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Origin Story w/ David McIntosh JrOrigin Story w/ David McIntosh Jr

Fin Taylor - Cancellation, Boarding School, Fin vs History and Bonnie Blue

Fin Taylor is a comedian and podcaster. Fin joins me back in Glasgow to talk elite schools, why TV comedy’s lost its juice, and how he built a cult audience by treating the internet like a stage. We go deep on craft vs. art, parasocial weirdness, the Riyadh debate, being punched on stage, and the playbook he’d use if he were starting again today. In this episode Growing up between Glasgow and Oxford boarding houses “Cancelled” at 14: the headmaster apology that shaped a career Debate club as early stand-up TV’s comedy diminishing returns vs. the internet’s meritocracy (and mess) The “death of taste,” monoculture shrinkage, and why niches win Parasocial fandom: intensity, boundaries, and the line you can’t cross Fin vs. the Internet & Fin vs. History — how the format actually works Getting punched on stage, corporate gigs, and “exposure” economics Riyadh: money, morals, and whether your persona survives the flight AI, live shows, and why communal experiences are inflation-proof The restart plan: if Fin had to begin at 18 with today’s knowledge Timestamps 00:00 Agent of Chaos, back in Glasgow 01:42 Life inside a girls’ boarding house (and why they left) 03:36 “Cancelled” at 14 — and the headmaster’s apology 05:48 What fee-paying schools damage (that money can’t fix) 10:24 Mentor moment: Mark Olver and the Bristol circuit 13:24 TV vs. internet: where audiences actually are now 16:23 Stand-up as craft (funny word at the end of the sentence) 22:15 Is Edinburgh still the route? The schism in comedy 25:16 Turning a podcast into a theatre show (without betraying podcast intimacy) 27:31 Parasocial intensity & setting boundaries 28:56 Finn vs. the Internet — roast mechanics, guests “in” vs “not in” 33:35 Finn vs. History — suits, cadence, and why it clicked 34:59 Patreon → production company → bigger bets 36:59 Tour sell-outs, Albert Hall ambitions 41:36 Getting pushed on stage (and why you don’t hit back) 44:20 Riyadh offers: economics, ethics, and optics 47:37 Warm-up TV gigs, corporates, and hating “exposure” 49:38 NFL interview chaos & why TV is now just “another video” 53:15 Monoculture’s collapse and niche empires 56:18 AI’s effect: making live more valuable 57:43 Bonnie Blue as monoculture moment 01:01:28 If starting again today, what Fin would actually do 01:04:08 Build the team so you can keep making the thing Guest Fin Taylor - comedian, writer, host of Fin vs. the Internet and Fin vs. History. Links & references Fin vs. the Internet - https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLcolhncWEZ9kLIrdehGI1Ip_xoxO4-MxD Fin vs. History - https://www.youtube.com/@UCcQdXzWsosXv_e_wpfZHZlw If you enjoyed this Subscribe on YouTube + hit the bell Follow the podcast on Spotify/Apple: https://open.spotify.com/show/6DV9tUfz5nGCmH0bfZUFrM Join the Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/c/davidmcintoshjr Follow me on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/davidmcintoshjr/

David McIntosh JrhostFin Taylorguest
Oct 25, 20251h 5mWatch on YouTube ↗

EVERY SPOKEN WORD

  1. 0:00 – 1:42

    Agent of Chaos, back in Glasgow

    1. DJ

      Agent of Chaos, Fin Taylor

    2. FT

      Agent of Chaos

    3. DJ

      [laughs]

    4. FT

      I like that

    5. DJ

      Professional troublemaker

    6. FT

      Yeah

    7. DJ

      Back in Glasgow. This is your, your hometown, right? You, you spent a lot of time there.

    8. FT

      Uh, yeah, I grew up... I was- I left here when I was seven. My mom's Scottish. Uh, mom and dad were teachers. They taught here at Hutchesons' Grammar. Does that mean anything to you?

    9. DJ

      Mm. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

    10. FT

      I went there for two years, and then we went- moved down to Oxford, which is why I sound like this. But I sounded like you till I was seven.

    11. DJ

      Really?

    12. FT

      Yeah, yeah.

    13. DJ

      This is, uh, an origin story of one posh school to another, right? Your, your t- your parents were teachers. A private school.

    14. FT

      Yeah.

    15. DJ

      And-

    16. FT

      Well, Hutchie's not... It was a grammar school, wasn't it?

    17. DJ

      Private school, yeah.

    18. FT

      Is it?

    19. DJ

      Hutchesons' in the south is a private school, isn't it?

    20. FT

      No, Hutchie... I mean, it's gra- if it's a grammar school-

    21. DJ

      Oh, is it?

    22. FT

      ... it's a grammar school

    23. DJ

      Don't know.

    24. FT

      Yeah. But, but I imagine it's definitely one of the posher schools in Glasgow.

    25. DJ

      [laughs]

    26. FT

      I imagine the bar's quite low for what a posh school is here. There was a McDonald's opposite it, so when my dad would do p- take us home, he'd, he'd take us to the f- the McDonald's opposite, which kind of, again, you start to see the, like, Glasgow-

    27. DJ

      [laughs]

    28. FT

      ... industrial obesity complex in straight from the school to McDonald's to home. Um-

    29. DJ

      Obesity complex. [laughs]

    30. FT

      Yeah. But no, the school, the school, the school we went and moved to in Oxford is one of the biggest fee-paying schools in the-

  2. 1:42 – 3:36

    Life inside a girls’ boarding house (and why they left)

    1. FT

      in mind, my, my parents were, like... Mom was a music therapist. Dad was in a band. Then they got pregnant with me, and then he was like, "I've... Fuck, this band's not working."

    2. DJ

      [laughs]

    3. FT

      Or, it, it... Well, it was a... It was good enough for to make a living, but not when you've got a kid on the way, so then he did a teacher's training course, and, uh... So they were just like, free, yeah, fuck it, free accommodation with the job in Oxford. Great. And so that's why they were able to buy a, a house is they did that for five years. But it meant that I lived... Yeah, I lived in a girls' boarding house for between the ages of seven and 13. They got, they got me out just as the pu- puberty kicked in, and they were like, "We can't have him in here."

    4. DJ

      [laughs] It's poorly contractual.

    5. FT

      "He's the damage, the damage he's gonna do."

    6. DJ

      [laughs]

    7. FT

      [laughs] So, uh, yeah.

    8. DJ

      Given that, uh, these fee-paying schools are like a, almost like a conveyor belt to politics or investment banking, given that you've become a comedian, were you a bit of a black sheep? So I know you started comedy very young. You said debate.

    9. FT

      Yeah, I was eigh- yeah, I was 18 when I started stand-up. Been doing stand-up since I was 18, basically.

    10. DJ

      And I think I've heard you say that, like, you'd do quite a lot of debating in those, uh, in those school-

    11. FT

      My secondary school, yeah. I, uh-

    12. DJ

      You used it as basically like a f- kind of roast battle or like a stand-up gig.

    13. FT

      Basically, yeah. I got told off by the headmaster when I was 14, 13, for sort of doing a, like, a five-minute speech that was my attempt at stand-up.

    14. DJ

      [laughs]

    15. FT

      And it got- I got told off in front of the whole, like, year for, like, being crude and toilet humor and, uh, all this sort of stuff. But then, because my dad worked there, this very interesting kind of political environment where I sort of could only get in trouble so much for things that weren't that, actually that serious. So I ended up getting a... The headmaster actually ended up apologizing to me in his office-

    16. DJ

      [laughs]

    17. FT

      ... for telling me off, and that was when I was 14. So I, I do think there's a correlation between that and my sort of what I do now, in that I kind... It's like, it's kinda fine.

  3. 3:36 – 5:48

    “Cancelled” at 14 — and the headmaster’s apology

    1. FT

      Yeah.

    2. DJ

      For comedians, it usually takes, like, 20 years until, like, an old tweet is, like, resurfaced, then they get canceled, but you got canceled at 14. [laughs]

    3. FT

      14. Yeah, exactly. Yeah.

    4. DJ

      Started early.

    5. FT

      Yeah, and then you're operating in the kind of freedom of being canceled already.

