The Struggles of a Storytime Youtuber (ft. @Emirichu) | Trash Taste #101

- Guys, if you haven't heard, (upbeat music) "Trash Taste" is going on tour! Yes, me and the boys are gonna be touring North America in the month of September and October. So if you live anywhere near St. Paul, Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit, Toronto, Boston, Philadelphia, New York City, Washington DC, Raleigh, Nashville, Orlando, Dallas, Austin, (inhales sharply) Kansas City, Denver, Salt Lake City, Phoenix, LA, San Francisco, Seattle, or Portland, we are coming to you! All the dates should be on screen right now. Tickets have been on sale, I believe LA is already sold out and other cities are already very close to selling out, so if you wanna get your tickets today, go to trashtastetour.com. That is trashtastetour.com, link's in the description as always. (Garnt sighs) (calm music) - We are so sorry, guys. - So sorry. - We really, really messed up. - Big time. - A lot of times, (upbeat music) which you can now watch on our Patreon. (Joey laughs) - We do, we do mess up a lot. - Yeah, we do, we do. - For those of you who are our $5 patrons, by the way, thank you very much, you guys will know that you'll get early access to clips as well as uncensored and uncut episodes. But we have extra stuff for you guys now, monthly behind the scenes content. - We fuck up so much that we can make a whole new video of just our fuck-ups every single month. (Joey laughs) And we will present that to you, to our Patreons on the $5 tier. So if you do wanna go and watch those, you can do, but just for, you know, 'cause we've been feeling a little generous, the first behind the scenes will be available, you can just smash that link down below to the YouTube unlisted link, and you can watch the "Trash Taste" behind the scenes. - So head over to patreon.com/trashtaste if you wanna see what we have to offer. On with the episode. - We always talk way louder. Let me tell you about this thing. - You beat your guests down, and they're like, (hosts laughing) - It's like, "Shut up, I'm talking." - "I'll wait my turn." - Yeah. - "Permission to speak." (calm upbeat music) - Hello, and welcome to another very special episode of "Trash Taste," we are joined by another guest today. I'm sorry, I completely forgot, it's been a while since I've hosted. - Yeah. - I'm your host for today, Garnt, and with me are, as usual, the boys. - What up? - And today we have a very special guest. Now in case there is one person in YouTube who doesn't know who you are, (men laugh) do you wanna introduce yourself and what you do? - Oh my God, that's a lot of pressure. My name is Anthony Padilla, some people say Padilla, I'm totally fine with that, but I do like to say Padilla like tortilla. (men laugh) That's how I get people to memorize it. Let's see, so, God, how deep do we wanna go into this history here? - Your YouTube link. - Do your thing. (men laughing) - Just admit it, Anthony. - We have two plus hours. - We have two plus. - Are we doing two plus hours? - Yeah, let's do it. - Okay, let's get deep, guys. So I started with my friend Ian, I started a YouTube channel called "Smosh" in 2005 17 years, - What's "Smosh?" - half of my age ago. - Oh my God. - Jesus. - Half of my age ago. - Oh my God. - Half your life has been on YouTube. - Half of my life, yes, oh shit, I'm having to rethink so many decisions. (hosts laugh) I'm gonna need that two and a half hours. - [Joey] Yeah. - And then in 2017, I kinda split off to do my own thing. Been doing an independent channel, which has slowly evolved into me kinda doing deep dive interviews with either groups of people or one person that has, you know, some kind of popularity surrounding them. And we drill in deep into the psychology behind blowing up or, you know, if it's a group of people, I like to kinda get in there and understand them. I feel like so many people have preconceived ideas about what a group or what a label or identity means. So I like to kinda show that there is variation and nuance from individual to individual. - Yeah. - They're really good. - Yeah. - Thank you. - I mean, this is like pretty intimidating 'cause not only are you like the OG of YouTube, I can say like, you're like, - You are. - you are like- - It's not even like a subjective thing, - Yeah, yeah. - it's like objectively you are an OG. - You are the OG of YouTube. But also you are now the interviewer of like YouTubers, and now we're interviewing you, so I'm like, yeah. - Just gonna reverse-engineer this interview. (men laugh) - But my stuff is so different. When I came here, I was like, "So what are we talking about today?" You're like, "I don't know." (men laughing) - We'll figure it out. - When I go into mine, I'm like, "Okay, okay, I've got like these 45 bullet points, I know we're gonna get through these." I overplan so much. - I think it shows though, it shows though, it's good it reflects in the quality. - Yeah, it really shows. - My favorite stuff is always the stuff that comes out of stuff that happens in the moment that was never planned. - Yes, yes. - And that is your whole show. - That's "Trash Taste," baby. - That's your whole show. - "Trash Taste," baby. - Yeah, yeah. On YouTube, it'll say top moment, all of it. - Yeah, yeah. - All of it. - 'Cause it kinda hit me, when you came in, you were like, "So what are we talking about today, guys?" And we just look at each other and we were just like, - "What do you mean?" - Ah, shit, we're talking to Anthony today, fuck, he's the interviewer. And we don't have any interview questions." - I was like, "Do they have some kinda secret thing that they're not telling me, some kinda prank that they're gonna do?" (Garnt laughs) They're like, "Should we tell him?" "No." - We're gonna hit you with a low blow in about 30 minutes. (men laugh) - Just grill me. - Yeah. - So actually, I've always wondered, how much prep do you do for your interviews? 'Cause as we've just established, we do zero, zero prep here. (Anthony laughs) So- - The only prepping we do is who are we getting on today? - Yeah, let's see, so the show start, I call it I Spent a Day With, whatever the topic or whatever the person's name is. And at first, it was like four people that I would sit down with and it would amount to like eight hours. Now, it's a little bit shorter, like two to three hours if it's just one guest, a little bit longer, but I do a pre-interview call, which is like an hour, hour and a half or two. And then I work backwards to try to figure out what questions I'm gonna come up with based on the things that we talked about. So, (sighs) God, I cannot even quantify, it's- - It's a lot of prep. - Yeah, yeah. - What made you start doing pre-interviews? Is it 'cause you've maybe had some guests somewhere, you're like, "Fuck it, I coulda done way better job?" - A little bit of that. It was also bringing on guests that have really big stories and I felt like I couldn't just go in there and be like, "So tell me about your childhood." And then just like, they just go, and I'm like, "I think they probably got everything." Also, I realized that in the interviews, I was cutting out a lot of stuff. - Right. - You know, I was like, it's a lot of me trying to figure out where this is going. I kinda wanna have an idea of where we're going first. And I realized that I was like every night before the next day was an interview, I would be up until 4:00 am, like 12 hours straight. Like, "Shit, I don't know what I'm talking about." I gotta learn every single thing about this person's life, like drill down. You know, I interviewed VTubers, that's actually how I found out about this podcast, I saw that you had interviewed - Ah! - a VTuber as well. - Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Callie, yeah. - Yeah, yeah, exactly. And I watched that episode and I was learning everything about VTubers. And I was like, wait, I could just talk to them, have them tell me the important things. And then I could reverse-engineer the questions based on the conversations - Ah. - that they want to have. - Yeah. - So basically you take out some of the research time, where you don't even know if you're going down like the wrong rabbit hole, - Yes, yes. - And instead you just come straight from the source, I guess. - Yes. - Yeah. - And then I'm able to use the extra time that I now have during the interviews to kinda drill in deeper to like the psychology behind the feelings that they were having and what things affected them from those moments and how they affect them now. And I guess it just allows me to get a little bit deeper with the conversations. - Yeah, so the interviews are like 20 to 40 minutes. How much source like footage do you have? How much of it gets cut out, do you reckon? - Yeah, so it depends the person. Markiplier, we shot like two hours and 40 minutes, - Oh my God. - and we cut it down to a half hour, somehow miraculously. - Oh my God. (laughs) - After it came out, he was like, "Holy shit, you did it, you bastard!" (hosts laugh) But we apparently were able to get all the key components, the conversations that were really meaty, have 'em in there while cutting out all the fluff. And it's a lot of, there's a big process, we have five editors now. - Four to five, wow. - And it goes from person to person, they all have like a very specific, they're like a specific cog in the machine. And it's a lot of just like grinding it down. It goes to the first person, they get the full two and a half hours of footage, they cut it down to 50. And then it's like, that person - Geez. - takes it and cuts it down. And each person's really good at refining all of it. - We just have a one man machine. (men laugh) - Yeah. - Yeah. He's like, he works like 10 people's work. He's just like, "I'll do it to myself." - Yeah, damn, props to you. - I do have solution to that problem, you know, if you're coming in with like two and a half hours of footage and you're having a hard time cutting it down, - Oh, yeah? - have you ever thought about this thing called a podcast? (hosts laugh) - Oh, you mean just releasing it all like that? - Yeah. (hosts laugh) - Have you ever thought about no cuts? - I have thought about that and people have asked, they're like, "Come on, just release the full thing. I know you got it there somewhere." But I feel like I'm too much of a stickler for like, I want it to really be polished. I want everything that I come out with to feel polished. And I know there's an environment where people want longer conversations that are unedited. - Mm, you're right. - Like this one, obviously has a huge audience, even on YouTube where I feel like people are not generally looking for very long uncut things. You guys found that audience, and it clearly does exist. - Right, yeah. - But I just, I really want something that feels a little bit more bite size. - But you could like take those parts that you cut out, for example, - Oh, yeah. - turn it into like a compilation, and release it on like Patreon for like a behind the scenes or something. - Oh, yeah, yeah, - Have you thought about doing that, or? - for sure, for sure. - Yeah, we definitely have a bunch of archived conversations that we are noting this didn't really make the cut, but it is still a strong conversation. - I mean, with the amount of questions I guess you're asking and the amount of people you're asking, I'm sure there's moments there you're like, "That question didn't go down great." Or, "That was a little awkward. Let's just cut that out, let's just-" (men laugh) - A little bit, well, it depends, sometimes the awkward questions and answers have like- - Are the best ones. - Yeah, are the best ones because it puts me on the spot to come up with something that was unplanned. - Right. - And I overthink everything that I usually do that it's the unplanned stuff that actually gets outta my head 'cause I'm actually, you know, - That makes sense. Right, yeah. - there in the moment. But, yeah, sometimes I just move right on, yeah. - You're like, "All right, next question." (hosts laugh) - Yeah, yeah. - That one didn't go too well. - Sometimes we'll keep it in of me being like, "Ah, so anyway, uh." Of not knowing where to go with it. Like when I interviewed dominatrixes and some of the details that they said, I don't think there was any response that would've felt appropriate in that moment about some of the actions that went down behind the scenes. (hosts laugh) Yeah, yeah. I think I'm a little too vanilla to have been prepared for some of those responses. - Is there a lot you have to cut out to, let's say, keep within YouTube guidelines? - I mean, to a certain degree, yes. Sometimes we just censor it and that's enough because we don't want the video to be age gated, and then it's like - Ugh. no one sees this video. - Right. - I mean, certain episodes, yeah, I Spent a Day With Strippers, I Spent a Day With Dominatrixes. I mean, I'm gonna have an upcoming episode, I Spent a Day With Pony Players. Look it up, the actual word, maybe not. - Oh. - Maybe with a private browser. Incognito window. - I'm sorry, what is a pony player? - (laughs) So they are people that, it's basically role play. It's a little bit of dom and sub dynamic, and they dress up as a pony, kind of in a leather- - I didn't know this. - Like My Little Pony, or? - Like, see- (laughs) No, like- (hosts laugh) - Or just like an actual pony? - Think about a human, oh, here we go, we got some visuals for you here. - Oh. - I've seen that before. - Can you click on that black and white one there? I think that one's a pretty good dynamic. Yeah, let's zoom in on that. - That was on Twitter. - Whoa. - Let's take a look, so. - Oh, wow! - Oh! - Yeah. - Moving on, put these off. - It's like a leather furry a little bit, except it's BDSM, so it's not a furry because those are not always associated with anything sexually. - Who's scouting this stuff for you? (hosts laugh) - Yeah, yeah, so- - Do you have a dude (all chattering) that's like, "Anthony, you won't believe what I just found?" - I mean, a little bit, yeah. - Right. - It's my producer Elise. She's like, "So we got this really interesting person. She has an arena, you know, where horses usually reside in, but it's for the pony players. Do you wanna add on a little segment where you go on location?" I was like, "Yeah, let's do it." I didn't know how to react to that, but the obvious answer is yes. - Right, you have to do it, it's the content. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - You have to. I mean, yeah, when I do a lot of episodes, I Spent a Day With Dominatrixes, I'm like, you have to dominate me. (hosts laugh) Like, that's part- - I'm not into this, but you have to, - You must dominate me. - you have to for journalistic integrity. - So many comments are like, "Clearly Anthony just wanted to know what this was like." Or like, "Clearly Anthony's a pro at this 'cause he didn't really have that big of a reaction." I was like, I mean, you know, transparently, I wanted to learn about dominatrixes and the scene, I have to put myself in it to really understand the dynamic - Of course. - of why people would do this, what do they take out of it, what do they like about it? - Yeah. - Yeah, how do you battle the inner embarrassment with it? - You know, it's the weirdest thing, when it's on camera, it feels like it's for research purposes literally. (Garnt laughs) To the point where, and part of the humor and entertainment comes from me being embarrassed, which makes me less embarrassed. - Yeah. - I get that. - Does that make sense? - I do videos in Japan, a similar thing, I worked in a strip club recently. - Yeah, yeah, I did not see that one specifically. (men laugh) But I saw one of 'em. - You don't wanna, you don't wanna. - Are the strip clubs there different? - Ah, yeah, a little bit, I guess. I mean, I haven't been to any here. - Oh, oh, shoot. - Just tell me for research. (men laugh) - Research purposes. - Research purposes. - Can you take him for research purposes? - Yeah, you have to be able to answer my question later. You must go to a strip club tonight. (men laughing) - Yeah, I mean, I feel like, yeah, when you're on camera, it kinda gives you like a free pass - Yes! - to just be an embarrassment. And not good. (men laugh) - I realized that the other day, I went to this bar, and there's this social anxiety that's just like, uh-uh, immediately like cut off any opportunity to feel like outta my element. - Yeah. - Right. - So I went to this thing and I was like, "I'm just gonna push myself to do it." And I was like, I was thinking, I was like, "I could totally do this if cameras were on me." And if it was like, I'm like talking to the camera, "I'm gonna be going to this thing, I'm gonna be uncomfortable. Let's see what happens." And then I would be able to totally do it. And I was trying to reframe my mind to be like, "Can I trick myself into thinking there is a camera following me and I'm doing this for research purposes." 