Cortex

00:00:00 ◼   ► Have you moved office yet?

00:00:02 ◼   ► *sigh*

00:00:04 ◼   ► No. No Myke, I have not.

00:00:07 ◼   ► Did we give a name for our friend? Our next door neighbor friend?

00:00:10 ◼   ► Have we got a name for him?

00:00:12 ◼   ► He doesn't need a name. He's just an inconvenience.

00:00:16 ◼   ► It's really annoying.

00:00:18 ◼   ► There at 6.30 in the morning and there at 8.30 at night.

00:00:22 ◼   ► Annoyance. He doesn't need a name.

00:00:25 ◼   ► So he's still hanging around, huh?

00:00:27 ◼   ► Yeah, this is like, this is like if you live on a farm, you know, you don't name the farm

00:00:32 ◼   ► animals because you get attached.

00:00:34 ◼   ► Like I'm not going to name the neighbor.

00:00:35 ◼   ► It's not going to happen.

00:00:37 ◼   ► In case you become friends with the guy who calls China.

00:00:40 ◼   ► Yeah, I literally don't want to know what he looks like.

00:00:44 ◼   ► I don't want to bump into him in the common area.

00:00:46 ◼   ► Have you not seen him?

00:00:47 ◼   ► No, of course not.

00:00:48 ◼   ► Why would I?

00:00:49 ◼   ► You've never seen him?

00:00:51 ◼   ► No.

00:00:52 ◼   ► Why would I see him?

00:00:53 ◼   ► What am I going to do?

00:00:55 ◼   ► Introduce myself?

00:00:56 ◼   ► on his door, "Hey I know you're in the middle of a call but I just I just wanted to say

00:01:01 ◼   ► hi. Why would I do that?" It just surprises me that that like you're next door to him,

00:01:06 ◼   ► he's there all the time that you're there and you've not seen him. It's just you know

00:01:10 ◼   ► not that you should necessarily barge in and be like "Hey I'm gray!" but just like that

00:01:14 ◼   ► that you may have bumped into him in the hallway or something. No I don't I don't want to bump

00:01:18 ◼   ► into him. Well I guess you might have done but you just don't know because you don't

00:01:22 ◼   ► know what he looks like. Yeah so it's like missions and achievements. You could already

00:01:25 ◼   ► be friends with him but you have no idea right like because you it might be somebody else no

00:01:30 ◼   ► I talked to nobody except the secretary in the whole building that's the secretary only because

00:01:35 ◼   ► she holds the packages so I need to talk to her to get the packages mm-hmm it's like I'm not here

00:01:40 ◼   ► to make friends I'm here to work that's true yeah so I don't want to get to know the next-door

00:01:45 ◼   ► neighbor guy and the way I entered the building and get to my office I don't have to pass his

00:01:50 ◼   ► office so I never look inside I just I just hear him. You never pass that area

00:01:56 ◼   ► interesting. I don't have to pass that area no. You're still in the office that you're

00:01:59 ◼   ► in you haven't moved yet. No I have not I have not moved yet which is a great

00:02:07 ◼   ► annoyance because this neighbor is having a legitimate impact on my

00:02:12 ◼   ► productivity because his simple presence is bothersome to me and I would like to

00:02:17 ◼   ► eliminate it.

00:02:18 ◼   ► Right, I've been in these sort of situations, right, where something just, it just frustrates

00:02:23 ◼   ► you so much unnecessarily that then the mere presence of the thing stops you from working.

00:02:30 ◼   ► So when I worked in the bank, the radio did this to me. They used to play a station in

00:02:38 ◼   ► the UK called Capitol Radio, which just plays the latest hits. But the problem with Capitol

00:02:43 ◼   ► radio at least at this time was they had about 25 songs on their playlist. Heavy rotation.

00:02:48 ◼   ► They played those heavy rotation songs all day. And there are a few of those songs that

00:02:52 ◼   ► I didn't like most of the time because it was more general. Wasn't hipster enough for

00:02:56 ◼   ► you. Just really mainstream. It was too mainstream. That was actually the problem. It was too

00:03:00 ◼   ► mainstream. I know. I know Myke. And I would sit for nine hours a day with this radio basically

00:03:05 ◼   ► in my eye. Oh god. In my eyeline while it was just playing these 25 songs. And then

00:03:12 ◼   ► And just the mere idea of the radio being turned on

00:03:15 ◼   ► in the morning, that just set my day off badly.

00:03:18 ◼   ► 'Cause I was just, I was merely frustrated at the fact

00:03:20 ◼   ► that the radio was receiving any power.

00:03:23 ◼   ► Right, like that was more than enough.

00:03:25 ◼   ► And there would be days where like there was this one lady

00:03:28 ◼   ► who insisted on having it on that station.

00:03:30 ◼   ► Whenever she was off, I would change it to something

00:03:32 ◼   ► that I would want and it was so much nicer.

00:03:34 ◼   ► And then I would remember like she would come in

00:03:37 ◼   ► the next day, she would turn it on,

00:03:38 ◼   ► and she would change the dial.

00:03:40 ◼   ► and I was ready to just take that radio,

00:03:42 ◼   ► just throw it out the window.

00:03:44 ◼   ► So I can completely sympathize with this idea

00:03:47 ◼   ► of just there just being a base annoyance,

00:03:49 ◼   ► which is there constantly,

00:03:50 ◼   ► and every time you're reminded of it,

00:03:52 ◼   ► it stops you from wanting to work.

00:03:53 ◼   ► - Well, the problem is that it's,

00:03:56 ◼   ► his presence is not perfectly constant.

00:03:59 ◼   ► If it was perfectly constant, that's easier to deal with.

00:04:03 ◼   ► - It's like white noise.

00:04:04 ◼   ► - Yeah, but he's randomly there,

00:04:07 ◼   ► probably two out of three times either in the morning or in the evening.

00:04:12 ◼   ► And I really do.

00:04:14 ◼   ► I almost sent you a text message once cause I walked in and it was 6am and he

00:04:18 ◼   ► was there and I was like, God damn it. Like what? And again, again,

00:04:21 ◼   ► always the same feeling like, what is this loser doing in this office building?

00:04:25 ◼   ► It's six in the morning, right?

00:04:26 ◼   ► As I am standing there in a totally empty office building at six in the morning.

00:04:31 ◼   ► Like I should be the only loser in this office building at this time in the

00:04:35 ◼   ► morning but nope there he is and again of course it's like we're the only two

00:04:39 ◼   ► people with this crazy schedule and we're the only two people like and

00:04:43 ◼   ► we're right next to each other it's infuriating I honestly believe that on

00:04:48 ◼   ► this guy's podcast he talks about the fact that he's varying his schedule but

00:04:52 ◼   ► you're still always there right right we're each trying to like move our

00:04:57 ◼   ► working hours further and further off of normal working hours into greater edges

00:05:01 ◼   ► insanity at the same time. You would not believe the times I go there and that guy's in the room

00:05:05 ◼   ► with his thunder sounds talking to himself. A bunch of people in the Reddit pointed out,

00:05:09 ◼   ► which was hilarious, that you are more likely a problem to him than he is to you. You may hear

00:05:15 ◼   ► him on the phone every now and then, but he's hearing you repeat yourself over and over and

00:05:20 ◼   ► over again, reading through your scripts. Yeah, yeah. I liked it. It really made me laugh.

00:05:25 ◼   ► Someone left a comment in the Reddit, which was, right, that that's, right, that I'm not locked in

00:05:31 ◼   ► in there with him, he's locked in there with me.

00:05:33 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:05:34 ◼   ► It really made me laugh.

00:05:35 ◼   ► I think there is a certain element of truth to that.

00:05:39 ◼   ► I do not know what this guy thinks of his neighbor.

00:05:45 ◼   ► Because part of the...

00:05:46 ◼   ► Okay, so here's what's been occurring, which is frustrating.

00:05:48 ◼   ► So a lot of people were suggesting, "Why don't you just soundproof your office?"

00:05:52 ◼   ► As though soundproofing an office is a thing that's even really practical.

00:05:56 ◼   ► When the walls are made of plywood and you're just renting a space.

00:05:59 ◼   ► Like, what am I going to do?

00:06:00 ◼   ► I'm gonna spend thousands and thousands of dollars to soundproof this little cube

00:06:03 ◼   ► And then I'm just gonna sweat to death on the inside of it because it's perfectly insulated.

00:06:08 ◼   ► That's the problem with soundproofing

00:06:10 ◼   ► Exactly. Like the office is already warmer than I really want it to be which is also a thing that slightly annoys me all the time

00:06:17 ◼   ► It's like soundproofing it. It just would be just totally unworkable

00:06:21 ◼   ► but I think a lot of people misunderstood that the the

00:06:24 ◼   ► Problem for me is not so much that I am hearing him because I'm again using those those headphones

00:06:30 ◼   ► We talked about last time the bone conducting headphones, which again

00:06:33 ◼   ► They're kind of great and I'm most of the time listening to Thunder sounds and one song on repeat through those

00:06:40 ◼   ► And so then I'm hearing myself talk out loud

00:06:43 ◼   ► But it is it is the simple knowledge that there is without a doubt someone nearby who hears me

00:06:49 ◼   ► with crystal clarity right through a wall because his office is right on the other side and his desk is right on the other side of

00:06:55 ◼   ► where I'm talking. And it's that kind of thing. It's like trying to do a presentation in

00:07:01 ◼   ► a room that isn't empty, but a room that has one person who's sitting in the front row

00:07:08 ◼   ► who's trying to do something else while you're doing a presentation and you're like running through what lines are gonna be like.

00:07:13 ◼   ► Like, is that person really bothering you? No, you're actually a nuisance to that person,

00:07:19 ◼   ► But it doesn't change the fact that it makes it much harder to just like

00:07:24 ◼   ► Try stuff out or just say something or really go through the motions of the way you would you would

00:07:29 ◼   ► Try to write a script so it's less of him being an actual

00:07:34 ◼   ► Disruption as it is like that you feel like you're slightly performing for this guy

00:07:40 ◼   ► Yeah, it's if he

00:07:43 ◼   ► Didn't take and make phone calls which I which I overhear and again

00:07:48 ◼   ► that's like the most hilariously business phone call.

00:07:51 ◼   ► Like he could be an extra in the office space movie

00:07:54 ◼   ► in the background with just like the things he's saying.

00:07:56 ◼   ► It's just so, like no one talks like this

00:07:58 ◼   ► with your synergizing, you know?

00:08:00 ◼   ► It's like, but he does, like this is what's really occurring.

00:08:02 ◼   ► But even if he was just there, you know,

00:08:04 ◼   ► being an accountant and silently doing paperwork,

00:08:07 ◼   ► that wouldn't change anything.

00:08:08 ◼   ► Like the phone calls just make me more aware

00:08:11 ◼   ► of when he arrives and when he leaves.

00:08:13 ◼   ► But it's the fact that there is someone nearby

00:08:17 ◼   ► who is hearing me that's the real problem.

00:08:20 ◼   ► And so this is where, this crazy thing where I'm spending a whole bunch of money

00:08:23 ◼   ► to rent an office in central London and so

00:08:26 ◼   ► in the past couple weeks, when I go in the morning, sometimes if he's there, it's like

00:08:30 ◼   ► "You know what, I just can't even deal with this today. I have a lot of work to do."

00:08:33 ◼   ► And so I turn right back around and walk back to my house

00:08:37 ◼   ► and then do work in my house instead.

00:08:40 ◼   ► Right, which is like, "Well, now what the hell is the point of all of this?"

00:08:42 ◼   ► But I just know in a certain kind of mood, like, I cannot just

00:08:47 ◼   ► run through this thing out loud, being aware that there's somebody else hearing me like

00:08:52 ◼   ► verbally edit myself constantly. It's just a little bit of an impediment that is super

00:09:00 ◼   ► frustrating.

00:09:01 ◼   ► Have you considered that this person might be your mortal enemy?

00:09:06 ◼   ► No.

00:09:07 ◼   ► Because if they know this about you, right, that you can't work in this way, then it would

00:09:13 ◼   ► make sense that the calls that he's having are nonsense because they're not real calls.

00:09:19 ◼   ► He's just trying to put you off.

00:09:20 ◼   ► Right, well this is, it's also just the possibility that like, we're each hoping that the other

00:09:25 ◼   ► one caves first.

