically greatfor everybody. So Indeed,
- Yeah.
But it is tricky. But yeah,no, but like to get, yeah.
Not the ethical side ofthat, but you're right,
the creative side of it andthe thing where you're often,
you're held to the sameembargo date, right?

(44:27):
So even if it's not asponsored content, right,
you've gotta, you don't have
to publish at the embargo timeon April 11th at, you know,
four 30 in the afternoon,
but if you don't, you'regiving up some time.
You're, you're, you'reletting everyone else run away
with the audience and you're,
you're not there in the conversation.
So that's a strategic decision.
It's not always good topublish at embargo time.
You can make that call, uh,on a case by case basis,

(44:49):
but it is fatiguing
to watch the same review if effectively
come out of 12 mouths.
And that's, look, if everyone'sdone the same work and this,
and come to the sameconclusions, that's one thing.
But to be entertaining, whichis part of the job on YouTube,
you gotta come up with adifferent way to deliver it again.
Sure. I don't always succeedat that. I always try.

(45:11):
- Well, I get it. But whenyou were coming up, um,
and I will call out that thisis around the same time that,
uh, I was at, um, unboxed,
which was the company I was a part of that
that eventually got acquired by Facebook.
Yeah. Um, just sliding that in there,
apparently about my bona days.
Um, bragging
- It up here on the airwaves. All right.
- It's what I do. .
Um, but I, I, one of thethings I remember about

(45:33):
that time was that there wasa very clear hierarchy within
the tech review space offolks who were at the top
of their game, who were well respected.
You didn't have the biggest following,
but you certainly had one ofthe most respected followings,
um, along with lots of otherfolks that are, are, you know,
friends of ours and friends of the show.
And then there was anupcoming class of folks, some
of whom are still producingcontent like our friend Al Hefe

(45:54):
and others who have fallen off the map.
Yeah. But it does seem to methat we're reaching a point now
as we are with many otherverticals in spaces like YouTube,
where there's kind of analmost oversaturation of
that talent, right?
Mm-Hmm. Like, there's a lot of people now
who have very good relationshipswith brands who can do ale,
you know, do an embargoed release
of a review at around the same time.

(46:14):
So it used to be you'dsee 12 or 15 reviews.
Now you're seeing maybe a hundred,
maybe 150 released at the same time.
Mm-Hmm. Do you think myview on that, just to,
to offer my thought there,is that's actually good,
because I think it forcescreativity from people who've been
around for a while becauseit's a little easier to go
to the next person whohas a different viewpoint

(46:36):
or is just sort of adifferent tone of voice,
even if I'm hearingroughly the same review
as the guy I used to listento all the time, uh, or woman.
Because actually seeing morewomen in tech reviews is
also a trend we're seeingright now. Thank goodness.
- Yeah. Thank you. Whatlong overdue. Yeah.
- Right. My question toyou is, does that pressure
and the now sort ofsaturation of the vertical
that you're in give you creativeimpetus to try new things

(46:58):
and to sort of push envelopes?
Or do you feel like, again,
like other waves like wewere talking about, like
with retention, editing, likejust keep doing what I'm doing
and I I I know that my audiencewill be there when I'm,
you know, when all is said and done.
- Yeah, so that's no, uh, it's,it's more internally driven.
It's not, it's not that Ifeel pressure externally
that much in this way.
I feel it in other ways. Okay.

(47:19):
Um, what it is is that,buddy, I just can't,
I actually said this almostverbatim in my S 24 Ultra
review at right at the top.
I said, I just can't have thesame conversation anymore.
I cannot do the thing whereit's just like intro set up,
hardware, software, camera samples.
Is it good? Is it bad? Should you buy

(47:40):
it, please, like, and subscribe.
I can't do that anymore.
And that is
what is driving the impetus to change.
And that's why you start seeing, you know,
people will be like, it's really funny.
Marquez, um, M-K-B-H-Dsaid he wasn't gonna do a,
I think it was a one plus 12 review,
which was Yeah, a fun coincidence.

(48:00):
'cause I had never planned
to do a one plus 12 review either.
Um, he has a much largerfollowing than I do.
And so when his audience gotangry with him as some did
with me for skipping thatphone, um, it was my perception.
I haven't talked to him aboutthis, so I might be wrong,
but it was my perception thathe essentially got bullied
into it, uh, becauseenough people complained
and said, he shouldn'tbe skipping this phone if
he's gonna cover asmany phones as he does.

