How Creators Can Thrive in the AI + AR Era (Samir from Colin and Samir)

0:00and the goal of a YouTube Creator uh which is also probably the goal of any startup founder is to identify what the audience is reacting to and then double down in that direction how do you know if you have product Market fit if you're asking yourself do I have product Market fit you probably don't have product Market fit and I think familiarity is a metric that is incredibly important in in the world that we are moving in in a world where we have an abundance of choice familiarity is going to win the reality is today for Content format are not defensible uh personality and perspective is uh and and I think that's

0:35like the most important thing that everyone can do to position themselves for the future again if you look at where YouTube is heading even with their announcements that made on YouTube two weeks ago like the you can you can gather that they are heading in the direction of more and more connected TV viewership and you look at that it looks just like Netflix so what the platform is is essentially signaling signaling to all creators is [Music] start yeah excited excited to jam excited to have you here um what I wanted to talk to you about today is is a little bit what I think is on your

1:16mind I know you recently were at Google HQ little birdie told me you were talking to Mark Zuckerberg during the you know Facebook Orion or meta Orion demo you know to me when I think think of entertainment and kind of like New Media you're you're my first call and I just want to know what like what's going on in your brain around where things are going because I think a lot of people are going to come up with ideas based on where you're going so yeah well um yeah it's it's a weird like it's always weird to go to uh companies as they like are announcing their new products right

1:55because you can't you have to take a step back and go like how much of this is practical how much of this is uh conceptual um like The Meta Orion glasses I think are a really great example if you think about wearables um do you remember Google Glass like trying Google Glass for the first time I do you know that that was probably 10 years ago um and this this like exploration of like whoa is this the future we're all going to be wearing these glasses and and we look like 10 years down the line and we're we're still here where like not everyone is wearing glasses but

2:25wearable tech is more popular now right like like watches are more popular rings are more popular wristbands um and so it is moving in that direction I think the Rayband metas are like the most compelling wearable I've ever seen and maybe the most compelling piece of tech I've um engaged with since like a a a smartphone but trying Oran which is meta's new AR glasses was was a really um jarring experience it's a very seamless AR environment where you're experiencing like screens and calls and um you're experiencing the world in a very different way now the reason I I like bring all this up it's like you

3:04know obviously the world knows us as like the YouTube guys um is we're always trying to think about like how audiences will engage with uh content and storytelling and entertainment and I think in the world of wearables um you know if that does become a reality I'd be curious to hear your POV on it it does feel like some of these products are the first products we've tried that feel like could this replace the iPhone um in in in a lot of years from now and and if so what does that mean for how people are watching things um today the share of watch time on

3:41connected TVs for YouTube has gone up dramatically for our Channel specifically 58% of our watch time comes from connected TVs and uh viewers are watching on average 42 minutes on connected TVs when we started on YouTube people were watching on desktop uh it wasn't really like massive share of watch time on mobile uh and so you think about just like these devices are how we consume content it's how we consume entertainment um does the the world of wearables suggest that if we now get our kind of uh this pass through environment back then maybe we're more interested in audio uh content that we can consume while we're

4:19doing other things uh are we down to have videos playing in in that world of course I'm like talking about a very distant future uh but that was that's that's what we're thinking about it's like where do where do audiences move uh in the future and how personalized does content get to an audience one one thing that I think about when when you paint that Future Vision is what stage are we in currently like when is this going to hit mainstream adoption I know that Mark Zuckerberg said a few days ago that he thinks that by 2030 uh this platform is basically going to start uh replacing like it it'll

5:03surpass uh mobile phones um smart glasses will surpass mo mobile phones according to Mark Zuckerberg do you think he's high on his own Supply there or do you think he is directionally correct or you what are your thoughts there potentially I think that the in terms of being directionally correct like it it does make sense when you experience it it's hard to explain if you haven't experienced it um but I think the the primary thing is like using um Orion felt like both Colin and I said this it felt like we got our hands back and it also felt like we got our posture back like I think there will

5:41be a moment in human history where we look back and go that was weird that we were all hunched over these like black rectangles all day you know like I think that will be something that we're like huh that's strange and when I look at like my dad um you know was is a lifelong entrepreneur and he he started a company Back in 1970 when he when he 1976 when he landed here in in the states and the photos of him working shh don't tell anyone but I've got 30 plus startup ideas that could make you millions and I'm giving them away for free these aren't just random guesses

6:22they're validated Concepts from entrepreneurs who built hundred million plus businesses I've compiled them into one simple database compiled from hundreds of conversations I've had on my podcast but the main thing is most of these ideas don't need a single investor some cost nothing to start I'm pretty much handing you a cheat sheet the idea bank is your startup shortcut just click below to get access your next cash flowing business is waiting for you are him sitting at a desk with a telephone and a bunch of papers and you think about like what does someone working look like today it's like a laptop in front of them that was not the