00:09:28 ◼   ► He's doing everything he can.

00:09:29 ◼   ► Yeah, there's no way I'm not an annoyance to this guy.

00:09:33 ◼   ► And it did occur to me like, you know, six in the morning, I could just turn the speaker

00:09:38 ◼   ► on and pretend like I don't know this person is there, but I'm not going to do that.

00:09:42 ◼   ► So I know right now the listeners are thinking, "Why the hell am I still there?"

00:09:49 ◼   ► Right?

00:09:50 ◼   ► Because now this is like three or four weeks of neighbor frustrations now at this point,

00:09:59 ◼   ► because I think when I spoke to you about it, yeah, it had been like two weeks since

00:10:02 ◼   ► this guy showed up.

00:10:03 ◼   ► So everyone's wondering like, "Why am I still there?"

00:10:05 ◼   ► And the reason is, it's because this video that I am currently working on is...

00:10:15 ◼   ► It has just been absolutely killing me over the last few weeks.

00:10:21 ◼   ► This has turned out to be just one of the hardest things that I've worked on in terms

00:10:27 ◼   ► of trying to come up with a coherent script to explain an idea.

00:10:33 ◼   ► Like this one is, it's just murder.

00:10:35 ◼   ► Uh, and it's one of these things where

00:10:38 ◼   ► almost everything else in my life has been pushed to the side for the past several weeks

00:10:43 ◼   ► because it's like, I have to get this script done.

00:10:48 ◼   ► Like I have a particular time frame that it needs to get done, and it's like,

00:10:52 ◼   ► everything in my life has fallen by the wayside.

00:10:56 ◼   ► So it's like, there will be no other projects. Like I'm not doing anything else.

00:11:00 ◼   ► I'm just trying to focus on this one thing.

00:11:04 ◼   ► And so this is why, even though this neighbor is coming at a particularly annoying time,

00:11:09 ◼   ► when I have this particularly difficult script to write,

00:11:12 ◼   ► I can't psychologically deal with trying to figure out how to move offices right now.

00:11:18 ◼   ► And like, if I move offices, well, I might as well get a real standing desk if I'm going to switch offices.

00:11:22 ◼   ► And then it's like, what am I-- I'm gonna spend a whole day looking at different standing--

00:11:25 ◼   ► It's like, you know, I'm just putting all of this to the side,

00:11:27 ◼   ► And it's like I'm just gonna just kind of like power through this for the time being and as soon as I'm

00:11:32 ◼   ► Done with this main video project, then I can refocus on

00:11:37 ◼   ► Making things better in the long run, but in the meantime, it's it. Yeah, it's just it has been frustrating

00:11:44 ◼   ► but I I do I do wonder what on earth this guy thinks about me because of

00:11:50 ◼   ► Any topic I have ever done

00:11:54 ◼   ► This is by far and away the worst one for someone to just overhear someone talking out loud next door

00:12:02 ◼   ► because like on the spectrum of videos that I do from like let's say

00:12:06 ◼   ► Brexit briefly which is like we're talking really fast and here's a thing and bah bah bah bah bah

00:12:12 ◼   ► and like it's kind of obvious that this is this is like a presentation that's going on to

00:12:16 ◼   ► America pox on the other end which is like slow and

00:12:21 ◼   ► serious, this video is way on the America pox end of the spectrum and

00:12:26 ◼   ► the topic makes me sound like I'm a total sociopath if someone hears me just saying the lines out loud

00:12:32 ◼   ► over and over again.

00:12:34 ◼   ► With thunder sounds.

00:12:36 ◼   ► Yeah, and like slightly changing them and yes sometimes with thunder sounds if I think everybody's gone in the evening

00:12:42 ◼   ► and I don't realize that he's come to the office at nine o'clock at night.

00:12:47 ◼   ► So yeah, that that certainly doesn't help but there have been a couple of times where he's obviously come to the office in the evening

00:12:54 ◼   ► after I got started and I didn't realize he came and then I leave and I look next door and I just think

00:13:00 ◼   ► Oh God, like I know I know what I was talking about here. Like there's a section about like crushing your enemy

00:13:06 ◼   ► It's like oh my god

00:13:08 ◼   ► It's like I don't know what this person thinks is happening next door

00:13:11 ◼   ► but maybe this is part of the reason why he hasn't felt the need to come over to me and have a little discussion about

00:13:18 ◼   ► what our working hours are and obviously us bothering each other with noise.

00:13:24 ◼   ► Because let's be frank,

00:13:25 ◼   ► whatever he thinks you're doing, he doesn't think you're making YouTube videos, right?

00:13:30 ◼   ► No, there's- right, it makes no sense. Yeah, it wouldn't make any sense.

00:13:33 ◼   ► Or

00:13:35 ◼   ► there's no reason someone would come to this conclusion.

00:13:38 ◼   ► There's no reason hearing what I'm doing would make you think that I'm anything other than just a

00:13:43 ◼   ► raving lunatic who for some reason is renting an office

00:13:47 ◼   ► It does sound bad

00:13:51 ◼   ► I mean

00:13:52 ◼   ► I honestly I can sympathize

00:13:54 ◼   ► Who do you sympathize with though me or the guy because I always feel like you're on this guy's side

00:13:58 ◼   ► I really don't know with the way that you've explained it today

00:14:01 ◼   ► I am definitely on your side because I've been in a similar situation of just this like

00:14:07 ◼   ► Dull annoyance which is then constantly like just eating away in your head and like it is more your problem and his problem

00:14:13 ◼   ► He's not actually doing anything really, you know, like it's it's your problem, but I have totally been there and

00:14:19 ◼   ► There's kind of there's there is no way to deal with it

00:14:22 ◼   ► Like there has to be a change if he leaves or you live like this this office ain't big enough for the both of you

00:14:27 ◼   ► Yeah, and I am happy to admit that I am

00:14:31 ◼   ► If not the unreasonable one in the scenario clearly the like the picky one and the one who is the oddball in the office

00:14:38 ◼   ► So like is way more my problem than it is. It's unreasonable

00:14:41 ◼   ► It's like because the guy is just trying to he's doing exactly what you're doing, right? He's paying for an office space

00:14:46 ◼   ► He's trying to get his job done and and you're he's able to do with it, right?

00:14:50 ◼   ► He's listening to you crushing your enemies and trying to take over the world and he's still calling China

00:14:55 ◼   ► Maybe this is why he needs all these motivational posters

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00:18:21 ◼   ► So Myke, how is your entry to the world of being a YouTube vlogger?

00:18:28 ◼   ► So I will say overall, the experience from last episode to this episode has been extremely

00:18:35 ◼   ► positive and exciting. I'm very excited to be doing this because the reception that I've

00:18:42 ◼   ► received has been very warm and I've been encouraged in this endeavor. There seems to

00:18:49 ◼   ► be, at least I have, the overall kind of sense from a lot of people that have watched the

00:18:53 ◼   ► videos and have left me comments that people are actually enjoying them, which is a key

00:18:59 ◼   ► thing. If everybody said it was terrible, then it would have stopped, right? Because

00:19:02 ◼   ► clearly I can't do it. But I haven't had that. Now I do want to talk a little bit more about

00:19:08 ◼   ► that but I can't get to the good stuff without talking about the bad stuff. And about 95%

00:19:17 ◼   ► of the bad stuff is focused around trying to use YouTube.

00:19:21 ◼   ► See now, it's funny to me that you apparently have a list of complaints about using YouTube.

00:19:32 ◼   ► using YouTube because I would think that surely, surely you must be broken into this already

00:19:39 ◼   ► since I dumped handling the Cortex YouTube channel on you when we were first talking

00:19:44 ◼   ► about who would do what with this podcast.

00:19:46 ◼   ► And I was like, "Oh, why don't you take this minor part of this job, this little thing,

00:19:52 ◼   ► just upload a video, it'll be super easy."

00:19:54 ◼   ► I feel like with that, you've handled annotations with that, you've handled all of YouTube's

00:19:59 ◼   ► back-end system so I don't even understand why you would why you would

00:20:02 ◼   ► have any additional complaints surely you're a YouTube expert by this point.

00:20:05 ◼   ► If memory serves me there is a previous episode of the show where I complain

00:20:10 ◼   ► about using YouTube in the limited sense that I use it. But trying to be a lot

00:20:17 ◼   ► more serious about this and paying more attention to it for my own project has

00:20:22 ◼   ► highlighted some different things. So with the stuff that we do for the Cortex

00:20:26 ◼   ► channel it is super simple. It is make the video, upload the video, draw a box around

00:20:32 ◼   ► the logo, publish. Right. Like that is it. But I'm trying to do more complicated things.

00:20:39 ◼   ► Well, what the YouTube system obviously deems to be more complicated. I didn't think they

00:20:46 ◼   ► would be complicated but they seem to be. And also I'm paying more attention to it once

00:20:51 ◼   ► the video publishes.

00:20:52 ◼   ► Right, of course, of course.

00:20:55 ◼   ► Because I kind of like just set it and forget it with the Cortex channel, right?

00:20:59 ◼   ► Like it's up and it's done and it's gone.

00:21:01 ◼   ► Like I never spend any time on the analytics.

00:21:03 ◼   ► I don't do anything like that.

00:21:05 ◼   ► Every now and then I look through the comments but I don't contribute because it would be

00:21:10 ◼   ► weird for me, I think, if the Cortex channel was responding because it's the two of us.

00:21:16 ◼   ► So I don't ever reply to comments on the Cortex channel with the Cortex account.

00:21:21 ◼   ► I just kind of leave them as they are.

00:21:24 ◼   ► But some of the things that I'm finding with YouTube that has been a real problem for me,

00:21:31 ◼   ► focus around the processing thing.

00:21:34 ◼   ► We've spoken about this before, it just seems to process forever for no reason.

00:21:38 ◼   ► It's just stuck at 95% for like an hour for over a two minute video.

00:21:45 ◼   ► This is the mystery of uploading a video comes in three parts.

00:21:50 ◼   ► uploading it, which of course you understand, like a bigger video is going to take longer because you have to squeeze it through the pipes or whatever.

00:21:57 ◼   ► So you have an estimate of how long it's going to take to upload.

00:22:00 ◼   ► YouTube then provides you with an estimate for

00:22:04 ◼   ► processing time, which is where they're, I don't know, putting it through a gigantic Rube Goldberg machine and

00:22:11 ◼   ► out the other end pops a bunch of different size

00:22:14 ◼   ► resolution videos. I think that's at least that's what they say they do. I have serious reasons to doubt

00:22:20 ◼   ► That's actually what's occurring during the processing because not all the resolutions are available right away

00:22:23 ◼   ► But anyway, that's what they say is occurring like they're they're converting the video into their format and into their system

00:22:29 ◼   ► And they tell you how long it's going to take until the processing is finished

00:22:33 ◼   ► But as you're referencing here and what I often find is the case

00:22:38 ◼   ► There's really two phases of processing one of which is the one that they give you a time estimate for

00:22:43 ◼   ► but that only gets you to

00:22:46 ◼   ► 95% processed and then it will just say 95% processed for a

00:22:53 ◼   ► Random interval of time every video that I have uploaded it took longer to get those last 5% in the previous 95%

00:23:01 ◼   ► Yeah, it's it's bizarre

00:23:04 ◼   ► You know sometimes I do have it go quite quickly sometimes it takes a lot

00:23:10 ◼   ► It's like it's like the YouTube computer is is rolling a hundred

00:23:14 ◼   ► D20s to come up with how many seconds it should take to get from 95% processed to finished because it doesn't seem to have any

00:23:21 ◼   ► correlation with video length or size or anything. It's bizarre and

00:23:28 ◼   ► infuriating and I wish instead of saying 95% processed they would just say something like

00:23:35 ◼   ► post-processing... Please refresh this page. It will be done when it's done. Yeah, exactly

00:23:41 ◼   ► Exactly, just some kind of like the 95% is so,

00:23:44 ◼   ► like it reminds me of the old Windows days

00:23:46 ◼   ► of like updates or copying files.

00:23:48 ◼   ► You'd get to like 95% immediately

00:23:50 ◼   ► and then who knows how long it's gonna take

00:23:53 ◼   ► to get that last tiny bit.

00:23:55 ◼   ► It's such a minor thing, but it is super infuriating

00:24:00 ◼   ► and I imagine from your perspective

00:24:01 ◼   ► just seems kind of baffling to somebody

00:24:04 ◼   ► who's just doing this for the first time.