(48:21):
And he did. But I, that was, um,
that was a test I was notlooking forward to facing,
because I was gonnastand up to, to people.
And again, my, becausemy audience is smaller,
I think it never reached a critical mass.
And because people are alreadyused to me covering kind
of weird out there, foldablesold phones, it not as many
of them expected me to do it.

(48:41):
But that was the perfectexample of a phone
where I was like, thisphone is last year's phone.
What are you talking about?And, you know, they fixed
a big problem with itthat I did complain about.
But again, I just can't, Icouldn't get up the motivation
to tell a story about it.
And I think once I gavemyself that permission
to just be like, you know what,no, we're not gonna do that.

(49:02):
Instead I'm gonna tell you about,
I'm gonna bring out anotherepisode of wind phones.
Were fun and we're gonna talkabout a Samsung phone from
2006, or, you know, this past week,
like whatever was hot this past week.
I don't know, apple Vision Pro.
Not that we're not gonna cover that.
I'm gonna show you this AI voice recorder
that sticks on the back of yourphone and it's kind of janky
and you shouldn't buy it because it's new.

(49:24):
It's interesting to me. Itis, it is not the same thing.
It's not the 18th iterationof another fricking rectangle.
So, um, that is another,
that is a benefit you getwhen you have an audience that
has a large enough criticalmass that they will show up.
This is to your other point,that they will show up
because they've beenshowing up for a long time

(49:45):
because they think you havesomething valuable to offer.
And you can be kind of like,
you can alternate yourofferings in terms of video.
Uh, Sara Deci said this, Idon't know if she was the first,
but, uh, one for you, one for me.
You know, you can alternatethose, those things.
You're like, here, here you go, guys.

(50:05):
iPhone, iPhone 84, here's,here's a 12 minute video
that took way too long to make, and,
but next week we're gonna betalking about a Bluetooth Star
Trek combat badge, and you'regonna like it, you know,
or else or Yeah.
Or you're not gonna watchit. Well, that's okay. Right.
- I dig that. I, I think that speaks, um,
as we were talking about at the beginning
of our conversation to thecreative side as well as to the,

(50:28):
the, you know, the reasonable,
I gotta produce contentkind of side, which is yeah.
You know, you can't, ifyou get creatively bored,
then you're not reallybeing true to yourself.
Right. You haven't takenthat shower time to just sort
of like re rebrand yourbrain a little bit into
that totally space of, you know,
I can't keep doing this anymore.
- Yeah.- Yeah. I'm not sure that
what I just said made any sense,
but I know that, uh,emotionally, you feel me there.

(50:49):
- No, I definitely do. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I just, it's whatever I,the, the words didn't matter.
You and I were vibe seven
- Blue, 45 Fish sticks, . You get
- It.
Yeah, I do. Yeah. Yeah.
- Um, well, you talked aboutAI a little bit earlier.
I mean, I, I know other folksuse it in their production,
you know, developing shorts.
Um, do you, do you have AI tools
that you employ as part of your process?

(51:09):
Or are you pretty much allorganic from, you know, your,
your, your brain andyour, your work ethic?
- There's this, uh, greatmoment in the Battlestar Gal
miniseries where the, uh,the commander of the ship
is leading a tour through the ship
and the Secretary ofEducation is like, well,
we're gonna, this is gonna be a museum.
We're gonna have to get somenetwork, uh, computers in here.
And he's just like, uh,

(51:30):
there will never be a networkedcomputer system on this ship
as long as I'm in command.
Is that clear? She's like, yeah, uh, yeah.
There will never be, um,purely AI generated content
from me, uh, reaching,reaching people like in,
in that particular way.
I, I think on the whole,
and I'm gonna come full circle on this.
This isn't just an old man rent,

(51:51):
but like on the whole,AI is driving a, a race
to the bottom in terms of quality.
I mean, it was already tooeasy to make lazy content.
You could just outragepeople or confuse them, um,
or appear to be authentic whenin fact, being misinformed.
Uh, I don't like TikTok is whatI'm saying. Um, but

(52:12):
- Shocking fucking- .
I don't even know if I'mallowed to swear on this,
but I'm so incensed. Go with it.
- Yeah. - Um, it was alreadyeasy enough to make trash
and AI has made it even easierto make trash that looks,
that has the, the veneerof something of, of value.
Um, but really there's, there'sno substance underneath it.
Now, as tools, as production tools,