7:10case for my dad or our parents generation and so it's not crazy to think about for our kids when they start to work like when I'm a parent of a 20-year-old kid and or 25y old kid and he starts going to work like work probably looks totally different like the way he engaged with technology is going to look totally different and so that that's like directionally it feels like it makes sense um but uh I don't know like adoption is the biggest piece uh I think like people being very human beings being very uh uh conscious of like their image and looking into each other's eyes and like

7:51that's where the question comes into to play is like will we actually adopt this type of stuff uh but it like being there in the moment you're kind of like yeah this makes sense yeah I think uh I think about this a lot because I want to be okay when something hits mainstream adoption I want to have been preparing for years because as soon as it hits mainstream adoption there's so much competition from like a idea building perspective that you know it was way easier to launch an app in9 that got a lot of traction when the App Store first came out then in 2019 basically um

8:30my take on and I saw I saw some of the demos some of the or Orion demos and I was I was blown away frankly I was I was absolutely Blown Away um that being said I think I think it's going to be further than Zuck act you know predicts I think that my take is it's going to be maybe 2035 2040 and what that means is I would start experimenting within the next few years but experimenting with what like building apps for that environment or what yeah yeah I think um got it yeah I yeah I'd start building apps like um I think about you know one thing that

9:16comes top of mind is um when the internet first came out some of the biggest uh companies were ad networks um basically what what did people do there was websites um they negotiated Banner real estate deals um and then they they basically were a Marketplace um Nike you want access to yahoo.com we'll sell it to you what does that look like when you put on glasses like what is the what is the ad Network first of all amazing yeah these are the these are the Rayband metas and uh I wish you could hear the sound they just made when uh I put them on but these are

9:53like the clear ones it's it's pretty incredible to see like how much Tech is in these kind of glasses now and and I don't know if you have you worn these um I've worn the older versions okay it's a it's pretty compelling especially now they have like this feature that's like a look and tell me feature meaning like you can look at a building and go hey meta look and tell me what this building is and tell me the history behind it right so you're using voice to prompt um AI there and I think like the um the question in terms of like when you talk about like ad

10:26networks and when the internet first launched like that that being a a major factor I think the question is like the fragmentation of attention right so if we if we keep going down that path of going there was a point when we were kids where there was a lot of monoculture right like whatever was on TV was on TV that's what we all watched um and if you think about like today if you're walking down the street and you look around you're like okay all of these people on the street today potentially listen to a podcast this morning but it's probably likely that none of them listen to the same one um

11:01and that's pretty wild and maybe there's overlap like maybe five of them listen to the same one or something like that um but when you extrapolate that further and think about like uh wearables as well as AI the question becomes like how hyper personalized does everything get to you like is it actually that everyone can listen to a completely personalized version of a uh of a podcast in the morning or completely personalized experience through their their own glasses um and then the question becomes like what do you serve like personal uh personalized ads to each of them like how what is everyone's experience like in a world of like incredibly fragmented

11:42culture I mean the the Arc of technological uh progress and I don't know if it's societal progress I'm just talking about technological progress is that the internet has become more and more personalized over time um and you know right now ad creative isn't personalized for the most part um but ad targeting is pretty pretty darn surgical at this point with meta and Google so it only makes sense that with AI um that uh AI is going to make the ability to create oneofone ads um that are going to show up on your glasses on mobile on on web in real time yeah you're looking at your

12:30closet and it's like you know what's missing yeah the totally the Sev I jacket yeah right like you know what would go well with these pants that you're wearing right now when you look in the mirror um the uh there's this really interesting software that I I uh was sent yesterday called notebook LM are you familiar with this I am but for people explain it for what people people people who don't know I mean this as far as I understand it and how I used it but essentially notbook LM is a Google software where you can load in sources so the example would be um load in like

13:03I loaded in three articles one about the new snap AR glasses one about the new meta ones and then uh one like just kind of think piece on the world of AR and uh it gave me in a Nine Minute Podcast that was Two Hosts talking uh essentially developing a podcast uh using the source material about all these the essentially giving me a podcast about the state of AR the difference between snaps glasses meta glasses and all the above um and it's compelling it's not like it's it's obviously you can tell it's AI but it's it's like there's a moment where the host clears his throat there's a moment

13:39where like The Two Hosts talk over each other uh there's a moment where they like make little quips and jokes and Segways and so then I loaded in like our um we have a newsletter that we send three times a week called the published press and I loaded two issues of that in and it actually edited down stories and uh made Segways and made things that made sense and didn't make sense and um it was it was a glimpse into like a potential future when you think about from a Content perspective you're like I have a 20 minute commute and I want to know about what just happened in the

14:13world of YouTube I want to know about the NFL and fantasy updates and I also want to hear a takeaway from the VP debate last night and you load those in and it's like here's your podcast that's 20 minutes long that matches your commute that's personalized for what you just um that's a really I mean honestly as a content creator it's like a a little bit of a frightening future of how hyper-personalized can this stuff get um and what does that mean for the future if like it's a more efficient way to get exactly what I wanted is that is that actually a great experience for uh