'Cause I would be a pro, I would be pro at anything. - There is an invisible camera. - Go to the toilet and vlog, I mean. - It's my invincibility. I'm like, "I could do anything if a camera is on me." I don't know, it's weird. - Tell me you're a YouTuber, tell me you're a YouTuber. - You're just a content creator, like through and through. - It's true, it empowers you. It feels like you have a pass to just do it. - Yeah, yeah. - They're like, "Oh, no, don't worry, there's a camera on him." "Oh, okay, okay." - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Like, if these cameras were not rolling and we were all just sat down up there, I feel like it might've taken us an extra 10 minutes to warm up, you know? - Right. - 'Cause it's weird, right? There's like this invigoration you can almost feel from being on camera. - Yeah, because normally, like most of my content is not on camera and the only time I started going on camera was like for this podcast. And at first, I was like really, really awkward. And it was just really, really weird being there. But then you kinda get used to it and it kinda becomes your friend. - Right. - It becomes like- - It becomes a parasocial relationships, dude, let's go. - Yeah, yeah, it kinda becomes like your excuse. - The camera or the audience? - Oh, no, the camera, the camera. It becomes like the get out jail free card for this shit you wouldn't normally do, right? - That's true, that's true because part of the entertainment factor comes from whatever happens. - Yeah, yeah, yeah, and- - So you're forced to lean into that. - Yeah, and the people around you as well, as soon as they see you being filmed, they're like, "Okay, they can be a bit of a monkey or whatever." - You absolutely get a free pass. - I'll tell you what is like the real free pass though. So sometimes in Japan, we bring the camera crew, but for some reason, every time we've brung like a boom mic, - Oh, yeah? - that is when people around us know that shit's going down. - Oh. - Because, you know, they see like a shotgun mic, right, and they're like, "Oh, well, you know, this is just a hobby for someone, you know, they're just filming for their friends or whatever." But when they see a massive boom mic, they're like, "Oh, this is real shit." - Like, they're professional. - They got a crew. - Yeah. - Yeah, "Excuse me, gentlemen, do you want some coffee?" "What do you need on set?" "Thank you very much." - They immediately think we're like more important than we actually are the moment when they see the boom mic. - Yeah, for sure. - And we don't even use it, mostly we just use a lapel mic. - Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's just for looks, man. - It's just like a statement. Yeah, yeah. - Get out of jail free card. But I was thinking back to, I was like, there have definitely been moments of things that I've shot that I would be so embarrassed if the cameras weren't rolling. And I did this video, I Spent a Day With Anime Cafe Maids, - I saw that one. - I saw that one. - I saw that one, yeah, yeah. - Okay, okay, okay. And I said if this video gets over 100,000 likes, I will become a maid and I will make a documentary about me doing a show. And I actually put it on, put the show on with the girls that I had interviewed. And I look back at that and I had the most confidence in the world, like zero bit of embarrassment about literally stepping on people and having my full on ass cheeks out. But I was like, if the cameras were not rolling, I would've been like, "I don't want this attention." It was something about knowing the cameras are there and I'm trying to, you know, almost like I'm working, like, "I'm fucking working here, guys." Like something about that, I was just like, "It's okay." - It's like a little devil that's sitting on your shoulder being like, "Don't worry, it's for content." - Yeah, yeah, yeah. (men laugh) I don't know if that's a good thing. I don't know if that's a good thing. - Just like a professional through and through, you know, it's like, you know, when you're an actor and the director says, you know, fucking, what do they say again? - Action. - Fucking, action. (men laughing) I was like, I just went- - You're in LA, Garnt, you need to know this. - I'm sorry, okay, I'm sorry, it's only been five days in LA, okay? - I feel like when I go into a lot of the videos, I'm like, "I will never get a chance to do this again." Like you can't make a- - Oh, true. - It's true. - You could do the video again, but you can't really. - No, no, no, it'll never be the same reactions. - No one's gonna click it again, or they will, but, you know, it's not the same. - It's not the same, yeah. - I was having a conversation with someone recently and I was trying to figure out why I feel like I'm in such a different head space when I'm conducting an interview. I mean, part of it is that I've done a pre-call, part of it is that I know where the conversation's gonna go to a certain degree, but also in many ways, I feel like it might be, it's like the last conversation I'll ever have with this person. Not to say that I'll never talk to them or whatever again, but for some reason there is, like, this is this one moment. In a way it feels like there's all this pressure. - It's like make it count. - Yeah. - Yeah. And even though there's a lotta pressure, for some reason the fact that it feels so dire, it almost alleviates the pressure in a weird way. - Right. - Yeah. - Knowing that you can kind of go for the deep questions and really push forward. - Yeah, yeah, like this is your one shot, kinda like what you were saying. - Right, right. - Yeah. - That's awesome. - When you started, did you ever feel like, I guess, nervous being too intrusive or, you know, kind of like - Oh. - diving down a bit too deep? - Yeah, a little bit. I mean, I would tell people beforehand, like if there's any question that you don't wanna answer, don't ever feel like I'm trying to pry further than you're comfortable. Then I would tell them, tell me to not if I'm going down in a direction that you're not comfortable with, but now that I do the pre-calls, again, that removes most of that. Sometimes I'll drill down a little bit further. But for the most part, I see if they're comfortable and I try to word the questions in a way where they can tell me as much as they want or go in as much as they want. Sometimes they'll tell me something, if I wanna get in deeper, I'll be like, "Oh," and I'll kind of rephrase what they just said to me. Which sounds really stupid, if we just leave it in, it's me saying the exact same thing that they said. But for some reason hearing it back, I feel like they know that I understood. And then it gives them the opportunity to refine or dig in deeper if they want. So usually it's like, I kind of throw out little invitations to go deeper without feeling like I'm prying in. - Okay. - Right, right. - So it's like their choice if they would like to go down if they want to. - Yeah, yes. Yes, exactly. - Right, yeah, that's pretty smart to do. - Yeah. - It sounded like you're describing a different experience. (men laugh) Consent. (laughs) - I didn't mean for it to come out like that. - You know he just took what he said and explained it sexually? So it's their choice (men laugh) to go down. - It's their choice to go down. - So you're telling me it's their choice? (men laughing) - They don't have to. - So, obviously, it's like a massive interview series on YouTube now, but you came off of this like off the back of "Smosh." What made you want to start doing this series? Was it, did you want to explore a bunch of ideas and then this was the one that like kinda stuck, or was it always this that you wanted to do? - Well, I mean, you know, "Smosh" was definitely a comedic, like silly thing, so I never thought that I was gonna get into any deeper conversations, like connecting with people in the way that the series is now. And the whole series kinda started off as a joke, of course, the very first video when I left, I was like, okay, part of the joke was that I'm an independent YouTuber now, I have no idea what's, I mean, it was- - I'm a strong, independent YouTuber. - I was feeling myself. And it was actually very true, I had not uploaded my own video in years because the company had taken it over. So part of the joke was like, hey, what does an independent YouTuber do now? And I was asking for advice and I interviewed a bunch of popular YouTubers. And there was something about that dynamic of having a conversation where I didn't know where it was going. And the funniest moments were the ones that were improvised rather than 100% scripted. And I really enjoyed that. And then later on it was like, let's revisit. And I was struggling for a long time, just floundering, like what do I do with this channel? And every single week it was like, I don't know what to do. Okay, I figured it out. Okay, I shot it. Okay, I hate it. So now I'm gonna figure something else out. Okay, I find the shot, now I'm releasing this thing that I don't really like, but I ran outta time. And eventually I was like, what were the things that I liked doing most on the channel so far? Let's, you know, I'll dial in deeper with those ideas. And then I started expanding on it from there. - Yeah. - Yeah. - Man, Japan needs to start listening to how you do your interviews. 'Cause you would hate how interviews are done in Japan. - I don't think I've ever heard a Japanese interview. Tell me about it. - Oh, bro, It's miserable. - Oh, God, so- - Do you guys get interviewed like on Japanese- - No, so when you do interviews with anyone, you have to give them the exact script of the interview. - Oh! - And there's no room for error. - Yeah, and they will sometimes have scripted answers about what they will say to you back. So everything is pre-planned. You are not allowed to go off-script at all. And it's just the most rigid interview you could like ever imagine. - Is it like that in different places of Asia as well? Because - I don't know. - Maybe. - I've also interviewed someone from South Korea, and it was a similar thing where, well, they were speaking English to me, and it was obviously not their first language. So it was like, of course, they want to know what they're saying. - That makes sense, yeah. - They wanted the questions beforehand and I figured, yeah, they wanna know what I'm saying to them just in case a word slips by that they don't know. But I didn't realize what they were doing was scripting their responses to such a degree that afterwards they sent me their script. - Yeah. - Oh, geez. - Oh, wow. - And I thought it was a little bit weird in the moment, whenever I'd ask a question, they would repeat the answer that they had already said. And I was like, "Hmm, okay, well, they were a lot more loose in the pre-interview just talking to me about all these things." And then here I was like, "Maybe they're just nervous or something. Okay, I get it, people get nervous." But then they sent me a script and it was verbatim, every single word that was said. - Wow. - So I think they had a teleprompter. - Yeah, I think like, 'cause I have done quite a bit of interviews with industry people in Japan and a lot of them are like, "Okay, send me a list of questions beforehand. We will approve all the questions. We will write up like a very basic thing. " And I'm like, "Okay, that's fine." But I've done enough now where I'm just like, "Okay, we'll follow you're script, but I'm gonna add extra questions." - Yeah, yeah. (Garnt laughs) - "And you won't be prepared for them. And so I can really catch you out on what you actually feel." And for the most part, they're okay with it when it actually happens. But I think if you tell them beforehand, "Hey, by the way, I'm gonna throw in some extra questions," they'll just freak out. 'Cause they'll be like, we're not prepared for that. - Their teams will say, "We can't do that." - Yeah, their teams will be like, "No, you can't do that." But when I do it on the day of the recording and I get a good answer and a good conversation flow going, then they're like, "Oh, maybe it's okay. Maybe it actually makes for an interesting interview." (men laugh) - They're not out to fuck me over. - Yeah, exactly. Maybe they actually are just like genuinely interested in me and want a good interview. - I wonder how many people have to be screwed over, like in order for that to become the standard, right? - Yeah, it's like, how many bad interviews must have you have done for you to get to that point? - Yeah, yeah. - Yeah. - But it does take a while to kinda build up - Rapport. - that rapport and that level of respect or trust with people, you know? - Yeah, definitely. And I've seen that, too. I have people that are a lot more comfortable with doing my interviews now than I think that they probably would've been a couple years ago before I had really, you know, I don't know if I wanna call it proven myself, but I guess proven that I'm not going to purposely and maliciously try to like defame someone and ruin their career. - Right, right. - You never really showcase even like, you know, what most people consider strange things, you never really show it as like, "Whoa, look at this weird thing." You're just like, "These are real people. Let's just see why real people do what they do." - Yeah, and if it is a strange thing, I like to talk with them about how it's a strange thing. You know? - Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. - And the thing is, most people are absolutely willing to talk about how something that they do is strange. It's not like they are so like in a different world that they think everyone should do this. And if they think it's weird, then fuck you, you know what I mean? - Yeah. - Yeah, yeah. - But you've had people like that though, right, in the past? - In which way? - In the sense of them trying to prove a point and being like, "No, you're weird for thinking that this is weird," kinda thing? - A little bit, but it still seems a little playful. They're like, "Normies don't get this." You know what I mean? (hosts laugh) So they still, I think, recognize that. But definitely people are a little bit defensive, but I think it's because they've been shown enough times that they feel like they have to be defensive, 'cause that means that someone doesn't respect them. And I think it's just a lot of like vying for respect of people. - Do you ever find people that it's a different field where you're just talking to someone casually, but when you're in an interview setting with cameras, you really have to make them feel comfortable like being themselves and talking, did you find that a challenge with your interviews at all? Just getting people to be comfortable on camera as quick as possible? - A little, I mean, yeah. And you bring up a good point. I do obviously have a limited time and I can't just spend the first like hour of the interview warming up. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - So I go outta my way to really connect with people. You know, we have the pre-interview call, so there's a little bit of that dynamic where we're already laughing together and we already are on the same page. So there's that when they show up. But, of course, they're a little bit more tense, but I'll meet the guests on the street, I'll walk them in, I'll bring them out to the back. We do our COVID tests and we hang out, you know, like on this park bench that I have on my balcony, and we just chit chat, and I get to know them. And I tell them a lot about myself. So I think that there's like a method to kinda warming people up so that they can see that you're genuine and that you're not secretly gonna be trying to get a one up on them. - We shoulda done that. (men laugh) - I should take him out back. (men laugh) (all chattering) - Dad, Anthony just turned up and we were like, "All right, camera's on." - Yeah, right, let's go, come on, chop-chop. - Now, we used to do something similar. We called it like, I don't know, I don't know if it was a strat, but the Denny strat. So there was a Denny's outside of our office and often I'd invite them to lunch beforehand to like get to know them, have a casual conversation. But one issue we always found ourselves having was we'd get into a conversation and it would just be like, "Shit, this is good material. This is good." I mean, it literally happened like the five minutes since after we sat down and we're like, "Shit, let's just not ask any questions. Because this is like good material that we can go through now. - And that's part of the challenge also. I mean, (laughs) the closer you get to someone, the more you start connecting with them, the more you start talking about things that are then difficult to bring back up and have it feel like the first time you talked about it. But that's what helps having my questions all ready because we actually go away from those conversations for a little while. And then if we have a good conversation, you know, I'll write it down in my notes. And I'll be like, "This is a good, we need to bring this back up again." - That's a good idea. - Right, smart, we should take notes. - We should definitely take notes. (men laughing) - This isn't a podcast, we're literally just asking for advice now. - It's like, how do you do it? (men laugh) - You guys didn't have to, I coulda just sent you a message. (hosts laugh) - It's like, where were the questions, bro? - Yeah, no, this is great. - So we were talking about before, like how many people you have to run this show now. So how many people are there behind the scenes and how many did you start off with? - Yes, so I started off with just two camera operators and it was just myself trying to figure out what the fuck I was doing. And then I slowly but surely had new people come on to help me and now I have 10 employees on the show. - Wow, Jesus. - And, you know, - Is it that nice? - it doesn't sound like that big of a number until you think about how much everyone needs to be paid. (men laughing) - That's the law, that's the law. - Yeah, that's the law, that's the law. - And there's a lot of moving parts. So, you know, when I started, I took two years of community college and I started to take business administration classes. "Smosh" started happening 2005 and I was like, "Ah, fuck college." But I realized I have actually always been interested in managing a team and a business. And I think it's a lot of fun, you know, teaching. And especially once you could teach, like I have a head of post, a main editor, and I get to teach him all the things and we get on the same page. And then there's four people that work, I guess below him is how people would say it, but that work with him. And so I get to communicate with one person, he communicates with four. So I just really enjoy the dynamic of a whole team working together and having it feel like a well-oiled machine. - 'Cause I was gonna ask, how many people did you have at most when you were at "Smosh," like working? - Oh my God, well- - How many employees did you have then? - It's kinda hard to say because Defy owned "Smosh." And they I think had 30 people working - Geez. - with "Smosh" and all the side channels and the live events and the live, yeah, there's so many elements there that I guess 30 was the magic number. I don't even think I met some of the people that were working there. (hosts laugh) - They're there somewhere. - It was a weird team situation where we all never really got to know each other fully. - Obviously, you know, we're YouTubers, you see that lovely one out of 10 system, which is the most depressing system on earth. And it's very black- - Or it's the best system in the world, one outta 10. - Our viewers have heard us complain about it like a