Should Podcasts Be On YouTube?

1. 0:00 – 1:30

   Intro

   1. AGAlex Goldman0:00

      People have little curiosities that they just sit with, and I'm sure this is with you, too, and it's with me, where I'm just like... A good example is the town that I live in, they insist on not letting us put both paper recycling and bottle recycling in the same-

   2. SPSpeaker0:19

      Oh [laughs]

   3. AGAlex Goldman0:19

      ... in the, at the, on the same week.

   4. SPSpeaker0:20

      Okay.

   5. AGAlex Goldman0:21

      It's every other week. And it's like I've now, then I have like-

   6. SPSpeaker0:23

      Oh, goodness

   7. AGAlex Goldman0:23

      ... tons of bottles just hanging out in my house.

   8. SPSpeaker0:25

      Uh-huh.

   9. AGAlex Goldman0:26

      And I'm like, "This is so dumb. Why do they do this?" And when I was pitching Hyperfixed, I was like, "This is the problem I wanna find out-

   10. SPSpeaker0:32

       This is-

   11. AGAlex Goldman0:32

       ... the answer to. Why are they doing this to me?" [laughs]

   12. SPSpeaker0:34

       Yeah. [upbeat music] All right. What is up, people of the internet? Welcome back to another episode of the Waveform Podcast, a bonus episode. We're your hosts. I'm Marques. I'm Andrew, and today we've got a very special guest, um, one you've probably heard of quite a few times if you're a long form Wave- if you're a longtime Waveform listener. In fact, I think we could make the argument Waveform doesn't exist without his work. Alex Goldman, thank you for joining us today.

   13. AGAlex Goldman1:00

       Thank you, and that's incredibly kind of you. I really appreciate it.

   14. SPSpeaker1:02

       It, it really is true. I think Marques and I, one of the first podcasts that we both consistently listened to episodically-

   15. AGAlex Goldman1:08

       The first

   16. SPSpeaker1:09

       ... was Reply All. And when we were thinking of making a podcast, like every YouTuber felt like they had to do at one point-

   17. AGAlex Goldman1:15

       Mm-hmm

   18. SPSpeaker1:15

       ... um, we like, we talked about Reply All all the time. So, um, long time ago, we'll get into that later, but, um, you've been podcasting in the space for over a decade.

   19. AGAlex Goldman1:25

       Mm-hmm.

   20. SPSpeaker1:26

       What got you started, and can you introduce yourself a little bit for those who don't know you?

   21. AGAlex Goldman1:29

       Yeah. So,

2. 1:30 – 2:15

   Alex Introduction

   1. AGAlex Goldman1:30

      uh, my name's Alex Goldman. I'm the host of, currently the host of a podcast called Hyperfixed, and also a podcast about the Amityville movie series called [laughs] Amityvilleville, which don't recommend anybody actually listen to. Um, and, uh, I started in radio. I got a journalism degree and then didn't know what to do with my life, and I got really into like, uh, I got into IT for five years.

   2. SPSpeaker1:51

      Okay.

   3. AGAlex Goldman1:51

      Installing RAM, fixing computers, troubleshooting error messages-

   4. SPSpeaker1:55

      Mm-hmm

   5. AGAlex Goldman1:55

      ... making sure-

   6. SPSpeaker1:56

      Turning it on and off again.

   7. AGAlex Goldman1:57

      Yeah, exactly.

   8. SPSpeaker1:58

      Yeah.

   9. AGAlex Goldman1:58

      Making sure everybody's McAfee virus scan was up to date-

   10. SPSpeaker2:01

       [laughs]

   11. AGAlex Goldman2:01

       ... in 2007 or whatever.

   12. SPSpeaker2:03

       Yeah.

   13. AGAlex Goldman2:04

       And then I, I always really loved radio, specifically like narrative radio.

   14. SPSpeaker2:09

       Okay.

   15. AGAlex Goldman2:10

       Like, I mean, This American Life was a big deal-

   16. SPSpeaker2:12

       Mm

   17. AGAlex Goldman2:12

       ... for me, and then Radiolab came along, and that was a big deal

3. 2:15 – 6:00

   How Reply All Started

   1. AGAlex Goldman2:15

      for me. And my cohost and I were working at WNYC. We got, I got a job at WNYC in 2010-

   2. SPSpeaker2:22

      Mm

   3. AGAlex Goldman2:22

      ... which is the flagship sort of NPR station in New York City. I was working for a media analysis show. And the way that we actually got started making our own podcast was the sh- the station put together a contest, which was like-

   4. SPSpeaker2:35

      Oh

   5. AGAlex Goldman2:35

      ... "Hey, everybody in the building can submit their idea for a show."

   6. SPSpeaker2:39

      Mm.

   7. AGAlex Goldman2:40

      "And if we like it, we'll give you a little bit of money to make it."

   8. SPSpeaker2:43

      All right.

   9. AGAlex Goldman2:43

      So we submitted our idea, which was very different from what Reply All ended up being.

   10. SPSpeaker2:48

       Mm-hmm.