14:53audiences uh is that actually something we're going to want um over long periods of time okay so this is this is what I want to get into you know and you know knowing what you know now speaking to the Zuck of the world like how are you positioning yourself so that you you know you and Colin and the Colin and Samir show to to build a a content and entertainment Empire that you know is is well position you know as as technology evolves in this direction yeah we you know it's it is challenging right like competition is at an all-time high for attention and like that's like it will

15:34continue to be more and more challenging to uh not only capture someone's attention but hold their attention like in a in a world of infinite opportunity uh it's really hard it's something that we call exit velocity um when it comes to like short form content or long form content or a podcast like it's highly likely that there's some people who clicked on this maybe thought it would be interesting for them then left and so we think about that is like this this term exit velocity like how how fast does someone like check this out and then leave and you think about like short form content like a Tik Tok or

16:10YouTube shorts or Instagram reals has the highest uh potential exit velocity right like someone is firing through those just going like let me see the next thing and you have to have such a compelling hook to capture someone's attention now I think um you know YouTube and social and creating content for these platforms is very much like a video game it's like solving an equation of how to capture attention how to write a compelling hook uh I think if you're doing that strictly for the the currency of of viewership and like the the video game reward of of high viewership or virality uh I think that's where you're

16:45going to get pretty lost over long periods of time so Colin and I try and take a step back and go uh first of all uh what is our like degree of difference what makes us unique what's our what's our unique perspective um and you know what makes us uniquely human it's a weird thing to say but it's it is something that we think about and we try and lean into situations formats uh content that can bring that out because at the end of the day like the reality is today for Content formats are not defensible uh personality and perspective is uh and and I think that's

17:19like the most important thing that everyone can do to position themselves for the future so if I'm understanding this correctly it's almost like a venai so on one one circle is formats and compelling formats and the other circle is what am I uniquely equipped for is that right yeah I think it's it's uh you know we we we often talked about this as a a a concept of content Market fit which is uh you know three things have to be checked one is uh what you want to make that's actually something that it sounds ridiculous but a lot of people skip skip that step it's like do I actually want

18:00to make this uh because to do it successfully you're going to be making it for years and years and years and you have to just love the process of making it so do I want to make it uh the second is like is there an audience for this is there is is this content that somebody actually wants uh which is another honest question you have to ask yourself and then the third is like does this match the platform's wants and needs and actually those three can uh evolve over time like just because they're all checked in like green on all three one week does not mean that it's the same

18:32thing the next month um those all kind of oscillate and change like again if you look at where YouTube is heading even with their announcements that made on YouTube two weeks ago like the you can you can gather that they are heading in the direction of more and more connected TV viewership connected TV viewership means 30 plus minute videos that are organized into series um that can be watched you know they they launched a new UI update for connected TV that's organized by seasons and episodes and you look at that it looks just like Netflix so what the platform is is essentially signaling signaling to all creators is we're looking for

19:10serialized formats that look and feel like streamers so isn't that isn't that the opportunity right like if if YouTube yeah of course right if YouTube is basically putting their money where their mouth is and making a bet that we want to be Netflix 2.0 we want to be the evolution of Netflix yeah and we're designing the product to with those constraints shouldn't we be hiring the best you know videographers in the world the people who've worked on the best television shows and say like hey this is the niche we're in come and like work with us maybe I don't know if adding more crew is the answer to solving a Content

19:54problem like I really don't believe that I think if it's warranted sure if like your show or format requ crew and and uh a specific type of camera because you want it or specific type of audio because it's it's it's what the format is asking for sure but one of the most prolific creators on YouTube right now is Ryan Tran uh he can't make a video that does under 10 million views but he shoots majority of his stuff with his iPhone and just by himself um so you know we you also have to take a step back and go what what has he done really successfully again his unique

20:24personality his unique perspective that's an intangible some people have it some people don't that's an intangible he's also been on the platform for ex a very long time and gone through multiple iterations he loves the video making process um but he has found himself into some really successful formats um he does these formats where he tries different types of airbnbs and those have taken off and the goal of a YouTube Creator uh which is also probably the goal of any startup founder is to identify what the audience is reacting to and then double down in that direction and again that's like directly aligning with the world of where content

20:59is moving and where um audiences are moving to go if I watch you know Ryan Tran I tried OMG or I stayed in OMG airbnbs uh on my connected TV the next video I'm going to jump to is Ryan Tran I stayed in underground hotels right it's like okay I stayed I stayed I stayed now this is a format uh that I'm watching they're all around the same length they all have the same host they all start the same way it's familiar and I think familiarity is a uh is a metric that is incredibly important in in the world that we are moving in in a world