    6. DJ

      Were there, like, career advisors at those schools where they were, like, trying to usher you into university or-

    7. FT

      Yeah, uh, Oxbridge was a big, like... You know, 'cause my parents both went to Cambridge, so they wanted me to go to Cambridge. I remember going looking around there, and I was like, "I don't like this." Uh, and I also didn't want to go to where they went to university. And then when you grow up in Oxford, you're like, "I don't want to just stay here." So no, I didn't, um, I didn't apply. I mean, I, I was told that I should, but I didn't. Um, I mean, I might not even have got in. Who knows? But...

    8. DJ

      I grew up in a council estate and went to, like, a, like, a state school. There was fights every day.

    9. FT

      Yeah.

    10. DJ

      There was, like, 13-year-olds selling and taking drugs.

    11. FT

      Yeah.

    12. DJ

      What were some of the kind of facets of a fee-paying school? What, like, what type of world is it? Any funny stories? Any idiosyncrasies from fee-paying schools?

    13. FT

      Well, I g- it's funny. The kids are... I, I think you have just as much likelihood of getting damage, just in a different way.

    14. DJ

      Mm.

    15. FT

      Isn't it? It's like I do think there's a kind of Overton window for money where you do the least damage, and if you go out of that up or down, you could still damage someone. Um, I mean, the, uh, uh... You know, what my mom was trying to... The fire she was trying to put out was that a lot of these kids, their, their, their, uh, you know, their parents are earning so much money. L- let's face it, normally one of their parents, probably their dad, is earning a lot of money in an investment bank, and so isn't around. The kids are boarding from age seven, uh, and so they're kind of outsourcing the childcare.

    16. DJ

      Mm.

    17. FT

      So doesn't matter how good the, you know, my mom was at making them feel like this was a sort of family away from family, they're still ultimately being kind of severed from their mom and dad, uh, who don't... And a lot of them didn't really sort of care about them. At weekends they wouldn't come and say hi. You know, so there's a big emotional damage that those people are doing, and it's very easy to say, "Oh, well, they'll be fine 'cause they've got money." But I think we n- we are sort of wise enough to know now that people with a lot of money can be the unhappiest, and I, I've got no idea, but

  4. 5:48 – 10:24

    What fee-paying schools damage (that money can’t fix)

    1. FT

      I'd be interested to see the stats in whatever metric you wanna choose, depression, suicide, whatever, between the extremes-

    2. DJ

      Mm

    3. FT

      ... of inc- of income. Um-

    4. DJ

      Which is interesting because you have- All of the stigma of going to, like, a fee-paying school, y- but you don't have the money

    5. FT

      None of the, none of the capital, yeah

    6. DJ

      But you had the parental support that they might not have had.

    7. FT

      Yeah, so actually you're right. Maybe I'm, I'm a very lucky, yeah, very best of both worlds. Although saying that, one of the main reasons we left, obviously it's cartoonish to suggest that I was, like, the Incredible Hulk about to sexually pop out-

    8. DJ

      [laughs]

    9. FT

      ... and wreak havoc on 50 preteen girls. But one of the main re- [laughs] one of the main reasons was that-

    10. DJ

      That's still to come [laughs]

    11. FT

      ... uh, that's still to come. We're still waiting for that moment. Uh, w- w- was that I just wasn't... Like, my mum was like an on duty, you know, w- when the term time was happening, she was just on call, and so it was like a girl would come, 12-year-old girl, knock on my front door. I'd answer it, and she'd go, "Where's your mum? I'm- I'm having my first period." And I'd be like, "Uh-

    12. DJ

      [laughs]

    13. FT

      ... what? I, I don't know." You know, so I never s- we never just, we never saw my mum for like five years 'cause she was just constantly working. I mean, the flip side is that we had, 'cause they were teachers, you had school holidays, so you actually hung out with them then, I guess. So it's not that big a sob story. But I think it was, it was constantly, like, you're just, you're never not at work when you're, you know, when you live there. So, uh, but yeah, no, I'm not, I'm, I'm not in any way as neglected as some of those-

    14. DJ

      [laughs]

    15. FT

      ... kids that went to that school.

    16. DJ

      What were you like academically? Did you stick in at school?

    17. FT

      Did I what?

    18. DJ

      Stick in at school.

    19. FT

      Stick in?

    20. DJ

      Yeah.

    21. FT

      Does that mean, like, do well?

    22. DJ

      Do well, like-

    23. FT

      Yeah

    24. DJ

      ... apply yourself.

    25. FT

      Get, get stuck in.

    26. DJ

      Yeah.

    27. FT

      I think I was quite, probably quite annoying in that I, I found the work, like, easy enough that I could do it, but then I started distracting everyone else and trying to cause trouble. So, um, but yeah, yeah, I, I, I was sort of stimulated by it, I guess. I wasn't a complete boff-

    28. DJ

      [laughs]

    29. FT

      ... but I also wasn't a dropout smoking reefers round the back of the sheds.

    30. DJ

      [laughs]

  5. 10:24 – 13:24

    Mentor moment: Mark Olver and the Bristol circuit

    1. FT

      would take people under his wing, and if he saw, you know, the right kind of drive or talent, he would basically make it his mission to help them achieve it. And so I wouldn't be a comic without him. He, that, the same could be said of people like, uh, I think like John Robins and Alice James. They were all... Anyone who started in the southwest in sort of the last sort of 20 years, 25 years probably owes a debt to Olver in some way. Um, but yeah, I w- I did his open-mic night when I was 18, and then he just, like, took me and a guy called Matt Ewans. You know Matt Ewans? He's-

    2. DJ

      No

    3. FT

      ... he's pretty, um, pretty crazy. He does pretty well at the Edinburgh Fringe. Crazy, uh, [laughs] crazy stand-up, really funny. But he kind of took us around all these, like, little village pubs and little community centers in the southwest doing gigs. And then by the time I left uni I was getting paid, uh, a bit for it. Not enough, like 500 pounds a month, and back then you could rent a place in Bristol for 380 pounds a month, so I went, "Fuck it. I like those ma- those odds. I can do maths." And then I was like, "Right, well, we don't have any money for furniture, uh, or really food." So we had like a, [laughs] like a sort of a junkies flat. We'd have, like, a big room and a tiny sofa in it and a tiny plant, and you're like, "That's all we can afford."

    4. DJ

      [laughs]

    5. FT

      But no, you're living the dream, man. It was great.

    6. DJ

      When you, like, were at that kind of level whereby money was tight, you were getting paid 500 pounds a month-

    7. FT

      Yeah

    8. DJ

      ... and you could maybe see, don't know if Facebook was a thing then, but you could maybe see your mates that you went to school with become politicians or investment bankers. Did you ever go, "Do you know what? I wish I went down that route instead"?

    9. FT

      No. No, 'cause it wasn't... I, I used to lie awake at night sort of- Having existential crises about what I would do if it wasn't comedy. Like, I, I always knew I couldn't do another job. Even during COVID, when my industry entirely shut down, like, this is before the big pivot to online really, or maybe just b- just b- this is as it started. But I did a job for... We were staying at my father-in-law's house, uh, during the first lockdown, and there was literally no, no work. This was before the government support schemes had come in. My wife had a job that was safe, so we were fine, and we... But, like, I got given a job by my friend of my father-in-law, writing copy for an e-scooter business, and within a week I was like, "I quit. I can't do this. I know I have no other income, but I'd rather stare at a wall than do this."

    10. DJ

      Fuck.

    11. FT

      I just... Maybe that's really immature and like, "Fuck you, man. Fuck you, the system," but I just, just couldn't take it. So I just, I kind of always had to just work to figure things out myself, I guess.

    12. DJ

      Did you know you had the potential to become a full-time professional touring internet sensation when you-

    13. FT

      Well, internet sensation I didn't know.