   11. AGAlex Goldman2:48

       But it was nominally an internet podcast.

   12. SPSpeaker2:50

       Yeah.

   13. AGAlex Goldman2:51

       And they were like, "Yeah, we don't like this." [laughs]

   14. SPSpeaker2:54

       Oh, really?

   15. AGAlex Goldman2:54

       "We're not interested."

   16. SPSpeaker2:55

       Okay.

   17. AGAlex Goldman2:56

       Uh, but my boss was like, "Listen, if you can just do it in the sort of corners of time that you are not making On the Media, the show that you're making, we'll let you make it. We'll give you the studio space, and we'll let you make it."

   18. SPSpeaker3:08

       Oh.

   19. AGAlex Goldman3:08

       So we made sort of like a proto Reply All. It was called TLDR. I think we did like 30-some episodes of it.

   20. SPSpeaker3:14

       Okay.

   21. AGAlex Goldman3:15

       And then while we were doing that, Alex Blumberg, who was a producer for This American Life for two decades, was like, "Hey, I wanna go start my own podcast company. And when I go, would you guys want to do what you're doing now over there?" And so we were like, "Well, absolutely."

   22. SPSpeaker3:32

       Mm-hmm.

   23. AGAlex Goldman3:33

       Um, we would love... Because WNYC, a great station. I, I learned a lot working there. They were not... They're a nonprofit, and they're very risk-averse.

   24. SPSpeaker3:45

       Okay.

   25. AGAlex Goldman3:45

       You know? So they were not in this, the market to like fund the thing we were making. They were like, "You guys are doing great. Keep up the good work." And we were like, "Yeah, well, we also make $44,000 a year."

   26. SPSpeaker3:55

       Mm-hmm.

   27. AGAlex Goldman3:56

       We're not really, uh... This is New York City. We're not making [laughs] out money-

   28. SPSpeaker3:59

       Yeah, right

   29. AGAlex Goldman3:59

       ... to live off of. So from there, we just start, we started Reply All, and it was kind of off to the races.

   30. SPSpeaker4:04

       What year was that? 2015?
4. 6:00 – 17:10

   How Reply All gained popularity

   1. MBMarques Brownlee6:00

      out there. It's why we do a lot of YouTube videos. But, um, I'm so curious about what it was like- In the early days of podcasts, like, was it mostly word of mouth? That's how I found Reply All, but how did people find podcasts when there were less podcasts?

   2. AGAlex Goldman6:13

      It's funny, because I find it so much harder now to get, to, like, get the name of our show- my show out-

   3. MBMarques Brownlee6:19

      Yeah

   4. AGAlex Goldman6:19

      ... than I did in 2014.

   5. MBMarques Brownlee6:22

      Interesting.

   6. AGAlex Goldman6:22

      Um, I think it was mostly word of mouth, but we also had a strategy of, like, "We're gonna try and get our stories on as many different shows as we can." So we were pitching to This American Life. I think we got two stories on there. We got a story on Radiolab. And each time we did that, 50,000 new listeners, which is like-

   7. MBMarques Brownlee6:41

      Okay

   8. AGAlex Goldman6:41

      ... such-

   9. MBMarques Brownlee6:42

      Mm-hmm

   10. AGAlex Goldman6:42

       ... such a huge number.

   11. MBMarques Brownlee6:44

       So when you say on a story, you mean, uh, one of your episodes posted on their feeds?

   12. AGAlex Goldman6:47

       Because we weren't on the radio-

   13. MBMarques Brownlee6:48

       Mm

   14. AGAlex Goldman6:48

       ... we didn't have to adhere to any particular length. So we'd go to This American Life and we'd be like, "Hey, we've got this 20-minute story. Would you guys like it?"

   15. MBMarques Brownlee6:56

       Yeah.

   16. AGAlex Goldman6:56

       And then we would sit there with them, and they would, um, because they have their own sort of particular editorial standards, they would go through it, and, uh, rewrite massive swaths of it [laughs] with us.

   17. MBMarques Brownlee7:07

       Okay.

   18. AGAlex Goldman7:08

       And then w- it would go on their show. But, you know, it was still the story, essentially, that we were, we were working on.

   19. MBMarques Brownlee7:13

       Okay.

   20. AGAlex Goldman7:13

       And then it would just bring so many people back to us.

   21. MBMarques Brownlee7:16

       This feels like the early days of, like, collaborations-

   22. AGAlex Goldman7:19

       Mm-hmm

   23. MBMarques Brownlee7:20

       ... on YouTube, where, uh, there were only a few huge YouTubers, but it was a big deal when one of them would collaborate and show up on the other's channel, and they'd make a video together, collaborating with their styles or whatever it was. Obviously, with podcasts, it's a similar thing, where you had a story style, and they were like, "Oh, this is really fun. I want more of that. I'm gonna go listen to that show." That's kinda how early YouTube felt to me. Podcast... Or, sorry, collaborations were a huge deal, unlike the way that it is now, where it's kind of just like a casual, once in a while thing.