00:24:06 ◼   ► Like what is it doing?

00:24:07 ◼   ► This is an example of something

00:24:10 ◼   ► which I think I'm going to talk about quite a little bit,

00:24:12 ◼   ► which is the only person,

00:24:15 ◼   ► the only thing that knows the answer to this is YouTube,

00:24:20 ◼   ► but they can't seem to answer their own questions.

00:24:24 ◼   ► For example, all of the view counts are estimated,

00:24:28 ◼   ► just as estimated, everything says estimated.

00:24:30 ◼   ► The only thing that knows the real answer is you, YouTube.

00:24:35 ◼   ► And I know that it's difficult

00:24:37 ◼   ► because they want to weed out what's real and what's not,

00:24:40 ◼   ► But just everything has these asterisks.

00:24:42 ◼   ► Like you go into the analytics page,

00:24:44 ◼   ► and there's just asterisks everywhere.

00:24:46 ◼   ► Everything is estimated.

00:24:48 ◼   ► And it's like, how long is this gonna take?

00:24:52 ◼   ► It takes three days to work out the view numbers

00:24:55 ◼   ► on a video, like what are you doing?

00:24:57 ◼   ► It's all just so baffling to me.

00:24:59 ◼   ► And I'm like, it says estimated.

00:25:01 ◼   ► Can I actually trust it's real though?

00:25:03 ◼   ► Like, and I'm trying to work that out.

00:25:05 ◼   ► But there are so many things like this

00:25:06 ◼   ► where it's like the only thing that knows the real answer

00:25:09 ◼   ► is the thing that's telling you it doesn't know the answer.

00:25:12 ◼   ► It's just mind boggling to me.

00:25:16 ◼   ► - I do always find that stuff baffling.

00:25:17 ◼   ► Today I logged into YouTube to change a couple settings

00:25:20 ◼   ► behind the scenes and I noticed on the CGP Grade channel

00:25:23 ◼   ► there was a little banner popped up on the top

00:25:25 ◼   ► which said view numbers and revenue numbers

00:25:28 ◼   ► from Mexico are incorrect and we will update them later.

00:25:32 ◼   ► Whenever I see a message like that,

00:25:34 ◼   ► it's like okay, so something went wrong,

00:25:37 ◼   ► But I felt like, but how will you know what happens?

00:25:40 ◼   ► Like, I just, I don't understand,

00:25:41 ◼   ► like what is the nature of the problem where--

00:25:43 ◼   ► - Oh, here you go, yeah.

00:25:44 ◼   ► YouTube Red Partner revenue from Mexico

00:25:47 ◼   ► is showing incorrect data for September.

00:25:50 ◼   ► But like, how, how, how did that happen?

00:25:54 ◼   ► - Well, I can, I mean, here's the thing.

00:25:55 ◼   ► It's easy to understand, okay, so there was some problem.

00:25:58 ◼   ► Like, I can just accept that, right?

00:26:00 ◼   ► The chaos monkey came along

00:26:02 ◼   ► and you lost a bunch of data from Mexico.

00:26:04 ◼   ► What I find much more confusing is,

00:26:06 ◼   ► How are you going to fix this in the future?

00:26:10 ◼   ► Like either you know now or you don't or like you just lost it.

00:26:13 ◼   ► You know, maybe you put up the little shrug emoji for like,

00:26:17 ◼   ► "Well, I just, you know, YouTube read money from for September.

00:26:20 ◼   ► Like we just we just don't know. We're sorry."

00:26:21 ◼   ► You know, and we'll prorate it based on what we guessed.

00:26:24 ◼   ► And I just but I don't understand like how how they can recover this information.

00:26:29 ◼   ► But I see messages like that quite often enough where they're letting you know

00:26:34 ◼   ► something went wrong and

00:26:36 ◼   ► they'll fix it in the future, but I always just wonder, but how do you how do you know what it should be?

00:26:41 ◼   ► I don't even understand like it's it's

00:26:43 ◼   ► There's a lot of just you just have to accept the analytics dashboard for what it is

00:26:49 ◼   ► Okay, these are the numbers it's telling me these are the numbers I'm gonna go with

00:26:53 ◼   ► It seems like magic how they know or how they're calculated

00:26:57 ◼   ► And I get enough messages saying that something might not be right, but they'll fix it later

00:27:02 ◼   ► So I'll just I'll just trust that it's fixed, you know, but I don't know like no idea really then there are other things right like

00:27:10 ◼   ► There have been on two occasions where I've accidentally included

00:27:14 ◼   ► 15 seconds of just a black screen at the end of my videos everybody does that don't worry and YouTube

00:27:21 ◼   ► Offers these handy tools for trimming. Mm-hmm. So you go in and you trim your video down. It's like great. Thanks YouTube

00:27:29 ◼   ► We'll be back with you in an hour maybe to let you know that this is done

00:27:33 ◼   ► And then you might have to do it again because it didn't seem to stick

00:27:38 ◼   ► Like there are all these like it's like we have these handy tools. Why don't you fix this?

00:27:43 ◼   ► why don't you fix that but any edits that you make can take an

00:27:46 ◼   ► Unknown amount of time to be updated in their system. I mean look don't get me wrong

00:27:52 ◼   ► I'm happy that those tools are there because otherwise I would have had to have re-uploaded

00:27:56 ◼   ► But it just seems like all of this stuff just takes so long

00:28:00 ◼   ► Yeah, I would just advise to anybody starting a YouTube career

00:28:06 ◼   ► Don't use YouTube's built-in editing tools

00:28:10 ◼   ► If you can do anything to avoid using those tools, you should avoid using those tools

00:28:17 ◼   ► I don't recommend the user experience of them. I don't recommend the reliability of them

00:28:23 ◼   ► I would suggest that you stay far, far, far away from those tools if you can.

00:28:30 ◼   ► If I wasn't uploading them on my mobile data, then I would just delete the video and upload it again.

00:28:35 ◼   ► Yeah, in the outer rim you have to pay for your internet so you don't want to double upload it.

00:28:39 ◼   ► Exactly. It would also be great if you could just swap the video out.

00:28:42 ◼   ► Well now you understand what I want from YouTube, but they will never give you that.

00:28:47 ◼   ► You are now part of the YouTube system where what they want is more,

00:28:52 ◼   ► Not necessarily better.

00:28:54 ◼   ► Everything in the system is designed to upload more videos.

00:29:01 ◼   ► They'll let you upload at the top of every page.

00:29:05 ◼   ► They'll let you upload directly from your phone.

00:29:07 ◼   ► But if you want to change an existing video, forget it.

00:29:11 ◼   ► That's not a possibility for you.

00:29:13 ◼   ► So, welcome to the Club Myke.

00:29:15 ◼   ► Better make sure everything's right in your vlog the first time around.

00:29:18 ◼   ► Seems like it.

00:29:19 ◼   ► Don't make any mistakes.

00:29:20 ◼   ► That's the plan.

00:29:22 ◼   ► When I'm looking at also, you know, saying that I want to be a part of the system

00:29:26 ◼   ► Mm-hmm. It isn't just the YouTube system. It's also like the mentality and the thinking and

00:29:31 ◼   ► Something that I knew that I needed to focus on was my titles and my thumbnails, right?

00:29:36 ◼   ► They were just not youtubey enough, you know, they weren't enticing enough. They didn't give enough information

00:29:43 ◼   ► Can I ask a question? Yeah, I'm bit confused here Myke

00:29:47 ◼   ► Your original few videos the one that's the ones that you showed me. Mm-hmm. They just had thumbnails

00:29:53 ◼   ► Which were yellow words on a black background

00:29:56 ◼   ► Yeah with sort of the format of your show where you talk about like three things

00:29:59 ◼   ► I would just like list go to London to buy a house, but not really just sign some paperwork

00:30:06 ◼   ► Yeah, three edit emojis into the video right like you list the three things that are going to occur

00:30:10 ◼   ► You were you ever were you ever serious about those being the actual thumbnails

00:30:16 ◼   ► I always thought those were placeholder thumbnails.

00:30:19 ◼   ► They were just the thumbnails that I had because I couldn't think of anything.

00:30:22 ◼   ► Okay.

00:30:23 ◼   ► Right, so like I just put them up there and then just left them because I didn't really

00:30:26 ◼   ► have a strategy for thumbnails.

00:30:29 ◼   ► Okay, but you weren't thinking like these are actually acceptable YouTube thumbnails.

00:30:33 ◼   ► I mean now they have to be left there on those original ones for posterity, but you weren't

00:30:39 ◼   ► thinking going forward like, "Oh, I can just have a list of text on the screen."

00:30:43 ◼   ► No, no, it never really crossed my mind.

00:30:45 ◼   ► not gonna fly in YouTube land."

00:30:47 ◼   ► Like, it was like, this is what I'll just leave there for now because I don't have any

00:30:51 ◼   ► other ideas. Like, vlog 000 also is, again, like, not the naming strategy. It was just

00:30:57 ◼   ► like, well, I haven't got any other ideas for this. I'm just gonna put it here. So I

00:31:02 ◼   ► figured I needed a strategy, and I had people saying to me like, "Oh, this isn't enticing

00:31:07 ◼   ► enough, blah blah blah blah blah." And then I was like, "Clickbait," right? Like, is this

00:31:12 ◼   ► what I'm supposed to be doing here? Am I supposed to entice people in? How do you do that without,

00:31:19 ◼   ► you know, being clickbaity?" And then I was kind of thinking to myself, "Well, if I'm

00:31:24 ◼   ► going to give in to the system, maybe this is what I need to do. Like, this is what I

00:31:30 ◼   ► see people do. Like, they have to try and entice you in some way. So maybe I just need

00:31:35 ◼   ► to give in to the system."

00:31:37 ◼   ► I have to say Myke, you know I subscribed to your YouTube channel, you know, back when it was still a secret.

00:31:45 ◼   ► Back before it was cool, right?

00:31:47 ◼   ► Yeah, exactly. And when you uploaded your first real video, I wasn't quite sure how to feel about the fact that you went straight for the clickbaitiest of clickbait titles.

00:32:04 ◼   ► What was your original title?

00:32:07 ◼   ► I went too far. The title was...

00:32:10 ◼   ► "Adena Left Me" was the title.

00:32:13 ◼   ► That was the title that I chose.

00:32:16 ◼   ► Which I will just state for the record was suggested by Adena.

00:32:20 ◼   ► I did approve said suggestion.

00:32:23 ◼   ► Myke, you're the decider here. You can't fob this off.

00:32:27 ◼   ► She didn't type it in. I typed it in.

00:32:29 ◼   ► You did this. You decided to go with this.

00:32:32 ◼   ► Because Adina left me for a week. She's in Romania right now, and I thought, "This is funny."

00:32:37 ◼   ► So I did it. I think it lasted about 15 minutes before I added some brackets in which I wrote "for a week."

00:32:45 ◼   ► Well, you know what this looks like to me? This looks like a man who lacks the courage of his convictions.

00:32:49 ◼   ► Oh, I definitely didn't have the courage to leave that on there.

00:32:53 ◼   ► Right, but that's exactly what this title conveys to me. It's like, "Clickbait, ooh but not, ooh but not really."

00:33:00 ◼   ► This is the thing, I don't know how to title these things in a way that is not, because

00:33:05 ◼   ► I could say a bunch of stuff, but it's boring.

00:33:08 ◼   ► Like I'm either going one or two ways.

00:33:11 ◼   ► I'm either going to have an interesting enticing title or they're just going to be called

00:33:15 ◼   ► Vlog Episode 4.

00:33:18 ◼   ► And I need to work out which one of those I want to do and I feel like I want to be

00:33:21 ◼   ► enticing, but I went too far.

00:33:24 ◼   ► I went too far and I know I went too far, which is why I then tried to walk it back.

00:33:29 ◼   ► How do you know that you went too far? How do you know this?

00:33:33 ◼   ► Because people told me I went too far.

00:33:35 ◼   ► Did you not receive a bunch of happy comments about that title?

00:33:39 ◼   ► Some people actually thought it was funny.

00:33:40 ◼   ► I actually honestly, before I changed it, I got as many people thinking that it was funny as I did

00:33:48 ◼   ► people thinking that I shouldn't title it that. Because there were people that were like,

00:33:51 ◼   ► Like they thought it was funny because I was being so outwardly clickbaity.