21:34where we have an abundance of choice familiarity is going to win I think that's right I also think uh you know I was watching this do you know this guy Daniel dalan he's a new Creator upand cominging guy went from like zero to 100K Subs in a few months and he he went viral within the entrepreneurial Community because his title was POV you're a you know a 26-year-old entrepreneur living in China um and he does these POV videos and it's really like the POV of an entrepreneur um and you know now you have hundreds or thousands of creators copying him being like POV this POV that

22:21but that just actually lends like it's not the same right it's you know you Daniel d is getting is the OG right yeah I think the unfortunate reality is actually that in content that does work uh and and I'm not saying that that is a positive like I think as a creative you should have integrity to be like I I'm not just gonna take someone's idea one for one um you know but the reality of YouTube is like the flip side of what I just mentioned of familiarity is that you're not releasing anything into a vacuum right you're releasing something into to a uh content ecosystem where you know

23:02the there's there's like four different ways that audiences discover content on YouTube the first is search and I think probably people um over maybe maybe think about search too much it's actually pretty nominal uh how many people find videos through search the next is browse that means you open up the YouTube app and what's on my home feed uh what is YouTube giving me right now it could be creators I'm subscribed to it could be uh videos similar to one that I watch but uh browse is the next one the next one is suggested which is I'm watching a YouTube video and then on the right side I get suggested other

23:35content that's similar and then the the fourth way is the shorts feed so going through the shorts feed you might discover a Creator and then go to their Channel and find their videos so when you think about like why does that work it's it's largely because of the world of of uh again familiarity when you go on to the YouTube homepage and you just watched this POV I'm an entrepreneur now you see another one that's POV I'm an entrepreneur in Los Angeles and it is someone taking it and giving their own unique spin on it um but the the reason that works is because the audience is

24:08familiar with that format they had a good uh experience with that format and the YouTube algorithm is fully designed for viewer satisfaction right like if you just think about what how is it designed it's like did this person enjoy it and if they did let's give them something else that uh we predict they will enjoy and the metrics to track there are click through was it a high clickthrough rate of they saw this thumbnail and they clicked into it and then did they watch for a long time average view duration and those two stats are going to give you the uh understanding if like the viewer was

24:39satisfied and then more content's going to surface like that so the reason you see people saying I'm not just going to make my own format I'm gonna look at what works on YouTube and try and piggyback off of that because that's like the quickest path to audience growth on YouTube plain and simple um but again I would say like as a as a creative coming into the space like I I don't really have the stomach for that and it probably like stunts our growth because it would be easier to just look at what's working and do that um and I've also had uh we had a great

25:08conversation with Austin Cleon who wrote the book steal like an artist uh and I think I like really believe in the principles that that he talks about in that can you talk can you talk more about that yeah I think like there's a there's a difference between like good theft and and uh you know bad theft uh there's a really simple term that that he he talks about of like even yourself being copied of um the elevator test like if you get into an elevator with someone who copied your work or uh would they patch you on the back or would they punch you in the face where it's just

25:44like uh like we all know the feeling of if someone like takes something we do uh and you're like that's like way too similar to what I do uh you would you would be upset if they walked into an ele elevator with you and then you know the feeling of someone who is inspired by you and they they make something you're like dude great great job with that um that's like a really uh simple simplified version of it um but you know the the other thing he talks about is um in the beginning and we did this as creators plain and simple like when we first started as the Colin Channel we

26:16were desperately trying to be like Casey neistat I think everyone was at that era uh he was like this amazing daily vlogger uh was able to tell stories about his daily life that uh it just felt like no one had ever seen before everyone wanted to be like him and we tried our best and failed miserably he's a much better Storyteller and also lived a much more interesting life but the interesting part about that is uh what Austin Cleon talks about is like you're taking apart the car uh so you're like reverse engineering this thing you really like and starting to feel what it feels like to make that and a lot of

26:51times creative people need like an impetus of like what do I make um ideas are like the one of the most challenging parts of creativity it's not the technical ability a lot of people can film and edit now it's what the hell do I make so um taking aart the car seeing the different parts seeing how it all comes together uh reverse engineering is a really great tactic in learning how to do something but then you got to put it together in a different way you got to put it back together in your own way if you keep putting it back together in the exact same way it's just uninteresting

27:22quick ad break let me tell you about a business I invested in it's called boring marketing.com so a few years ago I met this group of people that were some of the best SEO experts in the world they were behind getting some of the biggest companies found on Google and the secret sauce is they've got a set of technology and AI that could help you outrank your competition so for my own businesses I wanted that I didn't want to have to rely on Mark Zuckerberg I didn't want to depend on ads to drive customers to my businesses I wanted to rank high in Google that's why I like SEO and that's why I

28:00use boring marketing.com and that's why I invested in it they're so confident in their approach that they offer a 30-day Sprint with 100% money back guarantee who does that nowadays so check it out highly recommend boring marketing.com what do you say to people who say that there's nothing new on the Sun so there's no format that hasn't been tried already you know what's your reaction to that there's there's definitely Merit to that I don't I think like um you know creativity is like looking through a kaleidoscope right it's like you're just seeing different um uh different like versions of uh light going through and getting like you