million times. But I imagine when you have 10 employees that suddenly if you're getting a 10 outta 10 and then maybe you get a nine outta 10, it starts to get a lot scarier, right, when you got more people? - Yeah, there's a lot more weight. - Yeah. I mean, how do you deal with that? Do you deal with it as a team or are you like, "Guys, leave me alone, I'm gonna cry a moment?" (men laugh) - There's still a part of me that is affected by it. I can't say that there's not. And it's not even like an outward thing of like, "Ah, shit, dude, what am I gonna do?" But even if I just carry on with my day, there is a part of me where like my energy feels a little bit like something was pulled out - No, definitely, definitely. - from me a little bit. - Of course, right. - Even if I'm not thinking about it, it must be some suppressed shit. (hosts laugh) And then when there is like a one outta 10, I'm ooh, my posture's a little better, (hosts laugh) But I've been really working on reminding myself that a bad video now was actually a good video for me, like in terms of performance. - That's true. - When I first started, you know, what I would now consider like probably a lower performing video was a good performing video and we still have sponsors. And I still, I try to look at what my actual progress has been for the show, it's not just views. That is, it's so easy to think views are a measure of progress because it's the biggest number. When you go on YouTube, it's attached to every single thumbnail. In fact, many people decide if they're gonna click on something based on how high that number is. You see one video and it has, you know, 10,000 views, someone is much less likely than to click that same video with 10 million views because there's that curiosity aspect of wait, why, - Why was this watched? - so many people are watching this, there's gotta be something brilliant in there, right? - If there is a YouTube video under 30 seconds that has over a million views, you know it's a banger. - Yes, you know you're gonna click it. - You know it's always a fucking banger. - And that shit's gonna be delivered to you so quickly, 30 seconds, that's it, (hosts laugh) 30 seconds to have a banger. - Instant serotonin. - I'm fine with that. But that is not my only measure of where I'm going with this. A part of it is also like, I wanna grow respect and have people trust that I will treat them with respect on the show. So I'm having people with huge names, people have started to reach out to me and say like, "Ooh, I'd love to be on the show sometime." And that's something that I never had before. So regardless of where my numbers go, I have people that I really respect reaching out to me and wanting to talk with me and like have that experience of being on the show. And that is something that is so cool. And I could clearly see kind of that's my metric path now. - That's the path that you were on, the greater community. - Yeah, exactly, yeah. - I mean, so the whole YouTube system and giving a shit about analytics, was that something that, I suppose, that "Smosh" under Defy Media that you never concerned yourself with? - I didn't really because we were just on a salary. - Right, right, right. - So I was like, these numbers don't affect me. - Yeah, I definitely came in there like, Anthony, man, it's not doing too hard 'cause you're on a salary. - Yeah, I'm like, oh, man, well, it looks like I have two more years, so. (men laugh) - Geez. - So it must have been like you were under "Smosh," then under Defy Media, and then now you're separate. So there's probably that big gap where you didn't really take notice of what was really happening on YouTube much. Wow, that's interesting. - So now I had to start learning all these things. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - When did you kind of tune out of like giving a fuck about what was happening on YouTube or like kind of not paying as much attention and just doing it every time you get to work? - Ah, you mean like when I was Defy? - Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. - I'd say it was probably around 2014 or 2015 probably, to 2017 when I eventually left and decided to do my own thing. I think it was the two years that I was unhappy with where things were going, and the way that the company was being ran, and the decisions that were being made. And how I was being left in the dark about a lotta decisions that were really important that were being made. And it was around then that I started to just kinda tune out from YouTube in general, you know, I would still put a lot of my heart into making the things that I was making at that time, but there was still this part of me that was just getting detached from it. And that's when I kinda stopped caring about browsing YouTube and being part of the community as much. - Just when you thought you were out, you got dragged right in. (men laugh) - Yeah, I almost made it out the rat race. - So do you think not caring about it gave you more or less freedom than you do now? Because now you do have to care about the algorithm. Every YouTuber has to care about the algorithm, unfortunately. - Yeah. - I think it's kind of about caring about the right things. And by the right things, you know, it's not to say there's a wrong thing to care about, but like the figuring out what is meaningful for you and then caring about those things. - Right, right. - It's so easy to start caring about the things that seem like they matter most, like, you know, just straight up view count. But then you could drill in, you could read the comments and see how much of an impact a certain thing made. And you know, you could realize that that is more important. So you have to define the things that matter most to you before you just start caring about everything. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Damn. - So like you mentioned something earlier just off the cuff, but you were just like, yeah, so I quit college in 2005 because "Smosh" was a thing. - (laughs) Yeah. - What? - Yeah. - So you quit college in 2005 to do YouTube? - Yeah, yeah. - Wow, that's super, that's super letting it go. - Well, okay, okay, can I just say something? - Yeah, that was really, really good. (men laughing) - They were like solid. - Yeah. - Mom, I made one Pokemon Dollar, I'm going, I'm quitting. - Basically. (men laughing) I said it a little wrong. So I went to two full semesters, so I think it was technically 2006. And I was signing up for classes and I was thinking about the amount of time, 'cause the classes obviously get harder the further along you get with your degree. 'Cause they start dialing into the actual difficult things. And I was like, okay, I could be doing all these extremely difficult things for this, or, you know, which was now taking my time away from this other thing that is now starting to build, this is a once in a lifetime opportunity. I felt like I was almost the master of my own fate with this world, while I felt like getting a college degree, while obviously super helpful for most people, I felt like this is something I can always come back to. - Right. - And also, this kinda puts me in a position where I'm following a system that other people have put in place for me, I felt like I was making up my own rules on YouTube. - So did you like foresee the fucking ecosystem YouTube would become or you're just like? (hosts laugh) - No, no. I'm like, ah, I see it all. - Well, you were confident enough to be like, "Bye, collage," you know? - No. - Did you just have this, like 'cause obviously, how many videos or where were you at at that point when you decided to quit college? What kinda stage was it at? - I think we had, (laughs) (men laugh) - How many? - I think we had six videos out. (hosts laugh) - What the fuck? - Oh my God. - Oh my God. - Yeah. - Would you ever recommend to a YouTuber with six videos- - No, never do what I did. (hosts laugh) Never do what I do unless your parents are very well off and they're totally fine with you not doing college. And they wanna help you. - How many subs did you have when you quit? - (sighs) The subs were not a thing. (Garnt laughs) - Oh, they weren't a thing? - Wait, they weren't a thing? - They were called followers and - Wow. (men laugh) - they were not a thing. But the reason that I felt confident is because this outside company that was competing with YouTube called (beep), it does not exist anymore, they reached out to us and they were like, they gave us this contract that was in hindsight very shitty. But we were college kids who were still living under our parents' roofs. And we were like, you know what? This makes sense. We can fund these things that we love doing. Like we just had the best time hanging out and just laughing our asses off, creating things. And like, that's what the college kids really wanna do most of the time. Not the homework. - Man, you get one paycheck and you're like, "I am set for life. Mother, I have a career now." (men laugh) - So we signed a two-year contract with this outside company. They offered us 3,600 bucks to split between us. - For two years? - For two year, each, no, no each month. - Oh, okay, okay, okay. - I was like. (Garnt laughs) - I know, I know, I know. It sounded worse, but it's still not great though. So we each got 1,800 bucks and we each also invested our own money from that into the videos themselves. And they also give us a little bonus at the beginning. So I had this piece of shit car and like I couldn't do anything 'cause every time I got in my car, it would not work, anyway. So I bought a new car and I was like, you know what? This, like, we have a two-year contract here, we're pretty safe, I could come back to do these classes if I really I need to. - That makes way more sense. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - I just did six videos, yeah. - It was like one of the first deals where a company was like trying to compete with YouTube and take their audience away. And part of their contract was this video has to be exclusive to us for two weeks. And after the two week period, you can release it to YouTube, but it has to have a brought to you (beep) tag on the front and at the end, and a watermark on it. - Oh, shit. - So we like- - It's kind of generous that they even let you do that. - It was, but their whole strategy for marketing was that they were trying to steal the audience from YouTube. - Right. - So the only way for them to get an audience on their platform was to let people know. But, unfortunately, they didn't have anything to offer that was bigger than the scope of what YouTube had to offer. I don't need to get into the legality behind it, but eventually we were able to get out of that contract because they promised us a certain, wow, I don't know if I shoulda said that company name. (men laugh) - You wanna bleep it out? - Do you wanna bleep it? - We can bleep it out. - All right, Mudan, bleep it out, okay, yes. - Okay, thank you. Bleep out the company name. (laughs) - And now you can go ahead. - So now I feel more comfortable. (men laugh) Now I feel comfortable saying everything. So they promised a certain amount of marketing value and they translated that to a certain amount of views. It was like some odd millions of views they were promising to bring to our videos on our channel on their platform. They did not live up to that. And when we started getting on them about that, we found out, I'm wondering how much I should say, (laughs) this is how many years ago now? Jesus, it's 16 years ago. - Jesus. - Maybe it's okay, I think that everyone there is probably in a diff, I don't know, buried underground. - Yeah. (laughs) - So what I realized they started doing to fulfill their end of the bargai, - Oh no. - Right. - was, well, first I noticed that, oh, we had a million new views on our video on this channel this day. - Oh. - Okay, so this website where our videos usually get 5,000 views are now getting 1,005,000 views, there's something up here. (hosts laugh) - So- - Oh. - So I go into the comments and I get, "Fuck "Smosh," What is this bullshit? I'm trying to look at my MP3s, and this is." "Why is this playing?" I find out that they also own this other website and they have a little hidden eye frame that's like autoplaying our videos in the background - No! - of this other website. - Oh, shit. What the fuck? - No way! No way. - So they'd go to this website and then they'd hear the audio of our videos while they're trying to fucking browse this other website. And it would count as a view. (Garnt laughs) - Oh my God. - So eventually we were able to get outta the contract 'cause we were like, this is not very cool. It's actually giving us a bad reputation 'cause people think that we are doing this. And then eventually we were able to get outta that. And it was at that time that both, oh my God, Myspace was trying to launch (hosts laugh) a video platform. - I'm not sure if kids today know what a Myspace is. - No, no, it's your space. - Yeah. (hosts laugh) - So they were trying to launch a video platform and they came to us with an offer, - Oh my God. - and then YouTube was like, "Hey, there's this program where you can make money on your videos on our platform that never had any ads before, would you like to be one of the first 10 channels to ever make - No fucking way. - any money on here?" - Geez. - "We'll give you a guarantee." And even though their guarantee was lower than Myspace, thank everything in the world we said, "Yeah, we'll stick with YouTube." And that's kinda where everything started. That was early 2007. That's when we- - Geez. - Was that just like, were you guys just guessing or did you genuinely feel like, I think YouTube's gonna be the king? - There was this feeling, also we had a video on there, our Pokemon Theme Song Lip Sync video. (men laugh) - I saw it, classic, classic, - Banger, banger of a video. - classic video. - It's like "The Godfather," you know, you go on the IMDb page of like YouTube videos and that's like at the top. - Top 100 YouTube videos. It's up there. - It would be, if there was a IMDb - It would be. - for YouTube. - In our brains, in our brains. - In our brains, yeah. In our brains. - So that video, I think, had something like 25 million views. - Jesus Christ. - God. - And it was easy to see that the market, the viewership was on YouTube and they had just been purchased by Google for, you know, way too cheap. (laughs) Which is still billions of dollars. And I felt really good about Google. I felt good about where they're going. Even though I met Tom from Myspace myself, I was like, "Mm, Google." - But you met the creator of Myspace? - Yeah, yeah, briefly. - What was he like? - He was just a dude. I mean, I don't know, a dude wearing a nice jacket. I don't know. - Did he do this thing? (men laugh) - He did not, I feel like everything within him was like, I can't do that, I can't even give a thumbs up or a smile. No, no, he was a good guy. I think he does- - Did he add you on Myspace? - Was he, were you in- - I don't know, we were already friends, bro. (hosts laugh) - Yeah, but was he in your top eight friends? That's the real question. - He became part of my top eight after I thought I might have a deal with him. - Ah, shit. (men laugh) - My top eight business friends. - I'm like, shit, if he goes on my page, he's gonna know, (hosts laugh) ah, shit. I think he's in photography now and he is a good photographer. But anyway, so I went with YouTube, we went with YouTube, Ian and I made the decision to go with YouTube there. And obviously it was the right choice. It just felt right, you know? - Yeah, absolutely. - So you were getting paid even before there was even like an economy on YouTube or anything like that. - Yeah, yeah, (laughs) the funny part is that all they were was the lower third ad, the little tiny thing that pops up at like 15, 20 seconds. And even then, you know, we were afraid of the backlash that we might get for that. - That's so funny. - So, - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - we enabled it on our older videos. And then the newest video we'd wait 'til like our bigger audience came in and left, so that we wouldn't get flack for it. - No way. - And even on our older videos, people were like, "Whoa, you fucking sellout." (men laugh) There's an ad where you go, your mouse. No one's on mobile, you're on your computer. And all you have to do is move your mouse and click the X. And people are like, "Ugh, fuck this!" - There's one extra step I have to do! - Now people watch videos and there's a minute and a half of unskippable ads six times in a video. - And whenever YouTube gets sponsored, they're like, "Yes, King, make that money." - Yeah, yeah, yeah, but no. - Did you get backlash when you had your first sponsor? 