   24. SPSpeaker7:49

       And, like, the, how we always say the benefit of collaboration, where it's, it's how does this benefit both sides of it? So, uh, This American Life can get a story that interests their people, while also being able to be like, "Wow, I really enjoyed that. Where can I find more of this?"

   25. AGAlex Goldman8:02

       Yeah.

   26. SPSpeaker8:02

       And being able to come over to you.

   27. AGAlex Goldman8:04

       A- and I think another thing that, that was an advantage to us is just, like, I think we got in on the ground floor of treating the internet like a place-

   28. MBMarques Brownlee8:12

       Mm-hmm

   29. AGAlex Goldman8:12

       ... that people hang out, as opposed to just sort of this separate thing upon which you can do stuff.

   30. MBMarques Brownlee8:17

       Yeah.
5. 17:10 – 19:49

   How do you measure a successful episode?

   1. AGAlex Goldman17:10

      it's like, there's one where I talked about how I sit in the shower. People talk to me about that all the time. [laughs]

   2. MBMarques Brownlee17:15

      Yeah.

   3. SPSpeaker17:15

      Mm-hmm.

   4. MBMarques Brownlee17:15

      That's a really good... I, I, I sometimes think about, like, how do you measure success as a creative, and one of those things is when people come up to me in public and they'll, they'll say something like, "Oh, I, I loved that one video that you did about that one thing." And I'll go, "Okay, yeah, that, I can tell that's having an impact on people." So it's, there's obviously on YouTube view counts and comment sections and likes and dislikes and all that, but that's, like, one of my favorite metrics to being like, "That was a really good thing that we did." What is that like in podcasting? 'Cause I, we have this podcast, but it's also a video podcast. Do you have other ways of measuring and being like, "Oh, you know what? That was a really, we should try that again. That was a great episode."

   5. AGAlex Goldman17:49

      Uh, no. Uh, the metrics at, the way that you, that you measure podcasts, actually, or the sort of success or listener rate of podcasts has actually gotten worse over time.

   6. SPSpeaker18:00

      It i- it, I don't know if it's always been like this, but trying to figure out audio podcast numbers feels like the devil.

   7. AGAlex Goldman18:06

      Um, well, there used to be, I think the company was called Pixel. Don't quote me on this.

   8. SPSpeaker18:11

      Okay.

   9. AGAlex Goldman18:11

      There was a company that used to have a sort of tracking- ... the thing you could embed in your podcast that was like a tracking thing that could give you an idea of, like, when people were listening, what they were skipping, when they drop out.

   10. SPSpeaker18:23

       Oh.

   11. MBMarques Brownlee18:23

       Wow.

   12. AGAlex Goldman18:24

       And then I th- it was bought by a big company. I can't remember-

   13. MBMarques Brownlee18:26

       This is-

   14. AGAlex Goldman18:26

       ... it was Apple or Spotify or whomever.

   15. MBMarques Brownlee18:28

       That's worse.

   16. AGAlex Goldman18:28

       But-

   17. MBMarques Brownlee18:28

       We've never heard that before. [laughs]

   18. AGAlex Goldman18:30

       But it's no longer available, and no one has come in to fill that spot. So the best you get is, like, Apple and Spotify to some degree will tell you how long people are listening.

   19. MBMarques Brownlee18:39

       Mm-hmm.

   20. AGAlex Goldman18:39

       Um, but you're not, like the data's not fantastic.

   21. MBMarques Brownlee18:43

       It's awful.

   22. AGAlex Goldman18:44

       It's-

   23. MBMarques Brownlee18:45

       Yeah

   24. AGAlex Goldman18:45

       ... really pretty bad. [laughs]

   25. MBMarques Brownlee18:46

       Yeah.

   26. SPSpeaker18:47

       It's also tough to, like, not that you always wanna compare to other, uh, shows, but it's impossible to see how anyone else is doing. So I mean, we a lot of times will be like, "Oh, new iPhone comes out. This is how our video did compared to other ones." And while sometimes comparison is not the best thing, it, the only way you can tell how you're doing versus something is the charts, which change every hour. So we'll be like, "Oh, we're number 25 in tech podcasts for today on-

   27. AGAlex Goldman19:13

       [laughs]

   28. SPSpeaker19:13

       ... just on Apple," and then you refresh the page and you're like, "You're 30 now, and now Vergecast is above you." It, it feels like a mess.

   29. AGAlex Goldman19:20

       The other thing is that, like, again, 10 years ago, s- 70 to 80% of the audience was going through Apple Podcasts-

   30. SPSpeaker19:28

       Oh, okay
6. 19:49 – 22:18

   What is Alex's new show Hyperfixed about?

   1. MBMarques Brownlee19:49

      obviously an iconic show. You have the show now, Hyperfixed. What is the... I always like to give people, like, one episode that I share to them that gets them hooked on the podcast, and then they can understand the rest of the pod from that.

   2. AGAlex Goldman19:59

      Mm.