00:33:56 ◼   ► But the fact that there were people that didn't like it, I was like, "No, I don't want to

00:33:59 ◼   ► do this."

00:34:00 ◼   ► So I reversed my decision and put the brackets in there.

00:34:05 ◼   ► And I have a little thumbnail of the two of us.

00:34:08 ◼   ► I chose the thumbnail because it's the two of us laughing.

00:34:12 ◼   ► And I thought that that would counterbalance the title, but it clearly didn't.

00:34:17 ◼   ► So I shifted the balance back again.

00:34:20 ◼   ► This is really hard. Seriously, like the titling is really really hard.

00:34:27 ◼   ► I am giving you a hard time about this, but anyone who's never done this, trying to pick

00:34:36 ◼   ► a title for something like this, especially for something when you're trying to get attention

00:34:41 ◼   ► from people, it is shockingly difficult.

00:34:43 ◼   ► Because that's it, right? Like if all I ever wanted was for people that listen to this

00:34:48 ◼   ► show to watch my videos, I would just call them vlog episode three. Because those people

00:34:54 ◼   ► have made their mind up if they're gonna watch before they've even seen the video come out,

00:34:59 ◼   ► right? Like basically most of the people, if not all of the people that are subscribed

00:35:04 ◼   ► now, they are people that are familiar with my work and will watch it based on the fact

00:35:09 ◼   ► of whether they like me or not, right? And then they might watch one or two of them,

00:35:13 ◼   ► if it's for them and then go forward. But my whole point of doing this is to find new

00:35:19 ◼   ► people. So I need to give it some kind of like pizzazz, right?

00:35:25 ◼   ► Yeah, you're selling the sizzle, Myke. I guess you got her, right? Yeah.

00:35:31 ◼   ► Like that's what I mean. It is, it is, I'm giving you a hard time, but it is also, it's

00:35:38 ◼   ► It's also legitimately difficult and I think there's this kind of...

00:35:45 ◼   ► People use clickbait because it works and because it gets more people to click on video

00:35:54 ◼   ► titles.

00:35:55 ◼   ► And it's like you can have very complicated feelings about this.

00:35:58 ◼   ► And that's why when I saw that you went straight for the clickbait I was a bit "ahh, I'm not

00:36:02 ◼   ► quite sure how to think about this" because part of me is aware.

00:36:06 ◼   ► if I was starting a vlog from the start, I think people who do vlogs or vlogging-like content,

00:36:15 ◼   ► that seems to have some of the highest density of clickbaity-type titles.

00:36:19 ◼   ► And I think it's partly because the competition in that area is so incredibly fierce.

00:36:26 ◼   ► Like, there's so many people who want to do vlogs that there's a bit of an arms race

00:36:31 ◼   ► that if you are in that category, you almost have to.

00:36:35 ◼   ► Which is why when I look at your title with the brackets that pulls it back, I almost feel like,

00:36:40 ◼   ► "I don't know Myke, maybe you should just embrace the clickbait, embrace the clickbait and try to bring in the audience."

00:36:48 ◼   ► My thinking now is I'm still going further towards clickbait. That is my thinking.

00:36:56 ◼   ► But the level that this is clickbaity is probably the level that I'm going to go for, but I chose the wrong thing to point out.

00:37:05 ◼   ► Hmm, okay, okay. Like you're toying with people's emotions and your relationship.

00:37:10 ◼   ► Exactly. And that's so I know that that was the wrong thing to do.

00:37:14 ◼   ► Right.

00:37:15 ◼   ► But I'm still gonna keep going in this direction, but in some other way. But like,

00:37:21 ◼   ► this is the thing. If you told me to try and come up with another name for that video,

00:37:26 ◼   ► in that style, I can't do it. That's why it's called this because it was the easiest clickbait

00:37:33 ◼   ► to come up with.

00:37:34 ◼   ► - Yeah, it's so hard to title stuff, right?

00:37:37 ◼   ► Clickbaiting or not clickbaiting,

00:37:39 ◼   ► it's shockingly difficult.

00:37:41 ◼   ► It's frustrating because it's one of the hardest things,

00:37:45 ◼   ► and I think it's really important to have a good title.

00:37:50 ◼   ► I think the titles really matter.

00:37:53 ◼   ► Anybody who pays attention to their own user behavior

00:37:55 ◼   ► when just watching videos and seeing what the algorithm serves,

00:37:58 ◼   ► you know the titles affect you.

00:38:00 ◼   ► Like they can't not. So it really does matter trying to select something that's good.

00:38:09 ◼   ► I feel like eventually I'm going to get into the rhythm and like that these names

00:38:18 ◼   ► will come up just naturally for me, right? Like I'll get into a rhythm of thinking

00:38:25 ◼   ► what can these things be called and come up with a name at some point during the process

00:38:29 ◼   ► of making it, but right now I just, I haven't got it. I feel like I've laid the groundwork

00:38:35 ◼   ► now, like I feel like I understand where I want to be going with it, like from a naming

00:38:40 ◼   ► perspective, but I haven't yet landed on the identification of those names. And this is

00:38:48 ◼   ► something that is going to be, I think, a bit of a struggle for me. And again, like

00:38:52 ◼   ► the thumbnails are so hard as well, like you've got to come up with something that is enticing

00:38:56 ◼   ► and also where do they even come from, right?

00:38:58 ◼   ► Like, I'm trying to pull them out of the footage

00:39:00 ◼   ► that I've shot so they're not always

00:39:02 ◼   ► at the highest resolution

00:39:03 ◼   ► 'cause they might be moving images, right?

00:39:07 ◼   ► So now I'm thinking, oh, do I now need to think

00:39:09 ◼   ► about taking a photo of something as well,

00:39:12 ◼   ► like as well as taking video of something

00:39:15 ◼   ► so I get like a good photograph to be used?

00:39:19 ◼   ► Like, this is like part of why I started doing this process

00:39:23 ◼   ► in the first place, is like the understanding

00:39:24 ◼   ► of the different type of production,

00:39:27 ◼   ► a different type of creation,

00:39:28 ◼   ► and this is definitely part of that, right?

00:39:30 ◼   ► Like trying to work out

00:39:33 ◼   ► what this is meant to be.

00:39:39 ◼   ► And again, like I really could just do things

00:39:42 ◼   ► the way that I think that they should be done,

00:39:45 ◼   ► but then I'm not being a part of the system, right?

00:39:49 ◼   ► Like I'm really trying to fit into this system,

00:39:53 ◼   ► because the way that we title stuff, it's so different.

00:39:57 ◼   ► Like, the titles for our episodes of this show are not meant to entice anyone.

00:40:02 ◼   ► They're just, we just pick a funny thing that we said and we just put it in there.

00:40:08 ◼   ► Or on the very rare occasions, it is descriptive of the content.

00:40:12 ◼   ► Like whenever we've done book club episodes, for example,

00:40:15 ◼   ► it's just a title of the book. So it kind of indicates that it's a book club episode.

00:40:20 ◼   ► But like the titles are not anything. The titles are not meant to entice anybody.

00:40:25 ◼   ► And I think you can see on just across a huge number of podcasts,

00:40:29 ◼   ► until you start getting into the really highly produced shows that have teams of people.

00:40:38 ◼   ► But if you are a sort of normal podcast, the titles don't matter because the people listening

00:40:47 ◼   ► listening because they're interested in the people who are doing the podcast, right, for whatever reasons.

00:40:52 ◼   ► They're not intended to be-- they're really not able to be

00:40:57 ◼   ► viral things. Like, you don't have

00:41:00 ◼   ► huge swings in the number of downloads of an episode of a podcast. It's relatively

00:41:07 ◼   ► consistent. And I think even if you and I, Myke, like, we sat down and we're like, "Okay,

00:41:13 ◼   ► What's the clickbait-iest title we could possibly come up with?

00:41:17 ◼   ► But like, for an episode of a podcast, especially this kind of podcast,

00:41:20 ◼   ► there's no way even with the highest quality weaponized clickbait title

00:41:27 ◼   ► that the episode is going to go viral.

00:41:28 ◼   ► Because that's just not how people consume the medium.

00:41:33 ◼   ► I think I'd be willing to bet that a pretty large portion of the people who hear episodes of podcasts

00:41:39 ◼   ► never even know what the title is because it just comes up automatically on their playlist as the next thing to listen to.

00:41:44 ◼   ► So that's why the titles for podcasts are like a little afterthought of "Oh, we need a title, let's just whatever, let's just pick something."

00:41:52 ◼   ► But that's why it's like it is a different game on YouTube.

00:41:58 ◼   ► I think I often wonder like, I'm sure YouTube knows, but I'd love to see some big data analysis on

00:42:06 ◼   ► How much can a title affect views on a video?

00:42:12 ◼   ► I'm convinced that it matters, but I think it's an interesting and open question of

00:42:17 ◼   ► let's say the worst title possible versus the best title possible.

00:42:22 ◼   ► What percentage difference range are you talking about in views?

00:42:27 ◼   ► Is it 10% difference? Is it 200% difference?

00:42:32 ◼   ► Like, I wonder what it is.

00:42:35 ◼   ► You know, like, what is the theoretical maximum difference

00:42:38 ◼   ► that the perfect title could make versus the worst title?

00:42:41 ◼   ► There's an answer to that question,

00:42:43 ◼   ► but it might not be a knowable answer.

00:42:44 ◼   ► So I see something I'm still working through.

00:42:47 ◼   ► Like, I feel like I'm getting closer to an idea,

00:42:51 ◼   ► but right now, like, I obviously have not executed on that idea very well.

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00:45:06 ◼   ► Actually making the videos has been an interesting experience. There are some things that I'm

00:45:11 ◼   ► struggling with that I think I'm getting better with, like audio levels, which is kind of hilarious.

00:45:17 ◼   ► especially using the iPhone like as I am the audio can be tricky at the best of

00:45:24 ◼   ► times to get right. Pretty variable. But I'm working on it and I'm kind of

00:45:29 ◼   ► working on trying to make that better and I'm spending more time like the last

00:45:34 ◼   ► video I like bounced it out or however you call it exported it played it on my

00:45:38 ◼   ► iPhone played it with headphones like I'm trying to work out what the system

00:45:42 ◼   ► is so this is another thing where it's like I can't judge how long these videos

00:45:45 ◼   ► are taken because I'm doing way more to them than I would be doing in like six

00:45:50 ◼   ► months time because by then I'll just know how to do it. Right? Like by then it

00:45:54 ◼   ► would be like yeah I know this is how much I have to boost the video from

00:45:57 ◼   ► outside or inside or whatever but I have to say like I am loving the process of

00:46:03 ◼   ► making these videos. Like even doing things like that they're frustrating but

00:46:07 ◼   ► like when I get to the end of them I feel really satisfied. You know like I

00:46:11 ◼   ► feel like that the audio in the last video that I published, the Adina Left

00:46:15 ◼   ► video was way better than any of the others.

00:46:18 ◼   ► And from my taste, was pretty much as good

00:46:20 ◼   ► as it was gonna be, right, with what I'm doing.

00:46:23 ◼   ► And it isn't necessarily audio quality

00:46:25 ◼   ► that I'm looking for, it's audio balancing.

00:46:28 ◼   ► I know the fact that because I'm using the iPhone,

00:46:30 ◼   ► the audio's not gonna sound as good as it can sound.

00:46:32 ◼   ► But I don't think that's so much of a problem

00:46:34 ◼   ► on YouTube videos, to be honest,

00:46:36 ◼   ► in the style that I'm doing them.

00:46:38 ◼   ► Like as long as you can hear me clearly,

00:46:40 ◼   ► I think that's fine.

00:46:41 ◼   ► Like it doesn't have to sound like how my podcasts

00:46:45 ◼   ► sound. No you don't need the audio at that at that high level. Better audio is

00:46:51 ◼   ► always better obviously but how much does it matter and as we have

00:46:55 ◼   ► talked before like the the production quality doesn't matter as as much as

00:47:03 ◼   ► people think it does. What matters is have you created a thing that's engaging

00:47:09 ◼   ► to watch? Do you know how to cut a video together roughly even if you're not doing it in the greatest possible way that you can?

00:47:19 ◼   ► This is what matters way more to are people going to continue to watch a video.