'Cause I feel like YouTube ads are one thing. - Every YouTuber did I think. - Oh, oh you mean Smoothie King? - Was that one- - Was that your first sponsor? - (laughs) That was our first sponsor, it's called Smoothie King. It was this like, I don't know if they're independent or if they're like a chain, but they're a smoothie place in like Austin, Texas, or I forget. - Fuck off. - Somewhere in Texas. - No way. - I don't know. - Are you serious? - And, yeah, we just had to make a little video there and put it out, we didn't even put it on our main channel, our second channel. They paid us like a couple thousand or something. And it was like, you know, that was our first sponsor. - What was the reception to that though? - What the fuck is this? (hosts laugh) But- - Oh, YouTube seems so wild. Some weird shit. - There were absolutely no rules, and I remember when I first started, I would actually go outta my way to break rules to show YouTube that this rule could be broken. I'm just a bad boy. (hosts laugh) - Like what, like what? - And one thing that I realized is that there was this channel that, I can't remember what the name of it was, in fact it's probably better that I don't say the name, they had videos that would just pop off. But they'd have like 12 comments and I was like, this math doesn't add up. And of course, as an 18-year-old kid, I was like, "I must get down to the bottom of this. It's my duty." - Internet detective mode. - Yeah, yeah. So I did a test on our Myspace and it was kind of what I learned from that other company doing the hidden eye frame thing. So I realized on Myspace, - Oh. - you can hide an eye frame as well. Which is ridiculous, I think, that anyone could have any page load in the background. So I hid it on our page and I realized that that worked. So I said, "YouTube, fix this." I don't know. I don't know if it was even me saying it. But also a big thing was that that channel was also having hundreds of thousands of new subscribers, I think it was right when they announced subscribing. And I was like, how is this channel that gets so little comments having so many views and subscribers? So I also hid an eye frame on our channel. or on our Myspace, that auto subscribed people to our channel. And after like a day, I was like, "Ye, yeah, this is gross. I'm not gonna have this on here." So I removed it, we got like 100, 200 new subscribers, I felt gross about it. And I think in order to repent for my sins, I went to YouTube and I was like, "This is a way that people are cheating the system." So then YouTube, like within the next couple days, added a, on the subscribe page they had a little button that said are you sure you wanna subscribe? - Was that back when you could actually talk to YouTube and get through to them? - Yes, yes. Especially if you had a big audience on YouTube, you had, it was like concierge service. - Really? - Yeah. - You just kinda get shit done? - Oh, yeah, yeah. - Wow. - Yeah, we went and hung out in, I don't know, I don't remember, San, I don't know, San Bruno, San Jose, some San, near San Francisco. - What was that? - And, you know, hung out with people there that work there. - Wow. - I met Chad Hurley, Steve Chen, the creators on YouTube. - No way. - Damn, dude. - We just don't have enough subscribers. (men laugh) We need to fix that. - Think of the good old days, right? - Yeah. - It was so rare, though, for people to have an audience because most people that uploaded videos to YouTube - One off viral clips and stuff like that. - were one off viral clips. So it was very rare for people to have audiences and have recurring, you know, videos of a specific channel. So I think that they really treated everyone back then as like their gems that were keeping the channel, or like making YouTube be something bigger. - 'Cause I remember back in the day, it was just like, you would go on the most viewed, you'd go on like the most viewed of all time, and obviously the Pokemon Lip Sync was there. You have like "Evolution of Dance," - Dude, ah! - fucking Charlie Bit My Finger. - Classics. Classics. - You know, the classics, you know, the classics. - Yeah, because I always forget, at one point, you were the most subscribed channel on the platform. - Yeah, yeah, two separate times. - Two separate times, yeah. - There was like a three month period and a eight month period or something, I forget. - How was that? Like, how was it, at one point, you were at the top? - It was really cool. - Was there pressure, though? I bet. - There was definitely pressure. And it filtered the way that I looked at everything that I did for better or worse. There was the good of like, "Ooh, everything that I make has some kind of value. I should put a lot of my time and energy in this 'cause I know a lotta people are gonna see it." And it really pushed me to constantly be pushing myself outside my boundary, or outta my comfort zone because I knew that it would, you know, not literally pay off, but it would pay off in the sense that a lotta people would see it and potentially be able to enjoy it. But then on the opposite side of that, there was a lot of getting in my own head about the pressure and how I have to live up to this. And then you're also always seeing comments of people saying like, how is this, whatever. And it's a lot of filtering it out to be like, it doesn't matter that some people don't like this, it's not for them. But it would get in my head of like, "Oh, I need to be better." And it was a lot of like this pressure. - You were mentioning earlier about how, obviously, when you started, you got a deal from a company. I imagine when it was starting to ramp up and get to like number one most subscribed, you're probably getting offered all sorts of weird and predatory stuff, and probably just the most stressful company meetings ever. - Yeah. - Dude, we had someone show up to my house, I was living with my mom, obviously, in just like our small little tiny house outside of Sacramento, California. And there was this predator, I don't wanna call him predatory, but this guy came up in a business suit, and he's like, - Oh God. - knocked on the door. My mom was like, "There's someone outside to see you." - Oh no. - So Ian and I walk out and we're like, "What is up?" And he's like, "Oh, I got your address because I saw that you just registered for a business and it was marked under this address. So I figured I would just show up and tell you a few things about like what you could be doing, - What the fuck? - how you could be monetizing this." And I was like, I mean, I was 18 - What the fuck? - so I didn't know. - That's fucked up. - And it was my first time with like any kind of fame or labeling. I didn't know that this was a fucked up thing to do. So I entertained it. - Come on inside. - (laughs) Yeah, come in, would you like some tea? - Okay, I drew the line there. I did not invite him inside. (hosts laugh) There was no invitations inside. But luckily, he was a vampire and he could not enter without me inviting him in. (hosts laugh) No, so he was like, "Okay, so, your Pokemon Theme Song music video." (men laugh) Like it's this epic piece of cinematic work. And he was like, "It has 3 million views. So think about it this way, I could get you sponsored by Coca-Cola." - Oh my God. (Garnt laughs) - And if you get $1,000 per million, it gets $3,000 in your pocket (clicks) like that." And I was like, "First of all, do you actually know, do you have any contacts with Coca-Cola?" (hosts laugh) And he just started listing all, and I realized immediately that he was full of shit. - He was full of shit. - He was trying to make some kind of a connection. And he was like, "But like then McDonald's." And I was like, "Dude." So he clearly didn't know what he was talking about. Luckily, he only showed up one other time after that. - One other time. - Only one other time. - One other time! - One other time. I was like, "Mom, when that guy shows up again, you just ignore that man. (hosts laugh) The bad man in the suit, leave him." - Oh my God. - But luckily, we were, I mean, we were not very smart, but we were smart enough to know that that did not feel right. - Right, yeah, dude. - 'Cause we were talking to like Sean Jacksepticeye like a few weeks ago, and how back in like the early days of YouTube, there was just no boundaries between fans and like the creator. So fans would literally show up at his house. - Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. - Did that happen to you a lot? - Oh, absolutely. - Oh my God. - Yeah, yeah. So Ian and I ended up renting this place together, he and I, and we had another roommate with us too. And we lived there for, I think, four years. And that's when our videos were really, really, really starting to become popular, like 2009 to 2011-ish. And so many ridiculous stories of like mobs of people, - What? - like, I'm trying to edit in my editing room and I just hear people running around the house and laughing and looking through our trash. - What the fuck? - What? What? - People did not know boundaries and it was difficult. - How did they find out where you live? - Because we were really stupid. (hosts laugh) And so all blame is on us. But we would just shoot outside of our house. - I was about to say, yeah. - Our address would be in it, our cross street, - Oh, no. - cross streets of like, they knew exactly how to find us. And we- - Because this was also during the time where you were doing the Mail Unboxings on the same channel, right? - Yeah, yeah. - So I bet that also came into it as well, right? - Yeah. - I remember like, you know, way back when, I used to watch those Mail Unboxing, and- - Oh, yeah? - Those are my favorites, - Dude, those are so wild. - I love those videos. - I think, at that time, it was something so unique because, obviously, you know big massive celebrities would be getting this kind of stuff. But I think it was the first time that a normal person could just watch somebody receive all sorts of weird shit. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - And it was just like, this is so weird. (Joey laughs) - It really did show you the scope of like how strange the common person can be with the items that they choose to send you. (hosts laugh) And the drawings that they choose to draw. - That must have been weird. - Oh, yeah, yeah. - Well, what was some of the weirdest stuff you ever got sent? - I have some very good go-tos for that, don't you worry. - Okay, yes. (hosts laugh) - We got a Ziploc bag of dead bees. - (laughs) What? - I wanna know, how did they collect those bees? - They might not have been bees. Maybe they look like bees, - (laughs) Just insects. - I did not examine enough to know for sure. (Garnt laughs) We have a slightly smaller, thinner bag of nail clippings. - Oh. - Oh. - Yeah, yeah, everyone- - Didn't you receive shit as well at one point? - We received stuff that smelled like shit that we never ventured into, no. - You didn't play with it, you didn't play with it? - Yeah, yeah, I felt the texture. (hosts laugh) It's like, this is definitely - Gave a little smell, I don't know. - elephant shit. - It's definitely human shit. (men laugh) - We definitely had boxes, and we received so many boxes that we would sometimes just throw it in our garage and they would sit in the humidity and the heat. And it would be months before we'd get to it. And people thought it was so funny that they would send us sandwiches. And these sandwiches would just rot and mold and- - Oh my God. - Oh, 'cause of like the food fight stuff, I mean. - I don't know of why, but it became a thing. And the bags, the Ziploc bags would inflate with the gases from these things, they would pop. And then the scent would just permeate throughout our entire house. - Oh God. - Yeah, you'd throw away the boxes once they were - You could see patches. - kinda sopping wet or oily or greasy. But that quickly was like, it's probably about time to stop receiving the mail. Like, it was fun, it was a great time period. - So how long did you guys do that for? - I think we did it for like three or four years. - My God. My God. - Was all the shit fucked? - And by the end, it was years of stuff just built up, towers and towers of mail. - My God. I guess every now and then you probably get something really fucking cool that you're like, "Yeah, this is sick." - Yeah, we would receive some really cool shit. - Oh, man. - Lots of used video games. And then I would just take 'em all to GameStop and I'd be like, "Used video games." (hosts laugh) And then they'd be like, "$100 credit." I was like, "Two games I actually want." (hosts laugh) - That's so big, but I didn't about it. - Not like the eight copies of the "Nintendogs Rip-Off's" of like puppies - Oh my God. - and like all these weird like ponies and cats with a Z. (Connor laughs) So many weird games that I would never be interested in playing, I was like, "I can convert these into games I wanna play." (Joey laughs) - It's just people just giving junk. Are they just trying to get rid of it? - Well, a lot of stuff that we were given were just like, people are looking for things to send. - They're like, "I wanna send you something." - Yeah, and they didn't wanna spend money on just sending 'cause they didn't even know if we would see it. There is no guarantee. We didn't even know if we would see it. In fact, some of the things I hope, you know, it's probably better off we didn't see half of the things that we did see. But people would send us just old stuff that they wanted to throw away. - Yeah, because that's- - You coulda just started a garage sale or something, right? (laughs) - It was like old shirts that had not been washed in years and had holes in it. - Ooh. - Yeah, because to them, it was probably just like, "Yo, that's my shirt is the video." - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Yeah, you know? - So then we had to start being really selective about the things that we showed. We had to stop showing - The weird shit. - the shit stuff, the dead stuff, the body, human body. - The human bodies. - Anything that came from a human body was no longer making it in the videos to a certain point. Yeah, we realized - Ugh. - that we were encouraging it. And then we also accidentally encouraged people to send us money because we had one video where someone, a few people sent us like $1 bills, so he's like, "Ooh, we got 10 bucks," and like, it was kind of a joke. - Oh shit. - And then we had to make a ooh, we got 100 bucks. And then it was like, we need to stop showing money all together. - Yeah. - And we realized that anything that we showed was a direct call for people to send us more of it. So eventually we had to stop showing the weird stuff or the really grandiose stuff 'cause we didn't feel comfortable with either. - Yeah, someone might feel bad if you show off like something really amazing. And they're like, "Oh, and I guess, Charlotte from like Mexico sent me this like shitty little keyring." (men laugh) - And a lot of people were sending really sentimental handwritten things that we could never, like if I wanted to read every one of those, and I really wish I could 'cause they were so heartfelt, it would've been a full-time job to do that instead of anything else. Which is a great problem to have. - I'm interrupting this episode of "Trash Taste" to give you an important announcement. This "Trash Taste" episode is sponsored by Bokksu. Anyone who watches "Trash Taste" will know that we are big fans of Bokksu. If you haven't heard of it yet, Bokksu is a monthly subscription snack box service that delivers premium Japanese snacks and tea pairings straight from Japan to your door. The first Bokksu you will receive is called Seasons of Japan. Following the seasons of Japan, you'll receive a new monthly themed box every single month like this one. 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Back to the episode. - So you mentioned like, you were one like, pretty much one of the first creatures to get paid for doing what you do on YouTube. When did you start to realize, oh, this is serious now, this is like gonna get big? - I mean, it depends, there were so many different levels of big, like at that point, I already felt like it was a big thing. 'Cause I was like, we are one of the first people to get paid on this platform that I foresee as having longevity. (exhales sharply) But in terms of like, I don't know, it was a little bit dicey though. So that was 2007, and then four years later, I didn't really know what the fate of YouTube was gonna be. And we had an offer from a company which ultimately, you know, their name ended up being Defy. And they offered us then to buy our company for stock, it was a totally great idea. (hosts laugh) - Well, you've talked about this a lot in your video about it. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, obviously, didn't end up being worth anything. - So how did they pitch it to you in a way that you both were like, "Yeah, this is a fucking great idea, let's do it," how did that happen? - Yeah, you know, and it is a complicated process, too, - I imagine, yeah. - Because, you know, the state of YouTube in 2011, it felt really like, we didn't know where it was going. - Was that before or after the Google+ thing they tried to shove in? - Google+? - Do you remember- - No, that was 20, that was when I first started, so that was like 2014. - Oh, oh. - Yeah, that was ages after that. - Okay, okay, okay. 'Cause that just felt like everyone was- - That was shit. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - That was shit. - Google+ is when Google tried to do Facebook and- - Oh, yeah, I forgot about it. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - It was just a shit show when it happened. - I think it lasted like a year, - Then they cut it. - maybe, and then they were like, "Nah, we get rid of it." - I get it that YouTube has been constantly at, especially in it's earlier days, it did seem like it was like, what the fuck is YouTube? Yeah. - It felt very fragile for a while. - Right. - Yeah, so they presented it to us as we're gonna take all the website smash.com stuff off your plate because I was doing all of that myself, because (laughs) I actually made money before we started getting paid on YouTube by designing websites for people. And that's how I was able to fund a lot of things and side tangent. Our videos actually started getting, we made like two lip sync videos before the Pokemon Theme. (hosts laugh) - If it works, it works, baby. Keep it coming. - Doing a little tester run. (men laugh) - Before we found out about YouTube and I hosted it on my own website. And 'cause there was no website like YouTube to host it on and stuff. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - And I created a little thing, again, it was an eye frame, you copy paste there. And when you paste that to your page, it had instructions and everything, when you copy paste it to your Myspace page, it put the video there. And then it also had instructions to copy and paste for someone else, that was how I designed this like a copy paste viral kind of thing. And I didn't know how well that was doing with the two lip sync videos, (laughs) it's so weird to say, (hosts laugh) that we did beforehand. But I did get a bill. I did see the bill and it was a couple hundred bucks, you know? And I didn't know how to convert that into how many views is this getting, but I knew it was getting a lotta views or else I wouldn't have to pay a couple hundred dollars for bandwidth on videos. So you actually used to have to pay for bandwidth before YouTube offered the service. So we found out about YouTube by me doing a search for one of the videos I found that someone else had uploaded it to YouTube, and I sent 'em a message. I was like, "Hey, this video, thank you so much for uploading it here. We wanna upload it ourselves, do you mind removing it?" And they said, "Yeah, absolutely." So we created our channel. "Smosh" was still five letters, still available. And that was the beginning of that. - Damn. - Shoot, (laughs) I forgot where we were going. We were going with why Defy. - He asked you about- - Why did defy, like how did that all come around? - How did they pitch it to you? - Yes, okay, okay, yeah. Okay, I got off on a side tangent because I was talking about how I designed the website. (hosts laugh) - "Trash Taste" is all about tangents, don't worry. - We always have tangents. - You're fitting right in, right in. - Oh, yeah, it's seamless. So they came to us and they were like, "We will take care of the website so you no longer have that stress to deal with." 