   3. MBMarques Brownlee19:59

      How do you, uh, describe Hyperfixed to people, and what's the episode that we should share with our listeners to get them hooked on it?

   4. AGAlex Goldman20:06

      Uh, how do I describe it? It's a show where listeners write in with problems and I solve them, and sometimes those problems are just, like, a question about the world. Uh, one that we're working on right now is why does every microwave have a popcorn button, but all the bags say, "Don't use the popcorn button"?

   5. MBMarques Brownlee20:21

      Damn.

   6. SPSpeaker20:22

      I'm already very excited.

   7. MBMarques Brownlee20:23

      That's a banger. I'm in. [laughs]

   8. SPSpeaker20:24

      [laughs]

   9. MBMarques Brownlee20:25

      I'm in. That's a great question.

   10. AGAlex Goldman20:26

       Uh, I have a, uh, I have a, uh, an interview with a podcast m- or with a microwave manufacturer after we're done with this.

   11. SPSpeaker20:33

       Fun.

   12. MBMarques Brownlee20:33

       Okay.

   13. AGAlex Goldman20:34

       Um, and th- but, and then other real questions, like, um, oh, r- when I say real questions, I don't wanna-

   14. MBMarques Brownlee20:40

       I mean, that's a real question to us

   15. AGAlex Goldman20:40

       ... I don't wanna denigrate the popcorn question. [laughs]

   16. SPSpeaker20:42

       I wanna know. That's an answer I wanna know.

   17. AGAlex Goldman20:44

       Um, you know, people who are having interpersonal problems or p- with, with, with family and don't know how to navigate it, so we, we, we talk to experts and ask, try and figure it out. Um, pe- well, you know, stuff like there was a woman who, uh, used to buy a cake from a bakery every... Yeah.

   18. SPSpeaker20:59

       That was such a good episode.

   19. AGAlex Goldman21:01

       Yeah, every... Thank you. Every holiday, basically. And then the, um, bakery suddenly shut down, and she was like, "I thought I was gonna lose this cake forever." So we employed, um, Claire Saffitz, who is also a YouTuber, uh, to help us recreate the cake based solely on their description of it and pictures of it.

   20. MBMarques Brownlee21:22

       Wow.

   21. AGAlex Goldman21:23

       And-

   22. SPSpeaker21:24

       Great episode. I agree with him. See, I think something our audience would like, not to answer for you, but the, um, the A Story About a Mouse That's Also About Everything. And-

   23. AGAlex Goldman21:32

       Oh, right

   24. SPSpeaker21:32

       ... like, the, someone's Logitech mouse just stopped working one day. Um, I think-

   25. AGAlex Goldman21:37

       That's a good one

   26. SPSpeaker21:37

       ... obviously we're a tech podcast. I think they would appreciate that-

   27. AGAlex Goldman21:40

       There-

   28. SPSpeaker21:40

       ... and relate to it.

   29. AGAlex Goldman21:41

       We actually just learned that, like, a Logitech user created, like, a home brew software-

   30. SPSpeaker21:47

       Yeah
7. 22:18 – 28:52

   Difficulties of launching a new podcast

   1. SPSpeaker22:18

      ... okay, yeah. Um, what are some of the difficulties of launching after, like, a successful show like Reply All? 'Cause it was, like, a two-year gap in between as well.

   2. AGAlex Goldman22:27

      I, I think that the podcast industry's just totally different now. I mean, it's a situation where I got done with Reply All, which had, you know, a, a pretty successful run. We had about a million listeners at our peak, and I was just like, "Well, I'm gonna do whatever I want."

   3. SPSpeaker22:41

      [laughs]

   4. AGAlex Goldman22:41

      "Like, I'm gonna make the weirdest possible thing I can." And I started going around and pitching stuff to people, and they were all like, "Oh, that sounds really cool. Can you do two episodes a week? Can you do..." And I was like, d- I was like, "Do you-

   5. SPSpeaker22:53

      Know what that entails

   6. AGAlex Goldman22:53

      ... know what we do?" And I was like, "Yeah, if you give me, like, a, if you give me, like, a t- a staff of 15 or 20, I can." Um, and then, uh, I, I feel like I had all these things that were really close to deals. Um, Barack Obama's podcast company, Higher Ground, was, like, really interested for a while-

   7. SPSpeaker23:18

      Oh

   8. AGAlex Goldman23:18

      ... and then just vanished. I don't know what the deal is.

   9. SPSpeaker23:22

      Hmm.

   10. AGAlex Goldman23:22

       He got busy with other stuff. [laughs]

   11. SPSpeaker23:23

       [laughs] Fair enough.

   12. AGAlex Goldman23:25

       Um, but, uh, the thing that made me really realize, like, "Oh, I am in a different world than the one that I, that I was in previously" is I, uh, got pitched by a production company. They were like, "We wanna do a podcast about fandoms." And I was like, "That sounds really similar to sort of where I live."

   13. SPSpeaker23:43

       Yeah.