00:47:27 ◼   ► And just going back to one thing that you were saying before about how you're finding this a really satisfying process.

00:47:33 ◼   ► Another reason that I think this is a great side project for you is that this is a side project that has a fast feedback loop and iteration loop.

00:47:45 ◼   ► And I think it's one of the reasons why so many people like to do vlogging as a project is because it's the kind of thing that if you're getting better at it, you learn how to do a thing, you have a skill, you upload the video, you immediately see feedback from it.

00:48:02 ◼   ► from it and then you can go into making the next vlog thinking about how that

00:48:07 ◼   ► previous one went and it can be this this loop of fast feedback right it's

00:48:12 ◼   ► and I think that's that's an advantage for side projects as opposed to

00:48:16 ◼   ► something where it's like oh you're gonna work in secrecy for years on on

00:48:20 ◼   ► one long movie or whatever and then put it out to the public and they only get

00:48:24 ◼   ► feedback then it's a very different experience for side projects that have

00:48:29 ◼   ► long feedback cycles versus side projects that have very short, very tight feedback loops.

00:48:36 ◼   ► And obviously, vlogging is one of those things.

00:48:39 ◼   ► I think that's why it can feel really addictive, is because you're always...

00:48:44 ◼   ► you're in a little cycle where you're always looking for the next part of it.

00:48:47 ◼   ► It's like you're learning a new skill, you've just put it up, you're getting the feedback,

00:48:51 ◼   ► and you always want to go into the next part of that cycle.

00:48:55 ◼   ► So that's been a lot of fun and I've liked seeing what people are liking and what they're not liking and

00:49:01 ◼   ► Kind of trying to craft the videos a little bit more right like okay people like this part. They didn't like this part

00:49:08 ◼   ► So what can I do to make this bit better?

00:49:11 ◼   ► You know and that's been an interesting thing and it there's more feedback to give than there is with the podcast

00:49:19 ◼   ► Mm-hmm because people can like they can say what they like and don't like about what we talk about

00:49:23 ◼   ► But that's kind of it. But with this it's like we want to see you talk more about these things

00:49:28 ◼   ► But also why don't you try tweaking this a little bit differently or like I really like that thing that you do

00:49:33 ◼   ► Visually and maybe you could try and make this a little bit better that kind of thing. Yeah, and again, it's it's much more easily

00:49:39 ◼   ► Consumable as a complete project even for someone who's not super into it

00:49:45 ◼   ► But who wants to leave some feedback?

00:49:47 ◼   ► Like someone can watch a three minute or four minute video and then leave a comment and say like I didn't like this

00:49:52 ◼   ► I didn't like that right but no one's going to listen to a two hour long podcast

00:49:55 ◼   ► Just to leave some feedback about I didn't really like this part. It's just like the time commitment is vastly different

00:50:02 ◼   ► I've also liked the production process

00:50:05 ◼   ► The kind of the rhythm of it the feeling of it

00:50:07 ◼   ► So I kind of dump all of my footage into final cut

00:50:11 ◼   ► Start making my cuts and pulling out the things that I think are interesting

00:50:14 ◼   ► Then I go back and I add the music in and then I go back and then I add any of the little

00:50:20 ◼   ► graphics in but what I like is how while I'm making it it's

00:50:24 ◼   ► Feeling better like before I've added the music when it's just the footage. I always think it's boring and rubbish

00:50:31 ◼   ► Every time this has happened music does a lot of the heavy lifting weird right my god

00:50:38 ◼   ► Any music it doesn't matter what it is

00:50:40 ◼   ► Yeah, because then as well like I start doing fun stuff with the visuals right where I'm trying and it's tricky

00:50:46 ◼   ► But like I'm trying to like match some of the visual stuff up with the pace of the music and beats of the music and stuff

00:50:51 ◼   ► Like that which is a really hard thing to do

00:50:53 ◼   ► But like I'm trying to do that because I really like that in the videos that I watch so

00:50:58 ◼   ► It's funny to me how like I'm getting into this

00:51:01 ◼   ► rhythm and understanding my own

00:51:04 ◼   ► Process in that like when I'm putting the video together

00:51:08 ◼   ► It doesn't start to get good until the music's there and then in my mind

00:51:12 ◼   ► I'm like, well if I've got the music in and it still doesn't feel good

00:51:15 ◼   ► there's something more fundamentally wrong.

00:51:17 ◼   ► Yeah, that's that's that is definitely that's definitely the case when I'm editing the audio from my own videos

00:51:24 ◼   ► I always have to just just be listening to some kind of temp music

00:51:29 ◼   ► I just I'll just put something on repeat while I'm editing the audio

00:51:33 ◼   ► Because I'm aware of that same effect

00:51:36 ◼   ► Like if I don't do this, I'm going to cut it way too harshly because I think everything is just super boring

00:51:42 ◼   ► It's like well actually just like listening to any narration without the music. It just it's just

00:51:47 ◼   ► wrong and I wonder if it's partly also with vlogs that there's a certain element of performance that's occurring

00:51:56 ◼   ► like people just speak differently into a camera and I think maybe we're just I

00:52:01 ◼   ► don't know like

00:52:04 ◼   ► culturally

00:52:05 ◼   ► expecting that there's going to be music

00:52:07 ◼   ► underlying when a person is talking in a particular way and maybe that's why it sounds so weird if you don't have

00:52:12 ◼   ► anything playing underneath, but yeah, it's it's

00:52:15 ◼   ► astounding how

00:52:18 ◼   ► Any piece of content

00:52:21 ◼   ► Doesn't feel real until you have the audio there

00:52:26 ◼   ► Like it just it just feels so strange without it

00:52:30 ◼   ► I just really like that I'm able to have this feeling like I've made a thing

00:52:36 ◼   ► Out of stuff so like all of the all of the shows

00:52:39 ◼   ► There's just one

00:52:42 ◼   ► Piece of raw footage which is the whole recording, right?

00:52:46 ◼   ► Mm-hmm, and then I can cut that up and I can kind of make a thing out of it

00:52:49 ◼   ► but there's something different in like having 25 video clips and

00:52:54 ◼   ► Moving them around

00:52:57 ◼   ► So they make more sense in like the flow of the video

00:52:59 ◼   ► cutting them up and

00:53:03 ◼   ► making one thing out of these 25 things?

00:53:06 ◼   ► Yeah, it's the difference between

00:53:08 ◼   ► chiseling something out of marble or

00:53:11 ◼   ► constructing something out of Lego.

00:53:14 ◼   ► And I like the Lego more. Yeah. Yeah with the audio you're taking the thing and cutting it down and

00:53:20 ◼   ► with the video you have a wide selection of stuff from which you're picking some things and building a little vlog.

00:53:27 ◼   ► Yeah, like they even though I think if someone was sitting behind you and watching you do either of these processes

00:53:33 ◼   ► They would look very similar, but mentally they're totally different things

00:53:37 ◼   ► I want one is entirely about cutting and one is entirely about assembling

00:53:43 ◼   ► So I can see I can see why you would enjoy it as a very different experience

00:53:46 ◼   ► But I have learned a valuable lesson about the production

00:53:52 ◼   ► That it's kind of split into three parts and a lot of the time that they can take

00:53:57 ◼   ► Very similar amounts of time to get done. So what are the three parts of assembling a vlog?

00:54:03 ◼   ► I need to know maybe I'm gonna do this shooting. Okay, so I have to shoot video editing

00:54:07 ◼   ► editing video YouTube

00:54:10 ◼   ► YouTube's not a part

00:54:13 ◼   ► You just upload it Myke it's really easy it takes me

00:54:19 ◼   ► Right now it is taking me an astoundingly long time to get the video from export to publish

00:54:26 ◼   ► Like you know, and it's just like I'm having myriad technical problems

00:54:33 ◼   ► And and try and again like trying to like force this web app to do what I want it to do. Mm-hmm

00:54:41 ◼   ► I really don't understand why there isn't a native desktop

00:54:45 ◼   ► application where you can do all of the annotations and all the cards and then just upload it

00:54:49 ◼   ► from there directly to YouTube with the metadata. I don't know why that doesn't exist. Because

00:54:53 ◼   ► most of the problems that I have in responsiveness, in buffering, in loading, it's all based

00:54:59 ◼   ► on the fact that I'm uploading this video before I'm adding any of the annotations

00:55:03 ◼   ► and cards. And I wish there was a way to do that locally and then upload that information

00:55:09 ◼   ► to YouTube. And I again, like I'm getting better at it, I'm learning different ways

00:55:13 ◼   ► of doing it, but it still takes me a long time and also based in that is like the coming

00:55:20 ◼   ► up with a title and putting in all the keywords and adding it into a playlist and all this

00:55:26 ◼   ► stuff and it's building more and more and more every time I publish because people are

00:55:30 ◼   ► like, "Hey, you should do this thing that everybody does," which is like creating a

00:55:34 ◼   ► playlist and adding it to a playlist because YouTube refuses to play in any other order

00:55:38 ◼   ► than the one that they set.

00:55:39 ◼   ► And it's, you know, like all of these things, it's like building and building and building

00:55:43 ◼   ► every time.

00:55:44 ◼   ► So for me right now, at least, it's split into these three parts.

00:55:49 ◼   ► So I kind of think of it as like shooting, editing, distribution.

00:55:53 ◼   ► And those three parts are taking very long times.

00:55:57 ◼   ► And I know that it's going to change, like, and every video will be different.

00:56:01 ◼   ► Some videos, I will be only shooting them for like an hour or two, depending on what

00:56:04 ◼   ► I'm doing.

00:56:05 ◼   ► If I'm doing something at home, and there's going to be more stuff like that, where I'm

00:56:08 ◼   ► I'm kind of just talking or showing something.

00:56:10 ◼   ► Those videos take way less than if I'm out in London

00:56:12 ◼   ► for eight hours and then over that time

00:56:15 ◼   ► I'm taking video of stuff.

00:56:16 ◼   ► But I have highlighted that these are three, for me,

00:56:19 ◼   ► major things and they're all gonna take

00:56:21 ◼   ► a substantial amount of time to do.

00:56:24 ◼   ► Because, and this was, I only kind of really realized this

00:56:28 ◼   ► on the last video, 'cause prior to that I was just thinking,

00:56:31 ◼   ► just shooting and editing and then just uploading.

00:56:33 ◼   ► But if you're being serious about it

00:56:35 ◼   ► and you're really trying to bend to the system

00:56:39 ◼   ► and make the system work for you,

00:56:41 ◼   ► there are lots of things that you need

00:56:43 ◼   ► to kind of pay attention to.

00:56:45 ◼   ► That's kind of the way that I'm approaching it right now.

00:56:47 ◼   ► So the YouTube stuff and the distribution stuff

00:56:49 ◼   ► and the promotion stuff is taking a long time,

00:56:51 ◼   ► especially as I'm working on setting up a mailing list

00:56:54 ◼   ► because a couple of people have asked for that

00:56:56 ◼   ► and now realizing there's no way to automate this.

00:56:59 ◼   ► So that's gonna be another step in the publishing process.

00:57:03 ◼   ► See? I think you can see how I mentioned a while back like I have a 70+ item checklist for putting up a video.

00:57:12 ◼   ► I haven't built that checklist yet, but that's like something I may be gonna do with the next video that I publish.

00:57:18 ◼   ► Just write down all my steps, you know.

00:57:20 ◼   ► You should really do that and you can see now why.

00:57:23 ◼   ► Like there's just a bunch of little switches to flip and buttons to press and like, "Oh, did I add this in here?"

00:57:30 ◼   ► And it's like yes, you can mentally keep all of that in your head

00:57:34 ◼   ► But it's gonna be way better if you just you're just going to like a pre-flight checklist

00:57:38 ◼   ► Because one of them are gonna be like check the video ends at the right time and then I just saved myself

00:57:43 ◼   ► 45 minutes of waiting for the YouTube system to complete its edit. Yeah, one of the items on my checklist is

00:57:51 ◼   ► To watch the video fully on YouTube right after it's been uploaded because a surprising amount of times

00:57:58 ◼   ► I've run into an issue where the audio just falls out of sync with the video eventually

00:58:04 ◼   ► Given me warnings like this every now and then nothing's wrong with it, but it's like hey

00:58:08 ◼   ► We think the video and audio is out of sync. I'm like why do you think this yeah?