'Cause every week the website was crashing and I was figuring out how to keep it up. And they had this huge plan of all the things that they were capable of and how they had the infrastructure to allow us to do all of our dreams. So they asked us, "What do you wanna do with this company? If you could make this company anything, what would it be?" And we had these huge lofty goals. They said, "We got all of that on lock. We have the infrastructure, we have the investors, we could make this happen." And they offered us a certain amount of money in stock. It sounded really good. More money than I thought that, you know, I would ever see in my life before that. So I was like, "That sounds great." Obviously, this company's eventually gonna go public. That's how they work, right? I did not know, my lawyer did not tell me that that's not always the case. The people that we had surrounding us that were authority figures in some way to us, on the situation did not break down the details of how that doesn't always happen and how that's actually a huge risk. - Yeah, yeah, of course. - Yeah, yeah. - So they bought full ownership and they paid us in yearly, you know, annual salaries. And they had this structure set up where it was like, this year, eh, it's a pretty shitty salary, but next year, it's an okay salary. But by year four, you're gonna love your salary. So- - Did that happen? - It did eventually play out that way. And I was pretty comfortable with it. I was like, we are making a good salary here. Like, what do we really have to complain about? - And I guess they're doing a lot of the stuff that you used to have to do and they're looking for things and managing it. But then also I imagine as a YouTuber, it's probably quite difficult to give that control to someone else. - It was, because I did give that control away and everything was not how I woulda done it. So I ended up working double time to teach them how to do the things, but then they were rehiring. And the way that bigger companies work is just like, you're never just building a one-on-one relationship with someone who like you teach 'em once and they know, and they keep going with that thing. And then it's just a thing that happens now. It's like, no, you're reteaching and reteaching and reteaching until it's like, okay, let's abandon the website. And then it was like me abandoning a lot of the things that I had a dream of growing because I was not able to keep that up and also do the videos. So, you know, I had to figure out where to put my time. - Yeah, was there a specific point when you kind of realized, damn, this is not what I envisioned at all and I kinda want out? Like, was there a specific moment or was it just like a build up of a lot of things? - It was primarily a buildup over a long period of time. It was about four years in when I realized that things just weren't looking right. And I still had two years on the contract left. And I think one particular thing was like, they hired someone that I did not know that they were gonna hire. And then all of a sudden I found out that they were now a full-time employee in this really important position that meant something to me. And I was like, "Wait, I didn't realize that was what was gonna happen." And also, there were times, and I don't know how much I could say, but I'll see what I can do. (men laugh) - Well, they don't exist anymore, right, so. - True, technically. There was a fundraiser that they put on. - Oh. - It was for a game. And they had just seen the success of other people who had done fundraisers for games, Indiegogo, - Oh, you're right. - GoFundMe type things. And they raised like $250,000 for these games, which were like mobile games, but you could play it on the computer. And it was like this really cool thing with all these inside jokes from the community. And they said, "Oh, that's cool, guy, you do that." And then we were like, "We don't have a concept for a game." They're like, "Ah, we'll figure it out later. You just raise some money." - Oh, what, so they just made the fundraiser. And then afterwards, they were like, "Make the game." - And we said, "We need to have something to pitch to people, we need." And then they were like, "Cool, well, just tell 'em the idea then." And then they were like, "You come up with the idea." So I came up with the idea, Ian, of course, also. We both came up with the idea. And they were like, "Cool, you got the idea, let's do it." And I was like, "We need to have concept art, we need to like show a build of the game. We need to be able to show what we want to do with this thing." And they were like, "Ah, we don't have time. Okay, we'll get concept art." So all we were able to do was launch with this concept art. - Wow. - Oh my God. - And launching a campaign, asking people, incentivizing your fans to give you money, well, it did not feel right to me, but I felt backed up into a corner. And, you know, I think that's probably one of the things that I regret from my time there, is allowing myself to feel backed up into a corner, to accept money from people that were excited about this thing being built. Of course, you know, we did accept money for that. And I did put all of my heart and soul into making it as good as it possibly could be, still didn't live up to my expectations. And I feel like if it was done the right way, it would've. But the moment that really stood out to me was there was some shadiness about, you know, obviously the way that they pushed to earn money for something because they saw dollar signs. - Right, not because it was good projects. - Rather than it being like, those types of things, if you're gonna have your audience fund them, it should really be a passion project. - Absolutely. - Exactly. - And I could have made it a passion project 'cause I really was excited about it, but it was so forced and rushed. And then there was some shady stuff about like the way that they contributed to certain donations to inflate - Huh. - the way that certain things looked. And that's really all I'll say about that, but it made me feel so weird about it. I was like, "I need out as soon as possible." - I imagine when they were doing stuff like that, the confidence you had in the company was probably a bit like, okay, if they're willing to do this, stuff must not be going so great. - And I realized that the way that they treated that was the same way that they were treating me and all the other people. - Because a lotta people lost a lot of money, right, I mean, it was like crazy. - What was it? - A lot of people lost a lot of money on YouTube. - Oh, yeah, yeah, eventually. Luckily, I wouldn't say I foresaw anything, but it didn't feel right. And I got out a year before they ended up closing down. And another thing that really was a turning point was I had made a Facebook page and it was, I don't know, I had like 500, 600,000 followers or whatever you call it on Facebook. - It's just like Anthony. - Subscribers. - Friends. - Friends. - Friends, friends, yes. (men laugh) And, yeah, it was "Smosh" Anthony. And they were like, "Oh, this has "Smosh" in the name, so we're gonna run this for you, okay?" I was like, "Okay, yeah, yeah, sure." And then I was like, hey, you know, I was kinda trying to start to silently transition out. I think they kinda picked up on the gist 'cause we still were contractually obligated. But I was like, "Can I get my Facebook back?" They're like, "No, it's ours." I was like- - Oh. - Oh! - "But I made that thing. And you said that you just wanted to run it because you were gonna help me post content on there." They're like, "It has "Smosh" in the name, this is ours." - (gasps) That's fucked up. - I was like, "Okay." - Geez. - And then I easily settled on that. I was like, "Oh, okay, it's fine. It's just Facebook, who cares, it's Facebook." And then they were like, "Okay, hey, can we get access to your Twitter and Instagram?" (Connor inhales sharply) I was like, "No." - (laughs) No. - What the fuck? - And then I immediately changed the name from "Smosh" Anthony to Anthony Padilla (hosts laugh) - Not on my watch! - after they asked me for access to that. - In a way, it's kind of cool that they kind of forced you into being like, "You know what? Fuck this, I'm just gonna go on my own. Like, I'm gonna fucking brand myself. Fuck these guys." - It really got me thinking like, could I do something - Could I do this? - on my own outside of this brand that I had created? Yeah, and it was really sad because I had made that brand, - "Smosh" was yours, yeah. - when I was 14 years old, I made that as like a little shitty website, as like a forum for me and my group of friends at school to go on and hang out with each other. It was really before social media, it was like, we were either talking on AIM or we were going onto this website. And, yeah, it was sad to kinda let that part of me, this baby that I had brought into this world, kinda go. - Yeah, God, it must be nerve-racking trying to do something yourself though, right? - Yeah. - Because as a YouTuber starting, ditching your channel, which has like millions and millions of subscribers, to start from the ground up again. I think like you were one of the first people I know, like the first big creators, to really like branch off and try to do something themselves with a new channel, right? - And it succeeded. - And doing well. - And there wasn't a precedent set before that really that you could really succeed by doing something new, right? - Right, I mean, well, Fred did it. - Oh. - Oh, yeah. - Fred had another channel and then he did his thing. - That's true, that's true. - Well, he did a few movies. You had a few movies too. - I did a movie. - How was doing a movie? - How was doing a movie, ah, man. (hosts laugh) That was also another weird experience. - But a part of me, 'cause, obviously, I mean, do you, (laughs) it's not a good movie. (men laugh) I was just, ah, fuck it, I was trying to think of how to say it. It's not a good movie. But it's- - My heart, no, no. I put my heart and soul into that movie, it's the best movie. - Wow, right in front of him? - Oh my God. - I feel like- - This is up fucked up. - It's a part of you- - We invite him onto the show. - You invite me on here to talk shit about my pride and joy? - Listen, I wanna talk to you, answer me then. - Did you actually watch that? - Yeah, I loved it. - Dear lord, wait, - I love it in a way of like- - (laughs) you said you loved it? - Yeah, it's a terrible movie. (men laugh) - It's so fucking bad. - It's like it's so bad that it's good. - It's so fucking bad. - Yeah, but it's that amazing part of YouTube history where like everyone had to have a movie. YouTube for some reason was like, "Make a fucking movie, pop them out." Fred had fucking John Cena in his movie. (all chattering) - Oh, yeah. (laughs) - I completely forgot about that. - Dude. - It was just a fucking cool, weird time where people were making movies, whereas like, I mean, did you even wanna make a movie? Was it like, what was that, what was going on with that? 'Cause I feel like there must have been so many people trying to put their things in there, trying to be like, "No, it should be this, it should be this." "No, no, no, fuck, well, should get John Cena in it." "Well, I don't know, it's John Cena." - Oh, we got "Stone Cold" Steve Austin in it. - Oh, yeah. - Well, there you go. "We gotta get someone from the WWE." (men laugh) - Well, it was like, "John Cena's not happening. It's gonna be "Stone Cold" Steve Austin." - Yeah, I wanna know about the movie. Like, what was all that? (laughs) You know? - Yeah. So we, I mean, yeah, a lotta people had movies going on and a lotta people were breathing down our neck saying, "So when are you gonna make a movie?" And we did kind of have this dream of eventually making the movie version of our "Smosh" sketch. And we had a lot of, nothing concrete, but like, ooh, what would the movie version of this look like? If we get $1 million, do we... We had some of the dumbest ideas of like where the movie was all a "Smosh" sketch budget. And then we had millions of dollars worth of money pumped into the final scene. (men laugh) That was our initial idea. - No, because I remember on the "Smosh" channel, this was way before the actual movie came out, you guys released an April Fool's video called "Smosh the Movie." - Yeah, yeah, we did. - Have you seen this video? - I think I've watched this. - This was like the first ever - That was a long time ago, right? - April Fool's YouTube video that I saw, but it was like the first five minutes was the most insane quality, (Anthony laughs) like, oh my God, this looks like a movie. And then the remaining hour and a half was you and Ian walking back home with no cuts. And I thought this is the greatest thing ever. So then when I heard that you guys were actually making a movie, I was like, so psyched. - Yeah. (laughs) - So psyched, it's just another variable fortune. - I must say, for YouTuber movies, it was the, oh, what was the name of the one with the ghost? Wait. - "Ghostmates?" - "Ghostmates," that was probably - Oh, "Ghostmates." - one of the better YouTuber movies, I will say, that one was good, right? - That one we had a little bit more freedom with and in a weird way though, we almost stripped out a lot of what made "Smosh" "Smosh" with that movie. So it felt weird 'cause it wasn't quite, you know, a good movie and then it wasn't quite a bad YouTube movie, which is also entertaining for its own reasons. - I think it's 'cause you and Ian are, I think, naturally very good on camera. Like, compared to how some other people transitioned to the movies kinda thing. I think you and Ian did that a lot better. - Aw, thanks. - Well, I think it definitely helped that you guys were already acting in your sketches. - Yeah. - There's a lot of that going on. - Acting. - Acting. (men laugh) Acting in your sketches. - I heard a lot about how I should improve my acting in the comments, but- - Really? - Oh, yeah. - 'Cause they're gonna go into it and they're gonna be like, "You're a YouTuber, you can't act." So even if you did an amazing job, people would be like- - Like, stay in your lane. - "No, no, no." - There's an expectation. Yeah, but with the movies, you know, with the first one, it was a lot of, you know, we did have this dream to do it, but then other people, you know, it was at Defy. They were like, "We need to make this happen and we need to make it happen in four months." (Connor exhales sharply) - Four months? - Four months? - Okay, I'm just throwing a random number. - Ah! - Okay, I was about to say. - But it was too soon. - But it was something too little. - Too soon. - Not enough time, not enough time. - It coulda been six, it coulda been eight, but I think it was somewhere probably around six months. - Jesus. - And we were like, actually, no, I remember it was after we got to a point in the scriptwriting process that they said this needs to happen in this very short amount of time. We're like, "We're not ready. Well, we're still like fleshing this thing out." And it was a thing where we still wanted to make our videos on YouTube, we didn't wanna give that up. 