    14. DJ

      [laughs]

    15. FT

      I knew... Well, I mean, I knew I could... I knew once I saw what stand-up actually was, and that you could make a sort of teacher's salary off of just doing live, and once you saw the below the tip of the

  6. 13:24 – 16:23

    TV vs. internet: where audiences actually are now

    1. FT

      iceberg and you realize there are hundreds if not more, thousands, of professional stand-up comedians in this country that exist in this, like, live circuit, um, I was like, "Yeah, I can do that. I'm sure I can get good enough to do that." Um, and that's kind of what I wanted to do. And then, you know, Edinburgh Fringe, uh, so I, so I had some good shows and then got to do a bit of TV. But, but then I sort of started to get TV just at the point where it felt like no one was watching it or it didn't, didn't m- didn't equal audience in the same way that it maybe did five years previously or... A lot of people sort of start like to think who was the last comedian that did Live at the Apollo and actually got something out of it. Who was that, like, Indiana Jones hat through the door? I'd say maybe Bill Wang, maybe. Maybe Sindhu Vee. I don't know. Like, there's, there's the odd one that goes through, but really now it's like... S- you know, and I'm not, not saying that just 'cause you've done it means you should, you should have anything from it. But whenever I get in a taxi and you say, "I'm a comedian," they go, "Oh, when are you gonna do Live at the Apollo?" And I go, "I did it seven years ago." And they go, "Oh, yeah, I haven't watched it in 20 years." You go, "Right, well then why, why are you... You know, why are you asking me?" But no one, no one watches it anymore.

    2. DJ

      I think people just do it for the pinned post on their Instagram or, like, their Instagram bio.

    3. FT

      Yeah, and it is a massive validating thing. Don't get me wrong. It does, particularly when you s- to start out age 18, to do it, you're like, "Oh, I did it." There's an element of that. Then I remember waking up the next day and feeling quite depressed. It was like, "Oh, right, well what do I do now? I've still got to be a comedian. I didn't complete it." And then you get to just stop, you know? So, um, yeah. I don't know what the question was.

    4. DJ

      The, the route to entry for comedy was one that I didn't really understand. Like, you can look at your mate who's a joiner and understand that they did, like, an apprenticeship, and after you finish your apprenticeship you might go self-employed.

    5. FT

      Mm.

    6. DJ

      Or if you're an investment banker, you probably join the city in a grad scheme. But I never knew how, like, how do you break into comedy? And I never understood that. And I d- I did a comedy course. I thought that was like the rite of passage, but most comedians don't do-

    7. FT

      No

    8. DJ

      ... really shitty comedy courses-

    9. FT

      No

    10. DJ

      ... for charity where they rip off-

    11. FT

      Yeah

    12. DJ

      ... you for your tickets. [laughs]

    13. FT

      Yeah, but they... That, that, I think Greg Davies did a course, and maybe Rhod Gilbert did a course, and for them it, like, gave them the confidence to actually start. I think they always knew they could do it, but they were never... It was putting it off, right? Um, the, the o- the, the great thing about stand-up is you just have to do it, and so it attracts people who just do stuff.

    14. DJ

      Mm.

    15. FT

      Because if you, if you're always that mate who everyone says you should do it but you never do it, then you've not... You're not, you're not it. You know? You just got to do it. And you just have to fail publicly for a long time, and it doesn't stop either. That's what I like about it, is it's constantly humiliating, but it's good. In my very kind of, like, cold Edinburgh Presbyterian heritage, it's just good to constantly get in that ice bath. Fucking shame. Every tour, right at the start, "Fuck, that wasn't good enough. That didn't work. Fuck it. Right." You know? Good, 'cause

  7. 16:23 – 22:15

    Stand-up as craft (funny word at the end of the sentence)

    1. FT

      it means you actually... You have to learn how to write an hour every hour you start, you know?

    2. DJ

      And your hour always begins with, like, back of the fag packet kind of material.

    3. FT

      Yeah.

    4. DJ

      And you have-

    5. FT

      Absolutely

    6. DJ

      ... you have to go to, like, a shitty, like, open mic on a Tuesday night. Maybe you don't at your level, but some c-

    7. FT

      No, you do.

    8. DJ

      I think comedians like a-

    9. FT

      I think you do, and I, I think you get worse if you don't. I think if you don't go out there and eat shit, you can tell, because, like, it would be very easy for me now to coast on the kind of in-jokes of, like, the pod or of... Or, you know, just touch, touchstones that people about, you know, know that find me funny or whatever. But you've, you've got to always be playing to people who are seeing you for the first time. Which is why, which is what's so tiring about it. But also it's like every, every one is a challenge, you know?

    10. DJ

      I really admire stand-up comedians. I treat them like s- like skateboarders. Like, it's one of those things-

    11. FT

      No, I wouldn't put those two together

    12. DJ

      ... well, you see a skateboarder, right, and they're, like, failing publicly-

    13. FT

      Yes. No, that's, that is true

    14. DJ

      ... and it doesn't make any, doesn't make any sense.

    15. FT

      Mm.

    16. DJ

      And then they land the trick and you're like, "Oh, that's fucking hard."

    17. FT

      Yeah, I guess I don't think landing a trick is art. [laughs]

    18. DJ

      [laughs] You still think it's a fat dog?

    19. FT

      I still think... Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

    20. DJ

      [laughs]

    21. FT

      I think it was worth the failure.

    22. DJ

      [laughs]

    23. FT

      You're still a fat guy who lives with your mum.

    24. DJ

      [laughs]

    25. FT

      You know what I mean? I don't, I don't think... It's not, you know, it's not that he's landed a trick and he's Picasso, is it?

    26. DJ

      [laughs]

    27. FT

      But neither stand-up, I must say. Neither, neither stand-up. But-

    28. DJ

      Mm

    29. FT

      ... um, no, I know, you're right, there is a, there is an analogy there.

    30. DJ

      Tell me about some of your earlier gigs. Any horror stories? Any funny stories in the road?

  8. 22:15 – 25:16

    Is Edinburgh still the route? The schism in comedy

    1. DJ

      some new comedy-

    2. FT

      No

    3. DJ

      ... contests or just completely different?

    4. FT

      Well, I don't k- I, I don't know. And that, that's the great sort of schism that's happening in comedy currently. Um, certainly when I started that was what you did. Edinburgh was very important, and now I don't think it's ever been less important, uh, which is good and bad. I think it's good in that it's, there's a more meritocratic, democratic... You know, people like Mo Gilligan were never gonna be Edinburgh darlings, but they've done it thems- They've proved that they deserve a bigger audience. They've done it themselves. Uh, but at the same time you have people who aren't as good a stand-ups as M- as Mo or aren't as, like, intuitively funny as Mo who have got big followings, and then they're doing live shows even though they haven't done the work or they haven't got the, the chops for it. And I think there's been a... there's sort of, like, the death of taste. You know? That's... We've thrown that baby out with the bath water of the kind of demo- democracy of it all in that it's, it's now there's no taste setters. And so if something gets a lot of views, it must be good. You know?

    5. DJ

      Yeah. There's a TikTokification-

    6. FT

      Sort of

    7. DJ

      ... of comedy.

    8. FT

      And it's good and bad. Um, it's good in that people... you know, you don't... people that would never have got a shot 20 years ago can make it happen themselves. But then maybe people were always getting a shot that were crap. I mean, maybe just stuff is just crap, isn't it? Just crap stuff's allowed to exist. There's less... You know? You're allowed to-

    9. DJ

      Yeah

    10. FT

      ... the stuff that you don't like is allowed to exist, stuff that's... you think is crap. You know?

    11. DJ

      But it's-

    12. FT

      There's gonna be crap stuff, isn't there?

    13. DJ

      It's not gatekept by-

    14. FT

      No

    15. DJ

      ... a, a critic anymore.

    16. FT

      No, exactly. Um, and that's why I think Edinburgh's less relevant is that it used to be you go up there, you get these reviews from journalists, and then you get... you network, and you maybe you get an opportunity on TV. But when people stopped really watching TV, or certainly when this... when, when it stopped, the equation of, like, TV equals audience, when that broke down, then there was less reason to go to Edinburgh. There was more reason to just make your own stuff and find your own- I think basically what the internet's done is e- everything is just another video, isn't it? Doesn't matter how much you s- money you spent on it or whether a 20-team production have made it for Channel 4 or, like, it's a guy in his bedroom. It gets flattened out into the feed, so it's just another video.

    17. DJ

      Mm.