00:58:12 ◼   ► I have never gotten a warning, but I have often gotten the video and audio out of sync

00:58:17 ◼   ► There's a problem here. I'm getting your warnings

00:58:20 ◼   ► That's what it is

00:58:23 ◼   ► But that's why it's just one of those items on the checklist is every time I upload it

00:58:27 ◼   ► I kind of mentally want to start filling in all of the metadata and doing all of the steps while it's uploading

00:58:33 ◼   ► Because at least YouTube does let you do that, but I've learned from experience like nope

00:58:36 ◼   ► Nope

00:58:37 ◼   ► Don't try to fill in any of this ahead of time because it's just going to be a huge waste if when you actually

00:58:42 ◼   ► Finally watch the video it falls out of sync halfway through

00:58:46 ◼   ► Yep, it's like then you've just wasted 30 minutes filling in all of this stuff

00:58:50 ◼   ► And also protip don't bother with those keywords. There's no point in filling

00:58:54 ◼   ► Okay, good to know. YouTube really wants you to fill them in but you don't have to.

00:58:57 ◼   ► See, I've been filling them in because I thought it might help get it in front of people.

00:59:01 ◼   ► My understanding from some conversations that I've had is that those keywords are entirely for the benefit of the advertisers bidding on the video.

00:59:11 ◼   ► Oh, then I don't care.

00:59:12 ◼   ► that if there are no keywords in there, that YouTube just algorithmically decides what the video is about based on the comments that people are leaving.

00:59:21 ◼   ► It auto-generates keywords for auctions based on the comments people leave.

00:59:26 ◼   ► I had this in the context of a conversation of someone who was really convincing me to try to use keywords.

00:59:33 ◼   ► The longer you talk, dude, the more I am hearing "I don't need to bother with this."

00:59:37 ◼   ► This is for you. This is not for me. So yeah, don't bother with those.

00:59:43 ◼   ► Talking about advertising, I want to share some of my numbers with the audience.

00:59:50 ◼   ► You don't normally like to share numbers, Myke. You never want to share the numbers

00:59:53 ◼   ► about the podcast, but you're happy with sharing numbers about the YouTube channel?

00:59:56 ◼   ► I don't care about these numbers.

00:59:58 ◼   ► Right, because they're comical?

01:00:00 ◼   ► Yes. So this is another thing about the YouTube system. There is two reports. There is a revenue

01:00:06 ◼   ► report and an ad rates report and they both have different numbers on them.

01:00:12 ◼   ► This is another thing about YouTube's analytics system.

01:00:14 ◼   ► There's so much data but 90% of it makes no sense.

01:00:19 ◼   ► Why is there a revenue report and an ad rates report and they both have different numbers

01:00:24 ◼   ► on them?

01:00:25 ◼   ► Okay, well Myke, the difference between the ad rate report and the revenue report is the

01:00:32 ◼   ► The ad rate report shows how much money was actually generated by the ads.

01:00:39 ◼   ► And then the revenue is how much I got.

01:00:42 ◼   ► Right.

01:00:43 ◼   ► The revenue is your 55% of the money that was actually generated by the advertisements.

01:00:51 ◼   ► Why do they think they can take that amount of money from me?

01:00:54 ◼   ► Because they can.

01:00:55 ◼   ► Because they successfully can.

01:00:56 ◼   ► This is always again.

01:00:57 ◼   ► I hear Apple people always complain, they're like, "Oh, 30%!"

01:01:00 ◼   ► It's like I'd murder a family member for 30%,

01:01:05 ◼   ► you crazy?

01:01:07 ◼   ► - Well let me share my ad rates report

01:01:10 ◼   ► so people get the full kind of picture

01:01:12 ◼   ► and then I'll talk about the revenue.

01:01:13 ◼   ► So I have had 14,270 estimated monetized playbacks,

01:01:18 ◼   ► which is maybe my favorite statistic,

01:01:23 ◼   ► estimated monetized playbacks.

01:01:26 ◼   ► This is from September 14th to October 11th

01:01:30 ◼   ► because of course the data is multiple days old because YouTube, you know.

01:01:35 ◼   ► Right. So these are for the listener.

01:01:37 ◼   ► What that means in YouTube's system is this is a video that plays

01:01:42 ◼   ► against which YouTube was able to run an ad.

01:01:47 ◼   ► There are many circumstances under which a video might play where they can't run an ad.

01:01:51 ◼   ► Either there's nothing in the auction to fill, or someone's watching on a platform

01:01:56 ◼   ► where the ads don't play.

01:01:57 ◼   ► So you can have the video play

01:02:00 ◼   ► without necessarily having an ad show up.

01:02:03 ◼   ► Or if, I forget what the timer is,

01:02:07 ◼   ► but YouTube has some internal timer

01:02:08 ◼   ► where they won't show someone a video ad in front

01:02:12 ◼   ► if they've watched a video ad

01:02:14 ◼   ► within a certain window of time.

01:02:15 ◼   ► So this is what estimated monetized playbacks means.

01:02:19 ◼   ► - So I've had 14,270 estimated monetized playbacks.

01:02:25 ◼   ► I have made $88.98.

01:02:29 ◼   ► Well, not me, there has been $88.98 generated.

01:02:35 ◼   ► And then of those 88.98, I have got 48.94 of it.

01:02:40 ◼   ► - There you go, Myke.

01:02:43 ◼   ► - So look, this is not me complaining about

01:02:46 ◼   ► the amount of money that I make from my videos

01:02:50 ◼   ► 'cause I kind of don't care about it in that way.

01:02:54 ◼   ► And I've put ads on the videos not to make,

01:02:58 ◼   ► again, this is like, I'm not trying to make money here,

01:03:00 ◼   ► I'm again trying to understand the system.

01:03:03 ◼   ► So by having ads on my videos,

01:03:05 ◼   ► I am now understanding how much money

01:03:07 ◼   ► can be made on YouTube, seriously.

01:03:10 ◼   ► And the answer is, not a lot of money.

01:03:13 ◼   ► Now, again, this $50 that I'm gonna get,

01:03:18 ◼   ► that's great, that's $50, right?

01:03:22 ◼   ► I didn't really expect any money out of that. It's $50. It's just very interesting to me.

01:03:27 ◼   ► And I think it, you know, and again, I know that I make different money than you would

01:03:32 ◼   ► make. You make different money than PewDiePie would make because YouTube also calculate

01:03:37 ◼   ► their CPM, which is how much they pay per thousand, differently depending on many variable

01:03:42 ◼   ► factors. It's not a fixed rate, right? Like everybody has their own to a point.

01:03:47 ◼   ► Yeah, this is... the rates can vary by...

01:03:52 ◼   ► I would say from the absolute bottom to the absolute top, maybe by a factor of like five is the biggest range

01:04:01 ◼   ► I've kind of seen across different creators. And again that partly depends on

01:04:05 ◼   ► the auction system that is going on behind the scenes.

01:04:09 ◼   ► I'm always never quite sure how aware people are of this, but when you go to load a video

01:04:16 ◼   ► YouTube has a kind of instantaneous auction between a bunch of advertisers to decide what ad is going to be shown and

01:04:23 ◼   ► Advertisers can put in all kinds of stuff that they that they want their viewers like so they can fill out demographic data

01:04:31 ◼   ► So you know fairly commonly if it's like like a new shoot-em-up video game comes out that like okay?

01:04:37 ◼   ► We want males you know 14 to 35 in North America

01:04:42 ◼   ► And there's a few other like characteristics that they can put and they can say we want also videos that are in the video game

01:04:49 ◼   ► Category so we know like it's somebody

01:04:51 ◼   ► Watching a PewDiePie video that we want to run this ad against there's like a little auction that occurs to try to figure out which

01:04:58 ◼   ► advertiser is willing to spend the most money to get in front of

01:05:03 ◼   ► You at that moment, and it's actually it's quite like an interesting complicated

01:05:10 ◼   ► system, but what that means is that some people

01:05:13 ◼   ► like beauty vloggers in particular can rake in like

01:05:17 ◼   ► incredibly high ad rates when there's like built-in products around what they're talking about.

01:05:25 ◼   ► And then for

01:05:27 ◼   ► for channels like vlogs or for channels like myself that don't necessarily have a built-in

01:05:33 ◼   ► topic, the ad rates tend to be lower because there's not something that

01:05:40 ◼   ► there is specifically being advertised against.

01:05:44 ◼   ► So like that's part of what is occurring behind

01:05:48 ◼   ► the scenes. And it is one of the reasons why it's a little bit hard to compare

01:05:52 ◼   ► what ad rates are for one person versus another.

01:05:56 ◼   ► But yeah, that is what's occurring behind the scenes.

01:06:00 ◼   ► Okay Myke, we've talked about your revenue numbers. What I want to know

01:06:04 ◼   ► is on the YouTube Analytics page

01:06:08 ◼   ► There is one tab that is a combination of fascinating and terrifying, and it is the

01:06:19 ◼   ► audience retention tab.

01:06:21 ◼   ► Have you found this one yet?

01:06:22 ◼   ► I've been looking at this one.

01:06:24 ◼   ► Alright, would you please explain for the listener, what is the audience retention tab?

01:06:33 ◼   ► The audience retention tab is what tells me for every video how long people watch it.

01:06:40 ◼   ► So of the amount of people that pressed play, what percentage of those people get to the

01:06:47 ◼   ► end?

01:06:50 ◼   ► Now I have actually been paying attention to this and I am pretty happy with my numbers.

01:06:59 ◼   ► Now my average number, I guess across everything, should we maybe look at here?

01:07:03 ◼   ► Yes, so tell me, if you just load it up on the first page, it should have two numbers.

01:07:09 ◼   ► It should have average view duration, but the second one is the average percentage viewed.

01:07:15 ◼   ► What's the average percentage viewed across your videos?

01:07:18 ◼   ► 63%.

01:07:19 ◼   ► Ooh, see I think that's pretty good.

01:07:23 ◼   ► So do I.

01:07:24 ◼   ► with it, especially because the ends of the videos really skew the numbers. So there's

01:07:32 ◼   ► like a harsh drop off in like the last 15 seconds because the video's done. Right? So

01:07:39 ◼   ► lots of people close it. But like I keep it like most of my videos stay in like the 70

01:07:45 ◼   ► to 60% range for the majority of the content.

01:07:50 ◼   ► Yeah, so just so the listeners have a comparison, like my average viewed percentage across again the whole video

01:07:58 ◼   ► and I have the same effect that you do obviously like sharp drop up at the end

01:08:02 ◼   ► is 65% and so it's just around the same area

01:08:08 ◼   ► The thing that I think is really interesting and is terrifying

01:08:12 ◼   ► but to me is like the heart of YouTube tracking data

01:08:16 ◼   ► that you can click on any video and see exactly when people started getting bored and left.

01:08:25 ◼   ► They will draw a line on the screen that shows you the percent of people who are still paying

01:08:31 ◼   ► attention to your video from the start and the really interesting graph is that they

01:08:36 ◼   ► will give you relative audience attention.

01:08:39 ◼   ► So compared to other videos that are the same length on YouTube, is your video more or less

01:08:49 ◼   ► engaging than the average video of the same length?

01:08:53 ◼   ► And those graphs are-- they're both sort of like interesting and terrifying because you

01:09:01 ◼   ► can see the exact moment when you lose people, right?

01:09:04 ◼   ► Or like when people start getting bored.

01:09:07 ◼   ► really interesting to see like when when does something dip and you know

01:09:13 ◼   ► particularly if if you have moments where like you're talking about one

01:09:16 ◼   ► thing and then you're talking about another you can see the shape of

01:09:19 ◼   ► segments in your own video with those graphs. Now the thing that I find is that

01:09:26 ◼   ► it's this stuff is is fascinating and it's interesting it's interesting to

01:09:31 ◼   ► look at you know and to see how are how are different videos

01:09:36 ◼   ► received by people

01:09:38 ◼   ► Like I'm just like I'm just pulling up humans need not apply like and that one never crosses the below-average interesting graph. Mm-hmm, but

01:09:46 ◼   ► It is also very youtubey to me because they give you so much information

01:09:51 ◼   ► But it's also like well

01:09:54 ◼   ► It's very hard to know if there's anything actionable to be drawn from these graphs

01:09:59 ◼   ► right like it's it's very hard to

01:10:02 ◼   ► to pull out a general trend of what you should do and what you shouldn't do.