   14. AGAlex Goldman23:43

       "And I would love... That sounds really interesting." So we did a couple pilot episodes, and they were like, "We're gonna shop this around. We'll get back to you." And then they got back to me, and they were like, "Hey, listen, we haven't had anybody pick it up. We still believe in it. We wanna produce it ourselves. We'll give you $250 an episode." And I was like, I was like, "I need to, I need a j- I have a, to live." [laughs]

   15. SPSpeaker24:00

       [laughs]

   16. AGAlex Goldman24:01

       Like, I, I have to feed my kids.

   17. SPSpeaker24:02

       To eat. Yeah. [laughs]

   18. AGAlex Goldman24:03

       So eventually I was just like, "Well, I'm gonna go into business for myself." And I mean, it's different in terms of there being more podcasts now, but it's also different in terms of, like, ad rates and the, just, like, the saturation of podcasts in the world-

   19. MBMarques Brownlee24:22

       Yeah

   20. AGAlex Goldman24:22

       ... making it harder for us to get a foothold, you know?

   21. MBMarques Brownlee24:25

       Yeah, I, I get asked a lot as a YouTuber of, I don't know, 12, 13 years, whatever it is, "If you were starting over today in the current world of YouTube, how would you do it?" And I've never been able to really have a very good answer, because I know what it's like to start in 2009 very intimately. I know all about starting in 2009. But today, it's all about, like, taking advantage of the position that we're in now, and I don't really have a good answer for that. Does it feel the same in podcasts? Like, it's such a different landscape that it's almost a completely different problem starting today versus starting 10 years ago.

   22. AGAlex Goldman24:59

       Certainly, because I went- I was like, "Okay, I'll just run the same playbook that I did-

   23. MBMarques Brownlee25:03

       Yeah

   24. AGAlex Goldman25:04

       ... 10 years ago," and I was like, "I'll get on 99% Invisible with a story," and I did, and it didn't have the same, like, I didn't-

   25. MBMarques Brownlee25:10

       Yeah

   26. AGAlex Goldman25:10

       ... get the same number of people over.

   27. MBMarques Brownlee25:13

       Mm-hmm.

   28. AGAlex Goldman25:13

       I mean, you guys also have to deal with, like, the thing that I don't have to deal with that you have to deal with, right? Is, like, algorithm changes, and, like, how does that affect the way that you are- you're making content?

   29. SPSpeaker25:24

       We just went through a fun one of, uh, YouTube decided they're really scared of TikTok and Instagram, and drastically changed, so now a view counts when one frame of your video is played, but that only counts to the public-facing view, not the engaged views that we have, which are the things that mean someone actually watched it and how we make money off of it. So now, it- it's just, like, that essentially broke the r- we have this, like, rating system where every time you put out a video, it scales it against the last 10 videos you sent and rates it as a one- one out of 10, one to 10 out of 10. That whole thing just broke within the last week because they put it out. A very important metric thing we use to tell how a video is doing compared to previous videos.

   30. MBMarques Brownlee26:04

       Call it viewflation.
8. 28:52 – 29:35

   How we choose ads

   1. SPSpeaker28:52

      yeah.

   2. AGAlex Goldman28:52

      There are certain companies that I just feel like I don't like what this company does or their reputation. I don't wanna work with them. Um, Stamps.com is a non-starter for me. [laughs]

   3. SPSpeaker29:03

      Oh, really? Oh.

   4. AGAlex Goldman29:03

      [laughs]

   5. SPSpeaker29:04

      Good to know.

   6. AGAlex Goldman29:05

      Uh, mostly just because, um, I didn't like working with them at Reply All. [laughs]

   7. SPSpeaker29:09

      Oh, okay. That's valid.

   8. AGAlex Goldman29:10

      We used to, we used to do r- stuff at Reply All, and, like, the only, the only thing that makes ads worth it for me is, like, trying to make them as much my personality a- and to that end, kind of like, it's kinda like I gotta put my finger in the eye of the sponsor a little bit.

   9. MBMarques Brownlee29:25

      Mm-hmm. Yeah. [upbeat music]

9. 29:35 – 40:51

   Why Alex doesn't post to YouTube

   1. SPSpeaker29:35

      You want-

   2. MBMarques Brownlee29:35

      I do have a, maybe a more controversial question.

   3. SPSpeaker29:37

      Okay.

   4. MBMarques Brownlee29:38

      But it is along kind of the same lines of, like, the pressure of the, the algorithm and then the formats of the day today versus the past. Video is, is a huge format, and there are video podcasts-

   5. AGAlex Goldman29:50

      Yeah

   6. MBMarques Brownlee29:50

      ... and I think it was a, it was maybe last year where YouTube was going around telling everyone that YouTube is the number one platform for podcasts in the world now.

   7. AGAlex Goldman29:57

      I got that. I got those emails.

   8. MBMarques Brownlee29:59

      Oh, you got a bunch of those emails. And I'm curious about the decision to continue with an audio-only podcast, knowing all that you know about the challenges of that and then the huge wide world that is, you know, the recommendation algorithm and the explore page that is a video podcast. I'm so curious.