    18. FT

      So it all gets judged on that, right? It's just how good is the video. And so what do you actually n- need any of that stuff for in the consumer's mind? You're just judging it on the merits of the video. So, um, yeah, I think p- particularly with... I think TV is obviously... TV's a big word. I'm s- speaking specifically about light entertainment comedy, which has, which has it in a real bind, the TV part of that industry. The industry, you know, the internet and live comedy is booming in a way it never has. But TV comedy is in, is in a hard place because I think it's just got more oversight

  9. 25:16 – 27:31

    Turning a podcast into a theatre show (without betraying podcast intimacy)

    1. FT

      than internet stuff, and I think audiences are now used to a kind of intimacy with podcasts that you just can't recreate on a shiny floor with an audience there and a, you know, the whole razzmatazz, big shiny production thing, so.

    2. DJ

      Is that also a reason why you feel the need to do these kind of, like, open spot, open mics too? Because you'll be playing to... Because you've got such a large cult following through the podcast.

    3. FT

      Mm.

    4. DJ

      If you put on your own show, it'll be people that like your stuff coming to watch you, so the margin for error isn't as greater. Whereas if you go to an unannounced gig, like a top secret-

    5. FT

      Yeah

    6. DJ

      ... drop in there-

    7. FT

      Yeah, you have to do that.

    8. DJ

      Yeah, yeah.

    9. FT

      You have to. I mean, we've been having it with the pod- the, the tour we're doing now for the podcast. It's like we... It's been a really fun challenge to try and solve, but I really from the off wanted to make almost a theater show because I think podcast and theater show are like opposites in that a podcast is this stripped down spontaneous chat. It's intimate. You're listening to it on your own. You're doing something else while you're listening to it. A theater show is a communal experience that you pay 35 quid to be at in an amazing building. It's like those two things are opposites, so it's like I've been, we've been trying to solve how do we give people that sense that they're still getting what they want, but that it's a theatrical experience and it doesn't feel contrived? That's what we've been trying to work out, and we're starting to get it now, and it's really exciting. But, um, it's s- it's such a... I still, I still think it's very early days in doing internet stuff live because I think most people that have grown up on just doing internet stuff don't have the instincts for a live show, and they just rock up with some mics and just... And the problem is that the audience, I think that the audience will be happy with that 'cause, 'cause it's more about being in the room with the people that they have in their head for three times a week, you know? So, um, yeah, I... So that's the thing about the death of taste. It's like an audience will be happy with just being in a room with their favorite podcast, but how do you make something that is of merit on its own terms?

    10. DJ

      Mm-hmm.

    11. FT

      You know?

    12. DJ

      Has there been any other effects that you've seen from those parasocial relationships that you have with your followers? Do people feel that they know you as mu- know you know them as much as they know

  10. 27:31 – 28:56

    Parasocial intensity & setting boundaries

    1. DJ

      you?

    2. FT

      Well, they probably do. I mean, j- even just meeting them afterwards, there is a, there's a sort of intensity to the podcast fandom that, that there isn't... And this podcast is nine months old. Um, and I was on tour last year, and people were still very, like, excited to meet afterwards and stuff. But I guess with stand-up it's more, I don't know, people are more like, "Oh, yeah, I like him. I'll go see him," rather than, "Oh, you're doing the podcast. Shit, that's my, that's my life. That's how I get to and from work."

    3. DJ

      Yeah.

    4. FT

      "I need to be there." You know? It's a different, more urgent feeling. Um, so yeah, it is more, it is more intense meeting them afterwards. And the, and the... We have had a few people who were like, "Listen, we make a lot of joke about, jokes about the Nazis. We can do that. You've got to stop Hitler saluting in the, in the crowd because it just-

    5. DJ

      [laughs]

    6. FT

      ... it messes the whole thing up. It fucks the whole thing up. Put your arm down." You know? You get too drunk, too excited, you go for the full, you throw the full Roman-

    7. DJ

      [laughs]

    8. FT

      ... and you're like, "Mate, wind it in. There's a fine line we're walking here, and you're ruining it." Um-

    9. DJ

      For people that haven't came across Fin vs. History or Fin vs. the Internet-

    10. FT

      That's quite a good advert for it what I just said, actually. [laughs]

    11. DJ

      [laughs] Like, how, how would you s- summarize both those shows?

    12. FT

      Fin vs. History?

    13. DJ

      Uh, and-

    14. FT

      Oh, and the Internet

    15. DJ

      ... the Internet, both.

    16. FT

      Uh, Fin vs. the Internet was the first one. That's sort of like, uh,

  11. 28:56 – 33:35

    Finn vs. the Internet — roast mechanics, guests “in” vs “not in”

    1. FT

      put simply, I'm in character as someone who doesn't really understand what the internet is, and I'm asking someone who's big on the internet, um, what they do. But, but really I'm kind of... It's a scripted interview show where it's roast jokes essentially. Um, and so it's similar to Between Two Ferns ex- and let... but they're not in on it, or they're not always in on, in on it. Um, Between Two Ferns is obviously the actor's... is, like, has to look sad, has to look angry. We don't tell our guests to... We just say, "Do what you want. There's no right or wrong answer, and the episode will be the one you give us." I think, I think the people that watch the show in clips like the ones that are more awkward, and the people that watch the whole episodes like it when the guest plays along and th- they show that they've got a sense of humor about themselves. And I guess in that, in the full episodes are maybe more like the Ali G-

    2. DJ

      Mm

    3. FT

      ... show used to be, where you... People like it when someone clearly doesn't take themselves too seriously. Which I think more and more, and that's what part of the reason I wanted to start the show is that in the... I was joining social media having not done it, having realized that I... this is where an audience was gonna be, and what did I wanna do on it? I didn't wanna just do a podcast or, like, videos of me in my bedroom talking. But I was like there are all these people with massive followings, and they're, they're so tightly controlled because they control it. So wouldn't it be fun to get them in, into a space where they think it's just another podcast, but actually I'm trying to, like, you know- Fucked them up. Um, and obviously it- it's become as a different thing and, and, uh, yeah, I ... Now we're sort of only really doing it when we have a guest, a really big guest that's really exciting, and we can, you know, have these sort of ... try and have these big cultural moments, like the Bonnie Blue episode. [laughs]

    4. DJ

      What is like-

    5. FT

      Um-

    6. DJ

      ... the, the pre-recording chat like before you hit record?

    7. FT

      Depends, totally depends on the guest. What's crazy about that show is that, you know, we are ... It's essentially a TV production that we just put on YouTube. So we script. We're writing the script for like two weeks before. We're thinking of stunts. We've got chore- like choreographing these mad things. We're getting stupid props made, and we have two hours with this person, if we're lucky, and we have to get everything that we think is funny about them or what they do or their world in those two hours. Um, and we have to really, we have to get it in one take, 'cause it's always better when their reaction is their actual reaction and we don't have to do it again. Um, so some guests, they're like, "Oh, yeah, this gets numbers. My mate said it'd be good." And you're like, "Okay, let's see how you react." Uh, some guests are real- they're in on it, and they just wanna laugh along, and they love it. And then some, some guests are ... I think they struggle to know how to play it, and it comes off as awkward, and, you know, there's only so much we can do with that, and it's ... I always prefer the ones where they, they succumb to the silliness of it, but they're under no obligation to, and, you know, they don't have to, and it's kind of why I hoped that Bonnie... I knew it wouldn't happen, but I just hoped, with Bonnie Blue, I just hoped. I thought if there's any way in which you can laugh at the, all judgment aside, the absurdity of what you've done, the, like, the absurdity of the numbers, then that would be amazing, and she gets attacked so much on podcast that I didn't think she was ever gonna not put her defenses up, so.

    8. DJ

      She leaned right into it. She was cracking. Like, she was very, um, self-deprecating, I thought.

    9. FT

      Yeah. I guess once you've, once you've ran through a thousand blokes in a day-

    10. DJ

      [laughs]

    11. FT

      ... there's not much that can ruffle your feathers. Um-

    12. DJ

      Definitely

    13. FT

      ... not a bloke in a leather jacket's gonna do.

    14. DJ

      [laughs]

    15. FT

      But yeah. Uh, yeah. But then Fin vs. History is a podcast with me and Horatio, who, um, created Internet with me, and Vittorio, and he directs Internet, and that's a history podcast, but it's hosted by two comedians who, um, are very liberal with what actually happened and, and how worthwhile bits of history are, and the tagline for it is the show for people who like history but don't care what actually happened because, uh, I just thought... I felt like there wasn't a properly funny history podcast, and I felt an increasing sense that blokes my age, mid-30s, were ... They were sort of admitting to me that like, "Well, I've started listening to The Rest is History," as if it was like another step on their inevitable downturn to middle age, and I was like, "That's interesting. You're, you're listening to it, but you're self-aware about how it's kind of funny that you're listening to it." And I was doing the similar thing, and I, you know, I did a history degree. I've always been kind of ... You know, there's always been a dormant level of history obsession.