'Cause we felt like we would've had to dropped that in order to put all of our effort into making a movie. And they were like, "Don't worry, we can hire this person." And they gave us a few options, they hired a person. The script was not anything like I woulda wanted it to be. It was a lot of like- - Shoulda done one on Fiverr. (men laugh) We found a guy. - Yeah, who is this guy? It was a lot of like here's what someone who isn't in the YouTube space thinks our videos and thinks YouTube is. - Was it someone who worked in like, you know, Hollywood movies? - It was like a Hollywood scriptwriter who did like TV series and I think some movies as well. And he did do some funny stuff, but it was very much like an outta touch perspective. And it was like, I mean, a lot of "Smosh" stuff was cringing in its own right. But like I was cringing at how outta touch these things were, it's like I could not do these things. There was this area where like memes go to die that was written where it was like a space- - I remember this. - Was that in the movie? - I don't know, fuck, now was it, fuck, - I don't this it was- - it just sounds so familiar. - You know, I think that Ian mighta talked about it on a separate thing. - Okay, that's probably why this sounds so familiar. - Or maybe he and I both talked about it at some point, but there was this part written where it was like, where memes go to die. And he was like, "Tazuna's in there." And I was like, "Okay, first of all, you're trying to make us say that these people are dead memes." (hosts laugh) - This sounds so familiar. - That's kinda fucked up. And then also you are saying, here's all these things that are not in the now, it's just this weird period piece that just feels too soon to be a period piece. You know what I mean? - Also it might age poorly. - Yeah. - It also just sounds like a "Hello, Fellow Children" moment, right? - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - It's like, yes, I know memes, I know meme culture. These are doing right. - It was exactly like that. - Hillary Clinton, am I right? (men laugh) - It felt a lot like that. And then we did a lot of rewrites and it was still a very bad movie. (men laugh) - Oh, my bad. Maybe I was a little too harsh. - How self-aware were you on set to be like, "Guys, are we making a bad movie?" - I think I was half self-aware. - Right, right. - I wasn't fully self-aware, part of me thought, like after a certain scene happened, I was like, "Oh, that might actually be good." Part of me did think it might actually be a good movie depending on the way it was cut, depending on the way the special effects look. But the way that it came together was very much, after we were seeing like final cuts of it, I was like, "Okay, (hosts laugh) that's, um, - Can I get a reshoot? - that's the movie." - Well, I mean, at least it's not as bad as Shane Dawson's movie, that was- - Yeah. - I mean, it depends who you ask 'cause- - No, that one was really, really bad. - Was it? - Have you seen it? - I did, but I saw it like - Years ago. - on the premier night where there was so much hype in the room from all the friends and family that it was hard to tell is this a funny joke or am I just not in a good head space right now? You know what I mean? (hosts laugh) - You should go rewatch it sometime. - Maybe I will. - It's interesting. - Okay, okay. - It's interesting. - I never even tried that one. No, no, no. - It's not good. - Okay, okay. - Geez. - Well, it was a lot of fun though. And I think that some elements from the "Smosh" sketches retained their Smoshiness. - Yeah, I mean, it's much easier for me to sit here and be like, "You made a fucking movie." (men laugh) Like I could do any fucking movie. Like my movie would be good. (laughs) "Oh, you gotta make it in six." "What? I can't even spell." - It was a weird process because, you know, we had trailers, and we had - Oh. - an acting coach, and we had the pressure of like, this is the movie. It was something like $1 million budget. So it was like- - You got like the full Hollywood experience. - It was the full Hollywood experience. - Damn. - And, you know, we had like a writer there on set to do rewrites in the moment if we needed to rewrite something for time. And there were a lotta scenes that we had to cut for time and they were rewritten on them. It was such a different experience, where it was not, like I could still go to the director, who was Alex Winter and he's amazing, you know? - Yeah. - Is he the Bill? I forget if he's the Bill or Ted from "Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure," but not Keanu Reeves, - Oh, wow, really? - but, you know the- - Oh, he's the Ted, I think. - Ted, Ted, no, Bill, Bill. - I don't know. The one that's not Keanu. - That sounds awesome. - But Alex Winter's amazing. And, you know, his kids were huge fans of "Smosh" so he really did want to give it that genuine "Smosh" feel. - Dude, I feel bad for calling it bad. (men laugh) It's got all this heart and passion, and I just thought it was bad. - It was shit. - No matter how much heart and passion you put into something, if there are a few elements that are slightly off, it's gonna all feel, it's gonna kinda all get brought down to that level. And I feel like that's what happened. There were a lot of great things that could have been, but then it was like, there were certain elements that just kinda brought it all down to this weird level. - I've been hearing, "Oh, we're gonna cut the scene 'cause of time," that doesn't make you probably feel very confident. You're like, "That's not good." - Yeah, yeah, but, you know, a lotta times we're like, we're gonna cut this scene for time and we end up having this other scene that totally actually works fine without it, - Oh, that was okay. - and it was like the rewrites were okay. - Were you're sketches before scripted, so you already were used to memorizing lines, or were you like mostly improvised before? - Yeah, yeah, they were definitely scripted. But usually we would like get a take that we like, and then we'd be like go off book for the final take. And like half the time we'd go with the off book version. But it was a little bit different, so "Smosh" videos, we would shoot, you know, 10 second clips of like this thing. Okay, you say this thing. Okay, you say this thing. And when you do a movie, they really want you to get like the full scene with this angle, then the full scene with the next angle. - No jump cuts. No fucking jump cuts, yeah. - Continuity. - Yeah. - So a lot of the acting in it was actually me trying to remember my lines, and if I watch it, (hosts laugh) I'm just like, I'm just trying to remember my lines right now. (hosts laugh) For most of these lines, like it didn't really get past that. And also I got in my head a lot about like, I don't think this is gonna be the movie that I wished it could be. - That would be so hard to like really turn up and give it your all when it just doesn't feel - It was hard. - like it's going right. - It was hard. It was like after the first day, even though there were so many people that had a lot of passion and good intentions and a lotta people that did put their heart and soul into it, after the first day I was like, this doesn't feel like it's gonna be what I thought it would be. And then it was hard to get out of my head and get out of that head space. - And I guess you couldn't exactly go to Defy and be like, "Hey, (men laugh) can we change?" - Yeah. - It's not like a YouTube video where you- - Hey, we just shot the first day. - Yeah. (laughs) It's like this guy kind of isn't working, let's scrap and go to a new YouTuber. Let's do a new video, you know? - Yeah, yeah, well, even down to the sketches, it was hard to say this video didn't work. - Oh, really? - Oh, shit. - Because there was a lotta money that was invested into it. - Damn. - And we were given a certain budget each month. And if we scrapped it, it would be like, this is cutting into our overall budget. Let's just try to make this work. - Oh, right. - So when that pressure starts building up and you have all these other eyes and voices and budgets and restrictions, that's when I think things start to kinda go south in those situations. And that's when I started to feel like things weren't really right. Even though I could totally see why you can't reshoot a sketch after you shoot it. Obviously, it makes sense. But I think if I was fully independent, there were a lotta things that I might have considered reshooting. But when we have this level where we want the production value to be there and we kinda reach that point, it felt weird to go back. I now know that you could go back and it's fine, but. (men laugh) - Back then you're like, "Holy shit." - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Damn. - Would you ever want to make another movie with the correct amount of time and creative freedom? - Oh, man. - Anthony Padilla the Movie. (men laugh) - It's just me now. - This is you. - It's just him interviewing. - Oh, man. I don't know, I don't have any drive for that. I have been pushing myself more with the intros of my videos on my channel that I do now, it is scripted. And I realize that none of the passion that goes into me writing the words makes it on the camera when I'm recording these intros. - Yeah, of course. - So now I'm trying to, in a sense, maybe I'm like reverse-engineering a way for me to learn how to act is by just actually giving the emotions that I, when I write these things, for me to actually give the emotions. I'm like, "Oh, when you say a line you're supposed to visualize it." (hosts laugh) Oh! - You're not just saying it. - You don't just say the word? Oh, that's what acting is. So in a weird backward sense, I feel like I am pushing myself to learn how to act a little bit. And maybe, you know, it depends. It depends, but right now, no. (men laugh) No, no, no, no. - Yeah, you've kind of done so much in the time that you've been on YouTube. Like, is there anything you haven't done that you want to do eventually down the line? 'Cause I feel like, when you just think about even just "Smosh" stuff, it's like, you guys have literally been at the top, you've done everything, you've done all the big stuff. - Been at the top twice. - They've been at the top twice, dude. And you've done the movies, you've done, you know, did you release a book? - We released a graphic novel, - Ah. - yeah, yeah, I had a lotta fun making it. Most people don't even know that existed 'cause they did not market it. But I put my heart and soul into a graphic novel, but no actual book, so that's something I never have done. - Is that something you'd wanna try, or is there like something else where you're just like eventually I'd like to do it?" - Maybe, maybe. I thought about putting together some kind of coffee table book that goes through the different interviews I've done and talks about the different things that I learned from each interview. The things that I've taken from that and been able to apply to my own life. And the moments that stood out to me as key things that I now go back to and think about. - Yeah, so an autobiography. (men laugh) - A little bit, - In a sense. - but hopefully it could be also a way for people to learn through me learning. Like, that's part of why I do the interview series now. - I mean, to be fair, if there's anyone who has enough material to write a cohesive autobiography, it's you. - (laughs) I don't know. I feel like putting it in the term of autobiography, I'm like, "Ah, ah, no, no, no." (all chattering) - Why is bad? - It's 'cause you're self-important. Somehow you'll say I know so much more than you'll read about in the fucking handbooks. - It's cause we've seen the YouTubers who have written autobiographies, and you're just like come on. - Hi, I'm 24. (men laugh) This is my life, man. - I struggled 12 times in my life. (men laugh) - That's what I've always- - And I've recognized eight of them. - Yeah, exactly. - This video is sponsored by Tippsy. - Tippsy is a quarterly subscription sake box where you'll get six curated sake bottles straight from Japan - Ooh. - to try all sorts of pairings and dishes with. - Guys, come on, you know you wanna try some new sake, right, come on. - Well, why don't you guys try some out while I give you some pointers? - Well, luckily, Joe, we have some custom sake boxes that we made just for my wedding. - Oh my Lord. - I know. - Get the full Japanese experience with that. - I actually get to use it this time. 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So, guys, if you want some amazing deals in your starter kit, then you get can 10% off all products using code trashtaste10. - And you can get $30 off your first sake box by using trashtaste30. - Is that two coupon codes? - That's two coupons codes. - My lord. - That is two different deals, - Smash that link down below. - guys. - Smash that link. - Back to the episode. - I have to ask 'cause I'm curious, 'cause you've been on YouTube for so long, sorry, do you hate when people say stuff like that? - No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. - You're such a fucking dinosaur, dude. - I just think about my age. It's fine. - You're a YouTube boomer, dude. (men laugh) - 'Cause, you know, YouTube has gone through a lot of distinct eras, I'd say, do you have a favorite YouTube era where you felt like this is when it was peak YouTube? - The golden time of YouTube. - Yeah, yeah, I think it was probably around like 2011 to 2013-ish, where there was money to be made, and sponsors, like people would take it seriously enough to fund everything. But yet there wasn't this idea that like mainstream media had of like anyone can do this and become a millionaire. You know what I mean? - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - I feel like it was still very independent and it just felt like creativity was what thrived most. - Yeah, because I feel like that era of YouTube, all of the biggest creators at that time, they all started YouTube not to make money. But just because they enjoyed the creativeness of it. They enjoyed making videos. And then I feel like after that, it kinda progressed into people realizing that you could make this a job. - Absolutely. - And you could like, people did it for the money. - And it could be a business. - Yeah, it's a legitimate business, which is nothing wrong with that. But I feel like part of the magic was lost, I feel, you know? - Yeah. - 'Cause it kinda transitioned into something else, you know, it- - Yeah, a different mindset going into creating things. And around that time or soon after is when I think the algorithm was introduced. - Ah, yes. - The elusive algorithm. - The algorithm. - The one God of YouTube. (laughs) - I'm learning more now that the algorithm really does reward the things that people enjoy consuming most. And the algorithm's goal, while no one individual knows everything in and out 'cause it's made by so many people and it's taught to learn. That's not scary, don't worry. - That's not so good. - It's sent here. (men laugh) - That's not so good at all. - The algorithm does reward the things that do have the highest retention, they have people, you know, watching for the longest time, replaying the moments most, the highest click-through rate of what looks most exciting. So I am learning that you can work with the new way that it's set up, but it was definitely jarring when it first happened and no one knew or was told what was happening. - Just like flip to Let's Play overnight. - Yeah, yeah, because that was the fastest way to make repeating long form content that people would feel the need to watch entirely. - Oh, yeah, 'cause did you guys start the gaming channel around that time, or was it? - Yeah, yeah. - Is that why 'cause of the change or was it just- - We didn't know what the reason was that these videos were popping up, but we saw, oh, wait, gaming videos, that's becoming really popular. People wanna see this and a lotta people are asking us to play a game. - I get it, I'm a gamer, I'm a gamer. - Yeah, I'm a gamer. I could do it. - Did you have a hard time when the algorithm did shift and you were still on like, you know, scripted, you know, script, sorry, scripted sketches and everything like that? - Yeah, yeah. It was definitely a hard period. I mean, it didn't really affect us as much as- - Yeah, you were probably (all chattering) still going pretty strong. - We were still fine. I looked recently and we still have like a lot of videos from that time that have like 10s of millions of views, so it was okay. It was okay, but it definitely did impact the way that the videos were pushed out initially. So like after the first weekend, I remember having a higher up breathing down my neck saying, "You guys usually get a million views in the first three days, what's going on, why are?" - Oh, no. - You know, and it was a lot of like this stress of like what is going? And we're like, "I don't know, we-" - You don't want a fucking boss telling you that. That's the last thing you want. - And like their entire company and all the X amount of employees, like their livelihoods are built on the performance of these videos. So at that time we were really pushed to break off and create other side channels and experiment with longer form content, - Jesus Christ. - things that required less editing. - I feel so lucky being just like a almost independent, - Always been independent, basically, yeah. - like a one, two man team with my own like personal channel, because the pressure's just gone, you know? - It's a lot less pressure. - Yeah, okay, so, 'cause like I gotta ask 'cause I rarely meet someone who's been on YouTube for longer than me. - For longer than most of your viewers lives. - Yeah, because, what? (men laugh) - Honestly. - What a disturbing way of putting it. - Honestly, yeah. - I just interviewed Nihachu, who's like this really popular Twitch streamer, and she's 19, and I was like, "So I made my, been on YouTube when you were two?" - Oh my God. - And it freaked me out. - That's scary. - It freaked me the fuck out. - 'Cause I found out today actually, that today, out of complete coincidence, is my 15th year anniversary on YouTube. - Oh, shit. - You've been on a long time. (all chattering) - You did it! - Congratulations. - So like I rarely get to ask this, so what is the secret to stay relevant for a long period of time on YouTube? (Anthony exhales sharply) - You're asking that? - You've been on for 15 years! - Because you've been on for longer than me, so you're the only one that I can ask for a actual perspective, right. - Okay, okay, well, we could share perspectives here because I think that you might have something to contribute for 15 years. - Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. - I'll be Mr. 17. - 17, gonna talk to my senior, my senior now. - My YouTube career can watch an R-rated movie, but it can't quite vote or smoke. (men laugh) - Mine's in high school, you know? - Okay, yeah, yeah, chilling. - Yours is gonna be legal next year, you know? - You're getting your first zits and trying to be very uncomfortable about it. - Your balls are dropping. (men laugh) - You're very uncomfortable about puberty. You're starting to get the hang of it, no pun intended. But let's see, so the secret, the secret is to never feel like you have it figured out. - Right, yeah. - The secret, I think, is to always feel like there is something new to learn. I am constantly looking at the people that are growing audiences and I'm kinda filtering it out, okay, this person, they have a recipe and it pleases the algorithm. I think, maybe that's why they have views. Okay, what can I learn from that? Okay, this person has a really dedicated fan base, they don't necessarily appeal to the algorithm, but they appeal to an audience, and what can I learn from them? So for me, it's really about constantly learning. And when I do interviews with bigger names, tomorrow I'm interviewing TommyInnit, - Wow. - Oh, nice, nice. - And, you know, he's like, is he 18? - He just graduated. - He's still in school, right, or was he- - He's just graduated. But, like, I love picking his brain and, you know, people that are new and coming up on YouTube right now, and learning what they see in the platform now, because it's something completely different. And I feel like there is never a point, where you as a creator on the internet where things are so rapidly changing, there is never a point where you will be like, "Figured it out." And I used to think there would be a point that I would be like, I gotta grind and grind and grind, and eventually I'll have it figured out and then I'll just be able to sit back and let the thing just live on its own. And I think that's kinda what got me into, or convinced me that like selling to a company in 2011 was the right idea, I had it in my head. The goal is to figure this out, it'll go on autopilot. I can relax and maybe do other things in my life. - Mm. - Yeah. - But what I quickly realized is that I really love doing this and this is part of my life that I want to retain. And there will never be a point where I feel satisfied just relaxing. But also, if you sit back and relax, then, you know, and it's about like- - You get comfortable. - Yeah, you get comfortable and you lose track of why things are moving in the direction they're going, and what is relevant to the platform today. - Yeah, because that's really interesting to hear because from your perspective, you've really like been one of the top creators basically since the birth of YouTube. Whereas I've been on YouTube for a long time, but it's been like on a very, very niche topic, which is anime. So I've always been able to learn from what the bigger creators are doing. And try to apply what everyone else is doing. And seeing if I can take that into my own niche, my own channel, and seeing if it can grow out of there. - And how has that paid off? Like, were you able to take those lessons and things that you learned from the bigger YouTubers and apply it to yourself and have it pay off? - Yeah, I mean, it kinda felt like a cheat sheet, you know, it kinda felt like cheating. 