01:10:06 ◼   ► It's more like YouTube is just telling you exactly when you were boring and then saying, "Don't be boring."

01:10:12 ◼   ► That's what I kind of don't like about it in a way. Like I know why that's valuable and useful, but as

01:10:18 ◼   ► an artist, you know, like it can be a bit like, "Oh, I

01:10:21 ◼   ► don't really think of myself as an artist." Of course you do, Myke.

01:10:25 ◼   ► But yeah, so they're just telling you where you were boring and

01:10:30 ◼   ► What are you gonna do about that? Who knows? Don't be boring in the future. That's that's kind of what that graph says. So, yep, I

01:10:36 ◼   ► find it interesting but unactionable

01:10:40 ◼   ► which is I

01:10:43 ◼   ► think what might be the the summary of what I think is the the YouTube analytics page.

01:10:48 ◼   ► Like they will tell you everything about your viewers that you could possibly want to know. Their demographics, the playback location, the exact moment

01:10:55 ◼   ► they got bored, where they came from, what device they're watching on,

01:10:59 ◼   ► how much money YouTube made, how much money they're going to give to you, but it's also just

01:11:05 ◼   ► unactionable all of it.

01:11:08 ◼   ► Yeah.

01:11:09 ◼   ► I find that that's the YouTube data is a bit like

01:11:13 ◼   ► Okay, it's a thing

01:11:16 ◼   ► It's interesting. I check it every once in a while, but it's not a thing

01:11:20 ◼   ► to live or die by, Myke. I think you should just pay much more attention to your subscriber numbers and your view numbers and

01:11:28 ◼   ► And those are the things that you should track.

01:11:30 ◼   ► That's really kind of all I'm paying attention to.

01:11:34 ◼   ► I dip into the other things just to see what they're doing.

01:11:37 ◼   ► But it's the view numbers and subscriber numbers, just because I feel like I understand those.

01:11:42 ◼   ► They're analogous to the stuff that I'm used to.

01:11:46 ◼   ► Yeah. Yeah.

01:11:47 ◼   ► That's what you gotta focus on.

01:11:49 ◼   ► Asking people to like, comment, and subscribe.

01:11:52 ◼   ► Like, comment, and subscribe. YouTube.com/MykeHurley.

01:11:56 ◼   ► /user/MykeHurley.

01:11:57 ◼   ► This episode of Cortex is brought to you by Backblaze, the unlimited native backup solution for your Mac or PC.

01:12:06 ◼   ► You can sign up for a 15-day free trial, no credit card required, at backblaze.com/cortex.

01:12:13 ◼   ► I don't need Backblaze, you're thinking to yourself right now. I use Time Machine.

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01:14:12 ◼   ► [BEEP]

01:14:13 ◼   ► Alright, so I opened this whole conversation with you, Myke, kind of wanting to know how you felt about it,

01:14:17 ◼   ► And you wanted to launch into all the like behind the scenes

01:14:20 ◼   ► nerdery about your feelings on the processing but like to like so can we get can we get back to my original question from

01:14:27 ◼   ► an hour ago, which is

01:14:29 ◼   ► Overall, like how are you feeling man?

01:14:33 ◼   ► You're like you're a vlogger out in the world like you're a dude walking on the street. You're filming yourself

01:14:38 ◼   ► You're talking into a camera. You're at home talking to your UK echo

01:14:43 ◼   ► You put this out into the world, people have commented on it. How are you feeling?

01:14:48 ◼   ► Like what's your take on the reception of it?

01:14:52 ◼   ► So the reception has surprised me, I think is the best way to put it.

01:14:57 ◼   ► I didn't think people would hate the videos.

01:15:01 ◼   ► Mm-hmm.

01:15:03 ◼   ► I thought that some people would like them and some people would not like them.

01:15:07 ◼   ► And that I would have lots of criticism, good and bad, to kind of take away and work on.

01:15:14 ◼   ► But I think overall, the response has been more positive than I expected it to be, which

01:15:23 ◼   ► has been really encouraging.

01:15:26 ◼   ► Like people seem to like from straight away, were like watching the videos, like, "I really

01:15:30 ◼   ► like this.

01:15:31 ◼   ► I like that you do this and I like that you do this.

01:15:34 ◼   ► And I feel like you have your have kind of have your own style going on here or at least

01:15:38 ◼   ► like I can see the beginnings of like what will be your style, which is a very encouraging

01:15:44 ◼   ► thing because that was important to me, but I didn't try and like hammer it home.

01:15:51 ◼   ► Like I wasn't really trying to like force the Myke Hurley vlogging style.

01:15:57 ◼   ► I just did what I thought represented me and how I wanted the videos to look.

01:16:04 ◼   ► And in doing that, I've kind of feel like I'm landing on a few things which kind of

01:16:09 ◼   ► feel like me.

01:16:12 ◼   ► You know, like my use of emoji and my use of like, I like it.

01:16:17 ◼   ► Some people don't like it, which is fine.

01:16:19 ◼   ► But I like it.

01:16:20 ◼   ► I like it a lot.

01:16:21 ◼   ► I'm glad you like it, Myke.

01:16:24 ◼   ► Uh huh.

01:16:25 ◼   ► You're in that camp.

01:16:26 ◼   ► It'll be no surprise to you that I really do not like the emojis.

01:16:30 ◼   ► But I'm balancing it out. I think that I went a little too far in one video

01:16:36 ◼   ► and now I'm kind of like balancing it out a little bit. I'm trying to use them effectively but sparingly.

01:16:42 ◼   ► But this was one of my things when you first sent me the videos. That was going to be one of my negative pieces of feedback

01:16:48 ◼   ► but I thought, "No, you know, you gotta let a mic be a mic. He's gonna use his little emoji. There's no point."

01:16:55 ◼   ► I don't know if I... I wouldn't take your guidance on the emoji as clearly because you

01:17:04 ◼   ► don't send emoji, you don't use emoji, you are like emoji negative, you know? So I was

01:17:13 ◼   ► taking... in aggregate people really like the emoji.

01:17:16 ◼   ► Right. Yeah. I expected they would.

01:17:18 ◼   ► I'm sorry, but you're a bad test case for it.

01:17:20 ◼   ► I know people like their stickers. They like their emoji. Mm-hmm. They like their phones exploding with confetti

01:17:27 ◼   ► I understand and I like that the part that I you know

01:17:30 ◼   ► if what I can kind of call in my brain the narrator like the little comments that pop up which is

01:17:37 ◼   ► Editing mic telling you things or pointing things out or making little jokes. And also it allows me to make the jokes that I missed

01:17:47 ◼   ► It's like you should have made that joke there. You know what I could just put the text on the screen and I've made the joke

01:17:52 ◼   ► Yeah, and again for anyone who hasn't done this kind of stuff you you have to

01:17:57 ◼   ► Get into those mental modes. There's there's on camera mic and there is editing mic

01:18:05 ◼   ► Like and what what feels like the kind of thing that editing mic would put into the video versus what on

01:18:11 ◼   ► camera like would do. Like this is this is what makes a thing a thing.

01:18:19 ◼   ► Mm-hmm.

01:18:20 ◼   ► Right, it's it's um as a slight side note because I'm still worried about this video that I'm working on

01:18:25 ◼   ► that's gonna be coming out at some point. Like there's a very a very conscious decision in in this video that this

01:18:32 ◼   ► that the narrator it's like is this normal gray talking or is this like a different gray talking and you feel like a crazy person

01:18:40 ◼   ► when you're even thinking about this stuff in your head, but this is the kind of stuff that you

01:18:45 ◼   ► have to think about when you're creating something that is to be consumed by others.

01:18:52 ◼   ► Like, what is this? Like, as I'm talking into this microphone,

01:18:56 ◼   ► is it me talking, right? Or is it like a different version of me talking?

01:19:01 ◼   ► Just like you're doing this with the editing. Like, is it mic or is it editor mic in this moment?

01:19:07 ◼   ► - Yeah, to get super fancy about it.

01:19:10 ◼   ► It's like the characters at the video,

01:19:12 ◼   ► and there's me, there's me on screen,

01:19:15 ◼   ► the person that you're seeing,

01:19:16 ◼   ► and then the use of text is like a different character

01:19:19 ◼   ► 'cause it's like a different personality.

01:19:21 ◼   ► It's doing things that are not done by the people

01:19:24 ◼   ► in the video that you can see, right?

01:19:26 ◼   ► So it's like it's adding a different sense of humor.

01:19:29 ◼   ► It's adding a different perspective.

01:19:31 ◼   ► And that's kind of how I think about it,

01:19:34 ◼   ► which is maybe too much,

01:19:36 ◼   ► and people should and will roll their eyes at that,

01:19:39 ◼   ► but that makes sense in my brain, at least.

01:19:42 ◼   ► - It does make sense, although I do sometimes have

01:19:46 ◼   ► some limited patience for people who like to hide behind

01:19:51 ◼   ► the idea of like, oh, it's just a character on screen,

01:19:53 ◼   ► it's not me, right?

01:19:54 ◼   ► - Oh no, that's definitely me, you're seeing me.

01:19:57 ◼   ► - Yeah, yeah. - Right, like it's all me,

01:19:58 ◼   ► but it's like different versions of me.

01:20:01 ◼   ► - Yeah, I just think there's a, some people like,

01:20:03 ◼   ► hide behind this notion of like, "Oh, it's a character! It's all for fun!"

01:20:08 ◼   ► Right? It's like, "Oh, and I meet you!" and you're exactly the person on screen.

01:20:11 ◼   ► There's no character here at all.

01:20:13 ◼   ► For me, like, one of the things that is actually quite important is I want to be as close to me as possible in these videos

01:20:20 ◼   ► because that feels like the only way I can do them.

01:20:23 ◼   ► Yeah, you want to be raw and honest, Myke.

01:20:25 ◼   ► I want to just be, you know, open with the audience, you know?

01:20:27 ◼   ► Yeah.

01:20:28 ◼   ► Just like, I want them to see the real me, Gray.

01:20:30 ◼   ► Yeah, that's all you want.

01:20:32 ◼   ► They want you want you want the world to gaze upon the real Myke and love him

01:20:36 ◼   ► Please love me

01:20:39 ◼   ► Like comment and subscribe

01:20:47 ◼   ► Gross

01:20:50 ◼   ► One thing that's been hilarious to me over the course of my youtube career is that the face you career now

01:20:58 ◼   ► It's my YouTube career so far is that basically I think the day the day that I kind of started taking it seriously in publishing the

01:21:06 ◼   ► Videos was the day that PewDiePie's tuber simulator was released and we spoke about this game a bunch

01:21:12 ◼   ► It's like it is basically PewDiePie's mobile game in which you play a youtuber

01:21:18 ◼   ► and

01:21:20 ◼   ► I basically consider this the dark look at reality

01:21:25 ◼   ► That is PewDiePie's tuba simulator. Okay. What do you mean by the dark look at reality here?

01:21:32 ◼   ► So you play this mobile game where?

01:21:35 ◼   ► You are making YouTube videos in such a sense

01:21:39 ◼   ► It's like you click a button and then it's recorded edited and viewed and then the views start coming in

01:21:43 ◼   ► The more views you get the more items you can buy

01:21:46 ◼   ► And it kind of upgrade the room that you're in right? Mm-hmm. And then you adorn your room with things

01:21:54 ◼   ► You make it more lavish you make the room bigger over time that kind of stuff

01:21:58 ◼   ► Now some of the things that I consider to be the dark look at reality. So your character in the game is is you

01:22:04 ◼   ► And this character never moves from the desk

01:22:08 ◼   ► This character sits in front of a computer

01:22:13 ◼   ► Constantly and there is nothing you can do to make them get up and all they do is sit there and

01:22:22 ◼   ► and you are making them grind through making videos just to generate views and you are

01:22:28 ◼   ► like focusing on what's trending to make the video that's going to get the most views,

01:22:34 ◼   ► right? And there's things that you can do and every now and then the sponsor, Eagle,

01:22:40 ◼   ► drops something present on you and there are just like the and it's like the more views

01:22:46 ◼   ► you're able to get, the more things you're able to buy. It's like this twisted look

01:22:54 ◼   ► on what it's like to be a YouTuber. It's kind of fascinating to me.

01:22:59 ◼   ► - Mainly because your character just sits there, floating in a little room in empty

01:23:04 ◼   ► space. - On a desk.