  12. 33:35 – 34:59

    Finn vs. History — suits, cadence, and why it clicked

    1. FT

      Um, and then just Horatio had the similar thing, and we just did this, we did these sort of pilot episodes on our Patreon, and they went really well. The clips went really well, and we thought, "This is exciting. This feels fun. I reckon we could do this." And then we built a set and put suits on 'cause we thought it's funny to look like academics, and no one does podcasts in suits. We just thought that'd be funny. And then, and now we have to ... We ... Now the, the amount, the sheer amount of suits we have is insane. We have, like, 30 suits, and we have to try and wear a different combination of tie, shirt, suit every episode. I mean, we never meant to do three a week. We just started at it to get going, and then it's just not stopped growing. So we're just keeping it up, and it's become the main thing I do, certainly this year. So yeah. It's, it's got way out of hand, and it ... But it's so, it's so fun to do.

    2. DJ

      And not to call you rich, but the economics of it are incredible. Like, we look at the-

    3. FT

      This year's been very good, David

    4. DJ

      ... we look at the Patreon numbers-

    5. FT

      Yeah, yeah

    6. DJ

      ... and I've done the maths.

    7. FT

      Yeah.

    8. DJ

      I'm an accountant by trade.

    9. FT

      Yeah.

    10. DJ

      Yeah.

    11. FT

      Well, that's ... So I, I started a production company when I started the Patreon, uh, back in January 2024, and that was, that was for Internet. So that was just mainly to get ... to make Internet. And then now History has gone so well that the production company is hiring out. You know, we've got full-time staff. We've got a studio. We're getting

  13. 34:59 – 36:59

    Patreon → production company → bigger bets

    1. FT

      a bigger office and an edit suite, and we're now trying to take on, like, really ambitious productions, so I can just make more stuff, so.

    2. DJ

      Fin vs. Politics, Fin vs. Football, these kind of spinoffs would be-

    3. FT

      Yeah. I could-

    4. DJ

      ... good

    5. FT

      ... I could do a kind of incel goal hanger thing.

    6. DJ

      [laughs]

    7. FT

      I'm more, I'm more, I'm more excited by going into other mediums. Like, I, I ... I mean, there's a constant discussion about do we develop other podcasts. Um, I think as you know, podcasts are so much work, and our- ours has worked and is working, and I don't know if we have the bandwidth or energy to take on another one that maybe doesn't work as well, but is the same amount of work. I'm more excited about branching into other, you know, other things that this country hasn't really pulled off properly.

    8. DJ

      What are they? Can you give them away?

    9. FT

      Uh, r- r- I mean, it's very, very early days, but I've got a long-term ambition to make a sort of British South Park. Um, and so that's what we're trying to do. It's very early stages. But ... And there's other, there's other projects, like a sort of a travel thing maybe, and yeah. But the, the production I've ... Yeah. What's great about the success, uh, is that we can actually make more ambitious stuff, and I've never really been in it for the money, and it's sort of quite bewildering actually, 'cause I don't, I don't know what to ... You know, I don't understand money in the way that some people do. You see, they go, "Oh, you put this here, and you do that," and I'm just like, "I just don't... Okay, don't delete all. [laughs] Just don't delete all." That's all. [laughs] You know? Um, but what's exciting is that I'm s- more like, well, with that, we could actually hire a team of animators to fucking, you know, animate Hitler's stag do or what-

    10. DJ

      [laughs]

    11. FT

      ... or whatever it is, you know? So, um, yeah, it's a really exciting time for the, for the company, and kind of the sky's the limit. Um, and then just also just the, the

  14. 36:59 – 41:36

    Tour sell-outs, Albert Hall ambitions

    1. FT

      fucking size of the audience. You know, we put this tour on sale in April, and we're in October now, and we're like, we... You know, th- these, these shows sold out within pretty much a week. Most of them didn't actually go to general sale.

    2. DJ

      I had to beg you for tickets today.

    3. FT

      Yeah. Most of them didn't, most of them sold out on the Patreon. Um, and so, you know, we could do the Albert Hall, which would be fucking hilarious. I mean, the idea that, like, our podcast would do the Albert Hall is in itself a joke. So the, the-

    4. DJ

      [laughs]

    5. FT

      ... the ways we could, you know, play with that is so exciting creatively, so.

    6. DJ

      Have you seen an uplift in your, like, stand-up special numbers and your, your raw stand-up material and your gigs and your tours and your tickets?

    7. FT

      I have... Yeah, I mean, I haven't done, I haven't done any stan- I've hardly done any stand-up this year because I... the podcast has been everything. And I put a special out, and that did very well, but the whole, the whole point of me starting putting stuff on YouTube was to get people to my specials, but now the other stuff's taken off so much. I al- I also think there's a thing of, like, it's, it's changed what it means to be a comedian now. When I started, it was you, you do stand-up, and maybe if you were a comic actor, people would call you a comedian, but they would probably say, "I'm not a comedian. I don't do stand-up." Now, I think if you're a podcaster that's... If you're a funny podcaster, you probably... You might not call yourself a comedian, but I think other people would. And so there's, maybe there's a future in which, like, comedians spend more of their time podcasting and less of their time doing actual stand-up. I don't know. I mean, podcasting's so intense if you're doing it two a week or three a week, whatever. Um-

    8. DJ

      But at the same time, it's not, it doesn't require you to travel to Norwich for, like-

    9. FT

      Well, yeah, the studio's a 10-minute cycle from my house. I've got two toddlers. It's... You know, I'm around this year. So I've, I've, I've spent very little time in the marital doghouse this year, so.

    10. DJ

      What does your wife think about what you do?

    11. FT

      She's got a, she's got a fruitier sense of humor than me.

    12. DJ

      [laughs]

    13. FT

      This is what everyone thinks. Everyone's like, "Oh, his wi- I wonder what his wife thinks." I'm the acceptable face of my wife's sense of humor.

    14. DJ

      [laughs]

    15. FT

      Like, she's a backbencher of the party that I'm leading, right? [laughs] Her accents are way worse than mine, right? Don't, don't patronize her and think she's not the sort of same. So, um, yeah, I mean, obviously she's, uh, she's into it. I don't think the marriage would be able to... [laughs]

    16. DJ

      [laughs]

    17. FT

      The amount of things I've said about my sort of cartoon creature of a wife-

    18. DJ

      [laughs]

    19. FT

      ... um, that it must be said isn't her. But then that's the other thing, is I've never... I've always used social media and stuff as, like, this is, it's just for comedy. I have no desire to spill my guts, fucking emotionally sepuku myself all over social media, taking photos of me with my kids at a pumpkin patch. Mm. Like, you know, I don't, I don't... I want a private life and a, a professional life, and it's very easily demarcated for me. And there is a whole industry around sort of, um, like trauma porn, basically.

    20. DJ

      Mm.

    21. FT

      You know, the diary of a CEO thing. I don't know. This podcast isn't, isn't that, but it's probably, it's probably-

    22. DJ

      Got bits of it.

    23. FT

      It's got bits of it. But as in you're wanting people to open up, and then you can put a short out with some strings, and it's an emotional thing. But when that is all performed on social media, it's like, I think we're now... people are smart enough to realize that that's kind of emotional manipulation, and it's, it's performative trauma. And no one is separating the social media from their actual just lives of them just living normally.

    24. DJ

      'Cause they get validated from it as well.

    25. FT

      Of course they do. You... I understand, I totally understand the dopamine-

    26. DJ

      Yeah

    27. FT

      ... you know, the whole call and response thing. But if your life is, "I'm a family influencer," then you can't actually live as a family because any precious moment, you're like, "Fuck, I need to broadcast this so that I can advertise."

    28. DJ

      The CPM on this is, like, 40 quid. [laughs]

    29. FT

      Exactly. I need, I need to, like, gentrify and privatize my family life in order to sell that number to advertisers. That's kind of what it, the sy- the system is.

    30. DJ

      Have you came across a guy called Darren McGarvey?