28:42know changed around so I think like I think there's a ton of Merit to that I think everything is a remix and I think you're constantly collaborating with like your own inputs and things that you've seen so I I agree with that statement but I do think that like some of this is just as an audience know when something feels fresh and something feels new and someone put their own unique spin on it versus when you're like that's kind of the same thing totally yeah it kind of reminds me of like in startup land product Market fit the term product Market fit you know I get that question a lot around how do

29:14you know if you have product Market fit if you're asking yourself do I have product Market fit you know you probably don't have product Market fit you know but if you're trying to keep the servers up um because you have so many customers coming through the door you probably have product Market fit the same is true with copying stealing that sort of thing you know deep down if you took someone's format and 100% yeah right yeah but it is it's challenging like plain and simple it's it's hard to break through on social platforms today uh it's hard to break through specifically on YouTube and uh a lot of

29:51that is because of the uh the barrier that's very different from other platforms which is the thumbnail I'm sure you've experienced this now with you know putting your podcast on YouTube is a totally different game than having your podcast in RSS feeds right dude it's it's sobering like YouTube has sobered me sobered me right like I I come from Twitter and and just general podcast and now putting you know I I could record the most what I think is the most value ad podcast on the planet I put it uh I I launch it I'm you know I I I press publish I'm so excited this is going to hit a million views and

30:34clickthrough rate is 3% average you know view duration is low um people you know it's just not getting fed to the the YouTube algorithm because of the title and thumbnail in a lot of ways the the the first rule of YouTube that we talk about uh and this is part of our our um which I'm sure we we'll talk about our our um new businesses uh but it's it's part of our course called YouTube Playbook but the first rule is just if they don't click they don't watch it's just a really simple rule um of YouTube and you know what's hard about that is like you're talking about a medium like

31:10podcasting where you're the behavior of an audience member on like who's listening on Spotify is going to be actually completely different than the behavior of someone who clicks into YouTube um and the challenge is as a Creator how do you not totally miss that audience that's like just down with your podcast to try and hook an audience in this new environment um it's really hard and and you know earlier we talked about exit velocity like you think about this uh this world of like going to a movie it would be really weird if you like walked into a movie sat down and then like uh you know

31:4830 seconds into the movie you were like yeah this isn't for me I'm out but actually on YouTube that's really common uh like if you retain 90% of people uh on YouTube in the first 30 seconds you're like damn that that was a really good hook a really good intro and if 70% of the people are watching after the first five minutes you're like holy smokes dude I'm like we're really doing this uh that like thinking about that Concept in the context of like a movie theater would be absurd if if 30% of the people walked out uh of a movie five minutes in um but it's just the culture

32:19like what YouTube is and and and how challenging it is to keep someone's attention and so there's there's also the conversation around like which envir do you create what content in especially us as creators when we think about you know we are YouTube creators through and through we've been making YouTube videos since 2010 2011 um but we think about like how do we balance our environments between permission and Interruption so you know YouTube is like an interruption based platform like I have to interrupt your experience with a compelling title and thumbnail to get you to watch podcast feeds are actually permission-based as well as newsletters are permission-based

32:58um because like somebody has given you permission to give them that content they're much more likely to spend time with it give it a chance uh slowly go into it you have different um you have different levels of attention on every platform and so I think a lot of YouTube creators aim to especially like YouTube creators like us who are more in the educational uh space or or or like thought leadership space we try and get our audience uh as much as we can the ones who want to give us permission to go from an interruption based platform into a permission based platform like a newsletter or um you know exclusive

33:34content on an RSS feed or an educational course like we want to get uh audiences into those environments or like a patreon right those are like more permission based environments so I want to talk I want to talk a few ideas with you and and I want to double double down on that a little bit um I remember having coffee with you and uh Colin in in New York City um and you were kind of early with this idea around you know being a Creator is a treadmill in a lot of ways and I and you were early to creating the newsletter and the business around the

34:10newsletter and you were you were early to basically you know saying like I've got all this attention over here and I'm going to create content that I think is really cool and interesting for my audience here and then I'm going to go you know Leverage is a bad word it sounds like you're taking Advantage but you know you're just going to use you know some of those some of those eyeballs to um to to monetize it um and I want to know how you're thinking about like where how creators could monetize and some new ideas around um around monetizing attention yeah so uh you know there's

34:54there's um there's an abundance of ways to to monetize but I think the uh the most important is that you think about it as like a value prop extension so meaning like what is my value proposition of my content who's the specific audience what is the value prop and then how do I extend that value proposition um through what I'm offering so an example of that is like obviously if you know for us uh our mission is to like educate and empower the next generation of creators right so education being at the Forefront what's the value prop extension well it's more education right and so that uh