(52:34):
I will say I've seen itused very effectively.
Um, Kevin, Kevin, neither actually.
He may have mentioned this'cause I don't know if
you've run your last episode.
I've been looking for it with him.
- By the time you, uh, by thetime this goes live it will be
- Live.
It'll be up. Okay. Well, he
may have mentioned this in that episode.
I'm looking forward to it.'cause he blew my mind.
One of the biggest challengeswe have on site, if we go

(52:56):
to a location for content production, is
that you can't get goodquality microphone audio
if you're doing voiceover.
And he created an AI voicemodel of himself, um, which is
so good that really all he needs
to do is type in what he wanted to say.
And that AI voice, uh, it'sindistinguishable from him,
at least in the contextof an Instagram reel.

(53:18):
Uh, would I ever do it for YouTube video?
Maybe if it got good enough. I don't know.
My voice is such a bigcomponent of, of what I like
to include.
I don't know. But that'sa great example of ai.
Oh my God, that solves,that solves a big problem.
I don't have to be in a hotelblanket fort under blankets
between two beds whisperinginto a microphone.

(53:39):
Right. You just type it in.
Um, same thing for, youknow, I, I don't do this,
but I think people who needsummaries, people who want
to aggregate all their thoughts, um, and,
and let chat P two do it for, I,
I don't have any problemwith, with any of that.
It's just, I think it'svery tempting to overuse it.
And we're already seeingwhat happens with that.
We got pitched the otherday for a click, uh, for a,

(54:01):
a version of Clicks for, I don't know,
some other phone that's not the iPhone.
And it was this like3000 word screed that was
well formatted and arguedfor, I think a good idea.
But like three quarters ofthe way through it, I'm like,
why do I feel like I'm justeating empty calories here?
Why do I feel like I'm just going

(54:22):
to all this effort for not much return?
And at the end, the guy disclosed,he's like, I used it, uh,
chey to write this, butI think it's pretty good.
I'm like, of, of course.Because, because why?
Because it can only do what's come.
Before I wasn't actuallyreading anything new.
So I was at a, this is mylast thing I'll say about it
'cause this is moreanswer than you needed.

(54:43):
But, um, I was at a tech event.
I won't say who hosted it
'cause I don't know if thiswas live streamed or not,
but the CEO of this giant silicon company
was like asked about AI
and this CEO is famous for kindof saying what's on his mind
and not adhering to a script.
And he says, I don't know.

(55:03):
The AI thing to me is, itfeels very much like a bubble.
Does, doesn't it feelthat way to anybody else?
, I'm like everyone else on stage
who had spent like two hourstalking about the AI elements
of their new chip was like, I
- You are watching a stock price drop
in real time. Yeah. Yeah.
- But that's how it feels tome. Like, like there's a lot

(55:24):
of utility to it.
It's certainly a new era.
Certainly I'll be covering a lot
of AI hardware on my channel,
but I I I think it's more seductive.
It's seductive more oftenthan it is actually useful.
And I think the moreit's overused, the worse
content we will get out of it.

(55:44):
- I agree with that. I, I,
I appreciate your commentsabout the race to the bottom
because I do see that in some instances
that's very much the case.
I, I, and I also agree that chat GBT
and tools like it make production easier.
They make it easier for people who need
to overcome certain limitations.
Um, certainly there's a,there's a democratization aspect
to some of it, but you do see
so much particularly onthings like YouTube shorts

(56:05):
and TikTok, A lot of terrible just slough.
Um, so I, I can appreciate that.
Um, my view is not dissimilarfrom yours except I will say
that, you know, one ofthe things that I look
for in AI support is like,where can I cut the fat
of my production space?
Like I, I like editingthese podcasts myself,
but making shorts isthe single most painful

(56:25):
thing I ever do.
So finding a tool thatlets me cut them down
and has a quick editor that lets
me sort of clip them together.
'cause they're meant tobe cotton candy content.
Anyway, I may as welljust sort of get it good.
And if there's something Ireally wanna spend my time on,
I'll do something else with it.
Um, I think that's smart.
That's the one thing that Ifind really useful right now.
- Yeah. I think, and look,if I treated shorts in a,

(56:47):
with the respect that, thatfrankly should be treated, um,
then I would do the same thing.
But I just don't have the patience. Yeah.
Or the, or the motivation right now.
But if, yeah, if I had to makeshorts, I had to make reels,
I would certainly use AI toolsto, to make that road easier.
- Totally. Yeah.
Um, Michael, what do you watch