  15. 41:36 – 44:20

    Getting pushed on stage (and why you don’t hit back)

    1. FT

      be said. So I was in Exeter on my last tour, and the last tour was the first tour that, like, we just kept adding dates. We couldn't add enough dates. Everything was selling out. It was the dream tour from that perspective. And, and crucially, everyone knew what they were coming to. It's the first time where you're filling a room, and they all know what they're gonna get, which means you can just sort of start as you wish to go on. You don't have to, like, butter them up with some crowd work or some, you know, cutesy local stuff. Anyway, uh, I think the first joke of that show was, "Oh, I'm sorry I look like shit. I've been... spent the day running after a toddler." And I'd go to someone in the front row, "Do you have kids?" And he'd go, "No." I'm like, "Yeah, me neither. I'm a pedo. That's me."

    2. DJ

      [laughs]

    3. FT

      And then, so literally I've been on stage for a minute, and then a woman just starts kicking off. And then I'm like, "Oh no, it's an anti-pedo activist."

    4. DJ

      [laughs]

    5. FT

      And then, and then, um, she's... the louder she's getting, and she's kind of, like, leaning through the door, then the whole crowd are like, "Oi." And I basically turned it into, like, a pro-pedo rally. [laughs] And then she is obviously, as I was saying earlier, it's obviously hitting some buttons from something she's gone through. Fair, fair enough. But... And maybe she was... I... Also, it's unclear with us whether she was in the wrong room. Maybe she was meant to go to the cinema next door or... Anyway, she comes on stage, and everyone's like, "Ooh." And because it's Devon, the roadie's like, "Oh, I'm sure it'll be fine. Fuck it. We don't need security." And she just comes over and just, like, punches me in the chest. And everyone's like, "Hit her back." And I'm like, "The optics of me punching a middle-aged woman on stage, not good." Aside from the morality of it, um-

    6. DJ

      There must have been a moment where you thought, "I could get away with this." Because of your, your cancellation at 14, you thought you were immortal.

    7. FT

      Yeah, yeah.

    8. DJ

      You must have thought, like, "I can do anything, even self-defense."

    9. FT

      But I also, I don't, I just don't think that the cancellation thing, you know, that is... It's, it's bas- You, you never really get canceled for a joke. You get put on the naughty step by people that were never gonna come see you anyway.

    10. DJ

      Mm.

    11. FT

      You get canceled if there's this kind of unfulfilled justice, right?

    12. DJ

      Like a Russell Brand.

    13. FT

      Like Russell Brand, like Louis CK thing. You know, you have people who you've done something that is either criminal or, like, borderline, and your... People of your audience go, "I don't think I can enjoy what you do now." Whereas the, like, Jimmy Carr's Holocaust thing, that was a joke he'd written for people that come to see him, and then someone films a clip of it and puts it out on Holocaust Memorial Day. And it's like, well, you've completely changed the context of that sentence now, because now you're, like... You've made that outrageous.

    14. DJ

      Yeah.

    15. FT

      Um, so... And Jimmy ob- And then obviously the L- LBC lot were mad, and Jimmy had, you know, three

  16. 44:20 – 47:37

    Riyadh offers: economics, ethics, and optics

    1. FT

      months of probably keeping quiet. But then he's, you know, fair play, off to Riyadh. Fuck it. Do you know what, do you know what I mean? It's like-

    2. DJ

      What's your opinion on that, the Riyadh Comedy Festival? I was going to ask.

    3. FT

      Um, well, I wasn't offered.

    4. DJ

      If you were offered, would you go?

    5. FT

      Uh, probably not, but more because I know myself and know that I'd make a joke. I'd get into trouble, and if you get in trouble out there, I believe it's quite bad. I believe cancellation out there is not just some tweets. It's, um, choppy, choppy briefcase time.

    6. DJ

      [laughs]

    7. FT

      Um, and so I, I wouldn't go.

    8. DJ

      [laughs]

    9. FT

      But it's, it's very easy for me to say that as someone who didn't get offered it. I know someone who got offered it, a British act who got offered it and said no. And to be fair, it, it, like... I think if they were gonna go, it would've had to just be more money. Like, it's gotta be life-changing money, and that's what I saw-

    10. DJ

      Well, what are the economics of it? Now, I, I don't want you to expose who it was-

    11. FT

      Yeah

    12. DJ

      ... or how much they were offered.

    13. FT

      Yeah.

    14. DJ

      But was it, was it good?

    15. FT

      Well, I think it was something like 80 grand, which for someone who's touring, you know, if you're, if you're a big touring act, y- it's like, I gue- I guess you have to think about it. And I suppose if you don't have to think about it, because it's so, it's so much more than you could make, then maybe you've got a decision to make. And I, I, I've listened to the response, the, the people who went saying, you know, "The government's not the people," and that's a... Is it? It's true. Um, I g- I guess it's like people... If you're Bill Burr, I think that was an unwise move because your act is so sort of tub-thumping, like, little person, like, democratic, and that kind of changes the act a bit, almost, in my head. Similar in, in the way to when the Louis CK thing came out. I remember be- thinking, "Oh, I've always thought you were being the worst version of yourself on stage."

    16. DJ

      [laughs]

    17. FT

      "And so now I find it difficult to, to suspend the disbelief." And I can still enjoy stuff he does and, you know, there'll be people saying, "That's because you're a man and you haven't been threatened," and you'd be probably right. Yeah. But it's definitely... I'm definitely not as big a fan as I would've been if that hadn't come out or if that hadn't happened because there is that... There's just an interference in your enjoyment of it because you're like, "I don't..." You know. Um, and I... Maybe that's what the Riyadh thing's done to Bill Burr. Jimmy, I mean, who... Fuck it. Jimmy doesn't fucking care.

    18. DJ

      Yeah.

    19. FT

      He's always ve- And i- if you're just like, "I'm a comedian," then who fucking cares? You know. So, um, it's interest... I don't, I don't really have a set opinion on it one way or the other. I s- I, I'm someone who re- To be honest, I, I hear anything that sounds clever and well thought out and I go, "Oh, yeah. That's a good... That's a good point." You know. So I don't, I don't know. But, um, I think it's, I think it's probably been more damaging for some people than it is others because of their, their act.

    20. DJ

      Talking about doing absurd, absurd comedy gigs for money, you used to warm up Deal or No Deal.

    21. FT

      Yeah, I did. Yeah.

    22. DJ

      Pointless and a few others.

    23. FT

      I did. Uh, early on, when I'd sort of been full time for about a year and I was skint, Olver, Mark Olver got me doing warm-up for Deal or No Deal, which was shot in Bristol. Which if you're, like, comfortable on stage and you can MC is, um, is, it's doable, but it is making old ladies clap,

  17. 47:37 – 49:38

    Warm-up TV gigs, corporates, and hating “exposure”

    1. FT

      and it is pretty demoralizing, and I, I hated it quite quickly. Um-

    2. DJ

      Worse than corporate gigs?

    3. FT

      I don't really get offered corporate gigs, funnily enough.

    4. DJ

      [laughs]

    5. FT

      I'm not really a corporate guy.

    6. DJ

      [laughs] Neither do I.

    7. FT

      My entire personality is a series of HR violations.

    8. DJ

      [laughs]

    9. FT

      So I'm not really sure why you're asking me if I do corporate gigs. I've maybe done one for, like, a lawyer who had seen me and thought... And he was in charge of booking, and it didn't go that well.

    10. DJ

      [laughs]

    11. FT

      Obviously, because it's a fucking company environment, like, you know. Um, so that's the other thing. I was never gonna get corporate gigs, so I did warm up, I did warm up for Pointless as well, which was a great gig. I, I enjoyed that a lot. Um, but it is very, very different to what I do now. It's just kind of being polite to old ladies and making them clap and stuff.

    12. DJ

      I... One of my, uh, favorite... I don't know if it was a, a paid gig or maybe an unpaid gig, a- a- and this is why it was such a success, was your NFL Britain-

    13. FT

      Yeah

    14. DJ

      ... interview.

    15. FT

      Yeah.

    16. DJ

      Were you... Did they expect you to play that, like- ... ignorant character at very-

    17. FT

      No

    18. DJ

      No?