35:33monetizing through education through courses uh we also you know have a big uh piece of it that's Community focused so you know now we're moving into events where we have in-person events um that people can come attend um and our newsletter is further education about what's going on in the world of Creator so everything is like an extension of that now in terms of like the the primary way every YouTube Creator makes money is advertising that's going to be um you know AdSense uh which is just straight up what YouTube will pay through the platform rev share uh but then brand deals are typically like the

36:08largest sum of every Creator's U monetization and the uh the same rules apply there of like value proposition extension so when we first started our show and it first started to get some traction what we did is we wrote down every brand that shared the same Mission so every brand that we felt was like which brands also uh educate and Empower creators well you know let's let's look at the brands that are offering you know software solutions for creators think about like Adobe Adobe empowers so many creators right Riverside is a is a sponsor of ours they Empower a ton of creators so let's let's make a list of

36:46everyone who shares the same Mission with us and then let's go tell them our story um you know and and that is how we got most of our first sponsors our first big sponsor was Samsung they had the exact same Mission hey we we think our new phones um empower the modern Creator that's our mission too great it's it's always a more natural fit in advertising than trying to like jam something in and we we've done that in the past too right when we first started out looking for advertisers like uh it can be hard to to talk about something that either you don't use or doesn't

37:21feel value prop aligned um and so you know that that's like the core of monetization is like what is my value proposition and how do I extend that into either telling you about someone else that shares that value proposition or offering you a good or service that is uh connected to that value proposition as well so events I'm I'm so happy you said events because this is something I've been thinking a lot about I think that um there was this surge around you know online communities uh PID memberships and and that's still going to continue to be and grow as a category but I think that

38:02right now we're kind of early on this um I like this Creator and I believe in what this Creator says and it the creator has to be uh somewhat niche in my opinion um and then and then it's like I'm going to go create an event where I'm going to bring this whole identity of people together and it's going to be amazing and events are a hassle to create but they are multi-million dollar opportunities they're hard they're hard to nail right like um throwing a good party isn't easy uh and you actually have to think about like how it how it functions what it feels like the venue the food the coffee

38:44like and Colin and I that our biggest bottleneck as entrepreneurs is taste so like we have very specific taste we're uncompromising with that taste um and I think that's actually across a lot of creators and creatives it's like taste is going to be your biggest bottleneck that's probably going to limit us from building massive companies but uh I that's okay with me like I'd prefer everything to to be on my taste um but I like events have been also the most energizing thing we've done uh the way we've thrown them too has been really really cool we we don't like Mass promote them um we promote them

39:21exclusively through the published press uh our newsletter so typically there's like an RSVP Link at the bottom of the news newslet it's like hey are you in La um you know RSVP here and and that's been really cool because it's kind of like a if you know you know um and we do these these mornings called coffee with creators and you know a bunch of creators show up uh typically we have like a hundred to 150 um creators and and creatives show up there's like good coffee you're having coffee you're meeting people we do like fun like uh you know kind of moving the room around doing prompts

39:57people can talk to each other and typically we have like a Q&A with a Creator or some uh some experience with with a Creator and what's been really cool is that um you know as many as we can go to because I enjoy it Colin and I go but we've also hosted these events in New York where we aren't there and I think that's been some of the most exciting is recognizing like this does represent a community this this is like a um a community brand and that like opportunity for scale is super interesting um like being at one of these coffee with creators uh more

40:27Mornings in my head I was like in the future couldn't this be happening in La Austin New York and SF all on the same morning of course um that's a really really cool future yeah it's a really exciting future because I also think it's like it's actually honestly transformational to like I can see it on people's faces when I'm there that they're enjoying it and that it made a difference in their day their experience their career and I think it solves like a real problem of loneliness and and community and validation and like so many of these human emotions that um we needed When We Were Young creators you know like we

41:07needed to be around other creators and look at them and go like this is hard right or like hey what do you think I should do about about this are working with this brand and they're asking for too many revisions just even feeling the community around those problems is really impactful it's really interesting because we started off this conversation talking about AR VR yeah and what would a minimal viable product to build now for that future and maybe it's Events maybe it's IRL events my my hypothesis about the future is that there will be a premium on inefficiency so let me explain that like uh you know

41:47I my wife and I went to go see John Mayor live and uh you know at the Forum in LA and you know I went over there it's a pain in the ass to to park you buy this expensive ticket you like go in it's kind of miserable you like have to go to the bathroom and it's really far you like get in and then John Mary starts playing and he's like it's super cool because he's like riffing and like playing his songs in a totally different way he's singing them in a different way um and as I got in my car you know we put on another John May album and in my

42:18head I was like oh putting John Mayor on on Spotify is the most efficient way to listen to John Mayer but the premium is we will pay hundreds of dollars for the spontaneity the inefficiency of getting into this room with a bunch of people and hearing him play it in a totally different way um and verifiably human so I also think about that as like a future right of like Collective experiences that are verifiably human that don't necessarily value like incredible efficiency uh is is really interesting because everything with AI is like we're all talking about efficiency it's more efficient to brainstorm with AI it just