   9. AGAlex Goldman30:15

      I mean, part of it is just I'm a bit of a dinosaur. Like, I'm, I'm not, I don't have any video editing skills, and I don't have anybody on staff who's really very good at it. I can, I, I can edit a video.

   10. MBMarques Brownlee30:28

       Mm.

   11. AGAlex Goldman30:28

       It just takes me probably four times as long as-

   12. MBMarques Brownlee30:30

       Sure

   13. AGAlex Goldman30:30

       ... anybody who has any competence in it. Um- It's more the fact that we do this show that we write. We write a narrative, we do these interviews, and the way I actually record it is, like, we're still writing while we're recording.

   14. MBMarques Brownlee30:44

       Oh.

   15. AGAlex Goldman30:44

       We'll be sitting there writing, and I'll read a sentence and be like, "That doesn't sound right." We'll stop. I'll write something new. I'll read the sentence again.

   16. MBMarques Brownlee30:51

       Mm-hmm.

   17. AGAlex Goldman30:52

       Um, I also just, like... I, I'm, like, a very halting speaker in reality when I'm not [laughs] reading from a script, so it's really hard to actually adjust to this new landscape, and it would require so much more work from us.

   18. MBMarques Brownlee31:07

       Hmm.

   19. AGAlex Goldman31:07

       And, like, even the way that we edit audio, it's like we try and make a show that's, like, extremely concise. It's so the guest get... the guest's point gets ac- across a lot very easily.

   20. MBMarques Brownlee31:19

       Mm-hmm.

   21. AGAlex Goldman31:19

       So there's a lot of cutting out of ums. There's a, like... We'll cut ha- it, it midway through a sentence in order to get sort of the meat of the conversation there.

   22. MBMarques Brownlee31:28

       The perfect sentence, yeah.

   23. AGAlex Goldman31:29

       It doesn't translate well to video.

   24. MBMarques Brownlee31:32

       Yeah.

   25. AGAlex Goldman31:32

       And, and so w- we, we talk about, we still ta- we talk about it all the time. There's been a lot of discussion of how to make the show more visually oriented. My, uh, my, my editor when I was w- when I was coming over here was like, "Ask them what, what cameras they use," and I was like, "I bet they-

   26. MBMarques Brownlee31:50

       We're the worst people to ask that question. [laughs]

   27. AGAlex Goldman31:51

       [laughs]

   28. MBMarques Brownlee31:52

       Well, that's a, it's a funny question because I do think... So we get asked all the time about the equipment that we use, and I almost always say that, like, that does not matter. Like, you can use a half the camera that we use and it'll be fine. But I guess my hot take is I, I watch a lot of YouTube channels, and I s- I use the word watch lightly, because they'll make, like, 45-minute, 60-minute videos that feel to me like an adaptation of the old podcast format, where you can see that there's a lot of B-roll over a lot of cutting up of sentences to form, like, just the perfect thing. And obviously, it is a lot more work, but I, I see those do really, really well. There's also a lot more chatter about how maybe they won't be doing so well in the future, but it is a, it is a curious thing. I do see a lot of those on YouTube have a lot of success, so.

   29. AGAlex Goldman32:36

       The temptation is always there-

   30. MBMarques Brownlee32:38

       Yeah
10. 40:51 – 45:19

    How to grow premium subscribers

    1. SPSpeaker40:51

       Mm.

    2. AGAlex Goldman40:51

       It's pretty painless. Um, the struggle is in order to do that, you have to be relentless and shameless about your self-promotion.

    3. SPSpeaker41:02

       Mm-hmm.

    4. AGAlex Goldman41:03

       And I have a lot of shame in my life. [laughs]

    5. SPSpeaker41:06

       It's hard, yes.

    6. AGAlex Goldman41:07

       It's really hard. It's so hard to just be, over and over again just be like, "Yeah, you know, you guys really gotta sign up for this, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah." Um, so I don't love that part of it.

    7. SPSpeaker41:20

       Sure.

    8. AGAlex Goldman41:21

       But, um ... And also just, like, if you're not constantly on message, you don't grow. Um, you know, I did a thing, I did a thing, uh, in I think May where I was like, "Hey, we're really trying to get 250 new subscribers a month."

    9. SPSpeaker41:36

       Mm.

    10. AGAlex Goldman41:36

        And I was really relentless for that month.

    11. SPSpeaker41:39

        Mm.

    12. AGAlex Goldman41:39

        And I pulled it off. And then since then, so June, July, August, it's now September, so in the past three months I've gotten 150 new subscribers, so it's, like, really, really vanishingly-

    13. SPSpeaker41:51

        Yeah

    14. AGAlex Goldman41:51

        ... s- small, and it's just constant, constant messaging.

    15. SPSpeaker41:54

        We even have a hard time asking people to subscribe at the start of every episode. Adam is relentless about, he puts it into our document, and we still manage to skip it.

    16. MBMarques Brownlee42:02

        It mostly gets ignored every week.