    19. FT

      No. I mean, they- I don't know what they expected. I, I didn't, to be fair, I didn't ex- expect it to be this... I just, I just thought I was gonna, gonna get paid a lot, and then I then just had, they said, "You're getting paid in exposure." And I thought, "Well, fuck it then. I don't care about this. I'm just gonna go and say what I really think." And then they were just so American about it. Um, but again, it's that other thing we were talking about earlier, is like they, they sent me the footage or a guy sent me the footage so that I could then put it up, and suddenly it's like a thing. If no one had done that, it just would've... It wouldn't be anywhere, would it? You know. Um, because TV's so disposable now in a way that it wasn't 20 years ago. So, uh-

    20. DJ

      I have a tool, I'm not sure if you guys use it, uh, in-house, but it's, I think it's called like vidIQ, where you can

  18. 49:38 – 53:15

    NFL interview chaos & why TV is now just “another video”

    1. DJ

      look at, uh, the like, the, the, uh, analytics of other videos when you go on YouTube. It's like a kind of Chrome plugin. And when I was watching it a few weeks ago, most of the views came from the last three to six months on that clip, I believe.

    2. FT

      Yeah, we-

    3. DJ

      Or a large proportion of it anyway

    4. FT

      ... someone, someone, uh, changed the thumbnail-

    5. DJ

      Uh

    6. FT

      ... three months ago. Um-

    7. DJ

      But that would never happen with TV. You know? Like it's gone and forgotten.

    8. FT

      That's... Yeah, exactly. And now it's like you can always be discovered, you know. Which is, is again, is another good thing about it.

    9. DJ

      One thing I realized about how un-serious you take the kind of financial aspect of, uh, y- your podcast and how absurdly big the numbers is, is that you named the production company Fumble Ruski.

    10. FT

      Yeah.

    11. DJ

      Which is that moment, that really famous line or famous moment-

    12. FT

      Yeah

    13. DJ

      ... at the end of that interview. [laughs]

    14. FT

      Yeah. And the logo is a plane crashing into a TV set.

    15. DJ

      [laughs]

    16. FT

      Like 9/11-ing TV. That's, kind of, that's, to me, that's kind of the, that's the message of the company is like we... You know, I mean, currently, I, uh... You may have tweeted this out, I don't know, but, uh, we'll see. Currently, a commiss- a commissioner at a, at a major comedy, at a major channel in the UK is trying to get us to, m- me to do something. But like, I'm in a position where I'm only gonna do it on my terms, 'cause it's like just not worth, just not worth it. Like, I would short be doing them a favor because it's like, why would I, if I've got the resources to make what I wanna make and have full con- executive control over the edit, and I've got this mechanism where I know it can always find new people, why would I... What, what's the point in giving up creative control to an audience that I don't then have any kind of way of holding onto? Like, just doesn't make sense.

    17. DJ

      I can't imagine the economics of that would make sense either. Like, TV's dying. Like, when I looked at the numbers behind the Patreon, it sh- it would be very difficult for a TV house to, to pay you at the moment.

    18. FT

      Well, I mean, something like animation, US animation, US streamers, that is still a lev- a way, a level above, you know, uh, the biggest... Well, I don't know actually. I don't know how, how podca- you know, the really big Go Hang a Podcast, that must be absolutely insane money. But if we were to, if we were to make an animation, say, we would want to kind of partner with a US, like some- someone who could bring in some proper... 'Cause it's really expensive to make that. It's not like a podcast where you can just get some mics and you build a set and then you just go. You know, you're constantly building the set every episode. Um, so there's still a, there's still a, you know, there's still quite a high ceiling for, for stuff. But yeah, that cheap to make TV has kind of been supplanted by even cheaper to make podcasts, right? Podcasts are like the new panel shows. You know? Aren't they? The intimacy and the kind of frivolity of like people bantering on a sofa, that's now... You know, 15 years ago that was Mock the Week, to my generation. But now it's... And also I think people used to, people used to be going to school and we'd talk about Ali G that we saw last night, and we'd quote lines from it. Now people are sending like my videos on WhatsApp groups, dad groups. Like, like, like it's just the same thing, it's just changed slightly.

    19. DJ

      And we used to live in a monoculture. Like yeah, I can imagine old ladies in offices would turn up on a Friday and speak about Emmerdale that night.

    20. FT

      I'm into this monoculture thing.

  19. 53:15 – 56:18

    Monoculture’s collapse and niche empires

    1. DJ

      Yeah.

    2. FT

      Have you heard that interview with the guy who manages the Sidemen?

    3. DJ

      No, no, no. Jordan Schwarzenberger, that guy?

    4. FT

      Yeah. He did an interview on Amal Rajan's, Amal Rajan's podcast, and he talked about this monoculture thing. And yeah, I recommend anyone who's interested in that to listen to that. He's a fucking smart guy, that bloke. And yeah, he's right. Th- the re- it's the reason movies are bad now is because, um, uh, people are trying to appeal to the lowest common denominator. The only, you know, thing we have left are these big franchises. And like I saw the new, I saw the new Paul Thomas Anderson film last night. It was the best one I've seen for years. It's so creative and different and distinct and like, oh, film's really good. But they're so-

    5. DJ

      Not Fast and Furious 12

    6. FT

      ... they're so rare now because, um, like you say, we don't, it's not, uh... The monoculture has got so small that all they can afford to bank on are these big franchises.

    7. DJ

      Mm-hmm. But it means creators can have access to audience, whereas it would be-

    8. FT

      Yeah, niches, niches are massive, you know? Like who would've thought that a, a kind of a history podcaster didn't take their history seriously was a serviceable idea. But turns out there's quite a big niche, you know, 'cause in a global market, the niche is huge. So, um, but I do think, I do think there's something that's been lost in that as well. I think it's quite telling that Oasis is like, "That's the best gig anyone's ever been to," in 2025, and it was probably the best gig they've been to in 1997. It's like there's not really been anything that big Like, that binds people together in the same way. It'd be interesting to see people who are 10, 12 now, what are the touchstones of their childhood when they are, are our age? What are their... Would they be able to instantly relate over nostalgia in the way that, like... How old are you?

    9. DJ

      I'm 27.

    10. FT

      Right. You're a bit younger than me, but presumably, I don't know, did you have, like, Game Boy and N64 and stuff?

    11. DJ

      Yeah.

    12. FT

      Yeah.

    13. DJ

      Yeah, yeah, yeah.

    14. FT

      Right.

    15. DJ

      And then, like, like, PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3.

    16. FT

      The Sims.

    17. DJ

      Yeah, yeah.

    18. FT

      You know, we've got these kind of cornerstone things that we all, we all phase- things we all went through. I don't... It'd be interesting to see whether that carries on.

    19. DJ

      Or, or if they'll be reduced to, like, memes or-

    20. FT

      Mm

    21. DJ

      ... lines from a TikTok.

    22. FT

      Mm.

    23. DJ

      I see a lot of kids quoting things that I don't quite understand. Uh, this kind of, um-

    24. FT

      That's... Well, that was always the way, wasn't it? It's j- just about whether they're doing it together-

    25. DJ

      Mm

    26. FT

      ... or whether they're... they've all fragmented, whether they've all grown up in a kind of silos, you know.

    27. DJ

      Do you think AI will come for comedy or-

    28. FT

      I don't fucking know, man. I don't know. Who knows?

    29. DJ

      Yeah.

    30. FT

      I... The, the whole AI thing. Like, it's, it's more just the pace, the pace of change is so stupidly fast that in two years it could be an entirely different reality. I don't know.

  20. 56:18 – 57:43

    AI’s effect: making live more valuable

    1. DJ

      ridiculous. Uh, and there's apparently, like, loads of songs in the charts that have been completely, like, AI generated. Um-

    2. FT

      I think what it'll do is it will fuel demand for live, actually. I think live is always so healthy. You know, even at COVID when everyone thought live's dead, it's all gonna be online now. People have such a hunger for communal things. Again, probably why, you know, the, the Oasis tour has been so fucking massive, and I haven't been, but it's been such a, seemingly such a spiritual experience for people. Like, people yearn for those communal things, and so I do think that this has to be some kind of attempt at a monoculture that exists. But I don't, I don't know how you kind of reverse engineer the last five years. I don't know how you do that. Um-

    3. DJ

      Or if we ever can.