42:56is give me you know hey give me 10 ideas for a YouTube title um that happens more efficiently with AI than in a room with uh like three other creatives and as we go down and look at that like we we do value efficiency quite a bit in in work and business and as we continue going but I think there's going to be also the inverse which is like the incredible value on inefficiency so all that's a very long-winded way of saying I agree I think event is like so important for the next chapter both for like people like humans but also in business I think it's

43:34a huge opportunity 100% by the way I have this theory that all guys comment if you disagree with me but or agree with me all guys want to be like John Mayor yeah dude of course of course I don't think is that like a is that like a hot take or like a theory because that feels like it feels like relatively like squarely on the not uh like he's the guy guy right yeah I don't I don't have the height to be like John Mar John Mar is so tall but he's like he's super cool and smooth and like to be able to sing like that that' be

44:08amazing I also think that isn't it true that when you go to a concert even if the concert is worse like the sound quality isn't as good or they don't play your favorite song when you get back in the car and you play Spotify don't you enjoy that artist like 10 times more all sudden for sure of course you have like a deep emotional connection you had a you had an experience like I think that's uh that's a really important part of the future I think like yeah it's just it's just more and more important yeah that's why I'm doubling down on events so 2025 you'll be you know I

44:47haven't announced it publicly but I'll be doing way more events uh great and it's for this reason I think the AR and VR component like you know we didn't really talk too much about the VR component but if you let's say you're living in Mumbai but the event is in the col events in Miami course wouldn't it be great if you can have some of that same experience I I'm not like I'm not hot on VR oh here we go I'm not I just think it's uh and and maybe it's also like I I don't know I just think like fully immersive experiences are um very

45:24Niche like wearing an apple Vision Pro and being fully immersed in an experience I was like this is at least for me it's not it's not for me I like don't want to be fully immersed wearing a Ryan and experiencing like AR I'm like or mixed reality I'm like this is interesting because I'm still a part of the world and I can still look someone in the eyes but I'm having a you know a modern experience here um I think VR in the context of like gaming I think fully immersive gaming is interesting the first thing I thought when I put on Apple Vision Pro was like courtside

45:57tickets to the Lakers would be really cool if I could buy them through Apple Vision Pro and like sit Courtside and look around like that's really cool but I just think full immersion is like incredibly Niche and probably won't take off you don't think that in 2035 your Orion's 2035 Edition will have like okay mixed reality okay uh full full VR definitely I I definitely think they will have that option but I don't think like VR bulky VR headsets are going to be widely adopted I just don't think so I mean it's probably also a stretch like if we see a world where wearable glasses are like widely adopted that actually

46:36would be pretty wild uh you know like if everyone is wearing it's it's not weird for you and I because we like I wear glasses as well I'm wearing contacts right now like I've worn glasses my whole life uh to put on a different type of glasses I'd be like okay cool but people have never worn glasses like I don't know it's hard to imagine it's it's more it's easier to imagine a world where it's like headphones and like a wristband or something uh you know with the option to like put the glasses on yeah yeah I I agree I'm with you I I think uh mixed reality will take off

47:13first um I do think that at some point full immersion will be I mean think about if like we're going to get to a point where it's not even you won't even need glasses it'll be like contact lenses basically maybe yeah but like how is that re I don't I don't know like I I have no idea when I you know I'm I'm actually my wife and I are expecting we're having kid in January and I've been thinking a lot about like what does his life look like in 15 years when he's 15 years old that'll be um you know 20 40 what does the world look like when

47:48he's 15 years old because when I was 15 years old I had a Motorola Razor uh you know what I mean like I was I experienced the world like so much has happened in that amount of time uh how unrecognizable is his life going to be like to me uh in 15 years as like a a teenage boy I I don't know I don't know what that looks like I just I try and sometimes just sit and think about it and go like what the hell is that going to look like I think you know the answer I think you're you probably know the answer but you're

48:21probably afraid to to say it I know I am you know I can just speak for myself like you know you're seeing what's happening with like neuralink um chips being implanted in your brain um that seems to be the direction that technology is going contact lenses things implanted in your brain um AI you know being smarter than human beings robots that you know look and feel like humans can I can I totally shift into pitching you a business idea and you tell me if it's a good or bad idea yeah let's do it it's one I've thought about for like a really long time and Colin

49:02and I have always talked about so um we're we're like because we've spent most of our career like in incredibly long editing sessions um we've always like experimented with different uh you know like whether it's caffeine or like neut Tropics like uh eleanine or like um you know stuff like uh um there's these these mints called neurom mints I don't know if you've ever like tried those and basically it's like caffeine alanine and b12 like mixed into a mint um and it's it's like it's always been a product we've been relatively passionate about especially in the context of like creators and creators being in our audience um two two