(57:10):
on YouTube, if anything?
- Right. Yeah. , uh, not a lot
of tech stuff I always feel,
but we always kind of, a lotof us make this joke, uh,
when we get together ofYouTube tech folks is
like, yeah, did you see my video?
Oh no, of course you didn't.
Um, because, you know, we,the last thing you want
after you make a tech, ifme, the last thing I want
after I make a tech video is to watch

(57:31):
everyone else's take on that thing.
I will say there's one exception to that.
If there's something I'mreally excited about,
like the humane ai pin, right?
Um, lots of opinions.
I, I'm not saying it's good or bad,
but I am very interested in it.
When I run my video on that,
I will immediately go watcheverybody else's video too.
'cause that ex excites me. So
that's the only time II, I watch tech stuff.

(57:53):
I, but a lot of my YouTubestuff is space and ship stuff.
There's a great channel calledOcean Liner Designs where a,
a guy, a very talented,uh, young man, just kind
of teaches you things about ocean liners
and other big ships, uh, hasa great variety of stuff.
He's, that channel's grown rapidly.
I've been, it's been fun to watch.

(58:14):
Um, also Scott Manleyis, um, is a space guy.
He, I think he works at Apple,
but he's like a, an engineer
who comments on, on space things. That's
- A great name.
- Scott Manley. Yeah, I know Scott Manley.
He's got a great Scottishaccent too. It's great.
Hello, it's Scott Manley here. Oh my
- God.
. That's, ifthat's not AI generated,
if there isn't somebody behindthe sun scenes being like,

(58:34):
alright, I need to find some way
to get people really interested fast.
All right. He's gotta beScottish. It's gotta be deep.
He needs a last, he's gotScott last. No, no man. Manly.
- Yes. You know. No,that's just a placeholder.
No, no, no, no, no, no. Ship it.
- Ship it. No, you don'tunderstand. Stop, stop, stop.
- Don't- Mess with perfection.
- Uh, and finally, I think just, I,
I watch a few other channels,

(58:56):
but like, those are two that pop up a lot.
And then, uh, always givea shout out to LGR, um,
the finest retro computingYouTube content you will find,
uh, had the occasion to meet him once
and, um, had a great chat.
And he and I are of, of thesame mind on a lot of like,
YouTube as career stuff.
And my favorite thing aboutLGR, his name is Clint.

(59:17):
Uh, when he was making thetransition to YouTube full time,
I asked him what histhreshold was for that.
And he said, I decided the dayI made $1 more from YouTube
than my day job, I would quit the day job.
And that happened so long ago now.
But that's what, like,I found that inspiring
because what it led to wasthe creation of this channel
that is a lot like minein some of the ways

(59:40):
this I, I need to be betterat delivering things.
'cause this could sound like an insult.
I think Clint has not evolvedhis style much over time
as I have not evolved my style much over,
over the last couple years at least.
But I watch his videos religiously
and you look at the metrics andso do a lot of other people.

(01:00:00):
So yeah, you have to grow.Yeah. You have to adapt. Yeah.
You have to be flexible. Theseare all important things,
but you can also be consistent.
And if you are consistently good
and you have the audiencealready, you know,
in my experience, more people
gain interest than lose interest.
So until that audience startsdying, literally, um, slings

(01:00:23):
and arrows, uh, joke there,um, you know, uh, you, you,
you can, you can have a nice,
nice little career for yourself.
And I think that's a greatcomfort to someone like me
who only has the stomach for a full reboot
or a full evolution, uh,
maybe once every five years,if that, you know? Sure.
- That brings me perfectlyto my final question.

(01:00:44):
So, oh, um, uh, as I mentioned, uh, again,
we're bringing up thisinterview with Kevin.
It's like a two-parteressentially at this point.
But I, I talked to hima little bit about, um,
I'd recently seen a conversation that, um,
I think it was Hank and John Green had had
around thinking about theirvarious channels, you know,
of vlog brothers, even thebusinesses they've built the
books that they'vewritten as conversations.