    17. SPSpeaker42:04

        [laughs]

    18. AGAlex Goldman42:05

        [laughs]

    19. SPSpeaker42:05

        I mean, we definitely didn't say it this, this episode. [laughs]

    20. AGAlex Goldman42:08

        But now's your chance.

    21. SPSpeaker42:09

        Please subscribe.

    22. MBMarques Brownlee42:10

        Are you gonna do it?

    23. SPSpeaker42:10

        Yeah.

    24. MBMarques Brownlee42:11

        Hey, get subscribed.

    25. SPSpeaker42:11

        To us and Alex. It's-

    26. AGAlex Goldman42:13

        Boo.

    27. SPSpeaker42:13

        Um, uh, one of my favorite things, I just, on Discord for years, I don't get to get into it as much as I want, but there was a bonus episode about a woman who played this game when she was in, like, preschool or kindergarten. Um, and you released the bonus episode as unfinished.

    28. AGAlex Goldman42:31

        Mm-hmm.

    29. SPSpeaker42:31

        Kind of as a, a hel- like, a cry for help of if anyone has ever seen this game, this is how far we are. And I immediately was like, "I know they're talking about this on Discord."

    30. AGAlex Goldman42:40

        [laughs]
11. 45:19 – 49:15

    Waveform's constant problem

    1. SPSpeaker45:19

       so I'm gonna pitch this to you.

    2. MBMarques Brownlee45:20

       [laughs]

    3. SPSpeaker45:20

       You can say no, you can look into it if you'd like, or you can even just go through the process of how you would decide if this is a good problem or not, and tell us no right now. But do you know how chapters work on YouTube?

    4. MBMarques Brownlee45:31

       Yes.

    5. SPSpeaker45:31

       Or do you know what chapters are? On Waveform, our chapters break every single week without fail. It's gotten to the point where as a meme, our whole audience has to comment, "Chapters are working," within the first hour just to make sure we don't go crazy, because then they will break, and then they will come back magically later.

    6. MBMarques Brownlee45:50

       And they will break in a slightly different way-

    7. SPSpeaker45:52

       They really do

    8. MBMarques Brownlee45:52

       ... almost every time.

    9. SPSpeaker45:53

       So two weeks ago they went away, and then they came back all the correct timestamps, except all of the chapter titles were from the previous week's episode.

    10. MBMarques Brownlee46:03

        Oh my God.

    11. SPSpeaker46:03

        So we were doing-

    12. MBMarques Brownlee46:04

        Makes no sense.

    13. SPSpeaker46:04

        There was like a story-

    14. MBMarques Brownlee46:06

        What?

    15. SPSpeaker46:06

        ... about, uh, the new Samsung leak, and it was titled like, "Quince Sponsored," 'cause it was like the ad spot-

    16. MBMarques Brownlee46:12

        [laughs]

    17. SPSpeaker46:13

        ... from the previous week. Um, we've talked to y- both of us have emailed people at YouTube.

    18. MBMarques Brownlee46:18

        I have.

    19. SPSpeaker46:18

        The problem is, is we kind of fix it fast enough that by the... 'Cause we're not gonna wait around. We want the chapters to work.

    20. MBMarques Brownlee46:24

        Right. Yeah.

    21. SPSpeaker46:25

        They make sense in podcasts.

    22. MBMarques Brownlee46:26

        I've spoken directly to engineers who work for YouTube at a YouTube event, frustrated about the, first of all, the way that you input chapters on YouTube in the first place is kind of silly. You have to put the timestamps in the description and write it all out manually, and then it hopefully auto-detects and populates at the bottom of the video. That I think is silly. But I talked to them about it. I was like, "It doesn't break on the MKBHD channel. It doesn't break when we add it on other channels, but it does break [laughs] on the podcast for some reason after some amount of time." So that's been weighing on us.

    23. SPSpeaker46:56

        So our-

    24. MBMarques Brownlee46:56

        Trying to figure this out

    25. SPSpeaker46:57

        ... problem is, one, why do they break every week?

    26. MBMarques Brownlee47:00

        Yeah.

    27. SPSpeaker47:01

        And two, why does a company as large as YouTube-

    28. MBMarques Brownlee47:05

        [laughs]

    29. SPSpeaker47:06

        ... think the best way to input different chapters is to just in the description write the word chapters, and then put in like 00:00 start of podcast?

    30. MBMarques Brownlee47:17

        It doesn't make any sense. Yeah, no.
12. 49:15 – 1:05:14

    Alex reacts to weird tech products

    1. MBMarques Brownlee49:15

       All right.

    2. SPSpeaker49:16

       Cool

    3. MBMarques Brownlee49:16

       So I have, we have a little segment that I'm, I'm very excited about. I just wanna show you some interesting tech products-

    4. SPSpeaker49:22

       Okay

    5. MBMarques Brownlee49:22

       ... and get your reaction to them

    6. SPSpeaker49:23

       That we've e- either covered or have talked about.

    7. MBMarques Brownlee49:26

       Yeah.

    8. AGAlex Goldman49:26

       I'm into it

    9. SPSpeaker49:27

       Or maybe you haven't seen yet.