    4. FT

      No, and I don't... You know, it's, it's worked out for me. It's great.

    5. DJ

      [laughs]

    6. FT

      So, so... But, um, yeah. I guess, yeah, ma- mass appeal. Who, who's gonna have... Is it even worth having mass appeal now? What does that even look like? I guess it's, it's the Sidemen, but even that, you wouldn't know. Most people wouldn't know who they are still. Like-

    7. DJ

      Yeah, I think, I think you are right. The, the riches are in the niches, as they say.

    8. FT

      Yeah. But that's why, to get back to why... So we'd booked Bonnie Blue for Fin vs. the Internet, or we penciled her. I wasn't that... We'd had porn stars before. I sort of thought maybe we'd made all the jokes we could make, and I was sort of like,

  21. 57:43 – 1:01:28

    Bonnie Blue as monoculture moment

    1. FT

      "I don't know if we'll do." And then in the time between booking her and when we were gonna shoot, she basically became monoculture. Like, she broke through to the point where my mum was talking about her-

    2. DJ

      Mm

    3. FT

      ... and, like, people at the gym were talking about, and you're like, "Fuck, she has actually, fair play..." She's become sort of the most mainstream thing there's been for a while. And so actually we thought, "Well, we have to do this," because there's, there's a sort of, there's a kind of cultural, um, wave to surf. You know, we c- we have a chance to maybe be more relevant than we normally are, and, um, I have a feeling that Adam Curtis is gonna talk about her in 20 years' time. Do you know what I mean?

    4. DJ

      [laughs]

    5. FT

      It's like he's gonna be, he's gonna be... But the real, the real forces were, you know, all that stuff with footage of her fucking 1,000 guys. Um, yeah, she's sort of very symbolic of a, an era where it's like out- outrage, social media, you know, outrage industrial complex, to use that phrase again, of just extremity, extremity, extremity. Like, numbers, numbers, numbers.

    6. DJ

      To think she made it on your mate Chris Williamson's self-development podcast, that's when you know she's mainstream.

    7. FT

      Yeah, I know. To be fair, I did Chris's self-development podcast the other week.

    8. DJ

      Did you?

    9. FT

      It was a right show. It was good.

    10. DJ

      It was fun.

    11. FT

      I like... Yeah, I like Chris a lot. I'm-

    12. DJ

      Me too

    13. FT

      ... and he's, um, he's definitely, I think, one of the best episodes we've done on the Internet because he just... He's a fan of the show, and he knew exactly what we wanted from a guest and what the fans wanted, which is someone who can laugh at themselves. And I think, I think he, he normally gives a sense of someone who wouldn't, you wouldn't think they could laugh at themselves because he's so controlled and, like, masculine and like, "Grr. You, you be better. Think. Grr."

    14. DJ

      [laughs]

    15. FT

      And, you know. And so the fact that he could let it all out with us, I think, made for a really... People were really pleasantly surprised by that. Um, similar to M-Dot. I don't know if you watched that one, the Ja- the Jamaican, um-

    16. DJ

      Oh, yeah, yeah

    17. FT

      ... well, he's not Jamaican. [laughs] Um, well, he's from the Isle of Sheppey in Kent, but he speaks with a Jamaican accent. But he charmed us. We love him because he kn- he knows it's ridiculous and he doesn't care, you know? And that's, um, I think that's when that show really excels is when, when people can prove they don't have a s- they don't take themselves too seriously. I think that's the best thing about it. Um, sorry, we've gone off topic. I don't know what we were talking about.

    18. DJ

      Bonnie Blue.

    19. FT

      Bonnie Blue.

    20. DJ

      Monoculture.

    21. FT

      Oh, Bonnie Blue is monoculture. Yeah, that's-

    22. DJ

      But it-

    23. FT

      It's true, though

    24. DJ

      ... it is strange, though, like, you can openly admit to knowing who Bonnie Blue or Lily Phillips is as a man, whereas, like, 10 years ago if you mention a porn star's name you'd be embarrassed. But everyone knows who they are. It's... Porn's being celebrated. Not to go into this as a, as a topic itself, but-

    25. FT

      Yeah

    26. DJ

      ... like, porn as a category has almost become, because of OnlyFans and these celebritized creators like Lily Phillips and Bonnie Blue, has become less of a taboo industry because more people are talking about it openly.

    27. FT

      Well, it's also just more... It's just ubiquitous now.

    28. DJ

      Yeah.

    29. FT

      Like, when I was growing up it was, it was the, the thing, the, the picture loading down the frame. And then when my dad was growing up, he was probably going to some woods and finding a sort of stuck together mag under a rock.

    30. DJ

      [laughs]

  22. 1:01:28 – 1:04:08

    If starting again today, what Fin would actually do

    1. DJ

      Like you said, you started when you were 18-

    2. FT

      Yeah

    3. DJ

      ... and really earned your stripes, and then y- you've found a catalyst, which is your, your podcast that has been just incredibly successful over the last few years. If you were to start again with the resources that you have now and the knowledge that you have-

    4. FT

      Mm

    5. DJ

      ... you wanted to be a stand-up comedian, you didn't wanna follow your, uh, your mates into investment banking or, uh... I- if you wanted to, to really kickstart your career now, what would you do?

    6. FT

      If I had the resources I have now?

    7. DJ

      Besides, like, financial resources, like, just y- your knowledge-

    8. FT

      Mm-hmm

    9. DJ

      ... understanding of the industry, technology.

    10. FT

      Um, I don't... Well, I think the problem, the problem is is that you... It's, it's all kind of reliant on people. Like, no man is an island and all that, and I feel very lucky to have, to have got Horatio and Vittorio when they were on the way up and when I could only really pay them in sort of a respect that I'd built up from being around for a bit longer than they had. I, you know, was sending them booking details for other gigs they wanted to do. Uh, and, you know, they're both so brilliant in their own right that I feel f- so lucky to have found them at the exact moment when I needed those people to help the vision I had. Similarly, a guy called Pete Wells, who runs the company with me, who never gets a shout-out, but he is... He's the one who when we do internet, he builds that entire set digitally. It's filmed on a green screen. He builds the entire fucking set himself. He... All the... So he's got a VFX background, so all the mad effects we do, we can do because of Pete and, and, um, even producer Charlie, the absolute, you know, mong that produces our podcast, off Mike, uh, who adds so much to it. It's like all these people, uh, I feel very lucky to have, um, kind of, I don't know, found, gravitated towards. They've been sucked into the orbit of the whole thing, and, uh, kind of the real lesson is that you can't... You have to have the energy and the drive, and ultimately the ability to do it all yourself, but that's not sustainable, and so you have to get people you trust around you. So I know if it all falls apart, at the end of the day, I can edit, I can make clips, I can do all that myself, and I still do do that sometimes. Like, we've got, like, a pyramid, where if everything, if everyone falls ill, at the very bottom is me, and I can edit an episode if I have to. So I kn- I taught myself how to do it. But the, the way, the better thing to do is to find people that you really trust and get on with,

  23. 1:04:08 – 1:05:18

    Build the team so you can keep making the thing

    1. FT

      and whose instincts you trust to make it easier for everyone and to mean that you can move on to the next thing. And so, uh, I'd probab- I'd probably try and find those people. That's the first thing I'd do. But then I always think you have to have a... I always think that's a by-product of a project. You always have to... So y- y- again, I think the lesson is always you just do it and see what happens.

    2. DJ

      Yeah.

    3. FT

      You know?

    4. DJ

      And if it's good, it'll attract good people.

    5. FT

      Yeah, exactly. And if it's bad, then no one sees it, and that's great 'cause it was bad. So, like, there's just no, there's no risk in my head. There's... The more you make and the more success you have, the more risk because you want to maintain your quality.

    6. DJ

      Mm-hmm.

    7. FT

      But, but if you're building out the team, then you feel, like, more secure in testing, testing things around and, like, using them as a squash court and bouncing ideas around and, uh, yeah. So it's, it's very much... There's a... It's building that team that I think is the key to elevating it.

    8. DJ

      I love it. Fin Taylor, the funniest Scottish comedian.

    9. FT

      Your words.

    10. DJ

      [laughs] Thanks for coming on. I appreciate it.

    11. FT

      Thank you, mate. Joy.

Episode duration: 1:05:19

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