01:23:06 ◼   ► - With nothing else to do. - And you're buying things to put in the room

01:23:10 ◼   ► around you but you never get to experience them because you have to sit and grind and

01:23:16 ◼   ► make more videos to get more views.

01:23:21 ◼   ► It is kind of existentially bleak when you think about it that way.

01:23:24 ◼   ► It is.

01:23:25 ◼   ► The person sitting there just to make everybody love them.

01:23:27 ◼   ► And then when I start to think about it, right, like I've been thinking a lot about this

01:23:31 ◼   ► game, I think about who made it.

01:23:34 ◼   ► Right?

01:23:35 ◼   ► And I guess the creative vision for this game is the most popular YouTuber in the world.

01:23:42 ◼   ► And it's just this really kind of like, strange view on this stuff.

01:23:49 ◼   ► Yeah, I did because we've discussed PewDiePie a surprisingly large amount on this show,

01:23:57 ◼   ► and I think at one point we mentioned how the Tuber Simulator seemed like an obvious

01:24:01 ◼   ► project for him.

01:24:02 ◼   ► I find his growing business empire like a very interesting thing to observe from a distance

01:24:09 ◼   ► So I definitely thought like oh when this comes out

01:24:11 ◼   ► I have to download and just give it a try and kind of kind of see what it's like

01:24:14 ◼   ► but yeah, it is

01:24:16 ◼   ► it is kind of

01:24:19 ◼   ► Strange

01:24:22 ◼   ► one thing it actually made me think of is a

01:24:25 ◼   ► Black Mirror episode one of my favorite episodes. It's called the exact title, but something like a hundred million points

01:24:31 ◼   ► I think is the episode title.

01:24:33 ◼   ► But in that episode,

01:24:36 ◼   ► everybody just like kind of lives their own life in their own little world in their own little room doing their own

01:24:42 ◼   ► things. Like everybody's kind of very isolated for a large portion of the time. And so when I'm thinking about, I

01:24:48 ◼   ► mean, he has millions of downloads. I'm thinking about millions of people

01:24:52 ◼   ► playing these little characters, each of which are in tiny rooms that don't go anywhere,

01:24:59 ◼   ► that are totally isolated from each other.

01:25:01 ◼   ► There's something about it that is very black mirror to me.

01:25:06 ◼   ► It's very, very, I think there's real strong parallels

01:25:14 ◼   ► between that episode and the physical look of this game

01:25:18 ◼   ► and what it actually encourages in the players of the game.

01:25:21 ◼   ► - I honestly cannot look at this game

01:25:24 ◼   ► and not see it as a social commentary.

01:25:28 ◼   ► I'm being deadly serious.

01:25:29 ◼   ► Like I feel like that there is an element in here of PewDiePie expressing

01:25:35 ◼   ► something, which I think he has been expressing in some videos recently.

01:25:40 ◼   ► Like just this look at what it's like to be someone who does this type of stuff.

01:25:47 ◼   ► And it's kind of fascinating to me.

01:25:49 ◼   ► Like I was watching a video of his recently where it ended at like seven

01:25:54 ◼   ► minutes and then he just came back and I was like, I've got to do another two

01:25:57 ◼   ► minutes because we need 10 minute videos. Because I assume that there's some kind of

01:26:04 ◼   ► thing about YouTube's algorithm which means it likes 10 minute videos. That's what I took

01:26:08 ◼   ► from that. But he's kind of doing this weird thing at the moment where he's pulling back

01:26:14 ◼   ► the curtain at what it's like to live his type of life. And this game I think is a real

01:26:21 ◼   ► example of that. And it's just fascinating to me. The other part of it is this game is

01:26:27 ◼   ► probably the best free to play game I have ever played from a mechanics perspective.

01:26:34 ◼   ► I play this game and can see that it was directed by somebody who understands video games. I

01:26:44 ◼   ► tend to spend money on free to play games if I really like them because I'm putting

01:26:50 ◼   ► time into them and I kind of want the games to move along and or like and it doesn't really

01:26:55 ◼   ► bother me because if I've played the game for a bunch of hours I don't mind giving them

01:26:58 ◼   ► five pounds because I've played a bunch of the game. I haven't needed to do that in this

01:27:03 ◼   ► game. Like, because there is just a real way of progressing easily if you just watch some

01:27:10 ◼   ► ads. Like, the watching of ads in this game actually has a real benefit on the way that

01:27:17 ◼   ► the game plays in a way that I find is typically not the case for other free to play games.

01:27:24 ◼   ► Like, there's always like an element of needing to speed things up in a different way, but

01:27:29 ◼   ► there's like multiple ways of doing it.

01:27:30 ◼   ► You can watch an ad to advance the clock a little bit more, and then you can spend some

01:27:36 ◼   ► of the views that you accumulate to take percentages out of the time it takes to generate items.

01:27:42 ◼   ► And it's like, I have not needed to spend any money.

01:27:45 ◼   ► And also, one of the really, really interesting things about this game is the currency in

01:27:50 ◼   ► the game is views, which again, I think is hilarious.

01:27:53 ◼   ► your YouTube views are currency which you use to buy things. You cannot turn real world

01:27:59 ◼   ► money into views. Right, you can't buy views in the game. Which again, I have to say, I

01:28:07 ◼   ► can't look at that and not see a wink there. What do you think is the wink there? Money

01:28:14 ◼   ► does not buy you views. Like, doesn't matter how much money you put into it, it doesn't

01:28:19 ◼   ► mean you'll get views out of it. Right? Again, I can't help, I mean, I'm definitely overthinking

01:28:26 ◼   ► this.

01:28:27 ◼   ► Yeah, you're like a film student here.

01:28:30 ◼   ► Yeah, I'm looking at it like a Shakespeare.

01:28:32 ◼   ► Every single page, right? The opening shot tells you everything about the movie.

01:28:37 ◼   ► It's everything you need to know. It harkens back to Godfather.

01:28:40 ◼   ► Right.

01:28:41 ◼   ► Like all movies do. Citizen Kane is just throughout this entire piece.

01:28:49 ◼   ► But that idea though is really interesting.

01:28:52 ◼   ► It's like it's encouraging you to actually play the game,

01:28:55 ◼   ► to do the things you're supposed to do in the game.

01:28:58 ◼   ► And I just find it, it's just really sticky for me.

01:29:00 ◼   ► I have been playing it every single day

01:29:03 ◼   ► since it came out for two weeks.

01:29:05 ◼   ► I really like it. - You are an addict.

01:29:07 ◼   ► - But I'm not putting any money in.

01:29:09 ◼   ► The ads are 30 seconds long.

01:29:12 ◼   ► I press play on the ad and typically put my phone down.

01:29:16 ◼   ► Some of them I've watched,

01:29:17 ◼   ► But yeah, I just think it's really, really well made.

01:29:21 ◼   ► Like it really does just scream to me

01:29:23 ◼   ► if somebody understands how these games are made and played.

01:29:26 ◼   ► - Yeah, it's interesting 'cause I played it

01:29:33 ◼   ► because I figured, oh, it'll probably come up

01:29:36 ◼   ► on the show at some point

01:29:37 ◼   ► and I wanna be familiar with it.

01:29:39 ◼   ► - It has been a long running topic.

01:29:41 ◼   ► - Yeah, and I do agree that perhaps the first video

01:29:47 ◼   ► that ever got me into PewDiePie, still one of my favorites,

01:29:49 ◼   ► is him playing the YouTube--

01:29:51 ◼   ► - YouTuber life, yeah.

01:29:52 ◼   ► Which I think he said later,

01:29:54 ◼   ► he was already working on this game when he played that,

01:29:56 ◼   ► which is kind of hilarious.

01:29:58 ◼   ► - Yeah, but that video is like an amazing meta commentary

01:30:03 ◼   ► on YouTube and being PewDiePie, and it's fabulous.

01:30:06 ◼   ► But yes, I figured I do wanna play this

01:30:10 ◼   ► just to have a sense of it,

01:30:11 ◼   ► and I'll agree with you that as far as these things go,

01:30:15 ◼   ► It is a free to play game that doesn't feel like it's trying to suck the money

01:30:19 ◼   ► right out of your wallet, which every,

01:30:20 ◼   ► every other game like this I have ever played,

01:30:23 ◼   ► they just slow things down so incredibly dramatically, very quickly. Like you,

01:30:27 ◼   ► so you just, you just have to put money into it. But I,

01:30:32 ◼   ► I, for me anyway,

01:30:35 ◼   ► it's weird cause I had a lot of people tweeting at me and sending me messages

01:30:39 ◼   ► about the game. Cause I, you know, I talk about like,

01:30:43 ◼   ► I enjoy work simulator type games.

01:30:46 ◼   ► But this to me is just, I don't know,

01:30:49 ◼   ► this is, it's not for me because I feel like

01:30:52 ◼   ► with a lot of these free to play games,

01:30:55 ◼   ► I don't know, the mechanics are just too

01:30:59 ◼   ► on the surface for me.

01:31:03 ◼   ► Like the, I can never play these things

01:31:07 ◼   ► without feeling like all I'm doing

01:31:09 ◼   ► is constantly resetting a bunch of clocks.

01:31:12 ◼   ► That's all this is, is just winding up a bunch of timers

01:31:16 ◼   ► and waiting for them to go off.

01:31:19 ◼   ► And that's what these free-to-play games are.

01:31:22 ◼   ► And I know that that's fundamentally a ridiculous comparison

01:31:26 ◼   ► because all video games are something like this.

01:31:29 ◼   ► What are you doing collecting all those items in World of Warcraft?

01:31:32 ◼   ► Like you're just manipulating true false variables in an array.

01:31:36 ◼   ► You're not doing anything.

01:31:39 ◼   ► All games are like this, but I personally find these games--

01:31:46 ◼   ► It's just too exposed the mechanics of the game to me.

01:31:54 ◼   ► It's like the curtain is pulled a little bit too far back,

01:31:58 ◼   ► and I also think these games, by their very nature,

01:32:04 ◼   ► lean really hard on some of the more vulnerable levers of the human mind for getting you to keep

01:32:14 ◼   ► coming back, like to getting you to keep checking it and keep winding those clocks back up to make

01:32:19 ◼   ► them go off later. So I did put it on my phone because I wanted to just play around with it for

01:32:23 ◼   ► a little bit, but very quickly I was like, I just have to take this off my phone because I don't

01:32:28 ◼   ► even want this kind of thing on my phone and I just left it on my iPad to kind of play around

01:32:34 ◼   ► with a little bit when I was watching TV and just not doing something else. But for free to play

01:32:40 ◼   ► games I will agree that it's very well designed and it does not force you to pay money to play it

01:32:48 ◼   ► but it's not something that's going to stick with me for a long time. When I say I like work

01:32:53 ◼   ► simulator games like this is not at all what I mean. There's no real work in it.

01:32:57 ◼   ► Yeah and as dumb as it sounds like I find like it's too obviously

01:33:04 ◼   ► disconnected from the things that you're doing like you press a button to make a

01:33:07 ◼   ► video and then like views just like but there's it's not actually simulating any

01:33:12 ◼   ► work everything is just bizarrely disconnected so that the the YouTube

01:33:17 ◼   ► just feels like a very thin skin on top of all of these clocks that you're

01:33:24 ◼   ► winding up right like why is this clock views like because it's YouTube themed

01:33:28 ◼   ► right so it has to be views that that's why it's views you know what why do all

01:33:33 ◼   ► of these things happen it's like they're all up there all a bunch of clocks but I

01:33:36 ◼   ► do give it a lot of credit for the elements of designing your own rooms

01:33:42 ◼   ► right and and this kind of

01:33:44 ◼   ► wish fulfillment of like

01:33:47 ◼   ► You have done this thing like you have like upgraded your computer and you've upgraded your desk

01:33:53 ◼   ► And and you filled your room with all of these things that you want. Like I understand why why that is appealing

01:33:59 ◼   ► I I really do and again as far as these things go it's pretty well designed, but it's not for me

01:34:04 ◼   ► But I do have I do have a question for you Myke. Mm-hmm

01:34:07 ◼   ► Where do you have more subscribers?

01:34:12 ◼   ► YouTube or Tuber Simulator.

01:34:16 ◼   ► - Tuber Simulator.

01:34:18 ◼   ► And I think I probably always will.