'Cause I'm just like, you know, I'm in such a niche topic that I can just take what other people are doing and just put it with my own content. But with you, since you're one of the people setting the standards, you know, one of the people that I watch, and I was like, okay, let's see what "Smosh" are doing. Let's see what some of the other bigger creatures are doing. I'm like, okay, well, I see what's successful to them. But I feel like being at the top of the pyramid and trying to balance yourself is a lot easier than climbing up from the bottom of the pyramid - For sure. - and trying to stay relevant. - For sure, yeah. I think that some people have a goal of like get to the top of this pyramid, just stay afloat up here. And, of course, it is much more comfortable because you have the freedom to kind of apply more of these things that you learn on a bigger scale. But at the same time, there's so much more pressure. And I think that that's unforeseen to smaller creators. You know, I had my period, I left "Smosh" when, I think, we had 22 or 23 million subscribers, huge amount of subscribers, huge amount of pressure. I go off and do my own thing. Channel starts with a couple million. And they're people that don't really know what to expect. I don't know what to give them. And there was still that pressure there from me of how am I going to entertain these people who expect me to be giving the quality of content of a 22 million subscriber channel, but now it's just me? It's literally just me on my own. - I'm really curious about, obviously, a lot of the viewers, when you said, ah, I'm leaving "Smosh," I think a lot of people would see that and think, oh, he's just leaving a channel. But I imagine there was a lot of probably behind the scenes or like friendships that were strained by that. Was that like a, outside of just the business perspective, did that put a lotta strain on like your personal life, leaving that and having to kinda be like, "All right, I'm leaving this big thing." 'Cause obviously Ian is there and a bunch of your friends worked there. - Well, surprisingly, me leaving didn't put a strain in and of itself, like the idea of me leaving and then me leaving. That didn't exactly put a strain. I think, maybe afterwards it did a little bit, really, I think it was because audiences or viewers and commenters really were having all these different things that they were saying about like, "Oh, this person's better," or, "This person's better." Or, "You were better when you were here," or, "They're better now that they're here." And I think that that added a little bit of, it was unavoidable to see those especially- - Oh, yeah, yeah. - I feel like you can't turn off your brain from wanting to keep up with the comments, if you're not even trying to look for them. - Yeah, you see, yeah. - I'm trying to see what people are thinking about this new thing that I'm just like trying to figure out. And then I'm getting inundated with all these opinions from people, and I think that that does seep in when you're not ready for it. I do wish that I was more ready for the types of comments- - How the fuck can you be ready for that? (men laugh) - The only way to be ready for it, I think, is to live in it. But I also realized that there is a bit of freedom in having a smaller audience. So it was a huge struggle. And my videos when I first left, I think got a million views each for like a couple months. And I was like, "Oh, I need to retain this." And then very quickly, once I think people realized I didn't know what I was doing, I had no goals for the channel. I was like, "Each week, we'll figure out something new and I hope you watch it." And I quickly (laughs) lost this audience that I had and realized that they were not there just for me. And it was a little bit bit disappointing at first 'cause I thought, "Oh, I guess I have the freedom to do whatever," and I thought that I had that with me. And then it was a wake up call to realize, oh, but you have to make good content. You can't just expect them to be there because it's you. Egotistical maniac. (hosts laugh) And, you know, the views I think got to about like 30,000 to 60,000 views a video. - Is this on the Anthony Padilla channel? - On the Anthony Padilla channel. - Really? - Within the first year after. - Wow. - And at that time, you know, if videos weren't getting 100,000 views or even more, people in the comments are just like, "Irrelevant, irrelevant, wow, fell off, fell off." - It was views plus ratio plus you fell off. (laughs) - Yeah, yeah, yeah, a lot of that. - You basically had abandoned an audience for a different style, so then obviously that's gonna happen. But people don't see it like that. They're like, "Oh, your name is worth so much." - They're like, "What do you mean you're not doing sketches anymore? I thought you were gonna do your own sketches now," right? - And I thought that I had to, I thought it was beholden. And I think the reason that it got to that point is I felt like I was trapped in this idea of I need to create sketches, I need to be funny. I need to deliver something that appeases that audience that I've learned how to appease. And I think getting down to, you know, I call them lower numbers, 30 to 60K, I know a lotta people are up and coming, and that is a great number. - I mean, perspective wise, that's low. - I don't wanna discount that. But at the same time, I was like kinda floundering around at that number. And first of all, I had to get outta my head from looking at the numbers, it wasn't about that anymore. I realized that I had an opportunity now to experiment without the pressure of an audience. So that's when I started experimenting with all these different types of videos and all these different types of things. And that's when I fell into doing I Spent a Day With videos. And it was without that pressure. And the first few did have that pressure on me to be funny. So I was kind of, you know, I did I Spent a Day With Flat Earthers and it was kinda like look how ridiculous, how weird looking this is. (all chattering) These people are weird. But slowly but surely, over the next couple months or half year, I started realizing that I actually was really curious about different types of people. And I did this video I Spent a Day With Furries and I had a company help me reach out to these people. And I thought they were all local. When they showed up, I found out that one flew in themselves on their own dime. And then this person drove three hours to be there. - Geez. - And I was like, okay, this is, and I already wasn't planning to say like, "These people are weird." But a part of me was like, I don't understand this. This is kind of a weird thing. But, you know, they get there and they're saying, "I used to watch "Smosh" all the time, I love your stuff." - You're fucking weird. (men laughing) - So, anyway, why are you weird? - So I very quickly changed my perspective with the way that I went into the interviews. Like, there was no way, and it felt weird to me doing the flat earther episode, it felt weird to me. Like, I was going outside of my element to give the snarky commentary channel perspective that was really popular on YouTube at the time. I realized I was kinda falling into those tropes that were so popular. And I was like, I just feel like I need to just be me and have a conversation with someone, be curious about them, try to learn about their life. And in doing so, afterward, I had them reach out to me. They were really excited about the way it turned out. But also a lot of commenters were like, "Whoa, this is the first time I've ever seen furries represented in a way where they were treated with respect. And that is so weird, I've never seen that before. I'm gonna send this to my friends who don't understand me." It was really then that I realized like, oh, this is what actually feels right. This doesn't feel, like, I'm not appeasing an audience I think I should be appeasing 'cause it's the trendiness of YouTube at the time. Or like this sense of humor that I felt like I needed to always like be this character that I was on "Smosh." I felt like I was able to actually just be myself and my editor then helped me throw in jokes, but it wasn't up to me anymore. I was just making a connection with that person. - Back to like YouTube boomer talk. - (laughs) Let's go. Let's go. - You talked about, you know, constantly learning, constantly seeing what's out there. There must have been a point when you're just like, I am so outta touch right now. - Oh, for sure. - 'Cause I constantly feel that, sometimes I'm like, I get YouTube. I get the algorithm, I get all the content, I get what people wanna watch. Sometimes you just see something and you're like, okay, I am a boomer. - You see that one popular video, and you're like, why? Why this? - Yeah, there's this one channel called Weegeepie, have you heard of that? - No. - No. - Okay, so I don't know how they do it, they have a 3D CG rig of Luigi and they animate him and his face to react to things. Or at least this is what the channel was a few years ago. I don't know what they're doing now. So he was reacting to things with Luigi sound effects. They're like, "Wow, whoa." (hosts laugh) And it was just like a reaction channel by Luigi. And I was like, and some of them had millions of views, and I was like, "This is so bizarre." - (laughs) That sounds incredible. - But I loved. - That sounds incredible. - I reached out, I followed him on Twitter. And I was like, "This shit, keep it up, this shit's sick." But it was so weird, and I was like, there is always something to learn about YouTube. There's always some weird corner. - I mean, now you're exploring that as well. - Yeah, now you're exploring, yeah, yeah. - Yeah, yeah, and those are the types of people I really, really enjoy talking to, where it's like this community that's doing this thing that many people would just think is bizarre. Like, there's actually something to it. And why does it catch on? And we could talk about the emotional aspects of the connection that people make and why do you think this is popular? - I think it's just really refreshing, you know, I mean, obviously lately on the internet, and even when you started it, it was very combative and everyone was always at each other's throat. And I think it just came out at the time and kinda hit the right note of just like, let's just talk, let's just see, like learn about each other. - Let's be open. - Yeah, and I think it's, yeah, I mean, the success, I mean, it shows that the audiences wanted that kind of content. Like, people are curious about all the types of different things, be it pony, pony- - Pony players. - Pony players. - In saying that- - I wanna know that now. I wanna know why. - In saying that though, there have been a couple of videos I've seen from yours where you do kinda bring back that like old school, a little bit cynical type of interviewer type thing. Like, you know, the one about like you interviewing time travelers, for instance. That one was a little like, I saw like the little bit of the cynical side of you, which was just as entertaining. - You have to be though. - You have to be. - That was right after the flat earthers episode, so I didn't quite detach from that side of it. But I feel like now if I were to approach that again, the topic that I'm like a little bit like, mm, I think I would just outright say this seems completely unbelievable, do you have people telling you that and how do you feel about that? And I feel like there's so many more interesting conversations to have about that. - Mm. - And I think a lotta people are either afraid to tell someone that their shit's whack. Or all they wanna do is tell them that their shit's whack and they don't wanna hear why they do what they do. I think that if you could just be transparent with anyone really, if you could just have a conversation with anyone about why they do what they do, you can make some kind of a connection, regardless of who the person is, except Hitler, not Hitler. (hosts laugh) - Damn, they grow up so fast. He's maturing. - How'd you feel about TikTok? 'Cause if there's one thing that does make me feel like a boomer and outta touch, it is just TikTok itself. - Yeah, it's- - Have you thought about venturing into that? - Oh, I have a TikTok channel. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - I should really have a TikTok. - It does really well with just clips from my interview series cut down and- - Yeah, we did that as well for "Trash Taste." - And does it work for you guys? - Yeah. - It works pretty well. - I think that the thing about TikTok is that there is an audience for everything. - Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. - So you might log on and think this is fucking weird shit, but then there is a corner of the internet that is for you on TikTok and their algorithm is really good at feeding you content eventually. If you sift through enough garbage for enough time, it eventually will find the thing that sits. - Yeah, my favorite category of TikTok videos is somebody complaining about something really specific. And then someone's like, "Hi, I'm the expert on that actually. This is actually why it works." And it's like, "Who is the toenail expert? Why did you come to me?" (men laugh) - It's literally IOL Reddit, right? - It is IOL Reddit. - They'll be like, "Toenail expert here, let me explain to you." - It's just like the strangest experts all come out and they're all good looking, like that's the other thing, everyone who is like an expert on something is just amazing looking. - Yeah. - There is always an expert about everything. - And they look amazing. - And they always look amazing. - It's like, why did you have to be so good and charming? Fuck. - Did they become good looking because they're an expert, or which one came first? - They became an expert, then they had the time to go and more out and take care of themselves. - Or is it that most people that look good are bound to be experts? - Yeah, maybe, maybe. - It's like, I used to be a model, and now I'm a toenail expert. (men laugh) - It is really crazy, yeah, but it's such a cool platform, but it makes me feel really old. - It is weird because I thought it was gonna die. - I think everyone, when it was bought, when it was musically- - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Yeah, I thought it was gonna go down the Vine route back then. - Yeah, yeah. - Musically, it was the thing and everyone was doing the musically, like cringe, compilations. Everyone just thought, oh, it's for kids. And then TikTok blew up and then, wow, everyone was wrong. I think everyone thought it was gonna die. - Yeah, yeah, when everyone was just like that lip syncing or doing dances. And you're just like, oh, look at this funny thing the kids are doing. - The replies, man. - Anthony was like, "I did that so many years ago!" - I built my career that way. (hosts laugh) They took my shit. - I think it's the replies, the replies and the ability to share the music so easily just was a game changer, I think. And it made editing kind of, you know, accessible to the, I mean, editing very accessible to beginners and people who don't know it. It's like, you just slide this thing across, chop the video, chuck it in, put this music over it, and, oh, you want a funny filter? We've got that too. - True. - So it kind of made it more like less scary. I mean, you open up like DaVinci Resolve and you just have a panic attack. You're like, what the fuck is this? (Joey laughs) Like, this makes no sense. Adobe Premiere, it makes zero sense if you don't watch five hours of YouTube tutorials. So I feel like it kind of made it very accessible in a way that kinda just worked. - And TikTok is always changing their shit. If you look at TikTok now versus a year ago, it looks very different, - Yeah, true. - and before that, and the features that they add, they are doing the upkeep. Vine, I mean, (Connor laughs) I think it was clear why Vine died for many reasons. One being that you couldn't make money on it, but also they were not keeping it up. They were not updating it. And fortunately or not, things on the internet, platforms need to constantly be updated to go where people are wanting it to go. 