(01:01:04):
Right. And YouTube as a conversation
has to end at some point.
Mm-Hmm. Right. Conversationsdon't go on forever.
Even if you hand them off tosomebody else, like we've seen
with the sort of spate ofretirements you've seen
with guys like Matt Pat,et cetera, recently,
the conversation, if notending certainly shifts
and things naturally end in a cycle.
So at some point, your generationof content, the viewpoint

(01:01:27):
that you have will have to sunset just
by the nature of time.
Yeah. So I, I think myquestion for you is like,
when you look back at thelegacy of your creative work
of the stuff that you've produced, like
what do you think you wantyour, uh, contributions
to the conversation of tech to be?
What do you think peoplenot, it's not like, you know,
when I die, what do I wantto be remembered for so much
as like, what are the thingsyou hope people have taken away

(01:01:50):
when your conversation is over?
- It's a great, great question
and I wish, I wish I had abetter, more well-rounded answer
to it, but I, I gave it somethought when you gave me a
little bit of a heads upabout the outline. Don't
- Tell people that whatcha doing.
I don't give you questions.
- This- Is purely organic
- Shit.
All right, back it up. We'lljust, we'll, this all over

(01:02:10):
- Right there.
There's like publishingthe, the, the Big Mac
sauce recipe upfront.
Like, what are you doing to me? What
- A what a what a delightfully
unexpected spontaneous question.
Let me, I see if I can cook up
- A response, I'm kindof a genius. Alright,
- Anyway, .
Now you know, it, it, itis, it is a question though
that is similar to the
where do you see yourself in five years,
which is a question I've neverbeen able to answer, right?

(01:02:32):
It's like, it's tough to,
to encapsulate everything you want,
but if, if I could pointto one thing, it's nerdy,
but it's like in techyou will see companies
or people try to launch things
that they don't always fit into a mold.
Uh, and they will almostalways get slammed

(01:02:53):
by the vast majorityof people impractical.
And you'll often see the response be the,
that old chestnut thatjust people who want
to sound smart like to roll out.
But what problem does it solve?
Well, this is a real solution in search
of a problem, shut up.
What I would like is for people to

(01:03:18):
is for people toacknowledge that like,
if everything is the same forever,
if we are just doingiterations on something
that works forever, um, that,
that is a very boring world to exist in.
And at the same time thatfun can be a wonderful reason
to buy or, or, or expressinterest in a product or,

(01:03:40):
or something else thatsomething's creating.
Like nothing has to beendlessly utilitarian.
Nothing has to be pragmaticif you don't want it to be.
So I think it's, it's importantto just recognize the value
of whimsy and excitement and, and,
and challenging the status quo.
That has certainly been theshape of my content strategy

(01:04:03):
for the last, I don'tknow, three or four years.
It's just like, this doesn'tmeet the, the threshold for
news coverage because it's newsworthy.
Even it's just, it,maybe it's just different
and maybe it is a bad idea,but let's talk about why.
And let's, let's see if thereare good ideas within it,
or if it's a product thatalready failed, let's see
what we can learn from that failure.

(01:04:25):
I think there's a lot to a,a lot to be mined in things
that don't exactly work or don'tlook like they should work.
And I, I think, uh, anopen-mindedness when addressing some
of that is, is an attitude thatI would like my channel to.
Um, further

(01:04:45):
- A perfect note to end on.
Michael, thank you so much as always,
man. It's good to chat with you.
- Thank you. I don't think,I don't think that was,
I think everything before it was perfect.
I think, I think that was too long.
Well, can you cut thatinto something? That sounds
- Good. No, probably not. Gosh
- Darn it, Jason.
Yeah. Well, alright,
- Well this has been fun, .
Uh, I really appreciate youtaking it seriously, .

(01:05:05):
Um, no man, I appreciate it.Thank you. No, thank you.
I, is there anything before we close out?
You wanna call outsomething you got coming up
or, uh, anything related toClicks you wanna shout out
to the people before we endfor the, the, the session here?
- No, I, no, I think just, uh, just, just,
just a genuine thanks for,for listening to this.
'cause I think you and I, um,
have have wonderful conversations
and I really thank you for some

(01:05:26):
thoughtful questions for, for real.
Um, even though I, I didn'tknow they were coming
and even though I dreamed ofall my responses on the spot,
- Well, I have to thank you
for not only pulling backthe curtain on my Wizard
of Oz here, but, uh, more importantly, um,
every conversation withyou is always a joy.
Uh, we don't get to doit nearly often enough.
And, uh, thank you again.This is always fun.

(01:05:46):
Uh, hopefully we get to doit again in the near term.
- I hope so too, man.Anytime. Cool. Alright.