49:42different products one is like hydration which has been wildly popularized by like liquid IV and element and stuff like that and then like a neut Tropic brand like an alpha brain or like a neurom Min so just wanted to to start there like I've never explored cpg but we've always talked about it in like okay we could literally have one at every episode we could um you know Market this in the context of creativity and like empathy with like what our audience is going through it's always been just like a very blue sky like fun idea to talk about uh over lunch but never ever something we've actually

50:21explored did you see that I'm going to answer that question but did you see that Mr Beast is Raising $150 million at I think $ 1.5 billion valuation and he's doing it to double down on his cpg products and I know one of the VCS who are who's looking at investing and he called me up and he said what what do you think he wanted my opinion on it and I said I don't understand what's going through Jimmy's brain creating a cpg company is painful uh like the operations the shipping uh the consistency it it's no walk in the park um Jimmy has actually been experimenting

51:13with software so view stats view stats yeah uh is actually doing from what I can see quite well um and I wouldn't be surprised if he creates a crater software Tool Company worth $1.5 billion on50 to100 million of Revenue I my feedback I was like tell Jimmy this I was like just do more software do more digital products yeah it's a good note you know and if you are and so if I'm you like would it be fun to do that cpg project project absolutely would it be like cool also like I can see like the ads right now like you know you take it out you put it in like people lock in um

52:05but I do think that if I yeah if I were you i' would partner with someone to like ma do everything you guys are just advisers and like co-founders but if I were you and this is a question for you I'll bring it back to you it's like why aren't you doing more software yeah it's a good question um we're we've been heavily involved in a software called spotter Studio which is a ideation software for creators it's it's really cool actually like the the coolest part is that like it exists now and we use it on like a day-to-day basis we just actually created a uh really

52:39dope thumbnail with it yesterday um that now we're designing um so we're we're involved with that and that's been a really fun process I mean that's my honestly that's my first experience with software like truly with um even understanding what's possible in the context of software like sitting with their team and being like could it do this um so that that's been really cool and I think seeing like software come together has been a really powerful thing so the the short answer is like mostly because as creators our biggest problem is that we're opportunity rich and time poor um yeah and so Partnerships are always going to be like

53:14the cleanest way to get into stuff where it's like it's not we're not running a software company but we're supporting and Consulting and Advising um but the uh you know the the push for us is into digital products specifically education the question is like can that can that type of stuff turn into can software be education um you know can that be an extension of what we're doing because I I I I do think that sounds really really fun and really interesting and having this experience has been cool like I I had never experienced anything like some of the best software products have education you know built within you know

53:53I I was I just logged into right before this uh it was just rebranded to kit.com convertkit and you know when you log into the dashboard it's like you know video of jaylaa how I went from zero to 50,000 email subscribers like there's there's videos and education built in so I think that once I could see a world where your educational products evolve into software products software products yeah totally I I agree with that um yeah it's fun I mean our the biggest problem in the Creator economy is like operators it it will continue to be the biggest problem like people are growing and getting more opportunities than they can

54:31handle and at the end of the day like we're still the Arbiters of taste of our content like some some creators have really successfully scaled well and found people who can uh support their their uh growth and expansion and keep the content engine running but like our first product is content our first customer is our audience and like the reality is when we wake up in the morning that's what we think about like everything else is is is uh come secondary and so you know the challenge for us is to get to a point where we have support in that direction and we can go okay what where else can we put

55:08our minds because a as creatives and like entrepreneurs I'm very stimulated by all that it's super fun um but just you know needing to get out or finding a way even emotionally to get out of the the day-to-day of content is is is Art 100% dude I've taken up too much of your time you've been so gracious with your time thank you for coming on Samir where could people get to know you more and and just learn more about what you're working on I mean first and foremost Colin and Samir just check our YouTube channel out that would be awesome um if you are interested in YouTube and

55:45starting a YouTube channel or exploring how to get better at YouTube we have a new ideation Sprint that's about to launch just go to Colin inmar.com ideas and if you want to learn about the world of Creator economy subscribe to our newsletter it's called the publish press I think this audience I mean this is an idea audience so I'm sure a lot of people are going to be interested in that um and I can just just speak for myself and just say that YouTube uh it's it's such a good way to get your ideas out there as an entrepreneur and build an audience and and you know

56:21attract like-minded people so highly recommended on on uh on my and love that dude congrats on this pod this is cool it's cool to see it picking up like this I mean I'm not like a professional interviewer like you I I'm an you know I'm building businesses and I just do this to to to spend time with cool people and and to to serve the community but um I'm learning a wise man named Tim Ferris told me uh to bifurcate the two rewards you get from podcasting the first reward is the conversation once the conversation is done you should look back and go that was an awesome

57:00conversation I'm glad I got to have that the second reward is the performance and the results of that episode and conversation and so think about those as two different things that has really helped me along the path because performance is an up and down volatile volatile experience as a content creator but the reward is just getting to spend time and connecting with people and sharing ideas like that's a that's a really beautiful reward that uh you don't want to let go of I love that all right thanks for sharing that I appreciate that I'll see you around [Music]