'Cause it is ultimately for people, right? - Instead Vine opted to be like, what if we made a sequel to Vine. - Vine Two. - Let's make a Vine Two. - Did they ever do that? - No, no, no, no. - Were those rumors, or were those legit? - They kept saying it, - They were legit. - definitely, yeah. - Yeah, Vine was like, "We're coming back with Vine Two." And people like were like- - And then TikTok was like, "Nah." - Yeah, TikTok was like, "Nah, we got this, - Nah, we got this square, man. - don't worry." - We got this, yeah. - Well, I find it really weird 'cause I feel like now TikTok is what YouTube was like 10, 15 years ago, right? - True, true. - Where, you know, like remember when back in the day where YouTubers would try to get on TV, which was like the old media, in order to legitimize themselves. And now it's like TikTokers trying to become YouTubers - Oh, for sure. - in order to legitimize themselves. - To legitimize themselves. - And it's been so weird just seeing that transition, right? - That's so true. Yeah, I guess it's because the platform is so easily accessible. Like you were saying that anyone could jump on there and you can build an audience on there, people can find you, the algorithm is very good. So it's basically like if early YouTube had an algorithm that fed people content that was directly relevant to them. - Yeah, and I think it's also like the barrier for entry for YouTube now, I feel like, even though YouTuber is like, you know, you can make anything on YouTube and it'll be successful. Still like the quality of content on YouTube now is so much higher than it was 10, 15 years ago. - Absolutely. - We're in like the MrBeast era where everything has to be $100,000. I did this, I fucking stayed up for one week straight. It's like, "All right, okay, I can't compete with that. 'Cause I just don't wanna do that." - Have you seen any of Ryan Trahan's stuff? - I have, I have. - Yeah, of course. - So I feel like he's been reinventing what YouTubers can now expect to do with the platform, because he's taking some elements of the MrBeast style with thumbnails that look very nice and clean, and he has an elevated concept for this whole thing. And it feels like a video game, it feels like you're watching this person's journey unfold in front of you and you feel like you can't click away 'cause you never know what's gonna happen in any turn. But yet it is still a vlog and he can still, you know, because it is a vlog where the whole idea is that it's low produced, he's able to make one a day. - It's quite nice just watching it. And you're like, this is like nice. I just feel like it's not too crazy. Like, you know, obviously, - It's nostalgic. - I love watching a MrBeast video, but my God, I feel like I'm a cog in a machine. - Yes, yes, yes, absolutely. - It's just so much. - There's so much screaming and texting, it feels like a refined, modernized vlog that has kind of like an elevated game plan. - The thumbnails are just next level. - The thumbnails kill it. And I never would've thought that a vlog thumbnail, which is not click bait, 'cause it's not click bait, could look so good. - Yeah, it's, I don't know who does it but- - Yeah, like I remember when, you know, where back when YouTuber vlogs were just, you know, you put on any digital camera, hand handheld camera, and then Casey Neistat came along and just used a DSLR and made basically like mini short films every day. And people were like, "What, you can do that, that's possible?" And then everyone tried to be Casey Neistat for a while. - And then he burnt out. - And then he burnt out. - I mean, he was every day, I mean, when he used to talk about his schedule, he was like, "Yeah, I'd wake up at 4:00 am and I'm editing it on the plane." I'm like, "What the fuck?" - But I think what we can learn from that experience is that if you have something good, you don't need to overdo it. If you want it to have any longevity, you know, part of the game plan is to figure out a way for it not to take up your entire life. You know, I interviewed Markiplier and he was like, "Burnout is when people aren't refilling their bucket, they're constantly scooping outta their bucket for their content, and they're not refilling it because they're not living a life outside of that. And you need to have that balance." - Have you ever been burnt out? - Yes, absolutely. (hosts laugh) - I would've been shocked if you said no. - Just like, never, never. Always a creative mind. - 17 years strong, baby. - I was trying to be polite, the question shoulda been, so when did you burn out? (laughs) - You shoulda just said it, honestly, you shoulda just said it like that. Many different times and every single time is when I felt overworked. And then once it became like part of a company, overworked, underappreciated. It felt like I wasn't being, like my opinions didn't quite contribute to the creative. But then also outside of that, I was burnt out on my own outside of "Smosh" after I left and decided to do my own thing. For a lot of that time, when the views were dropping, I was also burnt out, so it makes sense that people were not wanting to watch the content of someone who was burnt the fuck out by their own content. That's like, that's not fun to watch. There's a feeling you can feel when someone is burnt out by their content. - Yeah, and then when you go to the actual video and the top comment is like, "He's run out of ideas." - Yeah, yeah, I'm like, "Fuck you, dude, I got so many ideas." And then I just sit there and I'm like, "I have no ideas. Oh, fuck, they were right." - Oh, shit. Call me out. - But, you know, I think I really started to reframe what was important to me. And then I started like not taking it as seriously, not putting as much of my time into it. And I was able to live a life outside of it and have thoughts that were separate from my work. And I think that's when it kind of helps reinvigorate to a certain degree. - Yeah, one thing I was gonna ask is like, because, you know, compared to you YouTube boomers right here, we are very much children. - Oh, yeah, nine years, seven years right there. - It's nine years, seven years, yeah, like I just discovered what boogers taste like. (men laugh) So it's like, what I wanted to ask you specifically is like, how much of longevity do you see as a YouTuber being a career? Right, because it's like, we don't really have any like, you know, 'cause instead of like Hollywood or the acting industry or music industry, right, we already have examples of people who have had careers for like 30, 40, 50 years plus. Right, but because YouTube is such a new thing, whereas I think the longest is probably someone like you, right, it's like, do you see yourself doing this for the next 10, 15 years again? - I mean, it's already been half my life. So it feels like I can give my confidence to the idea that YouTube will be around for a long time. They haven't made any glaring mistakes that are still glaring mistakes. Like, it feels like they made a ton of mistakes, absolutely, I'm not gonna write them off completely. But it seems like over time they are remedying a lot of those, it feels like they actually are caring about the community. I'm not, you know, there's plenty of issues, but it seems like enough people care to make changes to keep the platform relevant. - Right, yeah. - 'Cause, it's like, oh, go on, go on. - Oh, no, I completely lost my thought. - Oh, I'm sorry. - Just say, say, say. - 'Cause, obviously, people are gonna be like, "What do you mean they did this fucking thing?" And it's like, I think, as you were saying, as a whole platform, I think they meant, considering the amount of shit that goes on the platform, they do a pretty good job at keeping it relevant, pushing it forward and making it the place. Yeah, obviously, there's places you can find that are better. - Yeah, because I think definitely like the one moment that YouTube did a fuckie wuckie and everyone was like, "This is the end of YouTube," was when demonetization became a thing, right? Then apocalypse came and everyone unanimous was like, "This is it, this is where it dies." But it somehow managed to stick around for, what, five extra years? - I mean, that needed to happen though, looking back at it, it was an inevitability that it was gonna come to something, like a system like that was gonna have to be put in place. - They implemented a lot of things that help with that though. Like, on the backend, you can upload a video now and it'll say, I'm not sure if it's for everyone, I think it's for everyone, (hosts laugh) please correct me if I'm wrong. I don't wanna be like- (all chattering) - I got YouTube privileges. - You got YouTube privileges. - I'm like, "YouTube's great," and they're like, "Bro, we do not have any of those features." - Well, let's find out. - The 1%. - Okay, so what I will say is, when I upload a video, it says checking on the monetization, and then after a half hour, 45 minutes, an hour, whatever, it eventually does like the initial check. And then you can have some confidence that it probably caught it if it's gonna catch something that you shouldn't have in the video. So that has given me a lot of confidence in the direction of that, because monetization was a huge issue. Every time I'd upload for a while, I was like, "Uh, mm, I don't know, let's see this thing I put 10s of thousands of dollars into, it might be worth nothing. I could just be in the red for this." Well, they did fix some things I feel and they're slowly but surely I think fixing a lot of the glaring issues. - Yeah, was there a point where like this changed from, you know, because as with the way being a content creator is, this changed from being a job to a career? Because for the longest time, I treated YouTube as a job because you wake up and you're like, "Maybe I'll be irrelevant then, or tomorrow, a week from now, a year." And like, I didn't really feel like this was a career literally until this podcast. When I'm just like, "Oh, okay, this is like a business, a sustainable business that I can see myself five, 10 years in the future." Was there a point for that for you? - I think the moment that that changes with somebody in general is probably when you have a format that you know you can come back to and feel confident in. And that's probably why this podcast was like, we know the format, we know, yeah, you know it's kinda all figured out so that it feels like this is a repeating thing. For me it was, (sighs) I think it probably felt like career, I mean, when we were purchased by Defy because it was like we had - Salary. - Salary. - salary. I mean, I feel like it was unique to me though. But then after that, you know, going off independently, the moment that it felt like a career for me now was when I had a series I Spent a Day With to go back to. I knew that it was a repeating thing. - Like a safety net, like something comfort, you know? - I think that's the difference, when you know that you have something, you're not starting from square one every single video. You know, a lotta people are still trying to figure out what they're doing, so every single video is back to the drawing board. And then that just feels like a job. And trust me, it's tough. - Yeah, because I feel like when you're starting off at YouTube, you want to make every video like a 10 outta 10 banger, you wanna be motivated. You wanna do something new every time. Then you realize that after a year or two of doing it, you're like, this is not sustainable at all. I need some kinda formula that I can fall back on because I can't always be, you know, at my peak of creativity every time. - So you guys are like 90%, probably going into each episode, 90% sure where things are gonna go, you know? And that- - Yeah. (laughs) - Yeah, well, going back to the beginning of this episode, right? (men laugh) - We know roughly, we know roughly. - We know roughly, yeah. - You know a little bit about what the dynamic is gonna be like at least. - I know if I say this thing, how maybe you'll react. - You're face is not so sure. Your face is not so sure. (men laugh) - I'm like, all I know is that we're gonna have someone on the show and we're gonna be talking about their stuff. - Well, you have a name and you have sponsors. - Yeah, exactly, exactly. - Right? - But- - Yeah, I guess like, sorry, what'd you wanna say? - No, I was just saying like, I feel like in a weird way, we're still trying to figure out that formula for "Trash Taste" in a sense. It's like, we've kind of figured it out. You know, it's obviously like a lot- - 100 episodes deep. (men laugh) - Yeah, 100 episodes deep, right, but it's like, I'm personally always like, yeah, scared of like that moment where it starts to get repetitive or starts to feel like a job. And like, luckily, I don't feel that way right now about it. But it's like, I am scared to fall into that. - So what are you doing to prevent it from feeling like it's a repetitive job? - Ah, I mean, we're bringing it on tour now. (laughs) - I mean, we're filming overseas. We're getting, you know, all sorts of interesting guests and stuff like that. And I think the specials definitely help, where that's the moment where we can just really explode with our creativity in big ways. - But also, I feel like those specials probably are what excite the audience as well, right? - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - I hope so. (laughs) - Hope so, right, guys, right? - Every now and then, someone will be like, "Where's our four hour conversation? I wanted to go to work and listen to four hours, I don't wanna watch one hour of content." (hosts laugh) - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - I guess my final question is, what do you wanna do in the future? I mean, you've been on the platform for 17 years, is there- - Are you gonna do something for your 20th anniversary? (Garnt laughs) - Got nothing planned, man, but 21st, you don't know. (hosts laugh) I think, I mean, I just wanna continue refining what I do. That's what I've been enjoying doing most. This I Spent a Day With series has been so fun for me 'cause every single episode, I see at least one element that I wanna refine. Whether it's the lighting on the set or something that's like really technical like that. Or it's like my performance on the intros, it feels like I'm just reading words. I'm gonna, you know, revamp that and try to learn it. Or like, I just went all out and I did these tests where I reshot some of my intros where I have a jib, which is like a fucking little crane, glued to a camera. And I was like, what if I, 'cause I was watching a bunch of really big YouTubers, you know, like Eric, for example. And I was like, he has these intros where he's choreographed this scene. There's one that he did about like, what would you do if you had one day left to live? So he starts off and it's like the doctor saying, "You have one day left to live." And he's like in these bandages. And then he's like, (inhales sharply) he just gets up and he gets out, and the doctor's like, "Where are you going?" And he's like ripping off his bandages and stuff. He's like talking to the camera, and he's like, "What would you do if you had one day left to live?" And he's like saying this thing to the audience. And he's bringing us through the camera, it's like following him. And it's like this choreographed scene that just immediately right off the bat you know there was this effort that went into this. This is a good setup for this video 'cause I know that if the rest of this video is anything like these first 30 seconds, it's gonna be so much fun. So I was like, how could I apply some of these things that I'm seeing modern YouTubers do, and apply it to an interview format? And I was like, well, I can kinda choreograph the way that I say these things. So I'm still learning with that. And so it's hard to say like where I wanna go next. But I think more importantly, I know where I wanna go now. And that's to constantly refine and not allow myself to get bored because I wanna always creatively see what is like right outta my comfort zone. - It's pretty cool that you've been on the YouTube for that long, and you're like, "I still wanna get inspiration from the new guys." - I was about to say that's very humbling. - Yeah, it's inspiring to hear that like you are still on your journey, right? After 17 years, you're still on your journey and you're still figuring stuff out. - Yeah, because in my head, I was like, "Damn, I've been doing this shit for nine years, I don't know what the fuck I'm doing." (men laugh) I'm glad to know someone who's been doing it for almost double that also doesn't know. - No, I'm just having fun, man. It's like, if I enjoy what I'm doing, I feel like that is the best career that you could have. - Yeah, definitely. - Is where you enjoy it. Not the career that, you know, unfolds in this timeline that I prebuilt in my head for where it goes. - You hear that, guys? It's not about the money. (men laugh) It's about the love for it. - Well, yeah, thank you so much for coming on. - Thank you, guys. - This is awesome. This is so cool. - Hey, but look at all these Patreons though. - Yeah. - You see all of them on the screen. - Oh, shit! - Oh my God. - Look at these Patreons just coming down. - Become a Patreon immediately, this show is dope. (hosts laugh) Don't forget it. - Who's your favorite Patreon? I like that one. - That one right there in the middle, its already gone, but I did enjoy it. (men laugh) - And, hey, if you'd like to support the show, go to our Patreon, patreon.com/trashtaste. Also, follow us on Twitter, send us some memes on the Subreddit. And if you hate our face, listen to us on Spotify. And, yeah, go check out Anthony's stuff. I don't need to tell you that. (Garnt laughs) Everyone should know. - Yeah. - Link in the description. - Well, I hope we did an okay job interviewing you for once. - Oh my God, absolutely. (Garnt laughs) I've never done a three-on-one before. (hosts laugh) It's always been a one-on-three. Thank you for putting me in the reverse position, guys. - Hopefully, we're gonna hear about our skills later on, you'll write it all down as a score. - And I'll talk about this experience on another episode of my show. - Oh, shit. - Oh. - You won't know when it's coming. (hosts laugh) - You're just gonna throw it in and be like, "Oh, yeah, but, yeah, so about the pony thing, by the way, "Trash Taste" is shit." - So, what, so I came in there, and they didn't know anything. They didn't know anything, they weren't even prepared. - You're such a better guest than "Trash Taste," and they weren't even guests, they were hosts, so. (hosts laugh) No, you guys are great. - Hell yeah, dude. - Thank you so much, man. - I appreciate it. - Thank you, guys. - Well, thank you. - And thanks for watching, guys. - See you next one. - [All] Bye! (calm upbeat music)

Channel: Trash Taste

Views: 3,652,589

Keywords: TrashTaste, Trash, Trash Taste, Taste, Trash Taste Podcast, Anime, Manga, CDawgVA, Gigguk, TheAnimeMan, Joey, Connor, Garnt, Podcast

Id: Zd1iy4iMkmY

Length: 151min 33sec (9093 seconds)

Published: Fri May 27 2022