    10. AGAlex Goldman49:28

        Okay.

    11. MBMarques Brownlee49:29

        Uh, they're all, they all have appeared on this channel in some form, and, and for some different reason. And just for a little background, I... You're talking about, like, one out of every 10 stories actually make sense. Uh, I did a video where I decided to say yes to every email requesting a product review for an entire month. Because most of the stuff that I get asked to review, I just, I read the email and I go, "Hmm, a small camera robot on wheels? I'm not gonna do that." And then another random thing, "I'm not gonna do that." But then one out of every hundred, I'm like, "Yeah, okay, I'll review that." And then I did this thing for the month, and I got a whole bunch of stuff that was predictably dumb, but then a bunch of stuff that was actually kind of interesting, and I'm glad I said yes to. So we get ex- exposure to things that are unexpectedly cool and interesting sometimes.

    12. SPSpeaker50:17

        Mm-hmm.

    13. AGAlex Goldman50:17

        And some that are really dumb

    14. MBMarques Brownlee50:18

        And some that are also really dumb. First item, I'm going to show it to you in person instead of on the screen, and it is-

    15. SPSpeaker50:22

        We have a video, too, on the screen

    16. MBMarques Brownlee50:23

        It is this. And I'm just gonna tell you that this is called the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold. It's a trifold smartphone.

    17. AGAlex Goldman50:32

        Okay. I mean, why not just get a tablet? [laughs]

    18. SPSpeaker50:35

        [laughs]

    19. MBMarques Brownlee50:35

        Well, the thing about tablets is you can't fit them in your pocket.

    20. AGAlex Goldman50:38

        That's true

    21. MBMarques Brownlee50:38

        But you do have one device that is a phone sometimes, and then you also have a tablet sometimes

    22. AGAlex Goldman50:43

        I have wonder- I've never held one of these folding, folding smartphones before

    23. SPSpeaker50:47

        Your first one's the big dog of it.

    24. AGAlex Goldman50:50

        Yeah.

    25. MBMarques Brownlee50:50

        And it-

    26. SPSpeaker50:50

        And one that's already been discontinued, but-

    27. AGAlex Goldman50:52

        It's been discontinued already?

    28. SPSpeaker50:53

        Yeah.

    29. AGAlex Goldman50:53

        Why, why was it discontinued?

    30. MBMarques Brownlee50:54

        Uh, wanna guess the price?
13. 1:05:14 – 1:14:18

    Rapid fire questions

    1. SPSpeaker1:05:14

       gonna wrap up with some rapid fire questions. A couple here. Preferred podcast playback speed?

    2. AGAlex Goldman1:05:19

       Uh, w- um, normal speed.

    3. SPSpeaker1:05:22

       [laughs] Okay.

    4. AGAlex Goldman1:05:23

       I, I have a, I have some really, uh, strong emotions about people listening to my show at like-

    5. MBMarques Brownlee1:05:28

       Thank you, David

    6. AGAlex Goldman1:05:29

       ... 1.25 speed.

    7. MBMarques Brownlee1:05:30

       Thank you.

    8. SPSpeaker1:05:30

       Do you wanna do a 30-second pitch of your emotions on... 'Cause our other host, who is not here today, is a 2x. I think he has asked for more.

    9. MBMarques Brownlee1:05:38

       Dude is at 3x.

    10. AGAlex Goldman1:05:38

        He's up to three now. He's up to three.

    11. MBMarques Brownlee1:05:39

        It's, it's diabolical.

    12. AGAlex Goldman1:05:41

        I mean, the whole point-

    13. MBMarques Brownlee1:05:41

        And it's really disrespectful

    14. AGAlex Goldman1:05:42

        ... of the show that we're making is, like, our, the pacing is deliberate.

    15. MBMarques Brownlee1:05:45

        Yes.

    16. AGAlex Goldman1:05:45

        The scoring's deliberate.

    17. MBMarques Brownlee1:05:46

        Yes.

    18. AGAlex Goldman1:05:46

        And if you are playing it at 3 times speed, uh, you know, it's like, would you watch, would you watch The Odyssey at three times speed?

    19. MBMarques Brownlee1:05:55

        That's a ve- exactly.

    20. SPSpeaker1:05:56

        It is.

    21. MBMarques Brownlee1:05:56

        David.

    22. AGAlex Goldman1:05:57

        I'm not saying that my, I'm not saying that every episode of my podcast is Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey.

    23. SPSpeaker1:06:02

        [laughs]

    24. MBMarques Brownlee1:06:02

        [laughs]

    25. AGAlex Goldman1:06:02

        I wanna be very clear about that.

    26. SPSpeaker1:06:04

        We won't... That is the title of this episode.

    27. AGAlex Goldman1:06:05

        [laughs]

    28. SPSpeaker1:06:06

        Um, do you have a podcast player of choice?

    29. AGAlex Goldman1:06:08

        Uh, I use Overcast.

    30. SPSpeaker1:06:10

        Okay.

Episode duration: 1:14:19